Dinos

I was up late and up early but they are done! Isaac's was already done so I had two to finish. Actually, I didn't plan on making one for Sam since we have costumes that still fit him but I just couldn't say no to him when he wanted wanted to be a dinosaur too. I had to skip the hands and feet in order to have enough fabric, and make his arms a different color but he got his dino costume.

They are faaaaar from perfect, but the boys are happy and that's what counts.

Why oh Why...

I bought the patterns last month, the beginning of last month. I bought the fabric weeks ago, so why am I going to be up all night sewing?

Pictures

This week our art project was painting with watercolors. I hope you don't mind if I don't post pics since I have some other pictures to post.

Friday night was a family activity night with our homeschool group. It was at a local pumpkin patch. The boys got to pick their own pumpkins, see some animals, have some donuts and cider and go thru some corn mazes. They even had a haystack maze and a corn tunnel for younger children. It was a lot of fun! Jeremiah carved the pumpkins yesterday and I toasted the pumpkin seeds. They were good! If you haven't tried that, you should.







I got these angel wings and halo on clearance last week. I thought it was worth a couple bucks just for the photo ops! I also figured they would be fun for her to play with when she is older and into dressing up.

Kangarooboo.com

Sweetisu is a blogger I have been reading for years now, and have even got to know a bit IRL. When she announced a few months ago that she and her husband had an online business in the works I was excited to see what it would be! Well, Kangarooboo.com has now opened! If you are like me and you are sick of cheap plastic toys, you will want to check this out. It is full of wonderful, fun, high-quality toys that you can feel good about having in your home.

Slow Cooker Cont...

Several of you asked for favorite recipes, and I will share one, but I would rather tell you about my cook book! This is my favorite cookbook, in fact it's really the only one I use (I generally use allrecipes.com). This is a cookbook for people who like to provide home-cooked meals for their family but are not particularly adventurous chefs. I like using recipes that call for ingredients I already have in my pantry, and this book is full of them! What I love most about this book is that there are several (sometimes as many as 6 or 7) versions of each recipe. If a recipe calls for a spice or something I don't have, many times another version of the same recipe uses something I do have so I can mix and match.

And here is a recipe for Split Pea Soup that I have recently made twice. I combined three different recipes to suit what I can in the pantry.

1-lb. pkg. split peas
1 lb pre-cooked ham, diced
1 carrot, diced
1 onion, diced
1 rib celery, diced
2 qts. water, with 2 or 3 teaspoons or squares chicken bullion
1/2 tsp. pepper
1 bay leaf
1 tsp thyme
3 potatoes, diced
1 tsp. sugar

Wash and sort split peas, combine ingredients, cook low 8-10 hours.

I should add that you can get this cookbook for as little a $4.00 on amazon (used) and that there are other versions of it such as cooking lightly, for diabetics, 4 ingredient ect...

Five Reasons I Love My Slow Cooker

When Fall comes around and the temps drop you start thinking about hot soups and meals. In other words, time to bring out the slow cooker! I came up with five reasons I love mine.

1. Its easy. I have made a lot of meals in my slow cooker, and while not all of them made the "let's make this again!" list, I can honestly say I haven't screwed up one. Slow cookers have a large margin of error and it's really hard to mess up a meal.

2. Your house smells great. All day long.

3. Clean up. The mess you make preparing the meal is long cleaned up by the time you eat. You can enjoy your meal without a messy kitchen.

4. Early Start. I am the most productive in the morning. It's a great feeling to have dinner started before it's even lunch.

And my personal favorite reason...

5. Multi-tasking. Can anybody tell me another way you can be shopping and cooking a meal for your family at the same time?? (and take-out does not count).

Etchings

This week we strayed from our Art book. I saw this idea somewhere (can't remember where) and I actually remember doing this when I was in elementary.

Step 1. Color a piece of paper with a variety of colors. The secret is to press hard to make the color as bright as you can. The boys got bored after a few minutes of this part.


Step 2. Cover the entire paper in black tempra paint so that NO color shows. Yes, it is messy. Actually, we found that that a paint brush kept showing streaks of color, and our fingers worked better. The boys didn't get quite as bored with this step.


Step 3. After the paint dries, etch your picture with something sharp. We let the paint dry over night, and this morning the boys etched their pictures of dinosaurs (of course). You have to be able to press hard without tearing the paper, something they had a tough time with. However, mine was easier because I pressed my crayon harder and there was more wax which helps the paint scrape off better. Elijah's dinosaur:

A New Blogger

I would like to point you in the direction of the newest blogger in my family, my sister Kylene. She is a mom of 3 cute boys (and a miniature pincher), an Air Force veteran, an Army wife and just recently started college.

5 Months

Sadie is five months today. On Sunday, for the first time, we met another little Sadie at the store. A little girl about 3 or 4 who was happy to meet a baby who shared her name. I also noticed that there is a cow named Sadie in one of the California cheese commercials. Not sure what to think about that.

Over the past month Sadie has started to laugh. What is more delicious than a baby laugh? Babies have no concept of forcing a laugh, or pretending something is funny, so when they laugh you know it is just pure delight. I love that. The first time she really laughed she was sitting on my lap watching Elijah jump around. We all kind of stopped and looked at Sadie , wondering what was wrong with her, until we realized she was laughing!

We have finally moved into some cooler weather which means tights! Tights sure have changed since I was little, and it is fun! Speaking of tights...when I dressed her on Sunday I thought "this dress really needs off white cable knit tights". I just got a surprise box of baby girl clothes in the mail from my cousin Kim, and what was in it? Off white cable knit tights. Thanks Kim!

Fabric Banner

This weeks project was a fabric banner. I was looking forward to it all week because I love anything that has to do with fabric. Honestly, I wanted to shoo the boys away and do it myself! I didn't though, as you can probably tell. I gave minimal help. I can't say I won't make my own though, I do have extra dowels :D

Not Your Average Paperwork

The other night I was filling out paperwork for our local homeschool group. I told Jeremiah "You know your filling out something for a homeschool group when they give you 10 lines for your children's names."

Cookies and Cuties

So our Friday art project was another bust. We made paper buzzers that were supposed to vibrate when you blew into them and make noise, but we could not get a noise out of them. I wasn't too upset because I knew I was going to make some sugar cookies over the weekend that the boys could decorate. It was our turn to bring snacks to a Bible study we do with two other families and I thought some Fall themed cookies would be cute. Target had the Autumn cookie cutters and sprinkles in their dollar section (love that dollar section!)

The boys had a blast and of course Jonah got to eat the cookie he decorated because I don't think anybody else would want to eat that...





And here is Sadie all dressed up for church. I love this picture, I was trying to get her to look at the camera but I think it turned out better this way.

Overheard

Isaac: What are you doing?

Elijah: I'm making toast.

Isaac: What do you want toast for? It's just burned up bread.

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