One Night Craft Projects

In order for me to do a craft, it has to meet three criteria: 1. it has to be cheap 2. it has to be easy and simple, and 3. it has to be completed in one night. I don't want craft supplies cluttering up my house. And I have found three such projects that were very fun for me to do that I would like to share with you.

No Sew Tutu

This is my favorite crafty project. I really wanted a tutu for Sami, and I could find them in boutiques or online for around 30 dollars. That's way too much for this family's budget. So I made up my mind that I would learn how to make one myself, and my search led me to a tutorial. Here's the finished project:

One of my favorite princesses is modeling for us:

The best part of this project is that it costs around $7! Now every princess can have the tutu she needs for all that twirling and dancing. These also make great gifts. Can you guess what Sami will be wearing for Halloween this year?

Personalized Clipboard

I wanted to make my mother-in-law something special for Mother's Day. She is always helping us out and I wanted to show her our appreciation with something homemade. I saw this on the blog Controlling My Chaos and it also fit my criteria for crafts. Wo-hoo!

It's amazing what a little Modge Podge can do! Hopefully you can see her name under the clip. She sells Scentsy and I wanted to make her a cute clipboard for her parties.

Picture Magnets

And my last project was also a gift for my mother-in-law. They are fridge magnets with the faces of all her grandchildren. The idea comes from Crafting Chicks. Here are some of the ones I made:

Once again, Modge Podge came in handy. These are super easy and fun. Just by the pebbles at any craft store, cut out pictures that are the same size as the pebble, and decoupage the picture to the back of the pebble. Let dry (it takes a long time) and glue on a magnet. Ta-da!

Sami was impressed.

Check out all the links in this post for complete instructions on everything. I hope you have fun crafting!

Jonathan came home from MO on Tuesday, and he has had the rest of the week off. It's been so nice. Since he was home, I decided it was a good time to can since he could entertain the little people for me. I got a pressure cooker for my birthday from Jonathan, his mom, and sister, and I was excited to try my hand at it. I canned 16 pints of chicken (only half are shown here) and over 20 quarts of apple pie filling. We joke that if a disaster happens, at least we'll live off of chicken and pie. Doesn't sound so bad to me.



Then last night, we had Jonathan's sister, Tami, over for dinner and then later Jeremy and his family came over. Once again, it was so much fun. It's so nice to have family close. The only sad thing was that Sami fell asleep before her cousins came and she actually stayed asleep for their visit. She's been fighting a cold, so I think she needed the rest.

I've been tagged

A: Addiction: Chocolate
B: Breakfast (what you eat) ~ Cereal with skim milk
C: Chocolate or Chips ~ Chocolate
D: Dessert or Appetizers ~ Dessert
E: Essential Items ~ Dishwasher, and washing machine
F: Favorite Color ~pink but I also like teal blue since my girls look so cute in that color
G: Gummy Bears or Gummy Worms ~ neither, I'm not into gummy things
H: Hometown ~ Gering, NE
I: Indulgence ~ Once again, chocolate. But honestly, folks, I'm trying to be good. I still have some baby weight to get rid of.
J: January or July ~ In Arizona, definitely January.
K: Kids ~ Samantha and Jane
L: Life isn’t complete without ~ the gospel and my family
M: Most exciting memory ~ Being sealed to Sami in the Nauvoo temple. We had looked forward to it ever since we brought her home. It felt so wonderful to know that she was ours for eternity. We were surrounded with some of our most favorite people and felt Heavenly Father's love so strongly.
N: Number of brothers & sisters ~ 4 brothers and 1 sister
O: Oranges or Apples ~ apples
P: Phobias or Fears ~ I think my biggest fear is that I won't be ready for the big challenges that life brings, like the early death of a loved one.
Q: Quote ~ "All that I have seen teaches me to trust the Creator for all that I have not seen." Emerson
R: Reading currently ~ I am waiting for a new book from Betsy Brannon Green. She is my favorite LDS author. Actually, she's the only LDS author I like (so far), so many others are too cheesy. I ordered a book from Amazon and it should come this week.
S: Summer or Spring ~ Spring, summer is too hot.
T: Tag 6 People ~ Suzanne, Sarah, Kristen, Mindy, Lisa, and Christi
U: Unknown fact about me ~ I love watching old shows, like Matlock and Murder She Wrote, but sometimes they scare me so Jonathan has to be around when I watch them. He thinks it's hilarious that anything with Angela Lansbury could be scary. Some may think I'm a wimp, but I prefer to think of myself as a "sensitive spirit."
V: Vacation I want to go on ~ Hawaii
W: Walking or Running ~ for excercise, running; for relaxing, walking.
X: X-Ray or Ultrasound ~ Ultrasound if I'm pregant because I love seeing the baby, all other times, I prefer x-ray.
Y: Your favorite Food ~ Mexican
Z: Zoo or Bowling ~ Zoo (I can't wait to take the girls to the zoo next year.)

Daddy's coming home!

Jonathan has been gone since Sunday morning. He had to go back to Missouri to take an exam on physical exams (confusing, I know, and ridiculous since we have an ATSU campus 20 min. from here). I miss him so much! He is so much fun but he is also great help. As soon as he walks in the door, he jumps in and does whatever I need. Most of the time, it's entertaining the girls so I can get dinner on. Sami is his little buddy. I love this picture of her first horsey ride. Jonathan is the horse, of course :). She's never seen a horse in real life, or seen anyone ride a horse, so this is how she naturally rides. She giggles the whole time.

And Jonathan also does sweet things, like coming home early on my birthday with a dozen roses. Yeah, I did have a birthday last week. I turned 30! It seems crazy that I could be this "old" but I don't feel old, and I've never been happier, so I think 30s will be great. It still amazes me that when I turned 28, I didn't have any kids, and at 30, I have two! Heavenly Father has been very good to me.

Our niece is going to be on AFV!

My little niece, Elizabeth, is going to be on America's Funniest Videos this Sunday on ABC. She is such a little cutie, Sami LOVES playing with her. Click here for a sneak peak of the video. We hope you win, E!

Blog Makeover

You may have noticed that my blog has been "under construction" for a while. I've been trying new things, trying to figure out what I like and what I know how to do. But I think I'm finally happy with it, so it will stay this way for now. I have really enjoyed learning how a blog works. If you want to customize your blog, send me an email and I will tell you some of the secrets I learned that will hopefully make it must quicker and easier for you. One of the quickest ways to make over your blog is to buy blogwear, which is a premade headers and sidetabs. All you have to do is put in a picture and some text. Shabby Princess and Golden Girls both have really cute blogwear. But I wanted to know how to do it myself, and if you are the same way, I'd be happy to share.

Our Easter Weekend

So I realize that this is my second post today, but as I was downloading these pictures, I realized that this may be my only time to blog this week. This week is going to be filled with projects as I try to get everything ready for an Enrichment night on Thursday. And I love these pictures and I don't want to forget about them in my many picture files.

Our weekend started off at Grandma Olsen's. We had a brunch to celebrate Easter and her birthday. Her birthday is on Easter, how cool is that?! We had a lot of fun just talking, eating, and playing. She took this picture of us and I like how it turned out.

Then when my kiddos went to bed (they both go to bed at 6 pm and it's BEAUTIFUL!), I got to put together Easter baskets. I just love Easter baskets. I think it's because I have so many good memories of my Easter baskets as a kid. Sami's is the pink one, Jonathan's is in the middle, and Janie's is on the end. Janie just got Sami's old teething toys in her basket, but she didn't mind :). I was so excited for everyone to get up and see their baskets. Sami was mostly excited by the cookies in the basket, so the pink Cabbage Patch might disappear and reappear in her basket next year.

And then there was the egg hunt. Due to rain, we had an indoor hunt. Basically I just put eggs all over the living room and she picked them up, ate the treat inside and left the egg on the floor for Jonathan to pick up later. But she had a good time, as demonstrated in the blurry picture below.


And I saved the best for last. This doesn't have to do with Easter, but I have to post it. Sami loves music and she she dances whenever music comes on. But as this movie demonstrates, she dances without music too. All I have to say is "Time to dance?" and she'll start dancing. It's awesome.