Christmas Wreaths, Baby Showers, Video-making, and Meg's Owl!

My cousin and I have a tradition of making a wreath for Festival of Trees. My wonderful sister in law Angie and niece Meg joined us this year and this is what we have so far. We are doing two this year because we had a lot of supplies.

This one will have a garland, some gifts, and some caroling minions with it too:) More pics to come. And go the the Festival of Festival of Trees if you can! It is so fun!

We are going to make some for ourselves next year:) Come join us! (Just shop 90% after Christmas and these wreaths come out to be about $10 each)

I got to help carry out my cousin's "Skype" baby shower. Here is what my Aunt Chrissy (whom I love dearly) and my 2nd Mom (also much beloved) came up with:) 

 Silver, pink, and white color scheme

 My 2nd Mom's AMAZING taco soup recipe

 Babies breath centerpieces with balloons up top

My cousins Alycia and Kyle Skyped the whole time (they are in Arizona and this is their first baby) and it was so much fun! We opened the presents in front of the camera:)

 Baby quotes all around

Pineapple sherbet with raspberries

With my Box Troll winnings I promised my Heavenly Father 

I would do good and help build up His kingdom. 

So...I began with buying a special computer that makes it possible for me to make something to contribute to the work....Family History videos.  My Man and I made one for the BYU Former Student Officer Society to Honor our Alumni Anne Snow-The Student Body Secretary from 1948. I was deeply touched by her example and influence and can't wait to begin my Grandparent's and Great-Grandparents life stories! (you can see the video here:) Anne Snow

I am also excited to make other videos for fun...here is my first(and rough) stop-motion video. 

I made it to apologize to My Man for my grumpiness on Saturday afternoon. (He LOVES the song the video is done too...so that made it more sentimental...as sentimental as a potato can be...haha...My Man is quick to forgive, which is such a blessing)

And Madsen and I made this one today while he is having a sleepover. He was so proud.

My niece made this entire thing all by herself!!!!!! Isn't she great!!!

Have a great week!

General Conference Creation

I mentioned in my last post how I am trying to "create" something to go with every talk from last General Conference to help me remember the words of our living prophets.

It is really helping me a lot (I consider my self very Dory-ish...aka...short memory)

Elder Nelson's talk was inspiring and how I love our Living Prophet! I know he is a prophet of God. I know that the Lord directs all he teaches. Here was my favorite parts of the talk which I created into a poster to help me remember. And here is his talk Elder Nelson Oct. 2014

Christopher's creations, toddler/mom tears, more Box Trolls, General Conference and another Birthday Halloween:)

This was quite a week around here. 

• My birthday was on Friday(Halloween) and My Man made it incredible. I got 2, yes TWO birthday dates. One on Wednesday, one on Thursday. The first was a lovely dinner to Olive Garden, the second was a marvelous replica of a date I cancelled on him 5 years ago that we never got to have. He created an entire picnic, took me to a park, and had invented the most fun game using clay, paper plates, watercolors, and poetry to remind us of what we love so much about each other. We watched the sunset as we ate chocolate pie in a park on possibly the last "warm-enough-to-picnic" day of the year.

It was heavenly. Pictures couldn't do it justice. 

• My Man made me this for my birthday from scratch! It isn't quite done but I am ever so impressed :)

• He made me this birthday cake too!! (it is a tradition that we always make each other a fun cake:)

• Sabrina and I created lots, and lots, and lots of tears this week....and let me emphasize the "I" in that sentence. Having two toddlers can be very overwhelming. However, despite the struggles this week, my sweet daughter helped me take some real good inventory of who I am and who I want to become as a mother and a disciple. My newest (and most complex) creative project is going to be finding out exactly what the Lord needs me to do to help my child who is bright, determined and talented.  I am excited to rely on Him more, and see what He has in store for us to create to help her.

• Sabrina and I took some much needed time for just the two of us and painted this together while listening to a conference talk (to help me unwind a bit:). She did all the leaves:)

• MamaT commented on our Box Troll post just a little bit back about making her own family of Box Trolls for Halloween. She and I corresponded a bit and look what she came up with!!!! Doesn't her family look amazing! Each of their characters match up with one from the show! Their family always coordinates their costumes. They.are.awesome.

• Almost my whole family came to our house for my birthday. It was wonderfully wonderful. My dad even wore a Halloween costume!!!!I love them...very, very, very much. 

General Conference Painting

• I am a very visual hands/on learner so I decided I am going to "create" something to help me remember each apostle's talk from this last General Conference. Here is my first creation. Elder Scott spoke of 4 Habits that I really want to work to develop well. Take a few minutes to listen to his wonderful talk here: Elder Scott's Talk on 4 Habits
  
  

• Some other fun things we made this week:

Bone Breadsticks

Name skeletons 

(all the ribs are our names, paper folded in half and cut out on the fold:) Got the idea from my Sister-in-law Tara :)