The random rundown

The last few days have been a complete blur, a fun blur but still a blur non the less so my post today is going to be really really random. Yesterday I spent 2 1/2 hours at the pediatricians and 4 hours (count them- 4 hrs!) at the store waiting for Cody to join us to pick out a bike for Jeremy with all 4 kiddos. Jeremy's been working for the last few months to save enough money to buy a new bike. We told him we'd split the cost if he earned it and he did so yesterday I promised him we'd go pick it up. He's was so excited I didn't have to heart to leave the store without it so we waited. *Shock and amazement* -but I've been a home body lately and I don't feel like shopping at all. If I could have visited the pediatrician online I would have so I'm just exhausted.

So because I have done absolutely nothing interesting the last few days here are some random pictures and things from after Christmas with a tip or two-

• It snowed last night and I've been meaning to take a picture of our house all snowy. Cody took some pictures for me so I could scrapbook them someday.

• While wondering around the store last night I must have been extremely hungry because I picked up the yummiest smelling lotion, and now that I'm not so hungry anymore the lotion's not really my favorite feeling lotion ever. I realized when I got home that the Watkins lemon cream reminds me of those mothers lemon frosted lemon cookies. They should tide me over until I get to go to Bath and Body works, but now I want a cookie and my hands are kind of slimy. If you're hungry and need a cookie but don't want the calories I highly recommend sniffing the Watkins lotion.

• I retro fitted a pair of preemie p.j.'s for Ashlyn's new baby alive Becky. She only came with a t-shirt and hat and Ashlyn told me she was cold so I had to do something :0). Secretly I wish I still played with dolls, it was so fun to dress it with micro-mini clothes. We even bought her pampers preemie diapers, oh what fun to be a girl. Can I tell you how happy I am that Ashlyn finally decided to play with a doll!

• Jeremy and I did his ship in a bottle kit the other day. He had so much fun and made me swear not to tell how it got in there. He did a pretty good job but each piece was so stinking little it was more for 12 and up. It was well above his and my patience level and will be the last ship in a bottle we will make.

• While wondering around last night I also found a $4 knitting kit and some old yarn laying around and decided to start knitting. I'm so terrible at it Cody had to show me how to cast on and he's never knitted before in his life. I need him to come home to show me how to purl. My goal is to knit a chocolate brown cable knit baby blanket. Maybe I should make it Cody's goal cause I stink at it ;0) ! Who wants a neon pink unevenly stitched hot pad- anyone???

• And last but not least, my favorite laundry spray of all time. This stuff is magic! It's awesome on any body type or food type stain imaginable. It doesn't work for dirt or grass stains but I did manage to get out a 3 year old thousand times washed and dried chocolate stain with this stuff. This is how I keep my kids clothes looking normal. I buy the industrial spray bottle in the cleaning isle of Wal-mart for $1 that has measurements on the side. You pour in one part (the 1-1 measurement on the bottle) normal cleaning ammonia, one part liquid - you can not dilute dried powder it DOES NOT work- laundry detergent (my favorite for kid type stains is dreft but here I used tide), and fill the neck of the bottle with water and shake. Viola`. One bottle of ammonia is $1 and lasts me over 4 refills and the detergent was $6 and will make at least 4 more refills as well which makes it a ton cheaper than any other spot remover and it works so much better. Just spray on the stain and let it sit overnight and wash as normal. If you have a really tough stain don't dry your item of clothing and try it again until the stain is gone. It is totally color safe. I use it on all my gymboree.

Well that ended up being really long, I'm so sorry! I have some other good laundry tips that I'll share another time. Don't want to get carpel tunnel. Have a great week!

Merry Christmas!

I can't believe it's Christmas eve tonight! This is my favorite night of the Christmas season. I love the excitement, the cookie baking, the candy making, playing games, reading the Christmas story about Christ's birth, and just being together with my family. Tomorrow is usually about the gifts but hopefully it will be about so much more. It's been snowing today which is exciting, maybe it'll stick and we will have a white Christmas. I thought I'd show some pictures Cody took of the kids dressed in their Christmas dresses, oh and one suit.

I managed to finish the last Christmas gift today which is such a relief. I made a mommy and me apron set with spoons and an apron ornament for the person who's name I have on Cody's side and freezer stenciled a sparkly Christmas shirt for Ashlyn to wear tomorrow. It should look cute with a white long sleeve underneath. I realized late last night she's the only one without a deer shirt so I whipped it out while I was wrapping gifts.

Hope everyone has a safe and Merry Christmas full of fun and family!

Not a creature was stirring

... Not even these mice. Okay, that's my only corny line I promise ;o). Ashlyn and I made 75 mouse cookies for her school Christmas party yesterday. They were a hit! Needless to say making that many has cured my baking itch though. Normally they are supposed to be peanut butter cookies with peanut ears (they are pudgy that way) but 2 boys in Ashlyn's class are allergic so we re-vamped a sugar cookie recipe with a little extra sugar and a little more flour and they turned out a little flat but still cute I think.



I've been a little stressed out lately (translate into CRAZY) and preparing my lesson this week has been very difficult for me so when I took a break from my lesson I came back to find this little love note from Cody. Cute huh!





Speaking of Cody, I love him and his amazing taste for fair isle sweaters. He got me this sweater for Christmas yesterday and let me open it early so I could wear it to his family's Danish Christmas dinner tonight. He didn't know he got it for me (o.k. so I bought myself my own gift and I LoVe it!) but he would have if he would have been there. I took it straight off the mannequin- it was the last one and just happened to be my size, plus it was on sale and I had an additional $$ off coupon. It was meant to be.




Tomorrow is Cody's birthday and we have a full schedule until after Christmas so just in case I don't blog until then - HAPPY HOLIDAYS and MERRY CHRISTMAS!



I have a feeling that when I finish sewing a few gifts I'll have to share them before Christmas though :o).

Fun for all

We had our ward Christmas party tonight and even though I was going to skip out because I wasn't feeling that well we went and had a great time. There was the "Savior's Workshop" you could help make toys for disadvantaged kids in our community, they were good toys to and they managed to get a lot of them done. The kids had a blast making graham cracker houses and being visited by the 3 wise men bearing treat sacks. As if that wasn't enough sugar they had wassail and cookies as well. I spent my night helping Ashlyn and Mary make their houses and holding a friend's baby while Cody wrangled Kaci for me.

The kids had a surprise yesterday when they got their e-mails from Santa. They sent him an email and in a few days they got one back and were soooo excited! They also can't wait until they get to do the Santa tracker on Christmas Eve. Thanks aunt Vicky for sharing the link with me!

I love these guys...

I absolutely love these marshmallows, they just speak to me. Being a huge hot chocolate fan and loving funny and absurd art I just had to share. Every time I have a cup I picture this and it makes me laugh! You can find them here as well as a ton of other great photos and sculptures by Terry- Bent Objects.

Everything's better in 3-D

Or at least the kids think so. I put in Barbie and the Magic of Pegasus - gotta love $3.50 DVD's-and they were hooked. It came with four pairs of 3-D glasses and you can watch it in 3-D or when the glasses get lost, eaten, then crunched you can watch it the normal way. Jeremy who's not a Barbie movie fan even though there is a villain has watched it twice. Even Cody had to give it a whirl but I swore I wouldn't post the picture, but it's cute too!

Kaci ate the thingies that go on your ears (I can't think of the name right now, how dumb is that!) so I stapled elastic to hers so they looked more like goggles.

I'm off to prepare my lesson for Sunday and cut out a Christmas gift so have a great Monday!

Fun finds...

I know Christmas is just around the corner but I just couldn't resist getting this book "The Daring Book for Girls". It is so fun! I would have loved this book when I was little- who am I kidding, I love this book now. I truly think it's a fun book for girls of all ages. It has a million different things from history to sewing to how to play basketball in such a fun format it's not a chore to read any of them. Plus, it has a sparkly cover and I'm drawn to sparkles like a moth to a flame. I've been totally done Christmas shopping since Tuesday so this book is really for me, I mean for me to read to the girls ;o).

I ordered the "Dangerous Book for Boys" for Jeremy for Christmas but it was a dog biscuit product so I'm not sure when it will get here. I thumbed through the pages of one at the store and it looks just as fun as the girl version. The boy one includes how to be a pirate, a bit of fun boy history, how to make fire, wait a minute- I may have to censor that page out- what was I thinking! I noticed they have these hardback books relatively inexpensive at Wal*Mart (where I got the girl book) and I highly recommend them. Maybe a last minute gift idea?

Christmas Program

The school Christmas program was Wednesday night. I love watching the little kindergardeners sing, it was so funny to hear them mumble the words and then shout the Chorus- Priceless. Jeremy's class did a rousing version rudolph where a little boy on the top row just about fell down on the girl in front of them. I love that the program was only 45 minutes. Mary visited with Santa, Ashlyn was crying because a girl said she was stinky (probably the hairspray), and Jeremy and Kaci ran wild in the bleachers.

Diva Hair

I was cracking up laughing when I un-did Mary's hair today so she could jump in the tub. For the last 2 days I've been recycling birthday hair. Birthday hair is a (or sometimes two like the picture above) pony tail that's been wadded up in a giant knot and hair sprayed to death. I like to think we all have days where we're in a rush and don't have time to really fix hair so on those days I grab the water bottle, give a few refreshing squirts and re comb her hair into the same style as the day before with different colored rubber bands. I DO NOT recommend doing that with Birthday hair. Holy Smokes it was funny! Even she couldn't stop laughing which led to a rousing round of "She's got hiigghh hair, she's got hiigghh hair. High apple pie in the skyyy hair".

Our Enrichment decorations turned out pretty well. They looked no where near what I had thought they would look like but still cute. I grabbed some to take home so I could blog them but what do you know, I left them on the coat rack. Cody's sister Donni who made them with me took a picture so if I can get it from her I'll have to share. It was very green on green damask with black and white damask with buttons.

I branched out,

And made some ice cream cones from my cupcake tutorial for the bazaar last week. They are much easier to make (just faster) than a cupcake bottom and in my opinion a little cuter, but I have this thing with cherries. Who doesn't like a cherry on top?? This was my favorite one, mostly because it used to be a new sweater I didn't like until now and I'm so glad it's found a good home. I still have 2 white cupcakes left but that's not to shabby, I thought I'd end up with a lot more than that.

I'm off to make some trees for our Enrichment centerpieces tomorrow. Remind me again why I torture myself and wait for the very last second? Better get cracking since it is 9:30. Have a great Monday!

If they would just hold still for 2 seconds!

I might be able to get a decent picture of the kids. I wasn't going for a real holiday picture, just practicing and I can see we need to step it up a notch if I'm going to try to get a fantastic family picture this year. These where the best ones from yesterday- some not so bad and others are so sad!

Huuhhh..

I can breathe again- the bazaar is over! I could kick myself for not blogging at 2:00 in the morning when I was threading handles and bead cherries but that late (early?) I wasn't in my right mind. I finally got the last one done at 2:15 a.m. I wanted to show my cute little milk crate all laden with ice cream cones and cupcakes but didn't get a single picture- all those days of rear aching, neck tweeking sewing and nothing to show for it. Oh well.

The bazaar went well for all those who made sweet stuff and baked goods but not so well for the people who made crafty stuff (me). I did better than I thought I would which is great but it's hard to see everything fly out of there but your own stuff. I'm so glad I made things I knew I could give away so I'm not out anything which is great. I made 19 ornaments and still have 15 if that tells you anything.

My mom, Brittany, and aunt Tina popped up for a few hours and brought me lots of goodies, shopped the bazaar -I saw the squirrel mom, no pity buying! ;o), entered me in a raffle when I wasn't there (I won two prizes!) and then left. I barely got to visit with them but it was fun to have them come un-expected. My house looked really bad and the kids looked like rag muffins- sorry guys!

Cody and I are going to Handel's Messiah this evening without the kids, did I mention WITHOUT the kids. I could use the break before the holiday season really kicks in!

Friday

Me- sitting, staring, sewing, eating lemon pie (my 3rd slice), p.j's, freezing- repeat.

Kids- sitting, staring, snacking- repeat. The true life of crafter children bazaar week.

Thursday

Finally crafting! 0 down 16 to go.

Wednesday

Found a new friend at the tree store (and a few more things I don't really need but I still needed them anyway). Not much crafting going on- UGGGHhhh!

Tuesday

Picture from my phone on my way home from the dentist with Jim- 2:00.

Monday

I'm going to be super busy this week getting ready for the bazaar and church activities. I normally wouldn't be able to blog but since I love to talk/type I couldn't do that to myself, so I thought it would be fun and fast for me to share a picture everyday this week at the same time of day to kind of record little bits of my daily life and still squeeze in some blog posts without taking up my precious crafty time.

Here's todays-

A small army...

It takes a small army to get my house ready for Christmas and lucky for me I happen to have 4 kiddos which in my book constitutes a small army, maybe a tiny one but an army none the less! It being the first day of December and all, I decided today's the day to Christmas-ize. The tree is up and ready and all my little troops are more than ready to help. They can't wait to decorate the tree when dad gets home and have been cleaning and re-cleaning so they're guaranteed a shot at putting on the star, the grand finale.

I have a weak spot for a man in uniform (who doesn't?) so a few years ago my mom bought me a huge nutcracker. Word got out that I liked them and now I have a box full of them. I love them all- especially this little drummer. He's so cute and crazy looking for a little guy who's only 1 1/2" tall (little man syndrome I'm guessing).



I finished all my bling animal ornaments- YAHHHHOO! There's 19 in all in 7 different colors but the squirrels are my favorite.
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Except for this homely thing, I know she'll be one I end up with and will never use, one of those "looked cute in my head" type of things.
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Back to the workshop I go, I feel like an elf making purses and more purses!

My favorite season!

I love, love, love the snow. I hate driving in it and I wouldn't want to be stuck in it but I love being cold. I love the fluffy wet snowman snow. I don't think I could live in a place that didn't snow. It's the first snow this year that actually "stuck" from the day before and it's still snowing. The girls and I decided to walk to school and I got a few cute pictures. Mary was way to busy to be bothered, she loves it as much as I do!

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Forgotten surprises...

I forgot to post yesterday about the 2 awesome surprises I came home to after Thanksgiving. The first is that I have forced air heat. I've been waiting since April for it and it was getting so cold in my office I couldn't craft in there at all so it's nice to have my room back with toasty toes while I work. It will make getting my bazaar crafts done that much faster! Who can work when it's minus 30??? I managed to get 25 ornaments cut out last night, blisters included, and today in my nice warm scrap room I'm going to bling them up! Only 20 more ornaments to go and 15 purses- sounds so Blahhh when I add it all up.

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The other thing was a surprise package I got in the mail. I got some new Christmas scrapbooking embellishments compliments of Christy Tomlinson from the Scarlet Lime. Thanks Christy! As soon as I'm done with my crafty stuff I'm definitely scrapping.

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We're ripping the gas heating stove out tonight and I'm going to set my Christmas tree up in it's place. I swore I wouldn't decorate until December 1st but at this rate it won't get done until then so I'm still keeping my word right ;o).

Thanksgiving recap...

We had such a great Thanksgiving! We went to visit my parents this year and as much as I tried to get a picture of everyone I missed all the kids and a few adults, who I'm sure are grateful ;o). My grandma was able to come so it was nice to be able to see almost everyone (Kira, next year you better get on track!). I forgot to include myself in pictures so I had Mary take mine, pretty good for a 3 yr old.

We had a ton of super good food - partly because Cody picked out a 22# turkey so we had leftovers coming out of our ears but it made such awesome turkey noodles. Somehow I missed the pie that night but we had 8 pies laying around so I got my share later. Wow we had a ton of food!

Shopping was great, I forgot how nice it is to live in a tiny town so when you go to a store at 10 a.m. they still have some door busters left. In Boise it's do or die and at 5:15 my must have items were already gone. I did make it on the news on accident but that's a story for another day. I'm almost totally done with my Christmas shopping and it feels so good. I got so many things for soooo cheap and that feels even better! I do love Boise and all the stores they have. It was almost heaven, almost.

The kids knew that we were Christmas shopping Friday so on Thursday night they got my pile of ads and each one marked all the toys they wanted. I thought it was so cute when Ashlyn and Lyndsey started shopping for everyone. They were marking sausages, ovens, undies, tools and all sorts of things before bed.

While we were there Kaci developed a stye on her eye and we had to rush to the Pediatric Clinic last minute yesterday and Mary has a dentist appointment today so I've gotten nothing done for the past 2 days and the Bazaar is coming so hopefully I'll have a ton of cute projects to post withing the next few days. Wish me crafty luck!