a little yard work before winter

i never really wanted the black plastic stuff to separate the rock around the house and the grass.  i dont like it.  but at the time, i didnt have much of a choice.  limited on time and i didnt know for sure what i wanted.  fast forward 4 years in this house and pinterest.  i found the perfect thing to separate them.  but again time was an issue.  so i had a local guy come and do most of it for me.  i just had to move rock away so that it would be easier to dig.

  this picture doesnt show, but we also have a rock bed FULL of spanish moss roses.  i love them, i dont ahve to water & they give some color.  the kids love picking the flowers for me too.  but i was liking having to step on or around them to get to the water spouts on the house.  so off i went to town to get me some flagstone.  this should work nicely i think!

but my FAVORITE part is the gutter down spouts.  we have a dog (used to have 2) and said dog(s) like to chase rabbits.  (we have them more now that there is a bit of shelter for them to hide in with the shelter belt we have started) rabbits like to hide after they have ran for a bit.  and what better spot than up my gutters??? did that stop my dog(s)??? NO NO NO.  and these werent just any gutters.  my grandpa cut some heavy duty galvanized big boys for me. off came the gutters to get those dang rabbits.  there are teeth marks in them from dog(s) chewing trying to get to the rabbit.  plus we had to have them staked down with the lovely nebraska winter winds.  so when i saw this idea on pinterest i knew it was perfect for us.   sorry bunnies.

and while i had someone do the BIG project around the house, i figured i could do the little one around the water hydrant.  and i did!  and after 3 long years and i dont know how many loads i finally killed the river rock pile in the driveway.  all but 2 loads i moved around the house.  that was a lot of rock! by the end i sure got good at backing the trailer behind the mower so i could dump.  

#3 and final post of quiet book

last pages of the quiet book... 

i can remember buttoning items onto our quiet books when i was younger.  and what could be more fun than matching a fabric gumball to the button?

puzzles.  i think this was the 2nd page (well set) that i made.  there are 3 different puzzles to complete-flower, butterfly and heart.  each has their own pocket to be tucked into when not in use. i got the idea for the gumball and puzzle pages from 

http://craftychiclyric.blogspot.com/2009/07/girls-quiet-book.html 

zip, buckle and snap... all kids want to learn how to do 'big' things themselves.  

and then the cover.  i did this last cause i wanted to make sure that i made it big enough.  while had an idea of how big it needed to be, i wasnt sure how thick the pages would be laying on top of each other.  and that was the measurement i was concerned about.  i added about 2" to the final addition of the height & length (times 2) so there would be a bit of cover overhang. Then  i had to find the middle of the cover and the ribbon i used for the binding so that they could be sewn together and turned right side out.  

you can kind of see how i sewed the ribbon down leaving a channel for the binder ring to go thru.  then i put a ribbon all around the outside of the cover with magnets in the ends to close the book.  with the cover all done, it was time to loop the pages onto the binder rings and then thru the book binding.  

hope you enjoy your quiet book t!

quiet book part 2 of 4 (maybe 5)

next 4 pages 

so i go the lace & tie my shoes patterns from a great blog http://www.threadridinghood.com/wordpress/sew-along/

the hard part was finding shoe lace.  these are still a bit big, but it was the best i could do.  

the pie page looked too cute to not do.  and while i know i have never done a lattice weave pie crust, i had fun weaving this pie crust. 

pattern found here  http://www.rileyblakedesigns.com/cutting-corners/2014/01/17/cherry-pie/

this one, i used inspiration from my sisters quiet book.  i remember moving those beads up and down as a child.  p arranged the flower beads for me before i put them on the ribbon.  

every girl needs to know how to braid.  at least in my family.  point in case, i taught my niece how to french braid while they were here for a weekend stay this summer.  keep practicing k!

one of my longest... post 1 of 4

so here is what has been consuming ALL my time.... a while ago a friend noticed that i had been pinning quiet book ideas.  the plan was to make one for t for her bday (which never got done by the way) so c asked if i was making or just thinking... i said if you can wait (cause i had other orders that needed to get done 1st at the time) that i would make one for her youngest. (SO sorry c that it took so long... i promise i worked on it all that i could and as fast as i could) it was fun finding ideas on pinterest and etsy.  even making my own patterns for some of the pages.  

here are the 1st four pages.  

what little girl wouldn't love to be able to spell her name and learn to recognize the letters 

in her name?  

so the bee with all the yellow cording behind him has to go thru all the numbers correctly 

to get to his hive.

  

the color of the rainbow with a few ribbons. 

she can learn the shapes name along with the shape.

 i made a pocket for the pieces to go into, BUT remembering from my youth and quiet books, pieces can get lost... so i decided that i would attach most of the piece to the page.  its hard to keep track of things when you are little (heck its still hard some days) 

stay tuned for more but i didn't want this to be a HUGE post.  

baby for my niece

i finished this project a while ago (almost a month, but i have been SUPER busy-more on that next time) i had made this doll for t's 1st birthday.  and is was fast approaching h's 1st birthday.  i think the hardest part on this doll was getting the right blue for her eyes.  those are some pretty piercing blue eyes.  and i got the dress along with the skirt made for her baby.  (which i am told they named penny)  enjoy your baby my little h!

john deere for some dear boys!

i love my friend krn.  while i have almost all girls (5 girls and 1 boy-who knew-i thought i would have all boys) she is blessed with all boys (4 of them) & boy are they cute.  the older 2 look just like their daddy, the 3rd like his mom's brothers and i think that #4 is a mix of everyone.  i told her we could switch for a day if she needs some girls.  anyway, she wanted comforters for the middle 2's beds.  being the farm boys that they are, k wanted john deere for them.  we had wanted to go shopping together, but the selection in our big town just wasnt there.  so she found this great print online.  just plain and easy she said.  so it's just a rectangle of the jd fabric with a black border.  but i thought they needed just a bit of pop with the binding.  then i had enough fabric left for pillow cases (well technically i kinda planned for that) i really had enough of the yellow to do that pop on the pillow cases.  i really LOVE how those turned out.  super easy diy that i found here http://www.momtastic.com/diy/170222-diy-perfect-pillowcase/  i just added the trim and stitched that down again since it was so big.  

hope you and the boys love them k!

wipes of fun

t loves to pull things out and put them back in.  well maybe sometimes, just pull things out.  if you don't know where she is, look for the trail of items laying where they aren't supposed to be.  

a while ago, i saw where scraps of fabric were cut to fit in an old wipe box for babies to play their in and out game with.  just so happens that i had an extra wipe box laying around.  i cut my scraps to a double layer of 7x9".  well not the fleece one, that doesn't fray and both sides are the same.  did a zig-zag around the sides (this was a quick project, you could cut the scraps bigger, sew them inside out & turn to make them look nicer)

t loves them.  not sure if she has a favorite scrap, but they have also been put in other items....a water pitcher she got out of the cabinet. and now she has leaned to open the whole box, so its also fun to put the fabric in and then dump it all out.