Wood Burning Tool ~ Christ Centered Ornaments

I thought I would share this fun little craft I did last month in prep for Christmas. My Christmas tree is a little sparse and at the moment, it needs some ornaments that will not break with toddler hands touching them. After some research, a friend and I decided to make ornaments that have pictures of Jesus Christ's life and a scripture to go with them. I plan to use this as an advent in December.

I learned how to use a new cool snazzy tool. The wood burning tool. I have a close picture of it later. It had a bit of a learning curve, and I was discouraged at first. But you get the hang of it and it actually was fun to use!

Materials:

Wood slices
Pictures of Christ - trimmed to fit the specific wood circles
Wood Burning tool
Tiny little hook screws
Twine
Modge Podge
Sponge Brush
Tracing paper
Printed scriptures on paper to trace
 

DIRECTIONS: 

1- Glue all the pictures of Jesus on your wood slices. I don't modge podge the front yet. I want to wood burn the back with the scripture first. I used a free scripture list and went and gathered my own photos on LDS.ORG where they have free high quality downloads

2- Use tracing paper to make a pattern for you to follow when wood burning on the back of the wood slice.

3-  Use the wood burning tool to carefully follow the pattern you traced. SLOW and STEADY is the trick. Try to apply even pressure throughout so that the lines are not different levels of thickness. Be sure to practice on other wood first.

4- Modge podge the top of the pictures to add texture and secure the pictures in place. Let dry.

5- Screw in tiny hook and tie twine through to hang on the tree. I found that starting a hole with a little screwdriver helped secure the hook, plus helped prevent cracking. If you want you can add a tiny little bow on the top of the wood slice. I saw a bunch of cute little examples of Pinterest.

Happy Christmas Season!

Grocery shopping

I don't feel like I have wrote anything about grocery shopping. It is miserable. I actually like to meal plan, make a list, and actually get the food in the store, but my circumstances make it something to dread. Anything with babies is 5 times harder. Making sure their hair looks somewhat presentable after nap time takes extra time and fighting since we don't want to look like your stereotypical Walmart people. (which we do a lot usually anyway)  However, you add winter, and I am taking on and off coats as I buckle both in car seats. The car is freezing and doesn't warm up by the time we get to our two stores: usually Walmart and Aldi.

BEFORE

AFTER

 Getting to the car is an adventure on it's own. It is a little bit of a walk down the stairs, down the sidewalk and then down another flight of stairs. I usually just carry Jordyn, but I thought I would be kind and let her have a little freedom even if it did take longer. Madison all of sudden burst out giggling and couldn't stop because she said that Jordyn "walked goofy".

Coats on..ready to go!

I open the door for Madison before loading Jordyn in because she insists on climbing in herself. She also locks and shut the door as well. I just have to unlock her door and re-open it to buckle her in. We have a system and I just let her do her thing.

Aldi is actually usually a fairly good experience. The carts have two seats in the front, plus I am pleasantly surprised how much food I get for the price. However, after I pack my kids back in the car seats, and the groceries, we head next door to Walmart.

Walmart NEVER has working buckles on their one baby seat, they are either nonexistent or too bent to click. So while I am training Madison to stay close to the cart and stay out of people's way (she is doing fairly well), I am fighting with Jordyn to not do dangerous things in the cart, (since I cannot buckle her down). I even had a Walmart employee tell me to use the buckle once. She got an earful. I kinda felt bad, but not really.

After we get our food, which is fairly quickly. I can work through those aisles very fast. I have a  system. We wait in line for longer then we shop. Oh well...... such is life.

Madison is usually dancing throughout the store

Jordyn doing dangerous things

 I load the groceries then take coats off my kids to load them in car seats. We get home and I put their coats back on and get them out of the car. We live a bit of a walk from where we park our car so I take multiple trips taking in groceries to the house after I have put my kids in their room to play or even turn on a movie so they wills stay put while I run up and down stairs and sidewalks from my apartment to my car. In the cold this is especially miserable. However, I have to add; a year ago when it was super hot and I was super pregnant, I literally bawled the whole time I was carrying these groceries in. The weather adds, but it is miserable either way.

Saying "cold" in sign language

Anyways, sorry for the long description. I feel like I just may want to remember this crazy escapade someday. Writing about it actually helps me see the ridiculous humor in the situation instead of miserable and angry.  

Moments of Fall

Fall is leaving us. The days are cold. I rounded up a few pictures from different outings that I wanted to remember. I had cute kids this fall.

Fall Dresses

I have had a recent obsession with dressing my little girls this fall. I love the current trends and am definitely capitalizing on the fact that hand sewn clothes are in. I LOVE to sew. I love these fall dresses that I made for them and they cooperated pretty well for the camera. I had to share

 I used an old dress I made for Madi the year before, took down the hem and added the long sleeves with the flutter. First long sleeves I have done. It was fun and not to hard! She hasn't complained so I think it must be pretty comfortable.
For Jordyn's dress I had some extra fabric that I sewed the dress with. I added the round ruffle collar that I have seen lately. After it was done, I decided it needed something black. I really didn't want a sash or a flower, because I wanted it to go with the theme of vintage from Madison's dress. Embroidery was the answer. I got some help from a friend and completed my first embroidery project. It has a lot of mistakes, but I am still pretty proud. Enjoy the pictures of my goofy girls.

Anybody else find that loving their kids is a lot easier when they are dressed cute!

Halloween 2017

Halloween this year was packed! So much fun and so busy.

I helped plan and decorate the ward party this year. It turned out cute and I loved the finished product. I did have a stick fetish for awhile as I was collecting cool crazy for the centerpieces. The trees in Iowa are awesome, they actually have leaves and drop a lot of twigs. The fun little photo backdrop is also my brainchild. The tree cost me a lot of heartache, but turned out okay. The moon was painted with watercolor, with the help of a friend, and the fence was an old pallet I found that Jordan cut up.

This year for Halloween little Jordyn was a kitty cat. I decided that this age is perfect for them to be cats! They move like cats and act like cats. At least my girls are both a tad ornery and mischievous, both cat characteristics.

Madison was a "Ballerina, Fairy, Princess, Butterfly. At the moment Madi is the girliest girl you ever met. She is obsessed with all things pink, fluffy, and princessy. She said she wanted to be a ballerina at the beginning of the month. I bought her a tutu, she loved it, but wanted to also be everything else. I slowly added a tiara, wand, and wings.

Jordan and I were lumberjacks. We needed a costume for us to match a trunk or treat. I crocheted a couple of beards, rounded up some Christmas trees, made a Timber banner, and scrounged around our house plaid blankets and found a lantern!

My attractive backwoodsmen making chili.... in a dutch oven. Best red chili award

And a sweet dad that takes her trick or treating on a cold cold night.