Can't beat the view....

At Morro Bay!


We had a great time last weekend doing nothing and enjoying the beautiful weather. A much needed break.

My first sewing project

After receiving many homemade gifts from my sister in law for our wedding and other events and absolutely loving them I decided to give sewing a try. I have always thought that it would be something I would enjoy but not wanting to jump in and end up in over my head I decided to try a smaller project. I went over to Katie's last Saturday and tried my hand at my first apron. This one was to be for my Mom since she has never had one. Katie walked me through all the steps on how to follow a pattern, how to finish a seam, and how crucial ironing is. It helped so much because I had played around on my mom's sewing machine when I was little with scraps but never really had any instruction. The finished project turned out great. I surprised my mom this weekend with it as a birthday/Christmas gift. (no its not her birthday or Christmas but Christmas has passed and I couldn't wait until her birthday) She absolutely loved it and was showing it off. I got such pleasure from making something homemade for someone else and the fact that this is a hobby that always yields a product really makes me think I could get in to this. My mom, not being to inclined to sew anything (its just not her thing) is letting me borrow her machine indefinitely. I think I will be making a few more aprons as I have 4 weddings coming up for friends. I'm really glad I know so many people who are very talented sewers (seamstresses?) that will be great resources for me.

"My" sewing machine for now


Mom's apron!

Organization

I have talked about our back rooms and how they were disastrous before. Our new bookshelf in the front entry helped a little. Last weekend we went to Costco and got 2 sets of shelves. One for Ben's room and one for the "office." I have been dying to organize and finally had the time and tools I needed. Much of our stuff was spread out between two rooms. My goal was to put as much in one room as I could so someday if we are still here and have a baby we will have less work to do. My goal is accomplished. My room with everything is a kind of hodgepodge of storage but it suits me just fine at the moment. It may not be pretty but I can find everything and we have a nice good will pile ready to be taken away.

Before


After

Christmas present from Ben

Ever since July on my first visit to Ikea I have been wanting a bookshelf I saw there. Me being my cheap self instead of indulging myself in this wonderful item immediately decided to wait until I got Christmas money. I'm glad I waited because Ben took me to go get it. It is now assembled and looks just a great as I had dreamed it would. I have not had time to fill it with things yet. It has been a crazy Christmas season to say the least. I think my problem will be narrowing down what belongs in it. Although our house is wonderful it lacks good storage spaces with shelves and such things. It's exciting to have a new place to put things! My house is one step closer to being organized in every room.

Ben piecing it together.


The finished product!

More Christmas

Christmas day was spent at my Aunt and Uncle's house eating great food, watching the Lakers, and playing with some sweet remote control cars. We hung out with my cousins two little boys who were quite the entertainers. They got a real kick out of the cars and our makeshift jump we made in the living room out of a magazine and shoes. Christmas night we went bowling with my cousins and friends from church. Everyone had a blast.

The boys, showing me their new wallets with chains "so you don't lose it."


Ben snuck a nap in.


Korey being informed on how the chain on the wallet keeps you from losing it.


Our nifty ramp.


My brother and I. (no I don't know why my eyes are so wide)


My sisters.


Two parts of the unstoppable three!

Catching up

I know I have been a slacker as of late on here. The month of December seemed to catch up with me and I now understand why my mom was always a little glad to see Christmas pass. We love seeing family and friends but with double the family now it is definitely a juggling act. Where to start? We got our first Christmas tree a couple of weeks ago and the grape ornaments I blogged about earlier look great on it. I am still on the hunt for a great tree topper. I wouldn't settle for a temporary junky one, not to mention Ben would not allow it.

Our wonderful tree, with no topper yet


This has absolutely nothing to do with Christmas but it was just too funny. Peachy dragged her bed out into the middle of the yard and was sleeping like this soaking up the sun.


The first Christmas to attend was Sorensen Christmas. We first attended the big extended family one and then that smaller more immediately family one afterward. The big one was a little odd for me because I knew absolutely no one. Our smaller one was definitely fun with Henry crawling around and Ben throwing balls around with the little boys. Here's a couple pictures of Henry eating lunch. How can you not love that face?



After Sorensen Christmas was my immediately family Christmas. It was great to be able to hang out with them for a while. I got some great "grown up" gifts as I call them. It just makes me laugh how much my Christmas list has changed since I got married.


Kari on her new bike.


On the way home from my immediate family Christmas Ben and I were getting anxious to see what each got the other. Then I suggested maybe we should just open them that night. So like a couple of kids we lost our patience and opened them. I justify this by the fact that we will not be home on Christmas and why not open them early. It turned out great because Ben got to play with his new toy, I got him an itouch. His big present to me was a bookshelf from Ikea I have been wanting forever. He is taking me to Ikea to go get it too. He's actually going with me, now that's a gift!
These are pictures of us with our respective gifts.



Christmas Eve morning was at the Fast's. It's a whole different Christmas with the new additions of me and Henry. Henry is mobile now and was having a grand time of wallowing around in wrapping paper. One of his gifts was a walker and he thought that was the best because he could be upright with no help at all. I got some more grown up gifts at this Christmas and I am really excited to start using all the wonderful things I got.

My beautiful sisters in law.


Henry playing in his walker.

Saturday Fun

This last Saturday was a great day for Ben and I. Last weekend I was able to catch up on major cleaning so this Saturday I didn't have quite as many chores to do. Ben decided to take the day off so we both were excited for the day. We both started out taking care of a few things around the house and then as I moved on to Christmas decorations Ben moved to reloading. After this we decided to put the legs on our couch. For those of you who don't know the story we got a great u-shaped couch after we moved in. After much struggle and toil we finally got it in through the front door. When assembling the couch we could only find one set of legs (there should have been 3 because our couch is in 3 sections). Thinking they were just left out we left it on the floor and it looked good enough. A couple weeks later I was struggling with a cushion that never seemed to go down all the way when I reached underneath and discovered the missing legs. After this discovery I went on a hunt for the other set and found it under the other "funky" cushion. Needless to say we felt very smart and had a good laugh over our missing legs and have since failed to put them on. I'm glad we did, it looks much better. After this we put up Christmas lights on our house after a hunt in town for inexpensive hooks failed, we went for plain old nails. Peachy was a great helper and now our house is a little more festive :)

Couch with legs


Ben putting up lights


And more lights


My little helper Miss Peachy


Finished product