More Sewing Projects

We had to make some ornaments in our sewing class!  I found the CUTEST felt ornaments online and now I have gotten my whole family (minus Kent) sewing felt ornaments.    Here are a few of mine. We are planning to make more.

Adele made the candy cane ornament and Ian made the snowman.  They turned out so cute.

Dolls

The girls I am teaching in my sewing class are making dolls (which means that I have had to learn to make dolls too.)  The hair is a challenge, I'm not gonna lie.  Now I know why there are so many creepy dolls out there.  I just finished the 3rd one yesterday and some clothes too. My next project is to make a boy.  Adele is actually very excited for me to start letting her play with them.  So I guess the project is a success!

Decorating the Tree

 I wanted to get a cute photo of the kids in front of the tree. They were taking turns being turkeys.  Why can't they all smile in the SAME photo?

Smile Elise!

They are still pretty cute though.

Family Reunion Photos

We finally got a couple copies of our family pix that were taken this summer at the family reunion.   I am hoping to get the unedited files so I can tweak a few things.

Blue Man Group

Kent has been wanting to go see Blue Man Group for several years so I finally arranged a surprise trip to Las Vegas and we made it happen!  We were celebrating our 17th anniversary just a little bit early since December can sometimes be pretty crazy and snowy too.  I wasn't sure how much I'd like the show because some of their music isn't my favorite.  The show ended up being really cool and entertaining.  We had gotten a good tip from Kent's brother Mark who recommended that we bring earplugs to the show because it was really loud.  We did that and the volume was actually perfect with the ear plugs in. I don't think I would have enjoyed it nearly as much without them.

Annual Doughnut Party

I couldn't resist posting this dork-tastic picture.

We are a bit late this year with the doughnut party.  Usually we have it around Halloween.  We were just too sugared out around Halloween this year so we waited.  We were excited to invite some new friends to the party this year, but were sad that the Ena's couldn't make it to the party this year.  They moved across the state so they weren't around this time.  The doughnuts were, of course, super delicious!

Mmmm, doughnuts!

Zach, Sarah, Jodi, Sam and Kade

Sewing Lessons

I decided a couple of months ago to see if anyone around here wanted to learn to sew.  I posted something in the local Facebook group and got quite a response.  I ended up with 4 students, and have another that I think will be starting in a month or two.  I started out thinking I'd have an adult class and a kids class.  The adult class ended up being two private lessons because there wasn't a good time for everyone to meet.  I started the kids class a little later- after Adele and Ian got done with the soccer season.  I have really enjoyed teaching sewing and I hope that I will get more students in the future. I expect that during the summer I will have more kids classes.  Ian has been really excited to learn to sew and has joined my kids class. With him there are 3 in that class and I think that's just about as many as I can help at the same time.

The adults I teach both have different levels of sewing experience.  One is a beginner and we have made trick-or-treat bags, crayon rolls and aprons.  The other girl has been working on a dress, and hats and props for her photography business. She takes lots of pics of newborns so she wanted to make some hats, bonnets and diaper covers for the babies.   The kids I teach so far have made tomato pincushions, tote bags and next time we will start making some dolls.

My sweatshop

Since the girls I teach are interested in making dolls I have had to come up with a pattern that wasn't too hard for them.  The doll at the top of the post was the first doll I made.  I decided it is way too small and difficult for kids to make when they don't have a lot of sewing experience.  So I came up with the pattern above.  I'm still working on the hair!  The first one I made has the dark brown Yoda hair/ears.  I literally started laughing out loud when I turned that doll right side out. The hair was not supposed to do that!  The next one turned out slightly better but I have some more experimenting to do.  This is my first attempt at doll-making.

A Bazillion Aprons

So about a month ago my sister Carol asked me if I'd be able to make 35 aprons for her.  She volunteers with a group that does a retreat for moms who have kids with cancer.  They pamper these moms and give them gifts and goodies.  Their next retreat is in October 2015 and they have a Christmas theme.  Carol thought it would be fun to give them Christmas aprons.   I put together a few combos for the aprons and got them all cut out.  In the mean time Carol decided she'd like me to make a couple more aprons for gifts for friends.  So I added 2.  Then my sister Kathy decided she wanted to give some to her daughter-in-laws and one to a son.  And then I made a couple more for gifts for a couple other sisters....So in the last 3 weeks I have cut out fabric for 35 plus completely made another 9.  And I still have 2 or 3 that I want to make before I can even start on the 35 that I have to make for the cancer moms.  I'm glad I have 11 more months to get those done.

One for Carol.  One of my very favorite combos ever!

Ian's 10th!

Happy birthday to this very special dude!  Isn't he such a cute kid!   We have a tradition of picking up out birthday kid on their day and taking them out to lunch wherever they want to go.  Ian wanted to go to the Chinese Buffet.  He was very adventurous there and ate lots of interesting stuff:  clams, oysters, and sushi with raw fish (which he said was disgusting).  He is definitely my most adventurous eater.  Now if someone could tell me why this kid doesn't like noodles...

 Since Kent and I went to Las Vegas the weekend after his birthday and then it was Thanksgiving, the party has been slightly delayed.  More to come on that.  And more pictures too.

Yummy ice cream cake.

Halloween Fun

Elise: Chef.  Emilia: Tris from Divergent, Ian:  Scary clown, Adele: Pink Witch

That is some seriously awesome hair.

Crazy Hair Day 2014

Adele's Birthday Halloween Bash

My baby girl is 7!  She loves having her birthday around Halloween. For the last 3 years she has wanted to have a Halloween Birthday party, which makes things really fun and easy.  This year we did the Bertie Botts guess the jelly bean flavor, pass the pumpkin (hot potato), pin the legs on the spider and donut on a string. It was pretty crazy with 10 little kids.  I think next year we will go for the smaller 2 or 3 friend party.

Teenagers....

Even though Emilia has been a teenager for a couple of years now we really haven't seen a lot of the the often joked about "teenage behavior" until now.  It's good though.  She's pleasant and cooperative most of the time, but it's good that we see her developing like a normal teenager should.  There must be reasons for this teenager behavior. Doing things like hanging out with friends a lot.  Sitting in her room listening to music, sitting in her room reading, sitting in her room drawing, sitting in her room trying to avoid interacting with "little kids".  Rolling her eyes.  Grumbling.  Putting threatening signs on her bedroom door.  Normal teenage stuff.

Sewing

Between all the crazy new house stuff we have been doing, school, work and soccer, I haven't had much time for sewing.  A friend gave me a project idea that she wanted me to brain through and I finally got around to it.  While I was working on it I kept thinking about how much I enjoy sewing and how I had really missed it.  I decided I need to pick it up and do more sewing.  I decided that I wanted to teach sewing classes so I got on our local Facebook page and advertised.  There was a lot of interest at first and it looked like I'd have 4 adult students.  One bailed and one said she wanted to start in November.  I also got some names for another sewing class with kids.  I decided to wait to start the kids class until soccer gets over since I am way too busy after school with soccer practice.  I taught my first class last week and it was fun. I am excited to start my kids class as well. I am planning to reduce my hours at work (or maybe even go back to a temp status) because I just haven't had the time to do stuff that I need to do.  And also the stuff that I want to do.

Ian is going to be a scary clown for Halloween.

Alicia

I babysat Alicia for a few hours this week while Kathy did some substitute teaching.  Usually Alicia is pretty cooperative but this time she was so agitated and had a hard time settling down.  She gets really fixated sometimes and can be really hard to redirect.  I was finally able to get her focused on something.  But of course, she doesn't do anything halfway.  She got every last book from Adele's bookshelf and piled them on the couch. It did keep her occupied for several hours though so it was worth it.  It has been good for my kids to have the opportunity to interact with Alicia and learn some compassion and acceptance for people with special needs.  And it's pretty funny when Adele is fighting with her adult cousin who is stealing all her stuffed animals and blankets.  It's good for her.  Because she doesn't have any younger siblings who take her stuff.

Ian the Proud Man

Ian won a medal this year for his entry in Reflections for his visual art.

Lookin so cool

I had to add this picture too.  Ian built a huge car out of K*nex and he was pretty proud of it!

Pumpkin Patch

I was reading through a community calendar and saw some info about a pumpkin patch in town. The kids have been but I haven't. I thought it would be fun to go for FHE and get some pumpkins to carve.

Gotta find the right one

Funny selfie (I had to be in at least 1 pic even if it was dorky)

AMY! Our Favorite Friend!

My bestest friend Amy came to visit us in October.  She stayed for about 5 days and we partied like we always do (unfortunately we didn't get around to playing Scrabble this time).  We went exploring in the area behind out house, took the kids to the "rock couch", went to St. George to the Children's museum there and had a mini-cheese party.  And we watched lots of "Chopped" on Netflix.  It was so much fun. It was sad to see her go.  

She threatened to hurt me if I put pics on Facebook. I told her I wouldn't but I would have to document it on the blog.