July 2012 Photo Round Up

We had some fun this month!! I'm going to attempt a photo round up each month. If you'd like follow me on Flickr, where I share my better shots :)

Hope you had a great July!!

Finish It Friday

This was started AND finished today :) Thank goodness for little boys who listen and play together for once!

100% wool granny square circle potholder/hot pad. It got a little away from me size wise, but I still love it. :)

Work in progress. This lovely yarn is from Liberty Wool and is GORGEOUS.

Finished!!! Its big enough for a large pot, so that works out great for big dinners :)

 The Granny Circle pattern is from Purl Bee

The back is a flat circle from Attic24. Lucy is right, the stitches can quickly get away from you, and I did end up slightly off count and the circle started to ripple. But once I stitched it to the top piece, and after blocking, it will be fine :) The outside scallop stitch is from Crocheting with Raymond.

So, it's nice to have a little pretty in my kitchen. I figure if I slowly add crocheted things to the house, my husband won't notice their invasion of the yarn love.

I hope you have a fabulous weekend!!~~Amy

WIP Wednesday

I always have WIP's around here. Since I do blog ahead, I admit these pics may be behind and may no longer be WIP's (Works in Progress)....but anyhoo, its gratuituous shots of yarn and fabric or home projects, so roll with it.

Last week's WIP was the lovely cowl from Frayed Knot. It was beautiful. I have to make some adaptations for my next one because I don't like a lot around my neck, and I live in Louisiana, so a light weight yarn is better, but I had to try with this awesome blue yarn I snagged on clearance. (Deborah Norville "Lagoon".) You can get the pattern for the cowl in her Shop.

And it's finished!!

I'm a sucker for shell stitches and flowers...I love it. I'm thinking it'd make a great blanket pattern too!!
~~Amy

I Met Beyonce'....

Chances are if you read this blog, you know who Beyonce' is...and I don't mean a voluptuous R&B singer...

Well, on a recent trip to Ponchatoula, LA with my sister on a shopping trip, I ran across a cousin of Beyonce's. She was awesome. I wanted her. But alas, she could not come home with me. So, we took a snapshot to memorialize the beautiful moment.

 Yes that's really me....

It was an awesome day....saw some great things like this awesome green door on the side of the building that houses Nest Interiors.

And this great sign in downtown Hammond, La.

I also scored big that day...this vintage farm set that I remember playing with as a child. I also found this rocking chair that I have been hunting for for years. We had one when I was a kid, and I loved it! Best part?? Found it for 30 bucks!!

Have to love an afternoon of antiques hunting and quality sister time!
~~Amy

Finish It Friday

Flowers on a Rainy Day....

Made a few flowers, several for hair clips for a photo shoot for my niece, and the rest just for fun :) It was pouring while I made these, but they're a bright little fun piece on a stormy day!

~~Amy

Three Weeks Left??

There are three weeks until school starts. THREE WEEKS? Perhaps you read that with a sense of dread and the sound of a mother on the edge.

Ahhh, but you would be mistaken grasshopper...I am actually saying that with a sense of disbelief. Summer has flown by so that there are only THREE WEEKS left until school starts!!?? Yes, summer is wearing thin...I'm running out of ideas that I WANT to do, let alone that I CAN do (Pinterest is great, but only goes so far...)

We've done some awesome things just in the past week!

"Magic Doorway" of crepe paper streamers.

Sponge Water Bombs.

Playing with a cheap, huge Frisbee.

But something great happened today...my older one..H, my "glass is half empty, this sucks" kid, said to me, "Mom, I like when you do all the cool stuff for us like the magic doorway and the water bombs and water bed. Thanks." He usually only shows appreciation when he's sucking up. That's when he walks up and hugs me and says, "you're the best mommy ever, I love you." I have to watch myself, I tend to be worn out when he does this, tired of his whining for something he can't have, or just overall "too busy"...and I too often look at this as his sucking up and say, "ugh what do you want NOW?"

How would I feel if I was on the receiving end of that? No matter his motivation, even if it is selfish and he's trying to get something out of me, I am a grown up, I can say no to whatever it is. But before that, because he said those words to me, I should stop, hug him back and say "Thanks buddy, you're a pretty awesome kid yourself." And I do, a lot of the time. But sometimes I don't...I'm human.

So it was nice to hear that he appreciated the time it takes for me to do the fun stuff. He knows I work from home and I cram a lot into one day. He knows he drives me batty but he's glad I try.

So I hope I make the next three weeks the best three weeks of his summer!!

Back in May I wrote a Pinterest Planned Summer. Let's see how I did so far!

Original List:

*Glow sticks in the bathtub

*Balloon tennis

*Plastic sheet cover your homework sheets=dry erase.

*Make an obstacle coarse with crape paper streamers. They crawl and step over all of it while trying not to touch the streamers.

*Go Dollar Store shopping. Give them each 5 bucks and they're in heaven.

*Tear drop volcanoes. Put baking soda on a tray. Fill paper cups with vinegar and food color. Use a dropper to create fizzy foam!

~~~~~~From my head~~~~

*Join the summer library reading program.

*Go swimming.

*Have Pajama Day, complete with blankets, pillows, a movie.

*Have a lemonade and freezie pop stand.  We made four bucks!!

*Discounted movie trips

*Visit the little local beaches on the lake.

*Sculpt with air dry clay

*Make rainbows and suns from paper plates and tissue paper (or crepe paper)

*Visit Culinary Kids

* Eat LOTS of snowballs!


~~~~~From Various Pins and Blogs~~~~

*Cup Race.

*Use pool noodles to hit blown up balloons.

*Nerf Gun Shooting Range

*Craft sticks and vecro for making letters and shapes.

*Tin Foil River

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So we've done a lot so far! Three more weeks to have a lot more fun!!! Also, a little time to stop and smell the flowers....

~~Amy

I think we need a change...of diet...

I have a bad case of the blah's. No energy, EXTREMELY limited patience with my children (more limited than my usual short fuse), general grumpiness, and just MEH. I think it's the heat, the kids being out of school, the stress of having a house on the market that no one seemingly even wants to LOOK at....but I suspect a huge underlying cause is my diet.

I've been Gluten Free for over 7 years now and it's been quite a journey. But before that I definitely had an unhealthy diet. I was raised on sugary, fried, high fat, high calorie foods. Greens? Hah! Veggies?? HAH HAH! I come from the land of "if it moves, kill it and fry it.". My mother showered me with sugary snacks and treats rather than deal with me. (When she went into the hospital before she died her blood sugar was over 600....it was obviously an addiction for her.)

I too have a rampant sweet tooth. Now, my diet is LIGHTYEARS ahead of where it was as a kid. Now I WILL eat fruits and veggies, in a variety of forms. But I live with three very very picky eaters, one big and two little.

We've had a major food battle here for years. Our oldest is slightly better than the younger, but the youngest, E, eats very little. Nothing much healthy and we can use his Autism excuse all day long, but in the end, it's been that I don't want to deal with the epic battle that will ensue when I cut off his normal snacking and force healthy food. It's going to be uuuuuuuuuuuuugly.

What I'm thinking is, the only way for me to do this is to drastically change what is IN the house for us to eat. Now I'm not one who thinks you can't ever have dessert, sodas, etc. Even the great "health gurus" say if you want to lose weight to not cut out your faves ENTIRELY. Then you will feel extremely deprived and gorge.

But if the unhealthy food is IN the house, you will eat it. Therefore I am vowing to cut out some things from our diet. I'm sure this will be a process. I am not throwing out food we already have, because I don't have the funds to just toss food. But I made a small victory today when I refused to buy the kids the fruit chewy gummy treats they suck up like crazy. Yes they were 1.99 on sale, but NO, I walked away!

I found this site and it seems much more manageable. 100Days of Real Food. I want to look at food as God intended. If it has 8 thousand ingredients, put it back. If I cannot pronounce or explain where the ingredient comes from, put it back. Check out her Meal Plans here: http://www.100daysofrealfood.com/our-free-meal-plans/

So here's the foods I'd like to change out:


NO MORE:                                                 INSTEAD EAT:
"fruit" gummy treats                                        Natural, organic gummies, in less amount
Candy at home                                              Fruit, Organic Gummies
Soda at home                                                Soda only bought while "out" (church, out to dinner, special
                                                                     treat)


Daily Must Eats: (adapted from site linked above)

• 2 Different Fruits/Veggies with EVERY meal (this will be hard and vary depending on how often I go to the store)

• Only coffee, water, and 1 serving of juice allowed for me. Water may be sweetened with Crystal Light Pure to make it easier on me. Coffee is stevia and light creamer.

• For kids: Limit 2 milks per day, for E slowly cutting back the amount of Nesquik until A) we run out B) he's off it completely, whatever comes first. 1 Juice per day for each boy, water the rest of day.***NOTE, since I wrote this blog post, E now drinks WHITE milk with NO Nesquik!***

• As much as I'd love to only buy locally raised, organic meats...it's just not available or in the budget. So I will instead: Make 2 red meat meals, 3 chicken/poultry meals, and the rest meatless or fish.

• No fried foods. This is fairly easy for us as the only thing I ever deep fry is sometimes chicken nuggets, so we'll limit that to a monthly meal. Being gluten free, makes this one easier.

• Fast food once per week. (Soda can be consumed this night.)

• No low fat, reduced fat versions of food. We already do that, I found most of the "light" versions of foods are full of chemicals. I'd rather reduce the amount of the full fat item than eat a subpar substitution. Don't get me started on margarine...

• 100% Whole Grain, this is a harder goal for us, being Gluten Free.  I will say this, whenever possible, if there is a high fiber/high grain gluten free version of a GF Item (i.e. bagels), I will choose that one when possible.

• Stop eating when full, very doable. I hate that "oh my God, I ate way too much" feeling. Blech. For my husband, not so easy.

• Limit refined sugars. I'm not saying "no refined sugars" as this blog does. I just think that's too much to ask. I think stevia, agave, honey, and even good ol' sugar are fine in small amounts.

• Limited food dyes. Just by cutting the fruit gummies this will help alot. I have KoolAid mixes on hand for emergencies but mostly they are used for my yarn dyeing, so no worries there! LOL

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I think if I can implement these suggestions, we will all feel a lot better. Will we slip up? I'm sure. Will we have days where we still feel bad? Of course. But I know that for example, both my boys have digestive issues on top of our need for the Gluten Free diet. How much better would that be if they ate better? I can't blame it on them, I am the one putting food on the table. I am the one stocking the fridge and pantry. So if I DO NOT stock certain items, then they will have no choice but to eat what's there.

My new motto...."Eat it or starve."

Here's to better health! I'll let you know how I do!
~~Amy

What's On the Hook?

What's on the hook lately?

I'm trying to decide what pattern to use for a blanket. I love both patterns, but cannot decide!

There is the sunburst granny pattern, which is larger, and more texturally fun.

and the Summer Garden pattern from the fabulous Lucy of Attic 24.
This one is smaller and quicker. I can't decide!

And I love this color scheme, so I'm working on a standard granny square baby blanket in the same colors :)

I'm continuing to work on granny stripe blankets and shawls, as well as the Washed Ashore afghan.

I hope you're creating something fun!!
~~Amy

Wordless Wednesday

One Year Ago Today...

Happy Fourth!!!

And Then There Were Two...

Artoo the guinea pig has a new friend...his name is Yoshi and he's adorable. So far they're getting along....let's hope they stay buds!