Making Elsa Inspired Dresses Using Mostly Thrift Store Finds

Nothing in this post was sponsored and I am not in any way affiliated with any of the stores or brands or characters that I may mention.  If I mention them, it's just because I went there, or saw the movie. I'm not endorsing anything, either.  This is just what I did. 

If you like this so much you want to pin it, awesome, but I would ask that you not pin the photos with the girls' faces in them.  Thank you!

Before I get started explaining what I did, I want to note that if you have a very detail-oriented child, this method might not work well, because materials found at the thrift store vary wildly.  Or you may find that this is too time consuming or just not what you're looking for.  There are plenty of alternatives to paying someone on an online auction site thousands of dollars (Please don't do that!  They're the reason those dresses are all sold out in the first place). First, you might want to check to see if anyone locally can make one.  Or, you could also check Etsy.  I recently saw a seller with a lovely handmade Elsa dress selling for only $40, which is just a few dollars more than the Disney store dress they sell at JCPenney.  I think that one is $36, but I'm not positive.  And it's true that sometimes JCPenney does have that dress in stock (I actually saw it once, with my own eyes!).


Now that business is out of the way, let's get to the fun part.  Since the word "Elsa" is in the title of my post, some of you might be new here, so welcome!  This is a small, personal blog, and I don't do any reviews or giveaways, but hopefully you'll enjoy reading about how I made Elsa dresses for my two girls. 

When both of my girls (ages 5 and 2) were invited to a "Frozen" themed, dress-up birthday party, I knew that Karina's flimsy store-bought dress would not hold up (it's literally coming apart at the seams, she's worn it so much), and Elena didn't have anything at all. 

I had actually been thinking about sewing some Elsa dresses for them for a while, and came up with an idea  to use a T-shirt as the base of the dress.  I'm certainly not the first or only person in the world who thought of this, as you may find if you do a little online searching.  Once I had the idea, it was time to shop for materials.

I didn't plan well.  I bought way more than I needed.  Don't do that.  Figure out what color you want for each piece, how sparkly, etc, and go out with a plan.  You'll spend a lot less!  

I decided to look at the thrift store for clothing and other items I could repurpose into their dresses.  I knew I definitely needed a T-shirt base, and I thought I might find some other suitable materials there as well.  I took both girls with me to our local Goodwill, which is fairly new, and huge.  In the kids' clothing area, I managed to find two perfect white T-shirts.  Karina's shirt has silver plastic rhinestones on the top and the one I found for Elena has a heart surrounded by a snowflake, also in rhinestones.  Here is Elena's shirt before I started sewing.  (Please disregard messy craft space!)

Both shirts are long sleeves, so I could trim the ends into a point, similar to the cuff of Elsa's dress.  After we found the T-shirts but no suitable skirts in the children's area, I thought I'd look in the curtain area for some sheers and see what I could find there.  Along the way I ran into the ladies' nightgown/pajama/robe area.  Score!  Material used in nightgowns is thin, kind of wispy, and reminded me exactly of Elsa's cape.  I got several different pieces, including a long white slip that I thought I'd use for the cape, but ended up not using at all.  Then in the ladies' shirt area, Karina and I spied this awesome sequined turquoise top.  We just knew it would be perfect.  I did end up buying fabric for the skirt at Joann's, because I hadn't found what I was looking for to match Karina's Elsa top.  Over the next few days, I found more sparkly tops, two of which became Elena's dress, as well as a light turquoise slip that became both girls' capes.  I bought more items than I needed, because I wasn't sure what was going to work, how much I could find, and I also had some of the colors a bit off in my mind.  

What I ended up using for Karina's dress:  white T-shirt, sequined turquoise woman's top, sparkly fabric (one yard), half of a light turquoise slip.
What I ended up using for Elena's dress:  white T-shirt, sequined teen's top, sparkly woman's tanktop, half of a light turquoise slip.

Now for the sewing part.  If you have never sewn anything before, I probably wouldn't recommend this as your first project.  It took a lot of figuring out where and how to attach things, and sewing with knits can sometimes be tricky as they move and stretch.  If you have basic sewing skills and a little experience, definitely go for it.  If you don't have sewing experience, but still want to try this out, just make sure you have some backup material and take your time.

When I sewed the sparkly shirt to Karina's white T-shirt, I needed to turn the blue shirt upside down first, so the bottom hem became the top hem of the bodice.  The neckline of the shirt was off-shoulder and had a buckle, so it could not be used.  Then I pinned it like crazy to the white shirt, checking it multiple times to be sure it fit.  Then I cut slightly along the new top to make the curved parts of the top of the bodice.  You can also see the silver rhinestone's on the shirt.  See below.

  I left the back straight across, although you can tell from the photo that it's a little crooked.  Don't worry.  It's not really as bad as it looks; Karina's holding it up for me and she's holding it kind of crooked.  (This photo is from after I had sewn the bodice to the shirt and the skirt to the shirt)

I sewed the blue shirt to the white shirt (careful of the rhinestones; I had to go very slowly so I didn't break a needle) using a zig-zag stitch.  Then I tried it on Karina, marked where I wanted to make the V at the bottom of the bodice, and cut.  I intentionally made it big so she wouldn't grow out of it immediately.  You can see the V in this photo of the girls.  You can also see the pointy sleeve ends on Karina's dress too.  What face is Elena making here?  She is so silly.

Karina's skirt was hard, because for a while I couldn't figure out how to make it longer in the back than the front.  My advice: use stretchy material or a long skirt.  When I made Elena's, I didn't worry about it being longer in back, and the shirt I used for the skirt portion of hers was stretchy.  Elena's was soooo much easier than Karina's.  I finally ended up cutting three pieces and you can see that the middle piece was too short.  I added some extra to the top of it, and the cape hides this part now.  When I sewed the V of the bodice to the skirt, it did make it a little tighter on her, so I may have to add a zipper in the future (dreading that) but for now she is able to put it on and take it off just fine.

Here is another view of the back, with the train part.  I later hemmed this all around, so it's a little shorter than in this photo.

When I was ready to do the cape, I cut the turquoise slip in half and used the longer back piece on Karina's and the shorter front piece on Elena's.  I did have to do a bit of hemming on the sides to prevent fraying, but it was amazingly easy, as the fabric had a tendency to roll up anyway. 

The following photos show some of the processes and materials I used.  I don't normally post tutorials, so if any of this is confusing, I apologize.  Hopefully you can still find some inspiration here!  I also didn't take a lot of photos of Karina's dress at first, so most of these show progress on Elena's dress.

Here is the sequined shirt I used for the bodice of Elena's dress. Below is the sparkly tanktop I used for the skirt.  I cut the sides down a bit and sewed them back up, right sides together, to make a skirt.  I also cut off the neckline, as close as I could, to make it more straight across.

Here is where I had cut the V for the bottom of the bodice out of the sequined shirt.  See how many pins I used?  

 Here you can see it in my messy craft room with draped over a chair. 

Here are some more photos of the dresses when they were finished.  You can see the cape in these.  I did go back and hem both dresses a little more, so they don't trip, and the girls played for hours in them last night.

 Here is Elena's dress finished and hanging. 

 Can you see the tiny white lace trim at the bottom of the cape?  That was part of the slip!  This is why I liked shopping the thrift store.  So many cool little goodies already part of the material!

If you can, try the dress on your child several times during the process so you can check for length and fit.  Make sure it's not so long that she trips.  You may or may not want to include the slit in the skirt; Karina's has a slit but Elena's does not.  Elena's is also stretchy material for the skirt whereas Karina's is not.

Most of all, have fun!  Don't expect perfection or an exact replica.  All that matters is that you have fun and the little girl for whom you're sewing is happy in the end!  Mine are, and I'm a happy mom, too.

Update on our lives

I miss my blog.  I miss having enough time to write for it on anything like a regular basis.  I really do.  But, I'm not sorry for not writing because I'm spending that time with my little girls who are growing up way too fast for my liking.  Here's an update.

We had a long winter, as did everyone else in the country as far as I can tell.  But it was okay, because unlike last winter, we did not have a lot of sickness this year!  That is definitely a fair trade in my book.  Karina had one bad stomach bug, but no one got the flu or anything worse.  Elena had a run of colds, but she powered through them like a trooper.  That girl is tough, let me tell you.

Now that spring is trying to spring, ha ha, we have been getting outside more, so Karina is having some trouble with her allergies.  I suffer from seasonal allergies, which I describe as being more year-round than seasonal, but whatever.  My mom has them, my dad has them, my grandmother has them, my brother--you get the picture.  Well, Karina has them, too.  This year, they are affecting her eyes more than they have before.  She takes 2 different allergy medicines, both recommended by our pediatrician and one is a prescription.  That one is for her allergy related cough, and the other is an OTC that she takes twice a day.  I guess they help but it's hard to say.  Both girls are going to the allergist this summer to be evaluated for a possible latex sensitivity, and Karina is having her peanut allergy re-assessed as well.  She was diagnosed at a year old as peanut allergic, but has never had another issue in the slightest since the one incident.  Even when her friend accidentally swiped peanut butter across her head, she never had any problem.

Karina has upgraded to a 20" bike (with training wheels).  She was riding a 12" bike before, that she got for a birthday gift, I think, or half birthday or something.  She was afraid of it at first, but then once she got the hang of it, she loved it.  But we had the seat up as far as it would go and the handlebars up too and she looked like she was riding a clown bike!  So we looked around and found this one at a refurbished bike shop.  She loves it.  It is pink and purple, and had little pink and purple stars and suns on the spokes as well as a purple zippered bag for the handlebars.  We also got her purple streamers which she really wanted.  A new seat is possibly in the works (this one is fine but has a small tear) and maybe a basket. She still loves her Lambkin of course and she wants him to come ride with her.  Lambkin almost fits in the zipper bag, but it's a squeeze. 

Meanwhile Elena has taken over the tricycle.  It has one of those handles for the parent in the back so we can help her steer and move.  She pedals the whole time though, which Karina never did.  Karina would just sit there, feet propped up, letting the gears 'click click click' away while we pushed her.  She might as well have been in a stroller!  Ha, but Elena works!  She can pedal a little on her own, but we like to take longer rides/strolls so usually we just push her along.  She is so cute with her little 2 year old legs going round and round! 

Elena has really come into her own lately.  That girl is funny!  She makes up her own jokes!  No kidding!  Her first one was very simple: a knock-knock joke where she answered "Daddy" for both parts.  (Knock knock.  Who's there?  Daddy.  Daddy who?  DADDY!!)  But now she's got a new one and it's almost actually funny.  Knock knock.  Who's there?  Jelly (as in jellyfish, not jam).  Jelly who?  Jelly bread!  And what that means is jelly ON bread.  She is talking more and more and putting words together so much more.  Her pronunciation is getting easier to understand, too.  But my goodness is she funny!  Still has very cranky moments, sometimes whole days, but more often now she's happy and silly and wants to play with Karina or me or her daddy.  She is finally coming out of the "I don't want to eat anything but just drink milk all day long" phase.  I hated that with Karina, too.  I'm glad it seems to be ending with Elena. 

Elena refuses to use the potty.  She is very strong willed and I know it is going to be a tough battle.  I decided I'd give her til summer, when Karina is not in preschool, and then that's it.  No more diapers.  She can do it, she just doesn't want to.  But she doesn't want her diaper, either.  I told her those were the only two acceptable options, but she didn't like that answer.  Goofball. 

Karina is doing great.  She is still in preschool and loves it.  Her teachers love her and tell me she is very ready for Kindergarten in the fall (mom on the other hand is not so much).  We applied to and were accepted into a magnet school here, which is wonderful news.  Our zoned school is the school where I once taught, and at first I was thrilled she was going to go there.  But many changes in administration, zoning, and staff have left me feeling disappointed in a lot of things.  What was once a school we described as our city's best kept secret is no longer that.  It was a diverse, loving, safe school, full of excellent, caring teachers and an administration that any teacher would envy.  Rezoning by the city for a new school means it is no longer as diverse, and administration changes mean some of the best teachers have left after being practically harassed by the new administrators.  THE best teacher, in my opinion, in the entire school was in tears every day and finally left halfway through the year.  I know her well, and I know that her integrity would now allow her to do that unless she was sincerely being mistreated.  No one should have to put up with that.  And on top of that, the administration is extremely inconsistent with student expectations and discipline.  I know all this because I still know a lot of teachers who work there, one of them is a very good friend.  I also know that sometimes teachers, being humans, will complain, but this is more than just complaining, this is a situation that is so extreme that literally half the staff left the first year, and the ones who stayed behind either did not find a position at another school or decided that with only a couple years left until they retired, it wasn't worth the stress of changing school buildings.  This was not an environment for my sensitive, quiet, well-behaved Karina.  She would have fallen straight into the crack.  Not happening.  So we applied to a magnet school that happens to be five minutes down the road from us, and she was accepted during their lottery process, to my great relief.  That awesome teacher who left?  She's at the magnet school now.  And I love that the magnet is pretty much exactly what my school used to be: a happy, healthy school, with a diverse population and caring staff and administrators.  I was able to visit on a prospective parents night, and met the principal (who I liked immediately).  I have met the office staff as well as the nurse, and hope to meet more of the staff soon.  I'm sure there will be a day for Karina to visit before school starts, but that's probably not until August.  The school has a dress code so I've been gathering those items gradually.  It's a technology and engineering school, which partners with NASA and is also a STEM school.  They told us about the design projects they do for each subject, showed us the lab and the room where they do those projects, and it looks like a ton of art to me!  I know it isn't, but I just think Karina is going to love it.  I am so excited now for her to go to school, but do not mistake excitement for eagerness or a rush.  I am in NO hurry for September to be here!!!  I will miss my girl!

Elena will be going to preschool, too, 3 mornings a week.  I will have 3 mornings a week with no children.  What am I going to do?  Ha, like I don't have plans!  I'm going to clean the stinking house, that's what I'm going to do!  This place is biggish but not well laid out and the girls' toys are everywhere.  It's making me crazy!!  So when Elena is in school, I will be cleaning, cleaning, cleaning.  Oh, and shopping.  Sometimes I'm just going shopping.  Or crafting.  Or whatever.  :-)  (You didn't think I was JUST going to clean, did you?)

For myself, I had my wisdom teeth out, and that was fine.  Then just the other day Bill had one of his wisdom teeth out, with root canal.  He goes to a different dentist, who did it in the office, with just novocaine and don't you know Bill feels fine?  Yeah.  Stinker.  :-)  It took me all weekend to feel normal again and longer before I felt like I could eat and brush my teeth like a normal person.  Well, it doesn't matter.  I'm glad he's not suffering.  That leaves him free for things like fixing our washing machine and mowing.  :-)

So that's where we are.  Doing all right, still here, just really busy and trying to spend as much time with the girls as I can, especially Karina.  Hope all of you who are still reading this are having a nice spring and take care!

I want it all

Okay bear with me.  I have a cold and my thoughts are all over the place.  I started this post in my head, in the shower, where I do my best thinking.  Okay, my only thinking.  Most of the time my thinking involves things like, "Where's Elena's sippy now?"  "You spilled what?" "I don't know where the dolly shoe went, where did you leave it?" and so on.  Anyway, my train of thought is kind of like a train that derails, speeds off into the countryside, then over a mountain, under the ocean, transforms into a submarine, discovers Atlantis, and eventually just crashes because the shower ends. 

I find myself thinking sometimes, when not being inundated by child needs, things like, "I would really like a new pair of shoes," or "I would love if our house was more like this," or "I wish my car...." you get the idea.  I want.  I want I want I want.  And it's true, I'm sad to say.  I do want.  I usually think of myself as a pretty decent person, but this line of thinking bothers me.  I don't want to want. So I was thinking about this tonight, and then Tom Petty's song "You Want It All" popped into my head and of course I LOVE Tom Petty.  The song lyrics are partially (and no surprise here or anything but if you could hear the music in your head it would be so much better!), "You want it all.  You want it alllllllllllllllll all or nothing."  And that made me think about Tom Petty and how maybe his lyrics should have been, "You want it all FOR nothing" but then, of course, I think Tom Petty's lyrics are already perfect, so how could I want them to change?  Which led to a whole tangent in my head about Tom Petty's total awesomeness, but not in a hot celebrity kind of way, more like a "your lyrics speak to me now as much as they did when my dad introduced me to your music when I was like 12 and they spoke to me immediately and I have been your fan since then and gush gush gush I just love Tom Petty."  No really, I was thinking all of this in my head.

Then I started wondering about the whole wanting things thing again.  And wondering who I could blame for me wanting things all the time, because these days nothing is my fault.  So, I settled on human nature.  And because Karina was recently watching the Disney movie of Pocahontas, which I know is not historically accurate and I have no problem with that at all, but that movie makes me cry with that beautiful song and  because of what happened to the people who lived here when the Europeans came over.  (I am loving run-on sentences tonight!)  So, Pocahontas, the Europeans, hey, they wanted it all, too; look, they even wanted a whole continent and basically took it, so there's my excuse:  it's human nature.

I left out the rest of the Pocahontas tangent (about how I told Karina that Pocahontas was a real person, lived relatively near here, and didn't marry John Smith, and then about how I did not tell her that she did go to England like in the 2nd movie (which we also have and which she was also watching), and she married John Rolfe and had a baby and died at like 21 or something because the English germs killed her.  Wasn't it a cold or something stupid like that that killed her? I can't remember.  So sad, makes me cry.  See? See what I mean about that train derailing?).  And now I didn't leave it out after all, ha ha!

And then I got out of the shower and came in here.  Crash. 

So I'm still left wondering why I am constantly thinking of things I want.  Is it because we're wired that way?  Because we're inundated with images of things that are "better" than what we already have?  Is it because I'm selfish and shallow?  I don't think I am, but maybe I am. 

Anyway, I just had to write a post and it's been a long time since my last one, and this was what I was thinking about tonight during my "free" time. 

I'm going to try to control those "I want" type thoughts when I notice them.  I try to be happy with things the way they are.  I have a fantastic life, people, I mean really.  I've got it good.  I have two ADORABLE children, a loving husband who provides for our family and works so that I can stay home to raise those adorable girls, I have a home--a nice home, and I don't mean nice like mansion nice, I mean middle class, regular folks nice--I live in a great neighborhood, I am able to send Karina to preschool, I live near my mother who I love dearly and my grandmother who is aging; my dad and my brother aren't far; my brother's getting married soon and I'm happy about that.  I have all the best things in life, basically.  Maybe I have so much great stuff that my brain is totally fried.  Or maybe I should just stop going to the mall during preschool time and go home instead!

Winter Tag

I don't normally play blogger games, but I read Nout's post and it didn't look too hard, so I decided to go ahead and do this one.  You can read hers here.

1) Favorite Winter Nail Polish?
I don't wear nail polish in the winter.  I usually wear it in summer but take winter off to let my nails breathe.  Also I am lazy.

2) Favorite Winter lip product?
Whatever lipstick I'm wearing.  As long as I have some type on, I am usually okay, but if I need something else I just use plain old Chapstick.

3) Most worn Winter clothing piece?j
Jeans.  Always.

4) Most worn winter accessory?
My coat.  I usually wear my old red one, that was a hand me down from my former mother in law, but I just got a new coat yesterday on sale and I really love it.

5) Favorite winter scent/candle?
I don't do candles, but I do love the smell of cinnamon or apple cinnamon at Christmas.

6) Favorite Winter beverage?
Tea.  Hot tea, all the time, all day, forever.  

7) All time favorite Christmas/Holiday movie?
A Christmas Story (Ralphie and the BB gun), cartoon How the Grinch Stole Christmas, and most versions of A Christmas Carol.

8) Favorite Christmas/Holiday song?
Carol of the Bells.

9) Favorite Holiday food/treat?
Chocolate.  If you have ever read this blog before you know that's a no-brainer answer.

10) What is your favorite Christmas/Holiday gift you received this year?
Etsy gift cards

11) What was your favorite activity from the holidays this year?
I loved decorating the church trees with Karina and then caroling to the shut ins.  Being able to bring Karina for the first time was really fun.  I also loved our family get togethers with cousins and aunts/uncles, as well as seeing the movie Frozen with Karina, twice.

I'm not tagging anyone else, but feel free to play along if you want.  Have a nice day!

Since mid December here's what we've been doing

Since I last updated in mid-December, here's what has been happening around these parts.  :-)

As you know I was on the hunt for the elusive Elsa doll from the latest Disney movie "Frozen" (which if you haven't seen yet, please do, I think you will like it).  I had found a couple at KMart and gotten her one.  Later, I found the Disney store version at my local JCPenney, and then got a hot tip that local Farm Fresh stores were carrying them.  So this year, Santa Claus brought both of the girls an Elsa doll, plus an Anna for Elena.  Santa also brought them the mini figures, a set for each of them, and in a cool way, the dolls are actually different in the two sets.  Well, one was a set of both girls and the snowman Olaf.  The others were individual.  One Anna has braids and the other has her hair up.  One Elsa has a bodice for her gown and the other has the usual bathing suit that these little dolls come with under their dresses.  The set of two dolls had fabric skirts and the individuals had the clip on dresses.  It made for tons of fun after Christmas.  We gave Karina her jellyfish tank, but we discovered it needed distilled water to work right, and once we got that up and running it is super cool.  Both girls love watching the three little fake jellies 'swimming' around.  Elena got a big Fisher Price dollhouse that I found at a thrift store for $5.  It's almost as tall as she is and it turns out it is the perfect size for the mini princess dolls.  Guess what the girls played with for a week straight?  Yep.  The dollhouse and the princess dolls.  They have now started playing with some of their other stuff too, but that was a huge hit, as were the 11 1/2 inch dolls of Elsa and Anna.

Overall, these girls scored big time.  There was so much to open on Christmas morning that Elena was a little overwhelmed.  She's still not even 2 yet (15th!) so she ended up leaving half her presents unopened.  That was fine though, because she opened them the next day when Karina was opening birthday presents.  After our Christmas morning here, we went to my mom's house.  My mom as you may remember lives with my grandmother, Nana.  So they were both there.  My brother and his fiancee Erin came over (yes he finally proposed to her and we're all ecstatic!).  Plus this year my mom asked my dad to come over and do Christmas with all of us.  My parents are divorced but have almost always been friendly towards each other.  It is amazing and astounding to me, and something that I have great respect for both of them for doing.  Anyway, I can't remember ever having Christmas with both of my parents in the same room, ever, so it was pretty cool.  However, between all of these people, you couldn't walk into my mom's living room.  It was so full of presents it was crazy!  I think that because my dad's wife passed away, he might have been drowning his sorrow in some holiday shopping a little.  He got the girls a bunch of clothes (which they really needed badly!), a giant Hello Kitty and a giant Mike the monster plush (they have no clue who either of them are and yet Elena adores both of them!).  I can't even remember all of it.  They got books, clothes, toys, dolls, art things, and this amazing easel set from David and Erin that has storage at the bottom and will be so cool when we finally finish cleaning up Christmas and set it up.

The next day was of course Karina's birthday.  We kept it low key and just had my mom and Nana over for lunch and cake and some presents.  Elena finished opening her Christmas gifts and Karina had fun opening her birthday gifts, too.  I made her another cake, and she wanted jellyfish again but with chocolate icing.  So the jellies are swimming in what looks like mud.  Hee hee, but it's cute.

The next day we tried to recuperate, but then on Saturday it was back to Mom's for the extended family get together.  My aunt and uncle came, plus my other uncle (this is my mom's side of the family by the way) who we rarely see.  Two of his three kids came, my cousins Caitlin and Josh.  My aunt's daughter Anne came with her new son who just turned a year old in October.  He was so fun to watch.  Anne's husband had to stay home with pinkeye, poor guy.  It was another madhouse, but it was really fun.  In a few weekends more of my cousins will be in town and I'm looking forward to seeing them, too.

I didn't do anything for New Year's, Eve or resolutions, but Bill went to a party at a friend's house who retired.  She is going to sail around the world literally, and I told you I made her a quilt.  It's all finished and we gave it to her and she liked it.  So he went to her place for that party and stayed on her boat overnight.  My next door neighbor decided to be annoying and blast music all night long so loudly that it woke up Elena and me and continued until at least 4am.  He is normally a really super nice neighbor, so I didn't call the police, but it was so loud that I could hear it in my bedroom--which is on the opposite side of our house from his, with the door shut, and the heat running in the vent next to my bed (which makes a kind of white noise that does actually cover up some sounds).  So it's not like I was sitting next to the wall where his house was and hearing some distant sound and being all jerky about wanting to call the police, this was exceedingly loud, even for NYE.  Anyway, he's been doing this a lot lately, but it seems recently it's cut back a lot.  I kept trying to get Bill to talk to him because they're friends and Bill likes loud music too, so he could do it in a really laid back way, whereas if I were to go talk to him, it would come off not too nice.  Because I was the one who was irritated by it.  Bill didn't care.  Anyway he hasn't had to go over there yet.  It would be really awful to have to deal with that and end up making him mad or something.  He's normally a great neighbor.

Ha, this was going to be a quick update and look at it now!

Let's see, after the new year I had my wisdom teeth taken out.  I had had the top ones removed as a teen, but for some reason my old dentist left the bottom ones in.  Neither of them was able to fully erupt and one was completely sideways and my new dentist was very concerned that it would eventually cause the good molar next to it to become corrupted, so he insisted that I get them out.  Fun times.  The surgery was actually not too bad.  I requested to be put completely out, and I'm glad I did.  It was super easy.  I went in, they gave me some gas to relax me, although I wasn't too nervous about the needle in my arm.  The assistant was so awesome, and told me all the things she was doing, and told me the doctor would have needles in his hand when he came in but they were going into the port and I wouldn't be getting poked.  She did a great job putting the port in my arm and we chatted about our childbirth experiences with needles and such.  Once he gave me the meds, I was out like a light and don't really remember waking up.  I went into the recovery room and sort of took my time waking up the rest of the way.  Then I went home with meds for pain and antibiotics because the one bad tooth was so hard to get out he was concerned about infection.  I went home and went straight to bed.  I slept until midafternoon, woke up and felt pretty much fine.  I took my meds on time, swished my rinse as I was supposed to and everything is going just fine.  They warned me that each day would be worse til the 3rd day, and on the fourth I would feel remarkably better.  If not, I was to call them.  Well, I never felt that bad at all.  On the 3rd day I slept in until 1130, but I think it was more from fatigue from not being able to eat much nutritious food, since I could only have cold soft stuff, which basically means ice cream and pudding.  Not so good for getting your strength back.  Tasty though!  Anyway, even on the third day I didn't feel that bad.  I would wake up at night though to take more pain meds, but they worked great once I took them.  Now I've been to my follow up and he said it all looks great.  I'm still sore in the jaw some, and it kind of hurts to open my mouth too much, but that's because the muscles are affected when they take out those teeth.  He said they have to actually cut into the muscles to get the teeth out.  Ouch!  No wonder I'm sore!  But I'm healing up well and I'm so glad.  I had pizza for dinner, yahoooo!  The best was when I was finally cleared to drink my tea again.  Ah.  Sweet relief!  I do love my hot tea.

Well, that brings everyone up to date for now.  I'm going to try to put one of those Shutterfly picture things onto this post so let me try that.  Hm.  I can't seem to find that option on Shutterfly now. Well I found it but let me just tell you what a pest Google is.  It wouldn't let me sign in AS MYSELF to post the pictures!  It decided it wasn't me, and even after I marked it and told it it WAS me, it wouldn't let me sign in!  That is really annoying.  Seriously.  It was to share some pictures, Google, not decide the fate of the free world.  Sheesh.  Anyway I got the embed code so hopefully that will work. 

You will see the girls finished decorating my mom's tree (to the max, that poor tree was about to topple!), the girls modeling some hats, Karina helping to decorate the Chrismon tree at church (which I forgot to include up above; each year we decorate the church for Advent and we have special trees called Chrismon trees with special ornaments and stuff and we get to help put them on.  Then we go caroling to some of the shut-in members of our congregation, and this year Karina got to come.  That was really cool.),  the girls dressed up as Elsa (before Karina got her 'official' costume), some birthday pictures of the cake and decorations, decorating our tree, Christmas Eve dresses, Christmas morning at our house and my mom's although you can't tell the difference and it really doesn't even matter; the outside pictures are from when my cousins were here; it was warm enough that day to go play outside and all the kids love these hula hoops my mom has.  There's a picture of Karina in the 'official' Elsa outfit, posing again, I don't know what's with that lately; and then just a shot of Elena randomly sitting and smiling.  Oh, and Karina holding up the quilt I made.  Enjoy!

Click here to view these pictures larger

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

Hey everyone!  Things are super chaotic around here.  I've decided to stop apologizing for not having time to blog, so you just get me when you get me.  :-)  Before we even hit Thanksgiving it was nonstop for us. 

Karina turns 5 this year on the 26th of December.  Traditionally we hold her friends birthday party early in the month to avoid the rush.  We've found this just works out best for everyone.  This year, Bill also wanted to go to Chicago to visit his sisters who still live there (where he's from).  I've been so hesitant to go with Elena, but when Madeline (almost!) found a replacement Ducky (so close...) I figured we would just have to go so I could thank her in person for her efforts.  So we talked about driving (aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!  It would have been about 3 days in the car both ways because of how often we'd have to stop with the girls, and by "girls" I mean "Elena's screaming fits") so in the end we decided to fly.  It worked out pretty well, actually, and ended up costing less than it would have cost us to drive (with hotels and gas and all).  The flight there was fine, and Elena was really good.  It's only about a 2 hour flight, thankfully. 

The first day we went to the Shedd Aquarium to see their amazing jellyfish exhibit.  Karina is obsessed with jellies and sea creatures, and it was even the theme of her birthday party.  We went through the jelly exhibit twice, and probably could have gone 3 times, but we left Elena's stroller at Madeline's apartment by accident and it was way too far to go back for it.  So we just took turns carrying her and letting her walk.  She was a trooper!  The aquarium was phenomenal and they both loved it.  It was definitely the highlight of the trip.  We also visited one of Bill's oldest friends, who recently adopted his own little girl Karina's age, so we went out to his place and stayed the night.  Karina and his daughter got along great.  They came into the city later and we all went to the Lincoln Park Zoo together.  That was really cool, too.  We also went to Navy Pier and the Brookfield Zoo.  The Brookfield Zoo I have to say was rather disappointing overall, but they did have a brand new baby gorilla which was adorable!  Elena was great the whole trip, although the stress started to get to her near the end and she started waking up in the night throwing up.  She'd be fine during the day and then wake up at night and throw up.  Then she threw up alllll over the place on the plane.  That was so awful.  I ended up having to change into one of Bill's shirts because it was all over my sleeve, and we didn't have a spare shirt for Elena (just pants) so we put her jacket on her as a shirt.  Karina slept through the whole plane ride home.  I was SO glad to be home.  We had a good time, though. 

Once we got home, Karina had one day of preschool before Thanksgiving break, and that was the day of their Thanksgiving feast at school.  I helped out with that because I am one of the two room moms.  The other lady actually headed most of that up herself because I'd been out of town.  Oh, and I forgot to mention that the day after Halloween, literally, Karina got strep throat and was out for a week (sick as a dog) and then Elena got croup at the same time.  Luckily they were both healthy by the time we left for Chicago.

For Thanksgiving we usually have a big group of family but this year it was just my mom, grandmother, Bill, the girls, and me.  We went to my mom's house and it was quiet and small but really really nice.  I got to have a whole conversation with my mom that was not interrupted once by any small sweet children!

Then we had Karina's birthday party the first weekend in December.  I like to decorate for Christmas right after Thanksgiving, but having a pile of kids in the house makes that pretty much impossible.  So instead we decorated with jellies and seahorses and sea turtles and sea stars for her underwater themed birthday.  I think it went well, too.  We made jellies out of squeezy-fruit lids and jellies that light up out of inverted bowls and stick on tap lights.  We hung jellies and sea creatures all over the house and I made a cake and decorated it with icing jellies and fish sprinkles.  There were more kids than we've ever had and it went great.  One interesting thing was that a friend gave Karina an Anna doll, from the movie Frozen.  Some of my friends with kids had gone to see it but we couldn't go, and honestly, I thought it was going to be awful so I wasn't too upset about missing it.  But they raved about it at the party and finally Karina wanted to go see it, so I caved.  I am SO glad I did!  It was amazing!  I think it's probably going to end up being one of my favorite Disney movies.  Anyway, before we even saw the movie, I decided that I should go get the Elsa doll for Elena because she, poor thing, didn't understand why Karina was getting all this stuff and she didn't get anything (because, Mommy fail, I forgot to have stuff for her to open!).  Imagine my surprise when Elsa turns out to be sold out....everywhere!  So too bad, but then we saw the movie and that made me wish to find it even more!  The thing is SOLD OUT!!! 

Today was Karina's Christmas pageant at preschool.  It's a short little telling of the Christmas story and the kids ring bells and sing songs.  It is adorable.  My mom even got to come and that was great because Karina will be going to public school next year and so she probably won't be in any more Christmas pageants, not religious ones anyway, so my mom was really happy to see her.  Elena was, too, and she was a really good girl.  When my mom held her up to see Karina, though, she screamed out, "INA!!!  INA!!!" a couple times.  It was pretty funny though. 

Well today before the pageant I ran some errands and went to my usual places, and I checked for Elsa but of course no luck.  I did pick up a color change Anna doll and a Merida doll for Elena.  Then after we finished we had a little time left before we could go to the pageant so we went to another store nearby, one I don't go to often and frankly it's having trouble competing with the other two big box stores around.  So I thought there might be a chance I'd find one there, maybe the color change one that's more expensive.  BUT.  They had Elsa!  The less expensive one!  And they had FOUR of them!  I just got one, because that's all we needed and other people are looking for them, too.  I sent a friend of mine there later to get one.  I hope she was able to find one!

Karina doesn't know about it.  I'm saving it for Christmas.  She keeps asking me every day to check for Elsa online.  I just hope I can hold her off til Christmas!

Hope you are all doing well!

Winter sick season before it's winter? say what?

So this has been a week.  We had a Halloween party at Karina's preschool on Wednesday, with a costume parade and little party.  It was fun, and the kids are so cute.  The next day, Karina was so excited about trick or treating for Halloween that she dressed Elena in her costume early in the morning and I had to leave her in it because she's so fussy about getting dressed.  Luckily, she didn't mess it up!  We went out as a family and saw lots of our neighbors and had a wonderful night.  Karina said, "Mommy, Daddy, trick or treating is just like going for a walk in your neighborhood in the dark and getting candy."

The next day was Friday, and that morning, Karina was really tired seeming, but I figured it was all the excitement from the day before.  I am so dumb.  On the way home from preschool, she suddenly started crying and said her neck (meaning her throat) hurt.  As soon as she said it, I thought, Strep Throat. 

We got home, I called our pediatrician and got an appointment for later that afternoon, and they confirmed that she did indeed have strep.  Great.  So, we got some antibiotics, I dropped the prescription off on our way home, Bill went and picked it up and we gave her her first dose Friday night.  She threw it up 30 minutes later.  And then spent the entire night throwing up every hour.  EVERY HOUR.  ALL NIGHT.  It was one of the worst nights ever.  Finally she got another dose of medicine into her in the morning and we both slept til after 10.  I think she stayed in bed til 11.  Elena was great and really well-behaved.

We spent the weekend battling strep.  It knocked my little girl slam out.  She had no appetite, no energy, and continued to have episodes of throwing up here and there most of the weekend.  Since the doc had cleared her for school Monday, and she was in no shape to go back, and Elena was beginning a really nasty sounding cough, I brought them both into the doctor's on Monday.  I was told that Karina was doing much better, and her throat was looking much less red, but Elena had croup.  So more meds, but at least Elena has not felt bad, she just sounds horrific.  But she's on the mend, too.  Karina stayed sick until this morning.  Tuesday we went to my mom's for dinner and she was fine until we were sitting at the table to eat.  And she threw up.  I wanted to cry.  But this morning she woke up like a new kid, ate her whole breakfast, and ate a normal lunch, too.  Dinner she wasn't interested in, but I didn't push it at all. 

So this has been a mess of a week.  I'm exhausted, drained, and stressed.  We're going to visit Bill's family soon, and I'm trying to prepare for that, plan ahead for Karina's birthday party in early December, consider Thanksgiving plans, and make sure I'm getting my Christmas shopping done.  I am making a quilt for a friend as a retirement gift, I don't have all the stuff I need for it and haven't really been able to go out to get the stuff due to sick children, haven't been grocery shopping in a serious manner in a week, and oh, our fridge is messing up.  It keeps freezing up.  Bill thinks it's because the vent is messed up but I think it's because he keeps setting both freezer and fridge to the max cold setting.  I keep telling him the refrigerator is not meant to freeze your food and keep it indefinitely.  That's what the freezer is for.  Sometimes that man has no common sense.  Anyway, he's dealing with that and I may still get a new fridge out of it. 

My car still needs an alignment.  It's ridiculous how long that's been put off. 

And now I think I might have caught Elena's cold.  So not what I need.  My pediatrician said croup is one of the hundred or so strains of the cold virus, and that there are a couple of strains that cause kids' voiceboxes to swell up.  He said that's why they sound funny, and he said adults can get it too but our windpipes are bigger and can deal with the swelling better.  Never knew that.  I love that he explains stuff to me when I ask, and sometimes when I don't, it's so awesome.  I learn a lot.  We are lucky to have a really great pediatrician.

I hope everyone reading this is doing well and NOT sick.  And sorry for all the vomit talk.  I'm too tired to care about it too much.  I'm not even sure why I'm awake right now.  So I should go sleep.  Good night!

Just a little update-y post

This is just a post to update everyone on my life.  Because it is ever so exciting.  He he.

1. We had mice.  UGH.  Somehow a mouse or a couple got in, and even though they weren't in the house for long, they made a big mess and it was the most disgusting thing I've ever dealt with and I swear they better not ever get in my house again.  We have traps everywhere now and are leaving them up probably all winter.  Possibly forever.  We also bought some of those ultrasonic things, just to see if they work.  Not holding my breath, but hey, if they end up working, great.

2. Karina loves preschool.  She loves it so much that she asks every day if it's preschool the next day.  She only goes 3 days a week, but I think she would have been happy going 5 days (I wouldn't have been though!).  Today when I picked her up, she told me she had a great day. Not just a great day, but a FANTASTIC day.  She is so adorable.

3. We are going to Chicago later this year to visit Bill's family, and we'll be flying with both girls for the first time.  Please send positive thoughts our way so that maybe Elena will not spend the entire flight crying and/or screaming, thus getting us kicked off in mid-air.  That would be bad, even if gave us parachutes.

4. We updated our kitchen a little and got a new dishwasher, sink, and counters to match the other ones we put in (nothing exciting, just laminate, but they're much nicer looking than the ones we had before.  I have plans to share photos soon.)

5. Karina and I have been working on plans for her birthday party, which we will do in early December as we've done in the past.  This year she's having a sort of undersea theme, with jellyfish, starfish, seahorses, and sea turtles.  The girl loves jellyfish, it's the funniest thing (yes, she knows they sting, she doesn't care).  Anyway, I want to make it a really great party, and really go all out, as much as I can handle, because she'll be 5!  Bill and I offered to let her have a party somewhere else, like her friends sometimes do, since it was her 5th birthday, but she just wanted a party at home, and that was fine with us.  So I'm going to try to make it extra special in other ways.  So far, we have some pretty neat invitations (I'm not bragging, I'm just proud that I came up with a clever way to incorporate her favorite toys and things while sticking to the party theme) with some clipart of her favorite characters standing on a beach, with words to the effect of, "From under the world of all her favorite things comes Karina's 5th birthday party, in the coral reef".  Inside is a beautiful picture of the coral reef with all her favorite animals.  I wanted it to look like the same characters were peeking into the water from above, but that was really hard and I couldn't make that work quite right, but I'm still pretty pleased with the result.  We got some bowls and stick on tap lights and we're making some light-up jellyfish to hang.  We took the lids to those squeezy fruit pouches that most moms are familiar with and tied some thin ribbon to them and made little jellyfish.  We found some window clings at the dollar store with sea creatures to put in the window.  And I have plans for a cool coral reef centerpiece.  I want to make a cake for her and have the same characters from the invitation on the cake to look kind of like they're on a beach.  But I might have to do cupcakes if she would rather have those.  Anyway, that's been fun to work on with her.

6. I am making a quilt.  Really.  I'm so excited, too.  Our friend is retiring this year and she is going to sail around the world, so I have already done the quilt top and it turned out so great!  I just need to find a backing material and a binding, and then buy the batting.  Then I can smash it all together and start the part I like least, the actual quilting part.  I have actually made a couple of what I call "fake" quilts, because I usually sew a straight line in a + shape across the whole thing and maybe a few other straight lines to hold the batting in place, and that's it.  Can you say L-A-Z-Y?  Yep, that's me!  But this is fun, and it was fun making her quilt because it's small.  It's only about 4'x5', just a lap quilt.  It has some 12" squares and some 12" 9-patches (which are blocks made of 9 squares that make a square that's 12" across in this case).  Then they're just placed in a checkerboard pattern and it looks pretty cool.  I'll take pictures.  I haven't finished it yet, though, so I don't have any yet.

7. My 15th college reunion is this weekend!  I am going to see my college roommate and another very good friend of ours, as well as some other friends this weekend.  Things have changed a lot at William and Mary since I graduated, but in many ways it never changes.  I can't wait to get back and walk the campus and remember all the fun times.  Roomie and I are going to go to the reunion year mixer, where alumni can get together with other alums from their graduating year, and then to a big tailgate thingy.   I wonder if I have to print something and bring it with me.  Hm, I guess I'll be looking into that later.  :-)  I'm so excited to be spending literally the entire day at my old school, without the girls or Bill, as much as I love them, but just me!  I get to be JUST ME for a whole day!!  This is nearly unheard of.  Usually I'm someone's mommy or wife, but tomorrow I get to be just plain old me.  I think one day of that is enough.  You know I'll miss those little cuties at home.  (I've already been thinking I should have gotten them tickets, too, so I could see my girls run the Sunken Gardens and stand on the steps of the Wren Building....but I'll take them another day).  Guess I should head off to bed.  Lots to do early in the morning before I head out!

Click here to view these pictures larger

A note about these pictures.  The white dishwasher is not the one we kept; it wasn't working and we got another one, and when we installed the new one, Bill figured out what was wrong with the white one and we could have kept it after all.  Sigh.  The picture of Karina holding the drawing--those are the planets.  Check out Jupiter.  She used a poster as a guide, but still.  Proud mommy.  And the duck is the replacement ducky that's too big and has essentially been rejected at this point in favor of the smaller ducky we got at the baby store.  But it's all okay.  As long as she's happy.

Ducky Update (and a few other things)

This is for those of you who read about Elena's lost Ducky and felt as awful for her as I did.  Or close to it.  I took her to a couple stores over the weekend but they didn't have a good selection of stuffed animals to choose from, so on Monday while Karina was at preschool, we stopped in a big baby store up near Karina's school.  They had a whole shelf of stuffed animals, including a couple of Huggybuddies (no ducks of course).  They even had a plush Gund duck (not Huggybuddy), but the first duck I showed Elena, she squealed with joy and grabbed it.  "Ducky!" she cried.  That was that.  The best part is I got two of them because they were inexpensive store brand ducks.  She loves her new ducky.  I don't think it's the same kind of love, but she's happy and that's what matters.  She also became quite lovey with some of her other stuffed animals, so overall we have a pretty happy ending, all things considered.

Thanks to all of you who actually read that massively long post.  And thank you very much to those of you who expressed concern for both of us and offered some much-needed advice and insight into things (that would be you, Liz).  You were so right, and I never realized it til you said it, but I do feel guilty about a lot of things with Elena!  I'm working on that. 

Thanks all you readers out there!

Oh and I have to share the weirdest small-world story with you!  I was at my book club (okay it's not my personal book club, and I'm a new addition, but still) the other night, with my friend from my teaching days and her sister.  The other ladies were sick or unable to make it, so it was just the three of us.  We were talking for hours, and somehow the subject of blogs came up and I had said in passing that I had one.  My friend's sister asked the name, and I was laughing because of course the blog name has changed but the url is still the old name, daydreaming of cloth diapers.  So I told her, and she said, "I know that blog!  My sister in law uses cloth diapers and she sent me something from your blog ages ago!"  How funny is that?? 

We bought a new dishwasher this weekend and it was delivered today.  Hopefully we'll get it installed tomorrow.  Wish us luck!

Have a great week everyone!

The last month...

I realize I don't post very often anymore.  But it looks like roughly once a month could happen.  Here's what I've been up to the last month.

Planned with other youth advisors for the first half of the "school year" as I think of it.  Hopefully when our pastor comes back from her time away (due to chemo--she's okay, but she had to take time off to go through it) we'll plan the rest of the year.

Got Karina started in her last year of preschool.  Now that nearly had me in tears.  My little baby is almost in Kindergarten?  How can that be???  She is LOVING 4 year olds though!  I'm so glad.  I wasn't sure how she'd do, because I knew her best friend was going to be in a different class (Karina goes 3 days a week and her friend is going 5 days) but it has turned out to be a great thing.  Karina still sees her friend on the playground, so they play together then, and in the classroom, Karina has been making more friends and playing different games and just having a great time.  Her three year old teacher is the assistant in this class, so that was a great wonderful thing to have happen!  She is getting used to her new regular teacher, too, and they have started joking around together.  The other day when I picked up Karina, the assistant/former teacher, Mrs. B told me that Mrs. E loved Karina's dress so much she was teasing her that she wanted to borrow it.  Karina looked at her and said, "This dress will not fit you."  She cracks me up.  She's so smart sometimes.  She read the word 'sun' in a book about the solar system.  I think she can read some simple words, but she is like me and is so afraid to be wrong or make a mistake that I think she's second-guessing herself.  But I'm not pushing her or pressuring her, I just ask her sometimes if she knows what this or that word is.  Sometimes she does and sometimes she doesn't.  If she does, I praise her and get all excited and if not, it's no big deal and we figure it out together.

Recently we went to our State Fair.  We had a nice time, but we did have one bad thing happen.  Elena lost her Ducky.  You all (my regular readers) know about Karina's Lambkin, right, and how special it is to her?  Well, Ducky was like that for Elena.  But Elena's duck was smaller and she'd drop it or it would fall out of the stroller and I wouldn't notice.  If Lambkin fell out, he's so big you'd feel it when you rolled over him, or you'd physically feel him fall out of the stroller.  Ducky, being smaller, was hard to notice.  Here's what happened.  I took a few members of the youth group, some of their friends, and my girls up to the fair in the church van.  My advisor friends were camping that weekend so they were meeting us up there.  There were no other available adults.  So it was just me.  It was fine, really, just I felt like I needed to hurry so they could all start having fun.  Being the only adult, I had to do everything on my own, which normally does not happen.  There were only 2 youth and 2 friends.  They were no trouble at all, as I expected they wouldn't be (we have the BEST kids).  So when we got there, Elena had just woken up from a nap in the van and was being a little cranky. She didn't want to let go of Ducky while I put her in the stroller.  So I just let her hold onto her, thinking I'd just get Ducky back in a minute and put it in the van.  I didn't.  In the rush of getting the stroller, the right diaper bag, the wallet, the water bottles, the children, the camera, and all the youth, then locking up and making sure I had keys where I could find them again, I didn't put Ducky back in the van.  And we never saw her again.  I didn't even realize it until we were driving home.  But I figured that, as awful as it was, I would just order a new one when I got home.  I wasn't happy about it, but I knew Elena would probably not realize the difference.  And then I started looking for it online.  It is discontinued and NO ONE has it.  Not One Single Retailer on the Entire Internet.  Ducky is gone.  Every day, Elena cries for Ducky.  When she gets upset or scared or tired, or when she wakes up, she looks for Ducky and Ducky is not there.  I try to keep her distracted and she has some other stuffed friends in the crib, but they aren't the same.  Last night, after thinking I might have finally found one and having it fall through (The people at Peachtreeplaceonline.com were so kind!!!  Thank you so much), and then literally checking every single retailer that showed up and using several different variations of the key words and finding absolutely nothing, I cried myself to sleep.  My heart is just breaking for her and I feel so responsible.  My mom is so understanding and has been great at helping me realize that it's not my fault really, that it was bound to happen (she'd had several close calls beforehand, and why I ask did I not have an emergency spare backup already???), and that she will eventually forget, but still, it hurts my heart.  She will not have her special lovey from when she was a baby.  Karina does.  I guess part of what bothers me about it all is that Elena has been shortchanged in a couple of important ways.  We take plenty of photos of her, and I make sure she has an equally prominent place in the hall for her portraits.  I have equal numbers of photos of her, I saved all her little hospital mementos (although not in a pretty box).  But her first weeks...months even...were not the same.  She was NOT fun.  We did not bond the way Karina and I did.  That took a long time to happen.  Because her personality is different, the interactions she and I have are very different from what happens with Karina and me.  Bedtime is completely different.  There's no sitting and snuggling for Elena, it's diaper, jammies, and into the crib.  She can't have it the other way, I tried.  It doesn't work.  But I feel she's being deprived of that special time.  I am not nearly as patient with her as I am with Karina.  Not even close, and it's because Elena cries SO much, and Karina doesn't.  The crying just wears on me after a little bit, and I am simply not the same parent with her as I am with Karina.  I try to show her how much I love her, I do my best to appreciate her for who she is, and I don't want a second Karina.  But I am just worried that she will someday feel that I don't love her as much as I love Karina, and I do.  I love her dearly.  But I would never have let Lambkin get lost.  And I let Ducky get lost.  It just kills me inside.

Other than that, the fair was fun.  Karina rode the ferris wheel (with her "aunt" Kelly), she rode the giant Super Slide twice, all by herself, we rode the carousel (all three of us, poor Elena wanted to ride rides so badly but she's too little for most of them), and Karina rode a fishy ride.  We ate delicious, unhealthy fair food, bought some little sand-filled animals for Karina and Elena to share (but really they're just Karina's), we saw some animals but not many because the way they had the fair set up was very different, and the animals weren't anywhere near the rides and things.

Today, Bill and our friend are replacing our old dishwasher and countertops and sink.  They got almost all of it done today, but the dishwasher really gave them a hard time.  The former homeowners installed tile and didn't remove the cabinets and appliances when they did it.  So the old one was basically trapped between the counter and the floor, and the floor is like an inch thick (we discovered today)!  So installing the new one was a real pain!  Cali was on the floor on her side trying to get it all installed (Cali can do anything, this woman is amazing).  Bill helped a little, but he's no handyman.  The counter is on, and the dishwasher is in, and tomorrow they will install the new sink and test it all out.  I can't wait to use a dishwasher that will actually clean my dishes, rather than simply redeposit the random food particles onto different dishes, thus forcing me to rewash them.  Over and over and over and over.  Such a waste of time, money, electricity, hot water, soap, etc.  Plus we were having to use the heavy wash cycle or the pots and pans cycle just to get the dishes even remotely clean.  It was like the regular cycle was just sort of dripping water on them and then laughing.  The new sink will have a sprayer that doesn't leak (thank goodness!) so I'll be able to actually use it, and it's one of those ones that's really part of the faucet itself so there's no separate hookup for it.  Should be really cool.  We considered getting a sink that was just one big single section, because we do use the dishwasher for most of our dishes, and there are a couple of large cookie sheets I have that I like to hand wash, and they barely fit in the sink.  But the cost was going to be about $100-$150 difference (more expensive), and we finally just decided it wasn't worth it.  So I'm happy with the new sink and I'm excited to see how it all looks.  I took some 'before'ish pictures and I will share those and the 'after' shots, well, after it's all done.

I almost forgot!  I also went to Howl O Scream at Busch Gardens with two friends of mine and we had such a wonderful time!  We all had babysitters/husbands to watch the kids and we stayed out super late and were soooo tired and sore the next day, but it was so worth it!

I hope your September (which is already over, how does that happen so stinking fast??) was fun!
Trying something different with my pictures.  I hope this works for you guys.  These were from the fair.

Click here to view these pictures larger

I get all nostalgic and weepy before I ought to

When I was a kid, between the ages of about 10 and 20, we had a great dog, I adored him.  I loved that dog so much I couldn't even imagine loving anything more (of course now I can but that's beside the point).  I used to lay in bed at night and worry about how awful it would be when this dog eventually and inevitably died.  I would cry myself to sleep over it.  Looking back, it was such a waste of time and emotional energy, but I couldn't help it.

Fast forward to my life now, with two sweet girls.  Not dogs.  Actual children, who I love more than my own life.  A million, trillion times more than I loved that dog (I still keep photos of that dog up around my home, I loved him so dearly).  I find myself doing the same kind of thing, no not the scary what if they die stuff, because that is just too much.  No, I start thinking about how quickly they are growing up. How Karina's not a little baby anymore.  How she's growing SO fast. 

So today, I got to sleep in a little later than usual.  I did wake up at 630 (Thanks, Elena) but drifted back off.  I'm not sure if I was completely asleep and dreaming, or if I was just half asleep and sort of half dreaming, half imagining.  I'll call it dreaming just for ease of writing.  So I started dreaming about what it might be like when Karina is older, a teenager.  Coming into the kitchen for breakfast, dressed all crazy, like punky sort of 80s teens.  In my dream, I'm making sure she's not wearing anything risque, inappropriate, that sort of thing.  I imagine her saying good morning, but grudgingly.  (She would do it because she's polite, you know.)  And then suddenly, in the middle of this dream of Karina the teenager, just as she's sitting down to the kitchen table, she becomes superimposed over Karina the 4 year old, sitting at the table the way she does now.  I see Karina the imaginary teen, and Karina as she is now, but in the dream it's like 4 year old Karina is only a memory of her as a little girl.  I was awake so fast, BAWLING my brains out!  What a horrible way to wake up!

I hope I have explained that image well enough for you to imagine.  Sort of like in the movies, when they do those weird flashbacks, think "Father of the Bride" type stuff.  Yeah.  Exactly.

I have to find a way to stop doing this to myself because I can't spend the rest of my life doing this.  It's dumb.  It's annoying, and it bothers me.  And apparently it also ruins the one morning I get to sleep late!

Parents who might be reading this, does this kind of thing happen to you?  How do you make it stop???

The Great Yard Sale Post

Hey everyone, I'm belatedly posting some pictures and an update on the yard sale my youth group had last month.  It took 2 weeks of prep work, and then right after that my best friend Danise came to visit with her kids, and when she left, the yard sale seemed like an eternity ago.  So it slipped my mind until today, when I was uploading a lot of pictures so I could get some free prints.  (Oh, the things that motivate me...)

So here we are.  This is my friend who does youth group with me.  We're in the church elevator bringing stuff up from our youth room and the storage room in the basement of our building, to the first floor where the gym is.  After we get out of the elevator, we go left and down this big ramp and then down another long hallway.  It was quite a process. We did have some great help though.

 Below: stuff in piles where we tossed placed it after carrying it upstairs.  I have always wanted to type something with strikethrough.  :-)

 

This will become the linens section.

 And, thanks to Blogger uploading my photos incorrectly, here are the linens looking quite a bit nicer.

 Starting the sorting process.  This corner will become electronics and pets.  Trust me.  It makes sense to us later.

 

See?  Looks better now.

 Now here's some of the cool or interesting stuff we got this year.  These chairs are legitimately old.  They look so cute, but they are covered in some kind of plastic-y material, and would have been so much more awesome if that was a soft fabric.  I think they would have been cute in a little girl's room.

 Just a cool old table.  I like old furniture.  The fold-out mechanism on the leaves was pretty cool.

 We have had this china set for over 3 years and no one would buy it.  Most of the pieces are marked Limoges.  We looked it up and researched it the first year we had it, hoped to sell it for about $50, and when no one wanted it, we held it and reduced the price the following year.  And the year after that.  Green isn't my favorite color, but I thought it was so pretty anyway that I decided if no one bought it this year, I would.  It sold, of course.  I was actually very happy about that, and told the lady who bought it how glad I was that it was finally going home with someone who appreciated it.

 A gorgeous set of Noritake china.  It was donated by one of our youth kid's grandparents, and when the youth's mother came in and saw it, she was so upset that she bought it back!  Mom and I had tried to get my grandmother to buy it but she preferred to stick with her old, ugly, mismatched stuff instead.  Too bad.  It was just as beautiful as you please, a full 12 piece set.  But it had a happy ending, going home with the person who probably should have had it in the first place.

 Check out all the bikes!  We've never had that many bikes.  Over there you can see our lazy helpers.  They aren't really lazy.  We were just done for the day and waiting for parents to pick them up.  But it was funny to me to write lazy.  They were anything but.

 Some of the containers we had, plus you can kind of see some of the appliances, and in the background a rack of clothes that one of our awesome helpers put together for us. 

 A bunch of dolls were donated to us this year.  We actually had 2 Pillsbury Dough Boy figures, the one in this photo and another I didn't get a shot of for some reason. 

 Baby and toy section.  I didn't even get a chance to take pictures of the Legos we had.  We had about 10 boxes of the huge 600-800 piece sets, plus a giant bin of more sets all combined, with instruction booklets.  We probably made about $1000 off the Legos alone.  You can see a Star Wars toy here though. 

 Games

 We had a couple of nice bags this year, including this one.

 We always get some unique stuff.  I think you can see the standing cardboard cutout of the Nascar racer whose name I don't know.  She sold.  We had two antique sleds this year, too.  In fact, our sporting goods section was overflowing.

 A shot of about half the space.  Clothes, household, furniture (from near to far).  And the lazy helpers. 

 Now these sideways ones, I'm sorry about them.  I really thought I had figured out how to turn them in my posts, but now for the life of me I can't figure it out.  So I apologize and if I get around to figuring it out, I will fix it.  For now, just turn your heads.  :-) 

This is a view of our book section, which was rather small this year.

 Health and Beauty section.  Always some interesting stuff there.  Always a lot of stuff getting thrown out, too.  Ick.  Opened bottles of old shampoo?  Um, no thanks!

 Garden section, next to sporting goods.  There's that Nascar lady again.  We had two or three fountains this year.

 One of the old sleds.

 Christmas and holiday section.

 Old boat motor.

 Lazy helper.

 Jewelry.  Nothing amazing this year.

 An unusual piece.  It sold.

 Antique desk.  It sold. 

 Finally, just some of the pretty dishes we had.  I like that kind of stuff, too. 

 

Overall, a pretty great sale.  I think we raised almost $4500 this year.  So many people helped, and of course, I can't wait til next year's sale!