VBS Fun

We just finished up a great week of Vacation Bible School this afternoon. Caleb was hesitant to leave me in the beginning of the week and was absolutely loving it, in his quiet way, by the end. He loved all the crafts he got to make and the different activities. Alice was in the nursery while I helped with the jewelry shop. We were pretending all week that we lived by the Sea of Galilee during Bible times. So we were supposed to dress up as such and the kids were allowed to dress up too. So you can see how into dressing up Caleb and Alice were. They had a blast getting to play dress up out of the house. I couldn’t resist sewing a little sign for the jewelry shop as you see below. I borrowed most of these pictures below from Alli.

Fabric Sale Saturday!

I heard from a friend that the Chattanooga Theatre Center is having this incredible fabric sale Saturday morning.  (that’s Sat.  June 21st from 9am - 1pm)  They are selling off yards and yards of vintage and new fabric all for $1 a pound!  They are also selling over 1,000 patterns, $2 each or 3 for $5.  Its being held in the lobby of the Theatre Center.  I called over there (596-4934) and talked to the guy in charge.  He said their previous seamstress just retired after 30 years and they are cleaning out all of the fabric she stashed over the years.  He said theres tons of vintage fabrics some dating back to the 20s!  Ok, needless to say, I’m pumped.  Anyone want to come with me?  Bob says I have to set a budget, of course I will, but I’m sure it’ll be so much fun.  Leave a comment or email me if you want to come along.

Pumped

So I was just on my way to bed, trying for an early night and decided to check out some crafty blogs.  Well, 50 minutes later… I’m so completely surprised and excited and will never get to sleep tonight for all of the quilting ideas floating through my head.  I ran across Sew, Mama, Sew and their quilting theme for this month. 

I’ve totally been getting into quilting recently and I just love how they pull together many online, blogging, modern quilters.  This is just the resources that I need right now.  I wish I could give them a huge hug.  I have a couple of books, and love them.  But this month of quilting, ah I’m ecstatic!  This is great.  Sometimes these days I feel like I have so many creative ideas just bubbling under the surface waiting to explode into reality.  I have more sewing aspirations than time that’s for sure.  But I’m so thankful for this resource.  I love Sew, Mama, Sew, its the best. Gush, gush. 

Valentines

A day filled with fun cards from grandparents, lunchtime hearts, sweets and a valentine for my love. 

            

             

            

             

   

These days Alice consistantly stops, takes notice of who she’s with and says in her enthusiastic little voice “we’re to-ghe-ghe.” (hence that word on Bob’s valentine)  I love that us being together as a family is something that already brings joy to her little heart.

And when we return from Kentucky, I must take some pictures of the valentine Bob sewed, glued, and printed for me.  Intrigued?  Its wonderful!

Jingle Bells

              

While hanging the stockings this year the kids got way into playing with the bells at the bottom.  Not wanting to be a jingle bell party pooper, but also wanting to keep our hand knit (by my friend’s mom) stockings nice, I made the kids their own jingle bell necklaces.  I used some bells and buttons I had on hand and made a festive little necklace.  It was so nice listening to little feet patter through the house along with the slightly ringing jingle jingle.  We’ve not been able to find Caleb’s since that day and just yesterday Alice’s broke while we were at the doctor’s office.  Guess I need something stronger than thin ribbon to keep them together.  (any suggestions Katie?)  They’ve been a fun thing to wear and play the last several weeks. 

The kids get Christmas crafty

  

 

      

   

             

Bunny Cakes

My baby is 2 and she asked for a bunny cake for her birthday.  I was able to refrain from reading the Bunny Cakes book during her party, though it was very hard to not run and pick it up.  (If you’ve been paying attention I can’t resist a good natured double entendre or pun)  But I had fun making her cake.  Bob baked it for me, and I iced it.  Its so much fun to use the few simple tips I bought, but the store bought icing was a little tricky.  I wasn’t quite up to making all my own icing this time, so I used store bought.  It just isn’t as nice to work with as the buttercream icing I made for Caleb’s guitar cake.  I didn’t have any red wilton cake dye, so I used food coloring.  It really did make a difference in making the icing runnier.  So I’ll have to buy more of those icing colors (I only have blue, black and brown) next time. 

     

What’s wrong with this picture?

I was using this tape measure recently while working on one of Caleb’s Christmas presents.  As soon as I realized the problem with it I couldn’t believe it and threw it out.  Crazy!  Made in…well you can see where its made. 

Fall fun

I just love this time of year when I can pull out my jeans and stop shaving as much.  Admit it, you enjoy the lack of shaving part too!  But of course, I love the pumpkins and leaves and fall parties.  So much fun. 

We had Sara and Liam over to paint pumpkins last week.  Went to the church fall party this past weekend and also had Bob’s parents here for the weekend.  My sweet kids are the cutest M&Ms this fall too!  (thanks Em for letting me use the costumes!)  Needless to say, we’ve been taking lots of pictures.  Also check out these first pictures.  The outfit Alice is wearing was given to me by my grandma when I was little, how cool is it that Alice can wear it now!  And of course, its totally 70s and totally back in style, complete with flare pants!  The kids are really enjoying our new pup Roxie, as you can see.  Check out Bob’s blog, for the absolute cutest picture from all I took of Alice. 

     

    

 I have many crafty ideas floating and one project started.  But as they are gifts, you can’t get a sneak peak until they’ve been gifted.  So you’ll just have to wait until after Christmas to see what I’ve been working on. 

Oh but I did give an early present to Roxie.  She’s been too cold outside so I couldn’t resist the yarn on sale at A. C. Moore to make her a little sweater.  I actually made two.  The first one I made with a double strand knitted all the way through.  Well that turned out more like a puppy straight jacket than a sweater.  She couldn’t even walk in it, and kept falling over.  As hilarious as this was (I was literally in tears laughing so hard at her) I came to realize that I needed to knit her another one with a single strand.  So, as you can see, Alice’s baby doll gained a sweater dress out of the deal.  Though we think it makes her look more like a baby cave girl than a baby in a cute sweater dress.  Either way, the baby seems shocked and amazed at such a great sweater!

After all of that Roxie still seems to not like her sweater.  I put it on her this morning and she was fiercely growling and biting me.  I think she resents being a froofy pup in a froofy sweater.  And she refused to pose nicely in it too.  Oh well!   

   

The Perfect Calendar

I’m pretty picky about my kitchen calendar.  Mostly I hate how big they are.  For a long time I had one on the side of my fridge at our old house.  It was one with a big picture of some scenery at the top and then the calendar part at the bottom.  Since being in this house we’ve just had some health calendar someone sent us in the mail, with the big picture top folded down so all we see is the calendar part.  I like that because of the size, but not so keen on their health tips and including holidays and special days that I don’t really care about.

 So I made my own calendar!  I’m so pumped about it.  Its the little things that keep me going.  I entered all of the holidays that I wanted and included my extended family birthdays.  Then I picked a bunch of pictures based on who has a birthday for that month.  Plus I’m making my calendar be from August 2007 to June 2008.  That way I have lots of fun summer pictures to put in it and I don’t have to worry about making another one till next summer.  I also made it all one sheet, so its not in my way too much. 

I used publisher to make it.  It has a ton of different calendar templates to choose from, so I just picked one of them.  I love publisher.  I used it a ton when I worked at Esperanza and still use it a lot.  It makes it super easy to resize pictures, put text and images exactly where you want them etc.  Its a pretty cool tool for my purposes.  I’m pretty proud of my calendar and look forward to seeing all of those family pictures in the coming year.  So you’ll have to ask to see it the next time you stop in at my house!

 

Here’s a picture of my cuties playing house under cushions propped up on the couch and end table.  They are way into playing with the couch cushions these days.  Right now they are both screaming so I better stop writing and attend to them!