Part of baby packages

I am making packages to send to two of my cousins and their wives as baby gifts, first baby for each. I still have to get filler and elastic to finish off everything before I can send them. I will be sending each two of the bibs that I made earlier. Yesterday I finished making eight blocks, so each will get a set of four. They will also each get a set of mittens and booties.There is a picture of what the mittens and booties will look like once finished and one with how they look now with the sample one in the middle so you can tell what they are. All of my kids had a full head of hair at birth. Since babies don't tend to let things go easily and to keep them from scratching anyone, I used these mittens all the time. I had three sets of each. The booties didn't get used as much but they are cute so I figured that I would go ahead make a set of each. The mittens were my favorite thing when my kids where babies, though.

Bags

I got two bags made yesterday. The small cream colored one with flowers on it was partially made by some one in my husbands Grandma's sewing group. It was stuffed in a bog of fabric samples that you see in furniture stores. Which is were I got the leather for the handles. My oldest daughter doesn't like the fact that I used a blue leather instead of a brown. So she clams that she will not touch it. The other bag I had cut out last Christmas but put aside because of my family moving into a new house. It was going to be a Christmas present for one of my sisters, now I am not sure what I will do with it. I did not have a liner cut out for it before it was put away. So yesterday I found some black outdoor waterproof fabric that I used for the liner. That way the bag has a little more protection from spills and things.

July 19

Yesterday we had a birthday at my house. My fourth child, my second son turned six years old. Since it was Sunday we went to church and then spent the afternoon at home. Normally we do not go out and do things on Sundays and being a birthday the birthday kid gets to pick dinner. Well my son had asked to go out to eat till he heard that his birthday was on a Sunday. He came up with mac & cheese, corn dogs, and corn for a meal. little did he know that my husband and I had planned to take everyone out to dinner since that was what he had wanted. It turned out as a good surprise since none of the kids new about it. The only thing that didn't work out was that we had invited our friends family to join us and they couldn't make it. Not only do they have a son the same age as mine, but his dad's birthday is today so it would have been a double birthday party. Instead it just ended up being our family which is fine too. After we got home we had cake and sang to the birthday boy. In all it ended up being a nice little day.

July 16

Today I made and canned four pints of Peach Butter. My husband had bought two buckets of peaches from a local grower. After a little cleaning and a short visit from a friend I got to work. Now I have my peach butter cooling and just have to make labels for the jars.

One other thing that happened today was that my friend and I talked about getting our families together this weekend some time for a combined birthday party. One of my boys will be turning six on Sunday and her husband turns thirty-one on Monday. It works as a good excuse to get together and not feel bad about eating anything we want. We just have to work out what day and time we want to get together. So I get to call her this evening or tomorrow morning to work out those details.

Brag About My Oldest Daughter

Time for another brag. This is a picture of a wall quilt that my oldest daughter made me. It was her first ever quilt and she wouldn't let me help her. She hand pieced the top together and then tied the back on. She used the sewing machine to finish it off. It was a Mother's Day gift for me back in 2009. Since then she has started one for her father using the sewing machine for the whole thing but has not finished it yet. Partly because the bag it was put in got lost in my craft stuff and then we moved. Now that my craft stuff has been organized into a permanent home we have found it so she can now finish it off.

Girls Closet Decoration

We have been in our place for about six months now. Last month I started getting things to decorate my girls room. So far I have only been able to get the closet doors pulled down. The old ones would not stay in the track so we removed them all together. I took some old CDs that my husband had but no longer needs and painted the printed side. I strung them up to hang from the closet area. Now I just need to get the closet set up so that my two girls can put everything away that they need to.

Ducks and Geese

Thanks to all the stuff my husbands Grandma gave me I was able to make a flock of ducks and geese. My kids enjoy moving them around the family room. You never know where they will be popping up from under the tables, lined across the fireplace, on the couches. Your guess would be as good as mine, they change a few times a day. Oh and my dogs like to cuddle them, it is cute since they are bird dogs.

Little Girl Coat

In the stuff my husbands Grandma gave me there was a partly made coat. I found the rest of the pieces for it and finished it off. It happened to be just the right size for my youngest daughter.

Matching Vests

These vest were made for me and my oldest daughter. She decided that she wanted us to have matching vest. So here they are.

Bird Pillows

These are a group of pillows that I made for my living room a few years ago. I figured that I better get a record of them before my kids mess them up playing with them. I have the front done of a set of pillows that I need to finish that go with them. The other set has the initial of the first name of everyone in my family. It is embroidered using a mirrored image alphabet. Once I get them finished I will put pictures up of those.

Family Reading Tree

I forgot to put pictures up of my family's reading tree. This is what it looks like so far. The have met the first goal that we had set for it and are now working towards the second goal. If they manage to make there second goal then we get to put up a squirrel.

July 13

Saturday ended up being a really good day. I do not know how it happened but my kids all got along all day. There was no fighting or yelling of any kind. I had gotten to sleep till about six thirty because on of my kids woke me up. Since I am usually up that early it was no big deal. I got him settled eating breakfast and then started doing a quick clean up while the rest of the family was asleep still. Then everyone started waking up and getting breakfast. I started working on some of my sewing projects. Usually that has to stop when my husband gets up. That day my husband woke up and came into were I was. He spent the morning reading on the couch next to my sewing table. Which is currently set up in our formal living room. When I had to go make lunch for everyone my husband got up and followed me. He sat in the family room talking with me while I made lunch. After lunch he went back into the formal living room to read while I did more of my sewing and crafts. At one point my kids all went outside to play in the yard in front of the house were we could watch them from inside. It just made for a every good day. My kids all even managed to go to bed with out complaining about anything.

Sunday my family went to church and then had a descent day together. It wasn't as nice of a day as Saturday had been but it still was nice. I guess we had a few fights between kids so that must have been the difference.

Monday was busy but most of that was because of a bunch of calls that I had to make. It really did take me most of the day to get the stuff all taken care of that I needed to. I really don't like days when I spend most of my day on the phone. Just glad that it doesn't happen to often.

This morning my family took a quick trip to the library before my husband had to take my youngest daughter to the doctors. The only thing I don't like is how long it take to get to her specialist since she has to go to Birmingham for the appointments. Luckily she doesn't go that often. But this month my oldest son has an appointment up at the same hospital in about two weeks. So this month it just is a big pain. We just took my daughter up about a week or two ago for an MRI so to have another appointment already, followed by my sons in a week or two. It just seems like we are going a lot I guess.

July 9

I am sad to say that I have just been so lazy this week. I have hung out with my kids while they play in the water and run around out side each day this week. Till it got to hot and I make them come inside. When inside I have been on the computer a lot. Not really getting anything done or looking anything up of importance. Just waisting time avoiding doing anything. Which has included my crafts and reading time. I just haven't wanted to do any of it. Its a shame too, because I am sure that I could have easily done any number of crafts and activities. Guess the heat has just got me feeling lazy. I did manage to get my bathroom scrubbed down completely today before my laziness set in. With luck I might feel more active tomorrow and get more done.

July 6

Well we made it through the weekend. Saturday my family did a quick cleaning around the house and just relaxed the rest of the day. Did a lot of reading with the kids. They wanted to make it to the goal of having twenty-five leaves on our reading tree by the Fourth of July. They only got twenty-four leaves up but that is because on leave has two different reading with different people on it instead of on two. The little kids twice had the same book read but by two different people and to a different set of little ones listening. I figured they deserve their own leave for each reading but one I made in a hurry and put the two together. So they basically did make their goal in time.

On Sunday my family went to church before our BBQ. As soon as we got home, I started getting food ready for the BBQ. My oldest help make some of the stuff. Together we had all of the food we were providing done just in time. The family we invited over got to our house a little after two. The kids went straight out to play in the water since they brought over a slip and slide. After a bit we got them out and did some fun little ground fireworks that are best when you can see them in the light. We had another couple show up at five just as we were about to eat. The kids all got to sit in the eat-in kitchen and the adults sat in the formal dinning room. It was about seven when we started the fireworks just before dark. We finished fireworks at eleven but got to enjoy seeing the neighbors fireworks for a little longer. Not to mention the big fireworks display from the the family that owns the year long fireworks stand across the street. Their show alone is enough for a good Fourth of July celebration. Everyone had a good time and got along great. The party finished around eleven-thirty when everyone went home. My family did a quick cleaned up and got everyone to bed. It was well past midnight almost one in the morning when my husband and I went to bed.

Monday morning we finished our clean up from the BBQ. We took a little trip to get some stuff for the BBQ we were supposed to have that night with another family that couldn't make it on Sunday but still wanted to get together with us. Plus one of our kids was promised a trip to the local Bass Pro shop so we had to go do that. We went to the Bass Pro shop first and walked around and bought six different kinds of fudge that came to a pound and a half. We managed only to eat one kind so far. Considering everyone had a big sweet tooth that is a really good thing. Instead of a BBQ though we did pizzas for dinner with the other family. We had birthday cake for dessert since it was one of their kids seventh birthdays. They came over at five and stayed till almost ten.

My kids all slept good after two late nights for them. The only draw back was that my husband and I had to be up early this morning to get him off to work. My kids are all up now and driving me crazy because they want me to clean out a blow up pool and slide they got yesterday from one of our neighbors. So that is something that we will be doing here soon. So that they can play in the water.

July 3

For all the waiting my friend only got to spend one day with us out of her trip. They had so many problems along the way that they got to the area a day or two later then they had hoped and planned. Because of the time and the day they got in the area we ended up being the second stop for seeing people. I feel sorry that they had so many problems on their trip out here but it seems they had a good time once here and things seem to be going better so far for their trip home.

It was great getting to see our friend again and meeting her family. My kids are still talking about her kids and how fun it was having them here. Hopefully we can either make a trip to California or have them out again soon. Jason keep trying to talk her into moving out this way. He tends to try to talk everyone into moving out to where we live no matter where that is. His lucky chance would be with our friend and her family since they actually would like to move out here at some point. He just might move up their unknown some point to an actually date.

Today I get to start prepping deserts for our BBQ with a friends family tomorrow. I am glad that the Fourth of July is finally here so my husband can not change his plans for it anymore. I think now the only thing he can change about it is if he wants to have burgers or ribs. Cause all that in tails is another shopping trip to get the burgers and buns.

Speaking of shopping trips that reminded me. On Thursday my husband and I went shopping and got a bunch of apricots. My husband wanted us to make some jam. When we went to get started we decide that the jam had to much sugar for our liking so we ended up making apricot butter. It is just like a jam but it doesn't have as much sugar and does not get a thick. So it spreads smoothly onto what ever you want it on. My family really likes it, I just hope they don't use up the three jars we canned to fast. I might give one to our friends family tomorrow, if my husband lets me. He is the one loving it the most trying to eat it by the spoonful.