Christmas Tree

I know I've been missing for awhile, (sorry about that,) and I may go into why later, but I just wanted to post something besides that, so here is a pic of our Christmas tree.

This is a picture right after the kids decorated it. My compulsiveness wants me to even things out.... but I am fighting the urge. They love it, so I do too.

Good Morning New World

Costumes

We usually go nuts with costumes. This year we sort of took it easy.


Lore wanted to be the Doctor from Doctor Who, so I made his suit, he had his sonic screwdriver, he wore his shoes for trick or treating, but still had on his gym shoes in this picture. He wasn't cooperative at all, I call this "young doctor after a hard day of school on Gallifrey." I'm going to try to make him dress up and get a better pick, but I'm not going to hold my breath, he's been a little difficult to photograph lately.




Liam wanted to be Mario. We bought the bibs, had a red sweatshirt, we got some white stretch gloves and put little cartoon lines on them. I made the mustache out of interfacing, flannel, clear elastic and thread. I made the hat out of fleece.



Levi I don't even have pictures of (bad mommy!) but he recycled a simple black cloak and skellie mask and went as a reaper again.


Tim and I had plans to recycle one or our fav quickie costumes, that has never been photographed, but when we got them out of storage, there was a bit of mildew on it, so we scrapped that. I'm sure we'll resurrect them again, but I need to take it apart and see if it's able to be saved. So we went as Little House on the Whatever.... last minute we had it in the house from Ye Olde School House field trips and off we went. It was nice not being up until 3-4 am quick finishing it the night before. But we will have to up it next year.

Swaps Received

I've received some lovely swaps lately, and thought I should quick share


My dishcloths from Kimtastic on craftster.org


My mini quilt from taylynnsbean on flickr


and this one I made for taylynnsbean on flickr the theme was "out of the box" mini quilts. I have always wanted to do hexes, but they seem so daunting on a big quilt. I have been obsessed with wanting a beehive lately, so they sort of went together. I really like this, and may have to make one for myself. The bee was hand embroidered.

Christmas Craft List

Ok, I did this last year and it helped keep me on track to getting all the holiday gifts finished. I'd love to hear what you are all planning or have started crafting for the holidays that are coming quickly upon us.

"Baby" Cousin's Baby Girl
*Quilt

"Toddler" 1 niece, 1 nephew, 1 little cousins (1, 2, 1, )-
*will be making a fabric name book. or felt houses

"Little Girls" 2 nieces (4&5)-
*Tutus (Birthdays are right before Christmas)
*PJ Pants/Felt Houses
*I'd like to make them each their own personalized doll quilt
*Cranium Activity Books (Purchased)

"Bigger Girls" 2 nieces (11 & 8 )- Again not quite sure yet.
*PJs
*Cranium Activity Book (Purchased)
*a personalized doll quilt?

"My Boys" 3 boys (8, 9, & 12)-
*Stockings
*pj pants w/matching shirts
*?

husband (35)-
*Dr who underpants (I already started these, so he may get them for b-day instead, cuz they're cute)
*Dr. Who quilt?
*Checkbook Cover

"Old Ladies" Mother IN Law, Step MIL, Mother, Step Mother, 3 Grandmas, Aunt
*Basket With a crocheted dishtowel, embroidered tea towel, and homemade vanilla
*Pic of the kids

Dad, DIL, Grandpas-
*Not sure yet

teachers and crossing guards-
*Not sure yet

That's everyone I can think of. I'll update this as I think of or start other things.

Dishcloth swap sent

I sent this out yesterday. I hope my partner gets this before she reads it, or it'll be a spoiler. I'm afraid I'll forget to post otherwise. I was fairly impressed with them, and I had so much fun making them!

The egg I winged. I had seen a flower version with a scrubbie in the middle and thought it would look cute as an egg. The pink one is another pink argyle one. The blue one I'm not even sure what I did. It was a wonky half double crochet thing I sort of came up with as I went.

Who took my pretty house?

Have you ever been away alot, then home, then away some more? Then you're finally home for awhile, and you look around, and ask "Where is my house?" That's the state I'm currently in. My house seems to have imploded! I look around and there are dirty clothes, on the floor in front of the washer and drier. Papers and garbage strewn around the edges of the floors (especially in the mud room where the boys keep their backpacks.) Clean laundry sitting in baskets on the floor, cobwebs in the corners, and more. I had a bit of a panic attack the other day when I realized all of this. I was embarrassed to call this my home. I also have deadlines for swaps, costumes, birthday presents, and other things coming up too. So I figure I need to buckle down and schedule my time better, and whip this house into shape.

My Goal: (get it all done..... ok, not specific enough);
Have A Presentably Clean House By Halloween (oh, yes, it has gotten that bad!)

So I plan to start listing things (I'm a hopeless list maker by nature)
Monday- Clean front porch

• Scrub the siding
• Clean windows
• Sweep cobwebs
• Sweep Porch
• Clean and prep door

I began this, but I have one HUGE problem, I can't get the siding clean! I've tried dishsoap, then I tried Softscrub, I've tried bleach water, nothing is working. We live near a fairly busy corner and we have (slightly off) white vinyl siding. The exhaust and dust stains the siding and it's been like that since we moved in. I can't get the porch white. So if any of you have any sure ways of getting this done I'd love to hear the ideas. Otherwise I'll just have to be happy with dirty porch walls, and move on until something else is figured out.

Tuesday- Paint

• Paint front door red
• Paint front room light fixture red and white
• Paint metal breadbox red and white (again if I have time.)*Didn't have the right paint.

Wednesday- Craft/Costume Day

• Wash & Dry Lore's fabric
• Finish Mario Hat
• Make Lore's Pants
• Finish up Dishcloth Swap
• Make Mario's Gloves

So that's my plan for the next 3 days. I hope I can get it all done. I have a longer schedule, but some things may have to be adjusted if other things don't get done.

Dishcloths!!

Well, I have been trying to get some Holiday gifts started, or worked on, so I don't go crazy at the end of November. I joined a dishcloth swap to help get me motivated on making dishcloths for my family. My husband wanted to make homemade Vanilla, and he thought that would make a great gift. Since he was actually involved in gift decisions I figured I should go with it! So we have Vanilla steeping, and we are planning on pairing that with a dishcloth and a teatowel and/or pot holder for each major family. I think tomorrow I will try to post my list of gifts (it helped last year keep me on track) So anyway, here are the three dishcloths I've made so far in the last 2 days at soccer.

The two above are a modified version of an afghan square I got the pattern from here. I made it smaller and used a smaller hook. I had to take out a few rounds and such too.

And here is my tried and true favorite dishcloth pattern. The pattern comes from Cocoa Cream's Craft Closet I made it a bit smaller. Mine is about 8"X8" and I think the first chain was 27.

Bad Day With A Cherry On Top

Yesterday, after school, Lore came running into the house, just bawling! He said he got stung by a bee in his nose, and it was still in there.

He was right. He had been riding his bike and a bee flew up his nose and stung him, and got stuck in there. We got the bee out, put some ice on it, luckily he doesn't react severely to bees. Then he shows me he broke his bike helmet (luckily not his head.) Then about 15 minutes later he tripped and banged his head on a glass case. All of this happened to my normally extremely coordinated child within 20 minutes. He was pretty defeated, he was supposed to go to his soccer game in about 30 more minutes, but he wasn't too sure of it, and honestly neither was I. But, I felt it was my motherly duty to try to pep him up. I looked at him and asked if his nose hurt, he said not really. I then said, that it's a good thing he got all of the bumps and stuff out of the way, now he would have the BEST GAME EVER! He seemed to like that idea and got excited again about soccer.

Now, we have had a rough soccer season, Liam's team has won 1 or 2 games, Liam scored a goal, we were pretty pleased even though they lost most of their games. Lore's team on the other hand only has 2 kids on it who have ever played soccer before, compared to the other teams who have 50% or more of their kids returning kids. Not only have they lost every game, they had never score.... not once. Now I know it's not about the winning, but no one likes to get their butts kicked EVERY game.

Yesterday, after having a quite troubling afternoon, my baby.... SCORED THE ONLY GOAL HIS TEAM HAS HAD ALL YEAR! He was thrilled, so was his team, and so were we. It was the first goal of the game... they did come back and beat us 5-1, but that one point sure meant a lot to us!

Here he is trying to play it so cool, but notice the blue and white band on his hand. That means he scored and can't until someone else does.

It was a very happy house last night!

Stuff I've Been Working On

Ok, here's 2 of the things I've done recently. First is the tea towel for the tea towel tour. She requested our state or something that represents it and the year it was established. So here's what I did.

And here is the doll quilt I made for the Doll Quilt Swap I was in. She's received it, so I can show it now.

Terrible little blogger lately

Sorry, I don't know why, just plenty to do around the real world that I've needed to be online far less.

I had a request for my pink cookie recipe and thought maybe others would care to have it also. It is super easy since it comes from a cake mix. Which also means you can adapt it simply by grabbing a different flavor cake mix.

1 box cake mix (above is strawberry, my favorite is chocolate, but try anything!)

1/3 cup vegetable oil

2 eggs

Mix, drop by a small scoop onto an ungreased cookie sheet. Bake 375 F for 7-9 minutes or until puffed and almost no indentation remains when touched. Cool one minute on pan, remove from pan and cool completely on wire rack. Makes about 22-24 cookies

These make wonderful sandwich cookies. Above is filled with a delicious vanilla frosting I found here at the cupcake project I didn't have vanilla bean paste, so I just used my homemade vanilla extract instead, and I just winged it, I didn't measure. The cookies also taste great with icecream in the center!

Disclaimer: I know these cookies are not healthy or even the tastiest, but sometimes you need a quick and fairly yummy cookie. This is that recipe!

I have a few other things I hope to post soon, but I'm waiting for them to be received before I show pictures.

My current projects include another tea towel tour swap on craftster and Halloween costumes.

Lore is going to be the 10th Doctor from Doctor Who

Liam is going to be Mario

Levi is going to be Lego Indiana Jones

Yes, they all came up with their own ideas! I just have to make them happen.

Tim and I had a ton of ideas, but we haven't been able to lock one down, so it will more than likely be simple.

It's Quiet

I can't believe summer has flown by so quickly. It is the first day of school today. It is crazy quiet here. It's a bit after 3 and I keep catching myself looking out the window thinking they will be here soon, but I shouldn't expect them for another 30 minutes....
Boy, when they are with me time flies, when they are gone it seems to crawl!

Away too long!

Wow, I can't belive it's been over a month since my last post. Life outside the internet just sort of got away from me. I should be posting a bit more regularly now that the kids are on their way back to school next week.

We took the last week to enjoy some time together (also we had some bugger of computer and internet problems.)

We went camping finally! Tim's been working so much he had a really hard time getting away, so we really needed this.

We took a train ride (new to all of us,) to Chicago and did some touristy things there. We visited the Sears Tower (have I mentioned to you all how afraid of heights I am?) We went to Navy Pier (Have I mentioned how deathly afraid of piers, bridges and heights I am?) We went to Shedd Aquarium (Have I mentioned I'm allergic to fish of all kinds and the trainer didn't wash her hand before shaking mine ?? Yep that sucked!) We went to the LEGO store, rode trolleys and took taxis. Lots of these were firsts for the boys, some were firsts for Tim and myself too. Overall it was a lovely trip, but I definitely realized how much I love home. It was far too loud in Chicago for me! The train ride was wonderful and we're trying to plan another one soon. I should have pictures when I find where the boys put their camera.

We are going camping again this weekend for Labor Day, then the kids are back to school.

Oh, I received my GORGEOUS Doll Quilt from the Doll Quilt Swap 4 on Flickr.

Here's my best closeup. SheltonDHW made it for me. She also sent along some yarn and a needle book and a lovely embroidered card. Pics of those are on my flickr, you can see the yarn a bit though.

What else have I been up to? Well, soccer has begun and hit us full force. 3-4 games a week, plus some practices. It's a town over, so that's a bit more running than we'd like, but the kids LOVE it, so that's what matters. And it's only through mid October.

That's about all I can think of right now. I'll have to go through things better, I know I'm forgetting something.

Quilt Giveaway

No, not by me... I have been trying to think of a great giveaway, but I don't have the time to give away a whole quilt.... maybe a doll quilt.... we'll see, stay tuned.

But this is about a real quilt and a real giveaway! Old Red Barn Co, can you believe it? She's brilliant, and a little nuts I'm guessing. So Go Enter, and if you win you must name your first born after me.... or next pet..... or next sewing needle (we all name those right?) or.....

Baseball embroidery

Here's the crayon tinted and embroidered one of Lore. The colors are off because it's early in the morning and hazy. I'll try to take another one later, but once the day starts that just always becomes less likely.

The waterbottle isn't as wonky as it looks on the picture either.

Now to make the rest of the doll quilt. Picking the colors may be difficult for me. I matched his clothes and such to what he actually wore, but those colors won't match my living room at all, so I want it to look nice on it's own, but match my living room. (Pink walls, light blue curtains with red white and pink in them.)

Free Musical Superhero Movie With Neil Patrick Harris

Ok, just in case you are one of the 6 people (or more,) in the world that haven't heard of this, I thought I should post about it, because..... well, it's funny, it's a musical, and it's around for a short time free.

Go, Watch, Enjoy, Pass it on
PS. Not for kids

Clean up is done!

I am so grateful that the flooding clean up is finally finished. The work isn't all done, but the cleanup and sanitizing is done. We didn't have anything too major here, but all of my family and friends within an hour radius had major damage. I'm so thankful that the clean up is done. The furnaces and water heaters have been installed, new washers and dryers are at their houses. People can go back to living fairly normally again. I'm sure it isn't that way for everyone, but around here things are returning to happiness.

Gifts For the Nieces

We made a few gifts and were able to give them to the recipients this weekend.

First, you've seen me working on this, but it is finished. I wanted to keep it simple, and I think it looks pretty good, if I do say so myself.

Here's the finished front. (I these this crazy early in the morning, so I know the color is a little funny.)

Here's a bit of a close up, and you can see a peak of the corner of the back, and my mild label.

We also made my nieces (the ones in the quilt above) a frog game. The boys had tons of fun making/helping with these. We took the idea from Mama Urchin's Lilypad Game. We also used the same Purl Bee Frogs and they worked excellent.

Just a simple zipper bag to keep it all in. I meant to add handles, but I made it quite late at night, and forgot, so..... ooops.

And also, something I forgot to post a picture of. My Levi was in a musical version of Treasure Island. He played Chief Pigaloo. He spoke Pig-Latin and ROCKED THE PART! I was so proud, and truly impressed!

Sketch #2

Ok, so I fiddled around with the picture, and I took some suggestions, and this is my second try.

I got rid of much of the bench. Put in a bat and ball, and added his water bottle. What do you think?

Baseball- Embroidery

To a point baseball has consumed our lives. Funny thing is, only one of my boys is playing this year. Lore loves baseball, he especially loves being catcher. I think all of that gear gives him a sense of power!

I love baseball too. Mine is far more selfish than it should be. Practices and games for kids around 7 years old, is a lot of waiting. Not a whole lot of action much of the time. But we're outside in the lovely fresh air just sitting... or not. I have a hard time sitting still. Especially as the controlling person I truly am inside. So I need something to distract me. In comes embroidery.

Oh, Embroidery, how I love thee!

My doodles (and the patterns of others,) look so lovely stitched out. Far better than mine do on paper!

I have been on a doll quilt kick, and I have another one in the works now. I will work on this as I watch my little Lore running, catching, batting, making sandcastles, leaping onto home then doing a pirouette because he made a run and all of the other fun things he does while playing baseball.

I am fairly happy with it, but I feel it is missing something. I tried a chain link fence, but it didn't look right, and it made it too busy. I was considering some birds or something flying/sitting above the bench. Any other suggestions?

PS The mohawk was much more difficult to draw than I had anticipated.

Picnic Quilt WIP

I know I posted this before, but I am in a quilt square swap on craftster.org. We sent out our fabrics to everyone, they made a square and sent it back to us. (They are signing up for another round if you're interested.)

Anyway, here are the squares I've received so far.

I am planning on making a picnic quilt out of them. I can't decide what color sashing/borders/binding to do. My gut says white sashing, then blue border and red binding, but it's a picnic quilt, and I'm afraid the white sashing may be a bad idea. I'm open to suggestions. I also want to put something in the middle, but I'm not quite sure what. I don't want it too "picnic-y" but I think it needs something other than a plain pannel.

I really love it, the picture doesn't do it justice as I had to quick run out during a spot of sun, and before the rain cloud hit which was right behind the sunlight. I did get wet, but I wanted a sunny picture.

Thoughtful Friday

“Throw your heart over the fence and the rest will follow”
Norman Vincent Peale

Playing with crayons and embroidery

Right now I haven't had any time to get on my sewing machine, but I have had a bit of free time in cars, at parks and stuff like that, so I can bring along embroidery. I have been making my doll quilt for the doll quilt swap, I have also been making one for myself, and I have started one for my sister in law of my nieces. Although, I'm not sure if I like it. I don't know if it looks enough like the girls or not. The picture looked more like them, but the stitching didn't quite translate. Anyway, here's what I've been working on.

doll quilt swap with the scrappy border

The one for my sister in law. I don't know if it looks enough like the girls. I may just be being too hard on myself. (I do that sometimes)

The first kiss embroidery that's the same as the one I'm making for the doll quilt swap. I was afraid I wouldn't be able to send it, so I made one up for myself. I think I like the one for the swap better, so I think I will keep this one.

Thoughtful Friday

Conversation with a Kite
by Bobbi Katz

Come back, come back, my runaway kite!Come back and play with me!

I'm riding and gliding on whirl-away winds. I'm going somewhere. Can't you see?

Where are you going my beautiful kite,flying so high in the sky?

I'm going to visit the lost balloons that made little children cry.

When I hold your string, oh my magical kite,why do I feel the wind in my hand?

The wind is a taste of the sky, my young friend,that I gave to a child of the land.
____________________________________________

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend!

Doll Quilt 4 Swap Preview

I have been having lots of fun working on my swap doll quilt. I haven't been able to do any real sewing since the flooding, so this is what I've been still able to work on.


The picture is something I've been working on for quite awhile. I took inspiration from a few different pictures, but it was all totally drawn by me. It's supposed to look like my oldest son. I guess it's how I imagined his first kiss will be, and the girl is supposed to look like the girl I imagined it would be with, but it must not look too much like her because my son and my husband didn't recognize her, so I said I made her up. We'll see how psychic I am.


Anyway, I colored it in crayon, set it, then embroidered everything in brown with a backstitch.

I forgot my camera at friends' house, so it's a scan, hence the little ripples.

Funny Foods Contest

The boys were super excited to hear about the Funny Foods Contest at The Crafty Crow. They started coming up with ideas immediately. We made our first one today for lunch. It's a Stromboli Snail.

They love stromboli and always request to make them, so I wasn't really surprised when they picked it for the contest.

Basically you take pizza dough and roll it out. Then you layer your favorite fillings, for this one they used pepperoni, onion, black olives, and cheese. Then they rolled it up jelly roll style. Placed it seam side down on a baking sheet and brushed it with milk so the outside gets nice and brown.

Baked it at 350 for 20 minutes.

Then it gets sliced.

To make it like a snail, they laid a sliced piece on a bed of "grass" lettuce. Baby carrot was used for the head, string cheese for the antennae, black olive bits for the eyes.

A cut piece of string cheese and pepperoni were used for the little mushroom.

I was really impressed with how well they did this. All I did was put it in and out of the oven, (there have been burnt hands, so they are a little leery of this.) They did everything else, including taking the pictures!

Weekend Fun

Well, I'm very happy to report that all we did was blow our power supply, so my husband found and installed a new one and we are back in business!

The weather in Wisconsin has been weird, just like a lot of the Midwest right now. We were smack in the middle of everything that hit Wisconsin. We were unable to get to our house Thursday night because all of the cities between where we were and where we lived were completely flooded and you couldn't get south. (We were less than 30 minutes away.) Our boys were safe, but stuck at Grandma's, so we ended up bunking at friends' house on Thursday night. Friday we spent assessing damages and trying to find a route home that wasn't flooded out. We did and found, it wasn't too bad where we were, even though we received the second highest rain total of the area. All of the neighboring cities were flooded though, so we decided, this was the perfect time to go visit my brother and his family 4 hours away from the flooding.

We had a beautiful weekend, and I got to spend some wonderful relaxing time with my nieces, brother and sister-in-law. I actually miss them already. We'll see them again in 2 weeks though, and until then I can look at the pictures we took.

Ambrosia picking flowers



Clover sitting with a very furry uncle Tim

While I was unable to use my computer, I was invited to take part in Bella Dia's Thoughtful Friday. I thought that would be fun, so even though this isn't Friday, I took this picture on Friday, so I thought I could do a belated one.






Love is a canvas furnished by Nature and embroidered by imagination.
-Voltaire

computer go boom!

Well, if you've been watching the news, you may have seen that the midwest has been hit with some nasty storms. We have been very blessed so far. Some flooding in the basement, some power outages, etc... many people have it far worse! My prayers go out to those who have lost their homes, family, lives in these storms. I almost feel bad whining because I know so many have it so much worse.

But I do want to let you know. My computer went boom. It has died. We are hoping that we can resurrect it with a new power supply, but we'll have to see. I unplugged it during the storm so it wouldn't get hit, and when we re-plugged it in after the storm passed, and then it went BOOM! Don't know what happened. Anyway, so there will probably not be too many posts as I have to use hubby's computer late at night. And it's awkward. And he hates when I empty my camera on here, so there probably won't be tons of pics. Sorry. Hopefully this will be fixed soon!

Gloomy

A toad Lore found, he wanted to keep it, but I told him I'd take a picture and put it online, then he agreed to set it free.

It's pretty gloomy here today. It's been rainy and chilly. I really wanted to hang my sheets on the line outside today, but it's just not going to happen. That always cheers me up. The boys have one day left of school. We have big plans for Friday and Saturday as Tim will be working Friday and with his dad at a tractor pull on Saturday. (I just can't get into those!) So we'll be working on his father's day present which I was really hoping would be done by now. I can't complain, the reason it isn't done is because Tim's been around more than usual. That certainly isn't a bad thing.

I was tagged, and I don't usually do these, but I thought... what the heck;

-What time did you wake up today? 5:30am
-Natural Haircolor? It's been so long.... no it's dark brown, but I have TONS of grey from having really high fevers.
-Latest movie seen in a movie theater? IronMan & Indiana Jones (same day)
-Favorite TV series? Super Nova, Japanese Gameshows, Docto Who

-How many times have you moved in your life? 14

-What did you have for breakfast? A piece of Wasa bread with veg cream cheese and a hard boiled egg
-What's your middle name? Lynn
-Favorite food? brownies, a really good salad, pasta with grilled vegetables (depends on my mood)
-Which food don't you like? peanut butter (except in cookies) and I really dislike coffee in any way shape or form especially the smell
-Picture on your Calendar? I don't have a picture on my calendar, I need the space for writting.
-What's your favorite CD at the moment? the newer hairspray soundtrack (I don't really listen to cds, more like individual songs, so this is the only cd that I've listened to lately.)
-What car do you drive? I don't.
-Favorite sandwich? Ice cream sandwich
-Which human traits can't you stand? intolerance, ignorance, and dishonesty
-Favorite family vacation? Camping with hubby and the kids.
-What are your favorite clothes? camo yoga pants, tshirt, and flip flops.
-Favorite scent? onions & garlic in butter.... or lavendar
-If you could travel anywhere, where would you go? I don't know I'm fairly content here. Lazy vacation in Hawaii, otherwise for enjoyment somewhere in the UK or Australia
-Where would you like to retire? I'm only 30.... ok, maybe a nice big plot of land here in Wisconsin.
-Favorite time of day? 10am it's always quiet and peaceful at that time here (so don't start calling at that time =) )
-Where were you born? Central Wisconsin USA
-Which is your favorite sport to watch? kids soccer in person on tv- Japanese game shows
-Your most annoying habit? I'm terribly unorganized, but I'm a psychotic list maker. So people find millions of lists I've made everywhere, but I can't find any of them, so I keep making more of the same subject.
-Coke or Pepsi? Pepsi if I have to pick I don't drink either.
-Soccer or hockey? Soccer!
-Are you a morning person or a night owl? Neither any more, but more often a night owl.
-Pedicure or manicure? Manicure if I have to pick
-What's something we don't know? My neighbor keeps stealing my rhubarb and strawberries.
-What did you want to become as a child? Astronaut -until the Challenger Exploded, Fashion designer until I realized I couldn't put TAB on the label because of trademark laws, Graphic/commercial artist (still occasionally think about it.)
-Best childhood memory? Sitting in my backyard between the lilac bushes, it was quiet and no one ever found me. I could do whatever I wanted there. (This was before I became horribly allergic to lilacs.
-Biggest phobia? Heights & bridges are probably my biggest.
-Ever rolled anybody in toilet paper? Yep
-Have you ever been in a car accident? Lots, probably one reason I have no interest in driving.
-Favorite day of the week? Saturday, we are all together as a family.
-Favorite flower? daisy, daffodil, peonies
-Favorite - Hot dog or Chinese food? Chinese Buddha's delight or Combination vegetable plate with an egg roll and half a bowl of hot and sour soup mixed with half a bowl of egg drop soup or Won ton soup
-Do you own a bike? Yes, but I am desperately searching for another one that's perfect.
-What color is your house? Off-White, but it will hopefully be dark grey by fall.
-Who was you latest e-mail from? My sister-in-law asking about text spam she's been getting.
-Where would you like to shop more if you could afford to? Realty section for land in the country that we could build our dream green home
-Normal bed time? 11pm usually
-Latest person to share dinner with? Tim and the kids like almost every night.
-Favorite type of jewelry? I really never wear any, including my wedding rings, if I had to pick one it would be the odd necklace on occasion.
-What are you up to now? I'm doing laundry, writing this post and debating if I will get up the ambition to stencil/print/paint an Obama shirt for Lore tomorrow. He's been asking and I forgot, but I don't know if I'll have time.
-Favorite color? White with Red, pink, and light blue
-How many tattoos? None, simply because I keep changing my mind at what I want.

If you would like to do this, consider yourself tagged.

Winding down

The school year is winding down right now. There is less than a week left. I have had a field trip to chaperone every week for the last month or so. It's quite fun to see the different ages interact. Quite a difference 2 years can make between what friendships entail and how important some things are.
On Friday we had our talent show. Honestly I barely even knew we had a talent show. There'd be a little blurb in some newsletter saying it's coming up, but never anything after that. Well, this year my little Lore decided he MUST be in the talent show. The conversation went something like this;
L: Mom, I have to be in the talent show, what's my talent?
M: Honey you have lots of talents, I'm not sure what you'd like to show off in front of the school though. There's singing, dancing, you are pretty good at the splits and cartwheels, you could somehow work those into an act.
L: No, I don't want to sing, or dance, and the whole school has already seen me do the splits. I am a great arm farter!
M: Yes, you are quite good at arm farting, I'm not sure the teachers want to hear you arm fart for 3 minutes though.
L: Yeah, they get weird about that. Maybe I could do something with my brothers.
M: That could be fun, it'll have to be something they like too though.
L: Well, then it'll have to be a comedy act, they probably are afraid that someone will laugh at them, but they can't get upset if someone laughs if it's a comedy right!?!

Oh, 7 year olds can be so wise! That was about a month and a half ago. They narrowed some things down, and came up with an act. Tried out, got in. I made them hats. They practiced, and it was performed on Friday. Here's what they did.


The shakiness on the camera is from me laughing. The woman next to me was literally in tears laughing so hard, I couldn't stop laughing myself.
I made the hats out of a thin lining fabric, so they could see through them. It has wire for the brim and the top to hold it's shape. Levi changed how he wanted his hands, that's why his eyes are covered too much.
They did such a great job, I am so proud of them. And they are sort of rock stars at school right now.

Rainbow cupcakes

Well, baseball is off and running! Quite literally really. We are a little village, and so our village and 2 others combine to form one baseball league. So we play and practice in all different villages. Each week is in a different village. So it's quite a run to most games.


Today is my day to bring our little sluggers some baseball snacks for after the game.


Initially I wanted something healthy and wonderful for their depleted bodies after a hard game, but my son out voted me. (Did I mention he's 7?) He wanted cupcakes and gatorade. Well, he won. So here is what I made for the cupcakes.





Here's the inside.





I omitted the yellow, and sort of regret it. But they're still cute. They also sort of match my son's personality. Oh, did I forget to show you his latest look?

Yes, that's a red mohawk! It's his annual haircut, but we upped it with a bit of red this year.



Also, I forgot to post my returned tea towel. I think it still needs something up in the left corner. So I'll have to think about that a bit.

Older Kids Craft Projects?

Here is a pot my Liam made for our gerbil Yar to play in. I need to get the glaze specs from the teacher first, but he's super excited. You can't see it, but there is a little hole for the gerbil to run in and out of.

I have never really had a hard time coming up with crafts for my kids to do. Lately they are getting older (ok, not lately, they've always been getting older, however, I'm just starting to come to terms with it.)
Now, though, they are wanting to do more crafts that involve older stuff and more independence. Crocheting is something that they enjoy, but when they haven't picked it up in awhile I have to be right there talking them through it.
They love to embroider, but 2 of the 3 need me to re thread their needles every few minutes (I am going to get some of those self threading needles if I could just remember next time I go to the store.)
They use the sewing machine, but again, I still pretty much need to be right there. My oldest is the biggest lead foot when it comes to sewing (I really hope that isn't a premonition of the future car driving......)
They want something where mom doesn't have to be there. And honestly I do too. So often they pick during supper making time to want to craft. They have lots of free time then... I do not.
I absolutely love BellaDia's website The Crafty Crow and we have made some of the things on there, and have a few plans for others. But those are mainly for younger kids. As are most websites like that, that I find.
Does anyone know of one for older kids?
Right now the boys are hard at work on Tim's Father's day present. If it works out, it's going to be awesome! They just need to get done writing a bit faster I'm afraid. Otherwise the book won't be published on time. (Yes, I know that's a tease, but I can't give more away, my husband does sometimes read this.)
But summer is coming soon, and I don't want to run out of totally fun stuff for them to do. I also don't think I can handle more origami! Some of the things we already have planned for this summer are;

• tie dying (it's tradition)
  
• the boys are making a quilt for one of the grandmas


• freezer paper stenciling


• painting rocks (we're in the process of a little rock area in the front, so they want to paint rocks to put in it.)


• Making stepping stones


• Friendship bracelets


• Perler beads


• ??

Just to remind you (if you don't normally read this especially, my boys are 7, 9, and 11)

Any suggestions on crafts or sites to visit would be greatly appreciated!

Another Square finished

I have another quilt square finished.

Quilt Square Swap

I am participating in a quilt square swap on craftster. The details of this swap are we send our fabrics out to 12 different people. They do the same. Every person makes one square for each participant out of their own fabrics, so we'll have a cohesive quilt when it's finished. I sent some blues, whites, and reds, and a little mixed color fabrics. I am hoping to make a picnic blanket with mine. Here are some of the squares I have finished already.

mimw- this is for a man


critterpants- I really like the simplicity of this square.

Teachers

They are so wonderful, and so under appreciated. With DI ending, I received some lovely cards and even a very unexpected gift. They just lifted my heart, and made all of the times, I was exhausted and came home grumbling go away, and I'm now excited about next year again.
This in turn got me realizing that school's end is coming upon us at an alarming rate. Every year we always get/make something for the boys' teachers and include a note/card stating our appreciation. Usually the boys come up with the idea, well this year they haven't had any wonderful brain storms yet, but I thought I would compile a list of things we've done in the past for teachers, teacher aids, Sunday school teachers, coaches, etc... I thought maybe it would help some of you that may be in a similar situation.
As always the more you know about the teacher the more personal you can make these gifts. Also, if it's supplies you want to purchase, ask the teacher, she/he may have a wishlist.

• Gift Certificates- The old tried and true. You can get anything from a nice dinner out to school supplies, I know many people do Starbucks (we may be one of the few places on Earth without a Starbucks near us.) One of my favorites is a Gift Certificate for Haagen Dazs Ice Cream. They are $4 plus shipping and they can go get a container of yummy ice cream.
• Personalized Pen/Pencil/Post-Its/Stamp- These are really wonderful for the teachers and they can always use more of them. For pencils I usually go through oriental trading company. They also make nice gifts for kids. Teacher's love them because if a child borrows a pencil, they know who to return it to. Post-Its I get through here because I don't have to order in a huge bulk. They also have rubber stamps.
• Sharpies- In my house Sharpies make the world go round. I have never spoken to a teacher who couldn't use more sharpies!
• Plant/Flowers- If someone gardens or loves plants, a nice potted plant is wonderful. If they don't garden, I think even some men enjoy getting a bouquet of flowers on occasion! Your child could paint/decorate the vase/pot to make it more personalized.
• Donate a book/CD/Game to the class- Usually we do this around Christmas, so that our children can also enjoy them and see them being used, but at the end of the year would also be a nice addition.
• Scrapbook/project book- If you are great with scrap booking or you took lots of pictures while helping out in class make a nice little scrapbook (at home or online published) for the teacher with captions as to what everything is. Also, one particular teacher in my sons' school always writes a book to be submitted into a contest every year. We have gotten runner up both years that my 2 oldest were in her class. I took the story and got it published into 2 real hard cover books. One for her to keep at home, and one for her classroom. She loved it so much!
• Notebook holder- I made these for Christmas this year. I have also seen patterns for them. I winged mine, but this is a lovely looking pattern by Pink Chalk Studios. Your child can pick out the fabric that their teacher will like.
• Ice Cream Ball- My sons would never forgive me if I didn't mention this one. My sons had teachers who loved to go camping with their families. And this is one of our favorite things, so they thought their teachers would love them too. We got notes during the summer from BOTH of them saying how much fun they had making icecream. They knew that those were definitely winner gifts!
• Throw Pillow- We made these last year by embroidering a picture the child had drawn of them with their teacher. They picked out fabric and helped sew the whole thing together. These were a huge hit.
• Baked Treats- Who doesn't love something homemade and sweet!?! Cake in a jar is what my boys are making grandmas for mother's day, but these would be great for teacher gifts too, especially male teachers! But bars, cookies, sweetbreads, etc... would all be wonderfully received. We made delicious banana bread one year and gave it to all of the teacher's aides and secretary, etc... They loved it!
• Travel Kleenex/Tissue Holder- I have made these for family, but they would go over well teachers too I would think. There is a lovely tutorial here.
• Pencil or cosmetic case- Filled with things or empty, who can't use a zip pouch? They are easy enough for older kids to make, younger may need some help, even the youngest child can pick out fabric. There are many tutorials online here are just a few 1, 2, 3, 4 all a little different, but all quite easy. Personalize as little or as much as you want.
• Grocery tote- With everyone trying to be more green/ecofriendly my kids really like to give as gifts filled grocery totes. But they wouldn't have to be filled. A grocery tote is quite wonderful. There are tutorials to make them. Here is a whole list of different grocery tote tutorials. Or you can purchase them. Some of my favorites to purchase are ACME Workhorse and Envirosax because of how small they fold up.
• Waterbottle- This is near and dear to me. It sickens me as to how many water bottles are gone through. I carry my trusty SIGG bottles with me everywhere I go. There are SIGG and Klean Kanteen, I like both. Others may like different brands, but these are my personal favorites.

Well, that's all I have for now, I'd love to hear any of your wonderful ideas. To me even if you get nothing (which is absolutely ok!) I think it is very important that a hand written note from the parents, and from the student thanking the teacher be sent to school.

Swaps and more sickies

Ok, first sickies. This has been a rough winter with sickies here.Tim and I have seemed to have gotten the worst of it. I think I may have had a nasty allergic reaction, but exactly to what we aren't sure. I swelled up like a balloon and had a hard time breathing. Things are looking better now, but I really still don't feel like myself yet.





On a much more positive note. I have been finishing up swaps. I mentioned a gnome swap earlier, well, Canadian post has come through, and it was received. Here's my not so great quality pic that I quick snapped before sending it.

It's an embroidered gnome corduroy messenger bag that I made for my male swap partner. I got the image from a David the Gnome coloring page that I modified a bit. I also carved him a rubber stamp, and I made him a shrinky dink bookmark. Those are all pictured. The one item I made that isn't pictured is a zip pouch. I completely forgot to snap a pic of it. But it's coordinating corduroy.

I also finished up my lunchbox swap from Oh Fransson. My partner hasn't received (that I know of) yet, but it's a blind swap, so she won't know it's hers anyway. So I may as well post it right!


Made with Oh Fransson's Vintage Pillow case pattern out of Moda's Swell fabric and a satin bow. I used Insulbrite batting. I made my own place mat and a little napkin tucked in the pocket. I am quite happy with how it turned out.