A few little things...

Not in my Job Description
When I signed up to be a pastor's wife, there was nothing in my job description about costume designing.

Yesterday nap time was spent making a Bible Story Costume. This is the second one I've made, They sell for like $80 on the internet. I've made all of them out of old sheets or even new flat sheets from Walmart for $8 and two hours of time. I've decided I might try to do a tutorial for these, might be good for Easter programs or dress up clothes. The first one I did was for Adam while he was in seminary. It was basically a robe and I bought some trim cording for him to tie it with.

This time it is for AWANA Sunday this Sunday. We couldn't find the old one in the piles of boxes and Adam thinks we might have gotten rid of it in the move. He then requested a more elaborate one than last time. Two layers. How convenient that I just bought new sheets for our bed and so could use the old one (white under layer) and decided to not make my own shower curtain from a brown flat sheet (brown robe layer), so I had everything on hand except a tie, where I found "rope" at Joann's for 1.99 a yard.

Whole costume cost = $4. That's my kind of costume.

Too excited too quickly
Yesterday I spent the evening at the new house working while Adam took care of Max and put him to bed. When I finished I was thinking of all the things that we still have left to do and am questioning whether we'll be in the house in the timeframe I was hoping for. I suppose with our rounds of visitors we have in April and hopefully evenings like last night, we'll get more done than I think, but gosh, there's still a lot. We'll see. Luckily we've been so blessed, that we don't have an absolute date we need to be out of this house.

But I've been contemplating all the important things for the house. Window coverings, wall hangings, towels, shelves. You know those things where my brain starts to run wild. I found fabric yesterday that I'm really excited to make curtains out of. I just got a sample and I'm running it by the house today. It will either be livingroom curatins or kitchen curtains. It looks great with both paint samples. It will probably be livingroom curtains though because it also looks good with the color of the couch, which is not a neutral tan, it throws colors off. Hard to explain, but oh well.

I found some display boxes yesterday at Michael's for $2.99 for Max's room and they were already painted black! Yippee! Also got brown and aqua spray paint on sale at Menards for $2 a can. Can't wait to use that stuff on some picture frames that need a revamp for the living room.

Crafty Scene
I've been knitting away, I really love the class. I have some really fun women in there and one whose a mom with three little boys. I've tried from multiple books and videos to knit but as I suspected just needed someone to tell me what I was doing wrong. Once she showed me how it was different from crochet, I just went on and on. The instructor even showed me the purl stitch which she doesn't teach until the next class, so hopefully she'll show me some extra things next week while the other students are working on that.

I think it totally made a difference being a yarn addict anyway. Since I'm not afraid of yarn and have an idea of what it can do. It also helps that I have decent control of my hands. That is where most people struggle when starting these things, they are uncomfortable with their hands. A couple of the women where complaining that they couldn't make their hands move in that way.

We were encouraged to start a project over the week (we meet in a yarn shop, so of course they want us to buy yarn!) and I had no problem complying with that. I bought a rayon/silk blend that I would never crochet with, to knit a floaty open weave summer scarf. I love it so far and I haven't forgotten how to knit either, I do a little each day but I'm already getting faster at it. I even started another project with some cheap knitting needles I already had to make sure I could remember to cast on. So that's two projects on knitting needles.

I've tempered my growing knitting obsession with some crochet too. I got some beautiful Cascade Wool that I wanted to make a big scarf/shawl out of for a friend. Well it will be late for her birthday but it's coming along nicely because the pattern is beautifully simple, I'll definintely want to use the pattern again.

I have another birthday project I'm working up- but it's all still in my head- and it will probably be late too unless I can get it done tonight or tomorrow. But since it's still in my head, I'm guessing it will be late. But I'm leaving my sewing machine our on the kitchen table until I at least attempt it (I can't sew in my craft room because it's right next to Max's room and he always wakes up at the sound of it).

I've also been itching (and have the yarn sitting here) for another baby kimono sweater. I'm resisting, but my resolve is failing.


Recap
So let's take a count.... That's two projects on needles, one on the hook, and one completed on the sewing maching, but one potentially going onto the machine, and another I'm resisting getting hooked on. And I have a house to finish, carpet to pick out, three rooms to paint, curtains to make, a desk to find, boxes to sort through, and a birthday party to plan. This week's been more relaxing than the past few. :-)

And I just said to a friend the other day. It's a good thing I'm busy because otherwise I'd get nothing done.

Just for good measure, here's a picture of dinner the other night.... Avocado and pasta primavera. Max's new thing is to stick his hand in his mouth after every bite. I think the purpose might be to make sure it stays in, but I think it has the opposite effect.