Pintastic Projects

The holiday season is here and with it an abundance of opportunities to peruse pinterest for ideas to keep us busy!  But before we get to that, I need to show you one of the first projects I completed after finding pinterest.  I'd been looking for a jewelry organizer for a LONG time and finally found exactly what I needed.  I actually combined a couple different projects I found on pinterest to make exactly what I needed.  I bought a large wooden frame at the thrift store, spray painted it, staples hardware wire into it, added knobs for necklaces and nails for bracelets.  I also needed somewhere to hang earrings that wouldn't hook on the "chicken wire" so I found a ribbon type thing (that's the official term for it, by the way) with loops in it and ran it vertically down one side.  One unexpected hiccup in this is that it turned out to be VERY heavy with all my jewelry on it (and I actually only have about 3/4 of my jewelry on it so far!) so hanging it has been a bit of a challenge, but I finally found a good place for it.  Not sure if it will stay there but it works for now.

My pinspirations for this came from here and here with Chelsea at Us Three Birds really walking me through the steps.

The next project was a fairly simple one, but I must say the boys got bored with it (especially Riley) and I ended up being the one to finish them.  Right now I only have a picture of Owen's creation.  I used two sheets of 8.5x11 cardstock to make the cone for the tree shape and my circle punch to punch out all the circles.  The boys used good ol' Elmer's glue to glue all the circles on.  Ours isn't quite as sophisticated as the pinspiration was but it's from the heart and the boys LOVE them.  Thank you to Better Homes and Gardens for this pinspiration.

Owen missed school today due to a fever so I promised him a craft he could take to school to share with his class.  We did the Hand SANTA-tizers.  Both boys really enjoyed this and made it their own.  I gave them options for everything from how/what to make the belt from (they both decided on electrical tape!) to what they used for the white "fluff" at the bottom of Santa's coat as well as for the buckle on his belt.  Thanks to Beth Newlin for the pinspiration!

And while we were crafting, we made some paper circle ornaments for the tree.  We each picked two patterned papers and alternated the circles on each ornament using the directions from Sarah Nielsen .  The boys did a really great job.  And Owen decided he wanted some beads on his (I had them out as an option for the belt buckles on the Santa-tizers).  Riley, as usual, wouldn't be outdone so he wanted beads too.  Owen's is in greens and blues and browns with green beads at top and bottom.  Riley's is greens and blues with one bead of each color on his.  I left mine beadless but I actually really like the bead look so will likely add some at a later date.  And after looking back at Sarah Nielsen's tutorial I see she used 10 circles per ornament and we only used 6.  I think we'll go back and add more tomorrow...

One last pintastic project was snack for Riley's class the other week.  Reindeer donuts.  They LOVED them.  And of course the boys enjoyed making more with the leftovers at home for the next couple days.  Thanks to Oriental Trading Company for the idea!  I didn't make them exactly the same way as the recipe suggests.  I just used whatever was cheapest that I could find.  So cherry sours were the noses and little bits of Crunch ice cream topping (or something like that) had white and brown pieces in it so I used the white ones for the eyes.  The noses were just sitting on top of the donut, but the antlers and the eyes were pressed into the donuts.  And the one you see in the close up is my favorite little guy.  I love how the "mistake" hole on the donut makes Rudolph look like he's being taken by surprise.  Just adorable.  (You may also notice in the bottom picture, I didn't place the hole as strategically and it kind of looks like that Rudolph got shot.  Oops.  Unintentional, I assure you!!!)



Doughboys

So I'm hanging out on pinterest (of course) and see a pin of something familiar.  But when I click on it to read about it, I realize the way we do it is SO. MUCH. COOLER!  When we go camping, we like to have doughboys cooked over the fire for breakfast.  All you need is a dowel rod (about the diameter of your thumb), a can of biscuits, and a fire.  Oh, and whatever you want to go IN your doughboy.  The possibilities are endless.

We had our backyard fixed this past spring and it is soooo worth it.  We'd been here for YEARS and not been able to go in our yard and enjoy it.  Actually, Memorial Day weekend in 2006 Eric and Owen (who had JUST turned 2) decided to camp out back there.  And Eric ended up with the worst case of poison ivy I've ever seen.  We're talking about a big, huge blister the size of a golf ball on his arm.  If you get queasy easy, skip this part, but when he popped the blister there was a semi-solid glob of puss that came out of it.  It was so gross.  He ended up having to go to urgent care to get them to look at it and they brought all the doctors and nurses in to ogle at it!  When he went to work he had his arm wrapped in gauze and the guys ribbed him and basically called him a wuss.  So he unwrapped his arm and when they saw it, well they asked him to cover it back up!!!  Anyway, NOW our backyard is useable and we've been trying to use it as much as possible.  I'll try to do a whole update on that later (if I don't forget).

So we've had a couple campouts in our backyard.  The first one was with my mommy friends and all their kids.  Several moms weren't brave enough to give the camping a go ;-) so they came for the cookout and hanging out and went home to sleep in their comfy beds.  If I remember correctly we had 5 moms and 9 kids stay the night in our backyard.  So. Much. Fun.  Have I mentioned I <3 camping???

The view of our little camping compound from the deck.

Anyway, Eric was out of town for that experience so later in the summer we invited my good friend Lillie and her family to come camp with us.  We had a great time, as we always do with her family.  And for breakfast the next morning we made doughboys.  I've always made them with "whop biscuits" (that's the refrigerated canned biscuits you WHOP on the counter to open), but all I could find in the fridge was crescent roll dough so we improvised.  And it worked great!

Mmmmmm.  So yummy.  And Lillie was kind enough to bring us ANOTHER jar of her homemade peach preserves.  We made quick work of the first jar.  Those peach preserves were perfect inside these doughboys.  We also tried scrambled eggs and crumbled up sausage in them.  Also yum!  Butter, cinnamon, and sugar is also a must-try combo.

The trick is to make sure you do a good job wrapping it so you don't lose all your filling.  If using biscuits, stretch the biscuit out until it's about 6 inches long.  Start at the end of your dowel rod and coil the biscuit around.  Make sure to seal it up well at all the seams.  Hold it over the fire and rotate periodically to brown it on all sides.  Once it's cooked it should slide off the rod with a gentle twist.  If you twist too hard it will split open at the seams.  There's also a right and a wrong direction to twist it, but it depends on which way you coiled it.  Also, the first couple times you use the dowel rods for this it will stick more.  I've never tried using Pam or anything but I guess that might help.  After a few times though it will kind of get seasoned and will work better.

Two years later...

Wow. Life gets busy and the blog gets neglected. Let's see, I've got boys in 2nd grade and Kindergarten and they both love school (Hallelujah!!). They're also both doing really well at school. It helps that their school is awesome and they both have amazing teachers.

And with all my "free" time I'm now going back to school full time to get my Master's of Education. In addition to that, I've gotten more serious about running and when the boys started school back in August I started training for a Half Marathon. My goal was 2 hours and ten minutes. I finished the Athens half mary last month in just under 2:07 (I think it was 2:06:55). VERY happy with that. I have some really great friends who helped me get ready for it. I never could have done it that fast without all of them. Leah and April became my workout partners back in the spring. We started out doing Insanity with Sean T. Oh man, it truly was INSANE. But when summer started we decided to start walking and running at the track instead of doing Insanity. And we have kept it up. Some weeks are crazy and we only get together one night, other weeks we exercise 4 mights and one afternoon together. It sure has made a difference. Then Eric told his running buddies about me running and one of them told his wife and she texted me about starting to run together. I'll tell you, Robin is F-A-S-T. She's a machine. We do 5-5.5 miles once a week. There's hills. Big hills. And she doesn't let up. I usually have to walk at some point but she just keeps running. Wow. But she pushed me and I'm a better runner for it. And Eric has always been a big supporter. He's always encouraged me to run and had faith in my ability. I love him for that!

Eric, on the other hand, is taking a break from running. He did run a marathon just over 2 years ago and I think he wants to run another, but it will be a while before that happens. Three months ago he had hip resurfacing surgery. This was an alternative to total hip replacement. Instead of cutting off the whole head of the femur they just whittle it down some and put a new cap on it along with a new socket for that to fit into. He now sets off all the metal detectors at the airport. And speaking of the airport, Eric's job has changed greatly. He works for the same company but in the corporate arena. He helps with internal audits of safety and environmental procedures among other things and this requires traveling. He averages about one week a month of traveling. Sometimes he gets to go to exotic locales like Oklahoma and Tennessee. But he also has spent a lot of time in San Diego as well as trips to Maine, Virginia, Modesto, CA, the Philippines, and Brazil.

Okay, now that we're all caught up, on to the real reason I'm here. I have a problem. Well, maybe not a problem, but it is definitely an addiction. An addiction to pinterest. I love that sight. Man can I find some AWESOME things on there. Like this Praline Pumpkin Cake that is personally responsible for me gaining about 5 pounds. You may think I'm joking but I'm not. This cake is AWESOME. Apparently I think the word AWESOME is AWESOME. Anyhoo, I think I've made it 4 or 5 times in the past month. And I'm planning to make it again next week for Thanksgiving. I think what makes it so divine is how the praline layers kind of soak into the pumpkin cake and make it oh-so-moist. Oops, sorry about that little drop of drool on the screen. Let me dry that off for you... There, that's better.

The surprising thing about this cake is how easy it is. You use cake mix and store bought icing and just jazz it up. I know of 4 people who have tried this cake since I made it and are planning to make it for Thanksgiving too! So without delay, here a link to the recipe: Praline Pumpkin Cake and this is what it looks like (I took the pic with my phone so please excuse the quality)...



I do have other pinspired creations (I think I just made that word up!) and I will be sharing those with you in the future.

Update on Owen's wrist

The lump on Owen's wrist wasn't going away so we decided to go ahead and do the MRI. It was scheduled for last Monday and went pretty well. Owen was actually pretty excited about getting to go in "the tunnel" and he did FANTASTIC. It took about 40 minutes for them to get all the images and he was so still for the whole thing. I was very impressed. But then that afternoon after we got home, they called back and said they needed us to come back in for a couple more images. At that point she told me one of the images hadn't turned out clearly so they needed to retake it and then they were going to take one more just to make sure they got a good image. The whole thing would only take 10 minutes she said. When we got there Tuesday though she said all the images from Monday had come out fine but there were just a couple images she didn't get that the radiologist wanted. And of course it took an hour to get these two images, not 10 minutes like she said. And much of that hour, she was standing in the hallway talking to her pal. ANYWAY, we had to wait until Thursday for the results even though we asked if we could go ahead and talk to the radiologist Tuesday (since they made us drive all the way back down here), but it was no deal.

Of course, after the second round of images on Tuesday, my mind started spinning. Was there something suspicious on Monday's images that made him want more? Is it a bad sign that he couldn't determine anything conclusively with just the images from Monday? No matter how I thought about it, I couldn't find a way to make myself believe having to go back for more images was a good thing. By Thursday I was beginning to feel sick!

But on Thursday when we went to see the PA at the orthopedic clinic, the first thing he said when he came in the room was that it was good news! Hallelujah! I almost burst into tears of joy right then and there. It is a cyst. It is benign. It is filled with blood and there's some calcium crystals in it as well. He said there's no need to even discuss the "c-word" which made my heart jump for joy.

Other than the lump shrinking by about half in the first 24 hours after I noticed it, it didn't shrink any more in the next 3 weeks. We always took it as a good sign that it wasn't growing any larger, but we were still concerned that it wasn't shrinking. But that Tuesday of his second MRI, I thought it looked like it had shrunk just a bit. The next day it looked slightly smaller and by his appointment on Thursday we were certain it was shrinking. This is, of course, a GREAT sign. His PA was definitely glad to see this and it has continued to shrink and the bruised coloring has faded drastically. It's a small bump now and just slightly darker in color than the skin around it. His soccer practice Thursday and game Saturday were both rained out. He should be able to start practicing again this Thursday though! The PA just wants to see him again in about 6 weeks to make sure nothing changes, or if it does change it's for the better and he can basically return to normal activities.

The bump may not ever go away completely. It might be something he always has. Or it might go away and never be seen again. Only time will tell. Until then, we'll continue to wrap his wrist for soccer or anytime we know he'll be particularly active (and therefore likely to fall on it), but it's not necessary to keep it wrapped at school or while he's sleeping at night. And we don't need to keep giving the ibuprofen either. For all practical purposes, he'll be returning to life as a regular 5 year old boy. Praise God!

Ganglion Cyst???

So Tuesday afternoon I noticed this big lump on the inside of Owen's wrist. He had no idea how it got there or how long it's been there. He has no recollection of having hit it on anything, but it looked like he had a grape under his skin and we were concerned so I took him to Urgent Care to have it looked at. First we saw a Nurse Practitioner and she wasn't sure what it was but was thinking maybe a hematoma. So she went and got the doctor and he came in to look at it. He also seemed a bit unsure but thought it was probably a traumatic ganglion cyst but he's never seen one "that color" (it was a bruised purple color) and he's never seen "one like that on someone his age." So he referred us to an Orthopedic clinic and I got an appt for Owen for this afternoon.

Owen saw the Physicians Assistant for the orthopedist who specializes in the lower arm (elbow to fingers). He agreed that it's probably a traumatic ganglion cyst or a hematoma. He's encouraged by the fact that it has shrunk by about half since Tuesday and wants us to continue with what we've been doing (ice, wrap in Ace bandage, elevate, and anti-inflammatory) and come back on Monday to see how it's doing. Hopefully it will be greatly reduced by then. He did say no to soccer practice (the doc at urgent care had said it would be okay) and then tonight's practice got rained out anyway (yay!), so MAYBE Owen will be doing good enough Monday to return to practicing.

Still not sure what caused it. The PA said it almost had to have been from an injury and he especially liked the idea that maybe it happened at some point Monday night at soccer practice since he fell a few times. But then he also said Owen would have come to us crying/screaming in pain when it happened and he never did that. Owen still maintains that he has no recollection of anything happening that could have caused this.

So we're hoping for it to resolve itself on its own and hoping that will happen SOON. Not sure exactly what the next step will be if it doesn't get better on its own, but I think it will involve either using a needle to remove the fluid or surgery to remove the whole "lump." If I understood him correctly, we will have to determine whether it's a ganglion cyst (filled with joint fluid) or a hematoma (filled with blood) before deciding how to proceed.

So, we're waiting and seeing now. And hoping to see improvement everyday. I'll try to remember to take a picture of it tomorrow although it's not nearly as dramatic as it was. Or maybe, if we're lucky, there won't even be anything to take a picture of by the morning!

Thrift Shop Finds!

The conversion of Riley's room into a playroom and Owen's room into a bedroom (for both boys) is an ongoing process. We need a lot more storage options in the playroom and I want to set up a reading corner in their bedroom for all their books and such. Anyway, a little while back I found this great coffee table at the local thrift store. They were asking $20 and everything was 20% off that day, so I could have gotten it for $16, but I felt like I could wait and get it for 50% off. So I went back the next week only to discover furniture was only 25% off saving me only an extra dollar from the previous week. But then I discovered they'd marked it down to only $10!! So with 25% off I got it for $7.50. Needless to say, I was thrilled. It was a sturdy table with simple lines (making it easy to sand and paint). The only problem was the supports are partly chrome and they were quite tarnished. I used leftover paint from when we painted "the nursery" (now the playroom) so it's a very light blue to match the walls (I actually meant to paint it white and didn't realize I had the wrong color until later). And used a can of silver Rustoleum spray paint on the chrome part. I didn't think to take a "before" pic, but this is what it looks like now:
My beautiful model refused to move out of the way, so I just went with it!


I use it to store some of the larger toys that previously were taking up all our floor space. Some fit nicely underneath and others sit on top. See those toys piled up tot he right of it? Those are the ones that go on top. I haven't finished "decorating" it, but that will have to wait until next month when Riley starts to school. Owen has specifically requested it have sharks and fish and such on it.

I've been going back to the thrift store periodically and so far haven't found anything that was exactly what I was looking for AND at a price I was happy with (they like to price all the endtables and coffee tables at $20). I had 30-60 minutes to spare today so Riley and I headed down there. Got there around 11 am and saw that furniture was 50% off until noon! Found 2 tables I liked. The first is going to be used in the "reading corner" in their bedroom. I'm actually considering NOT painting it white like I'd planned because we're kind of going for a rustic look in there anyway. I do still need to get some chairs to go with it, but for now the Lil' Tot Spot will have to work. Again, it was sturdy with simple lines so if I do paint it, it will be fairly easy to sand down first. This one was marked $20 so I got it for $10.

The other table I bought was another end table. This one is also very sturdy but will require a little more time to get it sanded before painting because of all the little groves on it. Maybe I can just get a really good primer and not have to sand??? Anyway, it will probably eventually have fish or something on it too to tie it in to the coffee table turned storage shelf. You know the cute little fabric-covered, polka dotted bins on the table in the first pic? I got those at Michaels for 60% off (I think???) so they were $3-4 dollars each and I think they'll work perfectly on the little shelf of this table. Not sure when I'll have time to start working on this one, but hopefully next week! It was marked $15 (it's been there a while so I think they'd marked it down) so I got it for $7.50!


I'll post more pictures when I get it all finished or maybe even some "in progress" pics.

Gotta love a good deal... or three.

First homework assignment

I know ALL of my followers (yes, all 3 of you!) have been waiting on pins and needles for the promised pics of Owen's first homework assignment. It was a poster they were given at Open House to fill out and turn in at the end of the first week of school. I cannot put into words the amount of excitement surrounding this assignment. Owen kept begging and begging to do it. We actually worked on it 3 separate days and unfortunately I don't have a pic of the FINAL version (not sure why???), but it's basically done in the last pic.

This is the Saturday before school starts. He sat at the kitchen table to work on it while we were getting dinner ready.

Now, the little disk on our camera that lets us know what mode it is in is missing. I'm not sure what happened to all these pictures to make the poster so blurry, but I'm guessing it was on fireworks mode or something. I think I took 5 of these and only one has the poster semi-infocus but of course that's the only one where he's not grinning from ear to ear. So I'm including this blurry one on the left just to show you the level of excitement.

This is the almost finished version of the poster. He opted for drawing himself and his family but then decided he wanted to tape a picture of our (now deceased) dog on there. We put it in his book bag to turn in Thursday (a day early) but I guess his teacher didn't notice and he didn't say anything so it was still there Thursday night. We got it back out and he colored most of the stars and circles and decorated it up a little more before turning it in Friday so the final version was even more beautimous that this pic!

On a side note, I've been really impressed with his school so far. I was a little concerned before school started because all the lists we got from the school of things they should know listed things he's known for 1-2 years! And when looking through some homeschool materials for Kindergarten I realized he knew 95% of it so I was worried that he would be bored at school and might not learn much. I was wrong! He's loved everyday of it so far (well, one day was just "okay") and has learned something everyday. We have learned more recently that his teacher is gifted-certified so I think she incorporates a lot of that into their daily lessons.