Happy Halloween

Happy Halloween!

for free printable, go to: itworksforbobbi.com

Pumpkin Harvest

What with the cold and snow recently, we decided yesterday it was high time to harvest our pumpkins.

Our little punkins had a rough go this year. They grew for a while, then were stifled by the heat, and then decided to grow a bit more. so, we were left with this huge crop. Another problem may or may not have been that snakes have been tormenting me this year, and there were more than one sightings of them back by the pumpkins. I didn't really weed, or make sure they had enough water, or anything. They sortof had to fend for themselves, so they did pretty darn good taking all that in account.

I still am pretty darn proud of those little fellas. I would love to arrive at the day that I don't have to buy any pumpkins for decoration because I have grown so many. 

Snow in October and Temple Day

Yesterday we got up early (well, at least it was early in my book), and started our temple day. Our stake leaders have encouraged each of the wards to schedule one day at the temple, where each member comes and spends as much of the day as their schedule permits. So, Bob and I went in the morning and spent about four hours. The Draper Temple doesn't have a cafeteria, so we left to get some lunch, and I also had a hair appointment. I know, I know... a hair appointment isn't a great excuse to not be at the temple, but I had that appointment for literally three months, so I couldn't really change it at that point. We went back to the temple for 4 or 5 more hours a bit later on in the day. What a remarkable, wonderful day it was! I loved being there for an extended period of time. Sometimes it takes me a while to "unwind", but I had plenty of time yesterday, and thoroughly enjoyed the sweet strong spirit I felt All. Day. Long. I feel like I have filled my bucket to the brim! I love the temple!

It was especially nice being in the temple, since this is what was going on outside...

Draper Temple - October 25, 2012

...A little October blizzard. It was a cold, icy day!

It all melted off by the afternoon, but this morning we woke to another "dusting". Looks like our gardening days are numbered and I really need to start putting my gardens to bed for the winter.

Snow on the wisteria

These are the kinds of days where I want to put my sweats on and patter around the house working on little projects, or reading a good book. Probably not in the cards today, but one can always wish....

YW canvas art project and early voting!

                               

Early voting is one of the best inventions ever!  It seems that this election is really making everyone think a bit more seriously about their duty to vote, so I would think that means lines on election night. Four years ago there were lines. I know because I stood in them. This year, we decided to do it a differently and we went to vote right after out weekly lunch date (yep... every Wednesday for umpteen years, we have been going to lunch together. It gets both of us through the week!).

We drove up to the City Hall and walked right in. No lines. Not even one person in line. They had several workers at the tables ready to get voter signatures and give out the voting cards.

In the actual room where we voted, there were probably 15 booths, and only 3 people voting. What  a breeze. Plus, as an added bonus, they gave us candy and a free calendar on the way out. I've gotta say... early voting is the only way to go. L.O.V.E.D. it!

And on to my latest project. For our Joint Young Women activity in November, I am in charge of it. We are going to be making canvas art that we will display at the Young Women in Excellence night in December.

Bob (with his magic laser cutting machine) cut out 35 sets of letters out of wood. While he was gone to the BYU vs. Notre Dame game (BYU lost, but stayed in the game the whole time... he and Robbie loved their trip out to South Bend). Anyway... back to the craft. While Bob was gone, I had the weekend to craft and organize and even get some cleaning done. During the game, I glued all of the wood letters to the canvasses. (A much preferred method of "watching" the game, since I would eat myself silly out of nervousness if I wasn't busy working on something)

The theme for our YW in Excellence is just like the canvasses say: "be you tiful".  I finished all 35 canvasses. I say that loosely, because I finished 34, and had to have Bob cut me one more "t". It went missing somehow, so I actually finished up the 35th one today. Now they sit on my kitchen table.

Although this looks as if it is gray, it is actually a robin's egg blue. My camera wasn't really picking up on the color, and I didn't have time to fiddle around with the settings (not to mention the fact that I really don't know how to fiddle around with the settings).

At any rate, for the YW activity before the Evening in Excellence, we will have each of the girls paint up her own canvas in any color or design that she wants to. It will be fun to see what they come up with, to show their individuality.

Genealogy Fan Chart

Have you ever seen this?

This is a Genealogy Fan Chart, that YOU can create for yourself with virtually the press of a button. You will be able to see all of your ancestors for 9 generations. It is fascinating and the information is already all there for you!  When we printed ours out, it was interesting to see how far back so much of the work has been done, and also to see where there is still work to do! Fun for the kids, too, to see all of those generations fanned out. Love it!

Follow these simple instructions:

1. Go to createfan.com

2. Click on "Login", which will take you to the process of logging in to Familysearch.org. If you haven't registered in FamilySearch before, click on the "Register" or "Create A New Account" link. Registering is easy! If you are a member of the church, you will need your confirmation date and your membership number (easily accessible through your ward clerk); and, if you are not a member of the church, you can register to be given access to the FamilySearch program. (Note: if you already have an LDS Account, you will use the same login and password on FamilySearch)

3. Once you have signed in, or created your new account, it will take you back to Createfan.com. Click on "Create", and Voila!... It will create a fan with your name in the First Generation Circle, and will show all the 9 generations fanning out from you! Pretty amazing, eh?

4. You can print this yourself on an 8-1/2 X 11 sheet of cardstock or regular paper, or for a larger printed copy, you can email or take a zip drive to Staples, or Kinkos, or any other place that prints larger documents. Call your local office products store for more details.

This is such a fun way to get children and youth (and adults!) excited and interested about their ancestors and genealogy work!

Wedding Photos - Part 6 - The Wedding Party

To view the rest of the wedding photos, click below:
Part 1 - The Temple

Part 2 - The Luncheon

Part 3 - The Reception Entry

Part 4 - More Reception Details

Part 5 - Yard and Food

These should be the last of the reunion photos that I'm sharing here. I have more than 600, but I think I'll save the bulk of them for a wedding photo book. This post shows some photos of the wedding party...

I love this photo with Bob and Ryan. Looks to me like Bob is giving Ryan some father-in-law advice. I would love to have heard the conversation!

We didn't have a formal reception line, but the bride and groom and Bob and I seemed to find ourselves greeting guests in the same neck of the woods. I think it gave the wedding couple a bit of reassurance to have us nearby, since so many of the guests were our friends.

We had the cut-out made of Wilson (who is in California serving a mission), so he was here and there throughout the wedding day. I love this photo of Robbie and Wils.

And here is our family. I love this photo! (Too bad Wils' missionary wardrobe didn't include any colors of the wedding) Its actually better that way. I like how he stands out.

Me, my mom, and my sisters. One of my sisters left before this photo was taken, and the other of my sisters lives in California and wasn't able to come for the wedding. I love these girls!

And me and my cute daughters. Oh, how I love these girls, too!

Robbie changed into shorts to help clean up. I like how he still stayed within the wedding colors (all except the socks) even for working. He's an awesome son!

Faux Chenille Baby Blanket

I decided to try a different type of blanket to give out to the new babies in our ward. I had seen faux chenille blankets around for a couple of years, and then my daughter, Whitney, made one, so I thought it might be fun to try one myself. I started by getting 4 different pieces of fabric -- all 1-1/4 yards long.

I layered them with the bottom piece, right side facing down on the table. The next piece, I placed on top of the bottom piece with the right side facing up. The last two pieces were both placed on the pile with right sides facing up. So, to restate: the bottom piece is right side facing down, and then the other three pieces of fabric are right sides facing up. As confusing as that is, it ends up not really making too much of a difference how some of those fabrics are placed. I would say that the top and bottom pieces of fabric are the ones that need to be right sides facing out for sure. Now that I have probably thoroughly confused you, we'll move on...

After all of the layers were placed in the stack, I pinned them all together with several pins -- probably about every 5 inches all ways, so it is held together pretty well.  I marked a line with disappearing ink going from one corner to the opposite diagonal corner in a straight line. I then stitched on that line. From that stitched line, I sewed the next line about 1/2 " away, and so on, and so on, until I had one half (diagonally) of the quilt done. Then, do the same thing for the other half.

You can see the lines of stitching in the photo below...

When I was done with all of the diagonal lines, I trimmed the edges down so that they were fairly square (I'm not a perfectionist on projects like this!) and even.

With the quilt stitched, it was time to cut through the fabric. The important thing to remember is that you are cutting through three layers only, leaving the bottom layer intact (or else you will have lots and lots of tiny strips of fabric instead of a quilt). Originally I had wanted my brown side to be the bottom of my quilt, but I decided the stitching showed up a little too well, and showed my imperfections more than I wanted, so I flipped it over, and made the blue side the bottom. The middle two fabrics were going to show about the same either way, so I knew that wouldn't be a factor.

To cut the quilt, use a chenille scissors. It is made for this very type of project, and makes it easier to cut through the layers. I cut lines between every stitched line, as shown in the photo above. Remember, cut through only three layers, leaving the bottom layer intact.

You'll notice it doesn't look much like chenille yet. That will all happen in the laundering process.

The next step is to sew the binding on. I like to cut strips at a 45 degree angle, so that they are cut on the bias. That way, they don't get stringy and fray too much in the wash. I also cut my binding with a rotary cutter that has an edge like pinking shears. After cutting the strips, sew them together and iron the finished, long strip so that it is folded down the middle for the entire length.

I wanted the binding to be scrappy, so I left the raw edge on it instead of turning it under. 

After the binding was sewn on, I threw it in the wash to get it all soft and cozy and looking more "chenille-ish".

It is an easy project, but maybe more time-consuming than I was hoping. After it was all said and done, I decided to stick with the type of blankets I had been making before, and I'll use this little gem to snuggle my future grand babies in!

Primary Harvest Party

We had our ward Primary Harvest Party last week. The youth of the ward were in charge of it, so we did it for our mutual activity. Our Beehive class was given the assignment of the bean bag throw. We decorated the doorway so it looked "pumpkin patch-ish", with a scarecrow and fake pumpkins. We also made a vine out of paper grocery bags wrapped up and squished around wire, and then spray painted green. We made some leaves out of the grocery bags, and painted them, too. Bob made the wooden "Pumpkin Patch" sign with his magical laser machine. He is always coming up with awesome ideas to help me with my projects. It seems like he never gets tired of helping to make my life easier.  

Bob and I ran over to the shop for family night and made the big cut-out pumpkin that served as the bean bag target inside of the room. The kids had fun throwing the bean bags and earning lots of fun prizes. The Beehives totally ran the show at our game that night, so it was a pretty easy evening for me!

Lindsay made the most darling candy corn bean bags out of felt. How cute are they!?  She is so talented with felt crafts!

We had several other activities, one of which was a Cupcake Walk. The Mia Maids each brought a dozen decorated cupcakes to give away. They were masterpieces! We have some talented young women in our ward!

It is a fun tradition for both the youth and the children. They all love it, and its fun for the youth to work with the little kids in the ward.

On to the next thing.... :)

Country Living Fair

I was just remembering a trip Bob and I went on about this time last year. I LOVED that trip! It was like a dream come true for me. I had always read about the Country Living Fair in the Country Living Magazine. For years I had a wish to go, but thought it probably would never happen, since the Fairs weren't held anywhere close to Utah. Last year, I casually mentioned to Bob that I would love to go to the one in Georgia, and he said, "Well then, lets go!". He booked our flight and hotel, and purchased early bird fair tickets, and we were all set to go.

Here we are in front of the pile of pumpkins and gourds that they had in the center of the fair. It was freeeeeezing cold. I mean so cold, that after the first day, we headed over to Sports Authority and basically bought some winter gear.

Here is a shot of some of the booths. Since we had early bird tickets, we were in before much of the crowd was in. Doesn't it look like the most fun place to shop ever? Bob was the best shopping partner ever! He basically just walked around with me and helped carry all of my purchases. He never complained once about going back to certain booths over and over again, and he was even pretty helpful in finding some real treasures. Luckily there were a few booths that he was even interested in, as he, too, likes antiques and interesting old things.

I miss this fair.

We did find some time to do a few other things in that area of Georgia. The fair itself was at Stone Mountain Park. You can see the carving of some soldiers on horses behind Bob.

We climbed up Stone Mountain a couple of times for some exercise, which was really fun. We also went into Atlanta and saw a few things in the city.

All in all, one of my favorite trips ever. I think we may need to hit another Country Living Fair next year... maybe the Texas one?

Bob, are you reading this?

New York City

Bob and I went to New York for a few days last week. He had a business meeting in Long Island, and we thought it would be fun to go out together and spend a few days in the city.

We have been to New York a couple of times before, but there were some things I hadn't done yet... like go to the top of the Empire State Building. I've seen An Affair to Remember and Sleepless in Seattle enough times that I had to go up for myself! When we told the concierge at the hotel that we wanted to do that, he said that the view is much better from The Rock (another building... I'm guessing the Rockefeller Center, but I don't know... I wasn't really paying attention to what he told us about it). I hope he didn't catch me staring at him like his head was spinning around. Who wants to go to The Rock? I really didn't care what the view was like at the Empire State Building. I wanted to see it.

Then, as we neared the Empire State Building, we were told that there was so much fog, the visibility was really low. Again... I don't think I care. The fact of the matter is, since there was a low visibility, there were no lines to get to the top. There were line lanes all over the place inside of the building -- much like Disneyland -- but we were able to bypass all of that and buy our tickets and go right up in the elevators.

When we got to the top, this is what we saw...

And a view looking down...

Here is Bob. He smiled a bit like that when I told him I thought it would be romantic to act out a scene from one of the above movies. So... we didn't act out a scene, but he did kiss me up there. I'll take that.

My hair may or may not be feeling the effects of humid, damp air. And why is it that all of the photos that we take of ourselves with his phone are waaaaayyyy too close of me? He looks as amazing as always, but me, not so much.

The next day we went to Central Park. That was another of my "New York City things I haven't done yet". We had been all around the outside of the park, but never inside. So, Bob indulged me, and we went walking in the park. It was gorgeous! Full of huge, old trees and wonderful old bridges like the one he is standing on while taking my photo with his phone.

And here I am at the very same instant, taking a photo of him. When you are traveling as a couple, these are the kinds of photos you end up with. I may use them in our Christmas card this year.

And one look of the city. We never did see blue sky while we were there. It was hot, humid, and also a bit rainy here and there. We stayed at the Marriott Marquis, which was nice, because we were right there on Times Square.

We walked and walked all over Manhattan. We shopped and saw some sites and ate and shopped some more. So much fun! It was wonderful to be away together, even for just a few days.

Young Women Personal Progress Retreat

I have so much to catch up on! We just got back from a trip to New York, and then a conference weekend at the cabin, so I feel like I am way behind in "real life".

The weekend just before we went to New York, we had a Beehive Personal Progress Retreat up at our cabin. It was SO much fun!

We went up on Friday afternoon, and as soon as we got there, started working on making journals. 

 torn scrapbook paper

cut-up squares of layered paper

We used the regular memo notebooks that were really inexpensive during the school supply sales.

We had scrapbook paper, Mod Podge (with glitter mixed in with it -- the girls LOVE glitter!), scissors, and foam brushes, and let the girls create their own masterpieces. Some tore bits of paper, some cut shapes out... each had their own unique, darling creation. I wish I had taken a picture of each of the finished journals, because they were great!

We left the journal-making table up the whole time so that they could go over and put another layer of Mod Podge on it whenever they wanted to.

After they worked on their journals for a bit, we had hamburgers on the grill (this is where Bob came in to the schedule). After dinner, we had three 20 minute workshops on Personal Progress Value Experiences. My two advisors and I had each prepared a workshop in which we taught and discussed a different Value Experience. We made sure they were ones that the girls hadn't already finished. We even gave them journal-writing time so that they could have those three Value Experiences completed.

working on passing off a value experience

After the workshops, we moved on to another craft. We made Value bracelets with beads in all the colors of the values. Bob had made a little charm for each of the girls to put on their bracelets. The charm has the word "Shine" and also "2012" on it. Shine refers to the YW/YM theme this year: Arise and shine forth....

working on their bracelets

I should have noticed all of the Dr. Pepper being consumed in the above photo... then I might have had an idea of how late the girls would be up... (Note to self: next time, hide the Dr. Pepper)

Bob helping with terminating
the ends of the bracelet

While the girls were working on their bracelets, we (the advisors and I) interviewed each of the girls to update our records as far as what they have achieved in their Personal Progress.

When we were done with the bracelets, we moved on to a "Getting to Know You Game" that Jeanne (one of the advisors) had prepared for the girls to play. It was sort of like speed dating, but more like speed friends... with questions for the girls to be able to get to know each other.

After the game, we all got together and had a devotional on Friendship, which was given by the other advisor, Courtney. Perfect ending to a fun evening. It really wasn't the end of the evening for the girls. They had a lot more energy and wakefulness to work off.

The night was just beginning for them. They stayed up til somewhere in the 4:00 hour. Oh to be young.

The next morning, we had breakfast, and then gathered for a Personal Progress Devotional given by the bishop. I have a few strings I can pull with him, since I'm married to him. :) He said just the right things to help motivate the girls and also to help them recognize how important Personal Progress is and should be in their lives.

We went on a walk together around the loop and soaked up all of the fall colors and the crisp, cool air. It was perfect!

It was a fun overnight with the girls that had a lot of of substance in addition to the fun. We packed in as much as we could in the schedule. I think it might be fun to make it a tradition every year!