Sign Language

Probably about a year ago now Sarah was still somewhat new to using the toilet.  New to the point that she would still yell out in the store and restaurants when she needed to use the toilet.  I'm sure if your child has ever done that you understand how embarrassing it is.  So I was trying to find a way to get her to stop yelling it.  I decided to try sign language.  I downloaded a few of those baby sign language apps onto my phone.  I learned how to say "toilet" and taught her.  That was the end of our problem.  She no longer yelled out in public places, she would just sign to us.  I had to make sure that my husband understood as well.

I learned a few other signs and taught them to her as well.  Then a few months ago she started making up her own sign language.  She just loves it.  I don't know that much but have always wanted to learn.  In middle school a friend of mine and I bought ASL dictionaries and tried to learn so we could talk to each other.  We mostly spent our time spelling out the words.

I still want to learn sign language and went to Start ASL.  I did it one night while my husband was in Texas and thought that it would be a good thing to study and learn while he is gone.  I learned a few things and then got distracted with life again.

Yesterday during nap time Sarah and I sat down and did her ABC Mouse and then we started working on our sign language together.  I have really enjoyed it.  I think I may have over done it yesterday though.  By the end of the day my mind felt fried.  Not just because of the sign language but because I also was working on my Russian.  Two languages in one day was new to my brain so today I think I'll not push so much.

I'm trying to find out what time "Signing Time" is playing on PBS so we can start watching it together as well.  This is going to be a fun adventure because we are learning together.

If any of you have any advice or other websites that help please let me know.

I hope you all have a great day and that you learn something new today.

Hubby's bday cake

My husband's birthday is tomorrow but earlier in the month it looked like he was going to be in Texas for his birthday.  So I started planning.  I decided I wanted to have a small party and make a cake for him.  Since his parents live in Texas for the time being I asked if they would be able to come.  They said they would try and things got started.  I called a couple friends and invited them over for a BBQ at 5 this last Saturday. 

Then last weekend we (the girls and I) went to visit my husband in Texas and when we came back my mother in law came with us.  She stayed the week.  My husband thought she would be staying for two weeks because that is when he thought his dad would be coming up.  They are also going to try coming up for Labor Day weekend.  We just smiled at each other.

 So I started working on his cake.  I used the Wilton guitar cake pan and the instructions off of Wilton to turn it into an Island.

 I cut off the edges on the neck.

 I frosted the body green and the neck blue.

 I added "wooden" slats to make it look like a dock.

 And then it all fell together.  I made a tent out of graham crackers, the fire pit out of pretzels, and trees from ice cream cones. 

 I used blue piping gel for the water and then stuck whales in it.  I also used pretzels for fishing poles.  They are laying down because that is how my husband leaves them when we isn't on the dock.  That and I couldn't get the icing to hang for the fishing line.

Here he is with his girls and his cake.  It was a good BBQ with good friends.  We had a good time.  My father in law got here around lunch time and that is all that my husband thought was a surprise.  He thought we were going bowling and eating root beer floats.

It was a lot of fun.  I miss making fun cakes.  I hope you all had a good weekend.

Cinnamon Rolls.

 Sorry no sewing today during nap time.  I was learning how to make cinnamon rolls from my mother in law.  It was fun and they are delicious.

 Now I have a whole shelf dedicated to cinnamon rolls.  This may not have been the greatest idea but who cares when it comes to cinnamon roll.s

1/2 off Kellogg's cereal

 Well we went to Reasor's today.  They are having a back to school sale on their Kellogg's cereal.  It is half off.  Since that more than I can get with coupons I stocked up.  We bought 15 boxes of cereal and one Kellogg's granola bar thing.  On one of the boxes was a coupon for a free box of pop tarts.  So that is what we got.  We bot a few other things there and spent about $50.00.  I wont have to buy cereal for a long time.

Here is the top shelf of our pantry.  All the favorites and several that we haven't tried yet.  The sale ends today as far as I know so if you haven't been there you may want to.

1st day of school ever

 Today is the first day of school but it is more than that for us.  Sarah is our oldest and it is her very first day of school ever.  She started Pre-K today.  She was so excited. Last night we picked out which outfit she would wear and set it on the guest bed.  She had one outfit picked out but it was supposed to be a hot day today and the outfit had pants so she decided to wear shorts instead.  We got up a little earlier than I think we will need to in the future.  We had nothing to do but wait for almost 20 minutes.  I woke them up at 7 and they took a bath and then got dressed.  Grandma bought Yana a new outfit too so she got to wear it today although it wasn't her first day of school.

Then we did hair and ate breakfast.  After that we brushed our teeth and waited until it was time to go.  A friend of ours called and invited Yana over to play with her daughter who is only 3 months older than Yana.  So I dropped Yana off on the way to school.

It was weird dropping Sarah off at school.  She has never done day care and has only been left with family and friends but this was different and it was just plain weird.  I was really excited to pick her up later and talk to her about her day at school.

She had a great time.  They sang songs, read books, had snacks, played on the toys and even made a hand print on a piece of paper next to a poem.  She loved it and I'm glad that she did.

She was very upset yesterday when she found out that they don't go to school everyday all week long.  She wanted to go Saturday and Sunday too.  Just got to love their enthusiasm.  Well I hope that you all had a great first day of school whether it started today, last week or later in the month.

Froggy Quilt

It took me a couple days but I finally got it sandwiched last night.  I'm glad that I did though because I'm getting excited to sew it and get it finished.  I think it is really cute. I laid the top on the floor and then set up the frame around it so I would know how big to make it since the sheet was quite a bit bigger.

 Here is the back sheet.  It is a cream color.  See how much bigger it was, but a size smaller wouldn't have fit the top.

Here it is all pinned and I think it is safety pinned in this picture but I'm not sure.  Anyways it is all ready to sew.

Today during nap time I will try to get it started.  I have one more purse to sew and that should take about 20 minutes and then I can start free motion quilting this.  I'll will share more details like where I got the pattern, the size, and so forth when it is done and I do a blog on the quilt.  Have a great day.

Fun at the park!

 This morning after practicing for school to see how long it would take we went for a bike ride/run to the park.  We took the long way around the subdivision.  Sarah is getting so much better at going up and down driveways and curbs.  I took the camera today because I wished I had the last time we went.  It was fun.  Sarah loves to pose for pictures.  Yana used to but lately she would rather not hold still that long.

 She was looking at me but got distracted at the last second.

 She loves to swing but lately I can hardly convince her to swing in the toddler swings.

 She is turning into such a little monkey.  She climbs everything at the park including the stuff she shouldn't.

Sarah struggled climbing up this slide for a long time but Yana doesn't seem to struggle as much.  Maybe because Sarah helps her whether she wants the help or not.  The problem is that once she is on the top I have to go get her because she wont sit down and go down the slide.  I think it is a game to her.  Well

Purses and quilts

I know I said a while ago that I would share pictures of the material that I bought to make the 4 purses that I'm working on.  So here they are.  Last night I got them all sandwiched and ready to begin sewing on.  The top color on each of them will be the inside of the purse.  I have bias binding that will help bring out the color and finish it all off.  I'll share pictures of the finished project before I mail them off.

What do you all think?  Do the colors go well together?  It took forever for me to put some of them together.  In the end I liked them all.

An update on the quilt:  I meant to sandwich it last night until I had a "duh" moment.  I didn't have any backing so I couldn't sandwich it.  So today after Sarah meets her teacher we will go to the store and buy a sheet for the backing and I'll hopefully get it sandwiched tonight.

The garage is white!

Saturday we decided to let Sarah help us paint in the garage.  Actually my husband had been saving this project for her so she could help.  He had built this shelve and wanted it painted.  He had already painted the first one.  So we got Sarah all set up and gave her a brush and some paint.

 This is what happens when I ask her to smile.  She gives me a weird look.

My husband was moving when I took the picture but I mainly wanted to share what the garage looked like.  We had moved everything over to that side of the room in order to finish the other side.  Isn't it a nice white?  We like it.  We finished Saturday night.  We painted while Yana napped and then played with the girls until it was bed time and then finished painting.  It is so nice to have it done.  I can once again park in the garage and I love it.

Ultrasound

He did it.  He brought the ultrasound pictures home Friday but I didn't get them until Sunday.  So here she is.

This is kind of a front view.  She has her feet pulled up a little and her hands are there too.  She is looking down though.

It's a.....

Tuesday I had my official 20 week ultrasound.  They told us what we are having and I have wanted to share it here on my blog but I have been putting this off for one reason only.  My husband took the pictures to work and keeps forgetting to bring them home.  I wanted to share with you but I guess we'll have to wait until he brings them home.

We are having a little girl.  We are so happy to have a healthy baby that it doesn't really matter what we have.  Sarah was upset.  She wanted a brother.  Yana doesn't really have a clue so she could care less what we are having.

Well as soon as I get the pictures I'll share them with you.

Painting

 I think I mentioned the other day that we are painting our garage white.  Here are a couple of pictures from the first day.  He bought ultra bright white paint.  I keep teasing him that he is going to need sunglasses to work in his garage now.  We now have that whole wall painted and part of the ceiling.  By the time we got started last night we didn't have a lot of time to paint before we needed to get to bed.  We are excited to have it white.  We love our house but all the walls are that brown color and you can't wash anything off of them because the paint comes off with it.  So this white is supposed to be water proof when said and done.

After starting this project we decided that we probably wont be painting the whole house.  It is too expensive and way too time consuming.  It has definitely been an adventure though.  Well I'll talk to ya'll later.  I'm not sure I'll get any sewing done because I need to get some stuff done in the garage while Yana is sleeping.

Weekend fun

Our weekend was a lot of fun.  Friday night my husband and I had a babysitter and we went to see the new batman movie.  We really liked it, especially the fact that it wasn't as dark as the second one. 

Then Saturday morning we went swimming with the girls.  Sarah is doing so good.  Towards the end we let her take off her life jacket and she can swim.  Not long distances yet but a good distance for a 4 year old.  She learned how to tread water and she got better at floating on her back without the life jacket.  Yana also did great.  She just ran straight into the pool to the point where she couldn't tough and started swimming (she has a swimsuit life jacket on).  The girls jumped in, including Yana.  Although her jumping was more like trying to step onto the water.  It was cute.  They had a lot of fun and the water felt great.

Later we taped our garage...or at least started taping our garage.  We are painting it white.  We didn't have enough paint so when we ran out we ended our painting for the day. 

Sunday was church and it was good to be back where the children could go to nursery and primary.  In Island Park there are just too many people who stop by while on vacation to allow all of them to join the primary and nursery.  I understand and don't have a problem with it but they missed their classes.

Well that was our weekend.  It was productive and Sunday wasn't as hot as the rest of the week.  I hope that you all had a good weekend as well.

Frog Quilt

Here is the fabric that I have for my froggy quilt.  Just to show you how cute they are.  I have everything cut, squares pieced together and the squares sewn together into strips.  I have some ironing and then two more strips to sew and then it will be all sewn together.  Then I have to add the borders, sandwich and free motion sew it.  I'm really excited.

I will be sandwiching the purse material tonight I hope.  I'll try to remember to take pictures for you.

School Supplies

It has been a long time since I have had to buy school supplies.  Yesterday when we went grocery shopping we found the list for my daughter and started buying things.  It was actually kind of fun.  She is so excited to start school and she wanted to help pick out the colors of her supplies.  We bought her a back pack.  She picked a "Hello Kitty" pink one which she wanted to wear around the store.  Then we bought markers, paint, scissors, a binder, a folder, Clorox wipes and Kleenex.  Oh and glue sticks and glue.  No pencils though so I figure they just have them use markers for a while.

I wish I knew what time of day she goes to school though.  I should find out next week, hopefully.  Well this morning I changed the flag in my yard to the "Back to School" flag.  For us it isn't back to school it is starting school and I think that Yana is jealous.  She kept taking off with Sarah's back pack.  It will definitely be interesting to only have one child in the house for the rest of the year.  Well I think I'm starting to ramble.  I just wanted to share the excitement.