Some Crafts, Some Cooking

The older my dear ones get, the more creative they seem to be, and more capable of making fun things!

I saw a cute idea on the internet, to buy some wallet sized picture frames with interesting lines.  On the back, you glue on a baby safety plug, insert art of your choice, and then plug it into your sockets to hide the plugs!  I looked for months, but found nothing exciting.  When Alice started robotics, I asked her if she would draw me up a frame, here was my original sketch:

She finished the design a few weeks ago, but I had to wait until I could find some baby plugs.  They are a common thrift item, so I didn't think it would take long.  I found some on Wednesday, and once I started gluing, Emily, Grace, and Juliet volunteered to make me some bird drawings to put in them!

They are super cute, even "Derp" who was a hurried first attempt. He hangs out in the least visible plug.

The Kroger magazine has my number, and when I saw these cute little chicks I knew that I needed to make them for my mom's group!

Grace made chocolate chip cookies from scratch, and wanted to bring them to school.  I'd been saving* the clear bags that waffles, cereal, etc., comes in, and was excited that she was able to wrap them up without adding disposable waste to the world!

Erin's grandson is coming up on his first Easter this year, so when I saw these cute little fabric eggs, I loved the idea, was sad that I hadn't seen it when my kids were younger (they store flat!!!) but thought a first Easter was a great time for a flat set. = )

The bag is lined, and would have taken me quite a bit of time to take apart, and the top was too tight to put through my machine as is, so I embroidered a patch, and sewed it on.  She sent me videos of him playing with both the bag and eggs, and I was happy to see that he enjoyed the bright colors at the very least!

12 fabric eggs are nice, but 24 are even better, right?  I gave a second dozen to the coordinator of my moms' group to use as a fun raffle item, but no new moms came that meeting, so she gets to keep them!  Or pass them along.  Hopefully someone will enjoy them this year!!!

They are small, but can hold at least 10 Hershey kisses!

Another mozzarella and tomato salad, with basil clipped from our 2 year old basil plant!

Emily added so many of the details to her group's World War II history board!

For Emily's birthday, I made her a bag for her batons.  She's actually at a lesson as a type this, try outs are sometime after spring break.  She's not sure if the twirler from last year is coming back or not, so she might be all alone, as a first year twirler, but she's been working hard, and is quite excited for marching season.

The sweatshirt that my mom bought for me years ago was looking really rough, so I cut it up and made it into a pillow.  William's band director just happened to mention that this was his alma mater the day before I found a pillow for it, so William gifted it to him.

Emily made some egg fried rice for dinner one night!

A fancier mozzarella and tomato salad for my moms' group!

More brown bananas that happily disappeared as soon as they were cut and drizzled with chocolate syrup. 

I tried my hand at a rag bowl, using a plastic bag rope as the core.  It takes time and patience, but isn't hard.  I just started my third one.  It feels nice to use things destined for the trash one more time. 

 

Alice needed a spiral notebook for her English class, so we pulled out an old one, gave it a new cover, and it saw its third use!  As of now, she said it's been enough paper for what she does in class.

One of those snowy days we did get a snow day!  Grace and I spent our free day in the kitchen!

We made some pasties with from-scratch pie crust.

The filling was beef ant potato.

They were really pretty, but we didn't have them for dinner, because there were a few other things in the refrigerator that we needed to eat first.  So, we froze them.

When we did have them later in the week, they were really good!  I read a neat little factoid in the cook book that miners would heat them over the candles on their helmets, and that some people would fill one of the ends with a pie filling!

We made from scratch chocolate chip cookies...

and Lemon bars!  These were much too sweet, and we ate through a few of them, but threw away many of them.

We had a little bit of leftover pie crust from the pasties, so I made Billy a single apple turnover.  He said it was pretty good!

We also made some fruit & peanut butter bird seed feeders.  The bush has definitely seen an uptick in bird visitors since we did that, so we should probably put out some more!

For Valentine's Day, Grace made reusable hand warmers.  

They were cute, and worked really well!  It was nice to have something warm in your hands on those super cold days!

Looking back at all the cooking and crafts, I see how much fun we've had over the past few months, while hiding from the snow!  It's nice to have something to show for it. = )

later days

*I wash it, dry it, then have a file folder in with my plastic bags to store it.

Snow

The snow from Thanksgiving hasn't yet had a chance to fully recede, because it's been so cold, and we keep getting more and more snow! 

11-30-25:

12-07-25:

12-10-25:

This was actually enough of an event that they cancelled school, because they were expecting worsening conditions.  I spent the day in bed, fighting off something or rather, but the kids did a good job with the shovelling, with very little complaining, since they did have the day off! It didn't actually get too bad, though Billy did say that he slipped around a bit on the highway/interstate interchange on his way to work. We still ended up at Alice's robotics meeting that night, though the band concert was rescheduled.  

It has been a snowy December!  We are expecting some above freezing temperatures this weekend, which will be a nice change, because I feel like we haven't seen 32F in a few weeks! = (  Only seven more days until we start gaining light, and that can't come soon enough!

later days

Snow in the New Year

It's been a snowy, wintery, winter this year!

Emily and William attend a more rural school than Alice, Grace, and Juliet, so they've had a few extra snow days (hence the dinner making), but on days we get snow that needs to be moved, we all go out and take care of it!

1st January:

15 January:

21st January: 

Snow day for all 5! (so was 22nd of January!)  These days were dangerously cold too, hovering around 0F as a high.

Willam's boots were not going on over all of his bundling, so he borrowed Billy's boots.  Their comically large size brought me back to the days of William wearing oversized shoes that would fit over his leg braces!

23rd January: 

1st February:

2nd February:

We have been getting some dustings, but nothing substantial enough to register on my snow gauge, with all of the unmeted snow still piled up on the deck. 

The forecast is calling for more gross weather starting tomorrow, which I do love a good snow day, but Thursday day would go much faster for me, while impatiently waiting for Billy to get home so that we can watch Strike, if everyone goes to school and I do some chores and shopping!

Either way, winter is still in full swing, so you can expect at least one more of these snowy posts.

later days

Snow!

The end of November started the snow, and Thursdays have been particularly snowy this year!

11-21 The first sticking snow was actually not much, and the snow gauge (truck) was not in place for a picture, so I snapped a picture of the snow dusted plants instead.

12-1 The first "proper" snow.  It was a Sunday, so no school to know how bad the roads were. lol.

12-5 No School for anyone!!!

William got up around his normal time, and worked on his math until Alice's band concert, but he finished!  Better than giving up his weekend, which is what the plan was before the snow day?

Post-concert snow art:

12-12  Snow Day for Emily and William, who had a field trip planned and really wanted to go.  No snow day for Alice, Grace, and Juliet who were hoping for a snow day.  So, I got whined at by everybody.

12-20 no one got a snow day, the snow was really thick, and I found the sidewalks and driveway quite slippery as I was shovelling! = (

One day, my car blower fan was not working in the front vents, which is a poor time of year for it to not work.  So, we took my car in, and I was just going to use Alice's future car, the van, to run my errands.  However, when I hopped in that afternoon to drive it to collect the twins, it wouldn't start! = ( We had just driven it a few days prior, but apparently that was the battery's final hoorah.  Luckily, I can walk to collect the twins, and didn't have plans to collect Emily that day, but I was late, and it was a cold walk!  I was able to call AAA the next day to get it started and get a new battery put in, but that is a whole other story.*

Not all was bad though, I saw a sight I'd never seen! I thought I saw a beaver, well, at first I thought it was a duck with its head underwater, but then upon closer inspection thought it was a beaver.  While there are beavers in Michigan, I've not seen any personally.  I have seen woodchucks though, and it turns out they can swim too!  So, probably a woodchuck swimming the river.

Alice and Grace went out to build a dragon sculpture in the snow.  The lines are hard to see, so this is just the head, but it looked pretty good with wide wings and a long tail!

One more interesting sight was this cool icicle outside of the bakery at MSU where my mom treated me to a bagel & cream cheese!  I thought it was a very cool shape & design, for an icicle.

My weather watching is temporarily on hold, since the kids aren't in school for the next two weeks, but I'm sure there will be more snow to add in the new year!

later days

*Which I will include right here, because I have no plans to put it anywhere else, as I took no pictures documenting the morning.

I was able to use Billy's car to drive Alice, Emily, and William in the morning, but he's gone by the time the twins go to school.  So, we bundled up and walked to school that day.  I called AAA as I was leaving their school, to get on the list.  I could have called much earlier, but I really don't have time to deal with someone else's schedule while I'm trying to get children out the door.

He came, but his battery jumper was dead, after helping people all morning.  Thankfully, we were able to use the Kia, which is 'in storage,' but kept in operating order, to juice it up.  Once he got it running, I took it to Walmart, where we always get our batteries, but they had no openings that day!!!! = 0

I tried to call Billy, but he was working and was unable to answer, so I called my mom to help me figure out a next step.  She recommended O'Riley's because they will help you put it in, if it's not too busy or too difficult.  Of course it was difficult, why wouldn't my car be difficult!!!!!  Luckily, they knew a guy, a local mechanic, in Grand Ledge (where I was) who was able to put in the battery that I bought, right then and there!  So, if you are in Grand Ledge, I totally recommend Scrib's Auto!!!