So What, I Peeked!?!!

Of course I peeked into my present from Evander!  It's just what I do.  :-P

Evander was soooooo excited for school on Thursday because it was the day his class was allowed to shop in the Santa Secret Shop.  :-)  Multiple times during the bedtime process, he would ask, "My money's in my bag, right???"  It was so fun to watch him leave Thursday morning (usually, kind of sad to see him go), but he would put on the tease of, "I can't tell you what I'm getting you."  :-)

Once he ran off the school bus and came inside at the end of the day, he dumped his bag and all of the goodies with it.  He gave me my present and told me to open it now!  I really tried to explain to him that I wanted to wait so that Mommy had something to open on Christmas Day.  We settled on opening the gifts from him on Christmas Eve.

I knew right away what it was...small, square box.  I tried to drop hints all week:  "Mommy doesn't have pierced ears," "Mommy doesn't really wear jewelry," "Boy, I sure do wish I had a calculator that worked!" ;-)  I just thought, I didn't want to get stuck with a piece of chincy jewelry that I would feel obligated to wear a lot.  Evander didn't get the hints.

But, last night, when I opened the box, the ring just became sweeter, and I fell in love with it.  Granted, he may have been convinced by the mom helper to pick a ring...or convinced by his buddy, Brycen, who bought his mom a ring...but, *this* is what my son lovingly picked for me and this is what he is so eagerly anticipating giving me.  I love it.

I can't wait to hug him on Christmas Eve and thank him for it.  I can't wait to wear it with happiness that he is my son and as a reminder of our love for each other when he is at school.  Almost like an engagement ring, huh?

O, Christmas Tree Trip Ornaments

I'm just looking at my Christmas tree, and I love it.  I hope it stays in its shape and form throughout the Christmas season.  Ha.

Last year's tree

You just never know with boys and a little curious girl in the house!  Oh, and neighbor friends...and a cat...and trying to get the laundry basket in the little foot-wide path we have between the tree and the couch.  :-P  I am ever increasingly afraid to put the breakable ornaments on, of course.  I had one of my favorites break last year when the tree crashed to the floor.  :-/  But, things breaking are a part of having little kids.

I love pulling each ornament out of the box and remembering where it came from and who I was with at the time.   I had to move lightning fast this year as three pair of little hands were very interested in helping me and pulled out ornaments at their pleasure.  New this year, was that Evander wanted to put a little tree in his and Emory's bedroom, so he was pulling the ones out that he liked and claimed them for his tree.  Let it go, Michelle....let it go....

So here is a little stroll down memory lane.  There are certainly many, many more ornaments on the tree that I treasure, but this was fun to remember the trips we've been on.

Captiva Island 2004

Obviously, this ornament came from Captiva Island from our Honeymoon.  My camera got lost in the wedding shuffle and I ended up not having it for this trip!  :-(  I had to buy a stupid disposable camera, which took really lousy pictures.  It still upsets me!  Ha.  :-(  Oh well...guess we'll have to go back some day soon.  

New Hampshire/Massachusetts 2005

I got this ornament from the Yankee Candle Flagship store in Deerfield, Massachusetts, just down the road from where my sister lived at the time.  Nick and I went to visit his brother and sister-in-law in New Hampshire first, then to my sister and brother-in-law's in Massachusetts.  We visited Hampton Beach, Portsmouth, the UMass campus and lots of hidden places in The Valley.  I was three months pregnant with Evander and we hiked 7 1/2 miles with my sister (phew!  Hard work being pregnant), therefore, there is a picture of Nick carrying me on his shoulders...ha!.

Arizona 2006

We visited Nick's parents in Arizona before Christmas when Evander was 14 months old.  Can I just say how simple it is to have one child?  Man, I'm looking back on these pictures and goodness.  Although, you think it's difficult at the time.  The ornament is from the Casa Grande gift shop, one of the first things we did on the trip.  It is one of those hand-painted-on-the-inside ornaments.  We also visited Saguarro National Park, The Grand Canyon, the PHX Zoo lights and went to a church from which I received the thimble ornament.  It represents that we only really know a thimble full compared to what God has planned for our lives.

West Virginia 2008

We got together with all of Nick's extended family for a family reunion at Black Water Falls in Tucker County, West Virginia.  I rode seven hours sharing the middle seat sandwiched between two car seats in the back of my in-laws' truck.  Ouch!!!  I consider that one of the craziest things I've ever done.  What a BEAUTIFUL place.  Oh my.  It's breathtaking.  The mountain laurel was in bloom (pictured above) and there were rhododendrons everywhere!  Getting ready to bloom, sadly, they likely did about a week after we left.  We had an awesome time together hiking, whitewater rafting and just hanging out.  We didn't see any black bears, but they are supposedly abundant.

Arizona 2008

Again, we were blessed to visit Arizona at Christmas time.  This ornament was from Popper & Cinder to Emory, and he was asking for it as soon as we brought the ornament boxes in this year. We visited Saguarro National Park, Tombstone, Montezuma Castle and the Red Rocks of Sedona.  The trip ended on a crazy mountain road in snow/rain mix in the dark, peeing on the side of the road, and poor Emory got carsick.  :-(  That's another crazy experience.  All my crazy times seem to happen with the Fedors!  Just kidding.  ;-)

Cincinnati 2009

Thank goodness there's spell check because I can never remember if there are to n's or two t's in Cincinnati!  We went to Cincinnati to visit Entertrainment Junction, but we went to the zoo and Skyline, of course!

Cincinnati 2010

And we went back to Entertrainment Junction a year and a half later!  The boys love trains and this is such an awesome place for train lovers.  Note that this trip, there is one more passenger!  :-)

I sure didn't buy an ornament when we were in Arizona this year!  Bummer.

***UPDATE***

I sure did buy an ornament in Arizona this summer!  It's been staring at for four and a half months above our kitchen table.

Must have been camouflaged

Arizona 2011

We visited Arizona during the hottest time of the year.  It's completely fine as long as you do indoor things in the afternoon, and have a swimming pool nearby.  :-)  So yeah...we were in the water so much, Nick got sick of the pool!  Evander learned to swim by the end of our week-long stay, which was awesome.  We did cowboy stuff, Nick and I got away to a hotel, and we visited the Grand Canyon where Nick hiked to the bottom and back up to the top in one morning.  I thought the ornament was a Ringtail when I bought it, which is a Canyon animal, but when I read that tag once we got home...it's a RACCOON!  Sure didn't need to go all the way to the Grand Canyon for a raccoon.  Ha.

Hers, Mine, Ours

Her deerie

My deerie.  Will I ever be able to do something crafty with it if she keeps carrying it around all day?

My hair

Her hair.  Ha...she claims my hair as her own and calls it, "My hair."

Her silverware

My silverware.  Commandeered while I was cleaning the bathroom.

My cheesecake

Her cheesecake

Our cheesecake.  Baby Girl in a cheesecake coma.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Evander is thankful for: Lilo, Mommy & Daddy, his bed and color.  Color is such a beautiful thing!

Emory is thankful for:  God, Jesus, Mommy & Daddy, and pants!  Pants certainly are wonderful this time of year.

I'm sure Marin would say these things:  Mommy's hair, her deerie and chocolate!  Girl after my own heart.

Love my babies!  Thank you, Lord, for blessing me with them!

Thankful Tree

Here is a neat little tradition to start each Thanksgiving time---a thankful tree!  My friend's sister made a version of this out of felt (which would have been A LOT easier!!!...no need to finish the edges of the leaves), but I knew I wanted to dig into my scrap piles and have at it.

Each leaf is a pocket.  Family members can go around and write on notes what they are thankful for and tuck them into the pocket.  Wouldn't it be fun to keep the notes tucked away until next year and remember what you were thankful for the past year?  

And what sewing project is complete without a picture of Lilo sprawled out on top of it???

And here, Marin is pretending to be the cat sprawled out on top of my sewing project.  Yes, she is wearing her Halloween costume.  :-)

Give thanks unto the LORD, for he is good!  His love endures forever.  

Psalm 136:1

Let us not just be thankful, but remember who we are thanking.  Let us not simply utter words, but live by them!

Fabric Stash

Sooooo....it's a nice sunny Sunday.  My house is *really* quiet.  Why?  The Mr. left for church with Emory and Marin while I was still warm under the covers.  Whoops!  Someone forgot about the time change!  Since our church is nearly an hour away, there was no turning around to come and get Evander and me.  :-(  I thought he took the kids to breakfast...so, I didn't even call him until 8:55 a.m.  Can we say mis[or lack of]communication?!?!??  Guess it's my fault for not switching the clocks back before I went to bed.  Oh well, Evander and I watched church online, played LEGOs, and now I am blogging.

And now on to this...

I started sewing three years ago.  My wonderful mother-in-law gave me my machine as a birthday gift (gift that keeps on giving!), some thread and scrap fabrics to get going.  She showed me how to make a checkbook cover, place mats and valences for my kitchen.  Next, I started a car quilt for Evander's big bed.  I've still yet to finish that one.  :-P

I discovered that I LOVED sewing.  The projects and possibilities of what I could do with my machine were (and still are!) endless.

I didn't have a lot of fabric to start with, but of course it collects over the years.  After I finally organized my fabric, I can say I have more than I realized.  :-)  The problem was, that I just kept shoving my scraps and fabric in plastic bags and sticking the bags on a shelf in our downstairs bathroom.  I couldn't see what I had and couldn't easily find what I needed.  I knew that I wanted a better way...

Ahhhhhhhh...I hear heavenly music playing.  That is some serious eye candy.

I bought a whole bunch of comic book mounting boards online (100 in fact!) and got to work wrapping fabric  around each and every one of them.  The top shelf are my cottons and the bottom shelf are flannels, apparel and home decor fabric, and all the rest, including the weird ones that usually stretch and do anger-inducing things when I sew with them.  :-P

I am so pleased!

I can find exactly what I need now.

But now, I still have a giant bag of scraps.  If there are any sewers reading this, how do you organize your scraps that are too small to fold like this???  Thinking a plastic container is in order...

Playing LEGOs all dressed up for church.

Watching service online!

He-Man and the Masters of the Universe: Halloween 2011

So, this summer, Nick shared a show on Netflix with the boys that he watched when he was a little boy--- He-Man and the Masters of the Universe!!!  I'm probably the only one who just said that in the voice of the show's intro.  :-P

Anyhoo...it became a little bit of an addiction.  The boys concocted a plan that Emory would be He-Man for Halloween, Evander would be Orko, and Marin would be Teela.  They had a character picked out for me...but if anyone's ever seen the series...they don't tend to wear too many clothes on that cartoon.  I really didn't want to run around in a leotard on Halloween.

Much to my delight...there certainly aren't any costumes in the stores of these 1980s cartoon characters.  It's alright...I like to sew.

Marin is obviously practicing her Teela, Captain of the Royal Guard of Eternia, athletic skills here.

Nick's suggestion for Emory was for him to just show his skin...but OF COURSE he'd be cold, and he couldn't wear his costume to school like that.  He needed some extra He-Man muscles, too, so I sewed some to a t-shirt for him following this tutorial:  Muscle Shirt  I had to dye his shirt skin-color as I couldn't find a shirt in the right color.

The boot covers turned out really cool, but you can't agree with that judging by the above picture.  I forgot to put the toes of the boot cover completely over the shoe.  When completely in place, they look super snazzy!

Orko is a Trollan from Trolla from another dimension.  :-)  He has special powers that somehow Orko mixes up into something comical.  He tends to get into trouble a lot.

For Evanders costume, I found a $1.99 pattern on eBay.  The fabric looks cool...but I HATED working with it because it is a tad stretchy and the edges curl.

And here's Teela, captain of the Royal Guard.  For being head of the guard, she sure isn't too smart.  Ha.  I say that only because she *never* figures out that Prince Adam turns into He-Man.  Foolish woman.  She also manages to get herself into troubled circumstances a lot...but I suppose that's just how old shows tend to portray a woman's character.

I was happily surprised that Marin so very desired to try her costume on and loved it!  She kept shouting, "I have the power!!!!" which is what He-Man says when he holds his sword aloft.  I started with a vest for her...then added a collar...the breast plates (ha...laughed the whole time I was making those), and the dangling knot thing.  I ended up duct taping the faux fur to her boots.  :-)

I feel like I need to end this blog post the way each He-Man episode ends----with a lesson.  Sooooo...here goes!

Be nice.  Don't do drugs.  Help those who are in need.  Clean your room.  Help your mother.  Love each other.

:-P

October Treats for the Non-Baker in You

Being the mom of TWO little guys who are in school and other activities now, I've noticed a couple things.

Fundraisers....fundraisers....FUNDRAISERS!  Whither shall I go from thy spirit?  Or whither shall I flee from thy presence?  Counting three Market Days...we are on number six fundraiser, I believe.

My second observation is that there seem to be LOTS of opportunities to help out and be involved at the schools.  I am taking full advantage of this not having a job outside the home at this time.

Anyhoo...here are a couple cute things I did for the boys.  Note...no baking is involved.  Yikes.  I get so frustrated when I attempt to frost things.


MONSTER CAKES

I guess they aren't really cakes...they're Ho Ho's!  But, I didn't know what else to call them.  Monster Ho Ho's?  Eh.  Box of Ho Ho's, some candy corn, M & M's, chewy lifesavers and decorator icing.  You could certainly go all out with these.  Thought about giving them feet...but then I thought of 12 little preschoolers who would probably pick the stuff off anyways.


CANDY CORN KRISPIES

Here are the instructions: Candy Corn Krispies

Basically, you make three small batches (yellow, orange and no dye), layer them in a bread pan, and cut, cut, cut!

I know a few of you are die-hard Rice Krispie Treat fans.  :-)

I think I will forever be on the look out for fun no-bake treats.

Commit, Train, Believe, Achieve

As many of you might know already, we were in Columbus last weekend so that Nick could run in The Columbus Marathon.  I seem to be saying, "THEEEEEE  Columbus Marathon," you know, like "THEEEE Ohio State University.  Pretty important stuff.  ;-)

My family had a good time staying with my cousin and his wife, and we all had a good time trying to chase Nick down in the city.  With the help of automatic updates from TweetMyTime, we were able to catch Nick on the course once, and see him finish.  I cried both times I saw him.  There's just something about seeing one you love work so hard for something and achieve their goal.

I'm pretty certain I still would have cried at the finish line even if Nick wasn't there.  Just a bunch (4,729 full marathon finishers!) of shiny, happy people holding hands.

The mantra of the race was equally as moving:  Commit, Train, Believe, Achieve

Obviously, it applies perfectly to preparing for a marathon, but I think it applies to all decisions we make in our lives, as well.


COMMIT

Oh, the easy step.  But, don't take making a decision lightly...and ESPECIALLY don't announce to everyone on Facebook that you are planning on doing something if you don't intend to follow through with it.  Ha.  ;-)

But, seriously...what is involved in making a commitment?  You must weigh your pain and your gain.  It's likely that it's not going to be easy.

Sometimes we make commitments that we don't keep.  Working towards the goal has either become to difficult, or something else has taken precedence over it.


TRAIN

A person just can't up and run for 26 miles straight.  It's likely a person may not be able to run a mile without first working up the lung and leg endurance.  Training, practicing or perfecting your skill takes time.  It takes repetition and it can get mundane.  If the preparing for the goal is something you love to do, then of course that makes this part easier.  :-)  If not...then, move to step three!


BELIEVE

Sounds simple enough, right?  Ohhhhhh...but then things of this world and life gets you down.  There are certain to be times when you will be down and you will be faced with doubt.  "I can't do this anymore."  This is a time when the help of others is so very much needed.

With 1/2 a mile to go in the 26.2 mile race, Nick's hamstring cramped up to the point that he couldn't move it.  "I can't," certainly came from Nick's mouth.  A random spectator saw Nick's need and came to his assistance to rub it out for him.  You may not be able to do it alone, but with the help of another, your belief can be renewed.


ACHIEVE

I'm sure nothing felt better for those marathon runners than crossing that finish line on Nationwide Boulevard.  It was over.


I've never been eloquent or able to express myself well with words, so I always feel silly posting blog posts that are more my thoughts and less explaining what I or we have done.  Oh well.  :-P  Facebook's changes have caused a drastic decline in my blog readership, so it's likely only ten of you will read this anyways.  :-P