The Easter Bunny Came!

Here are some photos from my time in my home town with my family for Easter:

Hubby and I on Easter Sunday

My adorable parents 

Game time! (sister Rach grinning) 

I won this game! (I'm the yellow) 

My mom never fails to feed us way too much good food. 

Brothers: My hubby, and Rachel's hubby Nathan :)

Molly's first Easter

I think she likes her pretty Easter dress! 

so cute! 

alright, this is the the last one. At least of my family, I'll do another post for my crafting while I was there! I just had to show you how Molly crosses her ankles like a lady, cause it's so cute!

Hope you all had a very blessed Easter celebrating that our Lord is risen, risen indeed! And that through that truth we know that by grace, through faith, in Christ, we will be risen and know eternal life too!

Thank you Jesus! 

A really good day!

Yesterday was a fantastic day!

First off, my husband and I got a car for me to drive around. It's a 2001 Honda Civic with just over 75,000 miles, and it has been taken very well care of.  I think it's super cute and am so happy I don't have to drive our crappy other car anymore! YAY!

Then, the mail came. Now, just so you understand a little something about me, my husband would say I am obsessed with getting mail. I check the mailbox probably half a dozen times daily. I love getting mail! So imagine my complete elation when I got the mail and received my diploma that I've been waiting for a month and a half to arrive! There's something so wonderful about having the physical proof, the actual document in your hand, to make the accomplishment real. So folks, here it is!

I graduated Summa Cum Laude!


AND not only that arrived in the mail, but the latest Lion Brand magazine arrived! YAY! more pretty patterns and lovely yarns to look at :)

But the wonderfulness of this day did not end there, oh no! Next amazing thing to happen, I got a job!
The school district that I student taught in is hiring me as a sub, and I made an appointment for Monday to fill out all the paperwork to make it official. This is awesome because it means that anything I make from subbing goes directly towards paying off our new car, and then saving for a house!

Then to end my fabulous day, I ate at what I deem to be the best dining experience I have had in months! My husband and some friends and I went to this hole-in-the-wall place some friends had recommended called Laguna Cafe. First off, as we drive into the parking lot, they've got a sign outside that says "Live Jazz tonight," seriously? Could it get any better than good live jazz? It was wonderful :) ...just a little combo, drums, guitar, bass, and trumpet playing some of my favorites like, "My Romance" with such taste and skill! Then we sat down only to have the owner personally seat and greet us, recommend some amazing drinks, and welcome us. We all ordered something different but were blown away by the quality, taste, and reasonable prices of everything. I had a strawberry lemonade smoothie that was the absolute best smoothie I have ever drank, and we all left saying it was an extraordinary place!
All in all, I went to bed wondering if there will ever be a day so unexpectedly lovely like this one anytime soon...

Teddy Bear

(I love his little bum!)

I usually am against purchasing patterns, simply because there are a plethora of amazing free patterns online. My thinking is, if I can get something just as good for free, why pay for it? The problem with my obsession for free patterns is that sometimes, there simply isn't a good enough free pattern online for the object you desire to create. This is the problem I ran into when trying to find a cute-enough teddy-bear pattern. I wanted it to actually somewhat resemble a teddy bear, and it seemed that although there were plenty free patterns out there, nothing looked right. That is until I came upon a pattern on about.com under their crochet section. Sandi Marshall has designed a teddy bear, and a good sized one too that is super cute, and I finally had myself a pattern worth making! (You can find the free pattern here)

My friend's baby Josiah just had his 1st birthday so he was the lucky recipient of this adorable bear! Now all I need are pictures of him playing with it!






This is some of the construction of the teddy bear. I used worsted weight yarn on all his features including his nose and eyes so he is completely baby-safe!

Hitting a crochet rut? Throw a Crochet Party!

Last month, after having talked about getting ladies together to craft several times and having a few friends ask me to teach them how to crochet, I decided to make up a party surrounding the craft I love best: Crochet! Whether it was for inspiration, learning new techniques, patterns or how to crochet for the first time, I asked several of my dearest friends to come and enjoy a night of crochet, refreshments and fun!

Some ideas:

• Send out E-vites, they're free and normally you can reach nearly everyone who you would contact on a regular basis through email or some social-networking site, such as Facebook. Most E-vites have some sort of feature that allows you to post the invitations or access your contacts on that site.
• Don't worry about whether your invitation will be welcome to non-crocheters, you'd be surprised how many people are interested in learning how to crochet, and if you offer to teach at the party, they're more likely to show up!
• Offer to teach how to crochet at your crocheting party. I asked everyone who wanted to come and learn to bring a light colored worsted weight yarn, and a hook between G-J. Anyone who was apprehensive of obtaining those things I offered to supply those things for them.
• Ask those who do crochet to bring their projects they're working on, patterns they love, and so on.
• Display your goods! I set out several of my finished products from the past few months, along with their patterns, and nearly all my yarn, hooks, and supplies for my friends to see, use, be inspired by, etc.
• Use the party as an exchange: Bring your yarn you never use, see if someone is willing to trade from their stash! Bring your patterns and share with others the projects that you loved making! Share techniques and gift-giving ideas!
• Provide refreshments and an atmosphere that is comfortable. Winter is the best time to cozy up in a house with your yarn projects, there's usually loads of holiday food available for parties, and you have every excuse to play holiday music and have your house looking particularly lovely in it's holiday splendor. I let some of my friends who asked me if they could bring anything to bring goodies- cookies, a veggie platter, crackers and a cheese ball and I provided drinks! Tea, coffee, lattes, and water for those who didn't want something hot.
• Don't let this be your only party! Chances are, those who didn't come, simply had a time conflict, so schedule another! Maybe make it a monthly affair that those ladies can look forward to. Let your first party serve as a learning experience to throw better parties along the way!
• Don't let it become a burden. Let your friends help! Parties are supposed to be fun, so if you're stressed out about providing food, divvy up the load and have a few friends bring one dish each. Don't have enough room at your house/apartment? Ask a friend with a little more room to host, and maybe make something fabulous as a thank you present for her time/effort. Ask friends for ideas for what to do at the party, how to make it better.

Happy 2 Year Anniversary!

My love and I celebrated 2 years of happy union this week, and I just thought I would reflect on what a blessing it has been to be married to this man!

First off- marriage is a wonderful creation made by God to reflect his glory. Woman was created to complete man- to make God's creation finished and "good." It is a wonderful task to live out a reflection of the relationship God shares with himself in the Trinity as well as the relationship Jesus has with his Bride- the church.

It has been an especially edifying experience to share my life exclusively with one man- to be so vulnerable, to be so very humble in a relationship that I choose to honor their good and happiness before my own. I have learned through being married what a wretched sinner I am and how I cannot hide that fact from someone I am so close to. Marriage has taught me how wonderful grace is and how horrifying bitterness can be.

Marriage to Michael, my wonderful husband, has challenged me to grow more towards extroversion than my default mode of complete introversion. He has gently pushed me to speak more, to love lots of company, and to not be so afraid of new adventures. He encourages me to be creative and share my ideas and creations with others. Marriage to Michael means I am not ashamed to be myself, to be silly, and to play my music shamelessly. Marriage to Michael is lots of prayer, time in the word, humble correction, a life with Godly friends and their awesome wisdom, service in ministry, lots of practice and service for Worship team, and a general understanding that the direction of our life is completely in the Lord's hands.

Here is the card I made Michael for our anniversary. I think it looks very bridal

And here is the flowers my amazing husband brought home from work on our anniversary :)

And now for the story of the thank you card in my last post: We were invited over to a friends house (from church) the night of our anniversary for dessert and a little dip in the hot tub. When we got there they discovered it was our anniversary, and insisted they serve us, make us lovely cocktails and have the hot tub to ourselves that night. It was so sweet of them to do that, and we were so blessed just to have time alone that night with our drinks and lovely jets. So we simply had to thank them profusely and my husband asked me to make them a card with a ribbon for "Friends of the Year." I didn't think that would all fit very neatly into my little circle, so I just put a big 1, and told them they won 1st place for the coolest friends.

It is just so clear to me that they understand how important celebrating marriage and the milestones in it is- they clearly showed us by their service they long for God's glory in our marriage and desired that we strengthen it by an unexpectedly romantic evening to ourselves :)

And to cap off the celebrations: We're having a very fancy dinner tonight at a floating restaurant over the Couer d alene lake!