Etsy Shop. . . .READY. . . GO!!!

My Etsy shop is up and running!  There are only a handful of items up at the moment.  For now, I'm just selling some of my printable art.  I'm totally new to this, so it might take some time to get the hang of.  I'm excited!  My goal is to post at least one new piece a week.  With a household to run, a husband to make-out with, two munchkins to take care of, a dog to pooper-scoop after, and all the other stuff on my list, I think that's a pretty realistic goal.

Go ahead and take a peek at what's for sale over at Leslie's Love Prints:

http://www.etsy.com/shop/LeslieLovePrints

Oh, and to celebrate the new shop (and the new year), here's a free printable to help you ring in 2012!!

Wish me luck!!

Busy Bees

We're buzzing around over here, getting ready for C-day.  There's been Christmas parties to attend, lists made and checked twice, and a whole lotta fa-la-la-ing.  It's all great fun, but not a whole lot of time for me to sit and sip wassail whilst reading Dickens's A Christmas Carol, and listen to a fire crackle in the background (if only we had a fireplace, I might put our buzzing on hold and actually do just that).

I have made some crafty little things, and one ultra awesome gift for some people that I'm super excited about.  The only problem is, said gifts and said people all read my bloggity-blog-blog, and I would hate to steal the surprise away from Christmas.  So, no pictures of my creations. . . yet.  Maybe when our jingle-bell-induced buzzing comes to a halt will I take a moment to share some crafty photos.  Until then, take a look at my two best creations:

I love his little tired eyes in the morning.

She was waiting for me to read Olivia to her.  I was snapping pictures instead.  Eventually Olivia's adventures in Italy were read.  That being said, how come a pig and her family get to go to Italy, and my family and I haven't been there yet?  That needs to be remedied.  Plus--spoiler alert--we won't leave Venice in ruins like a certain O-named pig!

I just like this one.  Don't you wish you could hang out with her everyday?  I'm one lucky mama!  And sometimes, I'm one tired mama who wants to pull her hair out, but mostly I'm just lucky.

Four more days!!!

Tralee's First Dance Recital

Today was Tralee's first dance recital.  All the little girls tap danced to Brenda Lee's, "I'm Gonna Lasso Santa Claus."  They were all adorable.  Tralee cracked me up.  She stole the show, that's for sure!  But. . . perhaps her show stealing techniques were not in the way you would think.  Tralee started off standing in the wrong place, then forgot to put on her hat.  Part way into the dance Tralee stood front-and-center and while the rest of the girls were doing the choreographed tap moves, my sweet Stinks was in her own little world.  She finished the dance strong!  I giggled through the whole thing thinking, "Of course she's doing her own thing!  What else would I expect from my against-the-grain girl!"  I love my little tapper!  She dances to her own tune, and that's why she's a star in my book.

Here's the video.  Right around 2:07 Tralee enters her own little world.  She comes back to Earth at 2:28.  I love her!

In other news:  Christmas is getting closer!!!  Are you as excited as I am?

Christmas Party

We had our church Christmas Party on Saturday night.  Tralee played the part of Mary in the Nativity.  Her little crush, Alex, played the part of Joseph.  They were cute up there--all the kids were pretty cute acting out the story of Christmas!  

After dinner, the Nativity, and singing Christmas carols, Santa came to visit all the children.

Here's Tralee waiting in line too see Santa.

Tralee asked Santa for a, "stuffed animal that's a dog and a Barbie house with Barbies."

I think she just might get what she asked for!

Are you wondering where all the pictures of Hunter are?  He slept though the whole thing!  He woke up as soon as we got home.  Silly boy!

We had a fun and busy Saturday.

Craft Fair

I did a craft fair this last Friday and Saturday.  Here are some of the things I (I'm using "I" lightly, Jim did a lot of the work too) made for it.  We made crown molding shelves, various art and printables that we framed (Jim made all the frames and I painted them), and other little cutsey decor items.  I think we had a lot of fun stuff. 

Jim made the barn door display for me using an old door we came across, and some old barn wood.  I think it was a really cute display.  So cute in fact, it was one of the first things I sold on Saturday morning.  I had to rearrange the rest of the stuff after the door went bye-bye.

We got a good booth space with a bulletin board behind us.  We were able to hang up more stuff than we thought!

This was one of Jim's favorite creations.  I told him to make me a barn wood shelf to display some pictures in, and this was the outcome.  Cute, if I do say so myself.

Red crown molding shelf.  I love red things!

I made The Family:  A Proclamation to the World printable, and Jim made the awesome barn wood frame to put it in.

This little dity was a popular seller.

Framed printable

More stuff.

This shelf was one of the first things that sold.  

I don't know if you can tell, but there are little jingle bells in the frame.  This thing sold pretty fast too.

That's about all.

Overall, I can't say that the craft fair was a huge success.  There wasn't a whole lot of traffic coming through.  Several of the vendors were pretty bored, and I think we sold the most of our stuff to each other.  I haven't done a craft fair in several years, and I guess the market for it has changed a lot.  I talked to a lot of vendors who said they used to do 90+ craft fairs a year, and now they only choose a select few to do.  I guess I picked a not-so-great one to display my items, but it was still a fun experience.  I also have a good amount of stuff to start my Etsy shop with.  Yup, I'm going to give Etsy a try.  I like to make stuff, but I only have so much wall space, so I guess Etsy will be my crafting outlet.  Once I really get my shop up and going, I'll set up a link on the ol' blogaroo.   Until then. . . Adieu!

Child-isms

This post is mostly for Grammy Char Char who has been begging me for some new pictures of her adorable grandbabies.  She bought these little outfits for said babies, and they look super cute in them.  But wait!  These pictures are not all!  Scroll down and there are a few little Tralee and Hunter-isms I didn't want to forget about.

Tralee:

Tralee has been into wearing, "A plain long sleeved shirt without anything on it."  She thinks wearing this will make her look more like a kitty cat, because "kitties don't have stuff on their fur."  The only downside to this is that Tralee only has a few plain, long-sleeved, shirts without any designs or emblems on them.  So, we're constantly negotiating which outfits she should wear.  She's also been wearing one of my belts around her belly for the last three days.  It's her kitty tail, in case you were wondering.

Hunter:

While we were at church on Sunday Hunty climbed into my lap, gave me a squinch, and said, "You're the best mommy."  I responded, "You're the best Hunty."  He then added, "Aw!  We're both the best!" I would have to agree.

Another Hunter-ism happened the other day when I told him it was time to go brush his hair.  As I was carrying him to the bathroom he said, "We have to brush my hair so I can say, 'Ow!  Ow!  Ow!'"  I don't think it hurts when I comb through Hunty's feathery short hair.  I DO think he's observed me wrestling the tangles out of his sister's hair a time or two.  She yells"Ow!" through the whole hair-doing process.  I suppose Hunter thinks you have to say, "ow!" whenever your hair gets brushed.

The last Hunty-ism happened the other day whilst I was changing him (I know, I said I would potty train him in November. . . yeah, that didn't happen.  But it will happen soon!)  While I was changing the little stinker, he pointed to his you-know-whats and told me, "don't forget about my grapes."  GRAPES?!  We've never called them grapes before -- but now that's all we CAN call them.

Sometimes Hunter wants to get a hug.  If I go in for a kiss too, he'll pull away and say, "No!  Just hugs!"  After we're done hugging he'll look at me and command, "Now a kiss!"  After we give each other some kissies, Hunter will grab both of my cheeks in his sticky little paws, pull my face into his and tell me to, "Squish noses."  He likes to smoosh our noses together.  Sometimes that's all his wants, "No hugs!  No kisses!  Just squish noses!"  I love to squish noses with Hunter!  I highly recommend a good nose squish every now and again.

Silly kids.  Silly, cute, adorable, funny, drive-me-crazy kids!

Now I have to get back to making stuff for the craft fair I'm doing this Friday and Saturday.

Mom, I hope that helped satisfy your grandchild cravings for a few days!  Love you!

Decked a Lil' More

Hi.  I couldn't sleep the other night.  I woke up at 3am and was wide awake.  So, channeled my inner elf and worked on some Christmas crafts.  I even heard Buddy in my head saying, "I got a full forty minutes [of sleep], and still had time to make a rocking horse."  I didn't get to the rocking horse, but I did make a garland and some elf hats and Rudolph noses to decorate some pictures of my cute kids.  The elf hats were really easy and took about five minutes to throw together.  The garland took a little longer.  I saw something like it in a Pottery Barn catalog and knew I had to try making it.

I think it all turned out pretty darn cute, if I do say so myself.  Now I think I'll go make some snow angels for two hours, then go ice skating, then eat a whole roll of Tollhouse Cookie Dough as fast as I can, and then I'll find those cute kids of mine and snuggle!