Quiet book addition

With Gary off hunting I have spent more time in the studio than I normally would. However, recently it's been my sewing room. So here are pictures of the quiet book. These pages are at least 3 or 4 years old. I made them with the idea of longevity, so far things have held up really well and have been well enjoyed.
Front cover (the kids LOVE the clip) my oldest grafittied on the top corner

Pedigree page, pics come in and out of clear plastic pockets and can be stored in the red envelope. The pockets have the individual's names underneath that you can see when the pic isn't in it.

A pocket for the shapes and velcrow places to put them.

Pick the apples and put them in the basket

Lace and tie the shoes

Braid or play with the leather hair, also black ribbon to tie bows

Lift the flaps page with Noah's Ark, I used specialty buttons for the animals and the rainbow (under the cloud)

And here are the NEW pages I mostly completed and added to the book tonight. "Mostly," because I still can't find the bag of stuff I need to laminate. So I did what I could without them. Because of that I changed my idea of what to do with some of the pages.
I ended up doing a Jonah and the whale page. It still needs the right verbiage on the page.

A weaving page, where you weave the strips to make the bed, the pillows are positionable too. My Olea loves patterns so I thought this one would be a fun challenge for her.

Mailbox missing the flag (laminated piece) with two pencil slots, the pink envelope holds paper

Hickory Dickory Dock Clock page. The hands move over a thick clear piece of plastic (the kind people use to protect their wood tables). The pendulum was an afterthought to make it with my jewelry stuff to add a different feel and interest. Mouse and attached ribbon can be stored in the pocket at the base of the clock.

Cut it

Today we had to pick up our county fair stuff, so I tried to coordinate a visit to Aunt Kendra at the Paul Mitchell school so Olea and I could get hair cuts. Thankfully it worked out. I just got a trim since I haven't had anything since I last cut it back in, oh gosh.... um December of 08, wow, that's embarrassing.

Olea had decided that she wanted hers long so it could be like "Hannah Montanah" hair. So we went in under that assumption. Kendra comes to me (I was up front with the babies) and says, "Um, she wants it short." I was totally good with this since Olea and I have major fights over brushing her hair, and I don't want to worry about that for school. I said, "Ya, just do what she wants." (Wooo what liberties I am giving a six year old!) Apparently, she saw a lil gal across from her with a similar cut and decided it was awesome.
The process


Thank goodness for suckers!


BEFORE AFTER

Ohh that Kendra is good! Thanks so much Kendra, and thanks for the suckers, the babies might not have survived. :)

And we got home in time to show the MovingVan estimator around the house. Go to Meet the Teacher, and a neighborhood bbq, and I got to go running. A successful day.

Son, this is becoming a problem

Zurich will help himself to my make-up and then come find me, "I pretty, Mom?"
to which I usually reply, "Son, boys aren't supposed to wear makeup."
How old fashioned of me right?

He needs to see his Father get ready in the morning more huh? However, the fact that he already wakes up at 7 or so is bad enough I don't want him getting up at 5:30 just so he can see how men get ready.

Quiet book

Back in the day I made a quiet book for my first baby. I made it with expansion in mind. It currently has a pedigree chart type page where they insert pictures of ancestors in little plastic pockets. A girl whose hair you can braid (leather strips for hair), shoes to lace and tie, a flap lift page with Noah's ark, and a shape matching page, and an apple tree picking page with a bucket pocket. The kids love it. Over the years I have had ideas for more pages, but haven't gotten around to it.

But the other day I started working on an expansion page for the quiet book, because I had an urge.
I find that my fabric markers I had have all dried out. I guess it has been three years or more. grrr

Olea requested a mailbox page. Other than the flag on the box the rest of the page is sewn.
And with Olea who will soon need to learn time, and Zurich who loves clocks in mind, I made a clock page. Feeling all smart about how it turned out, except for the verbiage (because of the marker situation).

I need to find the pieces I pre-made, but haven't yet laminated. I can't so far. I have plans for a Golden plates page and a closures page. I also need to print out new pictures for the pedigree and get them laminated, since we have two more children since I first made it. Olea's picture could also use an update.

I should probably share pictures, but I need to go feed children now.

So instead, I will share what I did take pictures of: what the two older kids did while I worked on said quiet book page.

Painting.

The realization that Zurich is old enough to do this without it being a major stress to me is very exciting. He painted his train (left over from conference weekend) and then I pulled out a mini canvas, that I had plans for... but needed something else for him to paint (his other trains were in the room with the sleeping baby). His end result over two days painting on the same canvas is pretty cool. Zurich's on the left, Olea's on the right.


Then Zurich's black one, which we will let him work on some more, and Olea's bumblebee (the canvases had pre-drawn images on them, Olea chose to follow hers. The painting below is one that Olea painted, that was pretty cool, then she painted on it again, and I was kinda disappointed because she over did it, she should have let me know she needed a new canvas. I need to buy more canvases.

How can I get so stressed with finger paints, but acrylic paints are not such a big deal? weird.

County Fair

I had been warned. However, I was still shocked at the size of it. It was TINY. It was like an 1/8th of the county fair I grew up with.

With all that has been going on I wasn't very prepared. But Olea had her painting from the Freedom Fest all framed and ready to go so I took that down and some photos and tatting I had.
Apparently, I'm not a great photographer (knew that) but I'm good at Tatting and Olea is a fab painter (knew that :) ).
So Monday we get to go pick up our prize money and ribbons. Fun.

Kiddies liked the small selection of animals too. Nev would say "woah" at every new pig pen and she really wanted the bunnies and guinea pigs.

Last night was dollar night, so all rides were just one ticket, "just one" dollar. It worked out since any more and it wouldn't have been worth it. The kids all had a good time, the weather was kinda crappy, but there were no lines so that is always nice. :)

Milk wars

I laughed so hard. Parenting is hilarious. For the record it was the little gal's cup. Zurich gets devastated so easily lately.

Gary's first directed post

I was reading blogs tonight. Since I haven't been on the computer very much at all since the appy. Gary said, "here is something that you need to put on the blog," and read me this quote from the book he is reading. 

"Before you criticize someone you should walk a mile in their shoes. Then when you start criticizing him you are a mile away and he's got to run after you in his socks." Lee Child Gone Tomorrow.

It made me laugh, and it made sense so I grant his wish.

Mutilated Monkey bread

I had a loaf of Monkey bread defrosting on the counter to give to a friend. Came downstairs after putting Nev down for her morning nap and found that Zurich had tried to cut into it. Thus mutilating the top of the bread, rendering it only edible to us. So I now add making bread to the day's TO DO's.

The kid said he was done eating. So why did he feel the need to eat the bread right after breakfast?

Tie-Dye

This weekend we had Grandparents here and we made tie-dye t-shirts. I did mine and Nev's last so we had lots of dye left. For interest sake, 100 percent cotton shirts turned out the brightest. It takes 24 hours for them to cure so we took pictures of them today to send to Grandma so she could see how they turned out.

Olea told Gary how to pose in this one.

Outing with Olea

Olea earned an outing with Mom this past month. I had my reservations about how it would go since we've been on rocky terms for the last while. I have been irritated with her lack of gratitude as of late and her disrespect for others. However, this was something we both really needed for our relationship so we went.

We went to Mimi's Cafe for Dinner. Olea was excited about the bathroom sinks being gold. And she liked drinking her rootbeer and Strawberry smoothie together.


She had earned a free book from Barnes and Noble for reading 8 books. It was a huge struggle to get her to read 8 books. Her interest in reading (and I'd say her reading level) has significantly decreased in the last months since school let out. So with that considered we looked at the selection she had, I read her all the titles and she chose a book. I let her sit and look at a few books in the children's section before we rushed out to our next appt. She was enthralled with a book called Castles and Knights. As we left I was emotional (because I just am) that we had finally earned that book, accomplished a goal, worked at it together, and there was some tangible reward for her.

Afterward we drove to Color me Mine and Olea deliberated for a long time about which ceramic to choose. She finally settled on a Belle Princess bank and I choose a spoon rest. I was quite a way through painting mine and looked over at Olea who had been diligently painting away but who had made very little progress. She was using a TINY brush. So I cajoled her into using a bigger brush and we started making progress. I helped her do her multiple layers of glaze, and lift off places she accidentally put paint. She wanted to do the lips but asked me to help her with the eyes. She did a lovely job and really wanted to take it home but I told her we needed to leave them there so they could make it shiny.



We did actually remember to pick them up and it was such a fun thing I realized I needed to use my kiln. Just get busy and learn it. So this weekend while picking up Olea's Art I and my Mother in law went to Patty's Ceramics and picked up some things to paint and test the kiln and get things started. I was so impressed with how helpful and informative they were. Patty answered questions and gave me a test cone and I got mini kiln 101 lesson. Having my mom there was really great since she asked questions I didn't know to ask and the company was nice, since it was a lot of driving in a hot no ac car. It was very fulfilling and I am excited to give the kiln a test fire and then break out the paints and let the kids do something. I also stopped by Heindselman's to pick up Tatting thread and was thrilled that they have expanded their selection of Tatting supplies. I had to really rein myself in. Even I find it silly how excited I get about thread now days. :)

Olea and I had a good outing and it solidified in my mind that this is a phase we are working through. I need to make more effort on my part to acknowledge the good she is and lift my eyebrows and smile at her more. She is a fabulous, good, talented little girl and just needs more time one on one with Mommy. It is hard to do that with other little children who make messes of the things Olea and I like to do together but I am the only one who can provide her that.