Getting back on the horse

26 Monday Mar 2012

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Gosh, it’s amazing how fast life gets away from you!  Seems like I’ve been under the weather with one thing or another for the past month!  Definitely tired of being sick!  But I’m finally on the mend (I’m knocking on wood, I will not catch the next bug going around. I just won’t!) and hopefully can work on a few projects in the next few days. On my list:

- feather headpieces (for my sister-in-law’s wedding)

- a gorgeous burnt orange dress that I’ve been working on for a couple years and would really like to finish sometime soon!  Geez, it’s been longer than that! This was for before I was pregnant with Logan (4 years ago!) Yikes!

- another nursing cover for a friend

- more baby projects cuz the stuff is so darn cute!

- more jewelry (I even have new ideas! Not sure how well they’ll translate to the actual project but I am excited!)

- Easter projects (one that takes no brains or much forethought but I am SUPER-STOKED about I found at pinterest)

 

Even thinking of all this stuff makes me kinda want to get off the couch and get busy. But maybe I’ll do that tomorrow…  :)

Emily’s Birthday Necklaces

10 Saturday Mar 2012

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Welp, it’s Emily’s birthday!  So last week I bought some beads that made me think of her and put together four necklaces…

   

    

    

    

I did it with the intention of being able to wear them all together for the hip layered (I see it as junk draped on your neck) look that’s in right now. Maybe this is it?  I wouldn’t wear them together but then again, I’m never in fashion while the fashion is in.

So, take that for what it’s worth. Emily will wear them beautifully. Of that, I’m confident!  Happy Birthday Emily!

Logan Napping

06 Tuesday Mar 2012

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Today is the first nice day we’ve had in awhile and all the windows are open with a lovely breeze blowing through the house. And Logan wanted to keep his window open for nap – but usually his room is very dark for nap. He insisted.

And this is how I found him when I checked on him. Wrapped in the blanket with the most air inlet. Crazy kid!

The ABC’s – Letter E

02 Friday Mar 2012

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For letter E, I figured we have an easier time remembering…but it’s kinda the same story as D was…he can’t really remember what to call the letter. Though he identifies it as the one we’re on. Maybe this approach isn’t working???  I’ll keep at it for awhile but if this trend continues we may scrap it and try something else…what, I’m not sure yet.

There’s about a million “E’s” all over the house since there’s always a ton of E’s in the poster-letter packs – which is what we’re using for letters around the house.

The elephant we made really isn’t all that elegant – and Logan wasn’t sure what that meant. So he’s our Excited Elephant.

Lohg really doesn’t eat eggs. He’ll try them, as he does all foods. But he practically gags everytime. So I’m not forcing the issue on this food.

I also didn’t write “EAR” on his ear. We talked about it, but didn’t think it would be worth the trouble of labeling his tiny ear-lobe since it’s nearly impossible to see your own ear!

Kind of at a loss for “E.” Feel like I’m burning out! But maybe it’ll get better with the more exciting letters coming up :)

Letter E day:

  • Exciting Elephant paper craft (seen first at Totally Tots.)
  • Elephant
  • Eggshell Crafts
  • Egg-dying
  • Envelope
  • Eating
  • Songs: Do Your Ears Hang Low
  • Label “E” body parts: Ears
  • Special snacks: Eggs (hard boiled esp)

The ABC’s – Letter D

29 Wednesday Feb 2012

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Well…our household has been a bit under the weather lately. So the name of the game has been survival. In fact if you knocked on my door I would be mortified of the mess inside my house. *sigh*  But that’s just not as important as sleep and Logan’s play time.  But we’ve been slowly plugging through letters. Really slowly.

Letter D was virtually unknown to him for some reason. He always identifies it as the letter with a “straight line in back and one bump in front”. But can’t remember to label it as “D.”  Not sure why. But I finally moved on. Beating it to death isn’t going to help and we just weren’t progressing. Definitely on the list to re-visit later.

Anyway…for our D days we dug out the old dinosaur costume (he wore when he was about 1-year-old – we pretended it was a crocodile at the time) and he REALLY wanted to wear the whole costume. So we tried it on…

And unbelievably it went on!!!  I’m pretty sure he’s sporting a major wedgie under that tail though. He was in heaven until he started overheating.  We did a bunch of other activities, but I’m tired. So I’m going to list them below and post the picture of the “dangerous dinosaur” we made out of the letter D.

I sure hope we find some energy around here. We’re mostly well now, just still really tired!

Letter D day:

  • Dangerous Dinosaur paper craft  (see above)
  • Daddy
  • Dolphin
  • Dog
  • Deer
  • Dragonflies
  • Duck
  • Dragon
  • Diapers
  • Diamond
  • Donkey
  • Doctor
  • Dots
  • Doll
  • Dime
  • Dollar
  • Dancing
  • Songs: We Are the Dinosaurs
  • Label “D” body parts: Dimples
  • Special snacks: Doughnuts

Tummy Time Mat

26 Sunday Feb 2012

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I found this fabric for super cheap and knew that it would work great for a new baby so I tucked it away and figured I’d think of something to make with it!

But it’s not quite enough to make a quilt with…too big to waste on just burp clothes…hmmm….Then I decided on a tummy time mat (I know it’s completely unnecessary. But who cares?) So I padded it with an UGLY fleece blanket I wanted desperately to part with and stitched around each animal. Then backed it with a cloud-patterned flannel. Made a few tacks at random places so it wouldn’t turn funny when washed and voila!

Plenty big to roll around on when you’re still kinda immobile!

But small enough it’ll fit in the diaper bag to go!

Birthday Cards!!!

21 Tuesday Feb 2012

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This year we are going to be on a VERY tight budget for the first half of the year…but I still want to send birthday cards to all the important people in my life. But it costs to buy them. And it costs to make them. And it costs to send them. So….I went through all my junk on hand and did my best to create enough cards to send to everybody throughout the year. And I did it! Barely. And broke my “epic six” in the process :(   But it’s done and now it will only cost around $25 in postage. That I can live with!

I always like getting the handmade cards better anyway, so this will be an added bonus (I’ve never been able to make cards for everyone year-round…you just get too busy sometimes!)  I kept them simple, but since I sat down and thought of each person as I wrote them out, I think they’re still heartfelt and personalized.

I also made enough anniversary cards for every important anniversary. And if I can ever find all of my “baby” stamps I’ll make some new baby cards too for all the preggers people in my life! (I think I’ll try using machine stitching on these…wish me luck!)

Valentine’s Day

15 Wednesday Feb 2012

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Well…when you’re a mom sometimes the romance is small…and sometimes it’s just a day to celebrate love in all it’s forms!

We focused on Logan more this year. So I cut about 100 hearts and put them all over the house (we also skipped to letter V – can’t miss this opportunity! – we’ll revisit in order too). And put ribbon on the hand rail to try to catch his attention when he first got up. And it did!

The view coming down the stairs

He even started looking for all the new hearts that were all over the rest of the house…

And since it snowed before and it was pretty warm he got to play outside with a few of the neighbors. One dad even made a snow chair that was a big hit with the kids!

And then his Daddy had class until 8pm…so no date for us. But that’s okay. I gave Logan 20 bucks and he bought me pizza and snuggled with me while we watched a movie!  Pretty great day if I do say so myself!

 

P.S. The letters on the door are my example letters. His letters are hung in his room. (And there’s cut-out letters on the back of the bathroom door. He tends to take awhile to finish his business sometimes – useful space to subliminally teach :)

The ABC’s – Letter C

13 Monday Feb 2012

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We finished B yesterday so this morning I took down all the B stuff and slowly started putting C’s up. He had no interest in helping this morning really but that’s alright.

He’s always up for the project!  Today is a crab (seen first at Totally Tots.) He wanted him to be grumpy but I talked him into crabby since he’s a crab and all!

We talked about all the fridge items too (cow, chameleon, cat, cake, celery) and he helped me arrange the C’s on the fridge.  And he loves changing clothes – hence the hat and tie with gym pants – so there’s a bonus C for today!

Hey! Chin starts with C!

We wrote all the body parts on him (ones that he needs to look in the mirror to see, I write backwards so they look right to him). Cheek, Chin, Chest, and Calf.

For lunch we added cheetos and cheese to his plate for the letter C. For snack we’ll have carrots and cucumbers.

And it snowed last night (and still is kinda) so he wanted to spend time near the window today (especially because Daddy played out in the snow with him for 40 minutes!). So I got him to connect-the-dots without much persuasion today! (using Crayola Window Crayons)

He even made some dots for me to trace today (upper right).

We’ve also ready plenty of books. “The Icky Sticky Chameleon” made the C’s click best for him.

I really wanted to do a “cooking” activity or make cookies or cake with him. But with tomorrow being Valentine’s Day (and the huge box of candy (another C!) that Grammie sent in the mail…) I figured we’d had enough sweets without adding a batch of cookies to the pantry!

He definitely can identify a “C” without issue. Truly could before we even began today. But it’s such a tricky letter that it’s hard to make some connections…/ck/, /ce/, /ch/…they’re all c’s but they sound nothing alike…But at least we’re identifying and the rest will come in time!

 

Letter C day:

  • Crabby Crab paper craft  (see above)
  • Cats
  • Crayons
  • Cars
  • Clock
  • Clothes
  • Clouds
  • Caterpillar
  • Chameleon
  • Cake
  • Cookie
  • Cave
  • Cartwheels
  • Crawling
  • Clapping
  • Crab-walking
  • Songs: Who Stole the Cookie from the Cookie Jar?  If you’re happy and you know it (Clap your hands!)
  • Label “C” body parts: Calf, Chin, Cheek, Chest
  • Special snacks: Cucumbers, Carrots, Cheetos, Cheese

Curtain Tieback

12 Sunday Feb 2012

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So…we live in a row of townhouses. And we love our neighbors (which is great – I can only imagine the hell of living this close to someone you can’t stand!) but that means we know our neighbors. And care a little bit about what they think of us. So when my husband exercises in the morning he likes to have all the windows blocked to outside viewers as he does his video-workouts. Can’t blame him really.

But the curtains I made for our kitchen window weren’t really meant to be opened and shut repeatedly. We can only use tacks in our walls, so putting a real tieback is out of the question…hmmm…

Then I added a buttonhole and button!  Yay!  Now he can open or close them as many times as he wants without ripping the tack out of the wall!  It’s the small things that make a marriage happy.