An Alphabet Tag

Tracy from the Vintage Sister Studio tagged me and this is sort of a fun one I haven't done before so I gave it a try!
A -Attached or single: Attached
B- Best Friend: Probably my sister and hubby for different reasons, I've had them the longest but I would have to add my Utah girls that I have grown up with as a collective group too.
C- Cautious or Crazy: mostly cautious unless it is craft related, then I am willing to try most anything.
D-Day: It would be a three way tie between nap time on Mondays when a I can work on projects, Saturdays when we tend to do fun stuff as a family and a day out with hubby
E- Essential Item: The last year especially it would have to be my computer. I will shrivel up and die if it ever bites the big one.
F- Favorite Color: Pink! Pink! Pink! Love to wear it, paint it, craft it, but it shows up virtually nowhere in my house
G-Gummi Bears or Worms: Probably bears, feels like I get to have more
H-Home town: I still consider the little town I grew up in in Utah my hometown. I don't know how long I will have to live somewhere else for it to be considered my hometown.
I- Indulgences: Definitely chocolate. Preferably good stuff like Dove but I will eat any chocolate item if the craving is bad enough
J- January or July:July, I love the fourth and all the fun summer activities with my kids.
K-Kids:3-Brittany will be 9 in three weeks, Matthew 5 and Joshua who will be two in 2 1/2 weeks(can't believe that!)
L-Life is incomplete without: my little family, I sometimes can't remember what I was like without them!
M- Marriage Date: April 28, 1993
N- Number of Siblings: 1 sister
O- Oranges or Apples: Apples especially if I have some of that yummy caramel dip, um I think I need to go get some of that stuff!
.P- Phobias or Fears: Public speaking! I would rather shave my head than speak in public.
Q- Quote: changes all the time. Today it is: That it will never come again is what makes life sweet. Emily Dickinson
R- Reason To Smile: Of course my family, but little pretty things all around. My funny little projects, something a pretty color, a new flower and blogging!
S- Season: Definitely Spring which is good, it lasts a long time here and I love that. With the exception of one weird week we have had spring since about March and today it still feels like we are still having it. I do expect it to change soon though.
T- Tag Three:Only if they want to do it, I would pick on my childhood friends:1. The Motherboard 2. Circe and 3. Tiff
U- Unknown fact about me: I once saw Princess Diana going in to see a play in London when I was visiting there with my family when I was 14. I remember thinking she was so lovely and thinner than I thought she would be.
V- Vegetarian or Oppressor of Animals: I don' t actually enjoy meat all that much. I do eat it and if someone besides me prepared chances are I am going to enjoy it. Lots of veggies coming soon though, I love them from the garden.
W- Worst Habit:Procrastinating. Applies to housework or any other task I don't enjoy.
Y-Your favorite food: Things that are bad for me generally. Pizza, Chinese food, chocolate and loads of bread
Z: Zodiac Sign: Scorpio
Well that was sort of fun for me, hopefully not too boring for you guys!

More Sunday Updates!

Just when you thought I had talked enough about our week I have to come back to tell you more! First we have been visited by that magic, pink-hair making fairy, Miss Vanessa again! She got Brittany this time!

Isn't she cute with pink hair?! Complete with sparkles! (be sure and scroll down to the previous post to see my pink hair!)We are so lucky to have such a fun blogland friend!

William finally loaded his pictures from the weekend too. He and Matthew visited a great car show yesterday so we have to share them, with the grandpas especially!

Apparently they are too shiny for Mr. Matthew and he had to close his eyes in most of the pictures!

Sunday Update! Robots, Ballet and Pink hair?

Another week is gone! I can't believe it, we have less than three weeks until we go to Utah! Hurrah! This next week is super busy, even more busy than the one that is over. Here is what we have been up too.
Our ward had a talent show for the kids. Among other things my kids submitted Matthew and I made a robot/dog sculpture.
We glued all of the leftover "technology" parts he loves to take apart

and then spray painted it silver. I think we were both happy with the result.

I love when these rare moments happen. They built it together too.


It was ballet recital day yesterday

Keep in mind that we are used to recitals being a BIG deal. As in live orchestra, day long dress rehearsals, gorgeous costumes. This was very simple. Less than an hour long, very informal and no costumes. I have to say I did really miss all the pomp and gorgeousness we are used to but it was also a real pleasure this time of year not to have one more big stressor.

And Brittany was lovely and enjoyed herself.

We sold my little white car yesterday. This is Matthew waving goodbye. Goodbye little car, you served us well!

And in anticipation of our trip to Utah I had my hair done. I just love it!

Did I get you?! My sweetie friend Vanessa emailed me this today after I wished on her blog to someday have pink hair. This proves my theory that Vanessa is really a fairy girl and if you make a wish known to her it just might come true!
Have a great week! Oh, and don't be concerned, we haven't sold Joshua to the circus yet, although after his behavior in church today that is probably where he belongs! He just isn't in this weeks pictures I guess!

Belong to Me

Okay, I have about a dozen things I should be doing in the next hour before I have to go but I can't do any of them until I tell you all how much I looooooved this book! I just allowed myself the luxury of a bowl of ice cream and the last chapters of a really good book, a treat I highly recommend by the way. It was the perfect ending for a nearly perfect book. Any of you who have been visiting me for awhile may remember my talking about Love Walked In awhile back, or maybe you have just read it too. It has been very popular. Well, this is the sequel. But not your typical sequel. Most sequels sort of count on the fact you liked the characters enough to invest more time and money in them which I generally do if I really enjoyed the first book but let's face it, it is pretty rare I ever like the sequel as much as the original. This one sort of pretends you have never heard of them before. It could absolutely stand on its own.

I don't want to ruin one little bit of it but I will tell you this book is perfectly titled. It is about all the people that belong to us, neighbors, friends, spouses, children and how we belong to them. The first book was a bit hard for me to take, Claire an eleven year old is abandoned by her mentally ill mother. Don't do well with bad things happening to kids, no I don't. But don't think bad stuff doesn't happen in this one, I will tell you there is a friend with cancer in it which is number two on my list of subjects I abhor as the child of a breast cancer survivor, but it seemed more like bad stuff I am familiar with I guess. It was wonderful fun to love these characters again and meet new ones. I loved this thought that Cornelia, probably the main character, expressed near the end, "I've found that if you insist on goodwill, if everyone insists on it together, goodwill comes. I've found that love can be a decision." Isn't that a wonderful concept?!

Okay, now I have gushed about my new favorite book I hope you will at least put it on hold at your library. You won't be sorry, I really think I liked it better than Love Walked In!

New dolls in the Shop!

Well, I just finished putting three new dolls in the shop!







I had to snap their picture among the miniature roses on our walk to school today. As you can tell I am really hooked on the combination of black and white with the pink hair! See that little tiniest one in front, she just about drove me nuts!
Here are their studio portraits, you can see them a little more clearly.



This little girl is totally different than her sisters, funny when having pink hair makes you one of the crowd!







Thanks so much for all the lovely comments you girls leave me, they mean so much to me. And it make creating these little girls so much more fun!

A new doll and a shop update!

I just finished a new Little Miss Polka Dots. She is over in the shop and I think I will actually have four more done for a little shop update over there tomorrow at 1 p.m. Pacific time. These will probably be my last for awhile. With school ending and getting ready to go visit the homeland in Utah I probably won't have time for awhile.

And how did I have time today?

This is how! Bless Elmo's furry little heart!

The Glass Castle

I really loved this book! The funniest thing about this book to me is that I couldn't figure out why I liked it so much while I was reading it. It is the story of a very strange family. The story is told by one of four children, a daughter. The parents have a very different idea of what their responsibilities are in the raising their children. Feeding them, clothing them and providing for them is not necessarily on the list. It does seem very important to them that they be smart, even if it is just so they can outsmart different authorities. This could have been a fairly common sort of story about a dysfunctional family and how the daughter, Jeanette overcomes her difficult beginnings to become an outstanding person. We have heard that story before and probably will again. It is a good story, we all like to hear how people overcome obstacles. What is different about this one though is that Jeannette Walls tells her story with great humor and love. I never found myself laughing out loud while reading Angela's Ashes or An Ordinary Man, both of which were good books, but I did while I was reading this book. The parents do some bizarre things that I have to say make for an interesting and entertaining story, such as the time the family is driving a long and the author falls out of the car and it takes awhile for the parents to figure out she is gone, but again it is the ability that the author has to tell us these stories without bitterness and with great humor that made this book a new favorite for me.

The parents undoubtedly had some serious psychological issues but they somehow did produce amazing children. As much as the parents bothered me I felt like they did love their children, especially the father. They just somehow how had a bizarre idea of what their job description as parents were. I would definitely recommend this one, especially if you have kids. I promise it will make you feel like you are the parent of the year!

If you want to read some more review on this book from our blogging book club you can go here.

This is how things were this week!

So this has been a pretty fun week! There was some of this:
I love when they can actually work together!
These are the new homes for the new Webkinz Brittany and Matthew have been saving for. In desperation yesterday to occupy them I volunteered the couple of boxes I had for them to make house from.I recommend this activity! Kept them busy for at least and hour!
The arrival of the littlest superhero! Yes, Joshua has joined forces with his brother and they will be out fighting crime together!
I gotta say, super hero pjs are the best! Don't you love how neither of my boys would look right at me? Guess they didn't want to risk injuring that x-ray vision.

My little flower children! You were supposed to pick a favorite decade and dress like that time period. We didn't have too many choices so we tye-died for the first time. I have to say it was really fun and I think we will be doing it again. Josh thought he was really cool to dress like the big kids!

So that was our week, once school is out there probably won't be much to post. Look for pictures of our clean closets and tidy rooms. (Yeah who am I kidding?)

More Pink Ladies!

I finished two new little girls last night. I am really liking this new size. I did one that is even tinier but I am not happy with her yet. I think this is going to be the size I stick with for awhile, I guess I finally learned that less really is more. I am so happy that they have been well received and you guys like them! This is one of my number one favorite things about blogging. I love having someone to show my little creations to, it makes creating them even more fun!

So here they are!





I tried the pink and brown combo that seems to be popular right now. I like how she is kind of soft looking.





This Miss Polka Dots is ready for a party! Maybe one celebrating Spring? I love this happy color of pink and as you can see I covered her in pink!





So they are over in the shop waiting for new homes, I will definitely be making more. I like how they come together faster and take less of my favorite fabrics. I really don't enjoy turning their tiny little limbs. I need to teach my kids how to do it, I bet it would be easier for them with their little fingers. That is it, I could start my own little sweatshop!

I hope everyone has a wonderful Memorial Day!

Another Great Swap!

I received my mermaid swap from Tracy this week so now I can show you my treasures sent and received!

I sent Tracy off these goodies. She like teal and purple so I tried to use those colors.

I had fun painting this mermaid painting, I haven't done anything like this in awhile.

This is the fun package I received yesterday! It was just amazing!

I love the boxes she altered and I love that we both sent each other a mermaid doll! I have been so lucky with the great swaps I have done lately!

I am working on some more little dolls, I hope to have at least two in the shop tomorrow by noon. See that tiniest of the tiny one? She is making me nuts!

Throw-back Thursday, Me and Barbie

This is the little family that started it all for me! I adored Barbies! From the time this picture was taken, probably around five, until I was an embarrassingly old teenager.

Actually I guess it never really ended, William gave me a bride Barbie for Christmas the first year we were married. I would have paid good money to see him wandering down that pink Barbie aisle too!

Anyway, the Sunshine Family started it all for me. I remember them so clearly too. The Dad and the baby had such curly hair. And the mom was shaped more like a preteen than the mother of a child. I loved them! I have been thinking about my Barbies a lot as I have been working on miniatures. That became a huge part of the appeal for me. I had a cousin who taught me how to cut out the tiny little images of product that were in the paper on adds and coupons, then make little boxes and glue them to the front. Presto, Barbie could have a full pantry! Believe it or not most of them have survived and are still in residence at my mom's house. When we go to visit this summer I am taking pictures! So does Brittany love Barbies as much as her mother? Not really, but it is okay, I think I got it all out of my system when I was a kid!

Teeny-Tiny Little Miss Polka Dots!

Here she is, my littlest doll! I have sort of been obsessed with making this little doll for the last couple of days. When I signed up for Viv's miniature swap she warned me that I could become easily hooked. And I thought to myself "I really don't think so". Wrong! I am totally hooked! What is it about little tiny things? I have been wanting to make a tiny version of my original gingham girl. I have decided that there is just something I really love about a round headed doll. Weird, never would have thought I would think about the shape of a dolls head but there you are! I also really love felt hair. It never gets messed up and always looks cute. In fact I wish I could have felt hair myself. And that it could be just this color pink too! I love pink and black together. And polka dots. Are you getting the feeling that I really love all the things that make up this doll? Well I do, I am really happy with her. I thought she looked like a birthday girl so I made her a birthday cake to take along on her journey, where ever she goes. Another good idea, always bring cake!

Here she is in my hand so you can see how little she is. She is in the shop now.

I am working on an even tinier version, believe it or not! It is really hard to make clothes this tiny though so we will see if she make it or not!

**Yeah Tiny Little Miss Ginghamworld has been sent to her new home! I am glad she is so well liked! I will be starting some more!

A couple of good flicks!

I watched Iron Jawed Angels this afternoon while I worked on the project I had hoped to have finished to put in the shop today. I will have it tomorrow. This is an HBO film that start Hillary Swank, Patrick Dempsey and a few other faces you will recognize. I decided to watch it after Tif reviewed it last week. You should read her review here, it is much better than mine will be. I didn't know too much about the suffrage movement and I kept thinking that although I knew these women has fought for the right to vote for many years, I didn't think the movie would get too rough. I mean I guess I think of the turn of the century as a somewhat more civilized time. They didn't contend with porn on the Internet, nuclear bombs, terriorts and such. So surely, although I knew no one was going to roll over and just give women the vote I didn't think it would get too brutal. I was wrong. Those women really did literally fight for us all to have the right to vote, something I know I have taken for granted. It was really a good movie, made me think a bit and that is always good! Needless to say I will definitely be voting in the next election!

Last night I stayed up waaaaaay too late watching the end of Cranford, the PBS masterpiece theater series. Loved it! It just might be my favorite Judy Dench movie, and I really liked Mrs. Brown. If you missed it add it to your netflix Que. You can still see it here online too. Some of the witty little one-liners in here just killed me!

Sunday Update!

Just a few things going on around here this week.

First William had almost finished the playground/garden area this weekend.





It is looking so good now! The swingset looks so much better over here. Now we just have to finish that little area the roto-tiller is in. Probably some more dirt and a few trees.





Brittany got new glasses this week! They look waaaay too grown up!





Matthew drew this great picture of my hand during sacriment meeting. I know it is hard to see, but I had to show it as those little squiggles everywhere are apparently the veins in my hands! I guess I must be aging even faster than I thought! Hysterical to me that he had to draw them!





Mr. Joshua got a warning in nursery today at church for kicking. Apparently I am raising "that" kid. He looks too sweet doesn't he? He is saying "cheese" while I took the picture! These two boys want to wish you "Aloha" in their aloha shirts too!

Yummy Lemon Chicken!

This is one of my new favorite recipes! It started with a recipe my friend Tif's Sister-in-law's recipe for lemon chicken. I think she got it from Rachael Ray. It called for lemon curd which makes it really easy. The problem is lemon curd can be kind of hard to find. And sort of expensive in these parts. So I figured out how to make my own lemon curd. It wasn't hard because lemon curd is basically the lemony part of lemon bars. We love this recipe because I think of the crispy chicken and the yummy sauce which basically make it okay to eat dessert for dinner!

2-3 Chicken breast cut into small chunks. Salt and pepper chicken. Dip in egg, then in cornstarch. You can dip in flour but we use cornstarch because it is gluten-free and it doesn't seem to soak up the oil as much. Heat enough oil in a small sauce pan to cover the bottom about a half inch. Brown chicken chunks in the oil and then remove. I sometimes do this part in advance. Of course the last time I tried doing this Mr. Mathew snuck into my fridge and nippled his way a quarter of the way through my chicken!



If you don't want to buy the lemon curd this is how I make it. In a saucepan I combine 1 cup sugar, 5 tablespoons of lemon juice, 2 eggs. I cook it about 8-10 minutes over a pretty low heat, it will scorch easily, until it thickens a bit. Then I add 2 teaspoons of cornstarch to about a tablespoon of cold water and stir that in until it thickens more. This part can be done ahead also.



Then just before we are ready to eat I heat a tablespoon of oil in a large frying pan, add the chicken to reheat if I made it ahead. Remove that to a plate for just a minute while I add about a tablespoon of vinegar to the pan and then the lemon curd. Add the chicken back in and heat it all together, but really lower the heat because that sauce will scorch so easily. Serve over rice. A little green onion garnish on top looks nice but my kids won't eat it! This make really good leftovers except there usually aren't any!

More Incredible Mail!

More Incredible Mail!
I know it is hard to believe I could be so lucky but after my gorgeous mermaid arrived the other day, my swap from the miniature swap I was in also arrived. I wanted to make sure these two had separate posts because they are so amazing they shouldn't have to share with anyone! I was a little nervous about this one because I have never made this kind of miniature doll before. I became even more nervous about my offering when this gorgeous creature showed up!



Can you believe the detail?




Her face is all embroidered. Look at her tiara and scepter! She has a little basket full of heart shaped cookies and ity-bity mail. Inside the envelopes are the name of her creator, another amazing Vanessa. She doesn't have a blog but oh, she is just amazing!


And look at these little shoes, I think I just might love them the best

She has been crowned the queen of the loveboxes and is presiding over them in grand style!

This is the finished Party Girl I sent her.




She is a party girl so she came with her own cake and present.
That is the box she traveled that she is standing on. I hope Vanessa likes her a fraction of how much I adore my little miss!