Crafty Genius: August 2011

Monday, August 29, 2011

Crazy in a Good Way

This is going to be a very quickly written blog entry. I'm trying to write more often, so of course, my blog entries are more sparse. Go figure. This is a busy day in a busy week. Tad left Saturday afternoon to return to Rock Springs. He will spend the next couple of days driving, and once he gets to 700 miles, he can take his CDL test. Today is the last day of summer vacation. Hailey starts school tomorrow. She is madly reading the last 6-7 chapters of "The Count of Monte Cristo" by Dumas. The school assigned a summer reading project for the entire sophomore class, with chapter summaries due on the first day of class. She's been working like a fiend trying to read the chapters and write the summaries. We've taken her shopping for school clothes and supplies, we've downloaded school bus route info and she's ready to go.

I'm trying to copy a pattern to make baby clothes, but ran out of paper, so I'll have to get some this afternoon. I also need to make 2 birthday cards as well as a thank you card, plus some cookies to go with the thank you card. We're going to the visitor's center for FHE this afternoon, and when we get home we will be making invitations for Hailey's birthday party so she can take them to school tomorrow to hand out to her friends.

I spent yesterday afternoon working on my "Scrapbook about Me" which is my personal progress project for the Individual Worth value. I'm 7 hours into it, and still have plenty to go, so I'll meet my time requirement.

Tomorrow I want to sew an apron I've had the fabric for, so that's probably what I'll do after I get Hailey out the door. My sister, Cheryl, will probably also call one of these days to go shopping. We've been jonesing to get the kids into school and the hay out of the fields so we can go. Depending on whichever day we go shopping I will also be doing 2 weeks worth of laundry and finishing the SB about me. There's a birthday to plan for this week in which my baby turns 16, and getting a jump on paying September's bills.

I know there's more, and I still have to take pix of all the projects I've done in the last month so I can blog them properly. Busy, Busy, Busy. I've determined that life just gets crazier once school starts. Crazy in a good way.

Friday, August 19, 2011

Random Friday Night

My sweetie was supposed to be flying home tonight, but his flight got switched at the absolute last SECOND, and so he'll be here tomorrow. I thought I'd fill some of the waiting time by writing a blog entry. I know, I know, don't all pass out from shock. I know it's been a while. I've been busy. I've been doing things that I wanted to post about here. I'm just behind on taking pix. Here's a sampling of the last 2 weeks:

My sweet babboo in his work coveralls and hard hat

My pile of birthday presents (wrapped and unwrapped)

Hailey gave me the "Reflections of Christ" and "Reflections of Christ--Another Testament" books by Mark Mabry, Scott gave me the tall letter A and Tad gave me the Crocs and Our Best Bites cookbooks. Thanks, everybody!

Cute things for a cute, tiny girl

The fabric is Jungle Babies by Fabric Traditions, purchased at JoAnn Fabric. Small bibs are Jungle Babies Flannel, also from JoAnn Fabric. Bias on both sets of bibs is Wrights.

I promise there are more things to post. I just need to take more pix. Hopefully I'll have a chance to do that this weekend.

Saturday, August 6, 2011

Fruits of our Labors 2011

I know I posted last fall about our little raspberry patch, and how well it had started to grow. It's July/August now, and we've been getting raspberries. Not tons, just a couple of handsful. But at least it's not October. Late July and early August are supposed to be raspberry season. It's normal. It's what people who actually grow raspberries expect.

My parents have a rather sizable raspberry patch in their garden. Every year they get a very good harvest, and every year they threaten to downsize. In their defense, I think they actually DO thin out and remove a large portion of their patch. Raspberries grow back every year. Every year, mom and dad get overwhelmed by their harvest. When they've eaten and baked and canned and frozen and jammed as many of their raspberries as they can stand, they start offering the pickings to friends and family. I am family. Mom called last week and offered me a picking. I wasn't able to take advantage of it then, because Tad and Scott were on their way home, I had things to do and Hailey had things to do. I mentioned that we could maybe come later THIS week and pick. We scheduled Friday morning, but the weather, other pickers and other events compelled us to go on Thursday. It actually worked out to be the best day. I wished that I'd had my camera with me, but didn't take it, so I don't have pix of us actually in the berry patch. This is our harvest, though. For one day. One hour's work.

That's a LOT of berries. It might not look like a lot, but those are all of my biggest bowls. I have to say right now that Jessie LOVES raspberries, but she is now 4 states away. Scott HATES raspberries, which is why we didn't go earlier in the week. I thought it would be an insult to him to make him help pick on one of his very limited days at home, especially when he doesn't like them. Hailey CLAIMS to not like raspberries, but we dragged her out to the berry patch anyway. She's a teenager. She lives at home. She's cheap labor. (I actually caught her eating a few berries. Mmm Hmmm.) Tad also LOVES raspberries. He's the biggest reason I agreed to go pick at Mom and Dad's. They brought him 2 bowls (big bowls) of berries for his birthday last week. We ate most of one. The other got incorporated into the above mentioned bowls of fruit. I also LOVE raspberries, but this is still a LOT of berries.

Berries need to be processed fairly quickly. I knew we couldn't put them off for more than a day. This, then, is how we spent our Friday afternoon.