Saturday with the Fergusons

I spent the first part of my Saturday with Keelie, Justin, Jonah, & Glory. They had come to the mall today so the kiddos could get out of the house and have some playtime. I love Jonah & Glory. I live vicariously through Keelie & Justin since I have no kids of my own. The best part...I get to play with and spoil them and then Keelie & Justin have to take them home. Hehe. ;-)

I met up with them as they were getting on the carousel. Keelie & I watched from the sidelines as Justin rode along with the kids. I'm not sure that Glory knew what to think about it all. Jonah loved it though and always had a smile on his face as they went past us.

After carousel time we headed to Barnes & Noble so the kids could play with the Thomas Train set. I think Glory may have enjoyed it more than Jonah. She was cracking herself up as she shoved the trains upside down into the bridges. She also tried to climb onto the table a few times as well. At one point I looked down and she had three trains in her little fists and the other kids at the table had none. She doesn't quite have sharing down yet. It was pretty funny. I know I shouldn't have laughed but I couldn't quite help it when Keelie told Jonah to go play some more and he looked at the train table of all girls and explained "But I don't like girls!"

After train time we headed to the food court. Jonah was apparently starving, and I was hungry as well. The kiddos and I enjoyed nuggets and fries. Glory has a bit of an appetite. She always wanted to be eating something. I guess it was only fair that if Jonah and I were eating she needed to as well. :-)

After food we headed to the play area outside Sears. Us girls left the boys there and we went to shop around Sears a bit. While Keelie was in the clothing room Glory and I did laps with the stroller around the store...she riding, me pushing. Hehe. If we kept moving she wouldn't want out so I kept doing figure-eights through the clothing racks. She thought this was pretty funny. Especially since I was talking to her the whole time and making noises. The other customers looked at me at bit funny. Oh well. :P

I was pretty tired by the time we parted ways, I shopped a bit, and headed home to clean. I must be getting old. Haha. I had a great Saturday with the Fergusons though. Love them!

Yum!

I love candy corn. I always have. Weird, I know. Growing up I was pretty excited when Halloween would roll around because I knew that meant candy corn. I don't really know why I love it, but I do. It's strange if ya think about it. It's just this oddly shaped, waxy candy. Why am I talking about candy corn you might ask? Well, the last two days at work I have been eating it. Our cafeteria sells candy and junk of that sort. One day I noticed that a friend of mine had bought the Deluxe Valentines Day Mix from downstairs and I thought it looked pretty interesting. It was a bright colored pink, red, and white mixture of candy inside the bag. I never buy the candy at work because it is ridiculously over-priced. $1.99 for a small bag of candy...I don't think so. The next day when I was downstairs buying lunch I saw the candy sitting by the register. It was peering at me. I resisted...for like half a second. Before you know it the cellophane bag of bright valentine colors had jumped into my arms and I was paying for it. That afternoon I opened up the bag and thought I'd try this assortment. I mean, hello, it was bound to be pretty tasty as it did have white, pink, and red candy corn in it. I thought I'd just eat a little and wrap it back up. Who was I kidding? This stuff was awesome. It was a mixture of chocolate Dutch mints, red raspberry hearts, milk chocolate hearts wrapped in bright red foil, raspberry jell hearts decorated in non-peril seeds, and cupid corn (aka candy corn). That bag of candy was gone in a flash. And so was the one I bought the next day. I know, I know. I have to stop. But it's awesome! I even googled candy corn. How crazy is that?! That's actually how I discovered the name of the delightful candy I was enjoying. It's a real mix. I thought it was just something work through together. Who knew?! lol. I was pretty intrigued with what Wikipedia had to say about candy corn. I had no idea it was created in the 1880's and that the three colors of the candy are used the mimic the appearance of North American corn. Very interesting. Plus nowadays it comes in different varieties depending on the holiday. Anyway, just thought I'd share. I highly recommend you check out the Deluxe Valentines Day Mix. I would not steer you wrong. ;-)

Baby Shower for Benjamin

Last Saturday was Beth's Baby Shower for Baby Benjamin, due in March. Her aunt Helen and sister Amber did a great job with the brown and green themed shower. The food and punch were very yummy and we played some really cute games. We played 'The Price Is Right' where you had to guess the prices of different items used for a baby, we each had to guess how many jelly beans were in the huge baby bottle, and we also played the game where you wear a clothespin and can't say the word 'baby' and if you do, the person that catches you gets your pin. It was a very fun baby shower and I'm pretty sure Benjamin will be set when he arrives.

Super cute diaper cake made by Aunt Helen.

Mommy-To-Be

Beth's nephew, Levi, provided some great entertainment as a pirate.

Emma was very cute being Cinderella.

Big Sister Emma did a great job helping her mom open the presents for Benjamin.

Happy 30th Keelie!

Today is my lifelong friend's birthday. I've known her since 1981, when God blessed me with making her my next door neighbor.

We surprised her on Saturday with a 30th birthday party. I was worried for two weeks that she'd find out about it. It was great to know she was genuinely surprised when pulling up the driveway on Saturday evening.

Shocked to see all her family and friends standing in the driveway.

with her hubby, Justin

buds

Glory had fun at her mommy's party.

30th cupcakes

Blowing out the candles, with help from son Jonah & nephew Brooks.

Keelie's nephew Mitch really enjoyed the cupcakes.

Looking through the scrapbook I made her of us through the years.

Love ya girlie! Welcome to the 30's!

My 1st Blogoversary‏

Today is my 1st Blogoversary. Yes, a year ago today I started Kristi's Thoughts. In the past year I have written 100 posts; some craft related, some about my cats, some about events, and still some about the random. I have enjoyed blogging world so far. I'd like to blog more often but my procrastination and life tend to get in the way.

Thank you to those of you who have followed along with me through this 1st year. I have no doubt that you sometimes wish the posts were shorter and there were less pictures, but lets face it, that's me. I write like I talk and yes, I'm pretty chatty.

Get ready for year 2. I have no idea what's in store for us, but I'm sure it'll be entertaining. Stay tuned!

Making Ornaments

As you know from previous posts, I did a lot of crafting during the holidays. And yes, I'm still talking about Christmas! ;) One of my more time consuming crafts was making these ornaments. Part of Red Writing's TWOC were homemade gifts. I got the idea to make these ornaments from one of Hobby Lobby's weekly adds. They had these class ornaments on sale for 40% off. I didn't know how to make ornaments but thought I could figure it out and make some cute gifts for a few friends. I did some googling and got a few ideas on what to do.

One of the ideas online was to make marble looking ornaments by pouring different color paint down the insides of the ornaments and turning it ever so often so the paint would swirl/marble together. At the end you turn the ornament upside down and let the remaining paint drain out, which also helps in the marbling.

I also painted the outsides of some ornaments. I'm a fan of polka dots so the two I painted the outsides of were adorned with these.

After the paint was dry, I hot-glued the tops onto the ornaments and then piled on the ribbon with hot glue as well.

I also personalized the outsides of the ornaments with names and dates, as well as used a little scrapbook bling around the sides.

The ornaments that I painted on the outside were also painted with Modge Podge once dry to prevent the paint from chipping off.

Show & Tell

So back in October I blogged about how I would display my Christmas cards during the Christmas season. This was part of Red Writing's TWOC - Accent Crafts #1. As you can tell below, I did my own version of what Better Homes & Gardens did (theirs obviously was better) and really enjoyed displaying my cards this way. After all, Christmas cards are one of my favorite things of the season.

BH&G's cards display

This is how mine looked with all the ribbon up and two cards. I just used all the various ribbon I had in my Christmas gift wrapping box.

I attached most of the ribbon by tying it, others I taped onto the inside of my cabinet door.

End result. I actually ran out of room and had to tape cards to the side, top, & bottom of the door.

I like my cards so much that I think I'll leave them up until the end of January...or even February! ;-)

Just another close-up. Toward the end of the season you could barely see the ribbon.

Red Writing's TWOC - #12 Tour of Homes

Yes, it's January 4th, but I'm just now wrapping up the TWOC. I got a bit behind but decided I MUST finish what I started. I also had high hopes of tidying up the apartment to show you more, but there is post Christmas stuff everywhere so you are seeing a few glimpses of the apartment, and some of my favorite pieces.

Meowy Christmas!

My Christmas tree. Notice the sign, "Dear Santa, Define Good."

Rashahn made me this advent calendar and gave it to me for Christmas. Totally fits my tree decor. Love it!

She also made me this great wooden sign. I told her at least a year ago that I loved this saying on stuff I see during the holidays. Thanks to the Cricut and her painting talents I got my sign! Oh, Robert did participate by putting the hooks on. Love this!

My counter is a mixture of items; nativity, little Christmas trees, frames, & my NOEL letters. My lighted garland hangs below.

Our stockings - Sylvest, Me, & Jax

I displayed my Christmas cards on my cabinet door and decorated the kitchen with holiday dish towels, and other Christmas accents.

Hehe.

Random stuff displayed on my entertainment center.

I like displaying ornaments in various bowls and trays.

More ornaments - the entire table was too bad to show. ;-)

Yay! I finished the TWOC.

NOEL

Okay, it's time to make good on one of my promises in Red Writing's Twelve Weeks of Christmas. Yes, I'm still talking about Christmas. ;-) I said I would make the NOEL letters I posted in week 7 (above) when we did Accent Crafts. I finally have completed them.

I started working on the letters the first weekend in December when I had a craft day in Houston with Deborah & Elizabeth.

I bought various Christmas scrapbook and tore it into random pieces.

I then Modge Podged them randomly onto the letters.

For all practical purposes they were complete, except that I wanted to paint the sides like they did in Better Homes & Gardens.

At first I was just going to paint the sides, tops, and insides and leave the back and bottom unpainted.

For some reason leaving the backs & bottoms undone bothered me and made me feel as though they were incomplete. So last night I painted the the rest.

Ta da! They are all done now. I haven't put up any Christmas decorations yet so I'm still enjoying them this season and they will be ready to go next year.