Just a quick hello and some pics

We have been working away at the usual stuff but wanted to stop by with a few pictures.  We wish everyone a Very Happy Easter.  And although we can't be with you all we pray that your are able to be with loved ones and enjoy the true blessings of what this holiday means.  We will be spending the day with friends here at home and pictures will sure follow after.  Love to All!

A picture of our Spring/Easter Mantel

Paper rose ball was the one I made for Valentine's Day

The wreath the kids and I made out of Lima beans and spray paint.  Not my idea but can't remember where I found it.

A favorite Goodwill find - 2 vintage bottles in green and yellow for $1 each.  And a candle I wrapped in fabric.

A few dresses I made using some scrap fabric and T-shirts

On Gabriella's I added a little stenciling in fabric paint that says "All Natural" for fun

Here is Mia's dress that is almost like Gabriella's only I tried shirring for the first time on the top and then made it into a halter top.  She completely dressed herself this day for school.  I love how she paired her pretty dress with sparkly tennis shoes. This really fits her personality! A girly girl who's not afraid to get dirty and enjoy the outdoors!

I have had this bookshelf since Alex was about 5 years old (he is 19 yrs old now) and I purchased it super cheap from my Aunt Ida (it was my cousin Melody's).  It has held strong and is sturdy but it was looking a bit tired so it was time give it a little sprucing up. 

So a few contact paper rolls from the dollar bins at Michael's

and a few hours later I had this

I also found this large cork board at a garage sale a few weeks ago.  I'd been wanting to display the kids artwork in the playroom without having to poke a ton of holes in the wall.  I didn't want to spend the $20 it cost for these and was so happy when I found this for $3! I covered it in the same contact paper to match the bookshelf and now it is perfect!  And look at the beautiful artwork that Christian has made (2 large ones on top) at school.  The detail is incredible! The one on the right is a sunflower and the one on the right he says is the Japanese Foot Bridge.  I think I may have a little Picaso in my house!  The bottom two are Mia's and she loves to do handprints. 



While I was covering the bookshelf my two little Picaso's (Mia and Gabriella) were busy doing their own artwork....

ON MY WALLS!!!!!!!!

Lastly, here the kids are with daddy playing some baseball on a really nice day.  Gabriella has a habit of taking her pants off so that is why she is just in her cloth diaper.

Gabriella took off running all the way down the neighbor's yard so they all had to run after her.

HAPPY EASTER AND WE LOVE YOU ALL!
It get's awefully lonely here with no comments :(  We love to hear from you all!

Spring is here....or maybe it's not

The weather sure has been crazy around here lately.  We have gone from a cold rainy wintery day to a beautiful sunny day and it's reeking havoc on our little ones.  Christian caught a cold earlier in the week and was sent home from school and by the end of the week he had swollen lymph nodes on the side of his neck. The picture here is after he came home from the ER and it honestly is only about 1/3 of the size it was when he left. 

He is all better now so thank goodness!

Gabriella caught a stomach bug on Saturday and had a couple of those freaky projectile vomiting episodes. She was better by the evening but poor baby was quite hungry and we couldn't really give her much to eat since her stomach was so unsettled.  Calming a hungry child without food is no easy task. She was a trooper though and didn't fuss as much as she could have.  She is still not feeling herself and has had lots of diarrhea and a slight fever but we hope that it ends soon.  But she did have a wonderful playdate on Wednesday (while Mia was at school) with her friends and had a great time!

 She decided to go down head first and liked it so much she did it many more times

Mia today woke up with the same stomach bug as Gabriella so I spent most of the day dealing with Mia throwing up and Gabriella's diarrhea. Now that was fun! NOT! 

Shawn too caught the same cold as Christian (my two sicklings) so he wasn't feeling all that great all week.

On top of all of the illness we were getting ready for our spring garage sale.  It started with cleaning our garage last Sunday as it just was a total mess after Christmas and all the chaos. So cleaning and organizing it and our shed was an entire days task but well worth it.  I know I can always get a few extra hundred dollars by selling things we no longer use and it is always put towards our next vacation.  We used to be able to use our grandparents time share and that was a HUGE help and always great fun.  But they no longer have it and we have to save a lot more money for our vacations.  This year we are going to try to find a beach house and share the cost with another family that we are close too.  This will enable us to have a great time with great friends without having to spend a ton.  I think the kids will really have a great time at the beach even though most of you know I am not very fond of all that sand!

And finally I have still been crafting a lot and have found a new love for our local Goodwills.  I have found some amazing things there. The saying "One person's trash is another's treasure" is definitely true! And of course it's garage sale season and even though I didn't get to go out early Saturday, I was able to go out later in the morning.  Would you believe I found a ton of FREE stuff! Yes I did.  I got shoes for the kids from Land's End, Stride Right and a cute little pair of UGGS! Yes! I said UGGS for free! Well I'll show you pics of my free finds in the next post once I have had a chance to clean them up! 

Here are some pics from the last week.  Have a great one!

 I walked in her room one morning to find that she had dressed herself for gymnastics! What a big girl!

We had a thunderstorm so Mia decided to hide from the storm on the floor of her room and this is how I found her 

A few goodies I have been working on with some of the cutest little models!

Here is a better picturer of the St. Patrick's Day skirt

 I think I could make these all day long! I have so many other shirts ready for Gabriella to have a few of her own.  This is from Made by Dana

Gabriella's dress was my version of The Knotty Jumper by Moda


I have made several other dresses but haven't been able to take pictures of them all yet. I am trying to get pics of the girls wearing them on a nice sunny day so hopefully I am able to do that soon!

It's Been a While!

Hello All! It's been a while since I've been able to post here.  Everyday there was the intention yet the day would pass without being able to post.  So to update, we have been busy with everyday life around here but are enjoying all of the activities that Spring brings!  All three kids have started swimming lessons and Christian will start soccer this coming week! So we will have soccer practices 1-2 evenings a week now and Saturdays are full with 3 seperate swim lessons, a soccer game and ballroom dance lessons (for Shawn and I).  Yes, you read that correctly! I was able to convince Shawn to take ballroom dance lessons with me! We had some friends invite us to take it with them and although both husbands are not quite in love with the idea they still go.  They even try really hard and do quite well every week.  What lucky gals we are!

The kids are really enjoying their swim lessons and look forward to it every week.  Gabriella is in a Parent/Toddler class so Shawn goes in with her and essentially plays and helps her get used to the water.  Mia is in a class where she goes in on her own and they learn to get comfortable with the water independently.  Although I thought she wouldn't go in on her own I was quite surprised that she was very willing and very cooperative with the teacher. She had a great time and was sad when it was time to get out of the water.  Christian too loved his class.  He has to wait an hour and a half before it is his turn to get in so that is the least fun part for him.  I'm sure it's the longest hour and a half ever! But when he gets in he loves it.  In his class they taught him how to float on his back, dive for rings on the pool floor, and to dunk his head under water repeatedly.  He did well with all except the floating on the back but that just takes practice so I'm sure he will get it eventually. 

We also finally got to take family pictures! Although they are not of the whole family :(  I held off thinking we would get to take them when Alex came to visit but we were sooooo busy that we never got the chance.  And now I have no idea when he will be back up to visit so decided to go ahead.  Him being on his own is tough for this Mama! It is a constant reminder of how quickly they grow and reminds me to enjoy each and everyday with our 3 little ones. I hope to see him soon but since he works it's not so easy to just fly him up here.  I will post those pics soon and will be sending you all some copies as well.  There is something a little special in the works for you Grandparents and Great Grandparents that didn't get your Christmas presents yet! I am sorry it has taken so long but with the constant cold and snow around here it was difficult to get these done until the weather warmed up a bit.  So be looking for these in the next few weeks as I am working on them now and hope you love them!

As for me well I have been a sewing machine lately! With spring in the air I have found myself in the mood to sew lots of fun clothing for my girls!  And I am loving my new serger and think that it is one of the best gifts ever!  Shawn has been busy with work and although he has one of the worst bosses ever he makes the most of it and continues to do his best.  We have had a few shakeups in the last few weeks though.  First we received notice that he may receive orders for one year in Afghanistan and if he got them he would leave this May.  So for a full week we were terrified that he was going to be gone soon. It put a halt on everything we were planning. But with God's grace we received notification that the orders had been cancelled and that for now he wasn't going anywhere. What a relief! There is still the possibility that this will come up again and we knew that coming in so we can only pray that it doesn't happen to us.  But with 2 more years here you just never know. 

Then soon after we got an even bigger scare.  One of Cancer.  Shawn was feeling some pain in his lower abdomen so he went to the doctor to see what the cause was.  During the examination she located a couple of cysts and said that they needed to do an ultrasound because there was a possibility of cancer. Whoa!!! What?!?  We were terrifed! And now we had to wait several days for the ultrasound to see what we were dealing with.  So many things crossed our minds but mostly we worried about our children.  As you could imagine we just felt like God had given us this beautiful family and wonderful life and now it could all come crashing down.  Only he and prayer would get us through this and we would fight it if this was our path. And one week later we would find that it WAS NOT cancer and our family/life would continue on as usual.  Thank You Lord!  Wow, we can't be anything but greatful.  Many of you may be wondering why we didn't mention this to you and the truth is NO ONE was told because in truth we felt it was difficult knowing and we just didn't want to impose the same feeling on any of you.  Why are we sharing this now? Well I guess it's just a little reminder of how truly precious all of you are to us and to each other.  Cherish the moments, even the bad ones, hard ones and especially the sweet ones.  You just never know when it could all change.  We love and cherish all of you even though you are so far away.  And although we may not speak to you as often as we should we love you none the less. 

So we leave you with LOTS of great pics of our adventures in the last few weeks.

Swimming Lessons

Gymnastics

Gabriella at a playdate in a dress I made for her

Saint Patrick's Day - I made this skirt for her and one for Gabriella as well but for some reason can't find a picture of Gabriella with her



Gabriella in her brother's hat. She just loved it and wore it all day



And our new puppy! His name is Loui and he is a very sweet Shit Zu. 

And a couple of pics of my latest work.  I have actually made about 6 other dresses/shirts for the girls but will post pics later.

A reversible shirt for Mia that can also be used as a dress for Gabriella. Love Double Duty!

And remember that free fabric that I posted about last time?  Well here it is in a Spring Dress for Mia.  I also had enough to use as an accent on Gabriella's dress and will post that one later. 

I will post more often now that things are truly back to normal around here!  We Love You All and truly feel we have the BEST and MOST AMAZING family ever!