Mysterious Rash

A couple of weeks ago, Ellie woke up with this mysterious rash. It pretty much covered her entire body except her face. She had a few little spots the night before, but nothing like this.

I called the doctor and told them she had had a fever a few days earlier (which I attributed to being in the sun too much over the 4th of July weekend) and now she had this rash. I knew it wasn't chicken pox or anything like that, but I had never seen anything like this before in my life.

They got her right in and after looking her over, the dr said it was something viral and he had no idea where it came from or what it was for sure. He told me it would clear up on its own and if they started to itch, give her Benadryl. He also said to watch for signs of trouble breathing or high fever, but other than that, do nothing! I've never been to the dr before when they don't give you medicine whether you need it or not! Weird! Anyway, he was right...within two days the rash disappeared and she was back to normal!

Christmas in July!!

I went to walmart and thought I downloaded some new pictures off my camera. When I got home and loaded the CD, all they had done on it was the fourteen pics I had printed....UGH! So, until I go to town and redownload, I am posting pictures from Christmas that I just found and realized I hadn't posted. Chelsey bought this outfit for her birthday and looked so cute in the red that it went perfect with Christmas!

Braquel and Keven striking a pose. Keven's mom gave Braquel the new hat-aren't they cute in their matching beanies?

This is Treven at the Festival of Trees. He looks funny because he is blowing a kazoo! He lost a tooth right before the Festival and I didn't even know it until after he was all through.

For the past several years, Grandpa and Grandma Jones have spent the night on Christmas Eve so they can be there when the kids get up. The kids really look forward to this and start asking around Halloween if G and G Jones are coming for Christmas! Ellie helped grandpa open his stocking!

All of my brothers and sisters and nieces and nephews gather at my mom's house on Christmas Eve. We draw names earlier in the year and we exchange gifts then. We have done this since Brittney and Braquel were babies. It gives the kids a sneak peek into Christmas morning and they love it.

Lindsay and Mikayla have always been close. I think they even look alike in a lot of ways. They are both so good to pose when I ask them to.

Chelsey got some sort of electronic gizmo that records video and songs. I'm not really into anything technical so I'm not sure exactly what it is or what it does. I haven't seen her use it once yet.
Treven got a guitar from Santa. He loves to make up his own songs and he sings these songs for us all the time. He's so cute.

Ellie and Braquel posing on Christmas Eve. Ellie was so tired and ready for bed and totally unsure of what was going on around her!

Thanks for taking the time to celebrate Christmas in July with us!

Around my yard

Chelsey loves to use my camera and take photos of nature. Every time I download my memory card, I find several shots of the outdoors. The last time I downloaded, I found this shot of my petunias. I bought them from a fundraiser that Ivy did and I planted them in some small pots. We had a nasty freeze one night and I thought they were goners, but they came back and are HUGE now!

The flowers are in my front yard. They are so cool-they look like little stars and I have some red and some white ones. Gary's sister, Sheila sent them down to me. They are awesome to look at, but they take water constantly. I'm not so into high maintenance!

These are my favorite peonies. I have several peony plants throughout my yard, but these pretty soft pink ones are my favorite. Most of the others plants are bright pink ones. They are all done blooming now, but we sure enjoy them while they last.

My New Card Stacks

I ordered some new paper from Papertrey Ink and I just loved the bright colors. The pages only come in 8 x 8 form so I decided to make them into cards. I made 6 different cards using all of the same basic "things". Then I packaged them with envelopes and made a topper. They turned out really cute and now I have some fun little gifts to give on hand. They are all blank so they can be used for any occasion.

There's the first half- now on to the second half!

Hope you enjoyed my latest creation! I have two more sets in the works that I will show you soon! Have a great week!

Retreat Challenge #4

This is the page I made for this week's challenge. The challenge was to scrap about summertime and what it means to you. I've had these pictures from last year at Roaring Springs for a year so it was nice to have a reason to get them done! I swear I probably wouldn't get anything done if it weren't for the challenges!

Challenge #1 for the new Blog Hop

I've had a few responses to my blog hop idea and a few more people that are still deciding, but I'm going to go ahead and issue the first challenge.

"SEW MUCH FUN!"

This means that whatever project you choose to do, must have some sort of stitching on it. A few examples could be:

a hand-stitched sampler

a layout or card with stitching on it

a set of pillowcases

a new apron

a set of hairbows

I think you all get my point-the theme is so wide open it's almost scary!

Everyone needs to post their project on September 1st, 2010. Anyone that is still thinking about this, let me know so I can get your name on the blog hop list! Can't wait to see all the creative things everyone comes up with!

Summertime Fun

One way to beat the heat is to get wet! Ellie got this cute little pool for Easter and even though Treven was WAY too big for it, he got in there with her. He complained the whole time that he needed a pool his size, though! He told her these rings would keep her from going under, but mostly he had them wrapped around her neck instead of her arms!

I was filling the pool from the inside of the house so it would be warm for Ellie and I left the jug outside. Treven had more fun dumping water on his head than in the pool!

Treven is such a sweet big brother. He loves Ellie so much. He just keeps kissing her and loving on her. The funny thing is that she loves him so much right back. He can be sitting on the floor watching cartoons and she will come up behind him and just lay her head on him and give him loves! They are really fun to watch when they get together! I have to wonder if he is still willing to take all her spankings for her, though. She's getting to the age they will start happening!!!

Hillbilly Heaven

It's been fairly hot in Albion this past few weeks. Right behind our shop is a creek that runs pretty quickly in the spring, but it slows down a lot during the summer. It's the perfect place for a little boy to cool off.

The only problem is that Treven almost drowned on a field trip last year and he's been pretty scared of the water since. We've been working on it, but there is still some fear. When we went to Indian Hot Springs for the Jones Reunion, I bought him this float tube hoping that it would help. He now thinks he needs in 12 inches of creek water, though.

Apparently he needs his goggles and irrigation boots, too! What a sight this poor kid is! I don't know about anyone else, but I think it screams "HILLBILLY!"

Fabulous New Idea

Last night I couldn't sleep no matter what I did. I tossed and I turned and just couldn't catch any zzz's. So, I got up and started writing things down that were running through my mind and I got this idea. I want to start a small group of crafty women that would be willing to do a "Blog Hop" once a month. Here's how it would work. A month ahead of time, a challenge would be sent out to all of the ladies in the group. It would be a very generic challenge because I want to leave it wide open for interpretation. There would only be two rules- 1. you have to somewhat follow the challenge (it can be any craft, though-not just scrapbooking or cards. It can be a sewing project, home decor project, recipe card, anything crafty that fits the theme and 2. you must have your project posted on your blog by a specific date each month.

I will link to each ladies blog and people can see what each lady has come up with. I think it will be a lot of fun and a great way to get new ideas. If you are interested, call me, comment at the end of this post, or shoot me an email at miss_dani16@yahoo.com. I would love to have 8-10 ladies do this.

Chelsey's Room Makeover

My mom made Chelsey a magnet board last year for Christmas and Chelsey definitely gets her use out of it. She loves the Twilight series and I suppose is on Team Jacob. Her walls are panelled so I haven't let her paint hers. She keeps begging, but I know how much work it will be so I've been dragging me feet. We'll have to see.

Because she didn't have to buy paint out of her $100, she bought this beautiful mirror. She had her window open one night and the wind was blowing like crazy and knocked it off of her makeup desk. It broke in a ton of pieces and she was so downhearted...I feel terrible for her.

This is her new comforter set. I love the purple colors in the bedspread. She also bought a couple of throw pillows and a new hamper, too. All that's left for her room is curtains and an alarm clock! Maybe some sort of wall decorations if she will give up her poster space!!

Mikayla's Room Makeover

We've been working on Mikayla's new room this last month. She went from Braquel's salmon pink walls to all white. I gave her $100 and told her she had to make it go as far as she could (including the paint). She bought this comforter set for $40 and I think the paint ran around $30.

We bought a message board a few years ago at a family auction, but it had bold, bright colors on it. She didn't want to give up her board so we took off the neon flowers and put white and black fabric in the same spots. We also redid the flower magnets and tacks so they were all in black and white. We just have to get Gary to hang it up now!

Here is a bigger view of her bed. She bought some black picture frames that we need to do something with and I have a fun idea for some curtains that I'm going to try to get to in the next week or so. She also wants to do some sort of vinyl lettering with a saying on the wall. I will have to experiment with the Cricket and see if we can't figure out how to do that for her!

Some new cards

I originally made this card for my niece, Mackenzie, but since she just turned two, we decided that it was too "old" for her. Mikayla thinks it's unusable because I put the "M" on it, but I know several people whos names start with M so it will be ok!

I was making a scrapbook page for one of the 4 Girls and a Dream challenges and I had my Cricket out, so I decided to use some scraps from my layout to make a card. I cut "thanks" out with my cricket and used the flowers and patterned paper from my scrapbook pages.

4TH of July Camping Pictures

We decided to go camping Sunday and Monday of the 4th of July weekend. We got kind of a late start because we were hoping to go to Lake Cleveland, but it was still closed. We went to the Oakley Reservoir instead. There really wasn't anywhere to make camp, so we loaded the boat and took all of our stuff to a little island-type place. It was really cool because we were the only ones there and it was more of a beach than a regular camping area. There were no firepits so Keven used a kids sand shovel to dig one out and then he lined it with the river rock. It worked great!

Braquel took Ellie into the water. She is deathly afraid of any type of water except the bathtub, so we have been trying to slowly get her used to it. She did pretty well.

Treven and his friend, Carter, played in the water almost the whole time. From the time we got there, they were asking if they could swim. They had this tube tethered to a rock on the shore and one of them would push it out as far as it would go and then jump on. They would slowly drift back to shore and do it all over again. They had the most fun of all!

This is the view from our campsite. It was so beautiful! Hard to believe we weren't really at an oceanside resort!

This is about the only picture I got of Chelsey. She is so stingy with her pictures! Everytime she thinks I have the camera out, she runs and hides or she turns the other way. I really try hard to be sneaky and get some shots of her, but she is younger and faster! All I get is her hair as she turns her head!

Keven and Braquel came up for the weekend with us, too. Braquel's allergies were just killing her, but she said Keven had been wanting to go camping so they wanted to come. I felt really bad for her, but I think they had a good time anyway. Keven is usually pretty quiet around us, but he was very friendly and talked more than I've ever heard him talk before.

Mikayla didn't feel very good for most of our camping trip, but she did sit and build a sandcastle for a little while.

Treven stayed in the water most of the time, but I did catch him playing in the sand for awhile.

Ellie loved the feel of the sand on her toes. She had so much fun on the sand!

More 4th of July pics

Treven getting ready for the 4th of July parade in Albion. The sun was trying to decide if it wanted to stay in or out, but at this moment it was out and right in his eyes!

Our little firecracker. I found this little shirt at Target and had to get it for Ellie. A few minutes before the picture, her hair looked really cute. Now, it looks like she just crawled out of bed!

Every year at the park, Albion has a greased pole contest. It is only open to kids under 12 and it usually takes awhile for someone to claim the $100 bill attached to the top of the pole. The same kid won it for the last two years, but he turned 12 and couldn't try this year. It took most of the afternoon before someone finally won the money. Treven says the pole was way too slippery for him!