Washin' Faces

Yesterday afternoon the girls decided it was time to wash faces. They are so stinkin' cute!!!! That is probably just the Mommy in me talking. :)

Red, White, & Blue

Here is my ornament tree & frog for July.

Here is my doorway. I bought wooden stars at Michael's & painted them red,white, & blue. Super simple but super cute.

Camp picture framed

The first day of camp, the troop had their picture taken. Each camper was given a copy of the picture when they returned home. I thought it would be fun to do something with it for a keepsake for Chase. So I bought an unfinished frame & painted it. Bought letters & painted those green to match the cabin & the tree. I added the wooden diecuts at the bottom, there was no tent, so I decided a cabin was close enough. On the back of the frame are the dates they were at the camp, the name of the camp, & the names of everybody in the picture.

More camp

Besides heat & humidity here is a good reason to NOT go to camp! This little guy came climbing out of their fire pit.

The boys giving back to the camp- hauling mulch. Chase is in the green shirt & red shorts, yeah nice outfit!

I'm not sure what he's doing here, but he's on a misson somewhere!

Camp Ingawanis

The boys found these in the Scout house, thought they'd be fun to wear & pose in front of the trailer before heading out for camp. Crazy kids!

Poor Miss Big Truck, she was clean when she left home, this is how she looked when they got to camp! I asked the boys what they did to her when they got home, none of them seemed to know how she got so dirty.

Chase working on his fishing merit badge. Dad said he really wasn't fishing, he more snagging then anything. Chase complained that there were no fish to catch. Better luck next time, I guess!

Here is the group that went. 10 boys. 4 adults. Tim & Drew were the only two adults there all week, the other ones traded places half way through with two different parents.

Crammed in the shower house. They got a pretty strong storm on Thursday, so they spent some time in the shower house to stay safe. There was a debate on Sunday if it was 95 or 100 degrees in the shower house. I say "who cares, that's damn hot!!!"

I scream, you scream, we all scream

FOR ICE CREAM!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I believe this is a freebie that I got off of The Chart Shop. It stitched up really fast, is pink, & super cute- it will make a great addition to my ornament tree!

It's almost Saturday!!!!

I've gotten through 5 days & 4 nights. That leaves me 2 more nights & 1 1/2 more days till Tim & Chase get home. It has seemed like the longest week ever. I am SOOOOOOOOOOOO ready for them to be home. The day isn't so bad but going to bed is, there is nobody to play with the dogs, nobody to talk to before the girls & I get in to our bed. I think this is the longest time I've been by myself...... I sure hope that they next day and a half goes by super fast.
I have to thank my friend, Twig, who has done a really good job of keeping me company this week. We even figured out how to talk via webcam & mics. It's been great to have somebody else to talk to, the 4-legged kids aren't great at carrying on a conversation.
All in all it hasn't been a bad week. I've gotten a lot of stitching done, I've gotten some house cleaning done, & I've got some re-organization done. My only wish is that it would go by faster!

Still Stitchin' With Twig

Here is my 2nd piece that I've stitched with Twig. We FINALLY after almost an hour figured out how to use our webcams & mics. So now we can see each other, talk to each other, & stitch all at the same time. It's absolute heaven!!!!!!!

This one is Happy Autumn by SanMan. It was supposed to fit into a tuck, but even on 18 count, it's a little too big. I used some thread Twig sent me with the tuck to stitch Autumn, she tells me it's SanMan thread, that's before I even knew about SanMan. It turned out really cute. So now I have to figure out what I'm going to stitch to fit in my tuck. Maybe just the bottom part of Happy Autumn? I don't know.... stay tuned......

Bullseye's Birthday Ornament

Even the dogs have to have birthday ornaments for the ornament tree! So here is Bullseye's. It's a little off center, but oh well, it's gonna stay that way. I designed the dog bone on my own from a clip art piece. And then found the ABCs for the name & birthday in one of my files. I'm going to do pink ones for the girls.

Stitchin' With Twig

While Tim & Chase are at Boy Scout camp this week, my friend Twig, who lives in New Mexico is keeping me company via MSN Messenger. A couple weeks ago we picked three pieces to stitch together this week!

Here is the 1st one- it's a SanMan piece, Melon Block. I "em'd" it, as Twig would say, & just stitched the center. I like how it turned out after I got that far & decided not to stitch the red & white checkerboard around the melons & the other 4 ants in the corner.

Chase's Birthday Blessings

Here is Chase's Birthday Blessing, I finally got the last one done! Now we all have a birthday ornament to hang on the ornament tree during our birthday month. I'm working on ones for the dogs next, little bones. :)

Off to camp!

We had to make sure to say "good-bye" to the dogs before we left for camp. I don't even think I got a hug, but the dogs did. Does that tell you where I rate?

So this morning, Tim & Chase left for Boy Scout camp. It's just me & the 4-legged kids till next Saturday. :( I cried as they pulled out of the driveway. I don't think I've ever been alone for a week, what on earth am I going to do with myself??? I know everybody says it would be so nice to have a week all to themselves.... but really I'm dreading it. Yeah, I've got housework & stitching to do, & I'm sure it'll be nice for about the first 24 to 48 hours, after that it's gonna be really strange. So I'll be counting down the days till next Saturday. And on Saturday I'll be anxiously awaiting the phone call that says "we're hitting Iowa City", cause that will mean they are less than an hour away from home & will actually be home in about 3 or 4 hours, after they unload the trailer back at the Scout House.

Night, night Molly

I think Molly is trying to tell me something!
"It's bedtime, Mommy!!!"

Chase's Tree Frog

Tonight Chase found a tree frog on the window. He wanted to take a picture of him. He's pretty cute & I don't like slimy creatures. I like how you can see his reflection in the window. Chase took a good picture of him!

New meaning to "it's raining buckets"

Friday afternoon we were blessed with a lovely Midwest summer storm. It was raining buckets- it literally looked like somebody was standing on my roof dumping buckets of water down, kinda like how it looks at the indoor waterparks when the bucket dumps all the water on the kids! You couldn't see it was raining so hard.

After the rain, we took a drive through town. There were lots of trees down & standing water. My uncle has a front yard that is probably at least an acre, it was all down trees, there wasn't a lot of yard showing. The most amazing of all was at Hein Manor, the retirement home about 4 blocks from my house. Hein Manor is the big white house on the right. And then you can see how high the water was, Shawn is out in the middle of the road, & the water is up to his knees.

SAL- finished & hung!

I finally got matching ribbon to hang my SAL pieces. So here they are hanging from my plate rack with my 4-season plates. I like how they turned out. :)

Material

I stopped at Joann's today to look for some material for my "Welcome to the Nuthouse" piece that I am working on. I plan on trying out the tutorial I found for a no sew banner & hanging this on the door when you enter my house.

Here is what I found.










I really wanted something with nuts or squirrels on it, but of course there was none of that to be found. But I think this will work nicely. I also have some Heart In Hand patterns, from the Medley collection, that I am going to be working on next year. A family one & then one for seasons & holidays. I plan on making them in to banners & hanging them in my entry way. So I thought that this material would also work for those. Since all of the pieces will be in the hallway they will all coordinate. And someday down the road, I hope to to paint the hallway one of the brown's in this material.

Flag Disposal Ceremony

Sunday, June 14th, 2009- Flag Day, the Legion Post #430 family held a flag disposal ceremony at the small park across the street from the Legion Hall.

Here is a picture of all of those who participated from Post #430 and from Boy Scout & Cub Scout troop #153 and a couple of additional pictures that I took. One is of Tim inspecting flags before they are burned, the other one is of Tim & Ken putting flags on the fire.

SAL

I am done! Here are all four parts of my SAL. :)

I think I'm going to make them into ornaments to hang from my plate rack. I have a set of plates that are the four seasons that these will coordinate with.

Land That I Love

By Lizzie Kate

Swimming!!!!!

For the last day with the boys, we had planned on going swimming. Our original plan was to go to the Aquatic Center in Muscatine, but the weather was a little chilly & to go swimming in an un-heated pool on a chilly day sure didn't sound like much fun. But the boys still wanted to go swimming so we ended up at the Wilton Pool. They had a good time. Here are they are jumping off the diving board.

Wild Cat Den

Last night was the last night that the boys were at home with us. So we went out to dinner, at the old Charthouse, to celebrate Grandpa & Dad's birthdays. Grandpa's birthday was on Monday & Dad's birthday is on Sunday. The boys will be leaving for their 1st camp on Sunday so they won't get to see Dad on his birthday. On the way home we stopped at Wildcat Den & took a few family pictures. I thought I'd try some different things with black & white & sepia before posting them!

Me & Tim with the boys









Grandpa & Grandma with the boys.









Dad with the boys.

With Mommy

Chase took a couple of pictures of me with the kids this week. So here I am with Baby & with Bullseye. Molly didn't want her picture taken I guess, cause we tried to take one with her, but she just kept jumping out of my arms. As you can see, I don't think Bullseye was too happy about it either, but at least he held still, he just made a nasty face at me.

A Bit of July

I finished this Lizzie Kate last week. I have two more to finish for July & I'll be done with that month. I haven't had much time to stitch for the last week, the kids have been home, & it seems like we've done nothing but run, run, run, & then we run some more! I hope to get some stitching in tonight, cause I think we'll actually be home. And then the boys go back to their Mom's house Wednesday night so I plan to end the week with lots of stitches! The house cleaning will wait till the weekend or next week. :)

It's A Girl!

We added a new addition to our house this week & IT'S A GIRL!!!! She weighs in at about 2 ton & is almost 200 inches long. Yep, she's a big girl! We've named her "Miss Big Truck".

Here is Tim's new work truck..... isn't she pretty?!?

Chase's last soccer game!

It was also Chase's last weekend for soccer. At his level, they play tournaments the last week. He played three games, 10, noon, & 2. It was a LONG day at the soccer complex, but luky for us the weather was great. By the 3rd game it was super windy but otherwise it was great weather to be outside all day. Their team lost their first game, won the 2nd, & then lost the 3rd, they had to win the 3rd game in order to advance to Sunday's semi-finals.
Chase was never on the right side of the field to get good pictures of him, but here are a couple that turned out good. And where he wasn't just standing their holding down his patch of grass. LOL He had a pretty bummed leg from his bike crash on Wednesday night so playing soccer was pretty rough on him but he did great!

Carter's last soccer game!

This weekend was our last weekend of soccer. Here is Carter playing goalie, during the last quarter of his game. I was really bummed I couldn't be over by the bench to take his picture. When his team scored their 3rd goal, to seal their win, he stood up & did this funny "noodly" dance. We all laughed so hard. And then, he did it two more times! He was the only one on the bench doing this silly dance. Oh it was a Kodak moment, we were too far away to capture it though.

He wasn't very happy that I just happened to be sitting RIGHT there & could take his picture.

Kickin' the ball. Sometimes we're worried he's gonna biff it but he did really good this weekend.

Paws And Stripes Furever

It was a slow stitching week last week. I must have had a lot going on? Or was just lazy? :)
This one is from Stitchy Kitty. I used beads instead of french knots, because as you all know, I can't do them. This one might be one of my favorites.

Really BIG Bags

So I found these backpacks on LTD.com. They are like 3 feet tall. We thought they were perfect for packing to go to Grandma's or camping. They are HUGE, as you can tell. The boys thought they were funny, especially when they tried to put them on their backs & actually walk with them!