Decorating For Valentines

I've been busy working on some new little things for Valentine's Day. The girls helped me with the new banner which came plain in white. We painted and decorated with glitter, embellishments, and ribbon. We're happy with the way it turned out.
Then I got a kit at the scrapbook store by Making Memories for cute little banners to hang on my doors. They look very festive!
We're slowly making valentines and more decorations. We have lots of upcoming events that require valentines so we are going to have to step it up this weekend!

A little dressed up chipboard with glitter and ribbon makes a sweet door hanging.

Like Christmas Day

It's here UB! The box of treasured family pictures and mementos arrived from California today and for me it's like Christmas Day. And I am officially pulling the "I'm the oldest" card and I get first dibs on stuff so back off sisters!
Here are some of my favorites since I won't see mom and sisters until the weekend and I am busting to show some of these unseen items.

Top picture are both Grandma and Grandpa's bibles dating to 1939 and 1930 respectively. Along with the 1949 Christmas card and yes UB you were very cute.

These are my all time favorites, I have never seen these before. Mom - age 4? The hair and face are totally Lindy. Remember how Lindy's hair would curl like this when she was 2?

Precious. I absolutely love this one. Sorry mom. Your grandchildren like it too.

Grandma's High School Diploma

Mom - Age? I have the perfect paper for this picture. It's getting scrapbooked THIS weekend.

There is more, too many good ones to post so you will all have to get over here and take a peak. I LOVE this stuff!

Miss Independent

Being the youngest of five, with a mom who is busy doing school all day with her siblings, leads Erin to often fend for herself. She is not whiny and prefers to do everything herself. It came as no surprise to find her favorite Cheez-it's box ripped open and scissors on the floor to cut open the bag.
At least she is learning life skills of independence at a young age. I can't complain about that.

Go Sparklers!

We have been so busy, mainly with fun stuff and a lot of school. Lindy and Paige are both cheering this year. Paige decided to give it a try. She is having fun and really likes the practices, the games not so much. She really does not like to be in front of groups. She is doing better, this week she actually said the cheers not just going through the motions! She says she wants to go back to basketball next year since there is more action there.
Anyway, we took snacks this week and the girls love to bake. We tried to get creative with using our team colors and their squads name "Sparklers". We got the orange and blue covered and used fancy toothpicks to look like sparklers. They were a hit and all the girls loved them! Most importantly Lindy and Paige had a ball making them. Other than helping to ice them they did the rest on their own.

Economic Entrepreneurs

Lindy's Pet Store "Fur Real"


This week at the Miller Academy for "Troubled Youth" we are FINALLY ready to start our economics project. I started putting this together in November getting the idea from my homeschooling bible, The Complete Home Learning Source Book.


The purpose is to teach kids about economics in an interactive way. As suggested by the author, each child came up with a "company" that they were interested in. The first assignment was to design a logo and or a slogan on a poster to display in our school room. There was a great deal of thought on the type of business that would keep their interest for awhile and to come up with a catchy name. There was no way this project was happening without Erin participating so even she has a little business!

We all had fun working on our posters. Now the fun really begins. Next week will be the official start of their companies. They will each receive a ledger and a "bank account" with a beginning balance. Assignments will be age appropriate and get progressively harder. Kyle is in the oil drilling business so I can see quite some interesting twists with his and plan to tie in current pricing so he has research to do when answering questions.

Ethan is in engineering. He wanted to incorporate something that would work with his architecture and real estate interest. I am really excited about his too because some of his assignments will be designing things and then pricing various parts. And yes taxes, stocks, payroll, insurance, checkbook balancing, interest, and much more are going to be included in the boys.

A more down scaled version for Lindy and Paige. Personally Paige and I are going to have a ball. She created "Toppings" an Ice Cream Shop and since I have soo much experience in this field in product sampling, well let's just say there will need to be some taste testing going on. Lindy has "Fur Real" a Pet Store and Erin has "Goodies" candy and treats. Money management with lots of math will be the main focus for the girls but I hope to add lots of decision making for them as well some fun art projects. Not sure what Erin is going to do at this point but I can see a lot of drawing of cupcakes and such!

That's what we've been working on in a nutshell. It is definitely a bit of a time consuming project on my end to get together but the possibilities are endless and I am really looking forward to this being a very long term project that can grow with them. The amount they can learn from this makes it all worth it!



Kyle - Lonestar Oil Co. "Our Gas Gets You There Fast!"

Ethan took his middle name to create "Bryce Engineering".

Candy, cupcakes, cake, ice cream and Erin, what a combination!

Paige and "Toppings" which I think is a great name!

Impromptu Family Night

Whew! What a busy week. I have not had time to post as we have been busy doing school, school, school. And when we're not doing that we're at a practice or an activity. And it's Girl Scout Cookie Sale time so the girls have been out pounding pavement to reach their goals and that is taking some serious time!

So to recap our time, last Monday was Martin Luther King Day. NOT a school holiday in this house! The kids are getting used to me saying the same thing, "remember taking most of September to go to Hawaii?" "Remember taking extra time off at the holidays" "Remember how all your friends were in school then?" Oh, yeah.

Well, Bill was "off" work but still had some work to do but her was physically here which is a treat! So he made homemade pizza for dinner, something usually reserved for the weekend due to the time involved. Erin had a great time helping him make every one's pizzas. I made cake for dessert and we had a fun little dinner.

As we were sitting down Ethan said that we should have called Mimi to come. So off he went to call his Mimi. Well, what Grandmother could say no to her Grandson calling and inviting her over. Mind you, Mimi comes to dinner almost every Sunday, she had just been here the night before. Twenty five minutes later in walks Mimi who had been in jammies tucked into her house for the night! Ethan was a happy boy.
We ate, snacked, played Bingo, and hung out. For a spur of the moment family night it was good, very good!




Chef Erin

Lindy got a hold of the icing pan and did not leave a bit. Butter cream with almond, it was really good.

The kids new favorite thing is tea. Something I have never acquired a taste for but Bill loves. Erin is not one to be left out, such a sweet girl(literally with her sugar), her favorite part is to stir her tea.

Ethan and his Mimi wrapping up their Bingo round.

A Day At Miller Academy for "Troubled Youth"!

Um yea, this is Ethan's idea of school right now. What exactly I'm supposed to do with the Periodic Table and a ten year old is beyond me. I've gotten a couple of books at B&N for lessons but it is really not my area of expertise. How I passed Chemistry and then Organic Chemistry in Nursing School is beyond me! But when the kids are interested then that's what is incorporated.

So we are starting with the basics and at least he'll have the table down by the time I figure out how to teach this!

While I'm wrapping my brain atoms and molecules Erin is playing Mario since who has time to put together Kindergarten! But seriously she is doing her "school work" as she says. She cranks out her little work books and then heads off to have the play area all to herself for awhile!

Our family state study is going well. We've had to skip around a bit so we are back in order and working on South Carolina. Here is Paige's drawing of Drayton Hall and Ethan's of Angel Oak Tree. This has been a particularly fun state to do since it is our vacation spot. We've been to so many of these places and the kids remember them and so their sketches mean more to them.

So we're just humming along, working away!

Brownies Spread Cheer

After the great slumber party we had our regular Brownie meeting Tuesday. We worked on so many things! We finished up our Cookie Smart Try it with lots of role playing activities. It was very funny to watch everyone become dramatic. They can all really ham it up!
Pictures from our sleep over were distributed in paper frames and the girls decorated them with slumber party stickers.
We also did our annual project of decorating Valentine boxes for the Veterans who are in a local Veterans Hospital. We have done this every year since they were Daisies and they really enjoy doing this. The girls donate items to fill the boxes. We collect anything from toiletries to candy, snacks, playing cards etc. This is a big service unit project and the girls receive a nice thank you from the Red Cross for their scrapbook every year.

We then moved on to more games and a relaxation exercise for the People are Talking Try it.
This was a great way to finish up our Friends badge since we worked on how to say things to each other in nice ways and talked about body language.

We finished off with a great snack of donuts (thank you Lily!). Paige had read about doing a hot chocolate bar in her American Girl Magazine. So we put together all kinds of toppings and served hot chocolate. Everyone filled their cups with marshmallows, whipped cream, mini chocolate chips, sprinkles, and a candy cane to stir. I think they drank some of the hot chocolate!

All in all a great productive meeting, great job girls!

Brownie Friends Are Fun!

The Brownies had the ultimate slumber party and worked on their Friends Are Fun Try it badge. And they had FUN! For many this was their first official slumber party. Many of the girls have had a friend sleep over or had big sleepovers with family but not many have had a BIG sleepover.

Including Erin (our honorary Brownie) we had 14 girls for the evening. We started with pizza and a quick friendship activity. I have many pictures to share with the girls.

Some of the requirements for this badge we have done in other Try it's. So to not duplicate I substituted some of the activities. This Friendship Wreath was one of those activities. This was the first thing we did after everyone arrived. The girls traced and cut out their hand, then wrote things that they thought made them a good friend. We put the hands in a pile and I drew one at a time and the girl whose hand it was shared their friend qualities. As a group we added to this by telling our friends what we thought made them a good friend. The girls all really enjoyed this and it gave each of them time to think about and recognize each other.

Each girl had a bag that they could put all of their goodies in as we completed them.

One of the requirements is to make stationary. We added pens to the set. Girls chose the ribbon color and wrapped the pens and added feathers for plumes.

For the stationary girls made note cards. They had patterned scrapbook paper they could use to punch shapes from or many chose to emboss their paper with my embosser.

Remember these? Friendship pins! We used to make these in junior high and put them on our shoelaces. They LOVED making these. I had to hunt down more pins Saturday morning so they could make more. Some girls traded and others made some for friends they know outside of Brownies.

Pizza arrived and these girls were hungry and quiet. That quickly changed and they were charged and ready to go! Giggling, squealing, and laughing the rest of the night.

Annabel, Christa, and Lindy.

Faith, Rebekah, and Faith.

Best Buddies, Lily and Brooke.

Body glitter! Talk about Girly night, we mixed aloe with fine glitter and the results were sparkling.

I knew this would be just perfect for Mary our troop makeup queen!

The Faith's! These two have bonded over their special name. They really do enjoy each other!

Mia and Lindy shimmering.

AnnMarie and Lindy making friendship pins.

Faith making cards using her new pen.

Christa created many cards even after she changed into her American Girl Samantha nightgown!

Thank you to all the Brownie's for being so sweet and including Erin in all of your activities. You all set a wonderful example of being a friend by including everyone.

We had beads everywhere, feathers flying, hot glue, markers, paper, and glitter all night. It was the ultimate girl world!

Annabel and Lindy

Skylar and Christa

Rebekah and Paige reading and making cards.

There was a HUGE game of sneaking and spying on Bill in the kitchen. First I caught Brooke and Mary (taking off),

and then sweet little sneaky Lily made it farther than anyone when I found her!

All the girls wanted a pillow fight so much they could hardly wait. After Bill cleared the way for them they literally pummeled him! It was hilarious to watch.

Then we had to start getting things organized to fit all those sleeping bags and accessories and believe me these girls ALL travel with accessories.

They all have been wanting to watch a movie in our theatre and this was part of the main plan of the night. So after s'mores for dessert we retreated in our jammies to watch Hotel for Dogs.

Annabel and Faith waiting on their pancake breakfast the next morning.

The girls were pretty much winding down by 1am. After the "truth or dare" which was hilarious. Example - Lindy was dared to kiss her mom on the lips! Others were - hit someone with your pillow 5 times. I love the eight/nine year old innocent version of this game. They also played telephone and the quiet game via sleeping bags. A quick "conga line" ran through the sleeping bags at some point but I was not getting up to snap pictures of that one, trust me it was cute.

Good Morning Claire!

Erin and Skylar

Christa and Mary

Finishing up the friendship pins. I think Christa made over 50!

I hope that I got all of you in at least one picture here. I don't think they will forget this event for quite awhile. Most importantly they were all sweet friends to each other all night.

I Love A Man With a Toolbelt!

This is my mother-in-law's favorite saying and I totally agree. Bill has been wanting to build shelves in our basement storage area for years. After we finished our basement last year it really became a priority since we had about less than a quarter of the storage space we had before.

The only time that is practical to do this project is between Christmas and New Year's when all of the Christmas decorations are out. These take up over half the area themselves so if makes sense to do it before we put them all away.

Well, this was the year and the results are awesome. No more stacked containers and needing the one on the bottom! Everything has a place, I can find everything, and most importantly get to it! It took most of a weekend and he finished up during the week after work, it was worth every second.

I have gone through almost everything, given away and trashed what we did not need or use. It was awesome to take down all our decorations New Year's Day, pack them up, and put them all away.

Before...

After...

The added bonus was new lighting!

Back In Session

Still snowing and the moon was glowing when I got up.

We are all excited to get started on our new year and resume school. I tried to make it a fun day to get off on a good start. We started off with warm cinnamon rolls for breakfast and warming up beside the fire. Then it was off to work! Chores and digging into school.

A little of our day...

The kids love to sit by the fire to warm up and wake up in the morning!

Lindy is in charge of the chore chart assignments on Monday.

New addition to our school room, a dry erase board. It has helped so much with our state lessons and doing vocabulary with the girls. They love being able to copy things down and not always have me spell everything out all the time!

Erin was more than ready to get started. She is working hard on a word search book on princesses.

Both Paige and Lindy HAD to wear their Miller Academy shirts for their first day back.

Lunch is always cafeteria style and Paige takes this literally. She uses cookie sheets as her "tray". They count out their change, pay for their food, and I being the "cafeteria lady" have to serve them. They have a blast with this!

We had so much reading to do that I made popcorn for everyone to snack on so we could snack and work. It worked, we got lots done!

I love this time of year. I love hibernating in our house all day. I love having my kids to myself to school with, read with, play with, cuddle with, and just to hang out with. Happy Schooling Everyone!

Scrapping Away

Erin at 20 months with her mommy and daddy. I love looking at pictures of all the kids when they are little.

I took a BIG trip down memory lane last week. I committed myself to getting some scrapbooking done and I don't work in chronological order. I sift through pictures and paper and come up with combinations and when I like it together then I start assembling a page.
During the fall my favorite scrapbook store, Pizazz It!, started offering monthly page kits. I did this once before a couple of years ago by mail and loved it, I just couldn't keep up. Now I have space to work and am way more organized. That makes all the difference. I might only have ten minutes to work on something but ten minutes is better than none! You really can get something done in a very short amount of time.
So I turned out lots of pages and we all had a great time looking at old pictures. I by far had the most fun of all!


Ethan was 2 1/2 here and he often had this little grumpy face. He didn't start talking until about this time and he was very frustrated! This is one of my favorite pictures!


From the same set of pictures I did all of our holiday family pictures with Bill's family. It was Lindy and Paige's first Christmas and they were so little even at 2 months.


These holiday pages were from my December kit. I loved the paper and sparkles!

Kyle's little ray of Sunshine - I did Kyle and Erin from summer of 2008. I have been wanting to use these papers for a long time and finally found perfect pictures to go with them!

And last I did my January kit from Pizazz It! which was all vintage. Perfect reason to get those baby pictures of my mom out of the old album and into something new with archival paper and plastic protectors. I treasure all of my pictures and these especially cannot be replaced. I want them to be passed on for generations. The kids have really enjoyed looking at pictures of their Grommy and Great Grandma.

I hope to keep up with my scrapping this year!