Altered Jean Skirts

Have I mentioned that I am the proud mama of a beautiful shiny black Bernina sewing machine? She needs a name - any suggestions? I love her to pieces & she helped me make these today (the girls helped too)

I have a friend who made some great bleached jean jackets & I saw an article in an old magazine about some journal skirts with stamped stories & pictures all over them. I sort of combined the two and came up with this idea for my girlies.

I'm not quite finished, I still have some more hand embroidery I'd like to do and I'll add some more trim & buttons here & there. But I have to finish them tomorrow, because

#1 & 2 can't wait to wear them to school on Monday.

I love that they're not all embarassed that I like to make them clothes - Can you hear me singing Dolly Parton, Coat of Many Colors?

This one turned out very white...the fabric was more cotton than denim and the bleach just soaked in everywhere. But the ruffles are made from thick vintage lace.

I was very happy to find that my ruffler foot fits my new machine, If you've never used one of these, they're wonderful! I think it's actually called shirring - but you can set the foot to pleat or gather, and if you change the stitch size, the gather gets tighter or looser.

And here's the new machine, isn't it cute? My husbands grandma went to a quilt show last month and entered a drawing for it in my name. We were all so excited!

Linking to...........

Old Fashioned Spice Cake with Cinnamon Icing

The Tiddlywampus and I decided to make a cake last weekend -

this is what she chose.

It was out of an old 1964 McCormick cookbook & was very good!

2 1/2 cups sifted cake flour
2 t. baking powder
1/2 t. baking soda
1/2 t. salt
1/4 t. cloves
1/4 t. nutmeg
1/2 t. allspice
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 cup shortening
1 1/4 cups brown sugar, packed
3 eggs
1 cup buttermilk (or sour milk)



Sift flour, baking powder, soda, salt and spices together. Cream shortening & sugar until light & fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after addition of each. Add flour mixture alternately with buttermilk. Pour batter into two greased and floured 9 inch layer cake pans for 30 minutes or bundt pan 40 minutes (or until Bake in 350 degree oven 30 minutes. Remove from pan & cool.

Cinnamon Icing....

1 lb powdered sugar
1 T Cinnamon
1/3 cup melted butter
3 tablespoons milk

Sift sugar and cinnamon together. Add about 1 third of it to butter, creaming with a mixer. Add the remaining sugar and enough milk to get the desired spreading consistency. Beat hard with mixer. Spread on cake.

Beautiful weekend trip with the Pukers.

Last weekend we took a long drive to visit family in West Virginia.

This is a shot of the back of the car/puking center. 3 out of 4 of our sweet little children have inherited, from me, insanely horrible motion sickness. We can't drive 1/2 hour with out one of them getting woozy, and if we're planning a trip longer than 48 minutes, I pack trash bags, water, Clorox wipes, paper towels, buckets for each child (as vomiting tends to have a chain reaction) changes of clothes,

I wish we could tow along a spare car too.

Now imagine a 6 hour drive...#3 at front left, has her empty cup on her lap for security. #1, back left has an empty Whale of a Pail ice cream bucket.

We arrived, bathed & had a great time while we were there.

We spent alot of time with the goats, this little guy was just born a couple of days before.

I love this cow.

#4 was getting pretty adventurous - taking off anytime she got the chance and pulling her sister along with her.

"Come on Daisy, lets go check out those little piggies!"

"Oh, don't be scared! They only look huge because we're only 2 feet tall."

Helping milk the cow is always a requirement for our girls. Even though they spend a lot of time on our farm, it's different here. The animals wander all around together - and those little girls were seriously chasing after those gigantic hogs.

And the goats...

These goats spend most of their time up on the mountain, but were brought back down due to the rough winter.

See how they're always smiling?

Fuzzy little puffball.

Book Adventure

Book Adventure is this awesome website that encourages reading in children & my kids LOVE it.

After reading a book, or after I've read to them, they go to the Book Adventure website and look up the title. They take a 5 question quiz about the book & their score & points are immediatly displayed. The points all add up and there are great prizes in the prize library for them to choose from! Books, subscriptions magazines, stickers, chocolate... the prizes change often depending on the sponsors.

My oldest daughter started Book Adventure in school last year. Her teacher encouraged the students to read and complete quizes in during free time & at home. Maddie couldn't wait to read the next book for more points! Now that she's older and reading chapter books, there are 10 questions per book, so it's more challenging - but she's saving up for a years supscription to Highlights now. The site is also super safe for kids too, she has her own username and password, as do I, and can view her progress.

A new feature on the site is the Personal Incentive Plan. We haven't tried it yet, but it sounds fun. You decide and provide the incentive & set the required points necessary to receive the incentive. You child can view them in the Prize Library, along with the other prizes available to them. The sky is the limit as far as the prize offerings that you can create! Some ideas for incentives are:
Extra playtime
A movie or video game rental
$10 to spend at their favorite store
An educational toy
Once your child earns enough points to request one of your offerings, they would request the prize the same way that they would request any of our other prizes. You will have then have to approve the request, and your child has to print a reward certificate. This I have to say is great for parents to improve on follow through & it's better than a "bribe."

It's educational & best of all...IT'S FREE!
& we all love free, don't we?