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!