Updates

We've been making progress on our house and its been awhile since I posted anything. So here is what our main living area looks like now. I made the curtains and my mother in law hemmed them up for me (she got 2 done) so I'm scared to do the other two because I'm good at screwing things up!! I made the pillow covers and I'm not really wild about the color/fabric choice but for the time being it will have to do. I wanted something super washable and kid friendly!

View from the kitchen. I want to put something in that other bowl on the table and add some more flowers to the tall one. Next time Hobby Lobby has a sale...

Our front door area. Nathan picked the rug out! Yay for him!

My super amazing mother in law finished the tractor quilt for Easton. He was so excited about it! I'm excited to start thinking of things to decorate his room with. Definitely some paint!

We are still not really that close to being done but I've found the slower I go the more I love what I find and end up buying. I want to paint a lot of places in my house because I'm not in love with the brown walls every where. I would also love to do some wanes coating in the piano room just to test it out.

Making Progress

Now that I have a place to hang my Book of Mormon stories quilt I am even more motivated to finish it! My mother in law came for a day last week and helped me piece it together (she did 90% of it!). I just finished the border today (a HUGE PAIN!!) and now I just have to applique the letters on. (it will say "Book of Mormon Stories"). Hopefully I'll have it done to give to Lynnette to get it quilted when we go to California for the Judd Family vacation in a few weeks. I can't wait to hang it up!

Stuff

Wow, it was a RAINY and STORMY week! We had rain every day...and not just a little bit. There was crazy wind that toppled trees and hail and TORNADOES! Yes, tornadoes in Southern California. Irvine (where Nathan works) was in the path of it. Thankfully no one was injured (not that I know of) but it was kind of scary! I didn't go out AT ALL really. The one day I did go out I straightened my hair and came home looking like this:

Awesome. My favorite are the little sticky outey hairs on the side of my head. I wish my hair wouldn't fall out after having babies.

I made some more ties:

I love my little boys

And I made this flower using this tutorial. I made it so I could wear it as a corsage or a hair thing. Super easy!

Lincoln just loves this construction hat and will walk around with it like he is the coolest thing ever.

Easton lining his trains up. Man this kid has been giving me a run for my money. Nathan had to stay with him in his primary class today because he was misbehaving. Help!

this is for my mom :)

So my sister in law is a master at altering clothes and adding cute embellishments on them...so after getting my sewing machine I wanted to try my hand at it. PLUS since I don't have girls I need to learn how to accessorize myself, something I am not good at.

I love this one. I burned the edges on it to give it the curled look.

This is my first attempt at a gathered flower

For this I bought a large tank top from old navy for $2. I cut it down to my size and used the scraps to make the flowers.

It's definitely addicting and fun! It's cool to create something unique and totally yours. I'm excited to keep learning this!

Oh and here is an example of the Book of Mormon quilt I am doing. It goes from this

see how there is an outline on this star?

to this:

All of the edges are tucked in

FUN! although maybe I'm doing too much at once?

A tie for my little guy

I have not really touched a sewing machine for YEARS, but I heard about this site that had this pattern for sale and I got really excited. With the help of my mom I made a couple of ties and I am in love! I've always wanted ties for my boys but I really never found them (I guess I am pretty lazy and cheap when it comes to clothes for my boys).



So excited to make more! I need to make Easton one now...or 10. I SO wish I had a sewing machine!

Layout of the Week

I love this picture of him crawling!


I have no desire to blog lately. I just can't think of anything to write about! We had a great weekend though! It was fun to relax. I took a 3 hour nap on Saturday...yes!!! Easton is cuter and cuter, and getting more and more frustrating at dinner time. I love it when he throws up his hands when he wants to us to ask a question. He also is obsessed with belly buttons. He throws up his hands and waits for us to ask "where is mommy's belly button" or "where is daddy's belly button" then he goes and actually pulls up our shirts to find it. HELLO! Hopefully he doesn't want to do that in public! :-) We played the XBOX this weekend. Nathan got a Tiger Woods golf game and I actually like it! Yesterday we went and looked at some homes up the street from us that were ridiculously priced. We will NEVER buy a home here! It's still fun to look though.

Check out the recipe of the week. I must add that I made the BEST hot chocolate EVER. With the leftover coconut milk from the recipe of the week I poured a little bit (just so it covers the bottom of my mug). Then I made the hot chocolate recipe off the back of the Hershey's Cocoa box (the one that makes 6 servings). Then I added a dash of cinnamon. Talk about YUM. Try it, if you like coconut, you'll love it.

Layout of the week

I like to have two facing pages to match, even if the event doesn't match, it makes me happier when I look at them. I like these layouts because of the bright colors and little details, and of course...it's simple!

Dilemma solved...somewhat

I think I figured out what to do about my scrapbooking dilemma! I have heard of it before and actually have made one for my parents, but it didn't really occur to me that it would be WAY cheaper, classy, and fun! You can make hardcover or softcover, and they have glossy, printed pages with your pictures on them. You can basically do whatever you want. I was talking to my sister-in-law Cheryl about my scrapbooking woes and she told me one of her friends just made a book about their trip to Spain or something and how cheap it was to do. So I looked into it and there are two websites that I found... blurb.com and mypublisher.com. I've downloaded both programs and I have started trying to make books. Blurb is actually WAY cheaper and has better layout options and better options all together, but it really slows up the computer. My Publisher is pretty expensive at 99 cents per page after the first 20, but it doesn't slow down my computer at all. Hmmmm.

Right now I am testing it and remaking my wedding book. (Nathan spilled water on the scrapbook that I made and every single page is completely ruined) so if I get that book and I like it, I will start this year doing our family books in this way. During the year I will put my pictures and journaling into the book and then order the book at the end of the year. and voila! My whole year is documented! Every kid that I have will have the first year scrapbooked for them, but after that it will go to the books. Seriously this is going to take a huge load off of me and I feel better already!

Layout of the week!

So I think I am going to start posting one of my favorite layouts every Sunday for any of your scrapbookers out there! I am always looking for layout ideas that have multiple pictures...since I have so many pictures, so I thought I'd share my ideas as well. BUT WHAT I AM HOPING is that all of my scrapbooking friends out there will do the same and post a fun layout every week too!

I am having a really hard time with the whole scrapbooking thing right now. I love doing it and I think it is a fun hobby, but then I think about how many albums I will have at the end of my life...what are people going to do with them? Hopefully save them, but seriously, lets say I do an album for every 2 years of marriage and I am married for 50 years before I die, that's 25 albums!!! THat is WAY too many! Plus the kids stuff. I am going to need like a whole room to store all these things! Does anyone have any thoughts on this? I also have a hard time with how long it takes. For our family albums I am doing the simplest, ugliest work ever, but it still takes TIME. Not to mention when I get back to doing Easton's that I'm 9 months behind on. AHHHH. is this just a waste of time? Any thoughts?

This one is an old layout that I did last year, but I still love how it turned out. It's simple and clean.

Photography Class Week 2

Here is the Challenge I did for this week. All about shutter speeds. They told us to get a glass and put it in the sink and here is what happened.

Slow shutter speed:


Fast shutter speed:


I am looking forward to the coming weeks when I can actually apply these things. I probably won't take very many pictures of water in glasses during my lifetime! :-)

Check it Out!

I was browsing my favorite scrapbooking website yesterday and I found this fabulous class! It's all about photography!!! 12 Weeks to Better Photos. I bought a new camera a couple of months ago that does a little more than your basic point and shoot and is not as high tech as those fancy schmacy SLR cameras...and WAY less expensive. But I don't know how to use all those extra features. So I did the first week's class last night and took the above picture! I always wondered how to do that. Now I know. Anyways, the best thing about this class is that it's free!!! And even if you have a basic camera, weeks 5-11 are for every type of camera, so you can join in! They are just on week one right now. I'm excited! I don't want to become "a photographer" but I do want to learn how to take better pictures. Just thought I'd share!

**editors note: Nathan looked at the picture and had no clue what was different about it. The background is not in focus, only the flower.

Finally!

I finally finished this little book for Easton. I was so running out of ideas and was so bored of the colors I chose by the end, but overall, I like it. I wanted something for him to look at during church and something that would help him get to know who loves him! :-)