Rainbow Craft!

Early on during the stay at home order I saw this video on Facebook for how to make a rainbow. I just happen to have all he craft material needed. I thought it would be fun for Ella and I to work on this together. Of course those videos make it seem like you can make a craft in 5 minutes when it fact it takes 5 days.  

The first thing we had to do was measure out the craft rope. The rope they used in the video was lighter colored and smoother. This rope was more scratchy, but it still worked. After cutting the rope we had to cut the wire to size and then glue two pieces of rope together with wire in the middle. We did that 8 times. 

I got out my yarn stash and let Ella choose the colors for our rainbow. 

Then we started wrapping each piece of rope. Of course each piece of rope got bigger and took longer to wrap. 

The masking tape on the edges was to help the ends not fray and to also give you a visual guide of where the yarn should start and stop. 

Once all our pieces of rope were finally wrapped, Ella actually thought she might want to make 2 rainbows with 4 colors each by dividing the rainbow in half. Ultimately she decided to keep it as one big rainbow though. 

To finish it up I hot glued each piece together and then I glued a piece of string on the back side so we could hang it up. We also took the tape off the ends and unwrapped the twine so the ends looked curly. 

I used a Command hook to hang it up on one of the windows in our dining room. I just love how it turned out and I really love that it's not typical rainbow colors. It definitely took longer than I thought it would, but it was fun to be able to use up some of my craft stash and not have to go to the store and buy anything. 

Easter Gifts!

Easter was weird this year...the kids didn't get any sort of Easter Egg Hunt or Easter baskets. We are planning on doing a make up Easter Egg Hunt on 4th of July...why not combine a few holidays into one to make it a MEGA holiday. With the way the phases are going for reopening Washington I have a feeling this 4th of July is going to be legendary anyways! 

I really wanted to get gifts for the kids that would encourage them to play together. I looked up outside toys since I also want them to get outside and play more. I found this fun pitching machine for under $50. It takes D batteries and it's really fun. I read a review about how the balls that come with it aren't that accurate so I went ahead and bought a 12 pack of these balls and they really are better. 

It was fun teaching the kids how to properly stand in order to hit the ball. If they hit the ball into the neighbors yard we considered it a home run. 

I also bought this indoor or outdoor catching game. Jack and I are the main ones that play with this. They are so much fun!!! We did play it with Owen and Zeke in the front yard once and we played it like Pickle in the Middle. We had the best time and the boys got along so well. It was one of those magical moments in time that I wish I could freeze! 

One thing Michael has wanted me to buy for our family for a while now is The Farming Game. He played it once when he was around 12 years old and he enjoyed it so much it's stuck with him ever since. I finally bought it and we had a great time playing. It is one of those games that takes multiple days to play, but it was definitely fun! 

These weren't typical Easter gifts, but this whole year hasn't been typical so far so it's quite fitting really! 

Easter Sunday!

Easter Sunday 2020 will go down as the most interesting Easter ever. 

We had church at home...it's been so awesome that our church has had live streaming from the first Sunday we didn't meet. It's so great to worship together at our own homes. 

Me and my pretty girl. 

It looks like I curled my hair, but that's actually just Ella's hair. We have exactly the same color hair. 

Even thought we weren't going anywhere I still made the kids dress up. I hadn't actually picked anything out until the night before. I knew that Ella would wear the dress I bought her for her birthday, but thankfully the boys had shirts that all sort of coordinated. Of course Owen was not happy to have to wear a dress shirt. 

A couple days before Easter I finally got around to hemming my dress that I bought for Ella's party. I had to wear it with booties for her party and still had to lift it up to walk around. I really wanted to wear it with sandals so I knew I had to hem it. I took off a good 3 inches, but now it's perfect! 

My handsome guys! 

Once I saw this picture I was surprised that I had my hand on my hip. I seriously don't even remember standing like that. Michael says I do it all the time though. 

Daddy and his girl!

Me and my boys!

Since it wasn't a typical Easter I decided to go against the norm with food as well so we had Greek Pitas for dinner. The kids absolutely LOVE Greek food! 

I'm so thankful that God isn't surprised by all the craziness in the world right now. He knew it was coming and He knows when things will go back to normal and what that normal will look like. He knows the number of days we have on earth and I find comfort in that! I'm so grateful that He died for my sins and rose again conquering death so when my physical body dies and I leave this earth I can spend eternity in Heaven with Him. 

Hammock & DQ!

 During the month of April we had such beautiful weather. I got in a routine of letting the kids go on electronics for an hour and a half each afternoon so I could lay out in my hammock reading my book. I know I struggled last summer with actually using my hammock, but not this year. I have laid in it more times than I can count. Even though it was nice out it would still get chilly when the wind kicked up. I started laying down a blanket on my hammock to help the ropes from separating. The kids had made them separate by putting their feet through the ropes. 

Months ago my Mom gave me her Kindle Reader and I'm telling you I am LOVING it. I'm always late to the game when it comes to technology, but it's just awesome. I love buying books from Amazon...especially when you can choose to have things shipped later and get digital credits! I also love how easy it is to read outside on it. So amazing! The only thing I wish it could do is connect to the library....maybe it can I should look into that more. Right now I'm reading this book series by Lisa Regan...it's the Detective Josie Quinn series. I'm loving it! 

On this particular night...April 8th...I thought it would be fun to get out of the house and go somewhere in the truck. We told the kids we were just going for a drive even though we were actually going to DQ for ice cream. It wasn't until we pulled in and drove into the drive thru lane that they figured it out.

We've official assigned seats for the truck. Ella gets to sit upfront with Michael and I. 

All the boys are in the back with Zeke in the middle. So far this has worked out well. 

Of course if it's just the kids and I driving around in the truck Owen and Jack argue about who gets to sit in the front with Ella and I. 

Diamond Paintings!

Ella's Christmas gift from Santa was one of those diamond paintings. I thought it would be a fun craft that her and I could work on together. She started working on it, but then she got bored. It is a more monotonous task. At the beginning of the Covid-19 scare and homeschooling I was pretty anxious so doing a monotonous task was actually really helpful. I would sit at the dining room table, listen to worship songs, working with one color of diamonds at a time and just feel the anxiety melt away. 

Ella was a little upset that I was working on her picture more than she was, but I explained how it was helping me feel better so she was okay with it after that. Of course the boys all wanted to help as well so I finally broke down and just bought a 4 pack of paintings so each kid would have their own painting to work on. 

The four pack was all animals....3 felines and 1 canine. They were all these fun rainbow colors. One thing I've noticed is the pictures are way more fun to work on if there are many different colors. 

Owen's is a cat, Jack's is a lion...

Ella's is a cheetah and Zeke's is a wolf. 

While the kids worked on their new paintings, I was able to finish Ella's first picture. Of course since this very first day the kids have worked on their painting a grand total of ZERO times! I know part of it is because the weather has been pretty great and the main reason...the novelty of it wore off once they actually got them. I have worked on Owen's painting once so I'm not necessarily complaining that they aren't working on them. At least I'll have lots of opportunities to help my anxiety melt away! 

Sidewalk Chalk Art!

Another thing I wanted to start doing more of was including the kids in cooking or baking. Something I've realized in doing this is...I really enjoy having the kids help me bake, but I absolutely love my alone time when I cook. 

Ella asked if we could have French Toast so on our second day of Spring Break...April 7th...she helped me make everyone breakfast. 

Proud girl! 

Later on in the afternoon it was so pretty I wanted to get outside. I remembered I had this whole thing of sidewalk chalk I got on clearance last year so I grabbed that and some masking tape. I had heard about people decorating their sidewalks with messages to bring joy to people as they got out for their walks.

At first the kids did not understand what I was trying to tell them. Jackson was especially vocal in thinking that it was going to be lame. I told them to just give it a chance. I decided to do mine with a heart in the center because I had also seen that people were using hearts as a way to say thank you to all the healthcare workers. 

After seeing mine Jack decided he wanted a heart too. Ella asked me to tape her's so it would say 'Hi'.

Zeke was my helper when it came time to color mine in. 

Jack was starting to get it now. 

It really was a glorious day! The sun was out, but it wasn't too hot working out in it. 

Mine all finished before removing the tape. 

Ta Da!!! 

After this the kids finally understood what I was talking about. Seeing is believing! 

Jack was eager to take his tape off. 

Looking good Jackers! 

Ella need some help finishing hers off so I helped her color a bit. 

I really love how they all turned out and it was something fun and different to do outside. 

Later that afternoon one of our neighbors stopped by to tell us that this truly brightened her day. That was exactly what I wanted them to do. Yay!!! Of course now that it's been a while the rain has washed them away so I'm thinking we'll need to go out and make another round of them once we have a good break in the weather. 

To finish our fun day the kids asked for Michael to make a fire in the fire pit. 

First fire of the season! 

Being stuck at home can be hard so any reason to get outside has really been a lifesaver for us! So thankful for this amazing house, yard and family that I have! 

Wood Projects!

When I realized that I would be homeschooling I really embraced the idea that I could teach my kids whatever I wanted. Not that I don't normally teach my kids a variety of things, but with them being home all day that does lend us more time in order to do things we might not typically do. Also I was trying to keep my own spirits up as well. I was thinking back to something that really brought me joy and that was woodworking. I thought it would be fun to teach the kids a bit about tools and safety. First we needed a project and it had to be something I could built with just scrap wood. 

Of course I went straight to Pinterest! 

Here was the inspirational piece I found. Not only was it small and I was sure we had the wood for it, but it would also be very functional. Our love seat is right by the opening into our living room from the foyer and there isn't room for there to be an end table on one side. It's always super annoying to sit on that end of the love seat since you have to pull your glass on the floor and risk knocking it over and spilling it or you have to set the remote control on the arm of the love seat and it always ends up falling off. 

I gathered everything I needed in the garage before I had the kids come out. We went over safety such as wearing gloves, safety glasses and ear plugs. I also went over measuring and had each of the kids help me with that. 

The inspiration piece was just a starting point I didn't use the exact measurements so I drew up a quick rendering with the cut list so I'd know what I needed. Once we got to cutting each of the kids helped me cut. Normally I like to make all the cuts and then start with assembling, but since this was my design I wasn't exactly sure how long certain cuts needed to be so we had to cut a few and then start assembling and then cut the rest. During this time was when it became more difficult to keep all the kids attention and it became really clear that Owen was the one that was really interested. That was okay with me. I feel likes that's actually a great way to learn. Try out as many things as you can to find the one you like. If you don't like it move on until you find something that's your thing. 

Sweet helper boy! 

We originally screwed the legs on in the center and then realized that adding that back piece that was supposed to hold magazines or books in would in turn hang over the bottom so we had to unscrew the legs and fasten them directly on the edge. 

Owen really enjoyed getting to use the drill! 

Here was our finished end table. It really didn't take that long and it was quite fun to build. 

Dry fitting it! It's perfect for this little area. 

The top little shelf is perfect for the remote to sit on or a sleeve of Ritz crackers for Michael. I read to the kids everyday for about 20 minutes so we put the book I read to them down in the lower section so it doesn't wander off. 

We love dark wood at our house and I especially love dark wood with red hues in it so I choose to stain this with a English Chestnut.

I put two coats of Poly on it to protect it and give it a little shine. I did put a coaster on it since I don't want it to get water damage. 

The following week Owen really wanted to build a pencil case. He told me his vision and I drew it up. 

It was a basic box design. 

A couple other tools we got to use for this project was the nematic nail gun and some clamps to help hold it together while we nailed it in place.  At first Owen wanted to build two boxes one for Sharp pencils and one for Dull pencils. 

We wanted to use my burning tool to write Sharp & Dull on each box, but it was really hard to write with that burning tool and we didn't want to ruin the box and make it look hideous. He decided that one box was enough and we'd just store it next to the sharpener so if your pencil was dull you could fix that right away. 

Super happy with his build! 

Here it lives right next to the pencil sharpener and RIP my Sunflower pitcher that I knocked off the back of the desk raising the blinds one day. 

After posting about our building projects I had a friend from church ask if I'd take orders for the end tables. I've had people ask me to build stuff for them before, but they usually don't take me up on it. I love to build things so I was hoping she meant what she said and she did. She asked what I'd charge her and I told her to just get me a Lowe's gift card so I could buy more wood. 

Owen was all about building another end table. One thing we learned from building our end table was that we really need to pre-drill the holes before we screw them. I've known this, but I'm usually lazy about it. Since I was making it for a friend I knew we needed to take the extra time and do it correctly. 

It really did make everything easier even if it took longer so I'll most like do this every time now. 

So proud of his build! 

On to the second one! 

We actually had just enough wood to make these two. The top piece is a 2 X 8 and I only had this one chunk left that I was able to cut in two.

I ended up staining these a dark color, but it didn't have any red hues in it. My English Chestnut stain was almost gone and I didn't know if it would cover 2 end tables. I also gave it two coats of Poly. My friend picked these up and April 20th. She was so sweet. She gave Owen and I money to go on an ice cream date and then money for materials. She also brought me a jar of her mom's homemade raspberry freezer jam. So yummy! The funny thing was another friend of mine had borrowed our Carpet Cleaner and she brought it back that day and left it on the porch with a homemade loaf of bread she made for us. So I had some yummy bread to put my jam on. So fun! My friend from church has actually already asked for another end table...she gave one of them to her mom for her birthday present. I need to head out to Lowe's to get another 2 X 8, but right now it seems like it's crazy at the hardware so I'll probably do that sometime in May.

If anyone would like me to build them something please let me know. I have lots of scraps, but even if I don't have the right wood or hardware if you go buy it I'll build it. :)