Summer Days

These lazy summer days are going by way to fast!  Okay, so ours aren't really lazy.  We've just finished up artificial inseminating 50+ head of cattle, transferred roughly 25 embryos into our recipient cows, I ultra sounded 20+ head of cattle, and have had 66 calves born thus far.

Both kiddos are in the preschool summer school program and are having a blast.  Yesterday they "visited" Italy on their train tour of Europe.  It's exciting to hear what they learn and eat at each stop.  The teachers joke that they are "eating their way through Europe" as at each "stop" they make a food from that place.  In Wales they had welsh cake, in Italy pasta, etc.

Since Aslyn is going much more regularly now, I made her  a lunchbox just like her brothers.  Instead of trains, I used a couple of the Puppy Park prints I had won at Sewing Summit last year, as well as pieces from my stash.

Finished these kitchen towels from Patchwork, Please! 

Well, I'm off to chaufer kids to school!  Have a happy Thursday!

Randomn Thursday

School is out for the summer.  The preschool that my kiddos go to have two summer programs and every year we enroll them in that.  This year's June summer program theme is "A Train Tour through Europe."  So that starts up on Monday.  It would be fantastic to actually get to do it don't you think?

 

 

 

 

A few more little random projects I sewed.  This tote bag from Zakka Style. 

And I am working on this quilt from Sunday Morning Quilts.  I still have the right side to piece together. When this top is done, it will be number 3 in my basting pile; I think in the next week or so I'll be doing quite a bit of basting and quilting.

 

Saturday plans consist of putting this little garden together in my courtyard.  I know, it's hard to read due to it be a scan from a piece of notebook paper.  But you get the idea.

 

 

 

 Linking up to: Live  a Colorful Life

 

 

 

 



Randomness

Hi!  Are you all getting ready for the long weekend?  We have cattle work to do on our end here, so there will be that and sewing!

Today is my kiddo's preschool graduation.  Logan is officially going to be in Kindergarten.  Little Pea is so small that even the smallest robe swam on her!  So, it got sent home with me to do a lot of hemming!

 

 

Other than that, I've just been sewing a few random things here and there.  Just whatever strikes me to sew at the time.

 

 

Another one of Ayumi's lunch boxes.  These are so easy and quick to make.  You might remember I made two of them for the preschool teachers.  I had one of those mini charm packs of Vintage Modern and some Essex Linen.  The handles and inside cover are a piece of a small hounds tooth, aqua print I had lying around.  I don't know the maker/manufacturer - sorry.

 

  

 

Another little project I threw together, just because.  I wanted to make a journal cover; so, I took some of my batiks I had leftover from this project, and put one together.

 

 

 



Oh, and recently I received a sewing machine from a woman cleaning out her sewing room.  Mine has been acting up a bit, so it will be nice to have a spare.  I haven't tried it out yet, perhaps that will be a good weekend project.

Have a safe and restful Memorial weekend!

May Goal - Lovely Year of Finishes

Another month already!  My Lovely Year of Finishes goal for the month of May is to embroider all the names on the community quilt my kid's preschool made. 

There are still blocks lingering at the school that haven't been completed yet, but I think I have a good amount to keep me busy!

 

A couple of the students asked if they could embroider their own names, so once I figure out a few good stitches, I will teach those students and let them go!

Happy Holidays!

I hope everyone is having a wonderful holiday with their loved ones.

 

 



Do you believe this tree?  It's not ours, it is my son's preschool teacher's tree in their home (his teachers are a mother/daughter team.)  My picture does not do it justice; and no matter what I did or how I positioned myself, I couldn't fit the whole tree in.  Their ornament collection in itself is just amazing.  Many purchased while they were living in Germany, many made from preschool students or while they were growing up, many of homemade ones from past family.

Speaking of teachers - here is how their lunch bags turned out. 

 

 

I am rather pleased with them.  Any more sewing for you?  Or are you all resting up, getting ready for a new year?







16th WIP of 2012

Hey all!  It's dark and gray with a snow storm swirling in right now.  How's that holiday sewing coming along?

I decided to make Logan's teachers some lunch bags for this Christmas.  The fabric is La Femme by Melissa Crowley that I won from the Zakka Sew Along.  It's so pretty!  A few pieces of my stash make these bags up as well.  Most of you will recognize the layout as Ayumill's tutorial. 

Remember that community project for Logan's school I spoke about.  I am making a quilt with the kids; each kid is making a block of their hand and I will sew them all together and quilt it.

Here are the one's who have finished their blocks.  Aren't they coming along nicely?  Some of the kids are really getting into sewing, so I have had several parents approach me with questions on what materials to buy and encouraging their child in this interest.

Notice Logan's block isn't in there. 

Now for that triangle quilt that I started way back when.  This is where I am at now.  I don't know.  This is for a little special someone, but admittedly I am losing momentum on it.  I am trying so hard to power through.

Check out other work-in-progress projects over at Freshly Pieced.

Community Quilt

Logan's preschool has a program called "Community Elder."  Basically, someone from the community comes in and teaches or talks to the class about something.  There have been lots of music, paper making from recycled egg cartons and paper tubes, as well as potion making (for Halloween.)

Yesterday was "part 1" of my community elder project.  My job is to teach the kids how a quilt is made.  The idea is to have each kid sew a block and then I quilt it for the school.

These are some of the fabrics I chose to use.  Silly me, I didn't take a picture of all of the fabric before I set the kids on them!  The reds were the first to go.

My example block.  In my haste (I decided to do an example block right before I was to leave to teach the class) I used my sewing machine to go around my hand - the kids are all hand stitching theirs on.

Each child wrote his name on his block; I think I'm going to embroider the names.  One little girl was so excited about this project - I'm sure if I showed her how, she could probably embroider her own name.

They are all doing such a great job on their blocks!  In fact, Logan's teachers told me that instead of resting at rest time, all the kids were sitting around stitching away!

Parent Appreciation Tea

Mother's Day is just around the corner, which means that today was the Parent's Appreciation Tea (a.k.a Mother's Day Tea -  they changed the name for those students who have single parents) that my son's preschool puts on. 

The kids make the food themselves and  a little gift for their parent.  This year's gift was a bouquet of silk flowers.  Logan chose yellow and white for me.

Each child gives their parent a menu, we circle what we want, the kids go and put our plates and tea together and then serve us.  It is meant for us Moms  parents to relax, socialize and let someone else take care of us for a change.

When the parent's are served, then the child brings their own plate and picnics beside us.  A beautiful day with my cuties.

2012 Preschool Field Trip

Well, I said I would post a little bit  about the field trip we had out here at Lone Mountain Ranch.  As I mentioned last year, my son's preschool and us decided to make this field trip an annual event.

We were told that this years field trip topped 2011's.  Most of everything was similar, first a walking tour of the shop, working facility, observatory, and the old jail out here. 

Then onto a hay ride where we drove the kids to the hay barn, calving barn and up to the bull pens.  However, this year we had a newly born calf that the kids got to pet, Logan not only led his horse Rocket around for everyone to see, this time (with the parent's permission) Logan led Rocket around with his classmates taking turns riding him.  Instead of pouring grain out of the grain truck into a bucket for them to see, we let them climb the ladder to the grain trailer and peek inside (20 tons of grain!) 

Another new addition this year, we actually made it out to the farm portion of the ranch. 

Unfortunatley, this is the only photo I got!  You can view more of last year's field trip here.

It had snowed a few days before the field trip, but luckily the New Mexico sun dried everything up just in time!

Now, how to outdo 2013?!

Settling Down...For Now

Well, we survived!  The past week was hectic and fun all at the same time. 

Our cousin, Rudy, flew in on Tuesday for a couple of weeks to work out here on the ranch.  Meanwhile we had 7 inches of snow and lost power.

My garden

Thursday we had Logan's preschool out here for their annual field trip.  I made treats for the class again.  This time they were hay bails.  My plan was to tie licorice around to look like bailing twine, but it didn't quite work out as planned.  (I'll have more on the field trip in another post.)

Parent/Teacher conference on Friday.  Then it was off to one of Logan's classmates houses on Saturday to dye Easter eggs. 

Easter Sunday was nice and relaxing.  Rudy and I went horseback riding together, I got a few more granny square blocks done and replaced a zipper on one of Rudy's pants (my first time replacing a zipper.) 

Today it is back to our usual daily grind.  How was everyone elses weeks?

Happy Halloween!

A week of costume and trick-or-treat bag making, and still my sister - who came to visit - and I were up this Halloween morning putting the finishing touches on costumes.

As we were getting the costumes together, I wondered what did we do all week?  It seemed like we were working in every spare moment on it all and still we weren't done?  We went out Sunday, searching stores to purchase some pumpkins for my kiddos to carve; finally finding a few (and expensive) ones at the fourth store we drove by, a feed store close to home.  All the years before my little family has gone to the local pumpkin  patch, but somehow time got away from us this year and I realized while running errands on Sunday that we didn't have anything to carve into jack-o-lanterns.

My son's preschool party was at noon this year so we needed everything done by 11:15 am. I really think that if I didn't have my sister here visiting and willing to help with Halloween costumes, that I would not have had them done.

So thank you, thank you my little sis!!

I did get one out of two trick-or-treat bags done...

And my sister even made a Halloween dinner...

Mummys

And had Logan decorate cupcakes...

Spider cupcakes

Without further delay, this year, with a lot of duct tape, some bolts, felt, a sewing machine, cardboard boxes, paint - I present (drum roll please!)

A rancher in his John Deere Tractor and...
             

his little Wagyu calf.

Happy Halloween!!

Congrats!

Congratulations to the class of 2011!  Friday, May 27th was the last day of school here in New Mexico.  As always you could point out who the seniors graduating were just by looking at their cars.  All covered in shoe polish with some form of them being a senior written across the back window. 

And Cibola House Preschool joined in the festivities.  Although not every kid was moving on to kindergarten - Logan still has two more years of preschool - everyone still got to "graduate."

The graduates lining up.

Aw, my little boy and his pal, Emma.

Recital for parents.

The children put on a recital for us parents before receiving their diplomas.  The teachers and us were so thrilled that Logan joined in this time (read: holiday recital)  The recital consisted of all the children's favorite songs they sang throughout the year.  The first one being "Rainbow Train" followed by "Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah," "On Top of Spaghetti," and "Five Dinosaurs Riding in a Car."

The kids were called up one by one to receive their diplomas. After which each kid went to their parents and we all filtered into the kitchen area for cake, cookies, and lemonade.

Though I wasn't with some of the actual graduates all day like the teachers were; I have to admit that I got attached to a few of them.  It will be so sad knowing they won't be at the school next Fall.  Seriously, I don't know how these teachers let go every year.

Mother's Day Tea

For Mother's Day, Logan's preschool hosted a Mother's Day Tea Picnic.  Quilts were laid outside on the sidewalk for us Moms to sit on.  Each child was to bring his or her Mom a menu in which we circled the items we would like to have.

My menu


Yep, that's right, I circled everything!  Actually most of the mom's did.  Anyhow, Mom's were sent a memo earlier in the week stating that we were to do nothing, but sit back and have our child wait on us.  The children made everything on the menu themselves and had been practicing all week long being good waiters and waitresses.

We were to give our child our menu and they were to go inside and fix our plate and tea according to our menu choices and serve us. 

I gave Logan my menu....

Out came Eric with his Mom's plate....

Logan took this picture of Maizy getting her Mom ice tea....

And here is Logan, standing in the doorway watching and playing with his trains.  HEY!!!

He eventually got back on track and I received the plate I ordered plus another, then more ice tea.  Logan went in to get me a third plate (I never asked for the second) but I told him that he should come sit by me and eat too.  So he did.

Since I'm rarely without Aslyn on my hip, JP and I worked it out so that the tea would just be a special time for Logan and me.  Aslyn stayed at the ranch and ran molasses with her Dad.

Back to the tea.  I know I have mentioned before that there are donkeys who live right next door to the school, they roam around and get the fruit peelings (banana peels, orange rinds, etc) from the kids' lunchboxes. 

Well, the Mom and daughter donkeys (I forgot their names) came to join the picnic...

Daughter donkey - Logan took this picture.

Mom donkey - Logan took this picture too.

All of us Mom's ordering our tea



At the end of the tea picnic, each child presented their Mom with a potted plant as a gift.  I don't remember what the name of the plant is; I do remember that it is good for both sun and shade.

A gorgeous day and a wonderful time with my little boy!