Tag Archive | tutu

History, Snacks and Other Fun

February 22-25

What to do on a weekend when we plan to be home for it? Well… have company! Childhood friend Christopher and his wife Renee who is due any day with their 3rd (boy) and their sons Nathan and Evan. They came over for lunch and playtime. Younger than our boys the kids still managed to have a lot of fun. Of course Skylanders came out and Legos and such. It was nice to have company over where the adults could just sit around and chat (or craft).101_6276

Walking Tacos

Walking Tacos

We ended our Saturday calmly with a movie. Really not much to report beyond a great visit with old friends.101_6278

Sunday was totally a crafty day… after Sunday school. I had to get EVERYTHING out and package up my big commission from a friend up north… she requested I make her a variety of critters for her to gift etc this year… I think I covered the spectrum and had a blast honing my skills while doing it. Is it ever hard to wait until she gets it to find out her thoughts!!!101_6279

And then for a more local (but still mailing away) craft… one I have not done in ages – an infant knotted tutu. Using glitter tulle so I am on the hunt for the escaped glitter now. Really glitter is EVIL!101_6280

Monday was back to work… and back to swimming for the twins. I am really impressed how much more RELAXED they are each time.

We had some more sporty drawing to enjoy. Art for Kids (on right) put up a stick figure figure skating… something Trinity was quick to say SHE wanted to draw.101_6281

We decided to create our own Olympic medals. I love the 4 different interpretations… Zander’s all had his name on them, Gavin recreated the official ones for this year… the other two were equally creative. I got our template from Activity Village HERE. We used the 3 sizes of circles to show the different places as I really didn’t want to print out enough that we had 4 sets of large circles!101_6282

Emanuel and I are working on our Magic Treehouse dinosaur themed story still. It is so much fun reading one on one with him. His own reading skills are increasing by leaps and bounds!101_6283

We added a new animal to our Wild Kratts list – the Meadow Vole. The twins have come up with a new idea along the same lines. They want to watch Dirty Jobs episodes with Mike Rowe and pick one of the jobs of the episode to research further. We have been working on our Google searching and how we type in a specific topic or sentence and then reading through articles… with adult supervision of course.101_6286

The weather is just too yuck for the little ones so we pulled out our rainy day fun bucket and did some creative sticker and face shape crafting. Echo especially found this  to be great fun!101_6287

101_6289Tuesday was a rather special day… of course we still did our basics including some Lego time…101_6291

BUT Tuesdays 5-8 pm are free admission at the Minnesota History Center!101_6295

101_6335There was tons to see and do and not enough time for us to do it all. We had only an hour (5-6) before we needed to be back for Ken to go to his weekly gaming night but we made good use of it. We went straight to the area that was the most hands on for the kids. I want to go back and see the prohibition era limited time display in the following weeks.

There was tons about the fur trade and the Native Americans…101_6304

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Reproducing bead patterns

Reproducing bead patterns

A great display about the use of Bison…101_6321

And so much more.101_6297

101_6312101_6326The 4 big kids and Ken tried out the mine area as Echo was having nothing to do with the noise and darker ambiance.101_6330

It was so much fun to head out and just enjoy learning about the state we now live in. Together time well worth it! And how to end the evening with Daddy gone to gaming? With a late snack food supper and a movie… THOUGH I hasten to say – fun mommy was only for ONE night… the next night we planned bacon wrapped pork and vegetables…101_6337

The joy of learning not only at home but out in the open air!

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This entry was posted on 20/03/2014, in Uncategorized. 2 Comments

Beautiful Babies

I can never pick the best of a group of pictures… so why not share the rest on a quiet day?? Enjoy!

Lily Bean

Lily Bean

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Faces on this one are hilarious!

Faces on this one are hilarious!

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Sorry so few captions, but cute seems to speak for itself!

Sorry so few captions, but cute seems to speak for itself!

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This is Echo's one year dress, now a tutu skirt... LOVE IT

This is Echo’s one year dress, now a tutu skirt… LOVE IT. You can see her in it at 1 yr old HERE

My boys

My boys

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The best dresses make a lovely twirl possible

The best dresses make a lovely twirl possible

Not bad to the bone, maybe naughty on the hairline?

Not bad to the bone, maybe naughty on the hairline?

Gavin the artist

Gavin the artist

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Library is Visited… Children are Run… Slurpees are Had

We have continued our trend of creative outside the dwelling outings. Thursday was overcast and cool (some snow even!) for the bulk of the day with a good stiff wind. So that threw our plan of walking to the the Mac’s store for slurpees out the window. Instead we DROVE to the store and picked out slurpees and then drove to a park where Echo and Mommy were able to sit inside the van in comfort and the kids run and play and yet have a nice place to go when they got cold or thirsty.

Swinging

The boys shared a slurpee – very creative, they each got to pick a flavour… rootbeer, cherry lime and watermelon with a little blue raspberry on top! Trinity saved enough of her allowance for her own little bitty one – pink of course! And I got some time to work on another feltie penguin. I do love crafting in the van now, there is this little table like thing between my and Ken’s seat which is so useful for placing objects within reach! 

Zander and the Technicolor slurpee

Trinity in the warm

We managed to get right back on track with Farmer Boy where Almanzo made his own whip… and managed some math work as well. So we are continuing our trek through learning at some semblance of a pace! I am on the look out for some more field trips and ideas of outdoor learning for us though for the rest of the month of May. 

Our evening was also special – we headed to the same town Karyn works in to meet up with Victoria at the public library there. She activated my TAL card so we can take books out from that branch and the one here by Chris and Chris. The building the library is in there is absolutely gorgeous! And the library is HUGE for the size of the town. So of course I had to take a picture! 

Train table

Well 4 out of 5 looking this way

We have made tentative plans to see her on my special out and about Mother’s Day Sunday! We have missed people. With the van being an issue for the longest time and then this stalled move… well normal life has definitely been a thing of the past. So I am determined to get a little back. AND to take advantage of ANY warm days! 

Friday was a prime example of taking advantage of weather. It was a bit chilly but nothing pants and sweaters couldn’t combat. So out we went with out blanket in hand. This time with all the items we needed to work on the newest chapter of Farmer Boy (they made maple syrup) and the nature books. No apples so we had to settle for a bottle of Pepsi to share and soda crackers… maybe not the most balanced of snacks but everyone enjoyed it. 

Working on the printing

Trinity and her nature book

After some school work was completed we continued our walk to the park now dubbed “the one we get splinters at”… for those interested this trip resulted in one and it was tiny (Trinity). Shoes off… go go go until I noticed we had been gone for around 2 hours and I was STARVING. Even with the promise of lunch I had to push to get us back to the house. They really do love a good park! 

Gotta run!

With Mother’s Day this upcoming weekend we of course had to sit down and make cards for the various God Mommies. Trinity has the most work with her TWO and Zander’s will be the latest delivered as it has to go all the way to Minnesota. 

Emanuel and his card

Trinity and one of hers

We had a minor mishap with Zander’s glasses so pictures may be a bit confusing for a while if we cannot repair. The leg came loose and came off of what looks like a peg that it is glued to and attaches to the rest of the frame. That reminded me that we need to get Zander’s follow up rescheduled. I don’t know if everyone remembers, but he had one in the first half of the year that was cancelled due to over booking at eye place back in the city (an hour + away). So we were hunting for a local doctor. Sadly Echo’s surgery totally blew that out of our heads so I had to call the local Public Health to get suggestions. Luckily the nurse I got had a doctor she could personally recommend… not so lucky, I called after the office was closed for the weekend and the phone there cannot take messages. So add to the list on Monday!!

I am hoping the trend of completions (van, surgery, etc) will continue on with our income tax… we have been dealing with an audit forever. Mainly because it was NOT us who were the focus of the audit, rather two bigger companies Ken did contracts for. Not fun and definitely annoying as it has held up our tax related benefits… but we have held strong and are coming to the end of it. That means it will be simpler SOON to replace the glasses! YAY! 

Anyway… in order to keep the income going for our one income family we are trying to compress the bulk of our viewings into this weekend (as it is not late in the month landlords aren’t exactly rushing to set them up anyway). Which makes me more anxious but glad that there ARE some options out there. Again, I will keep everyone posted and all I ask is that you all keep a positive thought or a prayer out for us! 

And now it is time to continue the crafting. The craft sale is on the 9th and I have a table to fill… and some simple business cards to print out… I still need to figure out some sort of a sign for the table as well… oh and the pricing. Lately it has been felt that has held my attention. I am not sure how many I can make in time but I am hoping for enough to put in a basket. I am at a loss as to what to price my stuff. The larger of my owls I figure I will leave at 10.00, the smaller maybe down to 7.00 as it has been pointed out to me that people SEEING two sized owls would not want to spend the same amount… my felt bows maybe at 2 for 1.00… the duct tape ones at a buck or two? But those stacked bows… and the fancy ribbon ones… HELP!!! Suggestions????

Some of today's completions

The race is on to make whatever I can… the sale is set for 6 hours and I must admit a little worry about whether or not I will have enough stuff  to fill the table!! This delayed move has messed me up for supplies so I have had to drop the idea of having a tutu or two or any wands to sell. BUT I have a lovely selection of owls and bows… and time to make more! 

Hard to believe that Mother’s Day is this weekend! Be sure to hug your mom’s and tell them how much you love them!!

Baby on the go... with curls