Yikes! Can it possibly be true that it has been over a week since I last posted?! Holy Toledo, Batman! Where does the time go? For those of you with children, you know the answer to this question... it just flies! I have a baby who has been wanting to nurse alot and two other, very active children. I have discovered that you can do many things while nursing! Last week, I managed to make the bed one-handed while nursing!
I have sent some good mail out, so that has been a fun thing to squeeze in my calendar!
I have been busy sewing, filling some orders from my website and ebay store. I have also been trying to find some time to squeeze in some new designs as well. I just got a big fabric shipment - yummy, yummy fabrics...
I got some Anna Griffin fabrics, and some Amy Butler... can't wait to find some time to actually sew with it!!
I will post some new pictures of the family soon and hopefully some pictures of some of my latest adventures too!
Have a great day!
Missy
Tuesday, March 27, 2007
Missing In Action...
Monday, March 19, 2007
Tuesday, March 13, 2007
Self-Portrait Tuesday
Here is today's self-portrait challenge
for tuesday, march 13th:
lights, camera, action!
take a picture of yourself out and about in your neighborhood, your town, your city. do you live near a landmark or a setting that has ever been used by hollywood? would we recognize it? does it have historic significance to your community? has it become more popular since it was featured on the big screen? if no movie locations come to mind, how about showing us a significant landmark from your area? get out there and get creative!
There are a ton of movies that have been filmed in the town I live in! The Prince of Tides and The Great Santini, both based on books by local author, Pat Conroy. If you have never read any of Pat Conroy's books, I highly recommend them, start with Beach Music. Other movies filmed here: The Big Chill,, G.I. Jane , Forces of Nature , Full Metal Jacket , Something to Talk About , and several others.
I chose a road in my town that was used in the movie, Forrest Gump. You may remember the scene in the movie, when Forrest was a boy and he was being chased, and he ran down a canopy road so hard and so fast that his leg braces fell away and Jenny was yelling, "Run Forrest, Run!"
I had my husband help me take this picture. I was afraid you wouldn't be able to get enough of the road behind me if I took the picture myself!
Here is a picture of the road:
I was unable to find a picture online of the young Forrest running down the road, but I was able to find this one:
Here I am (making a fool of myself!) re-enacting the scene:
I thought of some parallels between Forrest running and my own life...
In the movie, Forrest starts ruuning one day, down the road, through town, and then across the country. He runs back and forth across the United States and then one day, he stops, saying, "I'm pretty tired. I think I'll go home now."
Like most busy Moms, I feel like I am forever running - running errands, running behind! I love being a Mom, and I love to sew and create, I love to volunteer, but I often feel that all of my running around leaves me feeling pretty tired. So, I think I should scale back and try doing more, by doing less. I am going to think long and hard about what things I commit to doing. Is it something I need to do? How does it benefit me and my family? I am going to strive for quality over quantity.
So, I think I'll go home now!
Saturday, March 10, 2007
Saturday at the Playground
We had a really nice time today - good quality family time - something there never seems to be enough of!
The weather was gorgeous - sunny and mid-70's. We packed a picnic lunch and then let the girls play. Sophia slept in her stroller, Georgia and Olivia played on all of the playground equipment and even Daddy got in on the fun!
Daddy and Olivia started swinging together and Georgia felt left out. Is this sad face just the most pitiful thing you have ever seen?
These photographs from the playground made me think about determination. Kids are determined to accomplish their goals. They know what they want to do - swing all the way across the monkey bars or climb the slide - and then they keep trying until they do it! I would like to forget the self-doubt and discouragement and be more DETERMINED!
Wednesday, March 7, 2007
A Paddycure
I have been wanting to share this for a few weeks now, and am just now sitting down to take the time to do it.
The day before I went into the hospital to have Sophia, I took Georgia to the nail salon to have a pedicure. We have a positive reinforcement behavioral modification plan at our house. Georgia, who is 4, earns buttons for good behavior - different things are button-worthy. We started doing this because Chris was on deployment and I was struggling with getting everyday routines done in a timely manner with the two girls on my own. I wanted a way to reward Georgia for helping and being independent - eating meals with little or no complaint, getting dressed for school, helping with her little sister, being nice to her little sister, etc. I also need a way for their to be a reasonable consequence for bad behavior. So, we started the button system.
I took an old baby food jar, and cleaned it out and decorated it just for Georgia, with colorful stickers and her name on it. It sits on the bookshelf, next to a jar full of buttons. When she is good, she can go and pick out a button from my jar and put it in her jar. When she is not on her best behavior, she loses a button and must go and remove one from her jar and give it back to me. This is quite painful for her! When she has 5 buttons in her jar, she earns a priveledge of her choosing. The priveledges vary - sometimes they are as simple as a lollipop or some other candy item, sometimes a new, inexpensive toy, sometimes a special playdate with a friend. Just before Christmas, I had gone to a beauty salon and had a manicure and pedicure (probably the first time that I had done this since Georgia was born) and Georgia was fascinated with my pretty, hot pink toenails and I explained to her that I had gone to have a pedicure, and told her all about it. So, I was tickled, when almost a month later, she earned five buttons and informed me that for her priveledge, she would like a "paddycure".
I ended up taking her the day before Sophia was born. We both had pedicures side by side. The nail techs thought she was so cute, they gave her a manicure for free!
Here are the photographs. It was sooo cute! 
Tuesday, March 6, 2007
I Love My Camera!
About a year ago, I purchased an amazing digital camera - a Canon Rebel XT. It is so powerful, I am intimidated by it. For the entire first year that I owned it, I only used the factory automated settings. I was too afraid to try to learn anything new and try adjusting any of the settings. I was afraid that if I started changing things, I would never again get the settings back to the fully automatic modes. But, I spent some time yesterday, while riding in the car, reading my manual, and trying out some different ISO speeds, aperature settings, and white balance settings. Before reading the manual, I didn't know what any of that meant! I am not totally sure that I know what it means now, but I do know that it sure makes a difference in how the pictures look!
Take a look at some of the pictures that I took:
Lost Socks and Other Mysteries of Life
I have always been perplexed by the mystery of lost socks. How is it that you put a pair of socks into the wash, and only one comes out? When this happens, I dutifully place the lonely sock on top of the dryer in hopes that its mate will join it whithin the next few loads, only to find that the lost sock is never to be seen again.
Lately, this mystery has been expanded, and I now discover that the pile of socks on the dryer are all white children's socks, and none of them can be matched together - they are all different sizes, styles and manufacturers. How is this possible?
I solved this problem with the infant socks, through a suggestion of a friend of mine. She suggested that I purchase diaper pins and use them to pin the socks together into pairs in the drawer. When you remove a pair from the drawer, remove the pin and place it in the laundry room. When you take a pair of socks off of the baby, you pin them together before throwing them into the washing machine. The socks stay pinned together during the wash and can be taken straight from the dryer and put back into the drawer still pinned in pairs!
When I saw this cute craft in the current issue of Family Fun magazine, I knew that I must create one for my laundry room.
Here is the original picture from the article:
and my version:
To create this "lost sock line" - I used scrapbooking card stock that I had on hand. I created the lettering template by using a computer font and the outline feature. I used font size 350 to make the letters between 3 and 4 inches tall. I cut out the letters from the card stock and used my hot glue gun to glue clothespins to the back of the letters. I threaded a small satin ribbon through the spring in the clothespin, and then spaced out the letters and hung to the wall from two nails.
Voila! It was probably one of the quickest, easiest, and least expensive crafts I have ever attempted!
Self-Portrait Tuesday: Mirror, Mirror on the Wall...
Today's challenge was a little more difficult for me to figure out how to accomplish. I have been busy learning how to take better pictures with my super fancy digital camera, so I played around with the settings some.
This is me. This is how I see myself pretty much all the time these days - with a child on one hip and running out the door!
Starbucks News Flash!
Mark you calendars - Starbucks is offering free coffee!!
Get a free tall cup of cofee at Starbucks on March 15 from 10 a.m. until noon!
Sunday, March 4, 2007
I'm diggin'...
Things I am currently really diggin'...
Cranberry juice slushes from Sonic.
Boppy slipcovers.
Hallmark's new musical cards.
Bravo's Top Design show!
Bad hair day!
Perfect quote for a bad hair day!
"You'll have to tell me over the phone, she said. I checked with my mirror & it told me I was too scary to go out today."
I am feeling in need of a haircut. I like that my hair is getting longer and am not feeling a particular need to do anything drastic or even take any length off, but do need to have my highlights "refreshed"! So, maybe I'll actually get an appointment to have my hair done sometime this week...
Thursday, March 1, 2007
More Pictures!
Due to popular request... I am posting some more pictures of the girls. I still have more pictures to download from the camera, so there will be more to follow in the next few days!
