We're back!

Really, we didn't go anywhere, but for months I had trouble accessing our account! Then I'd forget to try, then a few months would pass... Until tonight: voila!

Can't wait to fill in some of the void from the last time I blogged, but it'll probably have to wait until next week. Stay tuned...

Take care, and remember who you are and to count your blessings,
Oh, and don't do anything that I wouldn't do ;)
Love,
Brenna

Idea resources

I was looking around online, and found some fun blogs that are exploding with great activity ideas. Activities for Family Home Evening, Primary, etc... I could get overwhelmed by all the neat ideas, but I like to keep things simple: so I'll just be using these as a reference when I need some inspiration :)

http://lds.org/family/home-evening?lang=eng

http://www.sugardoodle.net/joomla/

Just had to share

I was folding clothes while the baby was asleep. I was listening to The Mormon Channel on my iPhone, and heard the most marvelous talk by Elder Russell M. Nelson. 

I love Elder Nelson to begin with, but this talk is wonderful. I went to the computer right away to find the text version. His address is titled, "We Are Children of God."


Elder Nelson talks about how "We are dual beings. Each soul is comprised of body and spirit, both of which emanate from God. A firm understanding of body and spirit will shape our thoughts and deeds for good."


The talk discusses our physical and our spiritual bodies. He gives stunning facts about the human body, and beautiful eternal truths about the spirits within ourselves. 


Some snippets that delighted me: 

• "When death claims an individual in the prime of life, we take comfort in knowing that the very laws which do not allow life to persist here are the same laws that will be implemented at the time of the Resurrection, when the body will be endowed with immortality."

• "To return to God through the gateway of death is a joy for those who love Him."

• "Among the most important of spiritual exercises is prayer. It engenders harmony with God and a desire to keep His commandments. Prayer is a key to wisdom, virtue, and humility."

• "Who are we? We are children of God. Our potential is unlimited. Our inheritance is sacred. May we always honor that heritage—in every thought and deed."

Please read and enjoy, you won't be disappointed. We Are Children of God.

(Almost) 11 months old!

It took her a while, but Eva is now crawling! For the longest time, she was one of those babies that was content to just be where I plopped her. Not anymore! She loves the kitchen cabinets and pantry of course. She is starting to climb up onto things, but can only get to her knees without help (so far!).

Eva is wonderful. We love seeing her grow and develop. She is very happy and healthy. She loves to babble to herself. It's mostly "da-da-da" sounds in various tones and speeds. Her first word was a couple months ago: "asat?" (what's that?) followed by "uh-oh" a couple weeks later.

A faux-hawk hairdo, courtesy of Auntie Ki... 

She'll hand you something when you hold your hand out. She loves goldfish crackers. Eva likes books, especially The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle. (Grandma recently gave it to her along with a caterpillar plush.) She just learned to drop a ball to make it bounce, and yesterday, she was dropping a Dansko shoe to watch it pseudo-bounce on our tile floor. Just so dang cute.

These photos are just too cute not to share. Enjoy! 

How to Make Flower Hair Clips

I have been asked many a time how I make my baby girl's flower clips... So here is how I make them:

I went to the beauty supply store and bought a package of what I call "alligator clips." I modified my clips using pliers and wire-cutters:

(Top: before

Bottom: after)

I cut the clip length because I didn't want it to stick out underneath the flower. I bent the upper part of each clip's "mouth" to be parallel with the bottom, so it would grip her hair better. 

I covered the metal clips with ribbon using hot glue. This is a little tricky, because you have to use one hand to keep the clip open, and work quickly to place the ribbon before the glue hardens. You also want to avoid the ribbon going too crooked... also avoid gluing the clip shut :) 

(This is what my ribbon-covered clip looked like)

I bought fabric flowers, so I got them ready them for attaching them to the clips. I pulled the flowers off the stems... but some had little plastic shapers inside, so I removed those too.

(This plastic needs to be removed to work well for our purposes.)

The fabric flowers have lots of layers of fabric. To keep them from fluttering around, but mostly to avoid having to glue each individual layer, I stitched the layers together with a needle and thread. (I did a few on the sewing machine... but I got frustrated trying to control all the variables on the machine in such a teeny area.)

(The backside of my stitched flower)

I bought tiny buttons, and using my wire-cutters, I nipped off the loops on the back. Then I glued the buttons in the center of my flowers:

My last step was gluing flowers to their ribbon-covered clips: Ta-Da!

(Side view of the finished product...)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

(September 29, 2010. Eva is just over 4 months old)

(I clipped these flowers to headbands when she had too little hair to hold the clips :)

ADORABLE. 

"Earth Muffin"? -I'll take it.

I'll admit: not everything I do is earth-friendly. BUT, we do recycle. 

I bought two nifty blue bins with a recycle symbol on them. One for paper/cardboard, the other for plastics. Yogurt cups/frozen veggie bags/sandwich baggies/shampoo bottles/to envelopes and unnecessary paperwork/receipts, you name it... I'll rinse it out and recycle it!

I make a weekly (sometimes every other week...) trip to Wal-mart, (I know, ironic huh?) and bring the bins in the car. I park the car, grab a cart, load baby and bins, then trundle into the store :)  I add my contributions to the big recycle bins they have near the entries.  Most times, I don't need to shop, so we just turn around and leave. The greeter probably thinks I'm a weirdo, but I don't care. 

I also buy organic produce. And I breeze through the organic foods section to see if any items we'd use are on sale.  

I peruse through blogs like this for inspiration/motivation to live more "green."

It helps. That's what I keep telling myself anyway. I like it :) 

A Birfday Gift :)

This weekend, we were invited to Lucy Overacker's first birthday, and I wanted to make her a gift. I was given some great suggestions via a facebook post. One suggestion from Katie Matteson led me to the Etsy website and I fell in love with the site. I saw an item for sale (lots, actually :) and thought: "I could make that." So, Lucy, I made you some Ribbon Rings or Fairy Rings or Dancing Ribbons or whatever you'd like to call them.

I found wooden rings and a few more flavors of ribbon at the craft store to supplement the ribbon I had at home. I cut lengths of about two feet. Then tied the ribbon on the rings (leaving the ends uneven lengths) and voila!

And they turned out so cute, I made some for Eva with some plastic link toys we had lying around. I think I'll like the links, so I can just slip it on my purse/diaper bag strap.  <oh, I found bells at the craft store too, and made them removable for Eva...>