Six, Silky Soupies for
Sleeping Sweet Sally Jane
who is snuggling with a snoring swine.
My little Sally Jane is obsessed with soupies. She has Purple one, a White one from Grammy, a mini white soupie from my friend Kim G., a yellow one she got for Christmas, a white one with ruffle edge and green one she pulled out of my embroidery stash that were to monogrammed and given as baby gifts - and yesterday she carried them everywhere with her. When she went to bed I had to take a photo of all 6 of them stacked up on top of her. She slept with her Valentine Fairy gift of the snoring pig. Have you seen these they are so funny. She tucks the pig next to her cheek so that the flapping ear hits her face until she falls asleep.
I even found a video on youtube.

before i put them to bed last night I found all three of them having a Sister Power pow wow underneath the comforter on the top bunk. These are the photos I got by sticking my camera under there.It was 10:30 - way past their bed times but they were waiting for Jeff to come home to do the nightly wrestling match. Sally Jane could not stay up any longer and asked to be put to bed. As for Caroline and Annie Kate they were geared and ready to do. Here is a photo of Caroline flying in the air getting ready to land on Jeff. She totally won the night. Me and the girls made a much needed visit to the library and here a few books I picked up that I recommend for you crafty gals to glance at.
The first one is B is for Baby by Suzonne Stirling. This book is packed full of great craft ideas that can be adapted for any age, but wonderful if you want to make something handmade for a baby gift.

These were darling matchbox announcements

and they have great patterns for little felt shoes too.

I picked up this button jewelry book by Susan Davis and I have looked through it 5 times already!But this book is a must to put on your library list! (please tell me you all have your local library bookmarked online so you can just have your library hold it for you - it is the way to go)
***edit. from Amy's comment. My library does not carry all these fun books on the shelf either. But you can request any book from your library. They will find it from other libraries or often order it in if it is new. That is why it is so key to work them online, just email them a list!

Kitschy Crafts - A celebration of overlooked 20th century crafts
This book is AWESOME. If I had my own business or was starting my own business I would run to get this book. Bringing back vintage crafts could make you some serious money.

but they had the pattern for these GRAPES. My grandmother had these in her basement window and made them in Relief Society at church. oh my i can't believe they have how to make them in this book. I so want to make them, but the instructions were a tad overwhelming. they even had a pineapple made out of them. Ok these in pink.... are calling my name.

. . . . . . . . . .

Has anyone made these glass grapes before?
Does anyone in my family know what happened to grandma's grapes?
Have you seen that snoring pig before?
Am I crazy for letting my kids stay up to wrestle with their dad?
. . . . . . . . . .

do you love my sewing machine cover, handmade by Mindy

Pick up these books.

I had pre-ordered these two books on amazon 5 months ago and had forgot about them, so when they came in the mail the other day I was thrilled and surprised.

Bend the Rules of Sewing
written by Amy Karol with Angry Chicken

Simple Sewing with a French Twist

• If you want to learn how to sew these books are for you.
• If you know how to sew these books are for you.
• If you don't know how to sew but want your kids to learn how these books are for you.
• If you want to make some handmade gifts these books are for you.

Your library may not have these yet, but you can request that they get them in, it may take awhile, but worth a try. But put these on your Christmas/Birthday wish list.

Jeff's Father's Day breakfast this morning.

Father's Day 2007

'To a father growing old nothing is dearer than a daughter.”

To be a successful father...there's one absolute rule: when you have a kid,
don't look at it for the first two years.

~ Ernest Hemingway

Jeff was again a sport in wearing his homemade tie that the girls made. I think we now have 6 of these. This year we put on shrinky dinks of their art work, I will do this again for sure. This year was our second year sewing on the bells.... poor guy. the sliver charms from the craft store were great and so cheap.

and huge congrats to my dad who did his first (of many) half marathons in
Durango, Colorado, yesterday. Way to go Dad we are all so proud of you!

The More we get Together...
The happier we are

Tonight I spent 6 hours at the church, the ward close to our house, helping the senior girls for next year make their senior quilt. It was such a brilliant idea to team up one senior with a sewer to work together.
I got one of the cutest girls who also is one of the assistant swim coaches on AK's swim team.

We did foundation piecing with preprinted squares that you buy by the yard. the colors of the quilt were pink and green, so fun to work with fabrics you love!

This was the flavor table that we got to pick the sequence of our blocks.

This is the back of the block after it has all been sewn. If you can sew a straight line - you can make this quilt. (top photo shows them after they have been cut)
these are the block me and my senior got done.

some of the A day's girls were working on flag quilts.

But the best part of the night was Annie Kate's sweat shop she had set up in the corner. I brought her machine and a chunk of fabric and ribbon for her and the other girls to make whatever they wanted. She was the only one who knew how to completely thread the machine and fix the problems is things got stuck and such. I told her to just do what ever she wanted but that I really needed to focus on getting these block done on the other side of the room.

So Annie Kate started teaching some of the other kids how to sew. She had them sit on her lap because the chair was too low to the machine and it was easier for them to do it. (oh my I ran to the other side of the room to snap this shot and was just crying I thought it was so cute)

The girls got easily distracted with playing and dancing to high school musical in the center of the room. AK kept sewing away to finish a project.
she then walks over the the grown ups to show us her finished project.
a patchwork back from her fabric stash! Even the seniors were excited about it. So then the other girls asked Annie Kate to make them one too. So until 11:30 at night, there she was making 3 bags for the other girls. She would have them pick out the ribbon for the handles and what they wanted on the front and back. I used to have a business doing this for other people and watching and listening to her was just something out of movie. It was so cute to hear her.

So she sat and sewed while the other girls played. I was just so proud to see how well she could cut, piece and sew the fabric. On the way home she said it made her feel good to know something to be able to teach others.
It was a great night

AK also had a coach's pick swim meet today and swam freestyle and the butterfly and then was asked to swim in the team relay at the end of the meet. Me and the drowning victims stayed home but Jeff said she did great. The night before the meet she said again, "i am a little nervous, I have no idea what I am doing" just imagine how great she will swim when she does know what she is doing!

Teacher gift.

I really don't mean to beat a dead horse (where did that saying come from?) with this money teacher book, but I did it for my 4th year in a row and again I walked away saying, "worth every minute"
This is now my third post on the subject, (more detailed instructions here) but I learned some new things this year and wanted to show off a couple of other bloggers who also tried it out. Cara & Andrea . If you have done it let me know, I would love to hear the results. Cara's friend also tried it and just had to share this email I received.

I just got back from taking my daughters teacher the book. She started to open it and once she realized what it was she broke down into tears. She could not believe it and she just kept saying over and over "this is incredible". She started going through it and would read one and start laughing and then cry a little more. She is 52 years old and said, "I have never seen anything like this before".

This year the class donated about $150, so we had to change it to "150 things we love about you..."

I did find this awesome stack of quotes that to me made it that much more special. You can find these at any craft or scrapbook store and they come in different themes. This one is on education and has awesome quotes on vellum paper. The same width as a dollar bill (OK a little smaller in length)
It was so easy to stick in between the dollars and quotes from the kids.

Also, Cara, did remind me that to get brand new money from a bank you may have to order it and could take 2 to 3 days. I forgot to put that in my original instructions. This year luckily they had enough there, but that has never happened before.

here is a photo with the vellum paper.

This year I printed the title on vellum and then had it over a cool floral paper that I had adhered to chip board.

and of course the polka dot ribbon finishes it off!

my favorite answer:
What I will miss most about Mrs. Lee
That I wont' hear her voice any more.

Mrs. Lee has the softest, sweetest voice you have ever heard and a few of the kids wrote about it.

Then at the last minute before I cut my printed pages, you should be able to get three to a page of the kids quotes, I ran to the copy center and copied them and bound them in a book for the Principal. I wrote him a note from the parents in our class telling him how wonderful we thought our teacher was and thought he might like to hear what the students had to say about her.
I then put it in a plastic popcorn bucket ($1 store) with some candy, popcorn and a blockbuster gift certificate. We have a great principal!

these are the forms that had been returned to me. I suggest a few things when sending the forms and trying to get them back.

1. copy them off on obnoxious green, yellow or orange paper, so that they will remember what it is when they see it lying around their house and remember to send it back to you
2. the envelope that i sent it had two things printed on the front each with a check box. to : Mrs. Lee's best second grader with a small box to: Kristi (Annie Kate's mom) then they had an envelope to send the answers back in and could just circle my name so that it would find it's way back to me
   
3. don't give the parents more than a week to get filled out and send back.
4. also send a email that they can respond to. (not everyone in our class has email, so this didn't work that well this year. )
   

Here is what I had typed on the form
You can copy and paste this for next year

For Mrs. Lee's end of the year gift, I will be compiling a handmade book. The size of the book is the same size as a dollar bill. every other page will be a dollar bill and the other pages will be the questions and and answers with your child's name on them. She will be able to easily remove the money and then be left with a treasure of thoughts from her 2007 2nd grade class.
Please fill out this form with your child and return in the original envelope and mark to Your Name here along with any donation,(cash or check) by THIS FRIDAY, June 1st)
Write whatever they say even if it does not make sense,
don't worry about correcting the way they say it.
If everyone donated at least $5.00 we would have $100.
If you can not donate, please fill out the questions anyway.
the cover of the book will read
100 reasons why we love Mrs. Lee

I then just had to share some of my favorite answers this year :


What I will miss most about Mrs. Lee
her niceness
she makes us do our best
is her smile
her compliments to me
I won't hear her voice any more

Mrs. Lee loves me because
I try my best to respect everyone
I am neat, I listen and I do what she says
I am one of her students
I am self controlled
I am creative
I am a good student, sometimes

I love Mrs. Lee because
She changes our desks every month
she is honest


This Year Mrs. Lee taught me
how to multiply, divide and how to be a great owner of a butterfly
my map skills
when a butterfly comes out of it's crystalis it shakes


What I will never forget about Mrs. Lee
she is from Korea like me
she cared for me
her wedding pictures (she got married this year)

Mrs. Lee lives
near the hospital (this year she was really sick)
in Georgetown
with her husband
in a place you couldn't have wished for, like a palace

Mrs Lee's favorite thing to eat for lunch
over half the class said Blueberries

Baby Shower Invite.

I made some Shower invitations this weekend and thought i would share the idea and a few things I learned.
I used the Scrapbook Factory Deluxe program. The card is finished 5x7". I always print two to a page. The graphics used in this card are from Two Peas in a Bucket and are the font called "Oh Baby" I printed the the card of white Presentation Paper from HP. I can not emphasize enough what a difference it makes to use this paper!


I cut the white paper to 4 3/4 " x 6 3/4". I cut a piece of chip board 5x7. this gave 1/8" border on the card of chipboard. You can cut chipboard on most paper cutters.
Then my new discovery that I had to share are the Cuttlebug embossing plates!! I cut a large scallop oval out of the Marvy Large Scallop punch. I cut it out of the old fashioned construction paper. I am in love with construction paper lately. it is so easy to print on and it is soft and has texture. Then I used the It's a boy embossing plate. In my Sizzix machine. (you must use the system converter when using embossing plates) Right now Sizzix machines are like $30 at Michael's, I think they may be discontinuing them.
I used brown grosgrain ribbon on the center of the card, glued on with a glue stick. But recently I saw Martha Stewart show putting ribbon in the xyron machine to add adhesive to it. Great idea! I cut the ribbon too big on each side and then trimmed it after it was glued on.
then i learned something big. when you use a glue stick on construction paper, it will be turn the paper yellow in about 24 hours. so i had to use pop dots to adhere the scallop embossed paper to the ribbon. Which was good because it looked a lot better to have it raised up.
I am a huge fan of typing the name and address on the envelope with graphics. It makes it so fun to get in the mail. Graphic is also from the same "oh baby" font.
Then on the back I used the duck in a light blue and layered the address on top of it. On your SFD program, click Arrange and then click send to front.

So there you go! These would also make great birth announcements. If anyone has SFD and wants me to send them the file I am happy to do so. You could just punch in your information.

Thanks to Elizabeth who introduced me to the new Jamestown Stamp, I used these stamps on the envelope. (Remember I am OCD and everything has to match even the stamp!) they were perfect they are blue and brown and I love how big they are. If you live in Virginia, I would buy these up and save them for your Christmas Cards.

*** my other tip is that when doing any invitation go to Fine Stationery.com and get great ideas for wording. or just Google "baby shower invite wording" it is a huge help.

still just $1.00

so if you thought the hats were cute, I guess I should tell you about the $1.00 swimsuits I found too. they didn't have any my girls size, but they did for some girls I know...

and Michelle you were right, Polka Dot ribbon makes anything look cute.

Wondering?

So what do you do when you find a really great deal on something that you know all your friends would want to know about.

like finding darling hats for just $1.00

then you come up with the idea to sew some polka dot ribbon on them

and you know these would make great mail and birthday gifts because they would fold up nice and flat in an envelope

but if you tell all your friends you found them at the dollar store and they go buy them, then it may not be as fun to get them in the mail.

but you feel so happy finding a great deal, you just want to shout it from the roof tops so your friends can feel that same kind of joy and have cheap, darling gifts to give to their friends.
so I am torn - what do I do?