Flag Football

This is the last week of flag football. I thought I would post a few photos :) I am so proud of the progress DS's team has made!

Latest Project

Here is a photo of my latest project! A Christmas dress for DD :)

Christmas Blessings!

We are so blessed this Christmas. We have such wonderful friends and family! Last night we had a church dinner and I sat there amazed at what God has done in our lives in the last year. A year ago we had 20 people in this little church plant and now it has grown to close to 200. What an amazing ride it has been! We are blessed to have seen so many come to know Christ in a new way and to see change in people's lives. God is doing amazing things.

We received gifts of goodies from several people and an awesome card from our middle schoolers. The kids sang a few songs and then the high schoolers sang a few songs and we all closed with Silent Night. It was a wonderful evening for which I am so thankful. We are truly blessed.

Saturday's Schedule

Wow, did we ever have a busy Saturday! I went to a women's group Christmas breakfast with Mollie this morning. It was wonderful to share Christmas memories and traditions that we are passing on to the next generation. After breakfast, we went to Charles' football game. And they had their first win of the season! Yeah! Then we came home and did a thorough cleaning, as we are hosting a Christmas Party tomorrow for our "life group" from our church. It is basically a group of 12 - 14 people who get together for fun and to grow together spiritually as well as pray for each other and be a real community for each other in this age of isolationism. Anyway, we set up the tree last night and tidied up the house today. We got a little crazy and even did the garage! (Which means I can now get to more of my fabric stash - lol).

And with all the busyness, I went to the mailbox and what did I find? My Secret Santa package from the Bee Sew Whimsical Swap! It came all the way from Australia from the wonderful Bronwyn. She doesn't have a blog, so I won't link her :) . I already put the ornaments on the tree and have hung the banner in my kitchen! It was such a beautiful package with many wonderful items inside, two beautiful handmade ornaments (I wish I could do embroidery stitches that small!), a card, a banner, a magazine, candies, a beautiful Christmas cracker, and an adorable tape measure. I am getting ready to sit down for a spell and read the gorgeous magazine that was in the package. This swap was so much fun and now I have a new friend too :) Thank you so very much for the awesome package! All in all a busy and wonderfully full day. Life is good.

Giveaway at Daisy Quilts

There is a gorgeous package being given away at Daisy Quilts, go check it out!

Thanksgiving

We will be heading northward for Thanksgiving, so we went to the beach last night to enjoy a little of our Florida weather before we head into the cold! I didn't bring my camera, but we saw a wild boar (too fast to photograph anyway). There is always something we see on the way out there!

The water was a little chilly, but the kids got in anyway and we saw a friend there and her kids were in the surf as well. They said you get used to it!

Our Local Beach

We went to the beach and stayed until sunset the other day.
Here are my favorite two photos of the time there. It is a natural beach with a lagoon that we drive through to get home. That is where we saw that jaywalking gator!

Charles and the Pumpkin Patch

When I went to pick up the kids one day, there was Charles' teacher with a wagon and two rather large looking pumpkins. Little did I know, he had brought some of his own money on the fieldtrip to the pumpkin patch. The one was enormous and way too large to eat. The other was more medium sized and he wanted to give a real pumpkin pie a try. So we cleaned and baked and pureed and mixed and baked again. And we saw that it was good! Now there are several more bags of pumpkin in our freezer awaiting their turn. I mentioned pumpkin soup, but the kids said no to that one! LOL We did taste some plain cooked pumpkin with a little butter and brown sugar and that was deemed to be ok, so hopefully I won't have to make a bazillion pies!

Well, I sent my gift to my Secret Santa in the Honeypot Swap from Bee Sew Whimsical. I was excited to send the few little things that I had made. I am even more excited for her to get my package and for us to be able to contact each other and not be secret anymore. I have been lurking her blog LOL I feel soooo sneaky! I really hope she likes what I made. I sent a chocolate bar in the package, just in case :)

Old Red Barn Co Quilt Giveaway

Check out the Old Red Barn Co from the button on the top left! They are giving away three absolutely gorgeous quilts! They also have a great blog with lots of gorgeous items. I know I would love to win one of those quilts... wouldn't you?

Christmas is Coming!

I am starting to get excited about Christmas. I love the sights and smells and the Savior, but for me, the giving of gifts to celebrate God's gift is what I really truly love. I have always loved making and giving gifts. Gift giving is my "love language" (find your love language here). I have so much fun deciding on the perfect gift for someone and have so many ideas traipsing around in my head. I wish I could spend unlimited amounts of cash on gifts for those I care about, but... unfortunately can't. I am able to buy some craft supplies, and ummm, well, I seem to have a few on hand *blush* Now is the time of year that I am delighted to have a fabric stash, a paper and embellishment stash, a yarn stash and a knitting needle/crochet hook stash! And I have limited myself to 3 types of craft stashes since our house is not that large. I can only imagine what I would own if I had kept supplies from all of my different crafty phases. Let's see, there's basket weaving, jewelry making, painting, and on and on. I am so glad that Christmas is coming and I can use up some of my supplies!

I have been working on a few things for a couple of swaps that I am doing, so I can't show them here, lest a dear reader or two get a spoiled surprise :) I know that some of the family may be out there lurking too, although I haven't seen any comments :( So I dare not post what I am making for them! One thing I am making is a cute star ornament that I learned to make from a fellow classmate at Big Picture Scrapbooking's Giving Well Class. It is interesting to fold and unfold, but once you do it a time or two, it's easy. Several people will be getting these, but I will keep them a surprise for now.

Free Knit Webkinz Sweater Pattern

Super Easy Knit Webkinz Sweater

I have this for sale on etsy, but I thought I would share it here too. Leave me a comment if you make one. Thanks!

Worsted weight yarn (two strands- can be the same or contrasting colors)

Size 13 needles

Cast on 16 for a lil’ kinz and 20 for a regular size webkinz

Rows 1-3: knit

Row 4: purl

Row 5: knit

Row 6: purl (you may add a few rows here to make it longer, alternate knit and purl rows)

Row 7: knit 2 together, knit most of row and knit last 2 stitches together

Row 8: knit 2 together, purl most of row and knit last 2 stitches together

Row 9: knit 2 together, knit most of row and knit last 2 stitches together

Row 10: knit 2 together, purl most of row and knit last 2 stitches together

Row 11: knit 2 together, knit most of row and knit last 2 stitches together

Row 12: cast off all stitches

Crochet neck band with a size G or H hook (14 stitches) and sew sides together (first 6 rows).

Find the crochet version here.

Giveaway at Sew Katie Sew

There are a lot of great giveaways going on right now, here is one for some yummy looking fabric!

Giveaway at Threads of Friendship

There is a giveaway at Threads of Friendship for a really adorable pleated bag- and you get to pick the fabrics if you win!

These ladies are really great, so go take a look and enter into their drawing :)

Holidays at Home at Sew Mama Sew

Just wanted to share about Holidays at Home at Sew Mama Sew. All this month there are great project ideas for gifts and all next month will be projects, traditions, and all kinds of holiday themes from Sew Mama Sew readers.

One Christmas tradition we have that we started when the kids were preschoolers and have just kept is that we make paper advent chains the first week of December and hang them on the Christmas tree. We remove one of the paper chains every night until we get to the last part (usually a chain hooked to a star). It's a great visual to show how many days until Christmas!

Giveaway at JCasa

I would love to win a gorgeous quilt in shades of yellow from JCasa, check out the giveaway here on her blog. She has a lot of beautiful things in her etsy store too.

Peasant Style Dress

I made this as dry run of sorts for Mollie, just to test the pattern. I will be making one out of a very fine wale red corduroy for a Christmas dress. I think this one turned out ok, but I want the final version to have a little more shape. I liked the addition of the lace on the bodice, it helps it to look like it has more shape than it does.

ETSY

I started an etsy shop! I am so excited. I will be listing vintage finds (some from my Grandma) and a few handmade things and I put a webkinz sweater pattern on there too. I even had my first sale :) check out the shop on the left!

spell with flikr

you can go here and spell anything you want with pictures, pretty cool huh?

a few pics

Here are a few pics of a trip to a special event at the Police Hall of Fame.

Movie with a Positive Message

Have you seen this!

I know, two posts in a day! But these are great! You can print out your own presidential candidate, their wives and their vp's. There is even Hillary if you want to print her!

More a Week in the Life

More of A Week in the Life

Well, I have been snapping photos of the strangest things and even forgetting things that I should take photos of (like car line at school, a big part of every day). I think I will use next week to get a few generic shots that I forgot- like car line. And work on building my mini album and choosing a color scheme etc. I tried to upload a few photos, but blogger wasn't having it! So I will have to upload at another time... maybe tomorrow. I've been working on a journey of faith album called Look Straight Ahead and I am excited to share that here as well. I finished it tonight and I just want to sit and flip through the pages over and over.

A Week in the Life

I am doing a challenge to scrap a week in my life. I was inspired by Ali Edwards. It should be fun and I am interested to see the finished product as I don't really know the specifics yet. I am already taking a lot of pictures of what seems to be nothing... and awaiting creative inspiration for how to put them together, but I have high hopes for what this little mini album will be!Here is a peek at some of the pics. And you can see I have just started another of those knitted washcloths, this one is a different pattern :)

Join the Birthday Bash Cyber Crop at Faith Sisters

Join Faith Sisters for our
Birthday Bash Cyber Crop!

Who: YOU are invited!
When: September 26-28th
What: Challenges, Prizes (traditional and digital,) Sales,
Chats, New Goodies and MORE!
Where: www.FaithSisters.com
Why: To celebrate our 1 year birthday!

a scrapbook page

Here is a scrapbook page I tried with a heritage photo.
I think the color scheme is great with a black and white photo!

I just love working with these kinds of photos, it helps me to feel connected to my roots.

New Venture Church Concert

This is the concert that will be at our church on October 30th! We are excited around here, it will be the first concert for our kids!
What Life Would Be Like Tour Promo from Whizbang on Vimeo.

It Begins

My darling daughter is only 9. Only 9, I say! Yet, the phone calls from the many best friends have already begun. Last night we were out and when we got home, not 1, not 2, but 3 messages- all for her. I am not sure that I am ready for this. We had only just started to let her talk for like 5 minutes on the phone and after homework and wow, do I need more rules? How will I deal with this? Seriously, I am so thankful that she has several good friends. Last year was a little tougher like that, moving to a new school and all. Maybe I need advice from my Mom. I know she always has some helpful wisdom for me. I guess I will count my blessings and set some parameters, that is what parents do. Right Mom?

Christmas in September

I know it is a little early, but we are so excited about Operation Christmas Child that we couldn't wait. We bought two plastic shoe boxes and filled them with toys! Our whole church is going to participate this year. I think it is such a huge blessing, that I had the kids use a couple of their own dollars, and then I pitched in to fill out the box of gifts! They are both excited to give a gift to a child who might not even have any toys. If you haven't done it before, click on the link and consider donating a shoe box to Operation Christmas Child! I may even do a few more boxes before the drop off deadline, it is so wonderful!

Knitting

I have been doing a lot of knitting lately... webkinz clothes and dishcloths (similar to this one), mostly for relaxation and maybe for a gift or two. I have tried several patterns for webkinz sweaters, after looking all over the web! They were extremely difficult to find. I found several at knitting pattern central that were meant for dolls and/or beanie babies. They came out ok, but I keep going back to the extremely quick and easy one that I created. Mollie doesn't seem to mind all of the webkinz sweaters and experimentation, it just means that her webkinz are accruing quite a wardrobe! Now to make some for Christmas gifts... I only wish I could find a great craft for boys to knit/crochet/craft/create for gifts. I have so many nephews!

Beyond knitting/crafting, we have really just had the first week of school after closings from TS Fay, and now we have our eyes on Hurricane Hanna and TS Ike to see where they might be headed.

Morning at our house

This morning I was awakened by a sweet voice saying "Mom, it's 6:59" (alarm was set for 7). Then she went to get ready. Alarm chimed. Another sweet voice came to wake me and said "you are the best Mom I've ever had" - yes that is his sense of humor. Then I got a sweet nose kiss. What a wonderful morning. I sometimes wonder what I will do when these days are gone and there aren't any sweet little voices to rouse me and get my day started out right? It just makes me realize that I need to enjoy the NOW! I picked NOW as my word of the year (Ali Edwards, a scrapbooker and blogger inspired me to do this). I had kind of let the NOW thoughts dull with the passing of the months, but this has rekindled my desire to enjoy the NOW. I will cherish them NOW... such a precious morning today. Here is my LO celebrating NOW as my word of the year:

Scrapbook Pages

Here are a few of the digital scrapbook pages I have done lately... some for challenges etc. When I see them all together it reminds me my scrapbooking "style" is a very eclectic mix of styles. I suppose that I scrap according to my moods or according to the photos/subjects of a page. I find it hard to do a whole album in the same style.

The Castillo in St Augustine

Here are a few of the pics of the Castillo de San Marco we visited in St Augustine, FL. It was an amazing place built in the 1600's by the Spanish.