VBS Prep

This week has been crazy busy with VBS preparation! I do not recommend moving 2 weeks before VBS if you are going to teach or play a big part in the planning. HA!

This year's theme is The Treasure of the Forgotten Island: Searching for gems in the book of Proverbs.

 The prep for this theme has been so fun! I love that it's going to be all about searching for our real treasure, the Bible. I think the kids are going to love it and I know I've had a good time (if not stressful) planning the lessons and activities for the 4 and 5 year olds.

I wanted to share a few of the things that I've done (with the help of several other people!). I will be sure to take pictures of my finished classroom and the other finished decorations and share them, too.

My sister and I definitely wanted a large treasure map for the wall in the hallway. One of my very first projects was tea dying this huge piece of muslin. My Mom helped me so much and I think it came out fantastic. I have finished drawing the treasure map on it now and I will share that once we get it up on the wall.

 I had the idea of making a pier and boat for the front of the auditorium. It was a struggle getting my sister (and really everyone) on board, but once my Dad started throwing his suggestions out there, they quickly joined my side. Since my Dad and I were the main ones making the plans, we built it together. It's going to come off of the podium just like a dock. The best part is that it is sturdy enough for Captain Solomon Fearlord (AKA my brother-in-law, Chris) to lead songs and talk to the kids from it!

 We also built a boat that turned out fantastic! It is going to look great by our pier! I finished up sewing the sail last week and I can't wait to see the pier and the boat in the auditorium!

 My sister and her husband came to our house last week to work on several different projects that needed to be done and we made this steering wheel. I have since cut the white from around the outside and it looks much better. We also make an anchor and these two things will flank the auditorium doors.

 The last thing I'm going to share right now is this drawing I did. It is the welcome sign that is going to be set up in the foyer. We added "Welcome" to it and the theme verse for the week. I'm so happy with how it turned out!

I have a lot left to do, but I'm so happy with our progress so far and I am excited to get all the decorations put together on Saturday. We start VBS on Sunday so I definitely need to tie up all the loose ends ASAP!

Tomorrow, tomorrow, I love ya, tomorrow!

Last week I took Chloe Jo to the library to story time. While we were waiting for story time to begin we were looking at the bulletin board and all the ads. We were so excited to see an ad for Annie the Musical!

Chloe Jo is just infatuated with the movie so I decided to pick one of the flyers up and see if we could go to a performance. Luckily, they were doing a performance today at 2:00 which was just perfect for our schedule. I purchased 2 tickets and Chloe Jo and went to see the play!

This is during intermission.

Chloe Jo did so good! It was over 2 hours long so I wasn't sure if she would get too restless, but she was so good. She loved the singing and the choreography. Every time Annie was not on stage she asked me where she was and when she was coming back. She also loves Daddy Warbucks. When I told her we were going to go see Annie or when I would talk about going she would always say "And Daddy Warbucks, too?"

I'm so glad we got to go! The performance was excellent and we both thoroughly enjoyed ourselves!

I think the highlight of Chloe Jo's afternoon was getting to meet Annie after the show! She was so happy to get to take a picture with her!

Chloe Jo now wants to dress up as Annie for Halloween. I think we can make that happen!

Getting Settled

Hi everyone! I have not logged onto Blogger in about 2 weeks! That is the longest I have gone in a long time. Somehow I will catch up on all my blog reading, but probably not today.

We have been so busy around here! We finally closed on our house and moved in. All of the boxes are unpacked. I ordered a few pieces of furniture online and am waiting on it to come in before completing some rooms. Chloe Jo's room is the only one that is completely finished. Our bedroom needs curtains still, but we were able to get our new queen size bed. It has been lovely. We have always had a full size (I know!?!) so we are very excited to have a queen now. Plus we went with a memory foam bed and I totally get the hype now. I haven't had an aching back a single morning since we bought the memory foam. Love!

This week I started working on stuff for our VBS. It starts on the 17th so I really need to get a move on. My sister and a friend are coming over to work on a lot of the decorations for it tomorrow so we will hopefully get those out of the way and I can concentrate on my class materials next week.

Ever feel like you've been running 90 to nothing? I am feeling that way and it won't get better until after VBS. I think I may have to take a week long siesta once it is over!

I noticed when I logged in that I am up to 99 followers! How does that happen? I haven't blogged in 2 weeks and gained 4! Ha! As promised I have a $5 Amazon gift card waiting to be given away once I reach 100. Only 1 more to go!

And a blog is no fun without pictures so I'll leave you with pictures of Chloe Jo's room. I'll put up a video of the whole place once everything is finished....which may be a while. :)

I love this plate as you walk in Chloe Jo's door. "For this child I prayed." It's a perfect reminder for me that we prayed for Chloe Jo and everyday, no matter how difficult, is a blessing!

 I worked really hard on her striped wall and it came out better than what I imagined in my head. I love it!

 This cross-stitch doesn't really match her colors, but I made it for her so I put it in her room anyway. I think I may have it rematted with a girlier mat at a later time (I had it matted in brown because, at the time, we thought we were having a Logan not a Chloe Jo...surprise!).

 I love that we were able to get her kitchen into her room. He previous room also had a bookshelf and a hope chest, but this room is just too small for all of that so we had to x-nay them.

 And this is just a reminder of Whose child she really is. Love.

I hope you all have had a fantastic week so far!

4 Away

Happy Friday everyone!

Guess what!

I am only 4 followers away from reaching 100!

And to celebrate I am going to be having a giveaway!

Soon!

Help me reach 100 followers and I will give away a $5 Amazon.com giftcard!

So spread the word and help me reach 100 followers!

Play Park

 Close to the town we are going to be living in (soon...very soon) is a bigger town where we will be going to do our shopping and playing. Chloe Jo and I came to Oklahoma to stay with my sister and her kids while her husband was out of town. While I was there we took the kids to an amazing play park in big town.

 This park is about phenomenal for a city park. I even had a ton of fun!

The merry-go-round was so heavy I had trouble pushing it, but Chloe Jo is a hoss and was running with it giving Brianna a ride.

Brenson hung out with Momma most of the morning on the bench. It was very sunny out so he had to wear his hat so his fair skin wouldn't burn (plus he looks so cute in it!).

We had so much fun just walking and running through the play gyms. We didn't even do many of the activities because most were for older kids but it was still fun.

Chloe Jo was being especially brave that day and she went down this very tall slide several times by herself. I was surprised she even wanted to because usually she is very timid about things like that. She didn't go down the tallest swirl slide, though. She got up to the top and decided it was too high.

Brianna, who is completely fearless, had a great time making her mommy nervous. Chelley was so afraid Brianna would jump off of one of the higher areas.

After we were done playing at the park we stopped by Atwoods to see the baby chicks. Sometimes this store has other animals (like horses!) inside, but that day they just had baby chicks. And, um, ugh. Brianna does have her mouth on the lip of the metal. Gross!

The baby chicks were so tiny and sweet. I had to keep telling myself that sweet, tiny, soft baby chicks turn into hens. Yuck.

We had a fantastic day playing at the park and going to see the baby chicks! The best part was the great naps the kiddos took after we got home! HA!

House Details

So yesterday was supposed to be our closing day. That didn't happen, but, honestly, we were not too torn up about it.

We have had a few bumps with the appraisal for the home. The original asking price for the house was 127,500. After negotiating a few times back and forth, we agreed upon 123,000. The first appraisal came back at 111,000 which is not good at all. At 111,000 we would not have been approved for our loan and we would have lost the house. Since it was so low, the homeowners paid for a second appraisal and that one came back at 112,500. We were pretty sad about the second appraisal because we thought we had lost the house. I'm sure the homeowners were a thousand times more devastated than we were. Because the two appraisals came back about the same, we can not finance more than the 112,500 for the house and that is bad for both sides. So we waited to hear from our realtor about the next steps. Then the sellers decided to come down to the 112,500. Now the paperwork is being processed and we should be closing sometime next week. On one hand I am so excited about buying our first home, but I am also sad for the sellers because they are not getting the price we had originally agreed upon and that is going to be hard for them. I know that is just a risk you take when buying and selling homes, but it is still stinky for them.

I am happy that we are getting such a phenomenal deal on the house and that everything has worked out in such a good way for us. So, if all the paperwork goes right then we will be moving in to our first house next weekend!

Mother's Day 2012

I hope everyone had a great holiday weekend.

I received my presents on Thursday because I spent Mother's Day at my parents and Russ had to preach Sunday in the town we are moving to. I will do a separate post all about that!

Chloe Jo gave me two fun vases for my craft room and a coffee mug and Russ gave me the 3rd season of NCIS. Love me some Gibbs and Abby!

Sunday was also fantastic. My sister and bro-in-law were also at my parents so we all were able to go to church services together. That is always a special treat since my Dad still preaches some and since Russ preaches we don't get to do that very often.

Love this picture of me and Chloe Jo!

I am so thankful to have a wonderful Mom who is a great example and support in my life.

This is a great picture with my mom and sister. We always love getting together!

And one of the littles because they are just too cute! Love these little girls!

I'm going to do a post all about our house tomorrow so if you want to know some details, stay tuned!

Oh How Pinteresting!

Today I am linking up with The Vintage Apple for Oh How Pinteresting!

Last Sunday night we had a meeting after worship services to discuss this years VBS. We all received our teaching materials and Chelley and I immediately started brainstorming ideas for decorations, games and crafts. Our theme this year is Hunting for Treasure: Finding Gems in the Book of Proverbs.

Here are a few fun things I pinned to help us prepare!

This first picture is from Oriental Trading Company (I didn't actually pin it so there isn't a link). We are going to try to build our own boat and pier for the front of the auditorium and make the anchor and ships wheel to flank the entrance.

This bag is something I am planning on doing for a craft one night. I haven't decided what we are going to fill it with, yet, but it will definitely coordinate with the Bible lesson.

I am hoping to copy this classroom door. I think it is so fun!

Source: room-mom101.blogspot.com via Lisa on Pinterest

My sister and I think this will be fun for the foyer. We are going to tea-dye muslin and glue it to a foam board. We are also going to tea-dye a large piece of muslin and make a treasure map for the hall.

Source: hwtm.com via Lisa on Pinterest

We think we can use this idea for a game. We will write a number on each "treasure" and it will coordinate with a question about the lesson.

Source: pinterestoffer.com via Lisa on Pinterest

Love this message in a bottle idea! We will write a Bible verse on it.

Source: parisbourke.com via Lisa on Pinterest

The last night we are really wanting to coordinate a scavenger hunt for the children. This is just an idea of how to make clues for the classes.

Source: manditremayne.blogspot.com via Lisa on Pinterest

We are really looking forward to doing our VBS this year. I love teaching class and I think the crafts and games we have come up with so far are going to be great. And, of course, Proverbs is always a great book to study!

Link up {here} and show us what you are pinning!

Recent sewing projects

 Last week was a big week for me as far as sewing went. Since I bought that super cute clearance fabric I had all kinds of ideas running through my head about what to do with it!

I decided to make a couple of summer outfits for Chloe Jo out of it and I am so thrilled with the results. I am thinking more and more that I want to reopen my Etsy shop after we get moved and life settles down.

This is the first outfit I made. I used a pattern for the shirt and pants, but added the flower to the shirt and added the ruffle to the pants. Don't the additions just add so much to the outfit?

I came up with the next outfit by myself. I bought the t-shirt from the local hobby shop and added the ruffle and the buttons. I used a pattern to make the shorts. Shorts and pants are so easy to make so the real time consumer in this outfit was getting that ruffle right.

And lastly, you may remember this shirt that I made for Chloe Jo to wear for her birthday party. It is Strawberry Shortcake inspired and oh-so-cute. Well I didn't think Chloe Jo would be comfortable wearing the matching tutu all of the time so I made a pair of matching shorts to go with it.

I have to say that when I put a pair of red Mary Jane's with it, this outfit was adorable! It may even be my favorite out of the three I made last week!

Now I need to start thinking about curtains for my craft room! There's always something on my list!

Down to the end

Last week was so hard, but it is finally over. I am emotional at funerals in general and it was a million times harder at a funeral for a baby. I hope the healing process goes as smooth as it can for my friends.

We are getting down to the last week before closing (or so we hope) and I've been getting ready to get moved in. I have bought several things to help make our house a home and am ready to get everything in the house and set up like we want it.

I went ahead and bought Chloe Jo a new comforter for her bed. She also is going to have a side table for her bed so I bought her a lamp for it. I still need to get her a bedskirt and we are going to paint her room before we load it up with her things.

Last week I went shopping with my Mom and bought all the rugs we will need, a new table cloth, dish towels and dish rags for the kitchen and new bathroom towels, washcloths and a curtain.

I liked the curtain that the current owners had in the bathroom so much that I went and bought one of my own! HA!

We are so ready to get into our own place (as I'm sure my parents and sister are ready to have their homes back to themselves)!

We still haven't heard back about the second appraisal so we are waiting with fingers crossed that it comes back correctly this time. I am really hoping that closing doesn't get shoved off because of the issues we have had with the appraisals. All we can do is wait and see!

I hope everyone has a good week!

Hard

I have several things to post about, but I just haven't felt like it. The last couple of days have been really hard. One of the couples from our new church family was expecting a baby girl within the next couple weeks. I found out yesterday morning that the precious baby girl went to be with Jesus. She was 38 weeks gestation. We have known the couple for several years and they are very close with my sister and her husband. We are all just devastated and trying to cope with what has happened.

Up, up and away!

The weather was gorgeous yesterday! It was bright, sunny and there was just enough wind to be able to go try out Chloe Jo's new kite!

She was so excited to fly her kite! When I asked her if she even knew what a kite was she said "of course. Boots has a kite." I should have remembered that. :)

We picked out a ladybug kite and it was so fun to watch!

I let Chloe Jo fly the kite just long enough for me to get a picture. I thought she was going to fly away with it! Tiny little thing!

She is begging to go out and fly her kite again today, but I don't think it is quite windy enough. We will definitely have to go again soon, though!