I'm a Slacker and a Fantastic Giveaway!

I love to take pictures of my kids.  I mean, seriously they are the cutest things on the planet.  It would be a crime not to be constantly taking pictures of them. Here's the problem with that. I am a complete scrapbook slacker.  I have hundreds of photos laying around at home and saved on my computer, and none of them are being displayed or preserved in a scrapbook to cherish in my old age.. So when I opened an email last week from Liz at MyMemories.com I almost peed my pants with excitement. Liz is giving me the opportunity to try out their amazing digital scrapbook software, and here's the great part, giveaway a free copy of their scrapbook software! That's a $40 value! Aren't you glad you read my blog?

I have been playing with this software since I downloaded it on Monday, and you will not believe how easy and fast it is.  I've made 2 scrapbooks with it already!

I seriously made this cute little card in under one minute! (I timed myself)

I use the fast photo add feature.  This is great for people with no time.  All you do is pick a album design, and choose all the photos you want in it, and they put them in for you.  You can go through and change them if you want, but most of the time they are grouped nicely together and look great! Then just go through and add text in the convenient little text boxes they put on the pages, and your done!  They have tons of free templates to download. This one is my favorite!

So I'm going to make this giveaway really easy.  All you have to do is go here, and look at all the great free kits they have. Then leave me a comment on my blog,telling me which free kit is your favorite. I will have a random generator select the winner on Wednesday! Tell you friends!

P.S. You can learn more about the My Memory Suite that I'm giving away here.

The Museum, Running, and Possibly Jail

Last week I took my two little ones down to Indianapolis to the Children's Museum.  If you have never been there, you must go.  I loved the dinosaur exhibit and the new Treasures of the Earth exhibit as much as my children.

Here's Lilly. Apparently she's a transformer and I never even knew it!

Lex turned into a dinosaur while we were there. Also surprising.

They were able to dig for dinosaur bones and also for Chinese clay soldiers.

They were pretty tuckered out by the time we went home. 

On to more news. I have recently decided to run a marathon this November.  I am not a great runner, but I'm not horrible. I've run about 5 mini marathons and thought, "What the heck. When is going to be a better time to train for this thing than now." So I signed up.

This news was met with mixed responses. My mother thought it was awesome. My brother Zach can't let me do anything without him, so he is now running the marathon with me. My sister and the rest of my side of the family thought it was great. That was the supportive side of the family. 

When explaining to my husband how great it would be to join the elite few who had run a marathon he said, "You wouldn't be one of those because you won't run the whole thing." Ahh, the ever support and praising Tyler.  He's always so proud of me, can't you tell?

And then, there is my Father-in-Law Tom. When hearing the news from Tyler, (I would never tell Tom thison my own for fear of his typically rude comments) Tom said, "You know it's 26.2 miles right?

"Yes, Tom. I am aware of the distance of a marathon." I replied in my nice, calm voice, that hid the irritation I felt.

"You know you are going to have to practice running long distances right? I don't think you will be able to do this." He said back to me, smiling the whole time

I replied "Umm, yea.  I was kind of planning on running at least one long distance run every week to prepare, and then a bunch of smaller ones on the other days. Hopefully by a couple weeks before the marathon I will be able to run a 17 to 20 mile run." Seriously, there has got to be some kind of reward waiting for me in heaven for dealing with this man.

Tom happily ends the conversation with this little comment. " Well, you probably will be able to since you go so slow.  Anyone could do a marathon at your pace." 

Yup, that's what he said.  Which  leads me to the next part of this blog post, and explains the title.  I may got to jail sometime in the future for killing this man.  After  insulting my running skill,. (Okay, I may not be fast, but I've never seen you go any farther than three miles Tom!) he turns to my 3 year old daughter and reminds her that the whole extended family is going out to eat tomorrow. She turns to him all excited and tells him what she is going to have when they go. She wants two grilled cheese sandwiches and some applesauce. My gem of a Father-in-Law replies with this, "Well I don't think you should have 2, it'll make you chubby." 

Yup, I'm going to kill him. (As a little background to the situation, these people are OBSESSED with weight.  They have been giving me a hard time for years for eating a whole sandwich).  I draw the line at saddling a three year old girl with worrying about her weight. I politely told him that she could eat anything and as much of it as she wanted, gathered my family up, and went home.  I'm seriously not looking forward to going out to eat tonight.   

We've Got Eggs!

Our chickens are now officially hens! We've got eggs! Friday afternoon I went to check on the chickens before I went home.  When I got there, I saw a beautiful little egg sitting in the nesting area.  Me, a very serious 27 year old, screamed like a little girl and ran around the yard waving my arms madly. Sadly, my kids were not with me at the time, so I called them and told them the great news.  Apparently, Lex, after hearing the news, also screamed and ran around waving his arms madly .

That night we scrambled up our tiny little egg and the kids ate it.  Lex said, "This is the best egg I've ever tasted."

My Mother gathered another egg on Saturday and then the kids, for the first time, collected two eggs on Sunday. We also spent Sunday afternoon fencing in the chickens yard, but I'll leave that for another post. Suffice it to say, the kids and I are ecstatic with our lovely little chickens and their perfect little eggs!  

All Grown Up

I'm feeling a little weepy today since my baby, 3 year old Lilly, started preschool today.  Now both my little ones are in preschool. While I know they are not going to school everyday, or even all day, it is still a big moment for me, and for them. The days of being their one and only is coming to a end.  Alas, enough of my melancholy ranting....I'll get over it I suppose.

Here they are all ready to go to school.

Please check out my guest post for the Clever-Copy writing Blog.  See my thoughts on introducing your kids to enough literature for Twilight to Not be their favorite book.

My Favorite Movies....Can you Guess?

The last two night my husband has been out riding ATV's with his buddies. Thus I didn't not have to endure the nightly ritual of watching ridiculous television such as Pawn Stars, River Monsters, American Pickers ect.  After I put the kids to bed I went out to the living room and picked a movie to watch while I knitted the night away.  It was fabulous! I had not watched these movies in months. Watching these reminded me how much I love them.  I know that sounds silly, but some movies you can watch forever and they always leaving with a feeling of awe.  So without further adieu here are some quotes from my favorite movies.  (I did not watch all of them in the last two days.)  Can you guess them?


1.  "When we are married, will you dance with me? I find dancing very agreeable. Why can you not say what is in your head?"
 " Why can you not stop saying what is in yours? Why must you lead, when I want to lead? If I want to dance I will ask you to dance. If I want to speak I will open my mouth and speak. Everyone is forever plaguing me to speak further. Why? What good is it to tell you you are in my every thought from the time I wake? What good can come from my saying that I sometimes cannot think clearly or do my work properly? What gain can rise of my telling you the only time I feel fear as others do is when I think of you in harm? That is why I am on this porch, Ivy Walker. I fear for your safety before all others. And yes, I will dance with you on our wedding night."

2.   I have struggled in vain and I can bear it no longer. These past months have been a torment. I came to Rosings with the single object of seeing you... I had to see you. I have fought against my better judgment, my family's expectations, the inferiority of your birth by rank and circumstance. All these things I am willing to put aside and ask you to end my agony. 

 "I don't understand." " I love you. Most ardently." 

3." Why do you hate them so much?" 

" They beat up on a weakling; that's all they did. The rest is just smokefilled coffee-house crap. They tortured and tormented a weaker kid. They didn't like him. So, they killed him. And why? Because he couldn't run very fast." 

4.  There's a lot of people out there, and they ain't just gonna go away. They got voices now and they're goin' to be listened to. Putting them in jail is not going to stop them. That's the power of the press, Joe. So thanks for teaching me about it. 

5.  There are children here somewhere. I can smell them. 

If you know leave it in the comments...Who knows I may hand out prizes!

Ethan's Hat AKA The Super Sneaky Spy Hat

A couple of weeks ago, OK maybe a month ago, a customer came in with her kids.  I had made a couple of hats for her daughter, and now her son  Ethan, a boy of probably 9 or 10 asked if I could make him a hat with glasses.  I thought that this idea was kind of awesome so I said I would try.  It took me a couple of tries to get the glasses right, but I think the hat turned out pretty cool, and I hope that Ethan likes it.

I made the glasses by knitting them up and then felting them, thus making them a little sturdier.  I left them to dry around two spice containers to get the perfect rectangular shape.  I then knitted up a basic stocking cap and sewed the glasses inside.  The genius of this hat, and I must give all the credit to Ethan because it was his idea, is that the glasses pull down.  You can wear the hat normal, and then just pull down the glasses whenever you want! I kind of want one of these.  What an awesome idea.

 Here are a couple of pictures of my latest creation.  Please don't make fun of my face. Just look at the picture and pretend it is not the worst picture of me you have ever seen.

Regular Summer

Super Spy Summer....I fixed that little fuzz by the eye btw.

Vacationing at the Beach

I just got back from vacationing at Beverly Shores in Indiana. It is located on the shore of Lake Michigan.  We stayed in this amazing house just a couple hundred yards from the beach.  It was fabulous.  Relaxing, beautiful, and fun.

The whole family was there, which is about 12 people.  I don’t know about you, but my family are my favorite people in the world.  I can’t think of anyone else I would rather spend my time with.  With all of us being so busy all the time, I don’t get to see them as much as I would like.  So being cooped up with them in a house is fantastic. I couldn’t ask for more.

I'm not going to bore you with every detail of what we did on vacation.  I'm just going to show you a few of my favorite pictures.  I did finish a new hat design while on vacation, but I'll leave those details for my next post.

This is my favorite picture.  They were just chatting to each other on the way to the beach.