Christmas 2011

We had a very nice Christmas this year, even though we were all sick quite a bit from late October through December. So far January has been kind.

We took 2 light-hunting trips just the three of us- plugged some of the area highlights into the GPS and just followed along! Here are some cell pics from a few houses:

We stopped for coffee/cocoa before and brought our own cookies along to munch on as we drove. This will probably become a little tradition- Emily had a ball, saving cookies until the next stop, then eating one...music on...free-save-for-gas Christmas entertainment. :D

Christmas Eve day J worked at the PO. He got home early though and we were able to make it to church. Had a nice dinner and then watched our Nativity movie. We love that tradition for Christmas Eve...it's nice to keep it low-key and fairly quiet and solemn. We always open one gift- pj's. E keeps forgetting each year that it's pajamas :) This year was Phineas and Ferb jammies. I didn't make something pj-wise since she still had a few that fit. The last nightgown I made was in the fall and it was a long sleeve flannel one. After the movie, we sang a few songs and she zonked out on our bed. We tucked her into her own and followed suit after stuffing stockings. :)


Christmas morning! She's still bleary eyed here:


I have lots of present pics, but I'll just include this one for her faraway aunt to see. This is E playing her new Active Life Explorer on the wii- super fun and it actually keeps them working for good portion which is nice. Can't just sit on your rear and play tennis with this one! :)


Nice to chronicle a bit of the season for remembrance!

Sewing Catch-up

I'm getting the sewing bug again, which could be a good thing since stash game on my favorite site is starting up in just a couple of weeks! Not that I'll win or come close by any means, but it's fun to play. :D

I made this for a birthday gift for one of Emily's friends this fall. Emily got her own version for Christmas:




This little matching skirt set was made from an old sweater. Another of E's Christmas gifts:


We had a crafty evening of ornament-making from an online tutorial. Put some cider and music on and chatted while stitching these little guys together. It was a fun night.

This was E's:


These were mine:


These were J's...the first one strongly reminded us of the 70's. Or the tootsie pop owl for some reason:

The second one here I hid at the side of the tree down at the bottom. :D Viking owls don't really jive with my whole golden-woodland-bird theme:


This giraffe flannel-lined minky robe was for my niece Romi for Christmas. She just turned 4, so it's quite large on her and quite small on Emily for the photos:


I want to make one just like it for E for next year. I don't have enough fabric though. :P I'll have to hunt this fall!

We made a few quick hair accessories for her small advent gifts:

The angry birds were inspired from a blog I follow. So cute!

I loved figuring out how to underbraid this year- looked really cute with all the Christmas-themed hairthings:


That catches me up for 2011. I finished a pile of hemming and finally sewed up 2 dryflex shirts I cut out for myself over two years ago. Heh. I also cut out a skirt last night and sewed it up today. Felt really good! I will post that soon. Off to watch Mansfield Park with J! :)

Weather

It's been quite the unusual winter here in MN. Last week we walked to the library and around town. It was in the 50's and we ended up taking our coats off at times. Very strange for January!


This was earlier- perhaps early Dec. E would normally not wear her light fall coat past October:


A week prior to that, we'd had a good dusting of snow:



Now it's pretty cold, but I hear it's warming up again. The city where we attend co-op was even debating whether or not to flood some of their rinks this year. Luckily, one of our moms went to the meeting and they decided to go ahead with it in hopes that there's still a good season of ice left. We're all glad since our skating class runs through January and February! Our first one was already cancelled due to no ice.

We're getting quite spoiled though...anything much below freezing and it's reason to stay indoors. Sad! :P

Been awhile!

I can't believe how long it's been since I last posted! I've sewn since and have even posted some of those projects on Sewingmamas, but I have neglected blogging here for some time.

I hope to be here a little more often than I have this past year :)

Much has happened in our family- probably too much to update all in one post! J is still on the hunt for his full-time job and I am doing school online for medical transcription. It's going very slow- it's not the kind of work one can do while overseeing schoolwork for a child. I'm hoping as I progress I might be able to flip back and forth so I can get hours in during the school day but for the moment it takes my full attention. So yes!- slow progress here.

We're having a great year of homeschool- each year gets a bit more intense than the previous. As it should be! We're loving our history studies which focus on ancient civilizations- I'm learning right along with E! We're in astronomy for science and hope to dust off the telescope this spring and get outside. All the other areas save for art I consider the basics which she is doing very well in. We'll be completing our first year of testing in about 2 months; it will be nice to have that first round under our belts. We've just begun swim lessons again this spring and she'll be finishing up her ballet in early May.

I'll leave this 'I'm back' post with some pictures of my last project. The nightgown was supposed to be for Christmas but I was only able to finish one set of pj's. She got this in February instead :) Her old flannel nightie bit the dust before this winter was underway so she was thrilled to have another. I made it plenty big for next winter as well!




I'll check in again soon!

Winter Bed

Ahh...the flannel sheets! :D

I finally made E her duvet cover...she went without last year. I used the flat snowman sheet as I hate flat sheets on kids' beds...makes it so hard for them to do on their own. I also used some clearanced Target sheets I'd picked up this summer...the flannel snowman sheet is for the back so it's soft against her skin :) I eyed her current duvet cover for how to do this one...turned out well! I was off somehow on my measurements in the back so one strip down the side is a bit narrower than the other. Shhh- don't tell. Even though I just did :D



I love my buttons! They look like candy!





We'll be breaking out the heated blanket for J and I very...very soon! :D