Mini Maira

I came across a cute idea when I was reading one of the blogs I follow: hand-drawn paper dolls customized to look like your daughter. It's called Mini Me and if you don't want to pay for shipping, Hannah, the woman behind the business, will email you the paper dolls in PDF and you can print them off yourself on cardstock. So, you just give her your daughter's name, hair colour, hair style, eye colour and skin colour, and you can add glasses and/or freckles as well, and then you can also choose from a few different lines of clothing. I got a line of regular spring clothes as well as a line of fairy tale costumes. Maira loves them and I do too, they're just so cute!

Maira already has an old-fashioned paper doll set that I keep up high and let her play with once in a while and she loves it but she really struggles with the tabs. So, on these ones, I just cut the tabs off, laminated the doll and the clothes and put sticky velcro on them to make it easier for her to use them. I also printed off a second doll so they can play together.

Bad Dog

Howie likes taking food off the table when we're not looking. We've known that for a while and so we've been trying to teach him not to and we try and remember to keep food away from the edge of the table, out of reach. But yesterday, Jess decided to set up a surveillance camera and watch what Howie would do if he left some food in the middle of the table and then left Howie all alone...

Apparently all he's learned is to wait until we're gone to eat off the table.

A Couple of Quilts

So, I finally finished Connor's quilt a couple of months ago but I'm a little disappointed with how it turned out. You can't really tell in this photo but the strips in the middle would not line up in a straight line, no matter how much pulling and muttering/mild cursing I did. So, instead of starting over (which I never do), I just sewed it together with crooked lines and a few bunches in the fabric here and there. What was supposed to be a simple quick quilt ended up taking way longer than I thought. Oh well, I learned a few lessons along the way and after a bit of a break from that pattern, I'm ready to go ahead and make a matching quilt for Hudson which will hopefully turn out much better.

Howie's favourite place to sleep is snuggled up close to Connor.

And here's another quilt I just finished (finally - I've been working on it for about 6 months). It's a Yellow Brick Road pattern with a kit of fabrics I bought at Earthly Goods. I really love it, it makes me happy every time I see it. Even Jess likes it (he's never complimented one of my quilts before!), especially because it's long enough to cover his feet when he uses it for a nap on the couch!

And since Hudson was hanging around while I was taking this picture, I thought, what better way to cuten up a shot of my quilt than to add a cute baby?

Sorry, it was my fault

I washed my kids' snowsuits and put away their winter boots so today's snowstorm was obviously my fault. Here's the view from my kitchen window this afternoon:

Yes, that's Connor's soccer net where just a few days ago he was out practising his soccer moves.

Here is a picture of a few of the crafty things I've been up to lately. There are other things, I just have to get around to taking pictures of them. A good friend is expecting triplets next month, 2 girls and a boy, so I made her some blankets, hats and booties. The hats came out awfully small, it's hard to believe a baby's head could be that small but we'll see.

Well, in another hour, I'm off to the first of my 3 mother's day spas I get to enjoy this week. Shae's activity days girls are bringing their mothers tonight and they're going to do our nails, and there may be a massage in there somewhere too. Then on Thursday, I'm invited to Maira's playschool class for a mother's day party and then Thursday evening, I'm invited to the kindergarten class's "Extreme Mom Makeover" where Connor is apparently going to be doing my nails, hair and makeup and giving me a fancy schmancy massage too.

Mom's Little Helper

Just a cute movie of Hudson helping me empty the dishwasher (sometimes I feel like that's all I do these days...)

Happy Easter!

Jess has been travelling to southern Alberta a lot over the past few months because his main (OK, only) client is the University of Lethbridge. Since it was spring break for the kids last week, we decided to join him on his southern trek and visit with Grammy Rose, Grandpa Ron and Uncle Paul (and Bella). We got to see Aunt Jayna and Uncle Travis too, so that was great.

While in Raymond, since it was the week before Easter, we decorated a bunch of eggs and then, as per McMullin family tradition, we drove out to the coulees just out of town, climbed up to the top of one without cows grazing on it, and threw the eggs down the hill. And tried not to get blown off the hill while doing it! It seemed extra windy that day.

When we got home (after enduring the torture of a 5 1/2 hour drive with a 15-month old who HATES being strapped into his carseat for longer than 20 minutes), we celebrated Easter with a low-key Easter egg hunt in the backyard and by listening to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and some excellent General Conference talks. The Easter Bunny doesn't visit our home (Maira was asked at playschool today if a big bunny came to her house and brought her candy and she looked at that lady like she was crazy!) For me, I just find it detracts too much from the true reason for celebrating Easter to make a big production of getting candy and toys from the Easter Bunny. But at the same time, those things are part of our culture and I don't want our kids to feel excluded so we still have some candy and games but the kids know full well that it's me and Jess giving them the candy. That's what works for us anyways.

Here's the backyard Easter egg hung (a big deal to have it outside instead of in the living room since our backyard is usually still pretty snowy at Easter).

And here are the kids in their Easter outfits that I sewed for them. For some reason, I feel compelled every Easter to sew them something new. I guess it's because my Grandma White used to sew me and my sister a new dress every Easter and mail it to us all the way from Spokane (to Ottawa) and it helped me feel connected to her then so I guess it helps me feel connected to her now too... Anyways, I didn't sew the entire outfits, just the boys' ties and the girls' skirts! And of course, Jess took the pictures.

We had a lovely Easter and I am so grateful for the reason we celebrate Easter: the Resurrection and Atonement of my Saviour.

Our newest baby (??)

Well, we've done it, we decided to adopt a dog. After years and years of persistent begging, Shae finally has gotten her wish. Our new dog is a schnoodle (I'd never heard of the breed before, it's a schnauzer/poodle cross) and he's 4 1/2 and his name is Howie. His current owner's fiance is allergic to Howie and so even though she loves him (the dog) to pieces, she love her fiance more and is giving Howie away. Her wedding isn't until May so we're just going have Howie over for a few sleepovers here and there until the end of April when he'll come live with us for good. Here are some pictures of our cute little dog:

And, here is some spring cleaning from my camera - when I was uploading the pictures of the dog, I found these pictures that are a little old but still worth posting:

And finally, this is a video of Maira singing "Santa Claus is Coming to Town". She sang it constantly all through the Christmas season and she does a pretty cute rendition of it so I thought I'd videotape it so I could put it on my blog...but then I forgot and it never made it up here at Christmas time so here it is, better late than never!