Bottlecap necklace

Here's my first attempt (still playing around with ideas) at making a necklace for the 2010 LDS youth theme:

I tried to get a clear photo, but the reflection off the top coat didn't allow it - so here's what the image looks like for the necklace and the bead:

I love dangling beads! I really enjoy that I can customize the paper beads to match too! =)

Beaded Watch

Blogger won't upload my photos correctly so the watch face is on the left hand side of the pictures =( But you can still get the idea ;)I'm going to bead some watches to sell - they're so fun to make and wear!

Take a Hand, Touch a Heart

I made this as a thank you gift from a friend who presented a wonderful message from President Monson of take a heart, touch a hand:

I used her daughter's hands in the image when she was over for an activity at my house - I'm so sneaky ;) Like she even has old nail polish on one of her thumbs - thought it gave it character, so I didn't edit it out.I made a matching bead out of paper that hangs as a charm with crackle glaze:Now I have a request to make a HUGE one for the dad, maybe without the glitter, ribbon and charms though, eh? hehe Guys appreciate crafted items too! =)

Video of Pileated Woodpecker

Pileated Woodpecker

A very cool woodpecker has visited us multiple times the last 2 days! This beautiful guy is a Pileated Woodpecker:I could see tiny bugs flying around and it seemed as though he was licking them from the air - it's tongue is super long!
I have a video of it too - I'll try and upload tomorrow. After 3 1/2 minutes of just observing, I got bored - hehe And I won't post the whole video - I'll edit it to a minute or so ;)

New Attic Door

This is our attic door before - a little obvious and extremely ugly ;) plus it's plain and tacky:

Here is the attic door and ceiling covered up with bamboo flooring:
It will match the bamboo floor we will put down in the hallway - I like the idea of bamboo flooring on the walls and ceiling - fun!

A bit less obvious - nice work Baby!See my electrical outlet? It's for the fountain - I love being able to say 'Honey, can I have an outlet here?' and it's done! =)

Give Thanks

These are blocks I cut from a 2x4, stained them, mod podged letters I printed on patterned paper and added some ribbon:

A cute mushroom house with a few things to be grateful for that I put at the end:

It was blue & pink before, I erased all the colors and scanned in my fall paper so the mushroom would match =) I lightened the lines to gray too. Okay, I squished it too - but I needed it to fit my block dimensions ;)

I heart fonts! And cute graphics!

Girly 2010 LDS Youth Theme

2010 theme girly ;)

Maybe a handout or scrabble tile necklace - I'm going to play around with the funness ;) (is that word with 1 n or 2 - hehe)

YW Handout for Drug Abuse

Combined lesson Word of Wisdom & Drug Abuse - Livi did the object lesson =) We're going to have the girls give a part of the lessons when possible.

I used a Christmas ball ornament and printed off a skeleton face and rolled it up and placed it inside - not a fun task - hehe The Crossbones are bent on the bottom to help it stand up.

Quote: If you never take the first, then you'll never take the second from N. Eldon Tanner. The DDD in the corners of the bones are for 'Don't Do Drugs'.

Here it is standing up - just switched the crossbones wording around on the final product, like the 1st picture:

The girls loved them - they're so cute when they get super excited - is it all about the handout?? (look who's even writing that! LoL) I hope they come away with remembering the message too ;)

Bedroom Closet Bamboo Floor

We got the bamboo flooring in the closet that is shared between 2 bedrooms done on Saturday. I cut all the pieces with the chop saw and Jonathan nailed them in:

Jonathan put up the trim and bead board, now the finish work (more putty, sanding and painting). Like the outlet? We put 2 in the closet . . . won't that be nice? For something, just can't think of what yet ;) Keaton liked it so much, he wanted wood floors in his bedroom - awww, so sad it's going to stay carpet!! Personally Jonathan & I both hate getting out of bed and putting our feet on cold, hard floors. And if there is wood floors in bedrooms, what do people do anyway? Put an area rug down - what's the point? hehe

Welcome to the Hive

We make these signs for the bedroom doors of the girl's we kidnap when welcoming new Beehives into Young Womens:

We have breakfast at the leader's house and the girls love it!

YW Handout for Virtue - Good vs Evil

We learned about having courage to live our standards because of worldly pressures. We talked about Daniel's faith and courage and I gave the girls granola (pulse) with the Word of Wisdom from D&C 89 summary handout. We combined 2 lessons today, which is really tough to do in the amount of time we're alloted for class! But, here's my handout on virtue and judging good vs evil:

I used the GOOD with the EVIL illusion for this handout and only 1 out of 9 in my class had seen it before, but they all liked it.

more ornaments

kissing ball:

Snowflake 1:

snowflake 2 (see, how fun is this ribbon? hehe):who's ready for Christmas? ;)

Reward for RSVPing ;)

Six of the YW RSVP'd for an activity and I told them after the activity they were going to be rewarded with a 'treat' for having such good manners. They all thought they were getting a cupcake or something and were very excited - LoL, but I only asked them what their favorite color was and didn't tell them what their reward was. This is what I made them:

Hopefully they like them . . .

. . . enough to wear them - hehe

Tin Ornaments

I made these graphics on my computer. I had a black and white graphic of the girls and colored them in using Photodraw application. I created the word art from cute Christmas sayings. I flipped the image before printing them on iron-on paper. I ironed them onto muslin and mod podged them onto tin I cut from roof flashing. I used the crop-a-dile to punch the holes to attach ribbon. I made both light and dark skinned girls.

Christmas Tree Ornaments with quotes/sayings:

The best of all gifts around any Christmas tree is the presence of a happy family all wrapped up in each other.

Christmas is a time when you get homesick even when you're home.

Open your presents at Christmastime but be thankful year round for the gifts you receive.

Those who have no Christmas in their heart will never find Christmas under a tree.

Snow Baby Ornaments

These suckers take a very long time to make ;) I used clear ball ornaments and added glitter to them this time.

Jonathan noted that I have a lot of ribbon as he helped me put away some craft stuff . . . I admitted to him I have a passion for CUTE ribbon especially when it's 50% off ;) If I'd hide something from my husband, it'd be ribbon . . . and that's very pathetic sounding - LoL

VT General Conference Handout

I found some free LDS graphics and free fonts, so I played around with a VT message from General Conference for November. I kind of made an ornament out of it, thus why it's hanging on the Christmas Tree:

I designed an iron-on graphic and ironed it on muslin and then mod podged it on to some roof flashing - hey, it's great tin for crafting with ;) I used Katie's Crop-a-Dile and now I am going to buy one myself - love that tool! Here's the graphic I made up close:

It's from Safety for your Soul by Jeffrey R. Holland. Great talk, but he also delivered it amazingly!

2010 LDS Youth Theme

I played around with the new theme, I like the fish graphic for courage:

Maybe a handout for January, but I don't love it - hehe I'll probably play around some more - maybe Christina already has an idea she wants to use anyway ;)

Halloween Moth

Isn't it beautiful? heheSo festive too ;)

Halloween Costumes

Keaton was Wolvervine. Yup, he was allowed to grow out his facial hair for weeks - he shaped the beard pretty good, but just not enough hair to 'fill in' in his youth ;) We used yellow electrical tape on his leather jacket. Pretty easy:

Brady was Robin ('old school' in Brady's terms). The boys both wore their costumes to school today. And they want to go trick-or-treating tomorrow . . . seems a little beyond their years, but I guess they're only kids for such a short time, so we'll see if anyone refuses to hand out candy to them ;)

At Enrichment we did a service trade. I got Fawn's service of sewing a costume - didn't she do awesome? =) The cape is amazing - love it!!

Bedroom Progression

The carpet is in and Jonathan put up some bead board or wainscoting, bottom kick board and chair rail on 1 wall in Brady's room:

Takes a long time to paint, cut and patch the nail holes . . . One day this room will be done ;) If it wouldn't rain so much, we could go outside and paint everything in 1 day . . . and if Jonathan didn't have the flu for a few days last week, could have been a little further along - ahhhh, life ;)Loving it so far though!

We did order 2 Murphy Bed Mechanisms for Brady & Keaton's bedrooms - hmmmm, another project - LoL

Two Little Hummingbirds Sittin in a Tree

Awwwwwww, I can't help myself - these little guys are so CUTE!!!

I have hummingbirds every day still - love it!! Do you love my new camera? I can take pictures from far, far away and they still look pretty decent:

No tricks needed here, they're fun to watch when they're just sitting around ;) I just want to cuddle one between my hands!

Double Date . . . Double Idioms

I taught the YW Group Dating Lesson and made up some Dating Rules (created this handout idea and rules myself!) after finding idioms with 'double' in it:

Double Check that everyone in the group is 16 or older.

Be On the Double, don’t make anyone wait for you.

It’s a Double Whammy if you don’t smell great!

Do a Double Take to make sure you look your best.

Choose Double Mint gum over Double Bubble.

No Double Dipping when eating.

No gambling with Double or Nothing.

It’s Double the Fun by avoiding frequent dates with the same person.

Double the Trouble if emails or text messages are inappropriate.

Don’t Double Cross your parents or your friends.

Double the Pleasure by choosing wholesome activities.

It’s Double Duty for adults when you make them worry.

Don’t lead a Double Life, be honest with yourself.

Double Up with laughter, have fun!

Always Double Date - I Double Dare you!

On the other side of the handout, it has a message to Try all the Flavors - message - date lots of people before dating just 1 person steadily. (this idea has been around for a long time, but I did make my own graphics and word art for it) I attached a Baskin-Robbins tasting spoon and a button - yeah, I'm always giving out buttons ;)

After I bought the gum, I was sad because it didn't have the ' labeled paper' for a gum wrapper - only the foil! I think that's standard now. So I had to print out a Doublemint graphic to attach! Always making more work for myself ;)

Birthday Earrings

I made a pair of fresh water pearl earrings for one of my visiting teaching ladies:

So I made a postcard birthday card and attached the earrings right on it. Her favorite color is blue. I couldn't find any blue beads that I loved . . . so hopefully she'll like pearls!

I dropped off cupcakes too - spice cake with maple frosting, that's what the YW will get for 1 of the girl's birthdays on Sunday too.

Beehive D.A.N.C.E.S.

I made up an acronym for DANCES for activities for just the Beehives to be held on the same night at the Stake Dances for the older kids 14 & up. It represents 'Date Among Novices Convening Exactly @ Seven-thirty':

We started in October and got together at my house for 2 hours. We did a little of Personal Progress, decorated Journals, planned activities for future D.A.N.C.E.S., ate munchies, practiced talents for the upcoming talent show and painted nails. It was a success . . . although no one had any sitters available for that Saturday night ;)

Nurture the Rising Generation VT Message Oct

VT Message for October 2009 and a handout:

I baked a cinnamon roll (because they had to 'rise') and put this with it:

You could also give away some homemade canned goods because of the 'preserve' phrase.

Loved that quote!

2 Doors Down ;)

I bought 5 solid wood doors that all match off Craigslist for $40 each =) Saved us a lot of money, but then again, they were A LOT of work sanding them down, prepping and painting!

Got Brady's doors in - took us 1 evening, amazing how much time everything takes to do:
We are getting carpet on Friday morning - oh, and 1/2 price (yup, another Craigslist find) - whoop, whoop! LoL

more jewelry

Still making more jewelry . . . wonder if I should make some for Christmas presents?? =)

I tore apart a very ugly necklace from World Market that I got on clearance for $4 and made these earrings out of semi-precious freshwater pearls.

I made a smaller pair for a trade with someone and will probably make a bracelet and a necklace to match my earrings as well. Should help Jonathan upstairs before playing around too much more ;)

Gingersnap Cookie Recipe

3/4 cup butter (1 1/2 cubes)

1 cup brown sugar

1 egg

1/4 cup molasses

2 cups flour

2 tsp baking soda

1 tsp ground cinnamon

1 tsp ground cloves

1/2 tsp ground nutmeg, (or grated fresh if you have it)

1/2 tsp ground ginger, (fresh is good too)

1/2 tsp kosher salt

Beat butter and sugar until light and fluffy, then add in egg and molasses.

Combine flour, soda, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, ginger and salt together. Mix together and then add half to butter mixture and mix just until combined. Add second half of flour mixture until combined. Cover and chill in refrigerator for 3 hours.

Roll into balls and coat balls with white sugar and place on greased baking sheet.

Bake at 350 degrees for 10 minutes or convection oven for about 8 minutes.

Makes about 30 cookies.

YW Handout for the Second Coming

I had to fill in for the lesson last minute on Sunday. Lesson handout for the Second Coming. Made a shrinky dink crown, glued gems on it and put a jump ring through a hole for the girls.