Emma's gift to Daniel

I thought that this deserved its own post.

When I asked Emma what she wanted to give Daniel for Christmas she said that she wanted to sew him a picture of a car. She decided on Lightning McQueen and when she saw Mater she wanted to do him too.

I found some coloring pages and traced them with really minimal detail.



Lightning McQueen was her first. I didn't suggest any color details and she made him all red with black eyes.


When she sewed Mater she got much more creative with color.


Emma did all of the sewing herself. All I did was thread the needle, tie it to the needle and tie a knot at the bottom each time she wanted to change colors. She worked really hard and steadily and finished these in just 2 days! I heard lots of "Daniel, don't come in - I'm making your Christmas present!" and "no, no, no, noooooooo - you can't look at it!" LOL


She was so excited to give it to him. She helped me fold the paper into a box shape and wrapped it and tied the ribbon. (I did the bow). She convinced him to open it for his Christmas Eve present. He was properly impressed and delighted with his "Ligh Teen!" and "Matee!".












She completely cought the embroidery bug and wanted to sew a doll picture for Beth. I stumbled upon a site with Fancy Nancy games and she fell in love with one of their coloring pages.

She didn't get it done in time and decided that she wanted to put it on something else - something for it's own post as well.

Snapshot Sunday

How it began

Soience Project giveaway!

Coming in just under the wire on this one.

The mission:
complete one science project from one of Janice VanCleave's science projects for kids books.


Completed:
one spider


Mission successful!


Did you know that spiders have eight eyes?

Neither did I. Oh joy - a whole new level of terror when I see one running around. lol

Head on over to Ordinary Life Magic to see what others have done.

Christmas Morning!

Just some of my favorite pictures from Christmas morning. Some with captions, some without.



Emma opened her present from Grandpa and checked the map to see where it all came from (New Zealand)


A new globe - thank you grandpa!





A soft bunny snuggly and super-soft blanket - thank you Meg! (and B, A, D & C)




Thank you Grandma for the new quilt!


(it was supposed to be gold but I didn't open it when I bought it back in Oct so I'm glad she likes her silver violin!)


Tuan (and the kids) got me a new camera -wonder why! lol I was super excited - can you tell? I LOVE it!


Emma had to try it out:


Emma colored these - one for her and one for Daniel






After all the present opening the kids played with their new toys


a lot!

And Beth did what Tuan and I wanted to do!

Smart girl!

(I know that I post a lot of these pics of her sleeping. They are just so calming to look at.)

Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve at our house means going and listening to Mommy play bells at the midnight (11 pm) service,

opening new Christmas jammie pants



wrapped in a new Christmas pillow case from Grandma,


patiently posing while Mommy insists on a picture of everyone in said jammie pants,


and then choosing one present to open



before hanging your stocking


and drifting off to sleep to "dream of Santa Clause and his reindeer" (Emma's words).

Christmas outfits

I took on way too many projects too close to Christmas. Any day that I didn't get much done I became very stressed. Any day that I got a lot done was a day that I missed doing things with the kids. So I took a step back and decided that there were certain projects that I was not going to be able to complete.

I was able to get the Christmas outfits done though. Other years I have given Em's Christmas dress as a present on the 25th but this year Emma helped me choose the fabrics so I had them done in time for them to wear the clothes on the last Sunday before Christmas.

I made Emma askirt and a top. They turned out very beautiful I learned a new stitch (bullion stitch) for the embroidery on the front.



I don't make clothes for Daniel because there just aren't that many patterns that don't look dorky if homemade. But this year I found a pattern for a tie and thought - why not! I really didn't expect him to wear it because he doesn't see Tuan wear one and never has put one on before. But he actually wore it! And looked quite dashing if I do say so myself.

Don't you love how Emma has accessorized? lol






For Beth I crocheted a skirt with some red yarn and a ball of fun fur. I tried my hand at machine embroidering a tree and star on her shirt. Eh - not so much. But the skirt is adorable!


This is what she gets to put up with everyday! She is one patient girl.

They love her tons and I wouldn't have it any other way.

Trimming the tree

We always had a real Christmas tree every year growing up and it's a tradition that I love. But this year we had a harder time finding one. There are several Christmas tree lots in town and I had decided on which one I wanted to go to. Most truck their trees in from a state or two away and one was from a local farm. You can guess which one I wanted! But when we got there (both Em and D had woken early and we rolled down the windows so that they wouldn't take 7 pm naps and be awake until 2 am!) the lights were on and the sign was flipped to open but nobody was there! Everyone must have gone to dinner. Two other cars pulled up and they would have sold 3 trees! Expensive dinner! So we drove to a different one and found a very beautifull tree. I just wish it hadn't be trucked in. Here we are trimmin our Christmas tree.





Beautiful!


After lots of fun and yummy food they were out like logs!