Valentine's Decorations part 2

So here is the heart garland Grayson and I made last night:



You can't really see it in the pictures, but Grayson colored on the paper before I cut it into hearts. That was his contribution :)

And here are some crocheted "chocolates" I made :) They look almost good enough to eat, don't you think?! I figured what's a good Valentine's Day without some chocolate?! And this way I don't eat them all.

Valentine's Decorations

I've been trying to make some cute Valentine's Day decorations -- I don't know about you, but I always feel like my house is so EMPTY after putting away the Christmas decorations. So here's what I came up with:

I made a bunch of crocheted balls in different sizes and colors, and put them all in this hurricane jar. But it needed something with it, so I made this cute little bunny, too :) I like her earrings :)
Close-up of the bunny. You can't really tell, but her nose is a heart, too.
I also made some felt-covered balls that I hung from my dining room light fixture. I got the idea from this blog: The Idea Room
I didn't buy enough felt to make three balls like I wanted to, so I cut the scraps into hearts and just pinned them to the third ball. Kinda retarded. But kinda cute :)
Gray and I are gonna make a construction-paper heart garland later on today. I'll post a picture here when we finish it :)
******OO, just found this GORGEOUS Valentine card wreath! I think I need it!! Now, how do I MAKE it.........hmmmmm........

If anyone's interested, I got it of this website here: WILLIAMS SONOMA
Anyone have any other ideas for cute decorations??

Giveaway

Awesome giveaway HERE!!! New giveaways every day Jan 25th - Jan 29th

Schooling Questions

***First, a disclaimer. This post is just my personal thoughts. It is not meant to be offensive to anyone else's opinions. If you comment, please respect my views as well. Be nice.***

Ok, I know Grayson isn't even 2 yet. But lately I've been thinking a lot about how to have him educated. There seems to be four options:
1. Public school
2. Charter school
3. Private school
4. Homeschool
I have been hearing so many horrible things about public schools lately, and the more I think about it, the more scared I get to send him to public school. It seems SO much worse than when I went to school!! I don't know much about charter schools -- they sound a lot like public school to me. Except Ogden Prep teaches in Spanish and English -- I like the idea of learning bilingually. Private school always seemed snooty to me, plus almost all of them are Catholic schools -- which I am not. So that leaves me with homeschooling. Which is WAY intimidating to me. But Steve and I have talked a lot about it, and he is very FOR homeschooling -- something about how on his mission, his mission president encouraged them all to homeschool, and he keeps bringing me quotes from general authorities that he interprets as pro-homeschool (though I know no one in the church has officially come out as pro-public school or pro-homeschool, just pro-good education). But it seems I can't count on public schools to give my child a good education. And the more I think about it, the better homeschool sounds. I can have complete control over what my child learns about (about creation, not Darwinism, for example), the environment he learns in (no swearing/immorality, and I could incorporate gospel principles in what we're learning -- seems like public schools can't teach about virtues/morals at ALL), I will be able to focus completely on him, and tailor lessons to suit his learning style. Plus we could do things that normal schools just can't do: we could have school at the park one day, or go on field trips to the places we're learning about: go to the dinosaur museum when we learn about dinosaurs, etc. And we could go at HIS pace -- I remember being SO bored in elementary school when we were doing reading -- because I was always 3-4 levels above the other kids, so I never felt like I LEARNED anything. I wouldn't have to worry about him missing things when he's sick. Et cetera!! I think I really may be leaning toward homeschooling him. We could enroll him in sports, music, other extracurricular activities, and he'll have friends from church -- so I think we could get the social interaction part -- which is really the only thing I'm worried about him missing out on with homeschool. And I think I'd just homeschool until Junior High or High School, so he'd still get that experience.
I just don't know if I can do it for sure. Does anyone have any thoughts about schooling options? What have you decided to do for your kids, and why??

It's a New Year!

Well, I've been a little lax on the blogging lately. Sorry. I just haven't had any new pictures, and I don't like to post without pictures. But I figured I'd just go ahead anyway. Here's what's been going on with us lately :)
We were sick for New Year's, so we stayed home, and it was like any other night. Nothing special. But I STILL can't believe it's already 2010. Here are my resolutions for this year: I've decided that this year, they should be a little more specific, and reasonable. So:
1. I'm going to walk 30-45 minutes a day, 6 days a week.
2. I will limit my meals to 17g of fat/meal, 1800 calories/day.
3. I will get my child out of the house every day for at least a 1/2 hr. (I have already broken this, and have since ammended this resolution to include "Except when the air outside is hazardous to one's health")
4. I will not restrict my child's activities just because it makes more work for ME, or annoys me. (So I will let him feed himself, fingerpaint on his paper AND his body, carry his toy animals all over the house, let him watch the "move it, move it" scene from Madagascar 30 times in a row, etc.) -- if it's not going to hurt anyone, or destroy something expensive, he can do it. I'm all about letting him explore and discover.

Steve went on another business trip, but this time it was just to Arizona, and just for a few days. I missed him. Gray missed him, which made me sad -- it's so sad to try to explain to an almost-2-year-old why his daddy isn't there when he asks for him. He'd go around the house looking for Steve, yelling "DAAAA! DADA!!" at the top of his lungs. Sad. But he is home now, and all is well again.

Steve's brother Jordan just got home from his mission in Ohio! Yay! Welcome home, Jordan! He is ready and raring to go for all those dates! So if you know someone that wants to go on a date with a cute, outgoing RM, pass on some info, and I'll hook them up :)


(Thanks for the pic, Kandis :) hehe)
On Saturday, Kandis and I threw a baby shower for Jessica -- and it was SO much fun! My camera battery ran out, so I didn't get any pictures. But it was so great to see everyone that came! And I'm so excited to meet little baby Gines! :) Here's the link to the baby website I was talking about: babysteals.com (it's a GREAT site for anyone looking for awesome baby stuff cheap -- they have a new "steal" every day starting at 9 am -- everything is at least 50% off) -- and their partner site is kidsteals.com (also wonderful -- same thing, just with kid stuff!) Also, I made a yummy salad that people wanted the recipe for, so here it is:
Wonton Salad:
1 head of iceberg lettuce, chopped
1 pack of wonton wrappers (wrappers? papers? whatever they're called)
4 green onions, chopped
browned sesame seeds (I don't know an actual measure, I just toss in a bunch -- I'm all about the eyeballing method)
almond slivers (ditto with these)

Toss all ingredients. Fry the wontons, and cut or crush them into smallish pieces -- toss these in right before serving, or they'll go soggy. Toss it all with the salad dressing below:

Salad Dressing:
4 tbsp. sugar
2 tsp. salt
1/2 c. salad oil
6 tbsp. white vinegar
Garlic salt to taste
1/2 tsp. pepper
2 tbsp. sesame oil

**you can make this Chicken Wonton Salad by adding chunks of grilled chicken, too -- it's really yummy and makes it more of a meal instead of a side


Other than those things, not much has been going on. January has thus far been full of sickness. Gray gets sick, then I get sick. Then Steve gets sick. Then Gray and I get sick at the same time. It's been relentless, and for some weird reason, it's always been worse on Sundays. Today we went to Jordan's homecoming, and it was the first time Gray and I have gone to church in a month. Horrible. People are gonna start thinking I've gone inactive. I promise I'll be back. Just saving the kids of the nursery from our germiness.

Here's one new pic I have -- my sweet boy playing with his bath toys he brought out of the tub after bath time. His hair is getting long. I kinda like it this way! :)


So there ya go. You haven't been missing much.