Renaissance Faire!

Remember how I said yesterday that I would tell you what I have been up to? Well here it is! Ellie has been reading the Lord of the Rings books with her dad and is really into it, so she wanted to be Frodo the hobbit. Being the good mom that I am, I broke out my sewing machine and my previously meager skills and made this costume for her!

For reference, here's a pic of Elijah Wood playing Frodo in the movie. He has a coat on here over his vest and shirt but under his cloak. I skipped the coat because, really, isn't a cloak, a vest and a shirt enough?

In the past, the pretty much home decor stuff, which is all straight lines. I made a footie pajama snow leopard halloween costume for ellie before she was born (she was born the day before Halloween), but it was WAY too big because seam allowances and I don't get along. 

So, I am REALLY proud of myself for making this costume. The pants were from a pattern that was for cargo pants, but I skipped the extra pockets, so she just has the two front standard slanted pockets. 

The cloak was not from a pattern at all, just instructions online, and look at that hood! Isn't that cute?!

The shirt was from a pattern for a pirate shirt, but it had a 'V' neck with ties, so I modified the pattern to create a sort of bib on the front with an overlap for buttons. (in this photo there arent any buttons yet and it's being held closed with a safety pin)

The vest was from a pattern I found online for an 'up to 5T' boys vest. I made it larger and it worked beautifully! (have to look up that blog post and link it up here)

Look at how the cloak billows! I loved that!

These pictures were from the first outing of the costume at the Renaissance Faire. We have to work on her hair more. She wanted it wavy, so I added some gel and scrunched and let her sleep on it wet, hoping to leverage her natural curl, but it ended up just looking dirty. Of course, Frodo was on a trek, so he WAS kind of dirty, but still... We are trying curlers next time.

We had a GREAT TIME at the Renaissance Fair! Ellie and I learned how to Scottish peasant dance (it was scottish day). She learned to sword fight. (and bought a sword to add to her costume, so that now I have to make her a sword belt). We ate turkey legs, tasted wine, and shopped and shopped and shopped.

oh, and now I am working on MY costume. I am going to be Arwen, the elf princess from the Lord of the Rings. Here's the costume that I am working on

What's going on lately

Things have been a little crazy around our house lately. I've been having some health issues, Seth had finals, and then we found out that our dog, Penny, has lymphoma. She's 10 years old and the best dog EVER! Seth and I got her just before we got married, when the stress of the wedding was really getting to me. I wanted to just elope. I wanted to just be a family. So, we decided to get a dog, a dog that would be ours, that would make us a 'real' family. And she did! She was our 'baby' until Ellie was born. Now she's the 'big sister'. We just can't believe that she's sick. The vet found the cancer on a visit for something totally unrelated about a week ago. Since then we've been trying to wrap our heads around this. Around the fact that our seemingly healthy dog is apparently dying. 

So yesterday Seth took her to the oncology center at the university of pennsylvania and they ran some tests. Today, they are running more tests including a couple of biopsies that she has to be put under for. And then she will get her first chemo treatment today. I've been on the fence about the whole chemo thing. The best we can hope for with this disease is a VERY slim chance at 2 years. More likely we are looking at buying her another year. Of course buying is certainly the operative term here, but also I worry about how this is going to affect her. She's such a sweetie, but she has gotten pretty severe anxiety problems in her old(er) age. I don't want to see her suffer.

But we are going to try. We can always stop if it isn't going well. In the mean time, I have noticed that I need to take more pictures of her! I have like a million pics of ellie but only a few of penny. Penny just doesn't like to have her picture taken, but that's no excuse. I will take more pictures.

That first one was when she was still a puppy, look how skinny she is! The second one is her meeting the baby rabbits that were living in a planter on our porch. She just looked at that one for a minute and it looked at her. then she barked at it and it jumped out of the nest and fell over the side of the porch, so I had to catch it and put it back. And this final picture is me carrying penny back from a hike because she hurt her paws. She HATES to be picked up or carried. The fact that she's letting me carry her is a testament to how much she was hurting.

So, that's what has been going on. and that's why I haven't had much time for posting or scrapping lately. I am feeling better now though. Im glad that we at least have a plan. I'm still nervous and worried for her, but knowing that she's getting the best care possible helps.

Quick Halloween Recap

Yes, Ive been doing more non scrappy posts lately - with Ellie's birthday and Halloween things have just been crazy busy! BUT I have been working on a few scrappy things, just can't share them yet. So, here is a quick halloween recap

Our street is usually pretty quiet. In the past it hasn't bothered me, she was little and I was happy to hit the few houses that give out candy on our street, talk to some neighbors and head home. But this year she was SO into Halloween that I wanted her to have a trick-or-treat experience similar to what I had as a kid - tons of candy, tons of houses, tons of kids.

Except, people just don't seem to into it anymore. We decided to head around the block and found that on the next street over, where the houses are closer together, it was more what I was looking for. She DID get a ton of candy. She takes her time though. She socializes, chooses her candy carefully, asks to pet dogs. So we ended up having to skip a lot of houses. and she was running from house to house and didnt want me to take her picture. So I only got a couple half decent ones.

Again, straight out of the camera.

Boo At the Zoo

Still havent had time to edit these photos - these are straight from the camera. Ok, to be totally fair, I guess I COULD have done it while I watched TV last night, but I decided that I really needed some time to sit and do ONE THING at a time, since I literally couldnt remember the last time I had done that.

Ok, so on to the story! We made some time on Sunday morning for our annual trip to Boo at the Zoo at the Philadelphia Zoo. We go every year as a family and have a great time. It always seems that the weather is perfect and it's a family activity that I very much look forward to.

We had breakfast at the diner on the way there. And I just adore this photo! It was before Ellie had a chance to mess up her makeup! LOL

Yeah, I took the easy way out and bought her costume this year. She wanted to be a cat, and it just seemed silly to make it when I found this one at Walmart online for $9 and free shipping. Although, as of now, she wants to be a lizard next year. Oy! hope she changes her mind.

The cat pose, complete with meow noises (which of course you can't hear)

Awww - arent they sweet!

The cat walk!
The artiste! I had to keep telling myself that we were not in a hurry and I had plenty of time before the birthday party, because she wanted to do every craft, and she was meticulous! Her coloring was so detailed!

Cake Pop Eyeballs and the Family Party

This weekend was a busy one! We had ballet, and a friend over on Saturday night and boo at the zoo and her family party aka her 12 grandparents and great grandparents, no room in our small house for cousins etc. So here are the eyeball cake pops that I made based on a recipe from bakerella.She used food dye pens for the black and red parts, but my food dye pens wouldn't write on the white chocolate. I think it has something to do with the wax content because it kept sort of building up on the pen. So I ended up using tubes of the same kind of meltable candy stuff for the red parts, and the leftover black icing from the cake. They still look pretty good but the black icing doesnt harden, so it made for slightly more messy.
For the pot that they are stuck in, I had a pot leftover from a floral arrangement that I got to take home from a wedding. I spray painted it with hammered black rustoleum, then tied the May Arts ribbon around it and embellished with some SRM stickers, Bella Blvd papers, Maya Road canvas tag and some Twinery Twine.

Seth helped me shove a piece of styrofoam into the pot. floral foam or something probably would have been better, but I had to make due with what I had. I glued the tissue paper to the styrofoam.

Ellie is really into Halloween this year, and I got the idea from a coworker to make a bundt pan cake and decorate it like a pumpkin - would have been sooooo easy. But Ellie wanted a spider. so I went to pinterest. bad idea! I came up with this cute idea to put the spider webs around the edges and the spider on top. Those webs took forever! I had to keep resting because my hand was cramping. Good thing my friend Alexis was over to keep me company.
And the tablecloth turned out pretty nice too. No, I didn't make it, but it is the result of a long and mostly fruitless search for a nice plain but not totally boring tablecloth. I wanted one that was beige with a sort of burlap look, which I ended up finding AFTER I already had this one, and Ellie loved this one, so it all worked out. I got the burlap one too - for fall/thanksgiving.

And this is really what it's all about.
"Look a unicorn!"


The Harry potter robe and accessories, including the wand that she was using this morning to 'open her dresser drawers looking for her clothes'


Hamming it up. oh yes, she is a ham


the money shot

Words on Wednesday

Ok, so I havent done this in a while. Things have been super busy since school started. What have I been up to, you might ask?

Well, seth started his Pharmacy PhD program. Ellie, of course, went back to school and started her slew of activities. We really need to cut her back, but most of them are after school and are a substitution for after school care. I did add ballet on Saturdays though, because she is so into gymnastics and ice skating, and she just loves dance. So I thought it would be a good thing for her to have. She loves it!

I have to say though - don't buy ballet slippers at payless, they are WAY overpriced!

Me? I'm spending more time working out and watching what I eat and just trying to be more healthy in general. I'm also doing couponing and trying to cook more - so we can afford all those activities for ellie.

Today in my couponing I got 5 laundry detergents and a box of tissues for $15 + $10 back in cvs extra care bucks for next week.

Yesterday (or was it the day before) I got 4 dove shampoos and one dove deodorant for $1.75 and $8 extra care bucks (which I used on the laundry detergent today). Why did I do two trips instead of just doing two transactions? Because the coupons that I had brought for the detergent were expired. I am still too shy/embarrassed to bring my giant coupon binder into the store. Plus CVS is literally like a minute from my office, so it's no big deal to go back another day.

And in other news. I am going to try harder to spice up my blog. I hope to add some more free digital stamps - maybe make it a weekly thing - and some book reviews (hopefully biweekly). Those are the first two steps. A monthly tutorial is another idea, but I don't know how to schedule that yet. biweekly will be hard enough to remember. Heck who am I kidding, weekly is hard enough! but monthly I am bound to forget. We'll see. Let me know if there is anything else you would like to see.

a card and some peach picking photos

Since I was in Niagara Falls last weekend, I didn't get a chance to scrap, but I thought I would share something that I made a couple of weeks ago, and never shared. This was for my American crafts DT application. Although, I ended up submitting a different one. The papers are American Crafts and the sticker is SRM stickers

And this morning Bubby took Ellie and Seth peach picking. Seth sent me a few photos.

The brief recap of our Niagara trip...

We had a great, busy, trip to Niagara Falls this weekend. I left work at 3pm on Thursday, drove home to get them, loaded the car and were off by about 4:30. We got to Rochester around 11pm and crashed. Ellie woke us up like clockwork - do kids actually have alarm clocks inside them somehow - at 6:30, and after a fast tim hortons breakfast we were off.

We stopped at walmart, target then walmart again to get a waterproof camera, and some pillows since we forgot ours. We ended up splurging on a reusable waterproof camera and said it was for Ellie for her birthday. (yep, that's how you know you are a die hard scrapbooker - you spend $70 on a waterproof camera for your 5 yr old, just so you can be sure to get close ups of the falls. Although to be fair, she loves taking photos and is thrilled to have her own camera. The 'kids' ones are just too baby for her, so a waterproof one seemed a good option - less moving parts to break)

We stopped at Duff's on the outskirts of Buffalo for some wings. Apparently there are two bars that fight over the claim of the first/best Buffalo wings, Duffs and I forget the name of the other right now. But it seemed that the other was maybe a little more authentic, but it was also all the way downtown and Duff's was right off the highway. Win!

Then we continued on to the Maid of the Mist. We parked in a falling down parking garage, got our discovery passes - which cover all the US side state park attractions, and went on the observation deck and the maid of the mist boat ride. Here are ellie and seth on the observation deck - notice the yellow camera? I have tons of photos of HER taking photos. but I didn't want to bore you with that.


My photo from the observation deck. (I havent really had a chance to go through all 600+ photos from my camera let alone the ones from Ellie's, so these photos are just what I grabbed really quickly this morning.)


on the deck of the maid of the mist



After the maid of the mist and some wandering around the park on the American side - where we saw a couple get married - just them, the priest and a photographer - so romantic! We went to the campground to check in, get set up, and have a quick swim.

Then on to Canada, where we had a great meal at the Paris Creperie restaurant. I have THE BEST kid! She had some french version of lemonade - which was like make your own, they brought fresh squeezed lemon juice in a glass with ice, some water, and some sugar. When she asked if they had lemonade he seemed sorry and sad when he told use about that option, like no kid would want THAT, but she LOVED it! Come on, make your own?! Then we had a baked Camembert cheese appetizer. Ellie tried it with an apple slice, liked it, then had more and decided she didnt like it. She still was willing to dip her bread into the sweet broth that came with it though. I thought for sure once she decided that she didnt like it, it was going to be all over. Seth had beef bourgingon and ellie and I split the mussels with french fries. She loves mussels. Then we had TWO dessert crepes.

Next we moved on to the free concert, falls illumination and fireworks show in Queen Victoria park. Ellie danced, and danced and danced.





On Saturday we slept in, then went to the cave of the winds trail where we got REALLY wet, and which ellie totally LOVED. Then we went to have lunch at the top of the falls resturant and another observation area.

We then rode the trolley to the aquarium and the gorge discovery center, which were both pretty unimpressive. We were all tired, so we went back to camp and took a nap, before the obligatory hotdog and marshamallow roasting.

In the middle of the night we were awakened by a CRAZY storm, with thunder, lightening and torrential rains. The rain was so bad that it managed to seep THROUGH the fabric of the tent and make a big puddle. We packed up in the rain and headed home.

Camping at Assateague

We just got back from camping and it was a blast! We have dubbed it 'Ellie-Wonderland' because between seeing horses, eating smores, and being on the beach all day, she was in heaven! The only crappy part was bugs in teh bathrooms in the middle of the night/early morning. We used a TON of sunscreen and bug spray and we still all got burned and bitten. I dont know if I would go back there without a camper, the mosquitos in the bathrooms were just too much.

here are some pictures

This is what happens when you dont put your trash in your car before you leave. (that's our neighbors site not ours)

Words on Wednesday

I have realized (again) that despite loving to write, I don't actually write a lot on my blog. I think this is because when I finally get to sit and put together a blog post, I am out of time. It's past my bed time or there are still a million things that need to be done, and I end up just posting the necessities.

So, I am going to make a concerted effort to start posting at least one wordy post per week. Hopefully I will increase that slowly, but if there is one thing I have learned about making changes, it is baby steps!

Speaking of making changes, I am finally back to running.

For those of you who don't know, I have always hated running, but last year I decided that I need to fit some exercise into my busy schedule and with running, I can get a full workout in about 30 minutes. I started with the couch to 5k plan, and moved on to training for a 10 mile race. Over the course of that training I realized that while I still don't love the idea of getting out of bed to run (or getting out of bed at all for that matter). And while I still don't understand the whole 'runners high' or hitting that meditative state while running, I DO love how it makes me feel for the rest of the day. It helps my mood and stress level.

Well after that 10 mile race (yes I finished, but just barely) I hurt my ankle and couldn't run for about a month. Then I started up again, only to need some stitches on my back and become unable to run again. It's been almost a week since I got the stitches, (and a week until they come out) but I felt that it was healed enough for me to run, and I started slowly today with one mile.

and.... I feel GREAT!

eating right - that's another story. I want to, but man, I really love food! I ate my lean cuisine for lunch today, then proceeded to eat a little bit of all my co-workers' foods - a slice of enza's cheese, two of marisa's meatballs, one of donna's tortellinis. Yeah, not so good. (no, I didn't pick off their plates, it was more like they had dumped out of larger containers onto plates, and I did the same) but yeah, 600 calories later... argh.

and because I feel that everything needs a visual aide (and I dont really have one for the running and eating part) Here are some photos from our busy busy weekend last weekend. Yeah I'm a geek, I admit it. So is my husband, he admits it too. We went to the comic book convention this past weekend. We let Ellie pick who she wanted to dress up as, and she chose Katara from the last airbender (the cartoon and comic, not the new and terrible live action movie) Here is the inspiration, since I know most of you have no idea who katara is.

I made her costume and it turned out pretty well if I do say so myself. The top was an old karate uniform which we dyed blue. We dyed some white fabric to match and I sewed the skirt out of that. Then I added the white trim, made the necklace and braided the hair of her wig. The ribbons on her hands were her idea - she wanted it to look like she could bend water.

Here she is in the garage right after we parked, bending water.

Here she is posing with darth vader because her Zayda loves Darth vader.

and here she is doing the Katara pose before the kids costume contest. You can see that the wig has seen better days by this point, it kept falling off.

Ribbon Storage

Really Reasonable Ribbon has been talking about ribbon storage. and someone just emailed me about my post on the CK blog storage discussion asking for a photo, AND this is my favorite thing to look at in my studio, so I thought I would share a photo of my ribbon storage here. My husband says I am a little brave, because this shelf is right above my head, but these vases from the dollar tree fit perfectly on it. And they are the perfect size because I can just fit my hand down inside (and I have large hands). although, as you can see here, I am running out of space in some of them, so I am going to need to come up with an alternative. So far I have separated out the 'really special' trims - like the ones that have all the ribbon roses on them, and my wide silk ones. The purple you see here is actually flowers. I have the purple, white and black ribbon stored elsewhere, because I had a very small amount of purple and a very large amount of black and white. Now that I am looking at this though, I think I need to get some more pink!

my laptop battery only lasts an hour

and thank god for Harry Potter!

I'm trying to host an online crop (FYI - online crop with prizes and the whole store is at least 10% off at acot.) and normally DH would be watching DD, but he is out of town, so I am doing both and it was getting a little hairy there, until I finished reading her a book, and feeding her lunch and she asked to watch the first Harry Potter movie for like the 100th time. SCORE! 146 minutes of freedom!

ok, totally copied this from my sister, but I think I might start doing a blog meme monday or something, could be fun.

this is seriously going to get personal, you ready? sure
If you were caught cheating, would you fess up? yeah I would. I think I am the most afraid of being the last to know, so I would do the same courtesy
The last time you felt honestly broken? hmmm, don't know. it's been a little while, well, wait, no probably the first week of the year.
Are you craving something? not really.
If you could have one thing right now what would it be? a million dollars - boring, but yeah, Im pretty happy right now, but I could always do with more money
Would you rather have ten kids, or none? none
What do you hear right now? the portable heater and the radio
Is your bed against more than one of your walls? no, it's not even really against one. up close, but with enough room for the curtains to hang down behind it
What’s on your mind right now? TOO much to list! (yeah I'll just keep this one from my sister's post)
Are you there for your friends? most of the time
Last person to see you cry? dunno
What do you do when you get nervous? lol - you want the truth? I get diarrhea
How old do you think you will be when you finally have kids? 27
Does anyone completely understand you? hmm, no probably no ONE person, but I have different people for different parts of me
Do you have a reason to smile right now? Yes!
Has anyone told you they don’t ever wanna lose you? yes
Would you be happier if life had a rewind button? probably
Do you tell your mum or dad everything? mostly
How many hours of sleep do you get a night? about 9
Are you easy to get along with? I think so
Do you hate the last girl you had a conversation with? No
What was the last drink that you put in your mouth? sipping on coffee right now
What size bed do you have? queen
Do you start the water before you get in the shower or when you get in? Before - who starts it IN the shower - BRRR
Do you like the rain? not really.
Have you ever done something you told yourself you wouldn’t do? yes
Who were you last in the car with, besides family? can't remember
Have you ever been hurt by someone you never thought would hurt you? yes
Do you regret a past relationship? Hmmm, I guess not
Do you care too much about your appearance? no, lol, I probably don't care enough
Have you bought any clothing items in the last week? no
Do you miss anyone? yes
What are you doing tomorrow? don't know. probably scrapbooking.
Is there anyone you want to come see you? yes
Have you ever been cheated on? not that I know of
Do you have siblings? yes, one sister. (haha, guess I'll keep this one too)
Have you ever fallen asleep on someone?yes
How has the past week been for you? sick - so sick that I don't remember most of it
What were you doing at midnight last night? sleeping
What is your current mood? content
Who was the first person you talked to today? Ellie
Will this week be a good one? well, it HAS to be better than last week
Anything happen to you within the past month that made you really happy? yes
Who were you with last night? My in-laws and ellie, then just ellie.
Did you talk to someone until you fell asleep last night? no
Next time you will kiss someone? probably in about 2 hours when DH gets home

Check out this giveaway! (and a great inspirational blog too)

Check out the giveaway over at life as lou, leah's blog. And while you are at it you should become a follower because she has great posts all the time!

in other news, the feb challenges are up at ACOT

croppin!

I went cropping yesterday and had a great time! I didn't get as much done as I would have liked, but I love everything that I made. The only thing I can share right now is this page that I made for the My Little Shoebox January sketch challenge. Thanks to Leslie for gifting me with these fabulous papers!






























Here is the sketch: