Summer Crafting

This summer has been filled with some crafting activities already.  This makes my momma heart proud because I can never say 'no' to a good craft myself and I love seeing the kids enjoying them too.  

One evening, it was just Jimmy and me at home -- the other kids were someplace with Steve -- so I lugged out our huge tote of sidewalk chalk and we set to work.  I would make a drawing and then he would try to mimic it ... all things summer-related!  I was amazed at how skilled he was just from looking at my drawings and then replicating them.  

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Sophia is such a patient teacher and loves crafts just as much as me.  One day, she set to work helping Jimmy turn wooden dinosaur skeletons into 3D structures and then covering them with clay.  Jimmy still has one of them on display in his room!

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One of our very favorite neighbors (and a babysitter for our kids when they were younger), graduated from high school this year and I chose to do something fun as our gift to her for graduation.  Instead of the traditional/standard gift of money, I turned it into a money cake and then decorated it in her school colors.  It made a great display at her Open House too.

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Sophia joined me across the street at a neighbor's house to work on a Pysanky egg.  It is a very tedious job that involves using blown-out eggs, beeswax and dyes to decorate the eggs with various patterns.  It involved several nights of working on it, but in the end, it turned out great!!

And I will now have it to put on display each year around Easter time:

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Jack found a several mailboxes out by the road at the end of our subdivision because a neighbor was apparently getting rid of them.    Multiple trips later, he lugged them all home and him and James set to work putting them together and have great plans to use them for random projects.  What kind of projects?  I'm not sure, but it definitely kept them busy for a few house one afternoon.

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Samantha's big project has been re-painting her room and updating it a bit.  This isn't the best picture, but she decided to change the beige-colored walls (leftover from when it was painted to be our baby nursery for Sophia) to a cooler gray color.  We also ordered some new curtains, moved her loft bed to a different area and painted all of the trim.

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Sidewalk chalk designs by Samantha!  Like her mom, once she has a picture in front of her, she is able to easily duplicate it.  Garfield and Odie graced our driveway for a full 24 hours before a big rainstorm moved in and sadly washed them away.

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Another fun project has been making bracelets out of paracord.  Sophia and Jack learned how to do this at a camp last year and now they are teaching Jimmy.  Note that he was not allowed to use the lighter.  It is there to be used by an adult to seal the end of the cord when the bracelet is complete.

Yes, Sophia received all of these colors of cord in her Easter basket this spring and she has been willing to share and/or make anyone a bracelet that asks for one.

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Sticker-by-number art: this is the perfect outdoor project -- so much light -- and the end results are always amazing!

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Mid-Week Randoms

One of the gifts that Jack received from his birthday was a complete Michigan State ensemble -- shorts, shirt and hat.  He loved it, of course, and then made sure that he had it ready to wear to school the next day.

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We brought the boat out of storage for the season in April and it will continue to reside in our garage until Fall.  I grabbed this quick picture of Steve and the girls and am amazed at how tall Sam is getting.  She's taller than me now and is approaching 5'4".

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Late Spring always means shoveling bark/mulch and putting it around the house in my flower beds.  Steve and I are pretty efficient at this task now, but I love it when I can snag one of the boys to help.

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This little boy graduated from kindergarten and it brought a couple of tears to my eyes -- partly because he's our last one ... and partly because he will graduate as the CLASS OF 2034!  Wow. 

Just for fun, here is a comparison pic of the three generations:

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This year, we opted to buy a new lawn mower.  We bought our 'main mower' used when we moved in 12 years ago and definitely got our money's worth out of it but it was time for an upgrade.  Jack had been using another used mower (a zero-turn, like this one) and we figured that he could start mowing lawns this summer to help with the cost.

Jack is in heaven:

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My sister hosted a joint birthday party for my niece and nephew and I love any opportunity to amp up the wrapping of the gifts.  It was a Mario-theme for Louie and a Pig theme for Zoe so I decorated their gifts accordingly.

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Steve recently painted Sophia's  old bike (it was pink camo) red and black for Jimmy and put new handle grips on it.  Jimmy is so pleased with it that I caught him outside giving it a rinse job in the front yard.  

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Strawberry season in Michigan means lots of strawberry shortcake and of course, homemade jam to put in the freezer.  There is nothing better than homemade jam all year long!

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We set up our stand at the end of the driveway during the annual neighborhood garage sale.  The food items that the girls sell (my two girls and their best friend/neighbor next door) changes a bit from year to year, but they always end up making quite a profit.  The weather held out -- much better than last year -- and they are already brainstorming ideas for 2023.

The next day, they begged me to take them shopping to Target and Ulta so that they could spend some of that hard-earned money.  I obliged.

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We don't know how much time we have left with our beloved Mia, but we are making sure that we don't take a single day for granted.  She is about 14 years old now and each of the kids treasures her ... especially Jack.

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