Crafter's Block

My blog posts have been few and far between lately. I seem to be procrastinating about crafting. What the heck?!? I am observing, partly due to the lack of posts on this blog, that whenever I find some free time I come up with something else that "has to get done" before I craft; Stuff like organizing all of my daughter's hair gizmos (rubber bands, barrettes, etc.), cleaning out desk drawers, file cabinets, and closets. I usually don't get the urge to do these things. Ever.

Today I actually crafted some things to necessitate a post. The card above is for a swap I am in that I turned in a day late but nevertheless did finish. We were given the owl stamped in black. I am looking forward to seeing what the other girls in the swap did with this guy.

I didn't feel like putting the paper, stamps, and inks away just yet so I made this card for a relative whose b-day is coming up soon.

My friend Dawn put one of my cupcake pincushions in a cupcake swap that she is in this month. I had the cupcake close to being done (as shown in this post) but she needed to finish it off with some embellishments which I never got around to doing (shocker). I am looking forward to seeing what she did with it because she is super crafty. I love cupcakes. The theme for the card swap in September is cupcakes too!

Talent Show No. 1

Lydia decided to put together a talent show. She recruited her dad and her cousin Laurel to perform. Lydia has planned another talent show for this coming Tuesday and I am a part of the show this time as well! I will be doing card making.

7th Birthday Celebrations

Well it's been more than two weeks since we celebrated Lydia's 7th birthday but when thinking about a crafty project to post, her birthday cake was the most recent thing I could think of that I have "crafted"! That is pathetic! I am going through a very long crafty dry spell.
Lydia and her friends enjoyed the birthday party very much. One of the games we played was a scavenger hunt. I took pictures of 12 items. I cut each of the pictures up and put each in a sealed envelope. The girls had to put the pictures together like a puzzle to discover the object they needed to find. Once they found the first item, they were given their next "clue", and so on. I split the girls up into two teams. The first team to find all of their 6 clues "won". This game was a huge hit with the girls and Ken and I had just as much fun watching them.

Back from Vacation

After talking about my "little monkey" in my last post, I thought this picture from our vacation to Bayfield/Madeline Island was fitting. The monkey on the left is a good friend of Lydia's who came along with us on our trip. We ran into the middle one at the Monkey Business store by the ferry dock in Bayfield.
I picked up a lot of this vintage fabric at a garage sale we stopped at on our way home. I LOVE it and I am itching to make something out of it!

American Girl Dress & Hat

Here's the American Girl outfit I mentioned yesterday. I think it may have taken me longer to make the hat than it did the dress. Now that I did it once though, I think the second would go quicker. Lydia loves the outfit and it's gotten her interested in her doll again. Ken mentioned yesterday he thought it was pretty cute to watch Lydia walking her American Girl in the stroller up and down the road along with Zoe (our Samoyed) wearing her matching bandana.

We went to the fireworks last night. We got about 2 blocks from where we parked when Lydia realized the hat wasn't on her doll any longer. She looked at me panicked and then asked if I could make another one. I had to smile and I laughed to myself because it took me 4 or 5 hours to make that hat, I wasn't going to let it go that easily! I walked back the way we came and found the hat a few feet from our SUV. Phew!

One more quick story. After I got home from biking to the pharmacy for some medication yesterday, the neighbor stopped by to ask me if I need drugs. He followed that by telling me that Lydia told him "my mom needs drugs". He replied to her, "oh really?" She then told him "my mom needs birth control pills because we already have one monkey and we don't need anymore monkeys running around". If you know my husband you know where she got this from. Sounds just like him. I had a good laugh from it.

Happy 4th of July Bandanas

I ran across this fabric that I found in my mom's craft stash when we cleaned out her craft room a few years ago. I decided it would make great bandana's for the dogs to get them in the festive spirit of the 4th of July. I decided I wanted to use all of the fabric up so I made a pillow case for a doll pillow of Lydia's and then I still had some of the fabric left after that so I made a dress for Lydia's American Girl doll. I plan to make a matching hat for her doll today so I will post a picture of the rest after I finish the hat today.

By the way, Scout is doing much better since he started his medication!

First Pillowcase Project

Lydia and I attended a sewing class together today. With a little help from mom she made this really cute pillowcase. She learned how to sew straight lines and how to press seams. Great job Lydia! I hope you will sew with me more often.

The Old Man

We've had Scout since he was 10 weeks old and he'll be 13 years old on October 5. He's really never been a very loving dog, just not the shnuggly type, but there is something about him that makes US love HIM quite a lot. He almost didn't make it to 8. We found out he had emphysema so bad that portions of his lungs had to be removed to save his life. Lately, he has really slowed down. He uses the house for a bathroom. He has also lost his hearing and about 10 pounds of muscle. We can tell he is really achy too. We took him to the doctor today and learned he has a tick born infection (curable) which is causing some of his pain, that and arthritis. We have started him on arthritis medication and an antibiotic. We're hoping the fact that he has been achy is what has caused the bathroom problem and it's not that he has started to lose his training. Time will tell. The arthritis meds should help him to be comfortable and as long as he is comfortable we won't have to say good-bye yet.

7th Birthday

This is the invitation Lydia designed for her 7th birthday party. We will be on Madeline Island for her actual birthday so we will have a party with her friends the weekend after we get home. She got her birthday present early (below) so we could take it with us on vacation.

Lake Dalton Burgle-ation

Ken and I took a motorcycle ride down to Lake Dalton in the Wisconsin Dells last Sunday to see the results of the flooding for ourselves. I have more pictures of what we saw posted in my web gallery.