Good stuff on the way

I packed a little today, and should have packed a little more but packing stinks so I paid my bills and played.  Not a lot like I wanted to, like making 3 quilts which would be so much more fun, but I finished up my giveaway packages so I did flex the ol' crafty muscle.  Here's what I came up with-

 

I wanted to do a little something random for winner #2 (hi Crystal- surprise! ) so I pulled this little number from my cabesa.  It's a  5 x 7" framed (but for sending purposes unframed) canvas applique thingy.  My kids thought it was a post card which would be really fun too.  I just didn't have time to run with that idea but I just might have to soon.  How cute would that be? Very.

 

 

Emma chose a cupcake art which was super fun to make but I had more fun with the tag.  I had an epiphany in the shower about a month ago and this is it.  A magnetic tag with a little magnet.  Mind blowing I know but it's growing on me.  Not my hideous hand writing, the tag itself.  I can't stop making these things, I have 10 of them and I've cut out about a dozen more in circles and squares.  Okay so I'm totally lying, I had to stop making them to move but as soon as I actually get in my new house you can bet your knickers I'm picking these little suckers back up again.  I'm a little late getting these off, I was going to mail them by Monday but hopefully they're worth the wait.

Our house is beginning to feel like an overdue baby.  We're still not ready and we were supposed to be in today.  It won't be painted for another 4 days at least so I'm just sitting here.  Waiting.  Wishing I were there.  Sigh.... 

Have a great whatever day it is.  I think it's late enough now that it's Wednesday here so have a great one. Oh, before I forget-  some of you asked what blog publisher I'm trying.  It's Windows Live Writer and after I fixed one little kink I love it.  LOVE it.

What's better than free street candy?

 

Well I can tell you right now, there's almost nothing better than free candy thrown to you on your doorstep.  May not sound good to you and I but to one 3 year old it was much better than Halloween.  One of the many perks of living on Main St. I'm going to miss.  The annual Stock show parade was yesterday and with my oldest three in it Kaci had the block almost to herself. She picked up the cutest princess wave and because of it got a few pounds of candy.  I think her curly hair gives her an advantage ;).  If only they threw chocolate.

 

Ashlyn and Mary are in dance and Mary was so excited to dance in the parade... then she decided she didn't want to dance last minute.  She walked and waved a flag instead.

Ashlyn was totally into it and danced her little heart out, I could hear her repeating the steps out load down the street.

Doesn't this picture make you want to install a disco ball and sing "Stayin' Alive"

Jeremy was on the church float again as a cowboy.  A hatless, horseless, chaps less cowboy but a cute one none the less.  He's the cute blue bandana boy.

And yes children in Oregon have faces ;). Protection and all that, I'm sure you understand, plus I'm crazy good with the blur tool in photoshop!  I'm not great at lightening dark photos but I've got the blur thing down.  I'm also testing out a new blog publishing tool thingy and I LOVE it.  It's cutting my blog publishing time in half.  Not to mention how stinking awesome it is at loading all my pictures. Such a relief to someone with serious a.d.d.

Have a great weekend! 

Lost and Found

Do you know how long it's been since I've scrapbooked or shared scrapbook pages? July of 2008, almost an entire year! That's way too long. I'm in the middle of packing up my craft room and I found these little babies just begging for some journaling. Poor things. I'm the worst at journaling, I really have trouble with throwing my thoughts on a page and not having it sound like a cheesy singles ad or a Carpenters song. Not to mention my handwriting looks like a mans. I don't have time to write neatly and I've never been a fan of hearts to dot my I's or swirly loopies.

Before I pack these bad boys and forget about them for another year I thought I would share them- sans journaling. I think I'll tackle the journaling during lunch so at least they'll be finished forgotten pages. I've found a bunch of stuff tucked in corners I forgot about. The best part is that it feels like Christmas all over again every time I go to pack a box- yay!

I get to paint my new house in 2 days and after that it's time to move in and set up so my crafting will be put on hold for a bit. I was worried about leaving my blog with nothing crafty to share for the rest of the month while I move but I have a secret. I've been holding out on you. I'm so sorry, okay I'm not sorry at all but I have a few projects I've saved so I can show you some cute stuff while I'm covered in paint and cleaning supplies. Have a great Tuesday!

Happy days.

No not the show, that's before my time (I think). I've been so wrapped up in what's going on around me it's easy to forget the little things that make me smile. I'm sharing mostly for my own therapeutic writing purposes but also because these are the things that made me happy. That and chocolate ice cream.

Kennedy is 9 1/2 months old and getting to be such a stink! I love her to pieces and she cracks me up. I was trying to feed her breakfast this morning and she would not pay attention. She was starving but couldn't focus so I snapped to get her to look at me. She's learned how to click her tongue, she's been doing that for a while, but today she lifted her hands above her head squeezing them and clicking- she was trying to snap! I love her. Of course when I tried to video it the little red light mesmerized her and she wouldn't preform.

Jeremy has been bugging me for the last year to cut his hair into a mohawk. I told him I would do a "faux hawk" but he wanted the real deal. I'm a mean mom and said I couldn't do it so dad got involved. Cody gave him this little number Saturday night.

We had church the next morning. I think I already mentioned I'm a mean mom and I told him it had to go. We documented it... the last of the Mohawkans. He had a "faux hawk" for church and got the rest of it shorn on Monday. The hawk was short lived but it did make me smile. Until Sunday morning anyway.

And this little ditty. This was Ashlyn's birthday cake. Wait, before I show it I should warn you. My mom used to decorate wedding cakes. She is awesome. Really awesome and still gets asked to do them, although she doesn't do it anymore. I'm not just saying that either. They were perfect! She did not teach me what she knows. Shield your eyes...


I'm so glad I didn't charge anyone to make this or it would be on Cake Wrecks. I told you I don't do cake. Like the mis matched candles? I was going to cut out a butterfly but cake scares me and as you can see for good reason. I usually have a big head and am very proud of the work I do but this my friends, this "thing" does not a proud moment make. She liked it sort of. In the "gee thanks mom, is this my butterfly cake?" way.

I should have stuck with the kitty pops. It makes me smile though. My mom is the all around ultimate crafty/cakey/sculpting/painting/you name it person and I am so thankful for all she taught me. I didn't inherit doll making and apparently I wasn't slapped with the cake decorating stick either. I can sew though ;). Thanks mom!

A lamb named Pixie.

Well what an exhausting week it's been! Holy smokes. Everything that could go wrong did in every aspect of my life. I was beginning to feel like I had been hit by a bus and then kicked while I was down... several times. But on the bright side everything's looking up, that's the great thing about feeling so low- it's only up from there :).

There's also nothing better than a giveaway to brighten your mood. I love getting things but I love giving them even more. So I decided to sweeten the pot and draw two winners from Mondays giveaway. I really needed cheering up! I let Ashlyn pick her favorite and I've got to tell you she has had a blast reading all those birthday wishes and has been dancing around on cloud nine all week, thank you.

I don't think this ever happens in the history of give aways but she chose Emma who was comment #1. She picked Emma because she mentioned pixie dust and that was the name of her substitute teachers baby lamb (or maybe it was a goat?). 7 year olds are funny creatures.

We threw the other names in a bowl and tossed them around a bit. Ashlyn pulled out comment #2 Crystal.

So the name art goes to comment #1 Emma (email me with your choice of shape and word/name) and a little something random will go to comment #2 Crystal. Just drop me a line with your snail mail address to dontlickthefloor@hotmail.com. I still can't believe #1 and #2 got it, just goes to show you sometimes it pays to comment first... and second. Thanks again to everyone who left a comment. I love giveaways!

*edited to add* I forgot to mention the 4th reason I was celebrating was because it was my 300th post Monday! That was most of the reason for the giveaway and I forgot to mention it. I've been putting people to sleep in 300 different ways ;).

3 reasons to celebrate today!

First, Ashlyn turns 7 today! I can't believe what an old lady she is. That's 49 in dog years, she's gonna love that. She was my tiniest baby (7 lbs 9 oz.) and my first girl so to see her losing teeth and asking for digital camera's and cell phones breaks my heart. Pretty soon it will be laptops and boyfriends... heaven help me.

The second reason to celebrate is today is the last 1/2 day of school! WAHOO! Now I have more slaves to help me pack, I mean now I get to spend quality time with my oldest two. No more homework freak outs!

The third reason is in honor of Ashlyn's birthday and my kids letting me sleep until 6:30 instead of 6:00 today I'll be doing a giveaway. How about one of these?

Just leave a comment wishing Ashlyn a happy birthday, remember she's 7 so nothing your momma would blush at please, and I'll let her pick her favorite comment and post it on Thursday. The winner will get just the canvas 8 x 10" art in his/her chosen object or animal and name (anything you want) without the frame. If the winner doesn't show his/her face by Saturday I'll re-draw, I'm not a fan of hunting anyone down like a dog to force you to take your prize so please come back Thursday if you've left a comment.

Have a great Monday. I'm off to carve a butterfly out of a round layer of cake. That's how much I love her.

She's lucky I like kittens.

She's turning 7 on Monday. She wanted to bring treats to school today. She asked ever so nicely for Hello Kitty treats. She has the most amazing and awesome mom ever!

They only took me over 4 hours to make. I was up until after 1 a.m. covered in white chocolate with only 16 of these heads to show for it. 4 are cracked. 1 fell off it's stick in the chocolate. I ran out of hours to do whiskers and couldn't find the right supplies to do anything else. Thank you Bakerella- thanks a lot ;).

My aunt Tina bought me the most awesome cupcake book (Hello Cupcake) for my birthday and I couldn't wait to use it for Ashy's birthday but of course miss Ashy pants wants a butterfly *cake* for our family party. I don't do cake, especially the cutting of the layers. Where's my fairy godmother?! Only 3 more birthdays to go and I'm scott free for the rest of the year!

The angels have their wings...

I love the altered tank top from the book Sew darn cute and thought I would give it a go. I had the girls choose their favorite scraps from my scrap basket, which by the way Mary picked all her fabrics by herself- I'm impressed, and thought they would be really cute with little sleeves. I put trim around the neck and added some beads between the scallops for some bling and if that wasn't busy enough I had to go and add wings.

I don't thing they turned out too bad but not at all what I had in mind. I wanted subtle little sleeves and instead the girls look like the Prince from Cinderella. All they need now is the fringe.

They love them as is and I'm not the type to rip out stitches and start over so I'm starting a new fashion trend. Tanks with wings. Think it will catch on? ;)

Going a little more green.

Here at the Baxter residence we are doing our part to stay green. Literally. We've deployed our mobile fertilizing unit now that the weather is nice and warmish. Cody built this chicken coop and run from scrap wood that I can move around the yard to help keep the lawn nice and green :). When we get into our new house it won't be mobile but in this house there just isn't room for 9 chickens to ruin the lawn in one spot or roam free, unless we let them terrorize main street and all the shoppers/grass roots goers. Hey, that's a good idea! I'm sure if I let them loose during grass roots no one would even blink an eye though. They'd just give them a stiff drink and ask them to dance.

Anyway, keeping the chickens outside smells much MUCH nicer than having them in my house. The strawberry jam I made actually smells like strawberry! So hard to eat when all you smell is chicken fertilizer.

Before and After

Ashlyn's surgery went really well. She got a new teddy bear friend as a gift that went in with her and got his own war wounds in the operating room. If that's how they treat a perfectly healthy bear I'm glad he went and not me ;). It's the last surgery for her so whoo hoo! Hopefully she'll be up and dancing in no time.

While Ashlyn was down for the count I couldn't really go anywhere and she didn't really need much other than movies and rest so I finished re-doing the highchair. I'm not sure how I feel about the finished look. It was so much cuter in my head but it is so much easier to clean so it's a keeper. Here's the before.... complete yuck!!

And here's the after....

I just used the old seat as a template and traced around it. I still have the old cover I can use as a backup.

Don't mind the cruddy pictures, we're all sick on top of everything else so I just snapped and loaded without posing and photoshopping. Sometimes it's just not worth the extra effort you know.

I found the best fabric panels yesterday for $1.50 a panel! Cody was home until last night so I snuck out, and I have big plans for them- BIG! Okay so maybe not that big but I'm going to have some fun this week :).