Don't look, Jenny

I made my Valentine a page from an old card kit that Wendy had made several years ago. I cut her card all up and added some matching papers. I should have taken a picture of the card.

Big No, No, but I did it anyway.

I wanted to show you what I have been making for Samantha. She posted a picture of her nursery on facebook and I remembered I had these papers that matched it.  I usually don't make scrapbooking gifts, because I know some  people don't care for it, but I became more brave after I made a little album for my hairdresser and she loved it. I think Samantha will, too. And she is so sweet, she will pretend she likes it, even if she doesn't.

So I made these frames ready for her to put  pictures of Connor  when he gets here and a little album, too. The pages in the album are ready for pictures, too, in a similiar style and with these papers.

Here is her nursery if you didn't see it.

Is There a Contest

for the most photographed kids in history? If so, these may be the winners.

We are finding lots of empty spaces to occupy since the decluttering took place.

J can sit up

and he wants to crawl. He can scoot backwards.

C says he is a hibernating fox.
Z said," I am a skunk". He did not hibernate, but waited until Mr. Fox woke up and you can guess what he did to him. Whew...scrapbook room had to be vacated.
(As it turns out, foxes don't hibernate.I guess we better read that book again.)

B brought pillow and blanket when it was his turn.

Today, it's all about snow.

J  has a crazy bracelet in his hands, but he stopped playing with it when the music started and begin clapping.

Add singing to that and we have a multi-tasking baby.
  (For all you with panty wad tendencies, I know a crazy bracelet is a choking hazard, and it was gone from the baby toy box as soon as photo op was over.)

My Decluttering Project

This is my car trunk today, but we made 5 other trips to various donation places. Today it was mostly books. Some were my husband's grandparents' and they were in German. I kept most of the antique books, though.

This is where we started several months ago. We called it "the library". You can only see one bookcase here but every wall, except the windows were completely covered with bookcases. It doesn't look too bad  here, but most of the time it was a mess of piled up papers on every surface.

We call this the computer room. This is where we put everything from the library. There is another wall of bookcases that you can't see in this picture.  We had to remove a desk, and many pieces of junk and clutter before we could move the library in here. My husband still has about 5 boxes of papers to go through. Some of them are 44 years old. He was surprised to look at some of his papers from seminary and find them graded down because they were turned in late. Yes, he has all his papers and notes from seminary.  If he writes on a piece of paper, he keeps it. He writes a lot. I do not believe he will ever look at them.

This is the library now.You can't see it, but it still has one wall of bookcases. I have 2 empty bookcases now, an empty iris cart and only one set of sheets and blankets for every bed. I was able to get all my Christmas decorations in the guest room closet and still have empty shelves in there. The closet in the library is storage for my husbands camera and photography equipment.

Then we took our piano to Lubbock to our  #2 daughter.

Here it is at home in Lubbock. We had a tire blowout on the trailer on the trip, but we got it changed with no problems and an electric company employee even stopped and helped.

We moved this bookcase from the library into the piano spot. I was very happy that my husband went through all his books and categorized them and donated of a lot of them. We had 3 copies of one book and 2 copies of several others. None of these books are mine except one shelf of children's books. The cost of this project was less than $150. We had to hire someone to help us move furniture after my husband hurt his back ( the first day) and we bought new linens and frame for the bed in the library.

I made a new tablescape in the foyer. This is a picture of my husband, his teddy bear and another one of his  toy he calls a noise maker on some of our German antique books. His grandparents were born in Germany but I don't know if they brought them on the boat. They emigrated in about 1902. I want another table or shelves for the foyer. I am watching one at Hobby Lobby.

I was concerned about where I was going to put my daughter's wedding pictures. They were on the piano and  are my favorite things in my house. Here is where I have them for now. I'm not really happy with the balance of these items. I will probably be tweaking them. Any advice welcome.

Someone's little sister

came to visit. Brought Santa and her son.

Chirstmas Day Home Alone

I know my kids are worried about what we did on Christmas.(It was our first time alone.) We sat in our Mother and Father places and had Cornish game hens.

We moved some bookcases into the den where the piano was  (we took it to our grandchildren who want to take piano lessons) and I put all my nativities on it except the new one I got for my birthday. It is on the mantel. I'm not going to do this next year, but I just wanted to see them all together.

Here is the one Jenny sent me. I want to get some candles for it for next year.

Then we had to rearrange the furniture in the guest room after we took the bookcases out. I still have 8 boxes of books that need a new home.

Courtney and I were alone one year on Christmas.That was a while ago..1993.

An Overheard Conversation

Z is 6. He has 3 little brothers. He is a very good big brother and very helpful to his Mom and Dad. He knows a lot about babies.

His cousin, I is also 6, but he is the baby in his family. He was interested in Z's latest little brother and was discussing babies with his very experienced cousin. He learned a lot: They spit up. They poop and pee. They sneeze and snot goes everywhere. They get boogers in their eyes. And don't forget, they cry a lot.