Miss Mack is talking Smack

I've learned so much since having children. I've learned that you can't drive past a McDonald's at lunch time unless the kids are stuffed and they know you know it because no matter what they still swear they're hungry. I've learned that the minute you run out of Kleenex and children's Tylenol that's when they get a cold. I've learned that no matter how many times you ask a 3yr old if they need to go potty before you go somewhere he or she will still need to go when you get there. I've learned that boys are magnetically attracted to dirt, rocks, sticks and the like. Most importantly I've learned not to ask questions. Ignorance truly is bliss.

I have a very honest little girl who is going through the "fat" phase. You know the phase where they call it like they see it. Mary is a pro at that and I keep explaining that it's not nice and it hurts people's feelings but she doesn't seem to grasp that yet. While at my brothers baptism I handed her my shopping list paper and a crayon and asked her to draw a picture of me. She did an awesome job! Mom noticed and asked her to draw one of her, again a lovely little piece of art. We then asked her to draw grandpa. That's when Mary told us in the most sincere concerned voice "I can't.... he's too fat" as she was motioning that the paper was just too small. Isn't she a treasure.

This morning while I was in the shower she needed to use the powder room so I invited her in. She kept asking me what I was doing and my answer just didn't seem to satisfy her so she thought she needed to take a peek. That was followed with pointing, belly laughter, and "your body is soooo funny!" as she left the room and recounted the tale to Ashlyn with more laughter. Just the little self esteem boost I needed today, coupled with the fact that this is the second time she's told me that. Ohhhh Mary Mack, I love you, but stay out of the bathroom. Where's my treadmill anyway??

It's a hoot...

The owl on Ashlyn's new shirt, not the lame name of my post today! The only good thing about being a hunting widow from September until February is that I tend to get a lot done while Cody's gone. It's lonely and not very fun to be a single mom almost every weekend but I can stay up and sew or maybe scrapbook (maybe as in I might actually touch paper tonight!) and watch chick flicks to my hearts content. Last night was no exception and I managed to start and finish Ashlyn's owl shirt.


I'm pretty proud of myself because I didn't know how to do a single hand stitch besides a french knot. All the neat stitching I saw on Kerrin Quall's blog yesterday really made me want to learn. I spent some time googling stitches and I was on my way. It's not perfect but I really wanted it to look shabby anyway so it was a good project to start with.


The shirt I bought on clearance and the owl was inspired by a baby gap tank, although I wanted to put an owl on this shirt in June before I even saw the tank top- I'm glad I waited because I thought he (or she I guess) was really cute. I think it's was the perfect project to transition my brain into fall projects. Now for burp clothes, a gymbo inspired shirt, a scribbled on fall dress, and some back to school scrapbook pages.
*Edited to add- Cody informed me the owl looked funny with one wing so he now has two, just to set your minds at ease for all of you who were worried about it ;o) *

Mom vs. Kids

I don't know how many days go by that I seriously sit and wonder who's winning? Mom or kids? I think I can safely say in this house most of the time it's the kids who end up winning rounds 1 and 2 but I usually manage to pick myself back up, bandage the bruises, swish some water and go back to win round 3. That's when I give and send them all to bed, one of my many super powers, and immerse myself in crafty things to ignore the shrapnel and rubble that's left behind.

My kids are normal (*I think*) fun loving, trouble making, cuddly, whining, hungry little creepies that I love to death but I think every mom has those days that you just wonder- Am I on some foreign countries poor idea of a reality show where they throw an unsuspecting woman into a house full of 4 kids. The audience at home gets to sit back and laugh as they watch her try to clean house, go grocery shopping, change diapers, bathe, run errands, do laundry, referee, and just try and survive until bed time. That's what some days feel like I guess- Survivor! I had one of those days on Tuesday and yes, Mary won all 3 rounds. Not all days are like that but sometimes it feels like you have more of those days than not.

I came across this blog - Ya think - (extremely crafty and scrappy person too) and her post Mess sums up how I feel too often! She has a link to this ebay auction that had me laughing out loud more than once because anyone with more than one child can relate. As I was reading it I thought - THAT'S ME!

Today's a good day, I think my four little fighters have taken a breather and I'm going to take advantage of it and get my dishes done. Later I want to finish a few sewing projects so I can actually scrapbook. I haven't touched pretty paper (do bills count?) in months!

Meet Alex, Gloria, and Melman

Our new hamsters. The kids chose the colors and the names and they just love them to pieces. They're the best kind of pets- no odor (although Jeremy's hamster has already been through the ringer and he looks like it), no food and cages, no scratching sounds in the middle of the night, no escaping, and if they die I can just re-stuff 'em. They were fun to make and look kind of like the cute pattern. I'm not the best face arranger and I had some trouble with the arms, legs, and ears but that's just because I chose fur and chenille instead of felt and the instructions are in Japanese.

I'm making 3 more with little tote carry bags for Leia, Josh, and Brittany. When I make theirs I will enlarge the arm, feet, and ears to make up for the bulk of the fabric and choose a less stretchy face and tummy fabric but otherwise these sew up really quickly and are pretty easy to put together. I got the pattern from Craftster and printed it on 8 1/2 x 11" paper to get a 4" hamster.

Cody is going hunting again this weekend and will be gone Thursday night and coming home Saturday sometime so I'm hoping to use that time to sew Ashlyn's owl shirt and matching jeans. I've lost my scrapbooking drive and I have no desire to scrapbook what so ever so I have no idea when I will post something scrappy. Any good ideas on how to get back into the scrapbooking swing?

Just the average weekend

This weekend I spent most of my time cleaning, sewing, organizing, baking, and extinguishing. Yes that's right- extinguishing. On Saturday I had a baking frenzy going on in my kitchen and I made 4 loaves of bread in two batches, a loaf of zucchini bread and 2 batches of zucchini muffins, blueberry muffins, and a few other things. I was on a roll and after sampling them all I am a roll, and I had dishes all over the place. I didn't have a clean baking item left in my kitchen and when I finished it was getting late so I lazily just let the dishes go. I always take Sundays off from all things domestic so this morning I woke up to quite the dish mountain. I loaded the dishwasher and things were going great until the "heat dry". I was happily blog surfing away when I smelled something burning. I peeked around the corner to see billowing smoke coming from my dishwasher. Here's the culprit- Exhibit A

This spoon got wedged somehow under the racks and on the heating element. My house really stinks like burnt plastic and electrical fire. At least we're all o.k. and I was home so I could put it out. I envisioned myself like the pied piper of baked things and while I was going to walk Ashlyn to school I was going to spread some muffin love over the neighborhood later today. Now they smell like junk yard tires on fire so I guess I'll have to spread the joy another time. Jeremy will be so sad he missed it- what is it with little boys and fire? Life is never boring at my house!

Kindergarten- here she comes

Today's Ashlyn's official first day of school. I can't believe I'm old enough to have 1/2 my kids in school already. Maybe I'm not old enough but they are. We spent all morning getting ready- finding leggings, rings, hair clippies, baths all around, and re-packing the backpack one last time. Ashlyn picked the cheapest plain black backpack and I couldn't handle it so yesterday while we were at the store she found some kitty fabric that she liked and I revamped her bag a little. Once again I decided to do it very last minute so I finally finished sewing it at 10:30 this morning. I need someone to follow me around when I get these crazy ideas and the smack me really hard when I say "well, I don't know. Maybe we should put it back, but maybe I can fix this part and then...". That's how all my midnight sewing starts.

Anyway, back to school. Cody came home for lunch just as we were headed down the street so he walked with us which meant a lot to Ashy. That's why there's the shot of me from behind. It's just nice to be in a picture for once instead of being behind the camera and the girls look so cute holding hands with their backpacks. Anyway, we got to the school and I had the hardest time letting her go. I wasn't emotional or anything I just felt like I was just dropping her off like a newborn girraffe. I stood there for a while as she put her supplies away and then I took her picture and waited for her to write her name on her folder. Her teacher kept making small talk with me and then looked at me like "this is the part where you leave and I do my job". I miss my little Ashy. When I went back outside I found Cody and Mary waiting for me playing "hopstotch". Mary is already acting older and it's only been 2 hrs. I think she's going to love being little miss boss while Ashlyn is gone.

I promise this is the end of the back to school posts. On to craftier things- like stuffed hamsters and owl shirts.

Shark attack

Once I get an idea in my head I have to finish it or at least keep buying things for my project or I go nuts. Last night was no execption. Jeremy needed a paint shirt/smock for school and Cody's fresh out of old shirts for him to use so I went on the hunt for an art smock. They are so stinking expensive for something so ugly! The only thing I could find was a crayola plastic thing for $8 and while I understand the value of clothing protection I just didn't want to spend that much for basically a kids primary color party tablecloth with ties. That's when I start the "I can make something better than that" thoughts and off I went. I think it turned out really cute, oh excuse me- "cool" and it only cost me $4 to make whoohoo! It's just a shirt that I appliqued and cut most of the back off then I added a velcro neck so he could put it on and take it off in a hurry. I didn't start making it until after 9 last night so I'm really tired today. Those teeth took forever to sew! Jeremy was so excited when he found it in the morning. Not to bad for my first attempt if I do say so myself.

For those of you who don't know my mom sculpts dolls. Not play baby dolls but the collector dolls for the girls at heart. I'm not the biggest doll fan in the world and to be honest they freak me out, I'll make my own real ones when I get the hankering for something bitty :0) . A few months ago a doll company accepted one of her dolls named Piper (the one at the top of the banner on the right of the site) and made it into a vinyl kit for people to paint and "make" their own. I was/am really excited for her and I thought it would be fun for the girls to have a doll grandma sculpted so I bought one kit and it came in the mail today. Now I just need to take it to mom so she can paint it and put it together for me. I know it's probably in bad taste to show a picture of a box of disassembled baby parts and label my post shark attack but anyone who knows me knows I couldn't resist.

Kaci had a big milestone this week. She has a little bit of hair!! It's about time, she's been sparse on the top for so long. This is actually the first time I've been able to style her hair other than the Kewpie or a headband and even then it's just a few hairs clumped in a rubber band. She's 16 months old so by the time she's 3 we might be able to get a real ponytail or piggies.

Blog hopping beauty

I've been blog hopping all morning and found an amazing quilt tutorial from Hyena in Petticoats. I originally started searching for an art smock pattern to make Jeremy a decent looking paint shirt for school.

Not only did I find smock inspiration I also found several great blogs that I haven't seen before and this cathedral quilt. This quilt is amazing and she makes it look so easy to do that I might actual make another quilt even though I've shunned quilt making. Now I know what I'm going to do with the new fabric I won yesterday- make a cathedral quilt for my bedroom.

Now my sewing to do list looks impossible so I'm going to write my projects here so I can get motivated to finish, because once you promise the masses project pictures you have to deliver!

• 7 stuffed hamster toys with matching carry totes


• Appliqued owl tunic and decoupaged jeans for Ashy


• Applique Ashy's blah backpack so it makes me happy


• A shark art smock for Jeremy


• Fall dresses for Ashlyn and Mary


• Mini important phone numbers book for Jeremy's backpack (scrapbooky)


• Queen size cathedral quilt


• New pillows and curtains for my living room

That's pretty much sums up my list for this month- I better get busy!

One step forward...

And one step back, a very confusing day today. For a while I didn't know whether I should make today's rantings positive or negative so here's the rundown.
*Disclaimer- list may be long and prolonged exposure my cause retinal harm and an indescribable urge to eat ding dongs and ice cream. Read at your own risk!*

1. I woke up in a good mood so that's a +.
2. I found out our fridge is broken shortly after taking a bite of my corn chex with some pretty nuclear milk so that's a huge -.
3. It's labor day sale time at Sears so my new fridge is going to be on sale +.
4. Sears just happens to be closed today even though it's supposed to be the big labor day sale(when you live in nowheresville) so all my food is now disgusting -.
5. Ashlyn kicked Jeremy's last loose tooth right out of his face but he thought she did him a favor so it's all good +.
6. I won a free yard of fabric from the awesome Sew Mama Sew website (great blog and flickr group) big +++!
7. I made beef stew for dinner and the flavor was great and the meat was melt in your mouth fantastic but the potatoes got over cooked so I give it a +/-.
8. I cut out fabric for 7 fun little projects I hope to share later on in the week, yay for being productive +.
9. Cody dragged me into the woods to look for a lost arrow (-) but we found it and got to go home shortly there after so that's a wash.
No, I take that back. I hate being in the woods and I really didn't want to be there tonight in the almost dark with a flashlight that was so small I think the squirrels were laughing at me so that's definitely a -.
10. I lost some weight from my infamous ice cream and ding dongs diet and I weigh the same as I claimed to have weighed on my original drivers license, skinny jeans here I come +!
11. My chest is now non-existent and was the first thing to go -.
12. Our car has been running really off lately and it's going to cost an arm and a leg to fix it, ouch -.
13. I have an awesome family that cares for me and loves me very much and I'm so thankful to have them all, even the ankle biters +++.

Sometimes I forget (I think the milk had some sort of effect on my memory today ;p) how you can change your day just by deciding that it's going to be a good day no matter what. With all that happened and didn't happen today I could have thrown in the towel and cried my eyeballs out like normal or climbed in my shower and assumed the position chanting (I'm not that nuts yet). It is a terrible time of the year for us and the last thing we wanted to do is buy a new fridge and worry about our car. I decided though to make today a good one and overall when you count the many pluses, and there's so much more that I could never list all of them, as long as you are on the right side of the grass you're doing fantastic. I tend to get a little -ahem- negative at times but I am truly blessed beyond measure and don't let me forget that!

Don't mind me

I have a love hate relationship with my internet. I am one of those old fogies that still has dial-up. Why?? Because we are too cheap to pay the extra $2 a month for high speed. Is it worth it, well that's an astounding yes but somehow Cody and I can't commit. One of these days I'm actually going to make the switch but until then I'm drooling over here over all the fun little toys I keep finding on the internet. If I only had high speed I could find so much more! Here's a little wish list of a few things I either want to make, own, or just look at and fawn over. How cute are these...

Frozen Charlotte Dolls from Jennifer Murphy. Her Christmas ornaments are begging to live with me for my toy tree this year. Especially the mouse, aawhhh!

West Hills horse fabric by Heather Ross. Mary needs something made with this.

This cute sweater vest from Boden, I think all girls in my house need this one!

Cute patterns from WeeWonderfuls. The butterfly just speaks to me.

I've been stalking this blog lately to. I would love to re-do the girls room like this one! Very cute.

Of course that's just the tip of the drool worthy wish list ice burg but until I get high speed I'll just have to wish in slow-mo.