Show and Tell Friday

I guess it was pillow case week at the Lewis house. Here is my oldest daughter's first, on-her-own, sewing machine project. She is very proud of her flip-flop pillow case. She was in a class at a local sewing machine store and later in July and August she has more sewing classes at the local fabric store. She is really excited about sewing.

Flip-flops close up with accent strip and cuff

This is a pillowcase my DH made for our youngest daughter. I picked out the fabric and ribbon and was going to sew it but my "crafty/handy" hubby beat me to it. Did I mention he will also quilt, cook and make soap with me. He likes to create as much as I do.

Close up!

For more show and tell Fridays go to http://kellishouse.blogspot.com

We buy children toys- why?

Sunday night we watched a family movie. It was not animated and didn't hold the 3 year-old's attention. No problem. She has an entire room of toys to play with. She was quiet and occupied and I, ashamedly, forgot all about checking on her.

Half-way through the movie she comes to me and wants to show me something. "Oh, good!" I thought. "She's been building with her blocks." (What she usually has been doing when she wants to show me something.) But to my surprise, she led me to the bathroom, not her room. At that moment fear entered me. What was I going to be shown? There is plenty of trouble to get into in the bathroom.

I was flooded with relief and laughter when I entered the bathroom. My silly girl had indeed been building. But she chose toliet paper as her medium, not blocks. She was so proud of her tower.

So why DO we spend money on expensive bits of plastic for our children when they are happy with boxes, toliet paper and wood scraps?

Father's Day!

Posing on dock

Posing on dock 2

Fisherman with poser

Seven tolerating fishing

Andi trying her luck

Rem waiting patiently for a bite

I was fairly sure at some point we'd be fishing Reagan out of the water. She liked the ducks.

We had a great Father's Day. The rain held off and we were able to take John fishing. It wasn't his ideal spot, but he wanted to go somewhere where the kids were safe (not standing in a river) and where they might actually have a better chance of catching something. We went to Grandville, a couple of towns over from us. They have a lovely little city park with a pond/lake. (It's really too big to be a pond and not really big enough to be a lake.) It has a nice board walk and fishing dock plus a playground, bathrooms, drinking fountains and the Grandville one room school house. The kids fished for a while and then we left dad on the dock and went to the playground as well as toured the school house which was open for a short while. (They had it set up complete with a dunce cap corner! The kids loved the look into the past.) I love family days.

Show and Tell Friday

Every once in a while we break out the craft supplies and create. The above picture is of my middle daughter's party invites. Card stock, scrapbook paper, computer printed wording, scrapbook embellishment flowers, sequins and stamps. We had it all on hand and we had a blast creating. The flip flop was made from a quilting pattern I had from a magazine.

The back of the invite: More computer wording and stamps. Simple yet pretty!

Here's the front of our Father's Day card; card stock, stamps and individually cut out computer lettering.

This card has an inside, unlike the invites that are just a front and back. I wrote a message on the top portion and printed out pictures of the kids/dad fishing, cut them out and glued them in. For those of you wondering about the bottom picture... John was showing off his "Bogga Grip". (Last year's Father's Day gift.) It's a tool that helps you lift fish out of the water. He was demonstrating that it could lift up to a fifty pound fish by lifting our 30 pound three year old. Don't worry... it didn't hurt her. She kept asking for him to do it again. He only did it once.

For more Show and Tell Fridays go to http://kellishouse.blogspot.com/ .

For the Grandma's- recent pictures

Seven learning to thread and operate the new sewing machine!

NO, She's not a hippie flashing the "peace" sign. She's not channeling Richard Nixon. She is however, flashing bunny ears, which she believes should be in every picture.

Rem with bubble beard and mustache. At least he isn't sticking his tongue out!

Mother of 1?

My three school age kids are at a VBS day camp all week. They go from 9am-2pm. They are having a blast but it's been hard on my youngest who has mixed feelings on being an only child. She loves that she has all of my attention but I know she longs to join in the fun the other kids are having.

I myself am adjusting to the time with just one. This is the first time we've experienced this for any continuing length of time, since we homeschool. The house is sooo... quiet! There is no arguing, especially over the t.v. . Very unique. Wow! It's so relaxing.

I love our library!

Today we went and signed up the kids for our library's summer reading program. For every three hours they read they get a prize, cummulating in a free book. They also get to participate in planned library programs through out the summer, free of charge. But that's not all.

The children's librarian also has other reading programs available. We signed up for the City of Hudsonville's reading program that the yearly Hudsonville Fair offers. For every one and a half hours of reading the kids do, they get a free ride coupon. They can earn up to five tickets and redeem them on a special fair day where all the rides only take one coupon. That's five rides for free!

We also signed up for Barnes and Noble's summer reading program. If your child reads eight books over the summer they earn a free book. I like FREE! FREE is good! All of thee above just for reading. You gotta love it.

I don't have a hobby room...

The new storage system w/ poser popping into the picture.

The old storage system... half emptied

The "Stash" all over the floor.

The "Craft Corner"

...I have a craft corner! After digging all the craft and sewing supplies out of the garage last weekend, I have finally gotten them organized. After storing my fabric stash in a moving box, in the garage for three years, I've finally gotten it organized into a storage bin. I also have everything I need in one place now. The craft corner! My DH has two bins for fly tying and I have two bins for sewing/quilting!

The beauty is, for convienence we can leave them in the corner most of the time, yet if we need to move them (if we have people over) we can easily transport them out of the room. I would love to have a really cute craft room but then the husband would need a Man Den for his fly tying. At least we have a corner!

Seven is spending the summer learning to sew

My oldest is thrilled to be signed up for four sewing classes this summer. She will be learning to make pillowcases, a back pack, a tote bag, and a skirt! Plus she is excited to start learning to quilt. (I will be teaching her that.) We have picked up all her supplies and fabric and she even got her very own sewing tote. (Actually it's a scrapbookers supply case but she liked it and it fits her supplies quite well. Her fabric stash is tiny, currently- give her time!)

I hope she learns her lessons well enough to start a sewing business of some sort. She is already dangerous at the fabric store- oohhing and aahhing at all the fabric choices and planning things she can make for family and friends. She'll need $$ to support her habit. Did I mention she already (at 11 1/2) wants a pink VW bug of her own. You sew girl! (Cause Mom and Dad can't afford 5- currently- used cars for kids let alone be buying new custom vehicles.

Is your family prepared?

Rhubarb- not officially "in" the garden so it has more space to spread. (Same with our mint.)

The planted garden

I just found a great resource for preparedness/self-sufficiency/sustainable living. Check out THE PREPARED FAMILY at http://familyprep.blogspot.com/ . I liked the Preparedness Challange. It is in week one so it's not too late to join. Here are the challanges and my answers.



1. Plant something: I just finished putting in the rest of my garden this week. I put in rhubarb, peppermint, onion, potatoes, squash and broccoli.



2. Harvest something: Uhmmm... I don't have anything ready to harvest at this point. I have been weeding.



3. Preserve something: Getting plans made to u-pick strawberries and can jam.



4. Prepare something: The DH has been working on tying more fishing flies.



5. Cook something: I cook everyday... last night's dinner was fried chicken. Tonight we are having nachos with refried beans.



6. Manage reserves: We just cleaned out our garage and can now reach our bean, wheat and rice reserves.



7. Work on the local food system: Will be checking in at the local strawberry farm for info on when their harvest will be ready.



8. Learn or work on a new skill: Will be sewing, quilting, baking and candy making this week and next.



9. Serve someone: I served my DH by planting rhubarb. (I can't stand the stuff) I am also planning my church's Far Above Rubies (Titus 2) classes for early and late summer as well as fall.



Now it's your turn: Tell me in the comment section what you are doing!

Guess what I got!

The old beast!

The new machine!

That's right! A new (to me) sewing machine!! We finally took my circa 1970's machine in for repair (it hadn't been working) and found out for that make and model our problem was common. It siezes up and has to be taken apart to be cleaned and repaired. Unfortunately this was going to cost $200.

I didn't know whether to be sad or happy. For that price we certainly weren't going to get it repaired but I didn't know exactly what the DH had expected to pay for a repair. Could I possibly get a replacement?

The gentleman at the store pointed to one of the store class models that they teach on and offered it to us for $125. I promptly put up the puppy dog eyes at the DH and told him that since the girls would be learning to quilt this summer we should have a machine. (They would get bored with the long process of hand piecing an entire quilt.) He agreed.

So now our family is the proud owner of a very simple but sturdy Singer 5705 C. It doesn't do a lot of "tricks" but at the current sewing level of our family it will do perfectly.

My oldest is signed up for a beginning sewing class this summer and if she likes it and wants to continue, then maybe eventually she may need a fancier model. I think there is no hope for me to progress out of simple projects and quilts. I am hoping for more sewing skill in my daughter.

My next oldest daughter has no interest in sewing. I asked if she wanted to take the class with her sister and she didn't even have to think about it. "No." Hmmm.... okay, I'll have one DD that sews. Andi does enjoy embrodiery though, and she's very excited to quilt.

I didn't ask if my son wanted to sign up and he made no mention of wanting to. Whew! As the only boy in the house I sometimes think he gets a little to much homemaking instruction. It's a good thing he likes to fish and build with Dad. I should search out a woodworking class for him to take.

Anywhoo... if you are in the Grand Rapids area and have someone who knows how to repair sewing machines, you are more then welcome to have my old model for free. You just have to pick it up. We hate to just throw it away. Anyone have any other suggestions as to what to do with it?

Too much garage sale

Someone crashed very hard on Saturday afternoon. (Don't worry, she had sunscreen on.)

The sale really picked up after my last post. We ended up with $80-ish. That's double what we usually do. People in our area do not part with $$ easily.