The Blessings of 'Small Miracles'

Today, this afternoon, I was listening to the BYU channel and there was a fill-in of 10 minutes before the next program started. It was a concert pianist with a full orchestra. They were playing classical music. I was preparing homemade vegetable beef soup in the kitchen and enjoying the music. I love classical music. I noticed that Kirsten was shaking her rattle to the rhythm of the music. As the music increased in tempo so did her rattle. I peeked around the corner and she had the happiest smile on her face. I kept an eye on her to make sure I wasn't imagining what I was hearing. She kept her rattle going to the tempo of the music and when it ended so did she, right on cue! I was so touched by this 'small miracle'! It was a joyful experience!

I got a quick shot of her here. When she sees me with the camera, she stops and drops her rattle and her performance is over! So I had to be quick! My camera has a few seconds of delay and I was trying so hard to capture her in motion! Got her! :o)

This was Kirsten when the music ended, no more rattle. She had finished!

This is a small frog that loves to 'sit' on my roses. He or she usually hides inside the rose petals and peeks out. This was taken a few days ago when the sun was out and I guess froggie decided to sun him or herself!

Mt. Rainier with its 'fun' clouds!

This was taken just as the sun was going down. I took it as a close up.

Same picture only at regular distance.

This was taken one hour 'before' the sun went down.

Same picture only a close up view.

I love the fact that all we have to do is walk out our front door and look a little to the northeast and 'click!'

Sometimes there are some very interesting cloud formations. Sometimes there will be a single cloud to the left of the mountain that make s a dead ringer for a flying saucer. Other times it looks like the mountain is wearing a beret. Other times it's a messy haystack. It's always fun to look at from early morning until sunset. When it snows and the day is clear and the sun is about 4pm the mountain is stunningly beautiful!

My new tote bag :o)

Tah - Dah! My new placemat tote bag! My camera doesn't do the color justice, but it's a pretty fall color! I have made several place mat totes from '1' placemat. The one above is made from '2' place mats sewn together. My scripture tote for my seminary edition quad is now just for my scriptures, minus lesson book, small hymnal ,etc. That has moved into the 'bigger'tote and my small scripture tote inside it! :o)

Side view. I added trim and ribbon. The trim covers the straps.

Bottom of the tote.

Straps for tote made from grograin (sp?) ribbon. I used my sewing machine to add the decoration on ribbon.

Book - The Lost Symbol

This book'The Lost Symbol' by Dan Brown was released last week. What can I say?

AWESOME! RIVETING!

A must read! If you read Angels & Demons and The DaVinci Code, you'll want to read this one!

It's 509 pages and it was an awesome read! I read it in 2-3 days! I can now get back to getting other things done! :o)

Twilight Tours

'Twilight Tours' an illustrated guide to the REAL Forks by Underwood Books.

This was just released August 2009. Today is September 13, 2009. The mayor of Forks declared today as the official 'Stephanie Meyers Day.' Stephanie Meyers thanked Forks for using 'Bella's birthday as 'Stephanie Meyers Day' today.

Neil gave me my birthday present last night, a few days early, because today he left for Edmonton, Canada on business for 5 days.

I didn't even know this book was published. It's only been out for about one month. It takes you on a tour of Forks.

The book has 112 pages. It is a soft back book. The pictures are gorgeous. David and Angela went to Forks back at the end of April (I think) and he posted a whole bunch of pictures. Some of the ones he took look a lot like the ones in this book. Hah! We got a sneak peak from David several months ago!

I'll have to read this and let you know how I liked the book! :o)

Paper Dolls! What fun!

Notebook to hold the paper dolls

Pocket pages that close and keep in the dolls, clothes, etc.

I have a piece of velcro on the back of the doll and on the page above the pockets that holds the doll in place.

I made 4 girl dolls and 4 boy dolls. They came from pccrafter.com of which I am a member. I love that program! It's so much fun! It has clip art, etc.

Two of the boy dolls.

A portable way to carry a few dolls, in a coupon folder.

When Lisa came to visit we made these paper dolls. I loved paper dolls as a child. Lisa and I were deciding how to 'store' the dolls. She came up with the 'coupon folder' and I came up with the notebook with pockets. Both work beautifully!

Lisa and Jordan were out to dinner last night for his birthday. She put a few of the dolls in two coupon folders, one for LaRue and one for Tillie. She said that it was great entertainment! Since they were laminated, the food smudges wiped right off!

I thought the notebook would work for your lap. The dolls are velcroed and the outfits velcro to the dolls. This might work for church. This was a fun project. Lots of cutting out though!

A little Monet or Rembrandt???

Lisa and I and LaRue and Matilda have been doing some mural artwork on our fence in the backyard. This portion of fence runs along the back. It's the only one we have not stained. It was stained that red color before we moved in. We did a nice oak color on all the other fence inside and out. I bought some sidewalk chalk and let the girls color, draw, be creative, etc. on the back fence. Someday we will pressure wash this portion of the fence and re-stain it to look like the other fence. In the meantime . . .

The blue vertical color is waterfall that LaRue drew this morning. She was quite pleased with her work. :o) I had drawn the cartoon car and flower a few days ago.

Today I drew the train and some flowers below. LaRue wrote her name above the train.

A work in progress. I drew mountains, trees and that is supposed to be a river and a waterfall cascading down...use your imagination! :o) There is a Little boat on the water. A kitty cat down below.


Lisa did the entire alphabet complete with drawings! LaRue starts Kindergarten in a few weeks and practiced her letters and numbers.

Another view of those magnificent letters and numbers!

We all added to this..hearts. I tried to draw trees, rain, sun, birds, swings. The girls had their requests going!

This is a clown and a lollipop and cartoon car and sunflower.

LaRue and Tillie were running around playing choo coo train. They did this after I had drawn the train.

This was taken after Tillie decided it was a lot of fun rolling and playing in the dirt strip by the fence. Her hair had tiny dirt clods in it. Er... her mom was NOT happy about it. They got instant baths and were not allowed to play outside for the rest of the day. Saturday night bath time was early afternoon time!

La Rue was not fond of the taste of the dirt her sister were freely tossing around!

Hope you enjoy our little art display! It was fun and each day we added to it. The fence is now completely full of budding artwork from budding artists! :o)