Great Christmas ideas!

In response to my last blog entry, my dear friend Stephanie thought of some really awesome, yet inexpensive gift ideas and I wanted to share them with you! Here they are:

*Placemats, cloth napkins, or tabble runners. They are all super easy to make, and very cheap if you get the fabric at a discount home fabric place. They usually have the wider bolts of fabric, so you only need like a yard and half for 8 placemats.

*I'm making my boys personalized letters right now. I bought big 10" tall cardboard papermache letters at a craft store for $1.50 and then I am going to piant them a plain color and then paint on things that they love like tanks, helicopters, stuff like that. Or a soccer ball for nathan. Anyway, they are going to be for their trophy shelves in their room.

*It's super easy to make a nice wall hanging for someone. I print out a poem I think they would love on Velum (5x7), usually it might have some kind of nice border around it. Then I mount it on a shiny piece of cardstock/cardboard (gold, bronze, silver) that is 8x10. Then I mount that in a matted frame (11x14) It's really easy, my printer can print on velum (it's just inkjet but just make sure to let it dry for a while (like an hour) otherwise it will smudge. Or you can take it to Kinko's and they will print it for like $.10-$1.00 depending if you want color or not. And a simple way to make a cheap frame look nicer, especially like a $1 store or a wal-mart cheapy is to get one that is a really plain solid color and just sand the very edge, so the wood grain show through. You could easily do this project for under $5 and it is personalized for the person you love.

*My kids love soap that is personalized. You can melt regular soap in the microwave and then pour it into a mold and put a little Mc Donald's toy or action figure half way into it. Or you can buy the soap and mold plain from a craft store and put a few drops of fragrance oils in it too. I have a kit for this from a lady I used to live by in utah. But she even had little confettis and curliey-q's that we would put into clear soap. It's not a big deal kind of present but it makes a fun stocking stuffer or something fun for your kids to give to a friend. You can experiemtn with different colors and do layered ones too, all you have to do is let each layer cool in the fridge before you pour a different color.

*Ken loves a blanket I made for us one of our very first Christmas. I hate to put it on my bed now because it doesn't match the colors, but I'm thinking of doing another one. In fabric paint I painted on (it looks like embroidery) a 3 line poem about him feeling love in my arms or something like that. I can look at it if you want and get it exactly. But he has absolutely loved that blanket. I should really make another one.

*My kids love fun pillowcases, and blankets too. But a new pillowcase that reflects what they are into at the moment is super easy. They don't care if it doesn't match their bedding at the moment.

*Dress up clothes for stuffed animals is always fun. I'm going to be doing that for Rose this year.

*Things with pictures is really nice. Like photo albums, or a photo collage. Or even cute ways to display souvenirs. Ken really really loves things like that, that remind us of stuff we did as a family or as a couple. He just likes to see things in our home that will remind him of good times because he is usually pretty focused but whenever he see it then he smiles or tells me about it. Like I just bought a $1 hurricane glass jar and put sand and shells from our Anniversary trip that we collected. That was pretty much our only souvenir from our whole trip, other then pictures. Or I put together a photo album that is only pictures of us and there is a cutout in the front that has a picture of us too, so that sits on top of our entertainment armoire in our room.

*The boys love having just a huge basket and put all sorts of stuff to organize things that are special to them. Like a binder and plastic sleaves for all their pokemon cards (you buy the sleeves by page protectors and they are way cheap). A plastic container for special lego builds. They really like it when I get them something that protects things that are special to them and helps them preserve it too. Like putting their Pinewood Derby Cars in a small plastic case (you buy it at a craft store).

I would STILL love to hear what else you all come up with, so keep the ideas roll'n!

What are you doing for Christmas this year???

I was totally inspired when I went to Utah this last week. My friend Brooke has such a cute house and she and her husband are just so clever about using what they have to make other things. Her baby's room was adorable! It looked like something out of Pottery Barn and they put it together using their old things. They mainly took apart their old entertainment center and got REALLY creative!
I got to thinking about Christmas coming up and how I'd like to save some money and get creative too! I thought long and hard about what I could make and I came up with this diaper bag for my girls. I had almost everything to make this already so it was VERY inexpensive. I made the diaper bag, the Velcro diapers (recognize the fabric from the aprons?),the blanket, and the cloth diaper wipes (in my old wipe container), and then I bought the bottle and got an old baby toy to put in. What a great present for so cheap!
SO NOW I AM ASKING YOU ALL TO GET CREATIVE. I want to hear all your ideas of what we could do for cheap presents this year. It can be for kids, parents, spouses, grandparents, whatever! I can't wait to see what you all come up with!

One more idea I had was to make super hero capes for boys. It would be so easy and I know Preston would LOVE it!




I also added another post under this one check it out!

Funny

I let Alise take a nap one day on the couch in my room. . . or so I thought. I had to laugh when I walked in to check on her and found her sound asleep on top of my laundry basket. It looks totally uncomfortable to me, but she slept so good. I love what kids come up with!

Mormon Tabernacle Choir

I thought you might want to hear their beautiful music. It was so neat to see the Motab Choir live! Also scroll down and check out the pictures from our Utah trip.

We're Back!

Gregg and I had such a GREAT time in Utah! Here is what we did:

* Saw the Joseph Smith movie
* Had lunch in the Nauvoo cafe
* Took a tour of Brigham Young's house (the Beehive house)
* Toured the Church History Museum
* Toured the Conference Center
* Shopped at Distribution
* Watched the Mo-tab choir rehearse
* Sat in the Hotel spa with Gregg
* Got up early and worked out in the gym with Gregg (at the hotel)
* Did a live session in the Salt Lake temple
* Went to "This is the Place" took a tour and explored there.
* Visited our friends Brooke and Kenny
* Went to dinner with them at Applebee's
* Had a few bowling competitions on the Wii (with Brooke and Kenny)

I might have missed something in there, but this is basically what we did. We had such a good time going places alone! Gregg a and I were able to just talk and pay attention to each other. Usually we are just so busy with kids and the flow of life that sometimes we don't have that one on one time like we used to. I loved it and I think that we wont wait another 10 years to do it again!
Brooke and Kenny thanks for the good times. I know we only had one night with you, but it was SO FUN! We laughed so much! At dinner that night we had this waitress that obviously hated her job but she was trying so hard to act nice. She would stand over our shoulder when we were still deciding what we wanted to eat, she had a fake smile and seemed annoyed when she messed up on our order (which she didn't even write down in the first place)! She was horrible! We had some good laughs about it and we joked about not leaving a tip. Finally in the end we were all very generous and gave her a very UNDESERVED tip. She was Great entertainment though! We loved our trip but we're glad to be back with our kids. I really did miss them! Here are some shots we took around Salt Lake (we didn't get any of Brooke and Kenny and their baby because we were just to busy to remember) :0(

Can you believe it's been 10 years????

Okay, it's finally here! Gregg and I will celebrate our 10 year anniversary this Wednesday! Actually we aren't celebrating on Wednesday at all, instead we are getting up on Thursday (September 11th) bright and early and we are heading for Utah without our kids! We are staying there until Saturday. I am so excited to finally go somewhere by OURSELVES!!! We have never done this before so I am actually having a hard time already just thinking of leaving Maleah behind. I know this is normal for a mom to worry about leaving her baby, but Gregg is right there with me! He already said, “should we just take her? One is SO much easier than 4." You know I almost went for it, but then I thought about it and there is NO way I am going to share my anniversary with someone extra. . .even if she is so cute and can melt my heart. We are finally after 10 years, going somewhere alone! We plan to visit all the church sites that we've never had the chance to really see before because the kids were always so ready to leave. We are also going to see some of our best friends in the whole world Brooke and Kenny Favero (our old neighbors in California). It's going to be great! I guess I will try to post something about our trip when we return.

My little Ladies

Alise and Maleah wanted me to take pictures of them (they love the all attention). This is a couple Sundays ago, after church.

Preston LOVES preschool!

Preston thinks he is So big now that he goes to school too. On his first day he sat down right away and started the project on the table (that's what they do when they wait for the other kids to arrive). I told him good bye as he was working and he didn't even turn around, he just said," Bye" and then kept doing his project. He has been in school now for a week, he goes Tuesday and Thursady mornings. He asks me every night if he has school the next day or not. When I say yes, he is SO excited and gets ready as soon as he hops out of bed the next day (usually at least 2 1/2 hours early). I am so proud of my little guy! Here on some school shots.

Tired of Pink

I wanted to change the background of my blog but pink is just NOT working for me! I cringe every time I go to this page. It's cute and all but it's to little girly for me (Alise is the one who picked it out with me). So I am changing it today! what do you think of my new one?