Here's another picture of Mushi mushi. Is he lovable, or what?

Meet Mushi-Mushi. Unfortunately, Cinders didn't get along with the dog...after she launched the 4th of many sneak attacks that left Jam bleeding, we decided she just had to go.

We took our dog to the shelter with us to pick out another cat, and Mushi was "the guy". He loves Jamie (we say he likes his women tall dark and hairy) and he loves to get attention (of course he has wanted attention at 3 AM the last two nights, what's up with that?) but so far he's a great cat.

Winter has finally arrived at our house. My dog acted like she needed to go out potty, but she just wanted to go have a good roll in the snow. I guess this weather just brings out her husky side.

what are you making for the holidays?

I admit, it's later than I think. Here's the thing though, I started my holiday planning early this year, so I'm not nearly as behind on my holiday crafting as I *usually* am for this time of year (Christmas is approaching like a speeding train though!)

I have mentioned a website called "you can make this" before, and I wanted to mention they are doing a series of videos of frugal and quick gift ideas (and maybe a little decorating too)

at any rate, you can find the website here, and the blog with the videos here. If you sign up for their newsletter they have a lot of fun free patterns too. I love the 18" doll sized patterns.

So there's my little infomercial about YCMT, If I can get my camera functioning, I will try to show some pictures of what I have been up to lately.

-Valarie

I got into a fun swap on the cricut boards. you had to make two cards, two titles, two accents, two journal tags and some other random smaller accents. we also had to add two candy bars, and some brads or other fun embellishments. I di one for fall, and one for Halloween

Here is what I got back. I can hardly wait for the next one, which will be for winter and Christmas.

Meet Cinders

Recently we had a cat show up at our house. while we have feral cats all the time, but this one came right up to us! My husband, a long time advocate of "cats are okay for others, but I don't want any" was melted when it rubbed up against his leg.

He decided we should let the cat become a house pet (and an indoors pet) lest it become coyote chow. So anyway, here she is!

more fun crafts

The boo bag was a big hit with the kids. The little boy plays with my kids and he nudged his big sister and said "ask her" she then asked if we sent the bag. Of course, I was evasive..."what bag?" and they proceeded to tell me all about it. They probably know we did it, but hey, it was fun anyway.

So I promised more crafts. If you ever wanted to try dyeing wool yarn, check out this link. I HAD to try it, so I used Patons winter white (do not get the kind that says "superwash") and after it was dyed, I felted it. I think I'm going to make potholders or something, maybe a table trivet. I used four packets fruit punch koolaid for the red (I could have gotten away with 3, it didn't absorb all of it, and none of it washed out) and four packets of pink lemonade koolaid for the pink. I left a healthy space in between so I would get some white too.

Halloween is on its way!

If you go on over to the graphic depot, you will see the trapezoid printable I created using Roxanne's great graphics. There will also be a "boo" set available soon, if you want to surprise your friends and neighbors with this fun tradition.

The bag was stamped before I added the graphics and filled it. This set will probably be in the store very soon!

Along with that note, there are some great pumpkin (as in really cute pumpkin, not Charlie Browns "GREAT PUMPKIN") earrings in my etsy store. My kids are getting into the "spirit" of things too, we have been decorating the house, and getting ready for my mom's visit later this month. I sure hope my neighbors don't know I have a blog, LOL

I'm a designer!

Okay, I've long thought of myself as a designer of many things, but my "new thing" is designing printables for The Graphic Depot. You can find them at http://thegraphicdepot.com. I'm really excited about it, because Roxanne has some really cute graphics on her site. go check them out!

I'll be sharing more as I finish some.
Valarie

I've been blurfing again.

on my minor quest for blog candy, I came across a blog getting ready to launch. It's called "the next level" and you can find it here. They are set to launch the first of June, and they are offering a couple nice prize packs (the pink and brown one reminds me of cupcakes)

I will probably post again today, as I have some photos to retrieve from my camera.

Have a great one!

Here's another blog giving away blog candy

I guess I went AWOL for a while

I've been "blurffing" (blog surfing) and boy have I seen some nice blog candy!

Check this out if you are into Scrapbooking or card making. Here's another one, but you better hurry, it ends today!

The boxes above are projects I have been working on. One is for my cuttlebug embossing folders, and the other one is, well, was meant to be for my folders until my DD saw what I had done to her box (that she didn't want anymore and had said I could have) so she took it back!

That's okay, I like them both. Have been working on some jewelry endeavors too, but I'm not quite ready to post them.

Valarie

5 years!

Okay, believe it or not, my twins are 5 today! I don't have any pictures to post yet, but I almost can't believe it. If you've never been through the whole preemie experience, it's hard to understand, but having them in the NICU, and not being able to hold them for almost a week (It may have been longer than a week with Wyatt, God has erased much of that time from my memory) I think I was suffering from severe PPD. It's just so amazing that those little guys who were covered in wires and tubes and hooked up to all sorts of alarms and monitors are now two rambunctious, intelligent (although maybe not in a "common-sense" kind of way ), mostly adorable boys.

Whoever said that Boys are just noise with dirt on it knew what they were talking about!

Happy birthday to my little guys!
Valarie

One of my favorite websites for make it yourself patterns is giving away a new Janome sewing machine. you can find out how by checking here!

Like the picture says, they have patterns for lots of different things, and the also have a lot of free patterns you can try.

some close ups of individual projects

While You were out!

Have you ever seen the show, "while you were out"? They take a family, and send one of them away for a weekend, while other loved ones decorate a room in their house. When they get back, "surprise!"

While my hubby was away on business, I decided to redecorate our bedroom (one of the last places in the house we hadn't painted yet) Here is the headboard which I re-upholstered, I also put new lampshades on and added a decorative shelf on the right.

In the corner you can see that I finally added a valance, and moved the hanging candle holder to the corner. I also de-cluttered (a lot!)

I stencilled the border, made the elk clock on top of the hutch, did both of the flower arrangements and put up some framed artwork (I actually printed the pictures on my printer...they are from PC crafter, by Dwight Kirkland)

Anyway, my husband was shocked, and very happy, and I'm glad that I finally have a room where things match. Now all we need is new carpet.....

Here is a card and a little pincushion I made for my mom for her B-day. The shoe was my daughter's, and the fabric came from an old Christmas dress of hers that I have long since re-purposed. I just wanted to share!

More shameless bragging- My daughter won gold on the floor exercise at the state championships, level 4. She seemed a little surprised that many of the "big" girls gave her heartfelt congratulations. I told her that a lot of people get to move up in levels without ever "winning" a state!

It was a nice way to wrap up level 4. She has one more meet at level 5, and then our season is probably over (maybe not, but we'll just have to see how she does)

Here is the Valentinte I made for my DH. the heart is cut out of close to cocoa card stock, with a black shadow. since I accidentally got some glue on the shadow, I dusted it with copper pigment powder. I thought this would be good for the BBTB challenge. The background paper is patterned, I'm not sure you can tell from the picture. It is a sort of damask tone on tone. Even hubby said 'beautiful card"!

Clank Clank! We Have medals!

Here we are coming home from our meet in New York.

The picture of the girls laying on the mats is after the meet while they were waiting for the awards announcement...it had been a long day, and most still had to spend 4 hours in the car heading home. I can't tell you how nice it is to have a pilot in the family!!!

Sabrina won 5th on floor, 6th on vault, 4th on Beam, and GOLD on uneven Bars. She's been chasing that one for the whole season, so we were very proud to see her up there on top!

She also won third place all around, which is the picture of her on the podium. Sorry they are so grainy, my little Kodak can't deal well with distance pictures indoors. I also put in a picture of Sabrina with her head set on inside the plane, and one of the sunset we saw, just before landing on the way home.

gymnastics stuff

My daughter competed in her second meet of the year yesterday. She picked up a 4th place all around, which was pretty nice, but she is mad at herself, because she let things get to her. It was really cold in the gym, and a lot of girls has less than stellar performances, but the ones who really shined were the ones that were able to block everything else out and just do what they knew they had to. Perhaps I should learn to apply that idea to things in my own life!

I made several items for the gift shop at the meet, the most popular were gymnastics themed notebooks. I will post a few here, but if you like them, there are more on my etsy shop.

I suppose I should mention that my etsy store can be found here

I finally did it! Not only do I have a blog, but now I have a shop on Etsy! I'm so excited! I have a lot more to post on there, but here are a few examples. Now if we could just get some warm weather so I can go back to taking pictures outside...taking jewelry pictures inside is really difficult!