Vacation -July 2012

Vacation was awesome.  It was the longest vacation yet.  My father in law spent the week before vacation with us doing some training in Tulsa.  Then we all flew back to Idaho together on the same flights.  It was nice.  We flew out on the 13th.  We got into Idaho Falls around 1ish.  We said hello to my husband's family and then used the vehicle they brought us and went to see my family.  We went to the shop to say hello to everyone and then we went down and visited my mom for a while.  While there we took lots of pictures of her flowers and my kids.

I took lots of pictures and then my husband took lots of pictures.  Here are just a few of my favorites.

 This was one that I took of my family at my mom's house in her flower garden.

My mom has a little swing that she hung up for my girls to play in.

After hanging out at my mom's we went to my dad's for the night.  We had dinner and took lots of pictures there as well.

 Sarah was playing on this big rock and loved jumping off of it.

 This used to be a playhouse that we used to play in.  My dad took down most of it because it had become hazardous.  He wants to put the slide back up with a couple o swings.

 I really thought this picture was cool.  The water she is scooping off the rock almost looks like a fish.  They were preparing the rock for pictures.

She is so pretty.  I just love this girl.

She got braver as the night went on and started jumping off the long side.

Well Saturday we ran a few errands and then helped my brother and his fiance set up for there wedding.  Then it started to rain.  It rained off and on.  They didn't want to move their wedding to the church so we just hoped the rain would stop.  The wedding was at 6 and it was supposed to stop raining at 6.  Well they risked it and ended up having a pretty quick wedding because it stopped raining and then started again right in the middle of the wedding.  The pictures were take under a canopy.  I'll share them when I get them.  I didn't take my camera out of the car because of the rain.  It was fun and it was good to see my brother so happy.  We love his new wife.  She fits right in.

After the wedding we went up to the cabin.  We spend the week working on projects around the cabin, fishing off the dock, swimming, and playing in the tube.  My girls loved it.  They had a blast.  I took lots of cool pictures.

Here is the dock that we fish, ski and swim from.

 I just liked the rain drops.

 We were just having fun.

She loved fishing.  Although she didn't want us to hurt the fish.

 Still fishing.

We were playing with Yana.  Someone has to kiss the fish. lol.  Don't worry Yana was not harmed in the taking of this picture.

 Here goes Sarah with her aunt Camille.

 They had a blast.  They caught some fun air.

I think this was the most air Sarah caught.

 Here goes Yana with her Aunt Camille.

 Her facial expressions were priceless.

She caught a little air.

Camille was the only one we could throw from the tube.  The tube is V shaped and with the little kids it is hard to get them off of the wake and they didn't want to be thrown.  Camille was a good sport and we all had a lot of fun.  We threw her twice.  You can see her roll on the water above.

Here she is right before she goes head first into the water.  We had a lot of fun on the water.  It really made us want a boat.

We spent a Sunday at my dad's and played volley ball.  That was a lot of fun.  It is always fun when we all get together. 

We went to Yellowstone park on a horrible day to go but it turned out all right.  People need to remember that when they stop in the middle of the road to take pictures and watch animals, that the traffic gets backed up for miles.  It can be frustrating.  We saw a few animals.

My husband was trimming a tree and I just happened to catch this picture.  I though it was pretty cool.

This is on top of Sawtelle.  It is a very tall mountain that takes a while to get to the top of.  We took some really good family pictures.  The island that the family cabin is on is behind us.

 In case you couldn't quite see the island here it is.  That is as far as my camera would zoom.

 I miss riding motorbikes.  So when I was at my dad's I asked to ride his Big wheel.  It isn't the same as the one I grew up riding but it was still so much fun.  I took my girls for rides too.

Here is one animal that we saw in the park.  He was walking right down the middle of the road.  We also saw 6 bears.  2 sows and each had 2 cubs.  It was cool.  We saw some elk, deer, birds and a just some pretty scenery.

Well we went to my family reunion the last weekend and had a blast.  I love my family.  I love Idaho.  I loved the weather.  Imagine the shock that or bodies are going through right now to come home to 110 degree weather.  My wonderful neighbor watered my flowers while I was gone so they are still mostly alive.  They don't like the heat either.  Well I need to get the kiddos up and we need groceries.  Have a great day.

The quilt

The Quilt.  Ok so I have been telling you all for a while now that I have been working on a quilt.  I also wasn't able to share pictures with you.  I wish I would have taken more pictures from the beginning.  I'll try to do better in the future.  This quilt was made for my brother and his fiance.  His favorite color is a limish green and hers is pink.  Their wedding colors are going to be.....green and pink.  So I went looking for quilt patterns that I could do just two colors in and have it look good.  This one is called "Picket Fence" and I found it in one of the quilting magazines I buy at random.  If you want to know for sure just ask and I'll figure out which magazine it was.  It was originally 85 X 85 but my husband and I like ours a little bigger so I added an extra row to the width and 2 rows to the length to help get it where we wanted it.

This is the quilt on the quilt frame that my husband built me.  If you have ever tied a quilt this is the same frame.  I don't tie quilts anymore so we didn't have the rack.  We built it and put it to use.  I was doing this on the floor.  Crawling all over and trying to keep all the layers straight and not bunched.  It took a while and a lot of help.  With this I pinned the sheet first.  Side Note: I use actual bed sheets for the backs of my quilts.  I actually buy the pack - you know the fitted sheet, flat sheet and pillow cases.  I give the whole thing as the gift.

Anyway I pinned the sheet on and then unrolled the batting and laid it on top.  My husband helped me because he didn't like that it wasn't straight.  Then I had him help me place the top of the quilt on top and get it all squared away.  Then I pinned it down on top of the other layers.

 Then I started putting the safety pins in.  It worked so much better than when it was on floor.  Everything stayed nice and tight.

 As I pinned I rolled.  It was wonderful.

 Here it is.  I used my new camera for these pictures.  Can you see the difference yet lol.  Ok sit fits perfectly on our bed and it looks really good.  It's hard to see in this picture but the binding is green.

 Our bed has a pillow top thing on it so it is pretty thick.  It hangs down slightly past the bottom of that and I have it pulled clear up onto the pillows.  It should wrap around a bed easily.

 This is the free motion stitch that I did.  It was fun and I think it looks nice.

 Here is the binding.  I chose this stitch for the binding.  It took awhile but it looks nice.

Here is the side view with the border and binding.

I really like this quilt.  It turned out much better than I thought.  I wasn't sure about green and pink but they do look nice together.  It was a fun quilt to make.  The original quilt in the magazine had many colors not just two.

Well have a good Monday.  I am on vacation and I'll try to post every few days but I'm not going to make any guarantees.

My new toy

As I said in the last post, my birthday was last week and my husband bought me a new camera.  A much nicer camera than the one I had bought myself after my mission.  He ordered it only after we did the research and it finally got here yesterday.  I was so excited.  So after the battery charged and nap time was over I started playing.  I just love this camera.

 Sarah was watching tv and I wanted to take a picture when she wasn't looking at me so this worked out well.

 I talked her into smelling a flower.  Although if you look at it she didn't get close enough to actually smell it.

 Here are a couple of my flowers.

 I was playing with the different settings.  I haven't ventured into playing with the light settings or anything.  Just the preset ones on the knob.

 Yana was much easier to get face shots of.  She was lots of fun.

 The look on her face is like "what are you looking at I'm busy".

 This is one of the things that we built Saturday.  My husband needed a rack to put his clamps on to get them out of the way.

 This is 1 1/2 of the shelves we built Saturday.  I didn't want to back up  in order to get the whole thing.  our garage is looking better and better all the time.

Grandpa came yesterday.  He will be staying the week with us.  He is actually here for work.  He is getting Training in Tulsa so he gets to stay with us.  The girls have been all over him since he got out of the truck last night.  It was a lot of fun.

It was a good day yesterday.  Today we are waiting to hear on my car.  It should be done today...or at least that is what they said.

I didn't get the binding done yesterday.  I had to clean my iron and then I got it ironed and pinned and ready and then Yana woke up....1.5 hours early.  She wasn't in a good mood so sewing was out of the question.

I'm hoping that she sleeps well today so I can finish it.

Well have a good day.

A busy weekend

Well,  Today is the 9th in case you weren't sure.  Well we had a good 4th of July.  Had a friend from work and his three kids over for a BBQ.  Then we had our own fireworks on the dirt patch in our back yard and then Yana burnt her poor face with a sparkler.

Well the 5th was my birthday and at the last minute we decided to go with my husband to Texas rather than spend the next possible two days at the house alone.  I really didn't want to have to take myself out to dinner.  It just didn't seem very appealing and he had to go to Texas.  We spent one night at the hotel.  Walked around a little and called on apartments, hotels, and rental properties for my in-laws.  They will be moving down there in August.  It turned out to be a good trip.  My husband took me to a couple of restaurants that he really likes. 

We ended up coming home Friday.  It was interesting.  We weren't in a hurry so we took a different route home that added another hour onto our drive.  It was fine.  The only problem was that the air conditioner on the driver's side decided to hate us and started blowing hot air.  There was no way to turn it off without turning mine off so we left it on but pointed it at the ceiling and then I tried to share my vent with my husband.  It didn't completely reach so I held a book up to help direct the air.

Saturday was a good day.  We worked in the garage in the morning.  We built a couple of shelves that helped get things off the floor.  Then while Yana napped I worked on the quilt.  It has been trimmed and the binding cut and sewn.  The binding has been sewn onto the back of the quilt.  Now I just need to iron it over, pin it and decide which stitch to use to sew it down and then I'm done with it.  I'm so excited.

Sunday we went to church.

Today has been interesting.  My husband ordered me a gift for my birthday that is supposed to be delivered today but they never say when and it needs a signature.  I also needed to drop my car off to get the air conditioner fixed.  I didn't want to leave and miss my package.  Well a friend offered to pick us up from the car place and bring us home.

After dropping off the car I started this post and then the package came so I got distracted. 

My husband bought me a new camera.  A really nice one so I'll start posting pictures as soon as I can.  Right now the battery is charging and Yana just went down for her nap so I had better get sewing.  Have a great day.

This morning....

This morning I was sitting her at the computer getting things done when Sarah comes down the stairs and rushes over to me and says "It's and emergency".  So, although I know that her definition of an "emergency" and mine are different I paid close attention to her.  "You have to come see what Yana did to my rug!"  Her rug is not very big and it is actually my husband's.  It is fur and was given to him when he was a kid.  It is like 1 ft X1.5 ft in kind of an oval shape. 

Anyway, I go upstairs to see what the "emergency"  I'm thinking to myself that I left the bathroom door open and I'm hoping that Yana didn't throw the rug in the toilet.  So I ask Sarah what happened.  "She pooped on my rug!"  That is one sentence I never thought I would hear.  Instantly inside the door to their bedroom I see that Yana actually threw up on the rug and surrounding area sometime last night or early this morning.

Ok so that was first thing this morning. Now I"ll preface this next story by telling you that yesterday we went to Best Buy to look at camera's.  While there a lady brought my children a very cute balloon animal flower arrangement.  There is a guy there who makes balloon animals for the kids.  It is really cute.  There are three flowers standing up out of a balloon pot.  Sarah just loves this balloon.

Last night before we went to bed I noticed that one of the three stems had lost it's air.  The flower was fine but the stem was dead. 

Ok so this morning after cleaning up after Yana we came back downstairs and Sarah sees her balloon and is devastated.  So what does she do?  She takes it to the bathroom and waters it.  She helps me water my flowers every day and apparently thought water would help her poor balloon flower grow back.

I was laughing a lot at that.  That was a wonderful way to start the day.

Anyways today I will finish the free motion quilting on my quilt (so long as Yana takes a good nap).  I'm excited for this.

I hope you all have a great day.

Weekend living

Saturday as a good day.  I woke up early and went for a bike ride.  It was wonderful.  The weather was perfect.  Then after breakfast we took Sarah for her bike ride.  My husband rode bikes with her while Yana and I jogged along behind.  Then after that it was time to change the fluid in my transmission. 

 Yana just couldn't stay away.  She just loved playing under the Yukon helping dad.

 What one does the other generally does too.  Sarah followed Yana under too.

 I think I mentioned back in May that my husband had made me a jewelry holder for Mother's day.  Well here is the finished product.  I have been using but he hadn't had time to put the padded material into it until this weekend.  I love it and it works great.

 This is the finished product of the dresses I made last week.  My girls love them and have so much fun wearing them.

They wore them to church yesterday and twirled a lot.  They just love them.  They were so much fun to make and I'm thinking that I'll start making them for all the holidays.

Well I have sat down and have written out a list of projects that I need to get done before our vacation and it is manageable.  I'll be fine there so long as I don't get distracted.  Then I started writing down a list of projects for when we get back from vacation. 

I have had 4 requests for a purse I have been making so that will be first on my list and then I need to get the chair cushions covered.  I have a quilt that I want to make and sell so that is on my list too.  I would also like to get a few table runners made for upcoming holidays.  It looks like I'm going to be busy. 

If there is something you want let me know and I'll get it on my list to get done for you.

We had a good weekend and hope you did too.  Have a great week.