I've gone bananas!

Bananas on Parade

Dancing with the stars Banana

Hummingnana

Hulanana

Peg leg Bananarrr

ipod Ba-nano

Dawn and I hosted a Tupperware party a few days ago in my home. It was the best home show of any kind that I have ever been to. It was a banana split party and you had to bring your own banana dressed up for a contest. The Tupperware lady gave out 'tupperbucks' for all kinds of different things like: being on time, bringing a friend, decorating a banana, if it had eyes, arms, legs... I loved seeing everyone show up with their decorated bananas. I had to share some of thephotos with you.

Quilt Show

On the way home from Young's Dairy, there was a quilt show at an apple orchard. I was so excited to get to stop and take pictures. It made me wish I had a better camera. There are so many neat things like that here. I just wanted to share...

The Wool Gathering

Alex, Emma, Kate, Hayden, Sarah and Rachel

Okay, switch hats....

"Hayden, feel this one."

Our kids all wanted us to buy the bunny. (Emma petting it)

Looking at yarn sure takes it out of ya.


Okay, most of you know that we went to the Wool Gathering at Young's Dairy last year. Well, we had to go back. I love going to touch all the different kinds of yarn. I just got a few pictures this year. They had a few more booths this year and a lot more people. We walked through all the booths and I bought some organic cotton washcloths that were hand made. The weather was much nicer this year. Last year, it was a little warm and this year, it was jacket weather; we loved it. After walking through everything, we went to stand in line for ice cream. After we ordered, I saw they had pumpkin ice cream, so I asked for a sample. Well, if you have never had pumpkin ice cream, you have got to try it. It was like pumpkin pie heaven. Delicious! Definately worth a drive to Ohio...just kidding.

Hayden's 1st day of Preschool

Well, not really preschool, but that's what we call it. He is going to a Mother's Day out program one day a week. He is in a room with mostly boys which doesn't usually happen with Hayden. He is used to being with girls everywhere we go. Last Wednesday was his first day and he was so excited to get to pack his own lunch, choose his clothes for school and do all the things he sees his sisters do every day. He had a lot of fun and even got to watch the cartoon version of fantastic four. He is in the big kid room, so he didn't even have to take a nap.

Worth the drive...

70miles= $11.32 (cost of gas roundtrip)

2 Southwest supersonic burgers, 2 wacky pack kid's meals, 1 wacky pack burger meal, 1 large popcorn chicken combo with Onion rings, 2 Rt. 44 vanilla Diet Dr. Peppers, 1 large fry, 1 jalapeno strips and 2 Supersonic breakfast burritos (to freeze for later)= $35.31

Our annual drive to the nearest Sonic= Priceless!

Skyhawks Volleyball

Ready for her first game. Go #2!

First play of the season... Kate is in the center-back row.

Her first serve and it was good for a score! Way to go Kate!

Kate made the volleyball team and plays for Baker Middle School. They had their first game tonight and they WON! Kate is really good. She did a great job and we are very proud of her. She got to start the game and scored several points. We are excited for the upcoming games and will keep you posted on her Volleyball adventures.



Go Skyhawks!

My Rag Bag

Okay, I posted the pictures of the whole purse making day at my house. Well, after teaching everyone else how to make the purse, I couldn't wait to make my own (other than the sample bag I had already made). I actually made 2 and have about 3 more in the works. I think I will take Heather's advice and maybe sell them on etsy. I'm trying ebay to see what happens. This is the one I have listed.

Fishing?

We just took our kids fishing over at a friend's house. They have a stocked pond in their back yard. We didn't expect the fish to be so little. In Texas when you go to a stocked pond, it is stocked with catfish that you can catch and fry for dinner. Not these. It didn't matter to our kids. (or to us really, we just thought it was funny) This was their first experience with fishing ever. They were not sure about it at first, but after the first drop of the line, they were hooked! They all ended up catching at least one fish. Sarah and Kate caught fish at the exact same time and both fish jumped off the hook and back into the water before we could get a picture. Kate had so much fun, she almost turned down ice cream. If you know Kate at all, you know this is a big deal. She loves ice cream almost as much as John. She had so much fun and probably caught 10 fish. Who knows, she may have even caught the same hungry fish 10 times.

Sweet Corn Festival

Okay, we told you there is a festival for everything here in Ohio. The Sweet Corn Festival was last weekend and we went to eat some corn. We got word early in the day that the fried corn fritters with powdered sugar were only 2 for $1 and that they were way better than the funnel cakes. Dawn should write an article for the paper about local eats. She called to give me the low down on the corn festival fare. We shared the fritter frenzy with some friends that we ran into and after a day of rope making, corn eating and sweat pouring, we finally tried the fried corn fritters. Well, Paula Dean would be proud. They were the best fried corn fritters I've ever had. Okay, so they were also the only fried corn fritters I've ever had. I hope Dawn likes Sauerkraut. The Sauerkraut festival is just around the corner.

Just another day...

Hayden got a couple of packages for his birthday a few days ago and he was very excited to find some new hats! He thought the spiky hair hat was so funny and even let John put it on and Hayden took his picture. He also got a new cowboy hat. Soon after opening his packages, he ran upstairs and changed into his 'cowboy' outfit. Boots, spurs, jeans, long sleeved 'cowboy' shirt and of course, the hat. He wore this outfit two days in a row. He wore it to pick Kate up from Volleyball and a lady in the parking lot said, "looks like the long lost son of George Strait." People at Target were pointing and explaining to their kids what spurs were. Hayden thinks it is so cool to dress like a cowboy.

We asked Hayden and Rachel, at dinner the other night, where they would want to live if it couldn't be Lubbock, Texas. They both said Texas! And went on to say that it should be on a farm so we could have some goats and maybe a horse and a cow. We have obviously instilled Texas Pride in our children. Each of them wants to move to Texas.

If you know me, you know I LOVE bags...

A few months ago, we went to the 'Superchick' concert and saw this girl with the cutest purse! It looked like a quilt. Not a Vera Bradley quilt, but a homemade, hand designed, do it yourself kind of quilt. I had to ask her if I could take a picture of her purse. She laughed and said yes. Turns out that her Aunt made it for her and sells them at a shop in Georgia I think. Now that I had a picture, all I needed was a pattern. My friend Linda called me later and told me that she had found a pattern online and would share it with me. Well, I made a sample bag out of some scrap fabric I had lying around and it turned out so cute! I took it to bible study and showed the ladies that had all seen the picture of this girls purse from the concert. They were so excited to see that they too could do it, so we set up a 'class' to make your own rag quilt purse. For the past 2 days, I have had around 9 extra people in my home (4 adults and 5 kids) and we have been making these purses. We had so much fun cutting everything out and putting them together. They are time consuming. It takes about 6 hours to make the larger bag and about 4 to make the smaller bag. We had all levels of seamstresses. Britain learned to sew for the very first time and learned how to use the cutting mat and rotary cutter. She even sewed some of her own purse. She really had a great time. It was a lot of fun to see the fabrics come together in a quilt like design to make a purse.

The purse we saw at the concert that lead to all of this...

Day 1: cutting and a little sewing

Day2: Britain learns to sew and her mom Michele guides her.

Britain and her new purse!

Suzanne, Michele and Britain show off their new purses. Aren't they cute!

VBS

We had Vacation Bible School this week and I volunteered to be the 'craft' lady. Dawn was my sidekick. We had K-6th grade for crafts and had about 60 kids. I just wanted to share a couple of pictures. I took some neighborhood kids with us this week and was seen a few times with 7 kids climbing out of our truck. It was a fun week, but we are all really tired.

Freezer Cooking Day

What a day! After a week of VBS, you probably think I'd have to be crazy to do a freezer cooking day. Well, I am exhausted, but the rewards from a day of cooking are so great. I can say for sure that I will not do it all in the same week again. I did get everything ready ahead of time and just had shopping to do this week. We had 11 ladies in our church kitchen cooking 9 recipes 11 times. It was great! At the end of the day, you go home with 9 recipes that are made to serve 6-8 people. What did we make? Penne Ala Vodka sauce, Nanny's Sunday Pot Roast, Machaca Beef, Chicken Soup, Creamy Chicken Italiano, Taco Pockets, Twice Baked Potatoes, Tammy's Yummy Cookies (we freeze the dough) and Breakfast Burritos. I have been freezer cooking for a long time, but never on this large a scale. I used to just do it for myself at home. Trying to save some time here and there and double up on my cooking and freeze what I could. Then, in Albuquerque, I got together with 3 other ladies and we would come up with a menu that was agreeable to everyone, have 2 recipes each to cook in our own homes and then we would make 8 of each recipe and then meet a week or so later to divide everything up to take home. That actually works great too. I have to say, this does make me think about opening my own freezer meal business. I love planning, creating the spreadsheets for my shopping, calculating and converting all the measurements of all the ingredients... After doing this three times now, I think we have worked out the kinks. I wanted to blog my experience for you to see what I have been doing. Well, now I have to go make dinner for my family, but at least I have something in my freezer!

Hayden turns 5!

Ourrrr little pirate turned 5 on August 1st. Hayden was so excited to have his birthday party. This year, we actually weren't traveling. Hayden has a friend named Noah that is just a little older than him. He goes to our church and Hayden loves to play with him. Noah was the only other boy at the party. There were a bunch of little girl pirates running around looking for treasure. We had a treasure hunt and enlisted the help of some neighborhood kids along with Kate and Sarah. Kate was a mermaid waiting with a clue in the mermaid lagoon. Sarah was Elizabeth Swan and ready to walk the plank with the third clue. We had another pirate waitin' in the open meadow to lead them to their treasure. The final clue led them home to the large wooden plank where they were sure to find a sweet treat. The cake! It was a lot of fun to have a boy party.