Feelin' Crafty

Okay, okay, I know it's been forever since I've updated.....again. I don't even have a real good excuse. I mean, we've been busy, but everybody's busy. And honestly, I haven't even been THAT busy, I've just been thinking about being busy. If you know me really well then you know I'm always thinking about being busy doing something. It's just that I have a hard time following through with things. For example, I need to give my house a good deep cleaning once a week, but most weeks I just think about doing it and hit the high notes when it gets intolerable. It gets the good deep clean, somewhat, when company's coming over. I know most people don't need the good DEEP clean every week, but remember I live with four males (so the bathrooms are no brainers; right?) not to mention there are five, yes, five, kids that reside here. Now you understand why we need the good deep clean every week--not that it gets it.

Oh, and speaking of company coming over, Clayton nailed down the date of his company Christmas party this week......AT OUR HOUSE! Say a prayer for me, please! I have no furniture, nothing on the walls and I have about two months to get things in tip top shape for not just company but basically complete strangers on my part, considering I've never met the new team since we've moved. I've never hosted a dinner party before unless you include cooking for family a dinner party, which I don't. Because if you're family you can fix your own glass of whatever it is you're drinking. A dinner party, that's a different story. I don't even think I have enough china for 24 people! Lord, help me. But two months is a while, I still have a good while before it's time to get in complete panic mode. I'm sure it will all be fine, it's just I'm a tad nervous....can you tell?

But all that's really beside the point. About a year ago I decided that I could do some cute things for the girls to wear. So I decided to get a sewing machine. Well, my mom, she knows me all too well. See, I just thought about getting a sewing machine for a long while -- I think I even went ahead and purchased some patterns and fabric. So my mom got me a sewing machine for Christmas last year. I thought it would be a piece of cake to sew a few cute things. Boy was I wrong. Honey, sewing is an artform, not meant for everyone to master. It didn't take too long before I decided I was gonna need some lessons. So I got myself some for Mother's Day. In the mean time I'm buying fabric like a mad woman (all of it still nicely folded in it's respective bags). I did make a couple of doll dresses, with the help of my mama and a couple of blankets for the girls. I learned some things in class. I can now make an apron, a cute one at that! Well, last year I was really wanting to do some appliqued t-shirts for the girls. Well, it took me a whole year to think about doing it before I finally got around to it. But I made this outfit:


It helps to have a cute model:

I had only finished one of them this afternoon so we had to take turns trying it on. Here's my sweet MA:

And after I tucked everyone in tonight I finished the other suit. So tomorrow I'll have to take pictures of them together, both dressed up in pumpkins:

Now, they don't look professional in the least. They look pretty homemade as far as the applique goes. But I must say, that ruffle on those pants looks pretty doggone good. I mean, it's hard to tell from the picture but they're both the same length and the hem is straight too! For a novice sewer such as myself that's pretty impressive! And since it's still almost 90 degrees everyday here I did them in short sleeve but I'm making them a long-sleeve one too just like these. I can't decide if I'm going to put the m on the long-sleeve though. What do you think? The only brown fabric I had was minky dot (cute, I know) but if you sew much then you know as I have discovered that minky dot is evil! It has way too much stretch in it and likes to bunch up under the presser foot. I hate that minky dot. That quilting cotton is so much more friendly. We've got to mend our relationship though b/c I've got two baby blankets that are needing some tlc so I can give them to the babies they belong to before they outgrow blankets. I may not be that good with the sewing machine yet but me and the seam ripper, we know each other real well b/c I make lots of mistakes!

I didn't mean to ramble on and on. I was just feeling crafty and finally decided to get off my tail and do something, seeings how it would be another year if I didn't before my girls could adorn some cute pumpkin suits!

Here Piggy Piggy

Here's an attempt at getting all five kids to look at the camera a few Sundays ago before church:
(note to self: need A LOT of practice if there's a chance I'm going to get a decent Christmas card picture)
And here's the reason for this post:

Margaret Ann let me play beauty shop on her the other day. Here's a few shots of my first attempt at putting pigtails in one of the girls' hair. MC has not let me try yet. They only last a minute or two. I only had them held in with bows b/c I didn't think a ponytail holder would hold that tiny little bit of hair. It won't be long though, hopefully. I still think they are so precious! Here's my girl modeling the new 'do':

And the back view:

(another note to self: need more practice on a straight part in the back if I ever want them to be able to wear pigtails out in public, ha!)

School Days, School Days, Good Old Golden Rule Days

The boys have started back to school. They are liking their new school a lot and have made lots of new friends! I love how resilient kids are at this age! I thought it would be a big adjustment moving and starting a new school but the boys have done so great and they both say they really like their new school! Here are the two big boys on the first day of school:

William's first day of Kindergarten:

Charlie's first day of 1st grade:

Now, as for me, this new school business has been quite an adjustment. Instead of walking to school a block away I now drive and sit in the carpool line. Let me just tell you a secret: the carpool line stinks! It takes too much of my stretched too thin already time out of my day. You either get there early and wait a while or you get there on time and wait in line a while. It'd be different if I were alone and had a good book to read, etc. But me and three toddlers, not so much fun. Especially when my car registered 138 degrees on the first day of school in the pickup line. It was so hot I couldn't even breathe with the AC on....talk about misery. Today it was actually nicer outside, almost felt a little fall like....highs in the lower 90s.....now that's sad. That's Texas for you I guess.

As for Henry, he thinks he is just as big as the older boys. He begged for me to let him go to school this year. So I found him a program that's two days a week. After he went the first day I think he was rethinking his decision and decided staying at home with me wasn't so bad after all, ha! He's going into his second week and likes it now. Here's he is on his first day:

Our Summer (A Recap)

So, I'm back from the dead. I decided it was high time to update the old blog. Sorry I've been dragging my feet. So anyway, our summer started out with a move. We actually moved out a few days before school let out and went in to temporary housing (a furnished apartment) for a week or so. My parents came and helped with the kids and let them finish out school and teeball while Clayton and I jet-setted to Miami for his work. We went to Key Biscayne for a long weekend and enjoyed time with his colleagues and their spouses. I can say this about Miami though.....I'd never been, now I have, and I'm not in a hurry to return. Just not my kind of beach I guess. On the up side we stayed in the Ritz so that was nice.

Anyway, we were homeless for about a month and a half. We couldn't close on the house we were buying until the first of July and with the holiday the movers couldn't deliver our stuff until mid-July. So we did what all people do when they're homeless.....we visited. We stayed with my parents a while and then with Clayton's parents a while and then we vacationed a while and then we came back to Texas to take care of business. By the way, thanks to all of the above-mentioned parents for letting us crash for weeks on end and for feeding us and taking care of us. I don't know what we'd have done without y'all.

We took our yearly vacation to Seaside (before the oil arrived) and had a fantastic week of sun, seafood, bike riding, and loving on our kiddos. If we could afford it I'd opt to spend every summer there, all summer. We love it that much. I didn't have my camera for our vacation so I borrowed my dad's and snapped our annual bench pics of our family in Grayton.

So fast forward to July 12th, the day our furniture got delivered and also our eldest son's birthday. The movers show up, late, and start unloading. I notice that they are leaving some things outside after unloading but I don't really think that much about it. I get my rug and start getting it rolled out in the living room and notice it smells really ripe. I just thought, it's the heat. We've never stored our stuff before so I really didn't know what to expect. By the way, Clayton's company paid for us to move and paid to have our stuff stored in a climate-controlled warehouse. So hours upon hours pass by and they're bringing in boxes and bringing in boxes and I notice in one of my plastic storage boxes that they're condensation on the inside of it. So I open it up and the smell almost knocks me down and I look inside and the clothes inside are soaked, like I could ring water out of them. So I stop a mover and tell him what I've found and ask how it could have happened. And he told me, "oh, yeah, he's going to tell you about that." See, the driver is a contractor for the moving company usually and he hires a couple of guys to help him. So I find the driver and repeat myself only to find out from him that we've had some water damage and he's sorry, but it's only a couple of boxes....there was a leak in the trailer.

But our stuff was supposed to be in warehouse storage I say, only to find out that he picked up the trailer from and empty lot. Okay, so I'm trying to keep my cool. He starts bringing out damaged boxes that seriously aren't even boxes anymore. I mean, the stuff in them was beyond ruined. Still I"m keeping my cool, call Clayton and put him on alert for when he gets home from work. I put him in charge of contacting the moving company, etc. Okay, long story short everything in our house was ruined. There wasn't a box that hadn't been touched at the least by moisture. See during our month and a half of storage was when the hurricane hit Texas and we got a ton of rain from all that.....nice. All our furniture, minus a few pieces had water damage. Our dry cleaning bill alone was over 13K........yeah, for real. Anyway, we've been back and forth with the moving company and have almost settled with them for everything. We're still waiting on a few items. Needless to say, it's been a chore. So as of now we're sitting around enjoying our Rent-a-Center furniture:) I did meet with the decorator today and have gotten the ball rolling to put our house together. I'm a bit of an optimist but I'm shooting to have it all done by Thanksgiving.....or I may just be dreaming, probably the later, ha!

So that's been our life as of lately.

Oh, as a last minute trip before school started my cousin Haley and I took the kids back down to the beach to try to capture the moment and I had my camera for that. I just have to chase this rabbit for a sec.......Haley and I loaded all five kids in the bus and headed for the day to Grayton Beach. We get there and it's hot hot hot and cloudy, as we had run into some rain on the way down. So we snapped a few shots before feeding the kids. They did not cooperate without food. I think Henry cried the whole time. Now, I am a little OCD when it comes to the picture taking. I would not give up. So we undressed the kids, fed the kids, redressed the kids and headed back out for another session. We got them seated just so and the bottom dropped out of the sky and soaked us through and through. So we ran back to the bus, undressed the kids again so their clothes could dry and waited out the storm. As soon as it quit we redressed the kids and headed back out to the wet sand and tried again. And all that paid off b/c we got some really great shots. Then we undressed the kids again and suited them up for the ocean and let em go at it for an hour or so. There was red flag so they couldn't get all the way in but they had a blast playing the sand/edge of the water. Then we loaded up and headed back to my parents. I must say that I have the best cousin in the whole wide world for trekking out in public with me and my crew. The kids had a blast though and fell in love with Haley (who can blame them?). All I can say is Haley and I enjoyed a good shower at home and probably slept better than we had in months b/c we were t.i.r.e.d. after all that fun.

And here's some peeks of what we captured:

And here's our annual family vacation to Seaside:

MC:

MA:

We do what all normal beach-goers do, lay out -- NOT! We chase kids and play in the sand:

And our annual bench pics in Grayton:

Our family of seven:

use your imagination or turn your head sideways (I couldn't figure out how to turn the pic) I'm so techno friendly.

Brotherly love:

Teeball 2010

Charlie and William were on the same team this year in advanced teeball (thank you, Lord). They did soooo good. They are both very good hitters. Neither of them hardly ever has to use the tee. They almost always get a hit when the coach pitches to them. Charlie has really gotten into the game this year. It's amazing what a difference a year makes. He is paying attention and has made a lot of great plays and gotten a lot of outs. He's been playing first base mostly. William is still in it for the snacks primarily but will be in the game for at least a third of it. He likes playing pitcher the best but sometimes plays outfield b/c it's hard to play a base when you're playing in the dirt. I'm hoping next year is as pivotal for William as it was for Charlie. We all enjoyed this baseball season. We've had our own cheering section and Henry just can't wait until he can play. He wants to play soooo bad. Hopefully next spring he'll get to play!

Here's Charlie batting (and getting a hit):

Here's William batting (and getting a hit):

I put these pics in for my mom. This is Mary Collins with her pen and paper:

Remind you of anyone mama?

Here's Charlie playing pitcher. He's baseball ready:

Here's William fielding a ball at second base:

Here's the team:

My Charlie man:

My William man:

We had our last game tonight and the team party and trophy giving outing is taking place on Saturday. Tee ball has come and gone once again.....here's to summer vacation!

TK Skip Day

Last week was the last week of school for William. On Wednesday his class had a "skip day" where we all went bowling and to the park for lunch and to play. All the kids got those 6 lb balls and went to town. There was a big splash pad at the park and the kids had a ball playing in it. Here's William bowling:

One other mom and I got a lane for the little kids to bowl and they brought out the stand thing that you put the ball on and roll it off. Henry loved it and so did the girls. Here's Henry:

By the way, Henry bowled like a 97 or something like that! I know we had the gutter things up and the stand, but that's as good as I can bowl! The kids liked it so much I told Clayton we need to take them this summer some. I only have one pic of the girls at the park. Here they are drying off playing on the playground:

TK Graduation

William graduated from Transitional Kindergarten last week. They had a nice graduation ceremony where they sang some songs for us and performed a skit in Spanish. It was really good. Afterwards we had a luncheon and watched a slide show. Here's our big boy:

His class:

William and his teachers:

Now it's on to Kindergarten! We're so proud of you William!