My New Year

Gosh!!! It's been a LONG while since I've posted anything.  Not that I haven't had any projects going on, just haven't felt like posting anything, well, okay, I haven't had time!!

A lot has happened since I've been away.  For one, winter never showed her beautiful face.  But, we did get one fantastic snow, 6 to 7 inches in our back yard,

 but it was basically gone the next day--back into the 40's and sunny.  Sigh.

Went to the Cayman Islands,

 which was right after I learned to CROCHET!!!!  YAY!!!  I'm hooked!!  Pun intended!!  Hooked, hooked, hooked!! Certifiable hooker here!!!  Yup!!  Here are all my dishrags...

They go from worse to better!!

My first baby blanket!!!

The one I deemed good enough to give to my granny!!

My second hat...  HUGE!!!  I see a  pattern here...

My first hat...  Turned out way too big!  Hence the reason it's on me!!

FINALLY!!!  The perfect finish!  Fit my Allie!!  yaya!

Then my cousin wanted me to make one for her daughter...

That was a proud moment...  To see my creation so well loved.  She didn't take it off!!

Then we went to New Orleans for the FINAL 4 baybay!!!  GO C.A.T.S. Cats, Cats, Cats!!!

The view from our room.

Me and the hubs before the UK vs UL game.  My stomach was in KNOTS!!!

On our way to the championship game.  UK vs Kansas...
Was a MESS!!!!

Now I understand Katrina and the whole below sea level issue.

BUT.....

WE WON!!!!  Whoop-whoooooo!!!

In the mood for...

WINTER!!!!!!

Okay, and some love!!

It's been such a crazy winter season here in good ol' KY, as well as most of the continental US.  At least Alaska is getting some snow, or ALL of the snow!!  (lucky ducks)  I mean really, can us snow lovers catch a little break?!?!  Our winter so far has been mild, which has totally, and I  mean totally messed with my body.  Every spring, like clockwork, I get sick.  Starting mid-April and lasting about 2 weeks, I'm down with sinus infections and all the fun that goes with it.  I had to go on a Z-pac to get through our wedding (going on 10 years!!  Wow!!).  So, why am I going through all this now?  THE UPS and DOWNS of this SPRING like WEATHER!!!!!  It's nuts.  Seriously, the zombies are coming my friends!!  Haha!

Okay, so onto the LOVE!!  Here's a little secret...  I've never, EVER, liked Valentines Day.  Always hated it in fact.  Well, except maybe when I was a child.  Mom would always get us a little chocolate heart and a cute little stuffed animal.  And then the picking and signing of just the right valentine to give to your BFF's, your teacher, and your secret crush.  Oh pitter-patter of the child's heart!  But then enter into the teen/high school years.  That's when my hate, and yes, it was total hate for "V-day" came in to play.  Each and EVERY year I got to see all the beautiful girls in my classes get the Whatever-they-were-called-Grams, and I'm talking these girls got a ton of them.  It was like, okay, just stab the rest of us in the heart a little bit more. Each. And. Every. Class.  SEVEN CLASSES, SEVEN times to feel like the loser that I was!!!!  Oh but wait, it got better!!!!  At the end of the day, they would all get called to the office to come and collect their Valentine bouquets (usually from their parents and or if you were one of the super-duper girls, you got them from your boyfriends too).  Do I sound bitter?!?!  Ha!!  Heck yea!!!  I was so jealous and every year I felt just a little bit more loser'ish.  I so hope they don't do that stuff today.  But, I'm sure they do.  I'm sure I'll get to go through the hurt and pain all again with my daughter.  *sigh*  Not looking forward to my babies growing up.

ANYWAY, I regress...

Onto the LOVE!!!

As an adult, I LOVE VALENTINES DAY!!!!!!  I finally have every reason to love the day!!  I have the love and respect from a funny, sweet, and totally amazing Valentine all rolled into one sexy, amazing package!!!  Then, one, by one, by one,  we were blessed with three little funny Valentines!!!

My love, my best friend

Always leading us the right way

Nothing like watching a big strong man with  a baby

MY MAN (hear Rachel from BB here) and our oldest offspring.

Us with our latest funny valentine

 Okay, okay, okay...  Enough pictures already and on to my project du jour:

GAUDY VALENTINE WREATHS!!!!

(At least that's what Kris called them!!)

One of my final products!!

Up close with the KISS

Someone took a bite out of my LOVE

Here's the set-up:

FINALLY, after searching every closet in this house, I came up with two matching wire coat hangers.  I'm a plastic kind of gal.

2 wire hangers made into circles, one roll of deco mesh
and one Lucy!!

I used 2 sizes of cookie cutters to make my "candy hearts" (oh how I think those candy heart are disgusting. makes my teeth hurt when I think about eating them!! Ugh!!)  

I mistakenly "hoped" that the cutters would slice right through the styrofoam.  YEA RIGHT!!!!  ha.  But, they did make a good imprint, with plenty of brute force, to cut them out.  

Used a little hand saw for the first one....

Then, I remembered!!!  My Pops gave me his band saw for Christmas!!!!  Que the chorus of angels!!!  

AAAHHHHHH!!!!!

Yes my friends, the saw works on styrofoam too!!!!  (Hope Pops never hears of this tho!!!)

Cuttin' the foam

candy 2 down in  seconds!!!

Allie girl helping me paint our 'candies"

Logan thought they were marshmallows!!  

I used the ABC stamps my wonderful Mimi passed to me.  I thought they made the 'candies' look authentic! Well, as much as painted Styrofoam candies can authentically look.  But you know what I mean!!!

 So, if anyone out there in blog land ever wants to try this, make sure you hang your wreaths BEFORE hot gluing your hearts, or stars, or whatever you choose to decorate your bad boys with.  I got some hearts hanging low.  Poor little fellas!!!

Glue Gun Christmas Tree

Okay, one last idea that I had to do. I got this when I did another tree using a similar technique. Don't know if I posted a pic if that. I'll have to check. Anywho, here's what I started with:

A poster board cone glued to a solo cup. Blue solo cup!!

I now have a hand cramp, but I only used 3 1/2 glue sticks.

Prime. I always prime. I'm a primer freak.

Decided to roll with gold. Silver and gold, silver and gold, la-da-da.. Don't really know the song!!

I did two coats, but after getting it inside, I think three would have been better. Whatev. I'll probably change the color next year anyway.

Up on the mantle.

Wire coat hanger Christmas Tree

Lazy day today. But this is an idea that's been floating around in the ol' noggin. Think I'm getting tired of Christmas crafts. Ready to start sewing again!!!

Christmas Wreath re-do

I kept putting off working on my wreaths this year because really, I didn't know what to do with them. I was tired of the plain Jane look they had. (sorry to my jane's out there!!).

Here is the before. I was into the deep reds/burgundy colors and minimalism. ( or most likely I took apart another decoration for parts!!!)

And sadly, that was that. But in my defense, these bad boys were straight out of storage. No 'fluffing' (as a dear friend calls it) had been done.

So, I took what little bits of decor that was actually there out and started with a blank canvas so to speak.

Between feeding kids, changing diapers, kissing boo-boo's and then putting them all to bed, this is what I came up with...

I found the polka-dot ribbon at Walmart and fell in love. Knew I had to do something with it. Was very excited to use it on the wreaths!!

Now, on our door. And yes, it, being our entrance, needs SO much more but. Don't think it will happen this year