Sewing With My Grandkids

Hanging out with my grandkids is a most delightful time!

Every time we go to visit our grandchildren the time with them is super special. I really never knew having grandchildren was going to be this amazing! Each visit I make I find it to be a surprise-- I never know what will be the project of the day or the play of the night but in the end we had great fun. 

When we head over for a visit the car is packed with items relating to the last visit. One time when we arrived my granddaughter Fiona has an armful of "injured" stuffed animals that she and Luke told me desperately needed help--could I ple--eeze sew them! That night we worked with the supplies they had but when I got home I put together an "animal hospital" sewing kit. My"animal hospital" sewing kit has a variety of thread colors in it, a small pair of scissors, a needle threader and such. Now in the past when we visit this had become an absolute "must pack" item! Fo the longest time in fact I packed the car with this at the top of the list. 

Once when my darling granddaughter called me on Skype she had a "special request". Could I possibly make a special doll she had in mind? This child has some amazing character traits. Her story telling capabilities are very in depth, details are her forte. I worked on Christina for a long time.(I'm going to save that story for another day).

Christmas was just days away when we arrived. With it being just 4 days before Christmas our thoughts were on many things... 

• Did I send out of town gifts, give local gifts and remember to pack the gifts for family we are visiting?
• Did I bring extra wrapping paper, bags, ribbon and tape?
• Did I pack our Christmas Cards and the list, stamps etc?
• Did I bring the address and phone info for theAirBnB hosts?
• Did I clear out the refrigerator?
• Is our dog, his cage, toys, food, supplements info for dog sitters etc packed?
• Did I remember our supplements, first aid kit...oh and MY pillow?
• Did I bring written contact info (sometimes there is no wifi)?
• Did we pre-contact and set appointments for business partners and friends?

I wish we could say I forgot nothing but unfortunately that was not the case. Every visit we learn  of another "staple" not to be forgotten item.   Some items that were needed have now been replaced with other items. The kids now had there own sewing kits, they had developed an interest in creating sewn items. Last year the oldest sewed pillows as gifts for friends, her brother helped. My contribution...I brought my sewing machine and basic knowledge. The gifts were a great success.  This year as we unloaded the big blue truck the first question out of grandson Luke's mouth...Did you bring your sewing machine? What?! H-mmm. Oh dear!  

Apparently Luke had ideas and it included creating stuff on the sewing machine! So-ooo we now needed to design an alternate plan. It turned out to be a great plan. 

I had suggested we make things from fabric around the home, things no longer being used for the original purpose- like socks. I showed him a Pinterest board that repurposed socks in various ways. That was inspiration enough.

I had suggested we follow directions from one of the projects but Luke had a better idea...Excitedly he declared "I want to make a toy for Chip." Chip is our now 1 year old Border Collie. We got this guy last year right after Christmas. In fact we were just driving home from visiting this family when I saw the ad. One call, a quick early morning drive and we brought Chip home right then.

Backstory: We had a beautiful Border Collie, "Oreo" for 15 years. We got him right after moving to Utah. Oreo had been named by our oldest grandson Tyler. He had died in 2017 and it took us a while before we were ready for another pet but when we decided, granddaughter Fiona had asked to be able to name him. 

Ok, back to Lukes sock "stuffie"... Luke wanted the toy to be for Chip and also he wanted it to look like Chip. Here is Luke working on it, his finished results with Chip and his toy.

PI DAY another reason to blog!

Do you love Blogging? 

Since I was first introduced to the worldwide web one of my favorite things has been learning and sharing. It may have been about my creative interests or business life-most often I find that the things I want to share combining what I am learning... Spiritual path, business focus, art, ideas to begin anew, Life. Often right in the middle of developing an idea I am interrupted and dang! I lose my train of thought or it may take an entirely different direction.  Pinterest helps me to quickly capture ideas, recipes, sites to go back to and more. Recently I noticed that Pinterest has a widget creator!  I was just in the middle of creating a "Things I'm Researching" board when I noticed this so I decided to try it out an see if it could be a helpful tool. So far I don't get it... Moving on...

DID YOU KNOW TODAY IS NATIONAL PI DAY? 

Tea Time With The Grandkids

It was our first visit since the birth of little brother Leo Alexander so we were catching up, celebrating birthday parties (Luke's 6th on March 23rd had just passed and Fiona's 10th April 4th had also just passed) and generally just enjoying time together. We planned our very first tea party ever. Fiona, Luke, Grandma Ferrier and Grandpa Ferrier held the tea party at the apartment in San Jose, Ca. Grandma interviewed the children to get ideas of what would be the perfect foods to serve, what kinds of teas to plan for and of course what theme to use. Luke asked for Honey Water Tea, sharing that he loved cinnamon buns and chocolate and Fiona said she adored Pomegranate tea and her favorites for a tea party would be cookies and chocolate. Grandma and Grandpa found a teapot and small cups at World Market and some Lacey cookies. The local Safeway had fresh strawberries, blackberries, Cinnamon Buns and some Salted Caramel cookies. Then we found some savory snacks at Trader Joe's; our newest favorite cheese, Cambozola along with some Rosemary crackers and Trader Joe's Pretzel Slims and some Agave Nectar. A visit to the local dollar store was perfect to set the table with square shaped floral plates with matching napkins and clever egg shaped toothpicks for the fresh fruit bites. Luke helped set the table and prepare the fruit bites while the tea was brewing. It turned out to be a wonderful tea party!

As we enjoyed our tea and munched the delicious sweet and savory foods we talked about our plans for the next tea party and the excitement of getting to come to grandmas house! I am so very delighted to enjoy this time with my grandkids and cannot wait to have them come to my house too! 

Summertime Flurries

Deer in my backyard

Can you see the dragonfly?

Happy Birthday Grand Nephew

Happy Birthday Grand Nephews!

Breakfast ~ Overnighter

This summer has been a flurry of activity! Looking over my calendar we've had events at nearly every weekend. A recent overnighter with my WOW ladies was a blast. My dear friend Melanie D and I planned it together. Last minute adjustments to our plan came up of course and as often happens God works out all the bumps :) Melanie D taught our ladies how to make fabric flowers created from her fabric stash. We used our Sizzix Big Shot and Stampin Up Bigs Die "Fun Flowers". The variety and creativity was simply amazing!

We also made some Journals and our resident Graphics Designer Carol G created the design for our covers. The rest was done with designer papers, the Cinch was used to bind our creations. Our devotional time gave inspiration and refreshment...the topic... Abiding in Him. The journals turned out to be the perfect thing to write down what God spoke to us over the weekend.  

Sandwiched in between birthdays, visits from friends, and memorial celebrations and last goodbyes the days of summer are slowly slipping by <sigh>. With all the celebrating it has given me lots of opportunity to be creative since I delight in personalizing the cards and gifts I prepare.


I thought I would show you a few of the fun things I have made while hanging out down in my craft room. {Like the potato chip commercial I just can't seem to  make just one of anything, ha-ha.}

An ATC for SassyRose on Swap_bot

Vintage Themed ATC

Vintage ATC

Christs Miracles ATC Swap on Swap-bot

Finally, I'll be getting to hang out with my sons, grandkids, and daughters...yippie! I am excited to see everyone, I love to spend time with my family. Yes.... Arizona is always sizzling hot but as they say, its a dry heat!