Inauguration Celebration!

I didn't mean to not mention this before. We of course celebrated the Inauguration of the President yesterday! After all Lore has been sure of this for 4+ years now. He has been his biggest supporter.

Here he is standing like the Statue of Liberty

We all had special "Patriotic Punch."

The globs are soaked tapioca. I soaked the red ones in cherry syrup I made (with added food coloring,) and the blue ones are with blueberry syrup I made (again with food coloring.) Then we added some 7up.

The kids took turns "Cheersing" each other and making toasts.

Levi's toast to the new Prez was something to the effect of "Keep loving comic books and get our Troops home soon and safe!"

Liam's was something about "making school go later in the day (he likes to sleep in) get the homeless homes"

Lore's was pretty much "I knew it!!! He rocks! I rock! We all rock!!!"

It was tons of fun.

Thrift Store Find!

My mother-in-law loves to go thrift store shopping. I love going with her, but I really never find anything I like, to say anything about love. Yesterday was different! I adore milk glass with designs on it. I have a lovely Christmas punch set, that I have no idea who made. I should post it sometime maybe I'd get some information.... sorry, back to yesterday's find.
It's a Federal Glass Patio Snack Set. I have four cups and 4 plates. There is a lovely little groove for the cups to set in. The bottom is sort of "skid resistant". I love, love, LOVE it! I got it for $5 at Goodwill of all places. Now I want another set, so that I can have snack with my nieces. The boys adore it and wanted to use them right away. Unfortunately one of the plates has really old masking tape adhesive on it, and I had to soak it overnight with some oil. It came off no problem. So tonight I'll have to make a supper that will fit on these plates.

DI weekend

We had our first Saturday meeting/practice this past weekend for DI. Unfortunately the weather wasn't very good, so many members were unable to attend. We had 3 out of 7. It was sad that not too many could come, but there is always the ability to do many things that are difficult to do with 1 adult and 7 2nd-3rd graders. I gave them a quick lesson in sewing on a sewing machine. We really weren't out to make anything special, so they cut out quick and dirty rectangles. But then they ended up making pencil pouches out of them.

We also always try to do at least one Instant Challenge type item. This week we did one from Think! . I love Think!, if you haven't checked it out and you have kids who like to do creative little challenges, you really need to check it out! This week's challenge was to give them a deck of playing cards and tell them to build a village. I gave them 10 minutes, (Instant Challenges always have time limitations,) and off they went. This is what they built.

Fave Children's Book

I signed up for a mini quilt swap on flickr. The theme for this swap is favorite children's book. I'm supposed to create a little quilt based off of my favorite children's book. I love so many, I'm not sure which is my favorite. Usually I think, then I pick one, then I realize I should have picked a different one. I'm trying to think now, so when it comes time, I won't have to worry about picking one that is less than my fav.
Some that I remember growing up with;

• Harry the Dirty Dog
• Pokey Little Puppy
• Goodnight Moon
• On top of Spaghetti ( I cannot find the version I loved anywhere)
• The Velveteen Rabbit

Some of the books that my children have loved/I loved reading to them;

• Goodnight Moon
• I spy books (one of many)
• No David
• The Spider & The Fly this is my absolute favorite retelling!
• Where the Sidewalk Ends
• How I Became A Pirate

I know there are tons more, but I'm drawing a blank. There are so many great ones out there. What were/are your favorite children's books?

Cold outside but warm inside

We have a day off of school today. Not because of snow or slippery roads, but because it is crazy cold out there. About -40 with the windchill. Brrrrr! Luckily we knew last night that school was cancelled, so we were able to sleep in today. My eldest son decided to make us all omelets for breakfast

(What you don't see is the Mario Bros. fleece sleep pants he's wearing!)

Here is a picture of him with the omelet that he made for his youngest brother (the one who doesn't really want anything in his omelet, and he likes them slightly over cooked.) For the rest of us he makes them "garbage" style. Whatever is in the fridge. So this morning mine had polish sausage, red pepper, green onion, spinach & muenster cheese. Polish sausage in the morning was a bit of a surprise, but it was really quite good.

Right now he is upstairs practicing his French horn by playing the Mario Bros. theme song (which he is winging without sheet music.)

Some days having a preteen can be pretty darn awesome!

Yoyos!!

I've been admiring little yoyo quilts for some time now. I have really enjoyed working on them in my free time. So here's a few red ones I made while my youngest was reading me his homework, (he has told me he doesn't want me watching him read, so I have to do something while he reads to me.)

I'm thinking possibly an upcoming giveaway soon.

Deep Freeze

This is what it looks like outside my house. A lovely winter day right? The temperature is -8F and a windchill of -22F. This is supposed to be the beginning. The rest of the week is supposed to be much worse. I really dislike it when it's this cold. I don't like anyone driving for fear their cars will break down or they'll get into an accident and be stuck in this awful weather. I fear for the children walking to and from school and the children in buses.

I just want to hunker down with my family and ride out the rest of the week. Hot soup, hot chocolate, tea, a movie, some board games, and wait for this cold blast to pass us by. Unfortunately, that isn't going to happen. So I will worry.... I will try to make everything warm and cozy here at home so as soon as they come back they will be snuggled.

_______________________________________________

Someone I grew up with had a little baby girl Friday. She was a month premature, and had complications. She died in her parents' arms on Sunday afternoon. My thoughts and prayers are obviously with them, but it definitely made me pause, grab my babies, and let them know how much I love them.

(And then they wiped it off and gave me a look like I was crazy, but....)

Make sure you let the loved ones in your life know how much you love them.