Our Family Project

Here's Kate's quilt.  (You can click on all the pictures to see them larger.)  I barely got it done in time.  Once again, my mom came to the rescue and slipstitched the binding for me while I was feverishly sewing Kate's baptism dresses.  I love Kate's quilt more than Eliza's.  Is that bad of me?  Maybe I will always love the quilt I finish the best right after I finish it. This was a free pattern I found on Moda Bakeshop Blog .  I love all their patterns and can't wait to try out another one.  I've got one in mind for Maryanne's toddler bed, and already have the material too ... so I'll get started on that one for her birthday. I didn't quilt this quilt.  I wish I had the talent for that ... it would seriously save me some money, and when I have quilted (smaller projects) I found it to be so relaxing and peaceful work.  Maybe one day when I have more time to devote to learning the trade.  Until then, I am really pleased with t...

I'd french braided Maryanne's hair for church on Sunday, and when we took it out on Monday it was all wavy.  So, since she is such a girly-girl, the older girls and I decided to curl her hair.  She's so good when it comes to doing her hair.  Maryanne will just sit on the counter and let me do her hair most of the time.  And, unlike my older girls, she will say, "Bowy, bowy" when she wants a bow in her hair.  She is just simply adorable!                         

Last night for our family home evening lesson, Eliza talked about a children's art exhibit our church will be displaying within the next year.  We talked about the different categories and themes for the art work, and then made our own family art exhibit.  Each of us chose one of those themes and used the medium of our choice.  Then, we taped them all to the wall. Here is Adam's picture of himself in the rain. Andrew painted a missionary in a cave. Eliza painted our family (notice we don't have any limbs???). Kate used pastels to draw a pioneer family. Jon painted a temple, a horn, and the golden plates to symbolize the gospel being preached around the world. Andrew drew Nephi with the sword of Laban and the Liahona. Maryanne ....... Painted. Andrew also painted his Book of Mormon and his small hymnbook. I drew a CTR shield with pastels.  (Sorry, you'll have to see that one in the picture at the top.) Adam also used pastels to depict a rainy day on a flowe...

Last week I imposed a "NO-TV-AND-COMPUTERS-WEEK!"  I got severly frustrated with the tv and the computer being on all the time.  It was as though my children had forgotten how to play with each other!  One day, Eliza and Kate were found in their room dressing up their dolls.  They started out adjusting and altering their own clothing to make it fit their dolls and taking pictures of them.  When I realized what they were doing, I suggested they use some of my fabric scraps.  Instantly, there were tons and tons of outfits for Kit and Nikki.  I told them I'd make them some clothing for their dolls, but it would be modest clothing.  They were both so excited about it.  I'm just glad I have another idea of a Christmas present for the girls that won't cost me any extra money because I can use my fabric scraps!  Yay!

A couple weekends ago I saw my mom and she inspired me to make her a steering wheel cover.  We were at my aunt's house and had been for a few hours in the middle of the day.  When it was time to leave she took a length of fabric and wrapped it around her steering wheel so her hands wouldn't get burned as she drove. So, I decided to make her a steering wheel cover.  I had some left over Insul-brite from the hot pads I made for my sister for Christmas, and I also had the layer cakes that she gave me.  So, I picked out the layer cake collection that she liked and pieced it together to make a length of fabric that was about 44" long.  Then, I placed my layer of Insul-brite inbetween the pieced fabric and some muslin and "quilted" in the ditch of the seams to hold all the layers together.  Then, I joined the two ends and made a casing on each of the long sides and inserted the elastic.  Once that was completed, I decided she probably needed a little "gift"...

The other day I put Maryanne's hair in pigtail braids.  It was adorable!  They were four strand braids , and I am still in love with those things.  Anyway, when we started to get her ready for church on Sunday morning, Jon took out her braids and POOF!  I think her messy face helps her to look even cuter!

I saw this great idea on a blog one day, and now I can't find it.  So, if anyone has seen this before, and knows the blog address, please let me know! The other day, Andrew and Adam made our own movable alphabet.  I remember using something similar when I'd volunteer in Eliza's first grade classroom to help the children practice spelling words.  Now that both Andrew and Adam have caught the reading bug (thanks Lynette for your help with Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons! ), I thought that letting them make their own words would be a great activity for them during the summer (and even into the school year ... I'm sure this will come in handy with spelling list practice). I got the foam letters and containers at JoAnn ; I even had the boys with me so they could get excited about the project.  The next day, I printed out the grid sheets and gave the boys some glue and told them to just go at it.  Adam went like gang busters, just putting whicheve...

I know it seems silly, but I love that I can put my bread and roll dough out on the patio to rise.  The Arizona temperature in the summer is the perfect climate for yeast breads.  My dough doubled in size in almost half the time it usually takes indoors.  And, usually, I let my dough rise atop a heated oven, just to make sure it is in a warm environment.  But, with it being so warm outside, I didn't have to heat up the inside of the apartment for this to happen well.  I know this is a really silly reason to like the heat here, but I'm looking for the good things about the heat .. makes me not miss the cold so much.

I wanted to take a gift for my cousin's son for his birthday party, but didn't want to go to the store.  We really decided the Friday before the party to go, and I hated the thought of taking my children to the toy section in a department store.  I never know how they will react ... and how long it will take to get them out the door after we've made our purchase.  To avoid this, I remembered a great idea I saw online: Bean Bag Games!  After some time spent trying to find the site I'd found before, I located the bean bag game cards and printed them out.  Such great ideas!  Then, I spent about an hour making the bean bags and the bag to store them in.  Really, it took almost the same time to make this as it would have to get everyone in the car and take them to the store.  I now know what all of our young nieces and nephews will be getting for their birthdays!  Well, actually, I have another idea in mind as well ... and cannot wait ...

Have you ever had a day when you just want to tell everyone that they are fasting?  These are the dishes left over from breakfast this morning.  Yes, my children barely ate anything!  And, it's so frustrating!  They barely ate anything last night at dinner time as well.  So, today, I have imposed a lunch fast for the children (excepting Maryanne).  Maybe they will eat their dinner tonight no matter what it is because they are so hungry.

Tomorrow night the women from church are meeting to go see a display at the Mesa Temple Visitor's Center. I want to see the display. I don't want to go with those women. Not because they are rude. Because I don't have any friends yet, and I kind of don't want to try to make any friends with these women whom I will probably see very, very, very rarely once we move. I already feel a lot of obligation to the people in this congregation, and know it will be hard enough to say good-bye in a few short weeks/months when we end up closing on a house. The only thing that stops me from feeling too badly about my attitude is the fact that very, very few people have tried to reach out to me. Jon and I have talked about this before and we've decided that I am probably one of those people that has a bubble around them stamped with the word: UNAPPROACHABLE. We think this because there have been times when it seems I have intimidated others, completely unbeknownst to me. Why is...

Yes, it's true ... it is hot here!  And, I've been told that June was unseasonably hot.  But, I think that has helped us to acclimate a little bit faster than normal.  At any rate, we are definitely feeling the heat.  The thing I love about the heat is that it is dry.  Which means that when we are outside, going into the shade makes a difference.  In Minnesota, we could go into the shade and there would be very little difference/respite because of the humidity. The children have enjoyed the heat as well because it means they get to go swimming much more often than they are used to.  The last couple of weeks they have been taking red cross swimming lessons.  It has been so wonderful to take them somewhere everyday and get us all out of the apartment.  While it is actually a pretty good sized apartment, putting six of us in here all day, everyday, has made us all a little bit more short and frustrated with each other.  So, going to the po...

Jon needed a break from work, so he scheduled the Wednesday through Monday surrounding Independence Day as vacation days.  I spent Wednesday trying to make a skirt for a lady from church (long, tiresome, and frustrating story that you will not be bored with), so we began our true stay-cation on Thursday.  We figured it was a great opportunity to explore our new home. Thursday: Montezuma Castle, Montezuma Well, Beaver Creek, & Sedona MONTEZUMA CASTLE We drove north to see Montezuma Castle.  It's hard to believe that the people who lived in this apartment-like structure carved it out of the side of a mountain/hill.  But, the location was amazingly perfect.  A stream running right in front, with the ability to be on the top as lookout for enemies, fields below near the stream for crops.  As far as they can tell, the people lived here between 1200-1400 A.D.  I stood there in awe, thinking about how long it took them to build this home, how many yea...

After I made Kate's scripture tote and cover, I thought about one of her best friends in Minnesota.  Their birthdays are only about two weeks apart (give or take a few days), and before we moved we thought they would share their baptism day.  I thought about offering to make a tote and cover for her, but I wasn't sure if she was going to get her own set of scriptures for her birthday or not. ... It's a tradition for us, but may not be for others, and I didn't want my friend to feel any pressure from me to do it if she wasn't planning on it.  Anyway, through Facebook, I found out that my friend was going to get her daughter a set of her own scriptures and was having a hard time finding a cute tote or case.  So, I told her that I would make her one. Her daughter's favorite colors are pink and purple, and I had a really hard time finding any fabric that had both pink and purple in it that didn't look like "baby" fabric.  My mom had recently rece...