Fun!

So, wow.  How long has it been since my last post?  Gonna have to get a routine if I'm ever going to get on here regularly!

So, Halloween was just here and my dear daughter decided to be BatGirl.  Hmm, not exactly the princess she used to want to dress up as, but still fun and somewhat girly.  Let's just say I don't really do store bought costumes and decided to tackle yet another costume for her halloween trick or treating adventure!  I have been making them since she turned 3 (My mom made the two before that!), so it's going to become a tradition I think!

Motivation didn't really strike me until Sunday though when by then, all I had was the sweatshirt screenprinted and nothing else done!  Enter the marathon sewing and crafting experience that is most representative of my life!

Here is the final outfit.  Black pants she wore to school.  Hanes sweatshirt with screenprinted bat symbol.  Metallic gold cuffs and "boots".   Belt with handpainted wood symbol and black cape and hood sewn quickly with love!

Can  you tell she was happy to be in it and going trick or treating?

She's such a poser!  Hope you all had a great Halloween!

Lately

Hey there!  It's been a while since posting, so thought I need to get back into a routine.  I hope to post at least once a week (or more, maybe I will start finding some great crafty things to put on here!)  So what's been going on? 
Well, the Saturday before school started for my little girl, I had to take my little kitty boy to the vet for the dreaded visit.  I seriously put this off for so long because I love him so.  He had been diagnosed with liver disease in April and at that point the only thing we could do was have an ultrasound and possible biopsy to determine the cause of the liver not functioning properly.  The poor boy had already been through much as a young kitten and we decided not to further the stress on him.  I am still feeling guilty and grieving the loss of him in our household.  Thank goodness I have friends and family that understand how attached we get to our furbabies and that they really are part of our family.
My daughter started 1st grade this year and she's proving that it may be an interesting year.  On the THIRD day of school, I received a call from her teacher.  She wasn't really being disruptive, but I would call it being rude and disrespectful to her teacher.  Really, my child?  Ugh.  Well, as a former teacher, I was mortified that I had not prepared her better or something.  I realize that she has a mind of her own and she says school isn't fun, but wow, I never thought my child would be a "problem" at school.  I've been assured that it will get better, but I feel like utter failure!
Let's see...
Oh, my birthday!  Let's just say that my birthday was OK.  I loved that my mom and sister showed up a few days before and my sister got me the most awesome gift ever! (Warning:  This is probably only awesome for those of you who like to create or are artists or something)  I had told her that I really wanted one of those KID's (yes, I'm 35 and I look at kid's art kits all the time) screen printing kits from ToysRus.  So, while on the phone with her one day, she went there, saw them, proceeded to go to Hobby Lobby and got me the coolest screen printing kit for ADULTS!  Yay, I love it and I love her!  So they both came over and we experimented with screen printing for the first time.  I'm totally hooked.

Pictures on what we did are to come for sure.

My hubby on the other hand doesn't seem to put as much thought or effort into remembering things.  For years, I've asked him to make a cake on my birthday (since I do it for the rest of the family) and he still hasn't achieved that.  I'm not asking for a designer cake here, just a cake, with store bought frosting if necessary.  Really, is that asking too much?  OK, I know I'm hard on him and he did get me some nice things, but he didn't have to get me stuff, he could have just made the cake-anyone else here love cake? 

We also celebrated my parent's 40th wedding anniversary this month.  Wow is all I can say.  I've only been married for 12 years and am wondering how we will make it.  Congratualtions to them! 

I guess that's all. 
For my sister: I will try and get that darn tutorial up soon.  You can see, I need to be compelled to do these things....

Tata for now...

Friday-No different than any other day.

So, today I've been thinking.  I do a lot of thinking, not always a  lot of doing.  Anyway, I've been thinking lately about how my life seems to not be anything I thought it would be.  Too many times I hear, I need that, I want that, we HAVE to have this!  I feel like we could own everything in the world and still not be happy, especially if we aren't happy with who we are.  At least for me, that's true.

I'm trying to make a conscious effort to not have so much "stuff" and really focus on the real things we need in life.  I want to look back on my daughter's life and really know that I didn't miss as much as I think I do and gave her lots of fun memories.   I want her to remember spending time with her grandparents and how cool they are (because seriously, they are all so talented it's crazy).  It's funny, I was talking with my neighbor and she asked how my work at home job was working out.  I said it was still hard to find the right balance between work and family and to always seem to be making a choice whether it's work more or spend more time with family.  She said when her kids were younger, she made the decision not to work and her husband supported that, they may have went without things, but the important thing was that she was available as a mom when her kids needed her and they spent time together as a family.  I really think that thinking is what keeps coming back to me.  I get stressed out (seriously, I don't know how I made it through high school and college doing all the things I did and wasn't totally burnt out and stressed majorly, perhaps i have some weird hormonal imbalance now...) easily when I'm trying to complete something for work and have to stop to deal with stuff at home,  life shouldn't be this complicated.  REALLY, I feel like I've made it complicated for myself.

So, I've been thinking how to accomplish this?  I don't really know, but I know that I'll try as much as I can.  One day, maybe just one day, I'll figure it out and share it with the whole world, until then, I'll keep stumbling along.
 Most bloggers have such smart and witty things to say, well, if you do, please comment and I'll read it.  I need to start looking up verses and things that make sense to share and hopefully it will not only help me, but also others reading this. 

Oh, and the tutorial, still yet to come.  See what I mean?  Lots of thinking, need to do more doing from my thinking! 

A Typical Night at my house

Well, perhaps some one wonders why I titled my blog, Finding My Island. 

I often joke about needing to go away, by myself, to my own little island before I literally go crazy.  Here's a little example of why I say this....

Last night I was woken up by our daughter.  She was not really speaking in anything audible besides asking me to sleep in her room with her.  I will typically do this for a few minutes, then sneak out of her bed.  Well, I'm pretty much blind without my glasses but I can navigate to her room from mine, so I didn't put these on.

I'm standing in her room trying to get her to get in her bed and she starts screaming.  Really?  What time is it?  Geez Louise.  Okay, calm down I say, she's pointing to where I'm standing and I'm like, what, what do you see?  Evidently I stepped right in the cat vomit on the floor-NICE.

So I got her in bed, went and hobble back to my bathroom where I washed my foot, grabbed some cleaner and paper towels.  (At this point I put my glasses on, you never know if there is more than one spot with my cats).  Yep, two spots. Ugh.

So, back to bed at 1:13 in the morning and now I'm wide awake.  Really and people wonder why I want to go away, far far away....


The good news?  It's Friday and I don't have to work on Monday or Tuesday!  Yay! 

BTW- I'm hoping to post a create tutorial today or tomorrow, but I do tend to find other things that keep me from doing this! 

Oh, and one may wonder where the sweet child's father is-he was sleeping.....NICE isn't it?

Okay, I finally did it!

For years, my sister has been telling me that I need to write all the stuff down that happens in my family, whether good or bad, as a way to help me get through the good times and the bad.  So, after the long stalling attempt, I decided what the heck, let's try it and see what happens.  I can't guarantee that it will encompass anything of substance, but I'm sure it will be fun as we go along the way! 

I hope to incorporate my interests in this blog as well, with hopefully fun tutorials and anything else that interests me and hopefully some of my followers!