Avatar. See it. 3-D.

It's magical.






That's all I have to say. I don't want to give anything away for you, so just go see it.

More crafts!

My Christmas vacation really was full of crafty projects! That was fun! It made up for all the time I didn't do crafty things last semester.

The last project was a hot pad. Greg's Mom taught me how to make it. It was kind of like a mini quilt lesson, because I learned how to make the pattern and sew the little pieces together. If I made a bunch of those squares, I could sew them all together to make a quilt. I would like to do that sometime. It would be really fun to pick out all the materials to make a quilt.


And by the way, it matches pretty well with my table cloth and the basket!

Christmas at Mom and Dad's

We had Christmas at Mom and Dad's on the 26th. Grandma and Aunt Mary came over for an early dinner around 1:30pm. Then we opened presents and had a nice time being cozy by the tree with pretty music. Then we had dessert. Mom made chocolate cake, and Dad bought cherry and lemon pie. Of course, we also had ice cream.

Later we played games at the table and on the wii. That was fun!

Christmas at the Kelley's!

On Christmas Day we were at the Kelley's. We started with a nice Christmas breakfast. Greg's mom made a quiche, Terri made cinnamon rolls and knots, and the boys made french toast, bacon, sausage, etc...It was more food than I could handle. After we had our fill of good food, we got to open presents. The rest of the day was spent napping, playing games, and getting ready for the dinner party. I made rolls, and Greg's Dad made a ham, and Mom brought potato salad. Again, there was lots of food and I didn't even get to it all. We had a good time visiting with Greg's extended family--aunts and uncles and cousins...And Mom and Dad came just in time to start dinner. It's fun to be with such a lively group of happy people!

There was also a fire outside for people to sit around and enjoy the quiet. It was so cozy and nice. After dinner and more presents, people played card games at the table, and others went upstairs to play the wii or pool. When it quieted down a little, I played the piano and Lory played her clarinet, and we all sang Christmas songs. I hope we do it again next year--that was my favorite part!

Painting with Mom and Dad!

When we visited Mom and Dad at Christmas they planned a fun day for us to be together. We went to the painting place and got to paint our own pottery. We spent about 5 hours working on our dishes! I could have worked on it another hour easily, but it was getting late and we hadn't had dinner yet. We were going to go out to Red Lobster, but since it was late we decided to order a pizza instead and play games. The pizza arrived at our house at the same time we pulled into the driveway. It was fun playing games and eating pizza.

We couldn't wait to see our stuff after it was fired. The paint looks a lot brighter and just different than before it gets the glaze, so you never know how it's going to look in the end. We painted our things on Monday and got them back Saturday night. I think they all turned out really good! And my fruit plate matches with my table cloth, kitchen rugs, towels, and potholders! Yipee!

Basket Weaving Class

For Christmas, Greg's parents gave me a basket weaving class. Greg planned with his parents and my dad so we could get the girls in the family together. Mom, Greg's Mom (Lory), Greg's sister (Teri) and two girls (Amanda and Rachel) all did the class too. It was fun to work on our baskets together, to talk and help each other. (The other lady in the background is Sherry. She is a great teacher!)

Old Plants and New Plants!

Hello
I've been fighting those stupid flies in my plants, and I think I finally beat them. I took all my plants out of their pots, thoroughly washed all the pots in the bathtub, washed all the dirt out of the plant roots, and thoroughly sprayed down all the plants in the bathtub. Then I re-potted them all with new fresh potting soil, and now they are all in one room together where the flies have never been. I'm hoping these efforts pay off! I haven't seen any flies for a few days now, so I'm thinking it might have worked!


Once I'm really sure, I will put all the plants back in the places they usually live around the house. It's kind of fun to see them all together like that though. I could arrange them and make it feel like a little jungle or forest!

This is my attempt to be creative. My friend gets baskets and arranges plants together in the baskets to look nice, so I thought I'd give a try with a few of the cacti.


These are the new plants I got the other day. There is a polka dot plant that has pink spots on it, and a snakeskin plant that shows a pretty white vein pattern on the leaf. I don't know what that other plant is but it looks cool! The leaves are actually green, but the plant looks purple because of the thick purple fuzz growing on all the surfaces. It has one large leaf sticking out with no fuzz, I'm not sure why.


I put them in a covered bowl so I can see if they are clean or if they will contaminate the other plants with bugs. I don't want to bring in more pests!

Last of all, this one was a Christmas present from Greg's mom. It's so cute! I love the little turtle pot, and the plant even has a cute name.


It's called a piggy back plant, because the new little leaves grow up from the old leaf and it looks like they're riding piggy back.


This one sits on the window sill in my kitchen and greets me every morning. Thank you Lory!

My Purse! Finally!

This year for our Girl's Weekend Wendy had the idea of making this cool purse. We all were making our own purses, taking turns on the two sewing machines and watching the babies. I ended up playing with the kids more than sewing, so I didn't finish my purse. Mom and Summer and Wendy would say, "Do you want me to just do this little part for you?" and of course I was having fun with the kids and didn't mind the help on the purse. (I like to call it the "Community Purse" because everybody worked on it. Haha!)

So I brought my purse and sewing things to Mom's so we could finish it during the Christmas break. We worked many hours on it, and it turned out great! The pattern didn't give any pockets inside, so we added extra features to make it cooler. This is one side of the inside. Mom had the idea to put elastic in the top of the pockets so they are stretchy and stay closed. I had the idea to make a separate pocket that snaps in and out easily. Mom pretty much sewed that one with the zipper part--it was really hard. She also made a nice little pocket in the front where I can slip in a chapstick. It's perfect!


This is the other side of the inside. There is a bigger zipper pocket and a place to clip my keys.


This shows how those magnetic snaps go in. I really like those! We made really strong reinforcements to keep the snaps from ripping out. It was tricky figuring out how to put it all together.


Mom did the hard parts for me. I was glad because I'm not very experienced with sewing and I didn't want to ruin my pretty purse.


Mom got this picture to show the clock. It says 1:30, and that's in the morning.


It was fun to work on my purse with Mom. She surprised me and made this nice make-up bag with the rest of the material from her purse. It's such a pretty pink (it matches the pink strip on the outside of the purse), and you can easily spot it in my purse.


Ta Da! Thank you everybody for helping me finish this purse!

Pay it Forward

This is what I got from a "Pay it Forward" post awhile ago. Thank you Mary!



The first three people to comment on this post will receive something special from me in the next year. You can send me an email with your address if I don't already have it, or leave your email.

Temple Square in Salt Lake City

Merry Christmas! This shows the lights on Temple Square. A friend sent this to me and I thought it was neat. You can click on different parts and then look all the way around as if you were standing in that spot.

Temple Square in Salt Lake City