December fun...

We have a fun December...we visited with Santa, saw LOTS of Christmas lights, listened to Christmas music, watched lots Christmas movies/shows, etc. It was a great month. I didn't get a lot of pictures taken, but here are a few of what I did take...

We set up the Christmas tree...

 Tried on some reindeer ears...

 

 All decorated!

 

Here are Nathan and Audrey all spiffied up for Church...

The kids got to go to a Christmas party at the Union Hall for Chris' work and got to see Santa and got their faces painted.

Spiderman...

 Little butterfly...

 Best I could get with both of them together with faces painted. Audrey only wanted to show me the side of her face.

 

Getting ready to open our Christmas Eve presents...

All ready for Santa in our new Christmas Jammies...

 

When we handed Audrey her stocking stuff Christmas morning, she just hugged it before even checking it out.

 We spent an hour opening presents. I took only a few pics, I got distracted by all the fun the kids were having.

 We were able to spend Christmas afternoon at Chris' Aunts house and had a great time visiting with family, then headed home and played with our new toys. :) 

Hope everyone had a great December and wonderful Christmas and were able to spend a lot of time with family and friends!

Things I wanna make...but not til next year!

So, I've been seeing some really cute things that I REALLY want to make, but seeing as how we are getting ever closer to Christmas and I have other things I am working on...I will not be making these things this year. I thought maybe some of you who do read this might be interested in seeing some seriously cute stuff that you too might want to make for Christmas next year. So here they are...

Really cute finger puppets, found here.

Or how about these cute reindeer gift tags/ornaments.

I also think these flower ornaments are pretty cute too. 

I'm gonna get me some power tools so I can make me some of these cute things.

I do need a cute wreath, or two, or three. Ok, it looks like there are four wreaths I've been looking at! Guess I'll make one for every room. I am SURE I have enough scraps to make the wallhanging!

A little something for the kitchen table, some reversible place mats. I like that these could be made for any holiday depending on what color you use! 

Since I'm taking you to places with stuff that I want to make, how about I show you something I did make! I decided the kids needed some cute T's and had a few ideas, but when I saw this I knew what I would do.

I LOVE being able to make things with stuff I have on hand. The T's have been kickin' around for a couple months and I had the felt on hand from other projects. 

For Audrey's I added a bow and a cute button that I had bought for 'something' who knows when.

 And to jazz up Nathan's, added a little bow and button around Rudolph's neck.

I LOVE how they turned out!

Of course I'll also need some new ideas to make the kids some cute holiday shirts.I think these might do. 

And how about some simple Christmas tree bows for a cute little girls hair.

Yep, cute stuff! Better get busy early next year. :)

Feelin' Crafty...

I've been feeling like I needed to do some sewing but didn't really want to since I had a curtain that I had been needing to finish since July. I finally decided to finish it and get it out of my house and so worked on it this last Monday and handed it off to it's owner on Tuesday. Now that that was off my list of "to do's" I felt like I could craft/sew again for me and my kiddos.
I had Wednesday off to get prepared for Thanksgiving and while Audrey took her nap, Nathan and I got to work on making 2 paper chains (one for each) to start counting down to Christmas. I figured with these being so visual it would help them better to know how long they have to wait for Santa.

I had also been blog hopping and saw a really cute turkey barrette and decided that Audrey had to have one! Luckily I had everything...well almost...that I needed. Only thing missing are some googly eyes, but I still think it turned out darn cute! If you want to make one for next year go here.

Then this morning we woke up to it snowing...and it hasn't stopped all day. I found instruction a while ago for some cute winter hats here and decided that since they're gonna need to keep their ears warm I'd better make them quick. Nice thing was they really were a quick sew up and both kids really seem to love them.
Of course Audrey loves dino's just as much as Nathan does, so they both got dinos! So cute!! I LOVE how they turned out.
Trying to figure out what the spiky things are on top of her head...

 Daddy distracted her on this pic so I could get a side view. Love her little smile!

I made Audrey's first since I wasn't sure if it would fit Nathan too and could make his bigger if needed. When I went to make his he decided he wanted green with yellow spiky's. I said "I can do that!" and then he 'patiently' waited for me to get his finished.

And can I tell you how much I love to do projects when I don't have to buy anything new! I had the green and yellow left over from Nathan's first Halloween costume (he was a dino, go figure). And the pink and purple for Audrey's came from Grandma Johnson's on one of my trips to visit. I had forgotten all about the pink and purple, I was going to make hers red but I'm glad that I found it!

Wonder what other things I can get to work sewing. I think I'll work on some UFO's (unfinished objects) that I can finish up for Christmas this year! We'll see what I can get done. I'll keep ya posted!

*S*N*O*W*!!!

Last Sunday we had our first good snow, and as soon as Nathan saw it asked if he could go out and play. So while Chris went out to shovel the walks/driveway, I bundled up the kids and took them outside to play...and of course I 'HAD' to get pictures! Audrey wasn't too sure of the snow, but Nathan had a blast!! 

Gathering snow...

 Going after Mommy...

 Trying to get Daddy...

Cheese!

 Nathan even got Audrey. She did not like it!

 Gonna have to go pick up snow pants and snow boots for Nathan. He had a great time but was frozen when he decided he was done.

 Caught a pic of Nathan right after Chris got him with a snow ball...

Making up...

I'm not a big fan of the snow...too cold for me...but I'm glad the kids can enjoy themselves. I'm sure well be spending more time out in the snow this winter.

We love visitors...

A week and a half ago my brother Gregg had to come down on a quick trip for work and needed a place to stay overnight. We had fun spending some time with him and the kids had a buddy to hang out with. 

 Takin' a picture with Audrey...

 Being silly with Nathan...

When it was time to eat. Gregg sat on the floor. Nathan sat down next to him and then scooted over as close as he could. Nathan's new buddy...

It was just a quick trip for my brother but the kids sure did enjoy spending time with their Uncle Gregg.

Halloween fun...

We had lots of fun this Halloween...besides the party. On Friday the kids went to daycare and had a little Halloween fun with their friends there. They go for a Halloween parade with the teachers and parents that come, on the way around the area they got stopped by one of the companies that gave them each a candy. Then they went back to spend some time with their classes and then had pizza for lunch. Here's some of the fun they had...

 

 Audrey with some of her class and her teacher Cheryl...

 Nathan...

 Nathan with his good friend Tamaurus and his teacher Neysi...

 Nathan and his buddy Buzz...or I mean Jaxson...

 Nathan's class...

 Here is Susan...She's the Daycare director and we love her...

 Audrey eating some lunch...

 Nathan...

*****

After the kids had lunch, we headed over to my work so they could go trick or treating. They sure know how to work it. Audrey would get some candy, then go back for more and everyone just said, "it's okay". Working the cute she was. Then Nathan would get candy for him and Audrey from someone and Audrey would do the same thing from the same person. They did this over and over again. And I wonder how they end up with so much candy! No pics of having fun at my work.

*****

Then we headed home and got ready to go to the Ward Chili/Soup cookoff and Trunk or Treat. I usually make Chili, but this year just did some cupcakes for dessert instead. Much easier. We had some good food and then headed out to get more candy...

 

 Audrey enjoying a cupcake after eating some yummy chili...

Here's Audrey with her Gigi. When Audrey saw this picture she said "My Gigi!"

*****

We didn't go trick or treating on Saturday because is was so cold and rainy. We just hung out at home and handed out candy to the few people that braved it out in the cold. 

Sunday the kids got dressed up and headed over to Chris' parents to visit them for a few minutes and then headed out to do a little trick or treating. We didn't have anyone stop at our house and there were only about 5 houses that even answered their doors. That's okay though, they didn't need the candy, just wanted them to have the experience.

Waiting to leave...

 Off we go...

 

 

""""""

As you can see the kids dressed up as a purple witch and Buzz Lightyear. I made Audrey's costume and I LOVE how it turned out. We're already deciding on what we'll be dressing up as for next year. Until then...

Hope you all had a Happy Halloween!!!

Fun with friends...

So this year I decided to do something fun for the kids and throw a little kids party for them and some of their friends. I probably got a little carried away with some of the stuff, but the kids all seemed to enjoy themselves. We had the party for them the weekend before Halloween, October 23rd.

Here's the invitations I made...

I also made some candy pretzels...

 And some gift bags...

For the party, the kids decorated picture frames and made masks (didn't get pics of the masks)...

We played a beanbag toss game. I got the instruction here if you want to make one next year...

Also played Pin the Heart on the Skeleton (he's a nice skeleton)...

And decorated sugar cookies (should have got a better pic of all the candy they had piled on them)...

They also had a lot of fun dancing around to the music that I had playing. 

Here's the gang...

Kingston, Nathan, Sydney, Whitney, Tali and Audrey.

I also wanted to show the decorations I had up. I saw somewhere (can't remember where) someone had done silhouettes of some Halloween shapes. I thought it would be fun to replace the kids photos on the mantel and put up pictures to represent them Halloween style...

 Not sure if we'll do another one next year (it's a lot of work) or not, but glad that I decided to throw one this year for them.