Work In Progress Monday

The last half of last week was occupied by a sick little one and lots of snuggling on the sofa watching movies and reading.  Thankfully Little Miss pulled through and was well enough on Saturday for the two shows that she was in at the studio.  :)

Since her and I were both sick and took the better half of last week and this weekend to heal up I didn't get to do as much crafting as I wanted to.  I have a list on my clipboard of all the things I "must" do and I just can't wait to get back into it. Hopefully on Wed. I will have some free time in the afternoon to work on a project or two. :)

One of the great things about snuggling and spending the days on the sofa or in bed, was that I got to work on some crochet projects off and on.  So today I am going to share the two projects I started and am hoping to work on this week a bit too.  One will def. be finished this week.....the other.....it might be Christmas before I have it done lol

This first project comes with a little story.  My daughter's cat loves to be near her...she follows her around like a little puppy dog and always wants to lay on her desk while she is working on her school work.  It drives her bonkers because the cat is always messing with her paper or trying to steal her pencil out of her hand while she is working.  We decided to put a shelf above her desk for the cat to lay on so that she can be close to my daughter but also out of the way.  That way its a win win for the both of them.  Thankfully, the cat loves it up there.  I wanted to make it more cozy and also protect my shelf so I am making a shelf cover.  The cover will cover all of one side and then it will button with straps to keep it on the shelf so that the cat can't push it down on top of my daughter while she is working.  Total light bulb moment for me when I thought of that idea :)  I will do a tutorial on how to make this as soon as its done.  All I need to do for this is to make the straps, sew on the buttons, and weave in the ends.  I put it up there this weekend and it already got the kitty seal of approval. ;)

This project will be a blanket for my daughter. I am doing a granny stripes pattern and its coming along nicely.  I love the softness of the yarn and the colors too.  It works up easy but I have a feeling it will take forever. lol  I tend to get bored with these kinds of projects where its the same thing over and over again but I promised my daughter I would work on it at least one day a week so that hopefully by mid summer it will be finished and all set and ready to go before the fall / winter season comes around.

What are you working on right now?  Lately I have had Christmas present ideas and Mother's Day ideas on my brain. I think this year I am going to start working on my Christmas presents in the beginning of March.  That way I have plenty of time to make lots of homemade goodies for all the special people in my life.  :)

Hope everyone had a great Monday! 

Here's a shot of my daughter before she went out with her group and they did their dance this past weekend. 

Falling for Fall {Thankful For Project}

I absolutely love making things for my daughter and doing projects with her.  But I also love watching her craft and create on her own as well.  Now that the leaves are changing I had this urge to do some fall decorations that were handmade {mainly kid made :)}.  Kid made decorations just make me smile.  So I went online and searched for leaf templates that I could print out for free. 

 I found this one:  http://images.marthastewart.com/images/content/web/pdfs/pdf3/tvs8651_corkleafcoaster.pdf

by Martha.  

I liked this one because there were different shapes of  leaves and it also told what tree each leaf came from so it became an art and science lesson in one.  Love it when that happens! :)  You can print that template off bigger if you want, Victoria wanted small baby leaves so we kept the print size smaller.  After you print them out have your little one cut out the template pieces and then trace them as many times as they want on colored construction paper.  Victoria wanted to do so many that I did help her in the tracing of them so it went a little smoother for her. ;)

So we wouldn't forget what leaves came from what trees she went ahead and wrote the names on the back. I am thinking about doing a science project where we take these trees and sketch them out in our science journal and find out where they are commonly found.  Victoria loves things that are nature and tree related. 

After tracing a million  okay 30 or so Victoria cut them out and then wrote all the things she was thankful for this year.  She had so much to write that she actually cut out a few more leaves.  Super cute!

 We started to tape them out around her home school desk area so she could see them while she did her work but then we thought we better not put too many .....the kitty monster has been known to come in the night and tear things down off the wall.

 Flopsina guarding my daughter's art :)

 So we took the rest and Victoria stuck them up high enough on the wall so that the kitty monster can't get to them in the night.

Now whenever we walk in from being gone, we walk by and see all the things our little girl is thankful for and it makes us smile.  :)

15 Days of Thankful Project

While we try and teach our daughter to think of things she is thankful for and happy about in her life often, November always is a reflection period for us as well.  I love to save the things that she writes that she is thankful for each year....even though she is only 8 right now things that she wrote about two years ago have changed slightly and they just keep getting cuter by the year. :)

I love the Thankful For trees that I see all over blogs these days and would love to make one.  But the kitty monster in our house has other plans. :O  lol

I wanted something that would be small and easy to store from year to year...also something that could be personalized as well.  So taking from that and some inspiration from my husband's grandmother's tradition this idea was created. :)

I gave my daughter a regular sized envelope and had her decorate it with a family photo drawing.  She also added in one of her favorite stamps of mine and some cute hearts. :)  I love the fact that she always gives herself heels ....so cute!

Each day we will each put in one card with one thing we are thankful for written on it.  We are officially starting this on the 9th but I thought I would share this cute and easy idea before the 15 days started.

I love this idea because it is not only is a drawing keepsake for my daughter but an cute and easy way to store our thankful cards each year.  Since I keep school samples each year in a file folder I just slip this envelope into that year.  I'm looking forward to the time when Sierra is older and I have 10 years of these envelopes with her drawings and our thankful thoughts each year to look back on.  It is going to be so sweet. :)

I love traditions that are fun, easy, and simple to do.  :)