Alto Fair! Yippee

Ok, the biggest little fair.... or so it's called.... The Alto Fair!

Well, my little demons were in the fair. Pulled in a wagon by my father in law. He sells old tractors on the side. My step-mother-in-law sells crap too, it changes all the time. So they are in the fair hockin their wares. Here's some pictures.


Hubby and boys



And hubby's aunt Carol (she's the greatest!)

My sewing machine hates me!

I don't know what happened, I love my machine. Sure, he can be tempermental, but who doesn't get a bit cranky every now and then? I did some applique using wonder under, and it gunked up my needle, and made me skip stitches, and was darn right a mess. So I muttled through it not really loving it, but it did give the bag a charm. I cleaned up my machine, changed my needle, started sewing again, and it still isn't working. I've adjusted my tension, etc.. nothing seems to be helping. It is sewing lines, but the stitches are looking loose on top. Like the bottom thread is coming up through the top. I don't know what to do. Sometimes when I leave him alone he behaves better in the morning. I sure hope so. Anyway, this is the bag I made for a swap on Craftster.org. It's a grocery tote. It's nice and big. I want to make some for myself.


Here's the whole bag


Here's a close up of the veggies. We've got a tomato (ok, yes EVERYONE knows it's a fruit, yet know one cares!) an ear of corn, a baby brussel sprout, (there is a reason for this I'll share later,) a carrot, and a celery. used fabrics for all the pieces except the corn tassel and the carrot greens. The faces I like some more than others.

Ok, brussel sprout story, I hate brussel sprouts not so much the taste, but the smell. I can't eat something that smells like feet. Anyway, since I don't like them I don't make them, since I don't make them my kids had never had them either. Well, one day we were leaving school, and my youngest son, Lore, says to me, "Why don't you ever let us have brussel sprouts?" To this I sort of chuckled, and looked around seeing all of the weird looks on people's faces. I explained to him " I don't really like them, so I never make them" Then he starts to whine a bit (very uncharacteristic of him,) and says, "THAT'S NOT FAIR, I WANT BRUSSEL SPROUTS! PLEASE make me brussel sprouts!!!!" Now I had people looking at me with such confusion. NO child ever BEGS for brussel sprouts.
Well we went to the store and all 3 of the were giddy with their bag of brussel sprouts. We got home and they had to try them right away!!! They took one bite and looked at each other and said... "wow they taste ok, but they smell horrible!" And now they won't eat them. I find it really funny..... maybe I'm the only one.

Craft Room Clean Up

Inspired by the "Share Your Mess... Then let's clean it up" post on craftster.org. I have decided to post pictures of my horribly messy craft space. I'll be honest, I'm really embarrassed to be posting this, as it is filthy!



Here is my craft room, you can see tons of Halloween storage, fabric, gifts, boxes of costumes, yarn, etc...



Here is the closet in my craftroom, filled with school supplies, teacher thank you gifts, alginate & plasters for mask making (along with my husband's plaster head) And tons of miscellaneous. I am truly hoping to work on this and get myself more organized! Tips are welcome!

We're having a rainbow heat~wave

Oh my, it's hot in here! Most people who don't live in Wisconsin seem to think that it's always cold here. Really that isn't true. I mean it's no tropical paradise, but still. Right now it is 103F on the thermometer across the street. That is before you consider the grotesque humidity that is here right now. We have heat warnings right now, so honestly the kids and I are locked up tight in our air conditioned downstairs. So I've been trying to get some sewing done, I got a bit further on my square quilt. I have given in to using same fabrics more than once, but I'm still only using swap fabrics, so I am further than I could have been. I still desperately need more squares, especially purple, red, yellow, and orange! (If interested please pm me on craftster.org my username is Ezri_B)
Also, I did find my camera, so yippee I have pictures!!! Well, ok, A picture, of my one nearly finished panel of quilt....

It's between 5.5 & 6 feet long right now. I have a little more to go on this one, then I can begin the next one.
I'm so excited about this. This is really the first thing I've made for me, that I didn't NEED. Plus it is so neat getting all these wonderful fabrics from all these amazing crafters all over the world! It's this awesome friendship quilt from people I've never even met. What an amazing concept! I am going to love having this bright, beautiful quilt on my bed (my bed has never seen a quilt, I've never made a quilt that has stayed in my house, they've always been for gifts!)

Stuff N More Stuff

Ok, so for some reason my camera seems to be missing. I'm not exactly sure where or when I lost it but I did. I unfortunately have been putting off posting because I wanted to post pictures. But since I can't find it I will have to just post words (boring I know.)
Baseball has finished for the boys. I'm really quite glad of that. They both did really well, and I think they had fun, so that's what's important. I don't know if Levi will want to play next year. The age group he is in now is really quite competative, and he's really into it more for the friends and fun. Lore wants to be in it again next year, but the Squirt league that they had this year was really a joke, (they don't call any kids out, even if they are out they still run. Everyone scores, etc...) so if they make changes we'll let him be in it.
Liam's soccer starts up soon, so he's excited about that. I don't think he understands how much running is involved, but he's excited none the less.
Dance sign ups should be soon, but our dance teacher had to quite and get a full time job since her husband's job (teacher) was severly cut along with all of his benefits. So we're not sure if we'll have a dance instructor or not. I really hope so. We have the fairs, and swimming lessons coming up. Then back to school. No rest this summer I guess.

As far as crafting goes. I have a nice strip of my little postage stamp squares. I am really excited about this quilt, but I need more squares! Whenever someone is sweet enough to send me squares and I receive them in the mail, my husband announces. "You got more crack in the mail" because I just get excited and drop what ever I'm doing to sort through them and put them in their color catagory. It's like crack to me. Plus, every extra time I have I'm cutting all my scraps into little 1.5 inch squares. I am really trying to limit quilt to 1-2 squares of the same fabric, but I may have to break that if I don't start getting more fabric. We'll see.

I have been waiting for my next swap to begin. I'm very excited, and now there is only one day left to sign up, which means that the Harry Potter for our Kids, swap will be starting soon. I can't wait to get crafting! Craftster only seems to have specialized harry swap going on right now, so this one is a little more general which I like.

Well, that's about it for now. Wish me luck on finding my camera so you can see pics of my quilt and such.

Where has the summer gone?

You know that summer has flown by when we haven't gone camping at all, none of my major summer projects have even been started, and the summer library program is ALREADY DONE!
Where went the summer?
School supply sales are already on, we have had the lists for quite some time (we get them before school lets out,) but we were sent a second copy already. UGH, I'm not ready for fall, I have too much to do!

Though I much prefer the crisp fall nights to the steamy summer ones. And Halloween is coming, and the kids will all be in school all day, so I should have more time for getting things done during the day. So I guess I can't complain too much, but I only get my babies home for a few months, I'm going to miss them.

CrispyTabberTots

Well, we went to the Dells this weekend with some of my in-laws. We had a pretty good time, but we did get a bit sunburned. My dad has always called me TabberTot, so he thinks it's hilarious to call me Bunt TabberTots. It irks me that I NEVER used to burn when I was a kid, then I went to California for the summer and I got quite severely burned, and now I'm white (I was always very dark skinned,) and I burn. It sucks. We put sunscreen on all the time, but yet I still got burned.

Crafting wise I didn't get much done, I did make a decision though. I changed my mind a little bit on the postage square quilt. Not a lot, still rainbow in effect, just instead of wider diagonal strips, I'm going to do a bit narrower diamonds. So I ripped up all my finished squares. And now after I move my living room around (I got bored with it,) I will start sewing that together again. I'll post pictures soon. That's about it.

Liam HP Card Monster

Well, my middle son Liam and I were home alone on Saturday. This is a rare event. And he kept showing me his Harry Potter cards, but as he pulled them out of his pocket, they sort of flew around all over the place. So I suggested a case to put them in. I told him we could make it. He responded by telling me no, only if a cool monster could hold them, would he want a case. Well, the boy asks and the boy receives! So this is what he and I put together on Saturday. He did most of the sewing, while I did most of the cutting.
He calls him Super Blue, and you can't see it, but he has a clip on the back that can attatch to Liam's belt loops. He loves him

Here's an open shot with the cards in.

Postage Stamp Quilt Beginnings

Well, I've begun piecing my squares together as I receive them from the craftster swap. I thought I'd show you what I've been doing. I'm going for a rainbow type pattern. My sons have been helping me, so I know there's one for sure I will have to repiece, it's seams are too narrow, but the rest they've been doing pretty well. I do need to trim them a bit though.

A group shot of my pieced pieces.

A little closer

And the others closer.
Now this isn't how I'm going to really place the, I just wanted them together for the shot. I need LOTS more to even get the pieces set up right. But I love the look so far!

Crochet Swap Squares

Well, I finished my squares for my Blankie Square Swap on Craftster.org. I like them a lot, I hope she does too. She asked for 9X9" squares, she said she really likes sheep in squares, she really didn't care about color, just no neons. And she wanted a picot edging around. So these are the squares I came up with.

Here's a picture of the collection. These are all pre-blocked.

Here's the lamb square. I just sort of winged it while in the van on the way to Ironstock. I used a light blue for the background. Black for the head and legs, and a boucle in white for the wool.

This is called the Fisherman's Ring. I made it in a soft acrylic in Dark blue

This is a knot type square that I made up. I was inspired by a friendship ring square I had seen and made for a different swap. The colors are the same blue I used in the fisherman's ring square above, a soft grey color, and a deep red/Burgundy color which on here looks sort of orange, but it's not. I REALLY love this square!

So that's what I've been up to. I hope you like it. It's been a long time since I've posted pictures and for that I am sorry. Enjoy!

Swim Suit Annoyance

Well, with the long holiday weekend here, we've been swimming a lot. I hate my swimsuit (as many people do). I hate shopping for the darn things too (as I think everyone does,) so I've decided I want a swim suit that I love. Now there is nothing I can do to hide, or cover all the areas of my body that I am a bit self-concious about, but I think I can make something that is cute and fun and will make me feel ok about swimming, plus it WILL fit! So that is why I haven't been posting lately I am drafting a pattern, and figuring out what I need/want, etc... I started on it already. They didn't have the fabric that I wanted, but I found a cute pink fabric with black dots (I was hoping for brown bottom that match something with brown on top, but didn't happen) So I am making black bottoms with pink and black top. My machine died for a bit but I got it running again. And I am hoping to finish soon. This is all very new to me. I don't really make much as far as clothing (besides costumes which don't have to be perfect, or baby clothes which are way smaller!) or stretchy fabric. So wish me luck. I will probably not post a pic of me in it, but you may see me post a pic of it itself.

Other than that I have been making a scarf for my mother-in-law, which I showed her, and she decided she wanted the whole thing wider. So now I have to frog it all, (pain in the butt because it's a weird yarn that she picked.) And I have been cutting tons of 1.5" squares out of cotton fabric, I want to desperately make a postage stamp quilt, but I would rather not repeat fabrics if possible. So I need TONS of different fabric squares. I joined a craftster.org swap, so that will help. If any of you would care to swap or simply send me small scraps, I'd love you forever!!!

Home From Ironstock

Well, we are back in Wisconsin. We had a wonderful weekend. Already booking our hotel room for next year. Ironstock is a Haunt Expo/Convention/really big party, put on in Tell City Indiana the last weekend in June every year. This event is put on by the Iron Kingdom and friends. The most wonderful group of people you could ever meet.

We arrived Thursday evening. Levi was pretty pooped, so we really didn't do much that night. We did run into a few other early arrivers though.

Friday we went swimming and then enjoyed the meet and greet put on in our hotel lobby, by Wormy T, Evilizabeth, and CandyMom (along with others.) There was a bbq fountain (like a chocolate fountain, but with bbq sauce in it. Meetballs, smokies, and brisket to dip in the fountain. There were wonderful candies made by CandyMom which included brains, fingers, and other assorted body parts, all different flavors. We brought a taco dip, and many others brought munchies too. So many wonderful people to meet.

Saturday morning we got to the grounds by 8:45, and stood in line to register for probably 15 minutes! It was fine though, it was a great time to meet more people. The weather was gorgeous. Low 80s and sunny (compared to years before where it is always in the upper 90s and terribly humid.) We registered, bought our raffle tickets, bought a tshirt, and headed back to the rapid remains game. Levi didn't want to watch or be a part of it, so him and I walked around a bit. Tim enjoyed it though, and his team won!

We enjoyed many wonderful demos. Levi hung out with the kids a bit, but also enjoyed some of the demos. We watched the coffin races, and participated in the tshirt toss, none of us got any though, we're not quite as aggressive as lots of them are. Still fun though! We then went back to our hotel room to eat and get ready for the Weasel Ball, costume dance.

This year's costumes didn't quite get done, so you will see those probably around Halloween, then we'll wear them for next year's Weasel Ball. We quickly threw together scrabble pieces for our costumes this year. They didn't have the bang that last year's TitHead and Hershey's Kiss of Death did, but they were cute. This year there was a wedding at the Weasel Ball, which was pretty great! We aren't late night party people, so we left a little while after the centerpiece judging. (We really need to do that next year!) And a few more songs. Then we got Levi from the babysitters and went back to the room.

Sunday morning, about 9:30 we got back to the fair grounds and enjoyed another demo, they picked some raffle tickets (Tim one some sensors donated by Nez.) The number 2 before us won the pirate... ARRRR! Said our good byes, and went back to our hotel. Tim and Levi swam a bit, then we went upstairs and turned in early since we had about a 12 hour ride home the next day.

It was a great weekend. I didn't take very many pictures. (I know I'm terrible!) I'm going to list some of the pictures that other people post if you are interested.

Bob-O Candid Video (some coffin races, tshirt toss, & others)

Wormy-Ts Pics
Thursday Pics

Friday Meet & Greet

Vampire Damien's
http://s81.photobucket.com/albums/j227/haunterds/IronStock2006/

I'm in Indiana

Well, I'm in Indiana right now. It's the day of the meet & greet. The main festivities begin tomorrow. I'm really too warm to crochet much, but I'm trying. It is a lot cooler than last year, but there is also more rain. We had some room issues already, and they gave us a different room. I just hope that it doesn't screw up someone else's plans. We were in a room with a single king bed (Levi brought his sleeping bag,) because it was the only room left when we made our reservations, but right now we are in a double-double room. So I hope no one is really pissed that they don't have 2 beds when they had probably reserved and were planning on 2 beds. But the desk said that this is right, and we need to be here, so who are we to complain. Anyway, I should get back, just thought I'd check in.

Finishing my crochet, costumes, and top

Well, we are leaving for Ironstock Thursday morning. So the countdown has begun. We had certain costume plans, but we just completely ran out of time. So we went with plan B.... well, actually plan "A" and "T". We are scrabble pieces. Quick and cute, and Tim and I love to play scrabble, so it's sort of fitting. Plus they are a fairly universal costume, that anyone even our kids can borrow and wear again. So those are 100% finished! Yippee!!! I will post pics soon, but it may not be until we return from Indiana.

I am working on some crochet squares for a blankie square swap I am in. I am working on making a sheep in the middle. So far, I'm still unsure. I'll keep you updated!

I am also making a shirred top that I was hoping to be able to wear this weekend. I found this amazing Alexander Henry fabric in JoAnns the other day, and I had to buy it, and I want a cute little top to wear, since Ironstock it is about 100 degrees. I just need to make it so it will cover my bra straps. I'm not a tiny woman, and no one wants my breasts popping out of my top! Ok, hubby wouldn't mind, but this is a fairly family oriented event!
I have the whole top done except the straps and the hem. So hopefully by tonight.

I am bringing some projects along, I really hope that I can get quite a bit accomplished in the 10 hour drive. Hopefully I will have a few finished projects to post when I get back, not to mention just general Ironstock pics!

Unconditional Swapping Goodness!

I received from Writer78 last night. I got the greatest swap stuff. She really must have paid attention, because everything she gave me was perfect!
Here is a picture of the front of an altoids tin that she altered for me. It has coats of arms and the really neat stone looking paper. Also the little card she sent me.

Here are all my inside goodies. A beaded necklace, 2 pairs of earrings, a cute drawstring bag to keep them in. Some Happy Halloween ribbon. And LOTS OF KEYS!!! I love keys so much!

I was so excited I teared up a bit when I opened it!

Lucky Lucky Me!

I sent some supplies to dontlookback, and she received them. I hope she's as happy as I am. I have 2 other packages out right now, but those were going out of the country, so I don't know how long they will take to get there.

Wistlists..... Who wists me?

Have you ever made something that you thought was really great, but you don't get any replies on it? Then you figure, no one else likes it. Well, that happened to me. I made a purse for a swap that I thought was great, sent it off, received a nice thank you. Then posted about it on craftster and really got very few responses. I thought, maybe it wasn't as great as I thought it was.

Well, the other day I was browsing people's wist lists and found that a whole lot of people put that bag on their wistlist! I knew nothing. I wish there was a way you could find out who has wisted you.

I got my bobbies!

I received some wonderful swap goodies in the mail last night. I got some of the neatest bobby pins for my new short hair.

I know another horrible sideways picture. Plus my hair is still wet, and I have no makeup or anything on.... but come on, I actually took a picture!

To see more pictures of them up close you can go to the unconditional june swap gallery page. They are at the bottom of the page. The ones in the pic above are silver sort of filigree style with little pink jewels. Another pair are fimo snail beads, and last, but certainly not least are a pair of gryffindor ones! Thanks so much zenochka!

posting problems

Well, I had a few different posts done, they were wonderful, articulate, witty, you name it.... however, either blogger hates me, or it's my computer. All of the updates I did (and there were quite a few) have been lost into the abyss.

So, the REALLY shortened version of updates from the past week;


School ended last week. So my kids were home.... [insert antics]

Tim's family came up. Enjoyed each other.... fun was had

A family friend died, so we had to help clean out her house. I got a whole bunch of craft stuff. (Didn't really ask for it, but got it, so need to find something to do with it.)

Worked in garden,

Found out we need an assesment, which sucks because we finally moved things around to start remodeling, and now have to move these things back. GRRR

Went to the park many times

Baseball, baseball, baseball..... Squirt league is a joke. They let the kids run the bases even when they are out, all kids bat every inning. All kids field every inning. There is no score..... How are you teaching them anything, and how the heck are they going to do tournaments if you can't eliminate them. There is no score.

Kids started summer school up on Thursday. They love it!

My hair won't take dye very well unless I lighten it, that sucks.

I REALLY need to work on the costumes for Weasel Ball or they won't be done.

NEARLY finished with the gifts for the showers.

I think that is it for now.

A No Crafting Weekend

Well, I had a very busy weekend. Tim's family came up. We only get to see some of them about once a year, and usually not all of them. We haven't seen some of them for years. So it was nice. All of the kids got along great which is nice.

Unfortunately with the beautiful weather and Tim's family around I wasn't able to get any crafting done. And now that school's out for awhile. I probably won't have a chance to do any crocheting or anything during the day. Levi's baseball game is tonight, but I have been designated score keeper, so that counts that out. I might have a chance on Thursday, when the boys start summer school. But they aren't gone very long.
So unfortunately it looks as though my summer updates could be quite low in project posts =( We'll see!

Hair cuts!

Ok, I am terrible at getting pictures taken when it's important. I'm honestly always terrible at taking pictures when I want them. And yes, I forgot to take a picture of before I got my hair cut..... so I only have an after shot or two.
Here's a horrible sideways one of my new hair. And bonus... my messy kitchen!


Here is a picture of me outside taken by my five year old, of me holding my hair to donate. I wasn't sure I'd have enough to donate, and here I measured it and I had over 15 inches! (thankfully you get to pull curls straight!)

I really don't love it yet. I like the back quite a bit, but the front I can't quite figure it out. Also I HATE the color. This is my natural color, (minus a few grey spots that I cover with a black sharpie)
I have never liked my natural color. So much so that no one has seen my natural color since I was 12. I was planning on coloring it purple, but the purple isn't showing up with my dark black hair, so I'm going to have to lighten it first, then dye it purple. I'll keep you all updated!


This is Lore, he's my 5 year old. He was sweating so badly after the park yesterday that he asked me to shave his head "bald". Well, it was so long I had to go skim it down a bit. After I got it all skimmed down, he decided he wanted a "zigzag mohawk" so this is what he got. He loved showing it off today on their last day of school!



I did however, forget that my husband's family is coming this weekend from all over the country, so ooops! Many of them haven't met Lore yet, so it may not quite be the cute little respectable boy that they were expecting, but oh well, he loves it!