We love mail!

So Grandma & Grandpa Jones like to send us just fun little packages in the mail at every holiday-- and we love it!

Usually they are just filled with fun things for the kids to do and play with. This time though our Christmas present "$$$$" was in there too :)  As were also these Rudolph noses, which the kids loved to wear everywhere- I had to draw the line at going to the store with them on-- they made me laugh at how silly they looked.

Also of course the Christmas Card they got had some tunes it played "Christmas Rock" that we heard over and over until we finally fixed that dang card :)  Brynley of course loved dancing to the card every time it came on :)

The watercoloring books this time were a huge hit too :)  of course Grandma knew they'd be

and lastly the window stickers-- they look innocent enough right--- I thought so to so I let the kids put them on the window--- but at about 3 in the morning those stickers we're coming down-- our dog Tiki was up all night growling at them cuz' they were causing weird reflections and stuff right where he looks out the window to watch for intruders. He was dead set that that Santa guy on the train was a bad guy! :)

Thank you mom and Dad for the great packages- we love getting them-- even if you do send a card that makes annoying music over and over again-- love you guys hope you have a great Christmas!


*ps. please ignore our grungy attire and the fact that there is a ladder in our kitchen- the package arrived on Saturday which is our family workin day :)

Our Early Christmas Present!

So we got to have an early fun Christmas Present this year! I had my Ultrasound apt. on the 21st and they are 99% sure that it's a ................

GIRL!

We are all really excited about it-- I'm excited cuz' Brynley and her can still play together but are far enough apart that I don't think they'll feel the need to compete with each other as they grow up. Payton was good about it too (he would always say whenever someone asked him what we were having before "that we didn't get to decided Jesus would just send us one" ). He was excited that he'll get to be the big older brother that will get to protect his little sisters--

Anyways we would love to hear some ideas for girl names-- I have a few but me and Dave have such a hard time agreeing on names that I need a big arsenal of ones I like cuz' he'll shoot down about 90% of them. So if you have any girl names you like leave them in the comments :)

Flower Headband

So I'm still just chugging away at making things-- I've been in a really creative mood lately so that has helped :) I may even attempt to get out my sewing machine today and make Brynley's dress-- may being the key word there- I still haven't forgotten how much I didn't enjoy sewing the crayon roll-

Anyways-- I found this cute dress for Brynley at Target-- actually she found it and was so excited about it and trying it on-- so I bought it-- sneakily-- and planned on giving it to her for Christmas but it just needed something to go with it I felt to make it a special dress for her-- so originally I was going to make a braclet for her but than I just decided to go with making a flower headband to match the dress since she seems to really like her other similar headbands.

It was easy and fun and I was able to finish it while she was at joy school one morning. I even made another one for the dress that I might eventually sew :)

Flower Headband 

1-So first off I bought some ugly headbands at wally world for cheap I think 6 for like $3 or so but they were all the wrong color so I just painted them and to make it slightly shiny I actually spray painted a clear protective gloss over it.

2- Than I went to work drawing and cutting out little flowers from some scrap satin fabric--- I cut out ten flowers and than gently pulled on the edges to give them the frayed look--- (I'm sure if you didn't want the frayed look you could easily burn the edges to keep it from fraying)

3- Than I went to gluing every two together-- folded it and squished it up until I was happy with the shape of it and than glued it one pair at a time onto the headband-- (I glued them really close together and in a straight line and on the edge ones I had it so the petals were sticking out and almost flat to the headband instead of up- if that makes sense at all)

4- Tada! We're done!  I had a hard time taking a good picture of the sucker though -- I think it will look adorable on her with her dress-- but we'll have to wait till after Christmas to see.

Christmas Gifts

Today we ate a lot and I mean a lot of chocolate! I'm so glad that after a super crappy start I actually accomplished what I needed to today--

Brynley's last day of School is tommorow before Christmas break so I had to help her finish her little gifts and I actually ran after the mail man today to make sure I got the Christmas letters in the mail today :) I'm pretty sure he thought I was crazy. O-well they are at least in the mail.

And I figured since some of our friends are leaving this weekend it would probably be best to get the gifts to them actually before Christmas instead of after--

So we cranked up the Pandora Christmas Tunes got the kids in play clothes and we went to work making  Peppermint bark and Chocolate covered pretzels. It was alot of fun and Payton was my huge little helper- Bryn helped mostly put the Chocolate in her mouth and on the table and all over her-- It was great!

Here's the final finished product :)

The little baggie is full of Reindeer dust (oatmeal +glitter) to help Santa's reindeer find your home. along with a little poem-- all thanks to Illustrator- did I mention my undying love for Illustrator :)

And here's Brynley's friends gifts to give-- she helped me put together the pattern for the Braclets and cut and tie the ribbon on and these little clippies are so easy to make (I love them)-- here's where I found the tutorial for them.

I'm feeling a bit better about being closer to being done-- Its slightly crazy-- see I was really done with all my Christmas shopping like the first week in Dec. but than I'm like "Oh I can do this and this and this since Christmas is so far away still" so in the end I'm still trying to fit everything in and being stressed :) when will I learn :)

On a totally opposite note----
Thank you Mom & Dad Foster for the Covey''s they have been very useful this year working in the freezing garage :) cuz' of them I finally finished the dresser which I can't wait to show everyone :) I love it!


Hope everyone is enjoying the season!

What to do on a cold Snow day {Crayon Roll Tutorial}

You can always do loads and loads of Laundry :) All the sheets- all the towels -all the pillowcases in your house and of course clothes 2.

But that's not nearly as fun as cutting out millions of little circles to make Christmas card stickers- and putting glitter on them so they sparkle and are cute :)

Actually the best part of a Cold snow day is getting to hang out with your kids, drink some hot chocolate, watch the Polar Express and the Grinch, play in sleeping bags- and when the kids are finally asleep getting another Christmas present done-- That's a great Snow Day!

So For one of Brynley's stocking Presents I decided I'd make her a Crayon Roll since she loves and loves and loves to color and take crayons with her everyone-- It was pretty easy and fast-- and I thought I'd share with you how I did it :)

CRAYON ROLL

Here's not so much a tutorial on the crayon roll but more of a linky tut and my own variation to it cuz' heaven knows I can't do things the simple way :)

For an awesome Tutorial on how to make the crayon roll, go here!

 There's a ton other great stuff on the blog also-- very addicting :)

  Instead of using the felt used in the tutorial I decided to go with just to pieces of my fabric sewed together and to make it stiffer a piece of Interface sewed in the middle-- It did make it harder to pull it the right side out when the time came but I think it was worth it.

Also because my little girl is only 3 and the tying ribbons capability is a bit beyond her and I didn't want to have to be tying the thing up every 2 seconds I decided to use a piece of scrap fabric and Velcro for the fastener--

 I just folded the scrap fabric in half and sewed up the edges so that there was no raw edges and put it in place instead of the ribbon in the pattern--

When it came to to put the Velcro on I just rolled it up and made sure to give lots of room for variations on how tight/loose it can be.

For a finishing touch and to make it easier for her to pull it open I added a fabric flower. 

I found the tutorial for the flower here. (another great blog!)

 I would have loved to follow exactly her pattern but since my adobe pdf reader isn't working on my computer I had to just guess and try to figure it out on my own.

In the end I realize I have very much a love hate relationship with sewing-- when I'm not doing it I think I love it and would like to do it but when I'm actually sewing- man do I hate it! I really think it's cuz' I never really learned how to sew- and I'm just too dang picky-- I can never follow a pattern exactly I have to always modify it and make it harder on me-- but like always I'll probably forget I hate sewing and be sewing something else soon.  Either way I know Brynley is going to love getting this for Christmas :) now I just need for the snow to melt off the roads so I can go to the store and buy her some new crayons for it.

Projects, Projects, Projects

So you would think the millions of projects I have going on would be enough-

 but what can I say I'm addicted. 

I'm 99.5% done with Christmas (wahoo!) but I always try to have something little for my kids to make to give to their friends -you know actually feel like it's fun to give instead of receive kinda idea-- so I've gathered the stuff for that, couldn't pull myself out of the fabric store though without buying some fabric to make Brynley a dress-- in my head it's so cute :) . I also got some fabric to make Brynley a crayon roll for in her stocking :) *She is my little artist and can't seem to go anywhere without bringing crayons and something to color-- this will be as much a present for me as for her- I'm sick of finding Crayons lost everywhere in the house and car.

and last of all at a stop at the Salvation Army I found a chair to redo for Brynley's room. I haven't quite decided what I'm doing to it yet-- I'm still in the planning stages of the design for Brynley's room so we'll see how long it take me to decide and than we'll go fabric shopping :)

We'll see how long these projects take-- maybe I can get back in the groove of when I think of a project I do it right than instead of waiting and procrastinating until it's no longer a fun project but a chore :) Maybe I'll post some tutorials on doing them that'd be slightly fun--
Toodleloo for now, I got me some work to do.