My sewing set up

I thought these were fun.  Here is a little peek into what kind of creators I, my mother and my aunt are today.  I've been able to join them for a couple of afternoons of sewing and I've quite loved this time spent feeling creative and connected to family.

Here is my little sewing station.  We'll call it a creative mess, shall we?  That seems to be how I work best, creatively speaking, all over the place, making much up as I go, often surprised by the outcome (usually happily surprised). 

Here is my Aunt's workspace.  Neat, tidy, efficient.  (Though she says her workspace at her home is much more messy).

And here is my mom's space, something in between.

More than one happy change today.

I'm so happy about this new 3 column set up I have going on here at the blog!  Until now it has been so elusive to me, had no clue how other people had these nifty 3 instead of two columns.  Today I found these easy peasy instructions and Presto changeo!  Here is the link if you need the same help.


Ok, now on to the change we'll start this month in our family life for the One Small Change project.  (and for the good of the planet and our lives:)
Time and time again I've decided to use no more plastic bags when I'm out grocery shopping and the like.  I have so many great reusable bags but lately they are getting used to tote toys, books, knitting, lunch and those sorts of family on the go needs.  I think these are all perfectly good uses for these bags but it has made fewer available when it is time for a shopping trip.

Our change this month will start with me making a few more reusable shopping bags (I have some great heavy duty fabric from the thrift store that will be perfect for this project).  And then, of course, they'll make their way with us to the store, every time.

A little snow, all the bettter

I thought I'd share a couple of our new family pictures.  Not sharing the favorites yet, those have to wait, but here are a few of the others.  We had Brittney Brog take them, she was great!  She was brave enough to deal with all of us, in a snowstorm, and the pictures turned out great!  So talented!~

A couple of the kids were slightly disappointed that  the Brittney we met up with that day wasn't Brittney Spears and just some other Brittney but when we were in the car headed home Natalie said "Its ok that it wasn't Brittney Spears I guess, this one is probably nicer anyway, and just as pretty".

We only had a 2 day window to get pictures done, as we don't all live together and only had John's kids over the weekend so we weren't able to wait out the storm but I really like the way the pictures turned out with the snow!  Thanks so much Brittney!

One Small Change

At Hip Mountain Mama I found and joined the One Small Change challenge.  I've been searching for things to take me closer to the life I want to be living and this speaks to me so much on that level.  You can read more about it and join here.  I'll be posting tomorrow about the changes we'll incorporate into our lives starting this month. 
I'm looking forward to the changes, and looking forward to being truer to myself through these changes.  A breath of fresh air indeed.

A little peek at what I'll be happily working on next week

Here are some fun things that  will make their way into finished projects sometime this next week.  My Aunt Sheila is in town and we have big plans for much sewing!  More photos to come.  Spencer's sewing debut will come this week as well.  He has plans for turning some of Grandpa's old shirts into sleeping bags for his stuffed animals and small cowboy figurines.  Photos of all this for sure will make it here!

P.J.s

Here is an overdue peek at a few of the pajamas that I made for kids this year.  The blue and brown polka-dot with contrasting cuffs and pockets were so my favorite!  I ended up making them for 5 of the girls, I wish I'd done the same ones for all of them!

There were also some great cougar ones for Spencer (that were hard to keep a secret until Christmas, I almost gave them to him early because I knew he'd be so excited!  ~he was!)

And some fun blankets and purses that I didn't get around to taking pictures of before gift giving.  That is a goal this year, more pictures of projects!

A few tears and something to smile about!

I dare you to read THIS without crying.  I dare you.

And on a completely separate note, I am so enjoying this:

Notice how empty those laundry baskets are.  Empty.  With only the clothes currently being worn waiting to fill them.  All.  Caught.  Up.  On.  Laundry.   Sigh.  Oh what a great thing!  Now if I could say the same about the rest of my housework I'd be a very happy girl.

Lucky me!

I was lucky enough to get to spend a few hours with some of my favorite people this week.  I love how Emily is looking at Tyson in the last picture here.  Cute hu?  She's such a good mom, her kids are so lucky!  I just love that you can see how much she loves him in this picture!

And look how big Marleigh is getting!  I promise she likes me part of the time, she is much like her brother Carter was at her age, in relation to me, she doesn't see me enough for me to fall all the way out of the 'stranger' category so she's a little leery most of the time, then warms up to me, then is scared because I'm a stranger.

Anywhoo, it was a great afternoon getting to see them and I was wishing I had days instead of hours to spend!

Check out her great saving tips at Freebies 2 Deals

I just wanted to share this blog I re-found!  I used to go get great money saving tips here and somehow in my crazy world lost the address and lost the thought of it from my brain until I saw 'Good Things Utah' this morning while I was being lazy at Amy's and watching T.V. (which we don't have at our own house!).

It is a great blog with sooooo very many great tips, links, etc. for saving.  Saving is always a favorite right?
So go see Freebies 2 Deals  HERE. 

Sidekick blog

Ok, so that whole project 365 being here integrated onto this blog thing that I said earlier?  Scratch that.  Still doing the project, but now it will happen over yonder.  Come see!

Another Tradition

Remember THIS?  We love this tradition that comes at least once a year for the past, oh, most of my life!

                    

It is that time of year again, Taffy making with Grandpa.  Looking back on the pictures I took made me laugh, Natalie was Grandpa's little sidekick and was so excited to be helping and in all the pictures she was just next to him, watching and always with a spoon full of candy.  She was the main taster.

 

Such fun memories we're making.  Traditions run strong.

Day 2 of 365

Because at least one tree picture where the house is a wreck before the tree gets put away is a must.

Almost nothing is better than Sleeping Baby Eyelashes

What a beautiful face, don't you agree?  Those eyelashes are record breaking.

Here's some new news here:

I've decided to jump on the bandwagon and do a 365 project. If you aren't sure what it is here's a fun look into the idea.  Basically I'm vowing to take a picture a day.  I don't vow to post every single day so some days will have more than one photo.  And on that note, I'm going to make it as easy as possible so that I will actually follow through, this means a few things: I'm not going to do a sepearate blog, the photos will show up here so some days will be more than one post days; 

I'm not going give myself limits by choosing a theme, I like the freedom of capturing whatever captures me any given day;

a lot of days of my life one photo isn't enough to take and likely not enough to share, so I'll loosely follow the idea of 365 but it will likely be a higher number in the end....

and probably a few more non-rules I'll make up as I go along.

To start the project here is today's photo, my friend's peaceful baby and her wild eyelashes!

A very Twister New Year to all

We had a fantastic evening hanging out with friends to celebrate New Year's Eve this year.

Here's to a great year blessed with great friends!

Not many a photo for our Christmas

It is still a little crazy to me that my boy is 9!  He is no longer quite as crazy about Godzilla and super heroes as he once was.  He is wild about the wild west these days and loves all things cowboy.  He received a couple of belt buckles for Christmas that he was overjoyed about, and a log cabin for his cowboy action figures to set up fort in.

Christmas Eve was a wonderful day of cooking while watching Christmas cartoons with Spencer then a quick visit to my in laws and dinner with my family.  On Christmas we had my parents over for gift opening in the morning then a great day playing at home then headed over to John's parents house for lunch and visiting all evening. 

I wasn't feeling the greatest on Christmas and somehow (I still have no idea how, I must've really really not been feeling good), I ended up with almost no pictures.  At the time it seemed like not a big deal to skip the picture hoopla and lay on the couch.  Now I'm missing the photos that could have been.  Oh well.  We did have a Merry Christmas and hope you did too!