My Favorite House

This month completes our first year in this house. It's my favorite house of the three that we've owned. The couple who lived here before us were here for almost 40 years! They took such great care of the house and the yard--they apparently worked in the yard all the time according to the neighbors. In the previous houses we've owned we've had to do EVERYTHING to the yard. Here we've pretty much done nothing, except maintenance.

They planted zoysia grass in the front AND the back, dogwood trees, Japanese maples, large oaks and maples (and a couple of trees that I don't know their names), hostas, azaleas, a fig tree, blueberry bushes, a snowball bush, a holly tree, roses (climbing and miniature), creeping flox, hydrangeas, crepe myrtles....the list goes on but I don't know the names of all the others.

Please don't think I'm bragging since we didn't do anything except buy the house. It's all such a blessing! I'm trying to learn how to care for everything as best I can. I know nothing at all about roses and I thought I'd almost killed them last year. However, they've leafed out beautifully this spring and it looks like there's lots of buds forming. I've got to do some serious reading up on the care of roses though--if you have any advice for me at all feel free to share!

Here are some shots from my yard that I took today, just had to share them with you!

in the front yard: an azalea bush in very full bloom

in the front yard: a Japanese maple

in the front yard: a close up of the lambs' ears coming up

looking into the backyard: roses on the fence with dogwood trees behind

in the backyard: dogwoods, a Japanese maple, creeping flox

in the backyard: trumpet vine

The Princess enjoying the Spring day
(blueberry bushes in the background)

The Making of an Egyptian Death Mask

We are learning all about the ancient world this year with Story of the World I and loving it! We've been learning a lot about Egypt, of course, which is completely fascinating. Most recently we have studied the New Kingdom of Egypt, which includes the story of King Tut. So we decided making an Egyptian death mask in the style of King Tut's would be a fun project. First since it was too cold at the time to paper mache in the garage (it probably would have frozen instead of dried-ha) and it was too messy to do it in the house, we decided to pick up a couple of cheap craft masks at Hobby Lobby. Next we cut out cardboard shapes to complete the shape of the death mask, attaching them with hot glue. Vince even put a little detail on the *beard* with the hot glue per The Princess' request. Then the kiddos started to paint them with this metallic gold tempera paint. It worked okay for the cardboard, but would not coat the plastic of the mask. We thought maybe a second coat ...

Door Hanger Chore Charts

My kids have had a chore chart for a while. It's one of those magnetic boards and they share it. However, it's not by their rooms and often they (and I) forget to update it. Plus it's a little bulky. When I saw the concept of a door hanger chore chart on Pinterest, I loved it! It was compact, right there were the kiddos could see it coming out and going into their rooms, and it costs almost nothing to make. I headed over to one of my favorite stores: Hobby Lobby, of course. They have these little wooden door hangers for .79. I also grabbed a couple of packets of decorative buttons for $1.99 each. I already had the clothes pins and the paint so those cost me nothing. I began by painting the door hangers (I used tempera paints because that's what I had). Then I grabbed a fine point Sharpie and the clothes pins and started writing chores on them, making sure to write them correctly so they will ...

Fun With 4th of July Crafts: Part 3

I love my new patriotic front door wreath!! I had fun putting this together, although I must admit this is more of an adult craft than one for kiddos. I was inspired by this article in Family Fun magazine. I didn't have quite everything I needed for this one, but all I had to purchase was a few sheets of scrapbook paper and some double-sided tape. Then all I had to gather up were some scissors, regular Scotch tape, a ruler and some cardboard. First I cut four (5"x 6") pieces of each paper. Then by placing a piece of double-sided tape on one of the short ends of the papers, I rolled them into cones, pressing the seams together well. Then I cut a 10" circle out of cardboard and began to stick the cones on it. I used another piece of double-sided tape to stick the cones on, arranging them in a circular pattern. Next I used regular Scotch tape to attach them on the back to the back of the cardboard. After getting all the cones on, I was ready for my centerpiece. He...

my blessed life

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