Christmas Ornament 2015

Every year I give the kids a Christmas ornament. For the past few years, I have made it a goal to make them and not buy them. I am really proud of myself for getting them made early this year. I even had them finished before Thanksgiving!

I can thank Pinterest and Roz for the idea for this year's ornament. Roz made a goal to read 52 books in 2015 so I decided to make book ornaments for everyone. I found instructions on Pinterest to make miniature books. They weren't necessarily supposed to be ornaments, but that was an easy fix with the addition of a piece of string.

The first step was to ask everyone what their favorite books were this year. I texted Roz to ask her and didn't mention why I wanted to know. I wanted to make one for Trevor too, so I had to text him on the sly as well. I ended up making him a book on his "to read" pile instead of his favorite for the year.

I went to Amazon and printed off tiny images of each book's front cover. If it was available I printed the back cover too. For the novels I was able to find excerpts and pasted them into a document in tiny font to print. So the tiny words in the book are really from each book. 

They all start with the real first sentence, but the following pages ended up in no particular order due to double sided printing and page folding. The comic and more graphic novels are a little bit different. They have tiny, printed screen shots of the preview pages courtesy of Amazon.

It's hard to tell from these photos, but the books are tiny. Most of them are just over an inch in height. The biggest is still under two inches tall.

My favorite ended up being Hayden's little Calvin and Hobbes book. It really looks just like a tiny version of the real thing! He reads C&H every day at lunch. Even though it is too small to read the actual words, he could tell me what it says because he has them memorized!

Here are all eight completed ornaments...

Top row: 

Lego Ninjago (JD), Diary of a Wimpy Kid (Eli), Cat in the Hat (Annabeth)

Bottom row: 

Calvin and Hobbes (Hayden), Around the World in 80 Days (Justus), 

Solar Flare (Wesley), The Nightingale (Roz), and Field of Prey (Trevor)

If you want to see them, here are some of the other ornaments I've made in recent years...
Hot Cocoa Mugs 2014
Stamped Washers 2013
Felt Owls 2012

Random Cute Photos

September 24 - JD's reading has really taken off in the past couple months. Here he sat down with Annabeth to read her a book. 

September 28 - Now that she is a little bit older, Annabeth has been going over to play at the neighbor's. Today, I drove over to pick her up and found her riding down the street with her friends in a car. All the girls were dressed as princesses.

October 14 - We have been learning about 10 famous paintings this semester. JD seems to really enjoy it. For each of the paintings I have printed a coloring page. JD wanted his coloring page to look just like the real Persistence of Memory.

October 18 - While Dad was watching football on the big TV, Annabeth and Wesley shared a little small screen time on his Kindle.

A Visit from an Old Friend

After the sound of the familiar clucking alerted me to her presence, I was surprised to open the door  this morning and find Loosey on the back patio. She hasn't done that in ages! She is pretty much the equivalent of a senior citizen so I'm not sure how she managed to jump the fence. We enjoyed her little visit and then I took her back to her home and friends. 

Loosey and her sister "The Red Evil One" (Annabeth calls her that) will be three years old in a few months. They are the only remaining chickens from our first batch of chicks and they have lived through quite a bit in their three years! They welcomed two new batches of chicks into the flock and survived a coyote attack. We hope they'll be healthy and keep laying for another year or two, but I wouldn't be surprised if this is the last patio visit we have.

Mom and Roz Weekend

Last weekend I took my annual trip to go see Roz in Minneapolis. I had a little trouble getting off the ground, engine trouble sent us back to the gate for about an hour. While I was sitting on the plane, Jerry and the kids were having breakfast at Denny's. 

Thankfully, I did get there eventually.

First stop after meeting up with Trevor (and getting a quick tour of his new place) was Giordano's Pizza for dinner. The wait was long, but they let you order your pizza half way through your wait so once you're at your table you don't have to wait all over again for them to cook it. No wonder it takes so long to cook, their Chicago deep dish pizzas are REALLY deep!

I'm not a big drinker, but I did try this beer. It was pretty good!

Roz and I made our usual trip to Junk Bonanza on Saturday. I kept my eye out for chicken items, I especially wanted an egg scale, but didn't have any luck. I only got a few small things. After JB we went out to Culver's for lunch and hit up a favorite thrift store. We hit up the new outlet mall where I splurged and got myself a new purse. Then we ran to JoAnns and Target to buy some crafting supplies before running to Panera for a quick dinner.

Sunday morning we got out the door bright and early to run to the Farmer's Market and meet my cousin Katie for brunch. I bought some fresh cheese curds to bring home to the boys. Yum!

We had brunch at Psycho Suzi's Motor Lounge. Weird name, good food, and AWESOME weather - although I can't give the restaurant credit for that!

After brunch, we ran over to look at the park location for next year's WEDDING OF THE YEAR!

Then we swung by the Happy Gnome (restaurant) for a quick peek at where the reception will be. As you can see, I made a new friend. You can meet him yourself next June if you come to the wedding!

Here is a little sneak peek at our craft project. Roz bought a small, vintage suitcase at Junk Bonanza. We took it home and ripped out the old lining. I re-lined it and Roz made a cute little banner for it. She will put it on a table at the reception for cards. So cute!

Before you know it, Monday morning rolled around and it was time for me to head back home. I'm always depressed for a few days after parting ways with Roz. At least this time I have her and Trevor's upcoming Thanksgiving trip to look forward to!

It was a Circus

Annabeth and I went to a baby shower for a couple of women at our church. The shower had a circus theme. We had a great time and enjoyed spending time with the other women and girls in our church.

There was a little "photo booth" area set up. Everyone took turns. Annabeth thought it was a lot of fun!

 We left the backdrop and props at church so the boys could have a turn on Sunday.

 Then, since it was no longer needed, they let the kids run through it!

Lost at Sea?

The day after we returned from our California vacation, I was sitting at the computer and put my hand up to my face. As soon as I felt my ring against my skin, I knew something was wrong. I looked down and the diamond in my ring was gone. 

I have no idea where or when it fell out. It could be at Legoland, the house we rented, in the ocean, or anywhere in between. I'm kind of hoping it's in the ocean because that's more romantic - kind of like the "heart of the ocean" jewel in Titanic - than having it drop down the bathroom sink drain at the Jack in the Box in Yuma.

I'm glad I didn't notice it until we got home, it would have really ruined my vacation. If would have really bothered me to know where I lost it when there was little chance of me ever finding it. 

Our 20th anniversary is next year so I guess I will get a new ring set! In the meantime, I just couldn't have an empty finger so I ordered this ring set from Amazon. It was only $12! I told Jerry he couldn't just say that was good enough, although I am sure he was tempted.

So, if you happen to be in the Carlsbad, CA area or the Pacific ocean and find a diamond, please let me know!