Husband of the Year Award goes to.........

Ok if there was a husband of the year award I would totally be giving it to my husband right now. First I'll have to explain. So we are finishing our basement so that my hubby's brother, wife and 2 kids can move in. Well that means that I had to loose my awesome toy/school/craft room since it was in the one room that was finished in the basement. So I was planning on moving all of that into the guest room we had upstairs, the only problem was that the guest room was going to be very crowded with my stuff and my girls toys since the room is significantly smaller. So my hubby willingly gave up his office to let me turn it into my very own craft room. So I was super excited for that. Then while we were planning the kitchen in the basement we realized that the kitchen cabinets that we had previously gotten off of ksl for a steal, wouldn't work in the basement. So instead of getting rid of the whole kitchen set my husband agreed to let me put it up in my craft room. SWEET! So I got to work right away on cutting the counter and rearranging how I wanted the whole set to go up in my room. Then my awesome hubby lugged all the cabinets and counter top and put it all together for me. He has definitively spoiled me this year. Not only do I have my own very organized craft room he had also earlier got me the best serger I could have ever asked for. I am going to be having so much fun this coming year.

This is the before picture of the cabinets. The wall cabinets are behind the counter so you can't see them.

These are the pictures of my craft room.

Now I can't wait for the spring and summer time because I think I'll give the cabinets and counter top a new fresh look!

A Temple gift

So recently I had a friend of mine go through the Temple with her family. I was so excited for her so I wanted to do something special for her but had no clue what to do. So I hit up google to try and find a gift I could make but I could not find anything that had to do with just going through the temple. Great I had to come up with an idea on my own crap. So I thought I wanted to do like a temple kit or something before she went through the temple but freak what do I know I have never been through the Temple, so that idea was out the window. Then I decided to make a little "BASKET" full of blessing as a gift to help remind her how blessed she is. So I called up my visit teaching companion and we got to work. We kind of did it like the candy bar posters but I wanted it to be cute so we just put everything in a basket and I made the cute little cards with my digital scrapbooking program My Memories Suite. This is the best scrabooking software and if you would like to purchase it type in STMMMS99421 at checkout and get 10$ off and then 10$ to use in there store for embellishment. It will be the best purchase ever! I use it all the time.

This is what all the little cards say.

-A "BASKET" full of blessing. (basket)
-There are many "RIESENS" why you are blessed for going through the temple. (Riesens)
- Your family will be "EVERLASTING" (everlasting gobstoppers)
-You will be "SODA"-lighted to being one step closer to God. (her favorite soda)
- "U-NO" your marraiged has been strengthened. (U-NO candy bar)
-You will be able to "ACT" upon the spirit. (ACT popcorn.)
- Your kids will have a "PASTA"-tive example to look up to. (Pasta)
-There is "MUFFIN" like an eternal companion. (Her favorite muffin)
-You will have "JOY" beyond "MEASURE" (almond joys in a measuring cup.)
-It is an invest-"MINT" in reaching your eternal goals. (mints)
-You "SKOR"-ed one againsted Satan. (SKOR candy bar.)
-We're "NERDS" for not doing this earlier.(Nerds)
-"HUGS" and "KISSES" ~ Emmie & Jessie (Hugs and Kisses)



This could be a real cute idea for a bridal shower gift too. Well I hope you enjoyed. I loved how this turned out. This is my first time I have come up with an Idea all by myself with out relying on Pinterest, sugardoodle, blogs, or google. Yeah me. Maybe I will break through this creative block I am in.

Potty Training tips for the Independent child.

Ok so my little miss V is one of those kids that wants to be sooo independent. She has been showing interest in potty training for EVER but every time I step in to potty train her it totally back fires on me so I had a break off of work and finally told her, "Here you do this yourself." And gave her some panties and let her wear them with no pants around the house, and what do you know she did great. Only like one accident a day sometimes which was great! The only problem was I did this 2 days before I had to go back to work. She hasn't done so well when I put pants on her so during the day when I am home I leave her in just panties and at work I put her in  a diaper. Great I don't think she is ever going to be potty train A) because it is not socially acceptable to let your child run around in her underwear all day and B) it is starting to get cold so my poor little miss V can't run around naked. Luckly I was cleaning her room and found one of those little diaper covers that came with an old dress and decided turn them into "Pretty Panties" so that I could continue the potty training at work. All I did was sewed some small lace in rows on the butt then got a bigger lace to go around the entire waist part and viola pretty panties that people will think is a skirt. Now for the cold part, I had made these leg warmers for Itylee when she was a baby but these work perfect for potty training. They keep her warm and she doesn't have to take them off to go potty! Score!!! If there are people interested in learning how to make the leg warmers let me know. I'll do a tutorial if people are interested. They are super easy! I put a panty liner in her panties because there have been times where she pee's just a little bit and this way it doesn't totally wet the panties and keeps her feeling like she is wearing big girl panties. Now some other tips you could do it a visit from the Potty Fairy. I did this with Itylee and she was good to go. Fill a basket with little prizes or treat wrap it up all cute and knock on the door and run. Tell your little one that the potty fairy dropped off this package so every time they go potty they get to choose a prize. Now with Vienna being all independent this did not work instead one time I got upset and told her "Fine you pee pee in the potty you get your potty treat. But you pee pee in the panties and I get your potty treat." Then I ate her treat right in front of her. Oh man did this get her mad. So with the "pretty panties" and the "i get your treat" I think we will be totally done with diapers soon. YEAH!!!!! Don't mind the little stain on the pretty panties I should of taken the picture before she had lunch. dang spaghetti ooo's.

Simple October Gift

Ok so here is what I did for just a little gift for the ladies I visit teach.  Here is the link for the cute witch shoes and for the treat I made some chocolate dipped strawberries and the card I made with digital scrap booking program I have. If anyone would like to share with me on how to upload of file I would be more then willing to share my card with all of you

AND THE WINNER IS..............

Ok first thank you everyone who participated and for the staff of mymemories for sponsering this give away. I have had so much fun with this digitial scrap booking software. I am learning something new everytime I use it. Plus the staff at mymemories is awsome. On their blog they do a different challanges and on their facebook on Sundays they do this thing called speed scrap sunday were in an hour they teach you a different technique but they give you steps every ten minutes for an hour then you post your picture and of course they give out prizes. It's so fun to see how we all had the same instructions but how differently everyone around the worlds tunrs out different. Ok ok ok I'll stop blabbering and get to the good part. AND THE WINNER IS.............ASHLEY!!!!!!!!!!!!! Congrats Ashley I know you will love this and A.J. can deal with the neglect. Ok I do still have some good news for everyone else If you really would like to still try out digitial scrapbooking mymemories crew has given me a promo code so that you can use get 10$ off of the digitial software plus another 10$ to use to in the desgin shop. The software is only 39.97 so with the promo you only pay 29.97 which seriously is a good price especially for what you get.  If anyone would like to test drive the program too you are more than welcomed to come on over and give it a shot. For those that are interested the promo code is STMMMS99421


They also have also have a cool wedding software if you are in the wedding business or just about to have your own wedding and want to save money you can create thank you cards, invitaition, place cards, ect. Now I just need to find someone I know that is engaged so I have an excuse to purchase it :)

This was my speed scrap sunday picture

This is a card I made to go along with a little gift for the ladies I visit teach. I will post this with the gift in another post since I have not delivered them yet

This is something I made for a friend who is getting married today and again I'll have another post to show you what I did with this

MyMemories digital scrapbooking software give away

Ok so I am sooooo excited to do this give away. Now if your like me you take a lot of pictures and never get them developed or when you do they sit in a box for ever until you finally get the urge to scrap book all of the pictures and you spend countless hours on it and when you have finish it's only one page. Yup that's me and dont forget the huge mess you have to clean up afterwards. I have been wanting to get to digital scrapbooking so I can make a book for every year. My goal is to do a page a month about what we did that month. Can I just tell you how much I love mymemories suite software. I had so much fun and it only took a half an hour out of my day to make this cute page of my girls. The nice thing you can do is just use an already made template where you can just drag pictures into or you can make your own. This page I made myself. No template involved. Not to bad for my first page. The program isn't just for scrapbooking either.You can make birth annoucments, christmas, cards, or even b-day invitaions!

Okay okay now time to get on to the good stuff. The giveaway for a free Mymemories Suite Software. Now it is simple all you have to do is go to mymemories.com and then choose a layout that you like best and post a comment telling me what you favorite layout is.  My favorite one is the glamour and glitz pack. That package is what I used to make my page. Also if you like to add another entry follow them on facebook, blogger, or twitter and leave in your comment which ones you have done. I will pick a winner next Monday so good luck everyone!

Blog- http://blog.mymemories.com/


Facebook- http://www.facebook.com/pages/MyMemories/140359372717593

Twitter- http://twitter.com/#!/mymemoriessuite

A is for apple

These are our apple faces and stain glass apples. We will be putting our stain glass apples on our halloween tree

ABC Halloween Countdown

Okay so today is the last day before my favorite month! Yeah I am so excited for October to come. Halloween has been my favorite holiday off all times and I wanted to help make my girls excited too. So I made an ABC Halloween countdown. Remember that vase that I stuffed my extra screen scraps into well I was taking a walk around my neighborhood and found a dead tree in one of the empty lots. SCORE I cut off a couple branches and put them in my vase. Then I found these cute little bags at the dollar store and wrote a letter on each of them and the number of days left till Halloween. Inside of the bag is just a little piece of paper with a word relating to the letter of the day. I have a sheet explaining what we are going to do for the day for each letter. Most of them are decorating crafts so that by the time Halloween comes I will have lots of cute little homemade decorations from my girls.

These are the bags with the letter of the day and how many more days until Halloween. I then hole punch at the top so I could just put them on a branch easily

This is our ABC Halloween countdown tree















I will also post a picture everyday of our activities in case they don't fully make sense in my description.


Here is my Halloween alphabet that I came up with

A-     Apples

B-      Bat

C-      Cats 

D-     Donuts

E-      Eyeball

F-      Frankenstein

G-     Ghost   

H-     Haunted House

I-        Icky

J-       Jack-o-lantern

K-      Knight

L-       Lantern

M-   Mummies

N-     Night

O-     Owl

P-      Pumpkins

Q-     Quivering Queen

R-      Raven

S-      Spider

T-      Tombstones

U-     Ugly Face

V-     Vampire

W-   Witch

X-      X-ray

Y-      Yucky Yummies

Z-      Zombie

27- Halloween wreath

28-Flying purple people eater

29- corn maze

30-MOVIE

31- Halloween breakfast

And here is the explanations

A-     Apples Stain glass apples*, apples faces, pull and peel for hair and mouth and m&ms for eyes and nose stick together with peanut butter

B-      Bats Stain glass bats* and bat cups but use children’s hands for the wings bat puppet http://www.craftjr.com/halloween-crafts-finger-puppets/ http://www.thebestkidsbooksite.com/craftdetails2.cfm?CName=1758

C-      Cats and costume Stain glass cats* Cat finger puppet http://www.craftjr.com/halloween-crafts-finger-puppets/

D-     Donuts play the donut on a string game

E-      Eyeballs edible eyeballs http://familyfun.go.com/recipes/edible-eyeball-treats-685115/

F-      Frankenstein  Frankenstein Paper plate http://www.dltk-holidays.com/halloween/mplatefrankenstein.htm

G-     Ghost Ghost Foot print trace foot and cut out two hot glue them together but leave enough space to stuff with cottonballs then seal it up and hang  and ghost suckers

H-     haunted house Build a ginger bread haunted house

I-        Icky Icky game. Blind fold children and have these things in a plastic bag and have the kids guess what “body parts ” they are touching  Hot dog chucks: nose, Peeled grapes:eyes, Cooked spaghetti: guts Pistachio shells: finger nails,  

J-       Jack-o-Lantern Jack-o-Lantern egg carton http://www.allfreecrafts.com/halloween/egg-carton-pumpkins.shtml Felt jack-o-lanters Make a pumkin and small shapes out of felt. Let the kids put the shapes on the pumkin to make a jack o lantern, Jack o lantern puppet http://www.craftjr.com/halloween-crafts-finger-puppets/

K-      Knights Make Knight customes out if paper bags from the grocery store and a shield from cardboard and helment from an empty gallon milk jug

L-       Lanterns Make black and orange paper Lanterns

M-   Mummies Glue two googly eyes on a toilet paper roll(if you don’t have white toilet paper rolls paint them white first.) wrap in white streamers fill with some yummy mummy treats. Make hotdog mummies http://familyfun.go.com/halloween/halloween-recipes/halloween-dinners/hot-dog-mummies-715031/

N-     Night paint empty milk jugs black poke some small holes all over the jug if you are going to put these outside, put some dirt in the jug. Place a tea candle or the little fake tea candle lights inside of the jug.

O-     Owl Build an owl out of shape http://www.dltk-kids.com/animals/mshapesowl.htm

P-      Pumpkins Stain glass Pumkins* and visit a pumkin patch make pumkin snacks http://familyfun.go.com/halloween/halloween-recipes/halloween-dinners/pumpkin-roll-ups-684822/

a.       Gumdrop pumkins-  get two orange sliced-shaped gummies and trim the semi straight side on both gummies to make straight sides so that you can put the two together to make a full circle. Now get a green gumdrop and trim the bottom off and press it on top of the candy pumpkin.

Q-     Quivering Queen  Quivering Queen game. Have the kids dress up as queens or kings and fill a plastic teacup with jelly beans or other small candies and they have to quiver until their cup is empty. When they quiver they cannot have their feet leave the ground because that would be jumping and also they can’t move their arm they have to quiver with their bodies

R-      Raven Hand and foot Raven. Trace one foot and both hands on black paper. Use foot for boy and hands for wings glue googly eyes on and glue a yellow triangle on for beak

S-      Spiders  Trace two hands on black paper and overlap the thumbs for the spiders head and glue on googly eyes Egg carton spiders http://www.dltk-kids.com/crafts/insects/mspidercarton.htm spider finger puppet http://www.craftjr.com/halloween-crafts-finger-puppets/

T-      Tombstone Paint empty cereal box gray to make their own tombstones

U-     Ugly faces- Make a felt face with separate facial pieces that the kids get to put together to make ugly faces

V-     Vampire Vampire suckers http://familycrafts.about.com/gi/dynamic/offsite.htm?zi=1/XJ/Ya&sdn=familycrafts&zu=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.craftster.org%2Fforum%2Findex.php%3Ftopic%3D272046.0

W-   Witch Make witches brew (homemade root beer made in a cauldron) Make witch hats http://4crazykings.blogspot.com/2009/09/halloween-kids-craft-witches-hats.html

X-      X ray x ray gingerbread men http://familyfun.go.com/halloween/halloween-recipes/halloween-desserts-cakes/gingerbread-skeletons-929720/

Y-      Yucky yummies- Make Halloween treats to share and to save for movie day.

Z-      Zombies Make zombie silhouettes.  Get a large piece of cardboard and trace your childs body in a zombie position . cut out and paint it black. We will be sticky these in our window.

27-Hand print Halloween color wreath

28-Recite the Flying purple people eater poem then play game Draw a large one eye one horn flying purple people eater on cardboard and cut a big mouth out of it. Make circle bean bags out of white fabric or felt and let the kids draw faces on the bags. Now toss them into the purple people eaters mouth.

29- Go to a corn maze

30-MOVIE DAY! Watch Kid Halloween movies all day

31- Happy HALLOWEEN have a Halloween breakfast http://hoosierhomemade.com/halloween-breakfast-food/

*Instructions to make stain glass
Supplies
       -Jolley ranchers
       -Metal cookie cutter in the shape you need cats, pumpkins, etc
       -Aluminum foil
       -Canola or safflower oil
       -wooden skewer
Pre heat oven to 350* F

Line the bottom and interior sides of the cookie cutters with aluminum foil and brush lightly with oil, set on baking sheet.

Arrange the jolley ranchers in a single layer in the cookie cutter and bake until the candy is melted about 10 min.

Remove from oven, let cool for 1 min. then poke a hole in the top with the wooden skewer. Cool then pop out the stain glass shape and peel off the aluminum foil. Thread some thin ribbon through the hole, and hang where ever you would like.

Homemade Halloween decor

So Halloween is my all time favorite holiday and last year I did not decorate so this year I want to make up for it. Now since I don't have any money to spend on holiday decor I am going to be making all the decoration from stuff lying around my house. When James went on his business trip awhile back I was at Lowes and they had these HUGE screen sliding doors for 95% off they were only .78 cents! I had no Idea what to do with them I just knew I couldn't pass them up. Now I am glad I grabbed them. I bought like 4 of them and with one of them I took out the screen and put it on my front door. I then drew a spiderweb with chalk and cut it out. Then with another one I had my two girls and a neighbor girl lay down and I traced their bodies to make some shadow people, and topped it off with some of my cornstalks I dried from my garden. With the little black scraps of screen I put them in a vase and put it on my front entry table. So far I have liked the decor and I can't wait to make some more!

Easy Chicken cordon bleu bundle

Ok so I am all about easy quick dinners because sometimes we don't get home from work til 7 and need a quick easy to make dinner. One time on one of those late days I had stop for gas and decided to get an already made food from Maverik. I was craving Maverik hot dogs and was sad to find all the buns were gone so I grabbed a chicken cordon bleu bundle and it was AMAZING! So this is my take on the chicken cordon bleu bundle.

This is makes 4
Ingredients
refrigerated Big phillbury crescent rolls
precooked chicken (I cooked it before I went to work and just left it in the fridge no need to preheat)
ham slices
Swiss cheese

pre heat oven to 350
1-put 2 of the crescent roll dough together and pinch the seam to make a rectangle
                      layer the cheese, ham, then chicken
2-fold it all up and pinch the seams,
3- then flip it over seam side down. You will have a seam on the top side from pinching the two dough
                      together but it is a lot prettier seam.
Do not grease your tray
Bake for 17-20 Min.
In the picture from left to right is step 1 then 2 then 3

 I actually liked how when I cooked them the top split open and goosed cheese!

I want to be here for all

To all my dear friends especially to those I have not talked to in forever. These past few days since I have learned about Jordan’s death have really been hard. I have been feeling really numb because your not suppose to be burying your friends. 22 is just too young to die. I think I have felt more regret more than anything. Regret that I didn’t try hard enough to keep in touch with all my friends. Instead I got caught up in my own life. It hurts me that I wasn’t there and I lost touch and had no idea what was going on . Back in High school I felt just like this when JJ died. Why wasn’t I there. Why didn’t I try hard enough to help someone out. It hurts a lot that I never received a phone call when someone needed to talk, and I know that is my fault. I didn’t try hard enough to keep that relationship up to where they felt comfortable to call me when they needed to talk. So that is why I am writing. I want everyone to know I don’t care if we never really talk now or even if we never really talked in school, I am here to listen and to comfort. I want to be the shoulder you can lean on. No matter how long we’ve known each other. I am here. I have had to bury to many friends in my 22 years of life that I would not wish upon anyone. I know I suck at keeping in touch but I want everyone to know to please call me if you are ever having a hard time and just need some support.


Jordan please forgive me for not being there when you needed someone. Please forgive me for not keeping in touch. I will miss your bear hugs and how it was impossible to be in a bad mood after one. I will miss the way you ran too. In middle school during lunch one time, I believe it was Kevin Cooper that said it, that you reminded us of Mario when you would run. How you had these short legs that could run so fast and how after that day I always imagine you in a Mario costume whenever you would run. Oh how I wish I could turn back the clock to middle school where we use to hang out behind the cafeteria. I will truly miss you.

In loving memory of Jordan I would love to hear your favorite moment or moments with Jordan. It was so nice to hear some of Jordan’s stories at his funeral today. It really helps remembering how kind and loving he was.

Peace be with you until we meet again.

Thank you every body for reading. I feel much better getting this of my chest. Now I must return to watching cartoons with my girls and eating my ice cream.

James's Vacation fun or should I say my fun

Yeah I am finally posting again. I have been so busy but since Vienna has strep throat today and hasnt been on anitbiotics for 24hrs yet we are stuck inside for the day. Both of my kids are asleep right now so I am taking advantage of it and finally updating on what I did while James was out of town.Back in July James had to go to a two week trainning in Ohio. I was beyond excited for him to be gone. I had all my projected planned out and was counting the days till he was leaving. I love to suprise James with things so I had so much fun. My first project was our old kitchen table. I had dreams for this table at one point but we found a table that was going to be for my sewing room and James like it to much for a kitchen table so this old thing got left behind and was taking up space in my garage. Then I had a better dream for this old table. I first cut it straight down the middle with a skil saw using the same legs I was able to make a skinny table that fits behind our couch. Then with the other half of the table top I made a shelf/mantle to hold our tv above the fire place.



TABLE BEFORE

MANTLE/SHELF

 SKINNY TABLE. Maybe one day I will use it as an entryway table.

Next I went to Ikea and found these scraps except the brown board which was sitting in my garage and decided to make a bench/laundry storage. I know I had seen a bench similair to this that held laundry but I can not recall where. I want to say Ikea but when I looked around last I saw no such thing. the total of scraps cost 13$. Now I am no good at tutorials but my neighbor friend is. And I made my bench from a combination of this bench and this bench from her blog.

SCRAPS FROM IKEA

Bench before I painted

BENCH AFTER AND NO IT'S NOT A TOILET HOLE IT'S TO HIDE LAUNDRY

I have some more project that I have not currently finished but will try to very soon.

24th of July lesson recap of last Year

I thought I would share this again since we are living in a new place and I know there are a lot of primary workers especially for the little ones that would like to do a special 24th of July lesson. This is what I did with my nursery class last year and it turned out wonderful. The kids listened and all had fun at the same time. If you are not a primary worker this would also work for preschool or even family home evening. Hope you enjoy.

 I had the lesson for nursery and I wanted to teach the kids about how the pioneers lived. How they traveled, what they played with, how they made their own food and ect. So I made aprons out of hot pads, ribbon and wash rags with a coffee filter for a bonnet, then I made rag dolls out of my fabric scraps that I keep around because Itylee likes to pretend they are noodles, and finally I got little baby food jars and put heavy cream in it to make butter and we all sat on the floor and sang some primary songs while we shook the jars. Or you can play primary songs on a CD and every time the music stop you freeze and when it starts playing again you pass your jar and ect. I was planning on make some bread but got way to busy. but the best part was my dad and I built a little handcart out of my old bike trailer. The kids had soo much fun and to top it off I made an amazing cake! Thank you Alessandra. Check out her website at howicook.com for the recipe and directions because you will be the hit of the party if you show up with this cake.

The top picture from left to right is James, Jesse, Hailey, Itylee, Henry, and Brynne The rest of the pictures you can figure out yourself :)

Celtic Celebration 2011

So Celtic Celebration was AMAZING this year. Everyone did so good. I want to say thank you to Liesl, Emily, and Amy for working hard and choreographing some amazing dances and of course Leia even though you are not there you did a wonderful job on Mother Nature and you are not forgotten. But also for all my fellow ADC dancers for working their butts off to make this happen. And also a shout out to all my friends and family for their support. I couldn't have done it with out you guys. My husband recorded our dances on his phone so sorry if you don't like the quality and thank you James for recording them for me. If anyone is interested in learning to Irish Dance come join us at An Dragan Ceilteach Irish Dancers I hope you enjoy our fun dances. Sorry about the Pirate dance if you want to watch the whole thing I shared a video on my facebook that someone else recorded. Its amazing! Check it out

Got to love free

So as many as you know I am prone to free stuff. Which I am very blessed since money is super tight. So the latest thing I got for free was this really cute playhouse that needed some work. I had to sand it all down, fix the bench, and take fix the door that was coming apart. I then found a new can of deck stain and sealer in my basement so this whole project didn't cost me a dime! I did it all and it only took me 2 days due to the fact that the door had to dry for 24hrs after gluing it. I think this is my first project that I actually got all done in such a short time. I am very notorious for not finishing what I start or it takes me months. So I am very proud of this. I would like to stencil in some designs to make it look not so plain. So if anybody near has some cute stencil designs let me know.

BEFORE

 AFTER

Unity Pass we meet at last

I DID IT! I made it to unity pass! Ever since we moved here in August my goal was to jog to Unity Pass and back. Well I have decided I suck as jogging so I put the girls in the bike trailer and haul then up it with me on the bike. There was actually a point where the girls and I started to go backwards but instead of giving up like I usually do and turning around I got off my bike and walked them up the rest of the way which was a workout in itself! But I needed that picture to prove to myself I can do anything. I cried almost the whole way back. For those who know me know why. I start many things and never finish exspecially in fitness. Over the past year I have lost 40 lbs and 20lbs have been in the past 8 weeks. These 8 weeks have totally changed my life no more yo-yoing for me. So I deserve the right to cry. Well until I get the feeling back in my legs and butt I will continue to sit on my sidewalk an let it ice the back of my legs and butt

First Slipcover

Yeah! I finally Finished my first slipcover. It didnt take long to actually put it together but holy crap it took a lot of planning. First off I do not suggest doing a layZboy for your first project, second do not pick stripes for your first project especially if you have minimal to work with, third if you do not have Shelley's how to dvd your screwed and should stop right away and head over to http://customslipcoversbyshelley.blogspot.com/ and order your dvd right away. Trust me you will not regret it! The only way I made it through my project was with her amazing dvd.

I had to make 3 seperate pieces because I still wanted to use the recliner and be able to take the back off so I can easily move it around. My girls love their new pink chair and the best part is I bought the layZboy on ksl for 10$ and the material was a king size sheet in the "as is" section at Ikea for 10$ so for this lovely new addition I only had to spend 20$! Now I need to get to work on some pillows to top it off. Thanks again Shelley for putting that dvd together!

72 hour kits reality check

My heart goes out to all the people in Japan and also to everyone that has loved ones there. We have been so blessed over here in Utah to not have the "Big One" hit us yet. All these natural disasters that have been going on around the world have been a warning to us to be prepared. So i decided to go through my 72 hr kits that hasnt been updated since 2008 and discovered my family would probably last only 1 day if we were away from home and because of my job its probably likely that I would be away from home. It was quite frightening. First I had to run down stairs to even find the 72 hr kit when really it should of been in my car. Then discovered it only had a few food items in it that had expired in 2008. So my shopping list was made. Then I realized there wasnt anything for Vienna due the fact she was born in 2009 and my bag was made in 2008. I was totally not prepared. Luckly while I was going through my kit I remembered James had gotten me a solar powered phone charger for Christmas but I never put it in my in kit. How mad at myself would I have been If i was in need of it and didnt have it because I was to lazy to put it right away when I got it. I think it is something everyone should have if you have a cell phone. Expecially if your like me and that is your home phone too. Also it was a great reminder to establish an out of state contact that both my husband and I could call to check in to incase I couldnt get a hold of him. So my list is made, food shopping, and calling my sister to let her know she is my contact. So I challenge all of you to just check your 72 hr kits and seriously let me know if your kit was up to date! I will give you a gold star if it is :)And seriously consider getting this solar powered charger. Its also good for more thing than a  phone too!

Refinished Piano

So I have really been dying for a piano and luckly I had just found someone who was getting rid of their piano for FREE! Yes there was a catch. It was really old built in 1925 but I LOVE old things so itwas no problem then some of the keys were not working and they had started to paint it and never finished. Luckly for me I was actually excited for those mishaps. First I had to take it apart and fix the keys that werent working then I painted it black with some left over blck polyshade. I didnt like how the black hid a lot of the dimension of the piano so I sanded around the edges and LOVE it! The Picture doesn't do it justice. There is not a better feeling than taking something broken and fixing it! So all and all I didnt spend I dime on this project which is a double bonus!