dragonfly days

the garden

My herbs are really taking off this year.   From top to bottom: feverfew, mullien, comfrey, goldenrod, milkweed, and calendula.

Time to get to work harvesting and more making goodness.

 

the garden

My herbs are really taking off this year.   From top to bottom: feverfew, mullien, comfrey, goldenrod, milkweed, and calendula.

Time to get to work harvesting and more making goodness.

 

We made it through Monday.

How we spent Monday...

• Spanish lessons
• Jack read,  Leonardo da Vinci  - the whole thing!
  
• Then he started to plan and make his own version of the flying man. I have talked him down from testing it off the roof or out of the tree house and we have settled on jump off the couch. Phew, that was close. 
• baking granola and baked oatmeal cups.
• picking mulberries, eating mulberries
• watering the yard
• loving on the animals
• watched the robins visiting the yard and the hummingbird in her nest
• painted some beads
• tap dancing
• baseball practice
• more tap dancing
• watching videos of Sammy Davis Jr, Gregory Hines, Fred Astaire, and Gene Kelly. 
• making this for dinner with some leftover steak from last night. Yummy!

More importantly, we made it through Monday! Anyone want to do a happy dance with me?

 

pre-history

Yesterday  we headed up to the local national park for pre-history craft day. Every year Zac and a few other pre-history enthusiasts set up a demonstration in the courtyard outside the vistor's center and teach people about the natives around the area.

The tables include all different kinds of replicas. They are all avid flintknappers.

These effigies (?) are awesome. I am planning on making some myself. I would like to make some and paint them also.  They look fun!

Jack jumped right in and started teaching people about the arrowheads. He was a natural. The ranger asked if he would like to come work there. It was also evident that he was very proud of his dad.  We all are. One of the other guys asked me what I thought of my husbands hobbies. I told him I was actually very impressed by them. The attention to detail and patience involved amazes me.

That is a fish basket on the table that someone made.

Sorry for the dark pictures. I was using my old camera since it is lighter and better for hiking. They were also making sandals out of yucca plants, cordage out of yucca, and Zac helped two of our little friends make arrows using his arrowheads.

After spending some time at the demo we headed up the canyon to take one of our favorite hikes.

The cool canyon water was a welcome relief at the top of the hike.

It was a really fun day.

 

 

 

beads

My latest project has been dying beads.  The pic above shows what I've done so far.

These multicolored beads were dyed using food coloring. I only left them in for about 5 minutes at most.  When I put them on a string the family said it looked like a candy necklace.

These are done with watercolor paint. Just me and my Crayola. If the first looked like candy, then these look like gumballs. 

 

These red ones were also done with watercolor. 

The only problem...I am running out of beads!

scenes from the weekend 3/18

 

 

We had another trip away this weekend. I hope that it's the last for a while, but alas it sounds like we might have another one this week. I'm thankful that Steve is working now, otherwise we would have two days away this week and multiple games on one day.  We are a little travel weary. This weekend we hit a bad storm coming back and let's just say I'm thankful I wasn't the one driving.  We also spent some time with my family. Jack collected a bunch of seeds from my dad, the seed guy, and is looking forward to planting his garden box. This year he is shooting for all flowers. I'm good with that.

On the list this week;

• Zac and I are celebrating our 18 year anniversary Monday.
• Prom for the boy
• Which means renting a tux sometime during the busy week and getting the corsage
• back to dance
• lax and rugby practices in full
• Except for the boy who is working almost every day this week.
• rugby games start, two this week
• park day
• plant the rest of the gardens- seeds and cold weather crops
• library
• learning- hitting the ocean big time in hopes of being done with it for a bit.
• make granola, bread
• projects- garland, get the walls decorated in my room

What's on your list?

 

 

 

lamp redo

I bought this lamp a few years back for around $5 at the thrift store.

After I had finished painting the room, I noticed that the shade color was too close to the wall color and it just felt kind of off for me.  I had also just painted my bedside shelf an awesome turquoise color. It seemed like the next logical step was to pump up the shade. I turned around and saw the bag I sewed up  a few years back and thought it would be perfect.

 

So after some deconstructing and a lot of fabric glue, this is the end result.

I love it! And it's going to get more use than that bag did!

monster pants

I've finally been getting around to some projects this week.   For one of them, I tackled the holes in the knees of Jack's pants. Last spring I scored some pants for Jack at a garage sale for 25 cents each. The only problem was they had holes in the knees. Jack likes the holes and thinks they are cool, but they were starting to bug me. Now I know I saw these somewhere on the internet, this is not my original idea. The problem is I can't remember where I saw this idea first. So forgive me for not linking back. If anyone knows of the first post with this idea, lmk. :)

 

The good news is he likes them. They are still cool enough to wear.  

the new hobby

A while back I mentioned that Zac has a new hobby.

It is a hobby  I fully support because it gives me things to hang on the wall.  Pretty things.

It's also sparked a lot of learning. We have a poster hanging up  that shows different types of butterflies and Jack would read it, copy down the names and then google them to find more images. There have been books and movies about butterflies.  This past Sunday Zac and Jack went on a butterfly hunt.  They were gone most of the day and came back with three.  Zac let Jack pin one.

Someone is hooked now. They are plotting buying a real net for him for the next butterfly hunt.  In the meantime, I no longer have to buy artwork.

silly

Today we had an poetry/art festival with one of our homeschool groups. Jack made this silly alien painting. The alien was trying to decide which planet to go to, he was headed for planet x.  Love that he was so excited for it.

We're thankful for the many different opportunities that this other group provides.

 

random musings

It's becoming a Wednesday thing. :)

• I finished another layout in Project life. I am really enjoying getting our pictures printed out and part of our story down.  It feels good. :)
• Our guinea pig is about to give birth any minute.  
• Tomorrow we get to visit with the doctor about turf toe.
• Today we didn't have any appointments or classes that I had to go out for. It was wonderful. I baked muffins, made a great dinner, worked out about five hours earlier than I usually get to, we pulled out the art supplies and played. It was very nice. I need to be sure to schedule these type of days.
• My husband is starting a new hobby, more on that in a few. 
• The series of shark books we found at the library this week are very popular around here. Perfect for a shark-obsessed beginning reader.

 

Frosty the doughman

Today we had the opportunity to go to a bread sculpting class put together by one of the moms in our support group. You can't see it in the picture, butat the time Jack was making a snowflake out of bread dough. Those were baked, brushed with melted butter and then dusted with powder sugar.

You can see the snowflake in this pic as he is dusting it with sugar.

After that they made a snowman out of dough. I have no pics of that. We brought it home and baked it and needless to say it didn't last long. 

Today we were also blessed with about 20 minutes of snow. Jack was thrilled. This boy has been wishing for snow all winter.  That is all he really wanted for Christmas. When I looked out and saw the flakes, he came running. And then he applauded.  He gave the snow a round of applause. Love that.

 

making

I saw this and knew we had to make it!

Giant Geoboard.

Here is our version:

It ended up being about 2 ft square. 

I am going to buy some of the thin elastic headbands to use for bigger shapes.  I'm also trying to figure something out for really big shapes, maybe sewing elastic? 

What are you making?

bricks

I'm getting real creative with the titles of these posts. :)

The Colosseum is completed.  Jack has been enjoying geography a lot lately, especially when we have time to do projects.   This one was a leftover from before Christmas, something we just didn't get around too during the hustle and bustle of the season. It's good to have it done. He loves building and had been looking forward to it.  I need to make sure to incorporate projects for him. 

This week we are studying Germany,  we didn't get around to this before Christmas either.  Today we looked at pictures of castles and the Berlin Wall.  I think we will try and make pretzels for park day this week.  I am channeling my fifth grade teacher who drilled us with German songs and words. I never thought I would thank him, but I am now!  Although I'm not sure Jack feels the same way.

 

scenes from the weekend 1/8

This weekend: family in from out of town-- family we haven't seen for about 13 years! We had a fun time rockin' out Friday night. We stayed up way too late. Date night last night. Today was a day to catch up on housework, practice driving with the teen boy and try and finally get those Christmas card pictures taken. I think we'll get them done by Valentine's day!

So on the list for this week:

• reading test for Jack- as part of k-12 we are supposed to do this.
• p.e.- yay for having p.e. back!
• lacrosse- in full swing
• concussion test for lacrosse
• guitar lesson
• hip-hop class
• Moms Night Out!!!!!!!!! Can you tell I am excited?
• Dentist- to take care of the rest of the cavities. Ugh.
• Oral surgeon- to get a consultation on the tooth.
• park day
• battle of the bands with our favorite guitar teacher. :)
• learning- Jack's request: penguins, Africa, and legos. My request: Spanish, math and reading.
• Getting started on my project for the One Little Word, finally chose one!
• I've also decided to do Project Life this year. I am starting with last week and can't wait. I am excited!

What's on your list?

 

my new space

This project has been in the making for a few months now and it is finally done!  After years of having to do dinner time while accommodating my projects laying all around, I finally have my own space.

There is still some final tweaking to be done, but it is useable!  Talk about fitting a lot in a very small space. The two brown boxes on the floor to the left hold craft supplies- top one wood craft and the bottom holds felt in yards.  The basket in the center holds my bag that I take projects out and about in.  The right brown box holds felting supplies.

From the left: old floss drawer that I found thrifting- perfect for my stitching supplies, my vintage typewriter, the pile of papers needs to be dealt with, and Jack cut the hearts out of felt.

On the top shelf is a pencil sharpener which is hidden behind a jar of felt beads, a big jar of buttons, jars holding- rubber bands, wooden thumb tacks, and mini wooden clothespins(for the shutter memo board in the top picture),  our terrarium, a metal bucket holding pens, scissors, markers and paint brushes.

The middle shelf- binder holding all of my class printouts thus far, embroidery patterns, felt patterns, and one full of homeschool ideas. Side note- I just realized they were all thrown on there after I had finished them yesterday.

Bottom shelf: card catalog of lesson plan ideas for homeschool., extra moleskine notebooks, blank canvases, and a big sketchbook, three hole punch, beeswax polish and my post it note supply. :)

In the far corner lies the photography supplies. The green crate houses our homeschool stuff in use. The roll of white paper on top is for an upcoming school project. You can see my planning notebooks in front. And the stack of papers in the middle are my home cleaning/organization ideas and planner. 

Time to create!

looking ahead.

This is the new years post. I hate to say resolutions, because well I don't like that word.  And I tend to do this a couple of times a year, usually at the beginning of each season.  But like everyone else change has been on my mind the past few weeks.  I haven't yet come up with my word for the year. I have a few in mind, but I haven't had the time to sit down and journal or meditate on them yet. Hopefully soon.  So on to the changes...

• learn how to play the ukulele. So excited about this one. I got my ukulele tonight and already have two chords and three notes learned. Now to practice, practice, practice so I can make a song. :)  BTW-Isn't it pretty? The writing on it is the word peace in all different languages.
• Daily movement. So far this is going strong. In fact I've been doing for a couple of weeks now. 
• Have a monthly date with each child. Zac and I decided we needed to do this. We have already had one and it was a blast. Mainly just a go to the coffeehouse and talk kind of thing.
• Volunteer more.
• Read more. I go through periods of reading way too much and then not reading anything at all. I haven't read any books, other than to Jack, for months now. Time to get back in the habit.
• Create. I want to create something- art, journal pages, jewelry, embroidery, whatever at least once a week. This should be easier now that I got my "studio space" aka the other desk in the dining room, organized and set up today. More on that tomorrow.
• get back in the kitchen. This fall was crazy busy and our eating habits suffered a bit. Not much, but I miss our from scratch foods. So I will be making time to work those back into the schedule. 

There are more, but those are for me to know and you to guess. ;)  Also I am doing a 365 type thing this year on Instagram. If I ever figure out how to link it here I will.  Looks like I may need to revive my flickr account.

 

 

making a plan

Today I spent some time trying to make a plan and set some intentions for the year.  I didn't get far, three kids trying to fit as much as they possibly could in on the last day of Christmas break made sure of that.  Hopefully I will be ready to share my thoughts tomorrow.  I still just can't believe how fast this past year has gone. 

Today I received semi good news from my doc, as in I will probably not have to go back for a year. We still need to see the test results, but to me those were sweet words.

For now though, my new moleskine and I have a date. 

scenes from Christmas 12/26

So busy. So much fun. And so much to be thankful for.

Friday we rang the bell for  the Salvation Army.  This was such a neat experience. It is on the list already for next year. 

 

Jack taking a break for bell-ringing, singing and dancing.

The big kids got a big suprise on Christmas Eve. I love the pics of their faces.

It's not often we can pull a big surprise on them.

Jack decorated some gingerbread men for Santa.

Christmas morning.

We hope you all had a wonderful holiday. :)

learning all the time

Here are some pics of all the learning that has been going on around here lately. :)

As part of our study of Italy last week we talked about Pompeii and made a volcano.

Zac and Jack spent an evening building this robot. It is really cool.  I picked the kit up last time we we at Hobby Lobby for 75% off. 

There was a last minute choir performance on Monday at the library to welcome Santa.

 We have a new fish. His name is Zen.  We fell in love with the peace sign decor. Then at Zac looked me and asked why I am trying to change the fish. Peace sign, Zen, Siamese fighting fish. Lol.

There was also some dog walking and visiting animals at the pound and guitar lessons today.