Emily Jones

Easy Leprechaun Craft

This morning has been stressful.

Jim had to work today, and that leaves three stir-crazy kiddos with me all day with nothing to do.

I asked the kids if they wanted to maybe do a craft and Joey said: "Can we do a Leprechaun craft?!" 

I thought for a minute and said, "Hang on, I'll see what I can come up with."  So I went to my little Cloffice pulled out some supplies and in about five minutes had a craft for the kids.  I am super proud of myself because I am not an on the fly kind of thinker, so yay me!

I don't know about you, but the worst part about making crafts with the kids is the prep time.  Cutting and tracing and measuring, it just sucks the fun out of it, at least for me.  So let me tell you with great happiness that this little craft takes around  two minutes to prep.

 

Here is my little Leprechaun creation, isn't he cute?!

Here are the materials you will need: 

A square punch

A large circle punch

A larger scalloped circle punch

A heart punch

Cardstock

And scissors or a trimmer, and glue.

You will need to punch: 

Two large circles of the green (my green cardstock was double sided dark and light green, so you may want to grab two different colors of green, but all one color is fine too!)

One large scalloped circle of orange

One large circle of peach

One green square

Two green hearts. 

Then you will cut a small strip of black cardstock for the belt and a small square of yellow for the buckle.

Your supplies should look like this:

You can use white cardstock or construction paper for the base of your project.

 

Using Elmer's glue or a glue stick, adhere the peach circle to the orange scalloped beard, set aside.

Glue your large green circle (the belly) to your paper base, leaving room at the top of your paper for the head and hat.

Next, glue your head to the body, overlapping the two circles just a bit.

Next you will glue your black belt to your Leprechaun's belly.

Then add the buckle.

Use the other green circle, cut it in half, and adhere one half to the top of the leprechaun's head, overlapping just a bit again.

Next, use your green square and place it flush against the half circle.

Grab your two green hearts, dab a bit of glue on the backside of one, and place it over the top of the other, creating a four leaf clover.

Add some glue to the back of your clover and adhere to the leprechauns hat.

Once he is all put together, you can use a black pen to add a face, or legs and arms, and that's it!  Easy peasy! 

Joey made his say "Yay!"  And told me that this craft was "Sooo much fun!"  So there ya go.  A craft that is pleasing to a Second grader, Kindergartner, and a three year old!  Woohoo!

Clean up was a breeze, there was virtually no mess! 

Now on to the other things on today's agenda....LAUNDRY.  (BOO!)

XOXO,

Em

Loving Hands

The other day I got upset over something so stupid.  Something that was not worth crying about, but I did. I heaved heavy, loud, wracking sobs into Jim's chest. 

I sat on the top stair, of the two stair decent that leads into the garage from the kitchen.  Jim knelt in front of me, as he would any of our children, and he held out his arms for me to collapse into.  We sat like this for a few minutes, as tears of frustration, tears of anger, tears of pain, rolled down my cheeks.

It felt good.

Until I felt a tiny hand on my shoulder.  It was Jake.  And my stomach dropped.

I hate to cry like this in front of my kids.  hate.

I know that they should see me cry once in awhile, and they do.  Maybe they see me wipe away tears, okay SOBS, at the end of Toy Story 3, because OMG it's so sad, Andy leaves for college! 

But I never want them to see me like this.  Wallowing in self-pity, crying because I'm pissed.  Not using my words, and basically, having a tantrum.  You know, the same thing I tell them not to do.

Jake asked me, "What's wrong mommy, why are you sad?"  And I didn't know what to tell him.  I paused, and finally just said:

"I'm crying because I'm mad.  Because I'm frustrated.  Isn't that silly?" 

And Jake bent forward, locked his arms around my neck and said, "I love you mommy."

Which made me cry even harder.

And then I heard the tiny pad of Lily's footsteps running into the kitchen.  She was decked out in full princess gear, head to toe, which made me smile.  And Lily stopped, looked at me and asked:

"You sad Momma?"

She came over, put her face in mine, gave me a kiss and rubbed my back, murmuring, "It's okay mommy, it's okay.  Don't cry."

And we sat like this, the four of us in the kitchen.  Jake and Lily were, by this time, both in my lap.  And we rocked back and forth. 

And I began to cry once more.

But this time, I was crying tears of happiness, tears of gratitude.

I am so blessed.

These kids are my everything.

Later that night, after the kids were asleep, and we lay in bed reminiscing about the scene in the kitchen earlier, I marveled at how sweet the kids had been to comfort me the way the did.  How they seemed to know just what I needed in that moment.

I said: "Lily is such a little mommy."

And Jim looked at me, smiled and said:

"And where do you think she learned that?  She learned it from her mommy.  You teach the kids compassion, you show them what kindness is.  She is only imitating the example you set.  You are an awesome mom, and they are so lucky to have you."

You know what?  Sometimes Jim knows exactly what I need to hear too.

My day started off with anger, and frustration and wanting to punch things, but it took one simple act, the act of being surrounded by loving hands, sitting on a kitchen floor, to change my perspective on everything.

All I know is I'm going to do my best to show my children the compassion and comfort they showed me.  The next time one of them is crying because they are frustrated or angry (which happens a lot)  I will not send them to their room for having a tantrum.  I will place loving hands on them and murmur.   "I'm here."

"It's Okay."

 

 

 

 

 

Kitchen Redo For $22.50

Hey all,

So today I thought I'd share with you a fun project that I finished up the other day.

As you can guess by the title of this post, I redid our kitchen for under $23!. 

Now, I am so terrible at taking before shots, and I of course forgot, so here is the closest thing I have to a before..this was taken in April, you might remember it from my Week In The Life series I did.

As you can see, the kitchen was a sea of boring Oak cabinets, no personality whatsoever.  No color.  BOO!  But at least you can enjoy the pic of my super hunky hubby! <3

So here is the AFTER:

When you are on a tight budget but you want to give your kitchen a lift, it can be challenging for sure.  A coat of new paint in a fun color is one of the easiest ways, but is not always practical.

The next best thing, in my opinion, is a great piece of art.  And it doesn't have to be expensive either.  See that guy behind the stove?  I painted that.  I had the canvas in my garage, and the paints I always have on hand...so I grabbed some paint colors that I wanted to bring out in the kitchen and got to work.  It took about 2 hours to paint from start to finish, but I'm very pleased with the end result. :)  It was literally a no cost painting.

Oh, and if you are worrying about the canvas being damaged by stray grease or food splatters..don't!  I sprayed a double coat of clear matte finish over the whole thing, so it can be easily wiped clean!

The canisters on the counter were also no cost.  Remember a couple weeks ago when Jim made me a Cloffice in our bedroom? When I used to scrapbook in the garage, I had all my ribbons sorted by color in the canisters, but alas, there was no room in the cloffice for them.  So they were re-purposed into flour, sugar, and brown sugar jars.  And the tall one with beans was previously just hanging out on our expedit in the dining room.

The rug on the floor is more of a soft mat, and I found it at Target.  It was only $9.99!  The brightly colored dish towels were also at Target.  I got the blue ones for $2.99 and a pack of two striped orange and and one solid orange for $3.99.  What a steal!

A few months ago I was inspired  by this post on Apartment Therapy.  I loved how this smart girl thought to remove the fronts of her cabinets to reveal her cute Fiesta Ware.  What I loved was the fun look of the paper she put in the backs of the shelves, but I was a bit turned off at how busy it looked with every door gone.

After prodding Jim multiple times and making him look at the post, he finally relented and took the doors to the cabinets above the microwave off.  Once they were off it made a HUGE difference in the overall feel of the space.  It took us two days to agree on which papers we wanted in the shelves.  As a scrapbooker, the sheer volume of paper I have is pretty staggering, so we had a lot to choose from.  We both immediately loved the blue, but it took a little convincing to get Jim to like the funkadelic paisley print.  I actually put it in the shelves temporarily for a day and we looked at it and decided it worked.

Once the papers were up, we chose what to display.  One of our Christmas gifts to ourselves was a new set of dishes.  We originally found the 10 piece set of small colorful plates at the Goodwill back in November, and then we decided on the off-white bowls and plates as accents.  The colors of the plates work well with the papers we chose.  Also displayed are my china plates and our Princess House collection of Fantasia Ware.

And I couldn't resist putting my little Gnome in there too.  He is special to me because my super talented Grandma Rose carved him for me.  She is a brilliant wood carver and she has made tons of little guys like these for the 21 grandchildren.  I also have a Santa she made me too. <3

This was Jim's idea...instead of putting an ugly bottle of dish soap on the counter, we used an old syrup jar with a wine cork...much cuter. ;)

Here's a shot from the dining room.  I love this table cloth, not only because it's cute...but I'll tell ya a little secret...it is actually a fabric shower curtain from the Target clearance section, and it was $2.48!  Can't beat that!

So there you have it, a new kitchen for minimal cost but optimal effect! 

Below I broke down the cost, just so you can see how cheap it really was,

 

Total Cost Breakdown:

Canvas and Paint: $0 (already on hand)

Canisters $0 (already on hand)

Paper $0 (already on hand)

Dish Towels $10

Floor Mat $10

Clearance Shower Curtain $2.50

TOTAL COST: $22.50

 

I truly believe in shopping around your home first before buying any new pieces.  I tend to collect little things here and there around the house and when I'm putting together a new space, I'll pull things from other rooms.  It helps with cost but the important thing is to give the pieces you love a home to display them in!

If you've done any new decorating projects lately, leave me a link in the comments, I'd love to check it out!

XOXO,

Em

Welcome 2011

Happy New Year!

I have to tell you, I am so looking forward to 2011 and what it has to offer.  New beginnings are a good thing, new experiences, new goals and things to strive toward.

We rang in the New Year child free, thanks to my sis who had the kids over for a New Years Eve sleepover with my nephew.  Jim and I headed out and had a wonderful dinner at my favorite restaurant by my parents house, Canyons.  They have great Southwestern food, and their Corn Fritters are divine.

After we finished our dinner, we sat and had coffee and chatted at the table for an hour or so, it was so nice to just be, just relax and not worry about antsy kids or the inevitable spilled drink that comes with dinner out with the kiddos.  We used our paper coasters and we jotted down our resolutions for 2011.  We each had four, and they are not small.  They are big.  They are life changing.  We'll see how they go, but I am hopeful and optimistic.  

We are so not the party-animal type so after dinner and few good hours of conversation, we decided to catch the 11pm showing of Black Swan.  It was amazing.  Natalie Portman was spectacular, she deserves an Oscar nod for the role.  What a beautifully shot, visually stunning film. 

New Years Day we went and picked up the kids at my sisters house and I took a few minutes to take each of the kids around the side of her apartment complex to take some pictures.  It was a beautiful day, still some snow on the ground.

Joey wanted to model the sweater my mom made for him, he loves it so much, he wants to wear it over everything, everyday. 

He is just such a sweetie, I can't believe how grown up he looks in these pics.  It makes my heart hurt a little to think that he's growing so so so fast.

 

 

Oh, Mr. Jake.  What a goofy boy he is.  I got so many cute facial expressions from him, but this?  This is just so Jake.  Love it.

And then he spotted a tree, and we had to go have a climb.  He was such a little poser for me yesterday, he wanted to try all kinds of faces and angles...my little model. ;)

 

And last but not least, Princess Lily.  She looks so angelic here, and though she is an angel, most of the time, ;) she is a busy body and was all over the place, so I only got two total photos of her.....

And this is the other. HA!  I love this, she is hilarious, this kid. 

 

After we left my sister's house we went over to pick up Great Grandma from the Retirement Community she lives in, and she treated us to lunch.  The best part of the meal was when Lily was ordering her food (we were at a little place that does Breakfast all day) she told the waitress she wanted "Bacon, Eggs, and PINECONES." 

We all cracked up, and then tried to figure out what she meant.  Scones?  Bagel?  Nope.

Pinecones = Pancakes!

Too cute!

When we were almost finished eating, the two elderly couples that sat across from us in the restaurant, stopped by the table and one of the ladies put her hand on Jim's shoulder and said: "It is so nice to see such well behaved children.  Good Job Mom and Dad." 

It made me so proud. 

After lunch we headed out to the patio and took a couple pictures with Great Grandma.  They just love her, and she thinks they walk on water.  <3

I hope you all had a wonderful Holiday!

I am working on finishing up my December Daily album, which I will share soon, and I even painted last night!  I made a fun abstract canvas for the kitchen...I'll share that too, along with our kitchen redo...

XOXO

Em

December Ramblings

It's definitely starting to feel like Christmas!

We've had our tree up since the second of December, and the lights too, but I'm getting so excited now that Christmas is only a few days away!

We finsihed up our shopping yesterday afternoon, and I cannot wait for the kids to open their gifts.  Also, remember that guitar that Jake asked Santa for?  I'm pretty sure Santa is briging Jake his very own Toy Story guitar. 

Just like every year Joey is getting a TON of books, which I'm sure he'll have read by January 1st.  ;)  That boy is such a voracious reader.  He is getting a ton of Goosebumps books, Diary of A Wimpy Kid 4, 5, and the Do-It-Yourself Journal, Animorphs, various Science related books, and my favorite?  The Baby Sitter's Club Mysteries.  Yep, you read that right.  My boy likes the Baby Sitters Club!  Just don't tell his friends. hehehe.  I am so excited that he enjoys those books, as they were my absolute favorites as a kid.  I had the whole series, including the mysteries and super specials, and I wanted to be Stacy.  So, I am pretty stoked that Joey likes them, though he tells me he likes the mystery ones because I think that makes him feel better about liking such an overtly girlish series. ;)

The present I am most excited about this year?  My novel.  It is a Middle Grade (meaning for middle grade elementary kids) fantasy.  The best part is that Joey is the protagonist in the book, and I wrote it for him.  I finished editing it a couple weeks ago and ordered it through lulu.com, and I got notice yesterday that it should be here sometime this week.  I cannot wait to give it to him.  He has NO idea that I did this. 

Anyway, I thought I'd share some pics from around the house and what we've been up to the last 21 days of December.  I am participating in Ali Edwards' December Daily project, but I'm waiting to put the album together until after the Holidays because I am getting the photos printed and shipped next week.  So here is a bit of our December:

 

My vintage glass bulb lights, LOVE them!

My Christmas Village.

Stockings were hung by the (pictures) with care.

Tis the season for Christmas themed homework!

Our pretty wreath.

The tree has been trimmed. (And re-trimmed by little fingers that like to move ornaments around.) ;)

Taking pictures of ornaments that mean something to me.  This particular one was given to me by my Grandmother when I was a young teen.

Baking and decorating sugar cookies.

Hanging the ornaments on our advent tree.

Tearing off links on our Christmas Countdown chain.

Just a few short days until Christmas!  Unfortunately Joey is having an MRI tomorrow, (more on that later) so I am looking forward to tomorrow being over quickly, and then beginning the joyous festivities. 

Christmas is and will always be my favorite time of the year.

XO,

Em

Month in Review...

It's been a little over a month since I've updated, and I don't know why I feel so guilty about that, but I do...so here's what's been keeping me away....

Field-trip to a super fun Local Museum with Joey's class:

A delightful 78th Birthday Tea Party for Grandma Betty at my mom's house....

This handsome boy of mine had his 29th birthday, and we celebrated with a BBQ and poker night:

And of course Easter, which we shared with Grandma Betty and Aunt Becky:

And lots of fun times in between:

(How to Train Your Dragon in 3D)

Needless to say, I haven't had much time to scrap....I'm still working on layouts for my goal of going through Liz Kartchner's 52 Scrapbooking Challenges...and you can even find one of my layouts on her blog Dear Lizzy {and I was told there are more of mine that will be featured. :-)}   I plan on updating with some new layouts very soon...

Tomorrow I will be back with another post, on a topic that I hope to make a weekly feature....In the meantime, if you've made it this far in this loooooongg post, thanks for reading! 

Season of Change...

Hi friends,

As you may have noticed, I have been having trouble keeping my blog updated.  It's not that I don't want to blog, in fact, a lot of the time I write entries in my head while in line waiting for Joey to get out of school.  But I seem to have fallen into the trap of, "well, it's been so long since I last blogged, how do I recap?" Or, "I have other things to do."  But, I am reminding myself that the reason I started this blog was for me.  For my family, for my kids. 

I don't expect a lot of people to read or comment, I don't want to HAVE to blog in order to make a living, (and kudos to anyone who has to keep up with THAT!) I just want to have a small place in the Internet world that I can call my own, somewhere my memories are written down and easily recalled.

So, I'm making an early resolution this year, well, more of a goal really.  I want to blog from the heart.  I want to tell my stories, even if it's just with pictures, and I want to share more of me.  I don't want to worry about what people think of the post, wonder if it's "okay" to post an entry without pictures or layouts.  I'm just going to do this for me.  I'm going to invite my family to read here, and let them know when it's updated.  They are my true audience, and the ones that most look forward to updates.

So, I would love it if you wanted to continue reading and being a part of my life, even if I don't know you.  My blog is most likely going to involve scrapbooking a lot less and focus on life a lot more, and if that's not your thing, no worries, my feelings aren't hurt if you don't want to read anymore.

Thanks to those people who I call my "online friends" who comment, who email me, who care about what I'm up to, I love that I get to share my world with you, and I hope you will delight in my journeys as I make changes in my life. 

Love to all,

Em

Pumpkin Patch Fun!

Every year we take the kiddos to the same pumpkin patch and get our pumpkins and take pictures, this year I decided to have the kids wear their costumes!

This is Picha's Pumpkin Patch, and even though it was raining the whole time we were there, I still ended up getting some really cute pics of the kids!

Here are my crazy babes...

Joey as Harry Potter: He was soooooo into it!

This is his SERIOUS Harry Potter face, lol!

This is Joey casting a spell on his pumpkin! LOL

Here is Jake as a Rhino, this pic cracks me up!  He was not havin' the picture taking thing!

This is what the top of his costume looks like, such a cute little Rhino!

This is Jake's impression of a scary Rhino face!  HA!

And Jakey finding his "perfect pumpkin"

 

Here is my little Cinderella!  She was so cute!  She is the perfect little princess!

She kept shivering so bad, so we ended up putting on her raincoat, isn't this a cute coat?  Goodwill find for $7!

 

And here is my lovely family, Jake was still not into getting his pic taken, he was kinda pissed, lol...
 

Jake ended up wandering out of the frame, so here is a smiley one of Joey and Lily with Daddy.

We are carving our pumpkins tonight!

We can't wait to trick or treat tomorrow!

And maybe, just maybe I will be in costume too!

Happy Friday!

Em

Busy, Busy!

Things have been so crazy the last couple weeks!

On the moving front, we are officially out of the old house and into the new!  We have about 60% of the boxes unpacked, but because of the schedule this last week and this week, it may take us until july to get all the way unpacked!

The birthday party for the boys on Sunday was so fun!  Unfortunately it wasn't hot enough to go swimming in the lake, but the kids all ran crazy on the playground!  There were about twelve kids total and their parents, we had a big cook out with burgers and dogs, and played pin the tail on the donkey and did a pinata.  Overall it was a big ole fun BBQ!
The boys made out like bandits in the gift department for sure!  Remote control cars, hot wheels galore, books, cute summer outfits, movies, a scooter for Joey and a talking construction hat for Jake, super soakers, and the biggest gift of all, the wii!  I think part of the lack of unpacking may be due in part to the wii!  LOL!  We've been playing like crazy!  The boys got a Ben1o game and a Bolt game, and of course it comes with the 5 sports games, so they've had plenty to play with! 
Joey picked up on how to use the controllers within minutes and is already on level three of Ben10 which is a 10+ game!  Jake LOVES the bolt game and likes to play with mommy.  I will hold the controller and he holds the nunchuck so we work as a  team!
After the kids go to bed J and I have been battling it out with the Wii sports!  I rock at bowling and boxing, he's better at golf and baseball...we're pretty evenly matched at tennis though...so funny...after playing for hours one night I woke up the next morning and my shoulder was sooooo sore!  It's the tennis game!  You slam the controller like a tennis racket, and J says my shoulder hurts because my "technique is lacking" HA!  I beat him a lot on tennis, so my technique can't be THAT lacking!  LOL!  We have now coined my sore shoulder as my "Wiinjury" hahaha!

Yesterday I hopped down to Ikea to pick up another expedit because the one I currently have for my scrap stuff won't fit up the stairs!  We are too afraid to take it apart because of how hard it was (and totally drilled incorrectly IKEA!) to get to fit together, so we just bought a new one to put together upstairs in the loft which is where my new scrap space is going to be.  That's on the to-do list for this weekend!

Oh, and tonight is election night at James' local!  He is nonminated for Vice-President!  Wish him luck and cross everything!  We will find out tonight at the meeting if he was elected!  I'm heading down there at about five tonight and will update tomorrow with the news!

This weekend we are going to our friend Michelle and Jorge's house for their kids bday parties...Isaac is turninig 9 and Bella is turning 5!  Hopefully Michelle and I can get in some scrapping time this weekend because we both have MLS projects to work on!

Okay, I'm off to get Lily dressed!  She is being such a stinker lately!  She is definitely a toddler these days, randomly undressing and running around in her diaper, tantrums galore when I won't let her have a drink of my diet coke or coffe (I know, I'm such a MEAN mommy! LOL!) and talking up a storm!  She has so many words these days!   Some new ones include:

Up!
Banana (not just nana, she now says bananananananana!)
Pew!!! (said while smelling her toes! LOL!
Mommy, Daddy (not just mama and dada, she now said Mommmmyyy and Daddddyy!)
Bo-Bo (her nickname for Joey, he loves it)
Kuh (what she calls Jake, I think she's making the K osund at the end of his name)
Car
Vroom!
All Done!
Mine! (this one we're not too excited about! ha!)
Puppy
Baby (this girl loves her some babies!)
Yum Yum!

And those are just a few!  She's quite the chatterbox!

Anyway, I'm gonna go get her dressed, go grab some coffe and maybe unpack a little before Joey heads off to school!  I'm gonna try to find my usb cord for my camera so I can take pics of the house and upload soon!

Hugs!
E

My Little Shoebox May Projects!

Hey there!

Thought I'd share my MLS projects for May....this month we were lucky enough to partner with Hambly Studios and use some of their products in conjunction with our MLS product!  I LOVE Hambly, so this was extra fun for me!

Also, this month at My Little Shoebox, we are focusing on showing different techniques with our transparencies and chipboard, so I have added those techniques in my descriptions.  You can find the rest of the MLS DT's techniques and projects here starting May 1st!

Playing Ponies

Journaling:

This was the best $2.99 I ever spent!  I found this My Little Pony house at the goodwill and you fell in love!  You now have4 ponies and love to bounce them around their house!

Technique: I used a nail file on the chipboard letters to create a cross-hatched pattern.

Love Birds

Journaling:

We are totally snuggly lovebirds!  Even after all these years, you still make me weak in the knees!  I am so lucky to have  found you and made a life with you.  I love our beautiful family and I love you! April 2009

Happy Lily

Journaling:

You are always smiling!

Technique: One of my favorite things to do with chipboard titles is to layer the letter for extra depth.  I also ran out of the letter "P" and used letter "a" turned upside down with the tails cut off!

Another technique here is creating personalized embellishments with the transparencies.  I used the "Who's There" flowers and stickled them so they popped right off the page! 

Beach Baby (MLS and Hambly)

J0urnaling:

Lily, I think your fave part of our beach vacation was sitting on the beach in your baby bikini!  Although I don't think you liked the sand too much after you figured out what it tasted like!

Expecting You (MLS and Hambly)

I used my square punch to punch out the MLS patterned paper and the Hambly Overlays!  I didn't know if you could punch through an overlay, but surprise! You can!  I then stitched the squares with my sewing machine and embellished!

Budding Artist (MLS and Hambly)

Journaling:

Lily you loved painting at the Children's Museum!  You were very excited to try it by yourself, and even though you got it EVERYWHERE it was great fun!  You painted such a pretty picture!

I created this paintbrush my free hand drawing the base and stem and used a die cut heart turned upside down for the brush!  I then flicked pink paint on the top and bottom of the overlay for added texture.

Congrats Card (MLS and Hambly)

So there they are!

Also, if you get a chance stop on over to Bella Blvd, where I am featured!

And oh yeah.....It's my birthday! ;-) Happy 25 to me!

-Em