"How High?"

For those of you who may not know, our 3 year old son was diagnosed with Autism at the beginning of January. You can read more about him and his development on our family blog.

A few days after Alexander's appointment at Marcus Autism Center I found and joined a website called MyAutismTeam.com. Everything is still pretty new but I'm really glad I found that site. Alexander is an anomaly in many ways but it's so nice to connect with other parents who can mostly relate to my current circumstances, whether emotionally or in the technical aspects. Right now I'm more focused on the practical parts. Because in fact, I find that my biggest anxiety-causer isn't Alexander at all; it's the red-tape. We want to get our little man all the help and services we can, and that requires paperwork.

And it requires cold-calls, and doctors' consultations, and IEP meetings, and waiting on hold with the insurance company (again). And being rerouted to yet another person at the insurance company who has no idea what I'm talking about or "no authority to make that call," (again). It means waiting in line at DFCS and "willingly" handing the state information that I, frankly, wish they didn't have. It requires, over time, filling out 57 different forms for 11 different offices, some private and some tax-funded, all with that same information! (Those numbers are guesses but I promise I'm not trying to exaggerate.)

Bureaucracy is the bane of my existence and has been most of my adult life. I'm sure I'm not alone in that. Alexander's pediatrician at least seemed to agree with me. I commented to him the other day that I'm working toward a gold medal in "Hoop Jumping" for the 2012 Olympics. He paused briefly in his scribbling under yet another "To Be Filled Out Only By Child's Primary Care Physician" heading. He glanced at the mountain of case files on his desk. (Alexander is his 4th patient to be diagnosed with Autism this month.) Then he gave an exhausted attempt at a chuckle and said, "That's actually a good joke."

Pass me the snow shovel

I saw this saying hanging on someone's wall when I was a kid. I remember being amused but now I really get it. I actually think a snow shovel would be a handy piece of equipment to have when picking up around my house. So here's a printable, free as always. You can edit the frame part out if you don't like it and put it your own frame. 

Click. Save. 

Share.

Enjoy.

Homemade Peppermint Brown Sugar Scrub

Here we have another great Pinterest find:

Tip Junkie Compiled - 14 Easy Homemade Sugar Scrub Recipes

I pinned that honey of a link all the way back in October when I first started getting ready for Christmas. I knew it would make a great "neighbor gift." We recently picked up about six or seven #10 (60 oz) cans of brown sugar from my husband's parents when they were cleaning out their old food storage. The sugar is 'expired' and quite possibly not as good for eating anymore but when I found these recipes I knew they'd be perfect for a scrub. I ended up making sugar scrubs for Alexander's teachers (teacher, parapro, and speech therapist) and for all the ladies at church that I visit-teach (and one or two that I don't). 

All the recipes are essentially the same (sugar, oil, some kind of extract for scent) so I knew I could get away with tweaking and making my own. Corrie's Brown Sugar Body Scrub from Paula Deen's website seemed the nicest, I thought, and I even already had a bottle of Vitamin E to use. My first batch was actually for a bridal shower gift for our brand new sister-in-law and my ever-self-sacrificing hubby braved Hobby Lobby on his way home from work to pick up lavender and peppermint extracts so I could indulge in my homemade gifting plans.

Indulgence for the bride

As you can see, I did one lavender and one vanilla scrub for my bridal shower gift. Then for the rest (I wanted to go more Christmas-y) I went with peppermint. Since I was making so many, I played around with doubling, tripling and quadrupling the recipe and made a few batches over several days. Here's the general gist of my final "mass production" recipe.

4 cups brown sugar

2 cups olive oil

1 tablespoon vitamin E oil (I used Spring Valley Vitamin E Skin Oil from Walmart) 

15-30 drops essential oil (I used Crafty Bubbles Peppermint Essential Oil from Hobby Lobby)

2 tablespoons honey

Combine wet ingredients first (I kept forgetting to do that, but with a little extra mixing they turned out fine). Then add brown sugar and mix well. (When I encountered stubborn lumps of sugar, I just reached in which my hands and smushed 'em good.) Portion into containers and seal tops on tightly. Tie on tags with cutesy ribbon and distribute. :-) 

I used 16oz (2 cups) containers and this recipe only filled two of them. 2 cups is pretty big though so you could definitely go down to 8 oz (1 cup) containers and have a great little gift.

I don't seem to have any pictures of the final Peppermint Scrub product but here are some free printables of the tags I tied on them. 

Click. Save. Print.

Click. Save. Print.

I got the tag itself from the Holiday Recipe Collection over at Shabby Princess. The little blue section is where I put the "To-From" info. I printed the tags on cardstock and then flipped the page over and printed the instructions on the back before I cut them out. That way you've got a nice two-sided tag with everything you need. 


These scrubs would be great gifts any time of year. We've got Valentines day coming up, then Easter, Mother's day, and then it's practically Christmas again right? Just change out the peppermint oil for your recipient's favorite scent and you're golden. :-)

Sleep in Heavenly Peace

I've noticed in my life that there is something about the turning of a new year that somehow puts the kibosh on Christmas messages. Not that it's necessarily a conscious decision people make, just that the new year lends itself to 'life' starting again full tilt. The decorations come down, we go back to work and school, we make New Years' resolutions, our insurance deductibles reset - things like that. There's paper work to do and we have to do it (at least in my house). Also, I do think that for some people it IS a conscious decision because they are bored with Christmas music and other assorted aspects of the season. So I wanted to take a second to remember that Christmas was only a couple of weeks ago and we don't have to forget about it through the year: in fact, it's best that we don't forget.

I absolutely loved the First Presidency Christmas Devotional that the LDS Church broadcast about a month ago. The most memorable part for me was when they shared clips from the new Life of Jesus Christ: Bible Videos the church has commissioned. The videos and accompanying pictures are a free gift from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints to the world. You can download and share them as you see fit. (Which of course I looooove.) Anyway, my favorite shot from the clips was this one...

It's kind of hard to see it the picture, they show it better in the video, but Mary is sleeping next to the Baby on the straw. This touched me deeply when I saw the clip. Since I've had children I've always wondered a little when I look at Nativity scenes that Mary seems so fresh and is generally kneeling or even standing. I wonder because in my heart of hearts, I hope that the Mother of our Lord got rest soon after the Birth. (I also hope she was one of those people who have reeeally quick easy labors, not like myself.) I know after the birth of both of my sons, people told me over and over, "You sleep when the baby sleeps," and I've come to recognize that axiom as wisdom of the highest order. Of course I'm sure the Baby Jesus was the Perfect Baby, but He still had physical needs that His Mama would have to meet.

So that's why I love this video so much. It's a little thing, and maybe only I noticed it (although I very much doubt that). It shows the very real nature of the people involved. Mother and Child zonked out cold while Joseph guards them closely, a watchman for his brand-new family. I see so much more of my own family in this version and I treasure it dearly. So, if you haven't already, and even if you have, please watch and enjoy...

A Gift to the World

Mamas' gifts

This is the post where I got the idea for my mom's and mother-in-law's Christmas gifts. I liked the idea of the plaques and the book page backgrounds. Scrapbook paper ended up being the way to go for the backgrounds though because I couldn't decide on which book pages to use (words are a big deal for me)! The silhouettes themselves I cut out in vinyl with my Silhouette machine after using Photoshop to outline the people's faces. I did all of my mom's 6 kids and my mother-in-law's 6 kids. Would've done the grand-kids but there are just too many of those (and more on the way)! I forgot to take a picture of my mom's finished plaques but here are the ones we gave Kevin's mom Christmas day.

Both moms seemed to really like their gifts so of course I'm pretty proud of my little project. Stay tuned for more post-Christmas-surprise insights!

Pinterest 'wins' from Christmas!

Now that Christmas is over I can post about the stuff I wanted to keep a surprise! I went a little nuts this year on projects (what year don't I go nuts?) but I really enjoyed making the gifts for my family and friends. I think this Christmas may have been my favorite so far since I put so much focus on the giving part. Of course, the receiving part was great, too, and I'm going to post about that on our family blog sometime in the next few days for journaling purposes.

So, here's the beginning of a run down on the projects you missed while I was keeping secrets...

First: the T-Shirts

I found the ideas for almost all my projects on Pinterest. I did a whole bunch of shirts for people based on designs from there, but using iron-on transfers instead of the fancier methods. Iron-ons don't always look as nice but since I was doing so many, I wanted to use a method I'd done before. I completely forgot to take pictures of my actual finished T's so here are the inspiration photos (some from Pinterest, some from elsewhere) and some exported jpegs of the files I used.

For soon-to-be-born and new babies of family and friends:

For our nieces:

  For my brother in law:

For my siblings and our nephews:

Another nephew:

 

These two were for a couple of good friends of ours who we refer to as the boys' "Godfather"

and "Fairy Godmother."

I'm particularly proud of this last one because I came up with the concept and the phrase for the back of the shirt all by myself.

I bought the shirts at Hobby Lobby (link) and Walmart (couldn't find a link to the actual pack I got, but just go to the mens underwear section and they have good prices for undershirts that work well for doing iron-ons).

The shirts were just the beginning of our gifting endeavors this year. Stay tuned for more this week!

Merry Christmas!

Christmas-time

My camera has gone on a little vacation, and I can't post anything about the homemade gifts I'm giving for Christmas without ruining some surprises, anyway. (Although just about everything I'm doing can be found in the glorious mess that is my Christmas & Easter Pinterest page. If you find yourself at a loss for last minute homemade ideas, DEFINITELY check out that page!) Soooo...here is a revisiting of my best past projects that could be used for Christmas gifting or decor.

Original Post: Easter Design

Original Post: Irish Blessing Subway Art

Original Post: More Easter Time Art

Original Post: Put Your Photos on Canvas

Original Post: A pseudo-tutorial (ish)...thing (The Living Christ Frame)

Just one more week to go! I'm so excited for Christmas this year!

"...Laundry" Printables

I hadn't done a free printable in a while and I've had this idea rolling around in my head for months. So here you go. Two options. Laid out to be 8x10's. Print and frame and hang next to your washing machine. Wry smiles guaranteed. :-)

Click. Save. Print.

Click. Save. Print.

Calling all children's story authors!

Hey all! I hoped you've already checked out knowonder like I told you to a few weeks ago. If you haven't then pleeeease do so now! My sister and I both starting working for the magazine and have had stories published recently. My story was just posted today so go read it and let me know what you think! It's a little Halloween story called Wait Til Simon Comes. My sister's story was posted a couple of weeks ago and it's called Matchless Melanie.

The magazine can always use new authors. So spread the word and get working on your own material to submit. Go back and read the archived stories to get a feel for what we're looking for and then get writing! Can't wait to hear from you!