Done!!

My sister got hitched last night!!

It was a beautiful wedding up at Red Butte Gardens. If you've never been there, you should go. It's lovely. I hadn't been there in years, so it's totally different than what I remember, but it's a great place to take your kids for a nice fragrant stroll. There's even a kid's garden that's really cool.

Anyway, we're really happy for Kristen and Keith. They're such a cute couple. Kristen was beautiful. But then, when is she not. My sister's a babe!

It was a lot of fun, but it was also a lot of work on my part. I'm bushed. I'm really glad I was able to help out though. I would do anything for my sister.

Sadly, I was so busy, not a single picture was taken by me from my camera and Joseph was too busy with the boys (particularly Asher) to be of any help in that department. So, what I'm going to do is have Kristen send me pictures and post them later.

I have such a backlog on this blog, so I hope now that with the extra time that I may or may not have that I'll be able to catch up some.

Sadly, also, I was not able to visit with any of my friends in SLC (unless they were part of the festivities). I think a visit to SLC, with no agenda, is in the future.

The Final Countdown

Ok, so this afternoon I finally finished all my big wedding projects. Yay! And they look... well, I'll let you judge for yourselves, but I'm pretty proud of them.

First, here's the whole ensemble that I've been working on. I've already showed you the flower girl dresses. I also did the baskets and the ring bearer pillow. The headbands I threw in because I happened upon some DIY headbands when I was at the craft store and figured it would be a cute and simple way for our flower girls to do their hair.

Here's a closeup of the girls' accessories:

I was on the lookout for baskets for a while, but everything I was finding was either the wrong shape or size or super expensive. Who knew baskets would cost so much? I was thinking that maybe I ought to enroll in a basket weaving class when I found the perfect ones in the Target dollar section. Ok, they actually cost $2.50 each, but still... It was way better than spending 4x that much on something I was going to cover in satin anyway. Thank heavens Target had started putting their Easter stuff out right after Valentine's Day.

Wrapping those basket was a bit challenging. Waaaaay different than wrapping a Christmas present. Satin is less forgiving than paper. Hands down! But they still turned out and that's all that matters.

The headbands were fun and easy and I actually need to credit my friend Aly for inspiring me on these. Thanks! (You should check out her awesome craft blog, ladies!) I wanted to make Aly's rosettes for everything, but I couldn't get mine to work, so I made up something that ended up resembling a carnation. Oh well.

And for the record, there were two of everything I had to do for the flower girls. Thank heavens only two!

Then there's the ringbearer's pillow:

This one I did in one afternoon. I mean, I'd do a tutorial or something, but I didn't take pictures and, honestly, when are you ever going to need to make one on a whim? It was fun and I kind of winged it as I went along, but I'm really pleased with the end product. I had tons of ideas for what I could do with it, but discarded them all because, let's face it, I was running low on time and felt like simplicity would look best anyway.

So, now my wedding projects are out of the way. The wedding is next week and we leave for Utah tomorrow. I'm still gonna be super busy though. There's a bridal shower I still have to throw and I've got to pack and drive (alone, with three young children).

By the way, I never did show how the invitations so perfectly turned out (but that's because I didn't get to see the fabulous finished product till I got mine in the mail).

Aren't Kristen and Keith so cute together it makes you wanna hug a pillow pet?

Anyway, I'm very excited for my BFF, my baby sister, to get married. Keith is everything she had been looking for and I know they'll be happy together.

I also look forward to relaxing after the wedding is over. Boy, being a Grand Dame of Honor is tiring!

Leave of Absence

Disclaimer update (4/22/2011):  So, the other day, the embedding was working for the videos. Apparently, embedding hasn't even been released, so if you were able to watch the embedded clips, you got lucky. So, I have now included a link to open a new tab or window so you can view the videos on Socialcam.

Flower Girl Dress Preview

Kristen's wedding is sneaking up on us. I need to kick it into high gear and get things done! I swear, it seems like whenever we get one thing crossed off the list, two more things get added onto it.

I've got good news though! The flower girl dresses are coming along nicely. I've got one of them done, so I'd like to show it off.

Here's the before:

I could not believe how difficult it was to find a modest flower girl dress, at a reasonable price, in the color that we wanted. So, we ended up with a dress that we liked, at a reasonable price, but it was all white, which is not what we wanted. However, the style was something I could totally work with and alter a bit without ruining the dress.

So, I found some silver-gray organza and did this:

 

I stitched a layer of organza in under the tulle layers and simply added a couple flower to the sash. It turned out better than I expected, thankfully.

I've still got a ton of work to do for the wedding, but I'm really pleased with how the dresses turned out. Well... how this dress turned out. I've got to do the other one now. I'm also going to make a white satin headband with an organza flower for their hair. It'll look so simple and nice, I think.

Honor Roll

Let it be known that Akiko has made the "'A' Honor Roll" in her class for winter term.

So, yeah, it's only kindergarten. I mean, I remember I had straight A's in kindergarten, too. But still, we're really proud of her and all her hard work.

So, being on the honor roll means that she's excelling in both reading and math. Some kids got certificates for just reading or just math. Some got certificates for "special recognition," whatever that is. Some got certificates for perfect attendance.

Everyone is different. No two people are not on fire.

Tee hee. That last paragraph I wrote reminded me of good ol' Strongbad.

Anyway, Akiko was the only one in her class to get honor roll.

Remember a few weeks ago she was having a hard time at school? Well, it was one of those times that steam needed to be let off because at the time it was so hard to watch Akiko have such a hard time and not want to go to school.

So, what had happened was her teacher was out of town for a while and was sick the first day she was supposed to be back. That day, the kids had a bad substitute. Then, a couple days later, I left to go to Utah for a week and a half and left her home with her daddy. She missed her brothers and me terribly.

So, I think it was just that her routine was thrown off. Things are great now and she looks forward to school every morning.

Spirit Week - Crazy Hair/Hat Day

And to end, I got my new phone this morning! Number's the same.

Cellphone's Dead

It's both exciting and frustrating at the same time.

Exciting because I've often found myself wishing I had Joseph's Droid with me on multiple occasions for various reasons and now I can get one. Frustrating because I'm not eligible for a discounted upgrade for four more months and being without a phone is kinda freaky.

You see, my phone was the free phone that came with the package when we purchased Joseph's phone, so it was nothing fancy at all. It did the basics: calling, texting, crappy camera, etc. However, when I've been out and about, and, well, any time I've gone into San Francisco, I've often found myself in situations thinking, "Ugh! I should've traded phones with Joseph today." It got to the point where I pretty much told Joseph that me having a smartphone was no longer an option, it was a necessity.

I could blame the death of the phone on the baby. It was fine this morning, then, unbeknown to me, Asher had snatched it, and after that it got really wonky. However, for a few months, even before Asher was old enough to grasp things, it would have days where it would totally wig out, then go back to normal after resetting it. So, I've got a feeling that this was going to happen anyway. Asher just expedited the process.

So, this is really just a public service announcement. Thanks for listening to me complain about my dead phone. If you need to get a hold of me in the next few days, Facebook or email me, or call Joseph's phone. I've got some cellphone shopping to do!

This picture makes me giggle because I totally used to have this phone when I was 18!

I Will Survive

Hey everybody,

Sorry for the lack of posts. I've been too exhausted to really post anything lately. I feel like I haven't really recovered from the Utah trip yet. And Asher still doesn't sleep through the night, though we are sleeping better now that he's not teething anymore... for now.

So, besides being sleep deprived, I just have what seems like a million projects going on. I finally finished the Christmas cottages, that you can read about here at the bottom of the post, however, right before I finished them, I was at the craft store when Christmas was on clearance and scored two more cottages for $1.50 each. Yep, 50 cents cheaper than the thrift store! Sweet!

It's a school and a church. I've got the school nearly done and I've let Akiko paint the church. I'll get pictures of her finished church before I clean it up. Akiko's doing such a great job with it. You can see she had already started it by the time I got the camera out. And if you're wondering about that beauty/donut shop...

It took me forever to finally finish this. There are, like, a gazillion little details. When I was done with it, I got that feeling like, "Great! Now what do I do with all this extra time?"

Never fear! Kristen to the rescue!

My dear, beautiful little sister, Kristen, is getting married this spring. So, even though she and the wedding are going to be in Utah, I'm doing everything I can to help her from California, since she's got a ton on her plate already. I helped her pick out cardstock and design her invitations and brought it all home with me. I did everything that I could from here and sent them back to her to finish them. (Shout out to Chelsie for the template!)

So, now all I have left to do is: alter the flower girl dresses so that they're not all white, make a ring-bearer pillow (because we didn't like anything we saw in the store, besides the fact that they want to charge you way too much for something so simple), and make the flower girl baskets (for the same reason we chose not to purchase the pillow). That way I can also match everything and make them into something that we like... well, that I like and I hope Kristen likes it, too.

Besides all the wedding stuff, I've got a few girlfriends that are having babies, so I've been working on gifts for them. I'm not going to go into detail here, but crocheting and knitting is something I can do while I watch tv/the kids playing video games. They're my veg-out projects.

Then, of course, there are all the little house projects, which are getting knocked off the list one by one. You know, the things that sit and fester for ages till you can't stand it anymore; burned out lights, hanging a coat rack that the kids can reach and hang their own jackets on... things like that.

Then there's the new calling at church. I got released as a Primary teacher and called as a counselor. It's more demanding than any other calling that I've ever had... well, except that time they called me to be a pianist in Relief Society. That was truly the hardest calling I've ever encountered. I'm not a pianist. I mean, I can play the piano and read music, but not very well at all. However, I am a little better at playing and sight reading than I used to be, but I was so relieved when I got released from that calling. Now that I've gone off on a tangent, I'll get back to the post.

There is always a learning curve with any new calling, and this one was bigger than I expected. Now that we're a couple months into it, I think we're getting the hang of it and things are running a bit more smoothly. I'm in charge of the Nursery and Sunbeams, which have 23 (27 by the end of next month) and 14 children in them, respectively.

So, yeah, all that on top of the daily grind. So, sorry it's been a couple weeks and it's already mid-March. The kids are doing great. Joseph's busy with his job, but he's great, too.

To end, I'd like to mention that my family and friends in Japan and Maui are all safe. Please keep them in your prayers as things will be hard for them for a while. If you'd like to help out, you can write "Japan Relief" in the Humanitarian Aid section of a tithing slip.

Thanks!