Strawberries, Stripes, Snow, & Scrambled Eggs!!

Are you tired of pictures of sewing yet!!?? :)  Just getting a head start on sewing Callie's Spring/Summer clothes this month.  It'll be here before you know it and I want to be out ENJOYING the weather instead of cooped up in front of the sewing machine!  All this snow/ice keeping me home is a great motivation for me to stay INSIDE and sew.

Here is the latest addition to her spring/summer clothes.  This pattern was originally a shirt.  I lengthened it into a dress and added lacing on the sides. 

 We were looking for a pair of shoes to put on with this dress and she mentioned the ones I had stored up in her closet.  I couldn't believe they fit her already!!!  She's wearing size 11 now!!!  Where did my baby girl go???

 She loves it and I love the fit and the way it moves.

 Boys inside playing Webkinz on their snow day.

 Callie takes a turn playing a preschool computer game and YES she insisted on wearing her new dress today.

 UGH...the backyard is FULL of snow AGAIN!!!

 I ventured outside to take some snow pictures for a friend that doesn't get to see the snow.

 There wasn't a drop of snow yesterday morning...now there's a bunch......*sigh*

Simon made scrambled eggs for me today.  He brought it to me on this tray for my breakfast/lunch!!  Super yummy AND super-sweet of him!! :)

The 'Un-spectacular' Snow Pictures of 2011

These pictures aren't spectacular....I'm no budding photographer, nor do I have any desire to be....:)  Just thought I'd better cease my sewing projects for a short time to record a few photos of our snow.  So without further ado...........this is what the area right around our home looks like.....I'll have you know I nearly slid on my fanny out in the road trying to get pictures of the house and plummeted through layers of ice walking around the backyard!!!!  It was treacherous!!! lol

Our house.....

Duane having fun plowing the road...

Helping out the neighbors....

hmmmm....wonder who forgot to put on the grill cover!!!!!

View from the back door....

uh....yeah...I fell through the layer of snow/ice/snow!!!

Our Christmas Tree(that was a prize many years ago) gets bigger each year!!!

I love its snow-covered branches.

A short clip of Duane plowing our road....

Fruitcake & First Snow

Making fruitcake is NOT an annual Christmas baking tradition!!!  This is a once every few years thing I do.  On the spur of the moment, late Monday night, after a wild & crazy evening of making gingerbread houses(for which I still haven't blogged about), I declared Tuesday evening to be fruitcake making night!!!  I make a quick run to the store before picking the kids up on Tuesday to get the last few items we needed.  Here it all is ready to chop......Doesn't all that fruit look yummy!!!  I had wanted all the kids to help, but they took one look at all that ooey-gooey sticky fruit and ran away!!!  Seth was the only one brave enough to stay and help....

 All the fruit FINALLY chopped!  Seth is pouring the liquid ingredients over it....you can tell what he thinks of the mess!! :)

 This is a mix-with-hands project.....

 At this point Seth took over the camera and took probably a dozen or more pictures of my hands.....I won't bore you will them all.....

 And for all of those gasping at my bare hands touching the food....yes, I washed them first!!! lol

 At this point, my hands/fingers were exhausted!!!

 All mixed up....now to wash this goo off my hands!!!!

 All that hard work paid off.....beautiful fruitcakes await us for later!!

While I was talking to my sil on Skype, Callie took a break from her school work to play in the first snow of the season!!!  She was throwing little snowballs at the window where I sat. 

 Scooping up some snow off the hammock pillow that still hasn't made it into the trash can!!! It was damaged this summer and needs to be thrown out.  It did make a great place to scoop off some snow though!!!

 Wiping off all the snow.....

On a side note.....her brothers were sooooo disappointed when they got home from school and all the snow had melted!!!  They didn't get to enjoy playing in it!! :(  I'm sure they're will be plenty more a-comin'!!

LATE night motivation...and doing a happy dance....kids are back in SCHOOL!!!!!

I was motivated last night.  After spending the ENTIRE day cutting out, ironing & sewing heart-shaped items I was SICK of sewing, cutting, glueing, ironing hearts!!!  In fact, I decided I didn't like heart-shaped items anymore!!!  I spied this fabric basket on another blog and knew I just had to make a couple.  I did things a bit differently then the other one I saw, and am happy with the results.

The anticipation of my children going to school today, stirred up the creative juices quite late last night.  I finished one a little before 2:00 AM and put the finishing touches on the second one early this morning.  I used 17 different fabrics for each one.  Makes for a quite colorful basket.  I'm keeping the pink/brown lined one on my sewing machine to keep all my clippings/threads in as I'm sewing.  The blue dotted lined one was shipped out this morning for a missionary lady in our conference.  Hope she likes it!! :)

 

without flash you can see the colors better but it's quite fuzzy...

with the flash....it simply washes out all the pretty colors!!! :(  One of these days, I'll learn how to take a decent picture! :)

Now to get motivated to CLEAN my house!  Two days of being snow-stuck does WONDERS for the way a house seems to FALL APART!! :) 

Snow Day=Fun Day

Samuel carries a pile of snow.

I love this shot. Simon threw a handful of snow at his brother at the exact moment I snapped a picture of Callie.
Callie was not happy with the 'nasties' that kept blowing in her mouth. (snow-covered pieces of hair) :-)

Samuel & Callie had fun sliding in the snow-filled swimming pool.

Simon was not happy about being outside. He kept running away from the camera every time I tried to take a picture of him.

This is a wonderful shot of Callie that I'm sure one day she'll not be happy about! It's too cute. This was her first experience with wearing snow pants and boots while walking in piles of snow. When she fell down, she could hardly get up! :)

Samuel had fun making snow angels.

We took a walk to the store. Seth shoveled a path for us.

Simon takes over shoveling the path through our yard.

Finally arriving at the Dollar General Store. The clerk kinda looked at us funny when we all walked in with our snow stuff on. She probably thought we were crazy for walking through all that snow!

On the way home. We bought some animal crackers, a funfetti cake mix (to make cupcakes later), and a new game.

Now, just after I took this picture, something happened that made me very upset. An older man in a pick-up truck is going through the parking lot. I told the kids that a truck was coming and they needed to get out of the way. Usually vehicles stop for people walking in a parking lot. Did this man stop. NO HE DID NOT. He just beeps and beeps the horn, gesturing wildly for my children to get out of the way. He had his window open, so I yelled at him that he had no right beeping at my kids, they were moving as fast as they could to get out of the way. Now here is what REALLY TICKED ME OFF!!!! The man pulls out of the exit to the parking lot turns goes down the road 10 feet and pulls right back into the next entrance to the parking lot. NOW WHY ON EARTH COULDN'T HE GO AROUND US AND THE KIDS INSTEAD OF PLOWING RIGHT THROUGH US. Can you tell I'm a little worked up about it! :)

We are almost home!

Samuel has to try his hand at shoveling the yard!

Callie kept telling me, "I can make it, mom!"