Sleeping Beauty crown

I finally finished LMS's Sleeping Beauty crown to go with her dress- just in time for the ward activity tonight!

I ended up making a couple different crowns before figuring out one I liked. I tried craft foam first, but it didn't work out how I wanted.
I then tried a couple different colors of felt, also spray painted, but still didn't like the results. I finally found some gold fabric and went in that direction.
I cut out two crown shapes from felt, covering one side with gold fabric. The less pretty sides got glued together, then sewed together. I hot glued the trim and used Fast Grab tacky glue for the sparklies.
The finished product:
I like that it's soft, flexible, and adjustable. LMS likes that it's a Sleeping Beauty crown.

More random cuteness of Little Miss Sunshine

Overall, LMS is quite articulate and knows a lot of words. However, she still has problems with some sounds, which makes for some interesting conversations.

lizards = scissors (she can say 'scissors' if you say it first, but if she hasn't heard the word for awhile, she calls them 'lizards')

dokey doe = pinnochio

snully pillow = snuggly pillow (she drops the g's)

shlocolate = chocolate (she's come a long way from how she used to say it- kokole, with a weird tongue twist)

banna = banana

pack pack = back pack (standard for little kids)

What I accomplished today

1. Go for a run- done
2. Phone calls from yesterday- still not done- have to do tomorrow
3. Finish 'the stockings were hung' sign- black washed it, scuffed up the edges a bit, screwed knobs on, applied lettering
4. Catch up on posts, including photos- done

I finally decided what I'm doing about the crown for LMS's costume- have to buy materials tomorrow. I've tried spray painting craft foam with gold paint (the foam ended up cracking), and spraying yellow and white felt with gold paint (end results just weren't authentic enough). So I've decided on white felt covered in shiny gold fabric, with trim and sparklies glued on. Sure hope it works out, since we have our first Halloween activity this Friday.

Now I'm off to work on Christmas presents. I'm trying to get as many taken care of as I can by the end of this month.

On my to do list today

1. Order bedding from Pottery Barn Kids for LMS- not done- it was on sale this weekend, but not anymore- have to wait for the next time it's on sale

2. Run- didn't get moving this morning fast enough

3. Pick up Mr. M from the airport- done :)

4. Mail a pair of shoes I sold on ebay- done

5. Drop off and pick up books at the library- done

6. Find more things for LMS's Sleeping Beauty crown at Hobby Lobby- done

7. Do some grocery shopping- done, involved 3 different stores- ugh

8. Call my VT companion- not done

9. Call the Activities committee chair about the ward activity this Friday- not done

10. Sort papers on desk- done, but will have to be done again in a week, I'm sure

11.Take clothes to storage- done

12. Glue ribbon to water bottle- done

13. Test fabrics and glues for LMS's crown (I'm having trouble getting a result I'm happy with)- done

Super Saturday

At Super Saturday I made a couple different projects.

An etched glass block:

A tile with vinyl lettering:

Some holiday clippies for LMS:

A Christmas sign:

Roadtrip recap

We're back from our roadtrip. Mr. M has drill this week, so Little Miss Sunshine and I drove over and dropped him off, then spent a couple days visiting with family and friends and doing some shopping. I had to be back for our Primary program practice today and the actual program tomorrow (I'm the chorister), so LMS and I drove back yesterday, and Mr. M will fly back in a couple days.

One day I drove from my sister's house to visit a friend (about an hour drive), and passed through three different construction areas. I slowed from 65 to 55, like the signs asked, and everyone else slowed from 75 to 65. Gotta love it. The cops were having a heyday- pull one car over, give a ticket, let them go, pull over the next car to pass them, give a ticket, and repeat. Now, I used to drive 5 over the speed limit, but I've gotten out of that habit recently. Our county is so strapped for cash that they're giving tickets for going 1 mile over the speed limit. Ridiculous, yes. Bringing in money for the county, oh yes. My brother's soccer teammate's mom got a ticket for going one over and had to pay $86!

I got to spend some time with a sister and a couple friends, but I also got to meet up with my roommates from junior college. We roomed together both years, but have mostly lost contact with each other over the last 12 years (has it really been that long already?). I finally got on facebook and was able to track everyone down and realized that two of them already lived near each other and the third recently moved to the same area. Since I was visiting nearby, we were all within a half hour of each other.

We met at a park so the kids (11.5 between the 4 of us) could play while we talked. It was great to see everyone, catch up on what's going on, and see how little we've all changed. If I knew where my scrapbooks are, I'd scan a photo of us from back then. We'll have to make do with this one that LMS took (another was taken on a different camera, but I don't have that one yet). I was able to lighten it a bit, but it's still out of focus, and we were crouching since we weren't sure where she was aiming.

And here's a picture of LMS sleeping on the way home last night. Similar to this one.

Chair color update

I was talking to my sister yesterday, and she said she thought the red cushions on the chair were a cherry red. I think they're more a brick/rust red. So I attempted to get a better photo of the colors involved- it's really hard to get good lighting in our room. I used Mr. M's camera, and I think the photo is a bit more accurate this time.

Tree poster

The other day I talked about making a tree poster for singing time. I finished it a day or so ago. I printed out leaves on different colored paper, covered them with clear packing tape, cut them out, and attached velcro dots to the back. There's also a slip of paper with a song name and page number on the back.
Close up:

I thought about cutting closer to the stems, but decided the nursery kids would be too rough on them.

Autumn decorations

We don't have much space for decorations, but lately I've been wanting be creative. A good side effect of feeling so much better...

I bought a few pumpkins from Hobby Lobby-
Dug out some alphabet stickers I've had for a couple years but never used-

Added some autumn leaves (the same ones I used to make my new background)-
The finished product. Yes, they're sitting on our dvds- the only flat space available. I thought it turned out pretty good, though later I might find some different letters and modpodge them on for next year.

Then I made a pine cone wreath like the one Vanessa made (we were in the same ward when our husbands were at language school, and she's super creative). Mine didn't turn out quite as well as hers did, but that's because of the pine cones I used. She used small ones that fit together really well. I used Ponderosa Pine pine cones which are bigger, prickly, and don't fit together very well. I think it turned out pretty good, though.

Next time I make a pine cone wreath, I won't be using Ponderosa Pine pine cones. My fingertips are sore from being poked multiple times, and I have scratches all over my arms. I also won't drop the wreath when I'm almost finished. I did that last night and the styrofoam wreath cracked right in half. I hot glued it back together (getting a second degree burn on my thumb in the process) and let it set overnight. This morning I checked it and it was dry and hard, so I finished it off and hung it up.

We went to Mr. M's parents' house to gather the pine cones, and I brought my camera along to take some pictures. LMS picked up this pine cone and said 'take a picture mommy!'.

The finished product hanging outside the front door. I used some muslin for the hanger and bow, but didn't hem it or anything- just cut it and tied it to the length I wanted.

My first poll

I've been trying to decide whether I really want to go through the hassle of re-covering the chair or if I should leave it as it is. Currently it's a very nice dark red microfiber, if I re-covered it, it would be in a nice dark blue (not navy) corduroy.

The walls of the room are sort of a sage green with one wall a light blue. The draperies are a darker blue. There is currently a navy blue rug down, but when we move out it won't stay. My parents will probably put a sage green rug down.

It's hard to get the lighting right to show the shades of green, blue, and red properly.The top left picture has the most accurate coloring. The bottom left picture shows my computer desk, which is where the chair will go. The bottom right picture shows the chair up against the green and blue walls. The shading of the colors isn't quite accurate, but it's the best I could manage.

So, the question is: change the chair so it blends in with the room, or leave it as is so it provides a pop of color?

Please vote and let me know what you think!

Project progress

(photo from Amazon.com)

I finally ordered my own cell phone- I haven't had one for several years- haven't needed one- but now it's time to get one. I got the Blackberry Pearl 8130. It was pretty cheap and it's web browsing capable, so now I can get online and see if something I found is selling good on ebay- answering the question that always holds me up- to buy or not to buy? (and then re-sell on ebay...)

The other ward had their Super Saturday projects out a week ago, and one of them was a bead and wire crown with a little tulle at the back. I looked at it and figured I could make one without someone showing me, so I bought some wire and some beads, dug out my tulle that's been sitting around for who-knows-how-long, and got going with the first pair of pliers I found. Unfortunately for my hand, that turned out to be Mr. M's military multi-tool. While effective, the handle has nothing by way of padding, so I have a blister on a finger and some nice bruising and sore spots on my palm and fingers.

A couple hours after starting, here's what I came up with (a bit different than the one I saw, but better, I think):

LMS modeling her crown outside. She was convinced it was going to blow away and insisted on holding it onto her head.

I started the gold 'Sleeping Beauty' crown for LMS's Halloween costume. I started by spraying some tan craft foam gold, but I need another coat or two before moving on. I'll post a pic when I'm done.

I also started a tree/leaf poster for singing time. The leaves are removable and have song names on them, and the kids take turns picking leaves. I had a 'fish aquarium' that I used for a month or two, and in another month or so I'll do some snowflakes. The fish/leaves/snowflakes attach to a piece of foam core with velcro dots, making for easy removal and replacement. I use it primarily in nursery, but also once a month for singing time in Primary. I didn't take the fish aquarium to church last Sunday because I wanted to teach them a couple new songs, and the kids all asked for the fishies. It always amazes me what makes an impression on little kids. I'll post a pic when I'm done with this one too.

New boots

Aren't these some great boots? Brand new Danskos at a great (low!) price on ebay- happy late birthday to me! I've been looking for these boots all summer and finally found them in my size at a price I could live with. They came today and I looove them! I think I'm going to have to find these boots in black, too. They have nice thick, sturdy soles, and I can put my orthotics in them. I'm going to get a lot of use out of these boots! I had a pair of Aerosoles boots last year, and the soles sucked. I only wore them a few times and I ended up selling them on ebay last week....

Homecoming parade

Friday LMS and I went to the local Homecoming parade. I love small town parades! The sports teams all ride on trucks/trailers/wagons, each high school class does a float, as do some of the elementary schools, the school clubs do something, local dance and gymnastics studios also have trailers full of kids, car enthusiasts show off their cool cars, there's some horse groups, and, of course, the police and fire departments participate.

LMS likes the candy. This year we were surrounded by adults, and I figured out that's the way for your kid to clean up: look real cute and the people on the floats will toss candy to you, and since you don't have to compete with other kids, you get it all!

Pictures, starting from top left, going clockwise: high school marching band, horse group, a pretty good picture of me that LMS took, a lady and her dog (both wearing cowboy hats) while we were waiting for the parade to start, LMS.

Living with two chronic diseases

This is a post I've been thinking about for while, and am finally finishing.

Back in August, the Meanest Mom, who has a chronic disease of her own, hosted an online Ms. Chronic Disease of America E-Pageant. Basically, you wrote in with all the sexy details of your chronic disease. I thought about entering, but I'm just not as clever with words as some people. The first contestant featured has PCOS, which got me thinking. I don't have just one chronic disease, I have two. I will have to deal with PCOS and gluten intolerance my whole life- they're not going to go away. I can minimize a lot of the symptoms, but if I do the wrong things I will definitely feel worse.

I've been feeling a lot better without gluten. After 10 years of feeling like crap (and sometimes worse), it's nice to feel almost human again. Unfortunately I keep forgetting that just because I've gotten to the root of part of my problem and figured out how to deal with it, doesn't mean that everything is completely better. I still have to deal with PCOS and yeast problems.

Comparatively, the gluten intolerance is way easier to deal with than the PCOS. Supposedly, they can both be controlled with a careful diet, but the results of a gluten free diet are seen much quicker (in me) than those of a PCOS friendly diet. I recently read 'The PCOS Diet Book' by Colette Harris. I was really hoping for something profound, but there really wasn't much I didn't already know: eat a variety of low glycemic index foods- whole grains, fresh fruits and veggies, lean meat, etc. Exercise. Lose weight. Get enough sleep.

The most helpful section was the section about herbal supplements to help with symptoms and hormonal imbalances. I'm trying Vitex to help with my hormones, and I'm taking aloe vera juice to help my intestines work properly.

The thing is is that I've always tried to eat healthy, exercise regularly, and tried (unsuccessfully till just recently) to lose weight and get enough sleep. Despite all that, I've never really noticed my symptoms getting better. Talk about depressing. Maybe that's why I've pretty much ignored it since I found out about it more than 5 years ago. Nothing works, so if I ignore it, it'll go away, right? I wish.

I've been losing weight (20 pounds now!), but it's slowed down the last few weeks. Thinking about fruit and its affect on me also got me thinking about PCOS. I've been ignoring it, but I can't keep doing that. Just because I figured out one cause of my weight problems, I haven't got all the causes of my weight problems taken care of (PCOS definitely causes weight problems, so combined with gluten intolerance, I never had a chance). So now I have to focus on figuring out how to eat to control the PCOS. I need to be more careful about the sugar that creeps into my diet. I need to work on not stress-eating, which I most definitely do (usually chocolate). I need to make sure I'm exercising a bit more consistently than I have been.

Hopefully if I can manage to do all that, I'll finally be able to alleviate some of the symptoms of PCOS, and continue to lose weight.