Fly On the Wall

I have fond memories of going to the craft store each Dec with my mom and picking something out I could make for the sibling whose name I drew that year.In fact Christopher you still owe me a refill of pb cups for the cookie jar you made me or is it me that owes you??? So keeping with tradition each of our kids will be giving something handmade to each other. Here are a few ideas I thought were worth passing on. Christmas is only a week away but that's plenty of time.

This first one is something that Kate is going to make for Jack. Here's where I found it and where you can see the tutorial (says they shoot 15-20ft). Kate is also going to make a paper target and a bag or box to keep it all in.

And here is what Jack is going to make Kate. It fits an 18" doll. And of course we'll have to make some cute bedding to go with it. Here is where you can find this tutorial.

Sometime earlier in the year I found a wooden checker board at the thrift store and thought it would be perfect for Jack. He loves playing games so he's getting a personalized checkers set with his face on little wooden discs. If you don't have a gameboard you can make one like this one.

There are hundreds of great ideas out there but you can go to Nie Nie Dialogues to see her 5 days of handmade Christmas where she reviewed TONS of gifts, it's a great place to start.

I hope you make something for someone this year, just because! Now get busy, I know I will be!

Have your kids written their letter to Santa? If not, check THIS out. I thought it was so cute I designed one similar for our kids. One night we were all at Gma's when the doorbell rang and on the doorstep there was a package stamped "delivered by Elf #64" and a poem from Santa basically telling the kids he's been watching and he'd love to get a letter from them. there was a letter, envelope and label for each of the kids.
I wouldn't want to just copy that cute idea and put it for free online (that seems wrong) but for family and friends I'll email it to you to print out if you're interested let me know.

We discovered Thanksgiving morning that the track is a great place to pull a sled. Ray played football and the kids and I took turns sledding although I couldn't get them to pull me very much! We lasted about half an hour and then headed home to bake pies and drink hot chocolate. It was a great day full of snow, good food and fabulous family!

A little bit of Christmas this past month.... picking out a tree 1/2 mile from our house - we missed playing in the snow and cutting a tree but there are definitely pros to picking up a tree and having it set up in the house all within 20 min.

A visit from Grandma Great was a definite highlight this month. We all adore her and I feel lucky that she is still able to travel here on her own to visit.

I was just thinking October ended so I better do a Halloween post, turns out November's almost over too - agghhh time is a flyin'! October included days that almost felt like summer (which of course required a lemonade stand), backyard campfire, the end of soccer season, some pumpkin carving, lots of candy, 3 witches, 1 ninja and a mad scientist. Their only customer, it was hot but it was also 3:00 on a sat in Oct - not many people passing by. Thankfully too since we didn't have lemonade they made their own with just water and sugar (they told me lemons are over-rated)- and yes I spied quite a few floaties. I let them have their fun and then I ushered them back inside before I had to warn any customers of what they were about to drink.

She wasn't too sure she liked the slimy insides!

This year we had a cat, a smiley face and a batMy guys.

It seemed like a warm day but that wind can really turn a warm day into a chilly one. The hot dogs were yummy and it was a good kick-off into Fall.

He looks like he means business doesn't he? Don't let him fool you, he's a softy on the field. We were so proud of him-from beginning to end he LOVED soccer and never complained. You wouldn't know he never scored a goal until the last game, just wasn't the most important thing to him - I love this boy.

And this little lady has come a long way, she had such a great experience too. Couldn't have asked for a better coach, nicer teammates, better weather, and look at that trophy - (it has 10 different light settings) but for an undefeated team the coach wanted only the best for his ladies. After we got over the initial Cha-ching ringing in our ears we agreed that a fancy trophy was worth it for the smiles.

The ninja.

Getting into character - sassy witch!
Pictures are so much more fun to take on a trampoline!
And here we are in our getup this year.
Hope your October was a festive one too!

I finally got around to taking some pictures of our dining room table since finishing it. It was last April that Mom and Dad (Gma and Gpa) were visiting from the North and we saw this set for $50 at the thrift store. We snatched it up the next day and eventually got to work refinishing. It only came with 4 chairs but just last month I was at a different thrift store and I found 4 more chairs for just $20 total. Those of course still need to be painted but will eventually be black with cushions. So here are a few before and after....

I tried using stripper but I found it easier to just sand. I was a bit impatient and there are marks from using too rough of paper. I could have worked to smooth those out but didn't - maybe on the next project. After lots of sanding with all 3 leafs in it...

Then I sprayed with black paint, distressed the edges, wiped on a dark stain on edges and then painted on a glossy seal.

I like easy re-upholstery projects like these chairs.
Before...

After...

Then of course we had to spruce up our small dining area. We wanted it to be a bit brighter and liked the idea of being able to display lots of family pictures - and be able to change them easily. So here is the space before...

During...

And after...
(this is how it looks now with the other 4 chairs that still need to be black, last night we had in all 3 leafs and 10 people around the table - I loved it!) Next is to decide on rug or no rug. Oh and fill those frames with pictures too.

Well I'm getting closer to posting about what we're doing these days but first I can't skip ahead without posting a first day of school picture. J is also going to school but I never got a pic of him so this counts for both of them. So here was the first day for our big 2nd grader. The first two months have been good, definitely getting better as the year goes on. Her teacher is super nice and fun and has high expectations which I think is a good thing in the long run.
And our little man is in pre-school which he LOVES and wishes he could go every day. I get to have him home all day twice a week and he's in school for a few hours the other three.Time is flying by and I am so grateful to have him home this year

After camping we woke up to a beautiful morning. We cleaned out the tent (which was not staked down), said goodbye to Ray (who went to work) and went up to Grandma's for pancakes. A few hours later we went back down to pack up the tent which was no where to be seen. We figured the wind blew it down into the valley a few hundred feet away but after looking everywhere the only place left was the pond. Sure enough we found it sitting on it's side, fully set up with fly still attached. It's amazing how hard it is to pull a tent out that is full of water. It took a loooooong time to get out but we only broke one pole and put one little rip in the fly. The stakes and tent bag we figured were long gone in the bottom of the pond but just a few weeks later they showed up on the edge of the pond so now we're all set to camp next year once we replace that pole.

This is where I pedaled for ten minutes or so and we went nowhere. And I'm pretty sure this is when Lily and Kate were begging to get off the rocking boat. Good times, good times!

We decided to spend an evening at the lake and have one last camping trip before school started. But we made it easy on ourselves and camped out by Gma and Gpa's barn. There's a bathroom, a fire ring, a pond for fishing and when we got hungry we went up to the house for pancakes. This easy camping turned into a memorable experience when the wind picked up but more on that in the next post.

Nathan and his family stayed up late with us and then headed for their nice warm beds after the fire was out. Can you tell this little cutie loves cats? We convinced grandma to spend the night outside with us and this is her personal tent/cot. It stays really warm and the kids liked snuggling in there with her in the morning.

In the morning Jack tried out his new fishing pole. This is where cute little froggies are found and become the bait.

This is the face of a boy who's bait swam away before he could catch a fish.

Ray had to head off to work but don't worry, Grandma was there to help spear the cute little green guys and a fish was caught.

After all the fun we headed up for pancakes and found this rattling critter on the road. Gpa was minding his own business driving home the night before and ran right over it. It's not the first rattlesnake found this summer at their place - but just one is enough to make this mama nervous.