First Day

A gift made by Claire

Today was our first official day of Christmas vacation. Some of us read, sewed, played with cars, and baked. We had two-o-clock (herbal) tea time accompanied by these precious little jam cookies Claire and I made for the occasion.

They were easy to make and yummy with tea, or hot chocolate!

Our plan for tonight is to drive around and look at Christmas lights - with some sort of treat of course! We did this in my family growing up, and I loved it! Love this time of year!

It's Done!

I finished the embroidery on the pillow case last night while watching "Malcolm in the Middle" on TeenNick TV. Funny, funny show. Anyway, it's done and here it is.

The pillow and mattress - I choses a Rose theme for obvious reasons

I am so pleased with how the painted Rose on the cradle turned out.


The lighting isn't that great, you can't really see the patterns on the fabric. Maybe I'll try taking another picture later.

I had fun working on it, but I'm glad it's done. Ryan thought I was a little bit crazy for spending so much time on it, but that's me. I wanted something beautiful because it would be sitting out in the girls' room and frankly, it's fun to make tiny things for a baby doll. I can make that quilt I've been thinking about forever, but on a small scale that's done quickly!

Snow Day Projects

So this is the second day this week school has been canceled. I usually don't mind it - we always stay busy with projects around the house. Monday, we made gingerbread cookies, I pieced a quilt, we worked on our Christmas puzzle, the kids and I watched fun movies, etc. It was a good day considering we were all trapped inside our little house. Oh and the kids went in and out of the snow a couple of times, resulting in a lot of snow on the kitchen floor, and gloves and hats everywhere you looked. It will truly be a wonderful day when all of the kids can get themselves ready to play in the snow by themselves!

Rose liked the cookies, but the icing was the best part

The project of choice today was finishing Christmas presents. Rose will be getting a nice baby doll from her grandparents for Christmas, and in the spirit of this gift, Claire and I have been busy making "gifts" for the baby. I made a small quilt, mattress and pillow to put inside a repainted cradle I bought at an antiques store. Claire and I stenciled a rose on the cradle today. I'm finishing embroidering the tiny pillow-case today and when it's all done, I'll post a picture.

I have to admit that every time I see the little cradle and bedding, it makes me giggle with delight! It all turned out SO cute!

Our Bread and Butter (literally)

The roads have been cleared, the snow is melting (barely) and my husband is back at work, allowing me to do a little blogging. I did take lots of pictures of our snowed-in weekend, but the camera is really taking lousy pictures, and my photography skills, or lack thereof, doesn't help the matter.

To keep the kids busy on Thanksgiving Day, I had the kids make the butter by shaking cream in little jars. It was so easy and so good, that I think we'll make it a Thanksgiving tradition. It isn't really economical to make butter this way, but it sure was a treat.

After the buttermilk is poured off - you get lovely butter
...and yummy buttermilk for pancakes the next morning!

And what goes better with homemade butter, than homemade bread? So good!

I really do love to bake, but limit my sweet baking to once a week for Family Home Evening. The kids have a great time "helping" - actually, Claire is quite helpful now, getting ingredients and reading the recipe as I mix. And Rose? Well she just enjoys sitting on my mixer, or as she calls it, her boat.
Happy baking this season!

Catch Up

I realized that I didn't put up a picture of the kids in their costumes. I know this is not the best picture, but believe it or not, it's the only one I have of all three kids. Claire was Kirsten - one of the American Girls, William was a ghost (he likes fuss-free costumes) and Rose was a ballerina.

I don't have much of interest going on here. Claire has been home from school with the flu and Ryan has it too. So that pretty much keeps me busy. I had to take Rose with me to Young Womens tonight so that Dad didn't have to deal with her. Rose was very happy and loved the attention.

It's just that time of year again...lots of medicine and trips for more medicine!

And here's a picture of me cutting Claire's Troy (from HS Musical) doll's hair; someone gave it to her for her birthday. He looked a like a girl, so I gave him a little trim. I know you can't tell from the picture, but I was humming "We're All in This Together" as I clipped ;)

Rosie Update

On her 2nd birthday, at the zoo. The guinea pigs were the only animals she was interested in.

I know, can you believe your eyes? It's been several months since I've been on here. Blogging fell way down on my list of things to do; towards the bottom, really. But I have lately been missing it and wanted to post some funny pictures of my girl, Rose. She had her birthday in October and is now two years old. I love hearing her talk and she is learning new words daily. Thankfully, she is less "busy" and plays with toys a little more. But there is still a lot about her little personality that keeps me busy. Love this girl!






Hopefully, I can stay a little more up-to-date on here, but I'm not promising anything. Our remaining computer runs very slowly, so all of our pictures are on an external hard drive. So in order to access any pictures, I have to plug in the drive, making the computer run even more slowly. It is quite the process. So there you go: my lame excuse...