outside

The other day I took photos of the girls for our Christmas cards. Ava was a turd the whole time.

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Emily just got home from school and after going to the bathroom, asked where her underwear were. I told her they were probably stuffed in her pants or on the bathroom floor. Well after searching for them it turns out I sent her to school with no undies on. Mother of the year here:)

only the best fudge ever!!

oh my, this has to be the best chocolate & peanut butter fudge ever! And I made it. I've never made fudge before and i really must pat myself on the back because this stuff is the BOMB. Jenny B makes the best chocolate fudge and I will forever be grateful to her and her fudge when I was in the hospital after having Ava. She brought me a big tub full and I think I ate it all. But this is the best peanut butter and chocolate fudge! Here's the recipe and I didn't alter it one bit! Even bought parkay like she suggested.

Yes, this is more projects from the Fa La La La Felt book! I think these two are what sold me on the book. They are perfectly weird and a little creepy and super cute! But I don't like mine as much as the ones in the book. My heads are shaped a little funny. I've already altered the pattern to be a little more round for the next time I try to make these. I did an awful job at sewing the hats on. I should probably redo that...

 This is what Frank does when I sew at my desk. He usually sits behind the sewing machine but I was hand sewing so he had more room. He would sit on a bed of tacks just to be near me.

I went ahead and bought the red coat pattern from the person I originally got the inspiration from. Look at the difference in size! Which do you like better? I'm not sure myself. Jon likes the bigger one. The small one should definitely have smaller buttons.

Momma coat and daughter coat.

Did you know that I'm not a fan of the blanket stitch? I think I was supposed to do that around the coat but I just really don't like that stitch to look at and I don't like to do that stitch. I should rephrase that. I don't like the stitch USUALLY. But sometimes it's ok.

             

1st snow. This is what I woke to. It wasn't much but it snowed!!!!

And below is Ava from this morning. Still in her night-night diaper but promptly out of her shirt! First thing she did was take it off.

I'm still reading the Sword of Truth series (I'm on #9 I think) and listening to Outlander for the 100th million time. Happy Thanksgiving! We went to Ikea and then ate some roast beef with mashed potatoes but no rolls becasue I needed to save room for the pound of fudge I'm about to eat:)

Eat, drink and get loaded

Maybe a year or so ago, I saw some napkins embroidered like these. I copied, pasted and printed out the idea and put it in my inspiration folder. Well I was going through it a couple of weeks ago and decided to just do it! I found these really pretty green 100% cotton napkins at the PX for $2.5 each. The embroidery is done on my Pfaff. And in case you can't read it, they say Eat Drink and Be Merry

They were easy to make but it did take 30 minutes each napkin. My thread broke several times and the bobbin ran out several times right in the middle of a word. Also, the feed dogs didn't move the fabric fast enough a couple of times so some letters got written on top of others. So these aren't something I would sell (not that it was even something I had wanted to do) but still good enough for a Christmas present.

The ones I had seen (on etsy? flickr? I didn't save the persons info) were on linen colored napkins with red thread which I would have preferred but this was the only color my PX had at the time.

After telling the girls to put ion their night-night diapers 15 times, they came out with them on.... just like I said. I should have specified which end.

oh and look! Ava has no pants on! 

Paper crafts

This paper pumpkin project was so easy and perfect for Emily to help with.

I think they would make great thanksgiving gifts like as a

thank you-for inviting-us-to-you-house-for-thanksgiving present. 

Made by the kids of course. Notice the garland? And the felted pumpkin/gourd?

The above craft is from here.

Emily colored everything and did most of the cutting herself.

Frank never gets air time so I thought I'd post a picture of him lounging on a baby doll.

Two owls, a fish and one polka dot

More wool felt ornaments from the Fa La La La Felt Book.

I don't even know why I'm making so many ornaments. It's probably becasue they are so easy, they are cute and quick. Instant (sort of instant) gratification.

I really wanted to do the hood over the owl eyes (they show it on the pattern) but I could not for the life of me figure out how. It's not a pattern piece but rather instructions saying "cut two half circles and put them over the eyes". I did that and it didn't work!  I might have had the eyes spaced to far apart....

Maybe when Katelyn and Laura get their books they can figure it out and email me:)

*aren't those eyes awesome?? They are old buttons and I think those are the only ones I have like it.

The fish is also from the book. I had such a hard time with his "scales". There are not really any instructions on that either. It just says to embellish as you want or something like that. I had to look up how to do that stitch (1st trying to find out what that stitch is even called becasue it doens't say it in the pattern). I have to say though that I bought this book when it was hot off the press as an e-book so they may have changed some things after hearing customers complain:) 

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I found an excellent way to get fabric polka dots on the wall!!! Steam-a-seam!!!!

Look at this idea!!! oh man this is cute! And it would be sooo easy!

You don't have to sew to make fabric decals you know....And if you have access to a die cut machine (that was for my sister and Jenny B who are teachers)...

Here's a close up of the circle. the edges are barely frayed and the only reason mine has some pulled threads is becasue when I cut it I didn't cut all the way through in that area when cutting my circle.  I used steam-a-seam, then using a large circle template, cut out a circle. I then peeled off the paper backing, put the circle on the wall and ironed directly on the wall. So far it's not fallen off and doesn't feel or look like it's going to fall off. I've had it up there for 5 days now. I just took it off and it left only a tiny residue in one spot and I was able to scrap that off with my nails. So I think this is how I'll do it!

 

Did you notice the watermark on my photos?? I stumbled upon this tutorial and found it easy to do even though it's for Photoshop Elements and I have Photoshop CS5 and the buttons are different! It made me search and now I know my program a little better.

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Emily stayed home yesterday after throwing up on the bus Wednesday. Ava had a temperature of 102 on Wednesday and yesterday was soooooo horribly cranky. We put the girls in strollers and went for a long walk with them super bundled up. Ava fell asleep and when we got home we woke her up. She was so CRAZY and unreasonable. She wanted her shoes, socks, fleece lined overalls, puffy coat, mittens and beanie left on (inside the house) and when her beanie would start to slide off she would scream. When her shoes fell off she screamed. It was a nightmare:) you couldn't pick her up or touch her. She literally laid face down on the living room floor screaming for I don't know how long. This is so typical of her. If she's in a pissy mood don't touch anything! Don't move anything! I moved her doll house from one side of the living room to the other while she was having this fit and she screamed to put it back (that was pretty funny)! Yesterday was a rough one:) But I did make chocolate chip muffins for us and the bus driver. I put peanut butter chips and piped peanut butter frosting into the middle of them but not for the bus driver. She's german and germans for the most part don't like peanut butter.

Roller Skate

Wool felt roller skate ornament!  I know the wheels look a little funny but I had no imagination when it came to those. That's the only place I used acrylic (sparkly)felt. I adapted this pattern. This is the same person who inspired the red coat except for the skate I actually bought her pattern. I would have bought the red coat pattern had it been for sale when I 1st looked at it but it was only for sale in kit from (from what I saw) and I didn't want the other ornaments. Then the other day I saw on another blog that she had down-loadable PDF's for sale so i got the ice skate. Oh well about the red coat. It would have been nice to just have a pattern instead of make my own.

I love to roller skate and ice skate.  In the early 80's, the movie Ice Castles had been out for a couple of years. I LOVED that movie and wanted to be the blind figure skater (she was so cool)! Me and my friends would pretend we couldn't see while trying to skate. I swear I had a pair of skates that looked just like these.

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When looking up the movie on IMDB it of course comes up in German and the title came up as "Eisfieber". I'm thinking, shouldn't it be Eisburg? And then made myself laugh becasue the movie would have been called Iceburg. I don't know, made me laugh. "Fieber" means fever in English ....

This is with a ball on the toe but I'm not sure it looks ok.

The butt.

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Emily had the yuck yucks on the school bus this morning. Really bad. It was in her shoes and hair and on her jacket and pants. I had to go get  her from the school. The bus driver pulled over to clam her down and clean her and the bus. I feel so bad for the bus driver I'm thinking of taking her a roll of paper towels and some cookies when Emily goes back to school. The bus driver was just telling me that I have the sweetest child and she's so good, etc. etc. and then she goes and throws up on her bus!

A mixer cover

I finally made a mixer cover! Finally! It's not exactly what I wanted but it'll do. It's really thick (hard-to-sew-on thick) vinyl or coated cotton in very 70's or is it early 80's colors? All I know is this make me think of our house in Oceanside with the mustard color fridge (I hope I'm remembering that correctly. Something was that color!) and brown cabinets. This print though is anything but early 80's. It has dear, mushrooms, squirrels, and hedgehogs.

I had started out sewing the seams to the outside using the brown colored bias tape but the stuff is so thick my stitches on the bobbin side were baaad. Anyone know why this happens? That's one reason I stopped making the bibs. So I took the tape off and sewed the seams wrong side together like you see it in the photo. I did use bias tape around the bottom. I used the pattern from here (instructions here and pattern here) and it was so EASY. Had I used cotton I would have lined it and put a pocket for the manual on the outside (like this one or like the one made by kitchen aid)

I don't think I showed the below quilt since I changed it up a bit. I went back, ripped out squares and sashing to add wee gnomes. I saw someone had done it on flickr and had to do it on mine! Right now it's at the quilters being quilted. I opted not to do it myself because of the trees and I wanted special stuff and I'm not experienced enough on the long arm to do it.

Boy gnomes above and girl gnomes below. I used this paper piecing pattern and tutorial. It's soooo easy once you get the hang of it. look at her store on etsy. She has new Halloween paper piecing patterns that I want just bought because they are $5 on sale from $7 in her store (not the etsy store)! So cute! Emily's going to love the monsters!!

And I don't think I ever showed or at least talked about the polka dots I had painted on Emily's wall when she was about 1. These were so easy. I cut holes on quilters template (thin flexible plastic) using a scraping booking paper circle cutter. I actually cut several holes at random on one sheet so i could make several dots at once. Using blue painters tape (my very best sewing friend) to hang it on the wall and using acrylic craft paint in the color butter I think and a sponge brush, dabbed and filled in the holes. Then moved the sheet to a new spot and did it again. This method of using quilters template isn't the best as the paint can leak around the edges and not form a perfect circle but it is faster than tracing each circle then carefully painting them in. Anyone know of a better way? I would love to do it again although Jon wouldn't. We had to paint over it (as you can see in the picture) before we moved out. It took two coats and it went fast so what's he crying about? I just had a thought that maybe I should try fabric decals.This person used cornstarch but I thought you were supposed to use actual starch? Anyone? I wonder how my German walls would like that! Do any of my friends that have lived over here know how that stuff does on the German walls? They are so porous and wall-papery. I'm afraid it won't come off.

I just wanted to show a picture of Ava and how she can't keep her clothes on. This was one of our drives to Schweinfurt loaded up with household stuff. I looked back and she had done this with her shirt. She also had taken off her socks and shoes. She does this ALL the time!! She tried to take off her clothes at Emily's parent teacher conference. One gross thing she tries to do now is take off her diaper and dump the contents in the toilet after she poops. The 1st time I caught her doing this I almost had a heart attack! I mopped the floor good that day:) I feel like I maybe should have covered her boobies in photoshop with stars or something. Does anyone feel violated?

Jive Turkey

A turkey placemat (idea from here). Emily cut out almost everything and I sewed it. She made her own pattern for the feet! I used a large dinner plate as a template for the turkey body. I wanted it large enough to use as a place mat like the pottery barn kids ones. I used wool felt for all of it.

It's a little hard to look at all the wobbly cutting and not want to correct it (I actually did some. Some pieces were so jaggedy your eye was drawn to it). I used contrasting thread because 1. it made it so much easier and 2. it looks like something a kid would do.

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I did use really awful wool blend felt from woolfeltcentral.com for the backing on the turkey body. It was hard to due becasue I want the whole thing to look good even when turned over but I have to get rid of it sooo I used it. I wont show it. It's ugly.

Every time I look at this ship from pottery barn kids I think of Jessica. It looks like something she'd see there and then go home and make it  but better.

On the way home from the bus stop yesterday I had Emily stop and take off her jacket...

So I could get a picture of this outfit!! Isn't she the most cutest??? I scored a huge deal on LOTS of Gap Kids uniform stuff from the nicest ebayer ever. This jumper is my favorite. I like Ava's facial expression in the one above. It was SO windy and cold.