Wednesday, February 20, 2013

Happy Birthday to Liz!

Oh, our darling Liz, it’s your birthday! And we love you!

Liz cuddled up on our couch at Locust Street.

Liz is a sweet, sweet lady and everyone should be friends with her. She is kind and generous, a peacemaker, a bad ass artist, and youth librarian extraordinaire!

Also, she used to have a kitty mustache.

One of Sam’s favorite memories of Liz is dancing around the kitchen to this song while galloping around using a swiffer and a broom as our “horses.” We were 23 or 24 at the time, not 3 or 4 like you might (hope) imagine.

Liz is also the LSC bride of this year! We can’t wait to celebrate your wedding with you this year, even though you did find your knight in shining armor at Erica’s wedding.

Good thing Eric already locked down the engagement.

Liz always has great ideas! In addition to entertaining and educating children at the library with awesome programs, she also is great at coming up with super awesome friend activities! Some of our favorites have been captured in a picture of the Locust Street white board.

Unfortunately, we never got around to raising any earthworms for profit OR pleasure.

She’s also super adventurous! Did you know that she studied abroad once in Italy? And she was also a camp counselor in New York once summer! And though she is a world traveler, going here and there, she always remembers to stay in contact with friends and family around the state and country.
She’s not paint-eating adventurous, though. That’s just crazy.

Coincidentally, one of Erica’s favorite memories of Liz is pictured above: painting the blue room back to white at the Locust Street house. Liz made a weekend of it to come visit us and help paint the room back to it’s original(ish) color. There was lots of fun and laughter--and not just due to pain fumes. And as many times as we primed and painted, that room still looked blue to all of us.

We love you Liz! Happy Birthday, and may you have many, many more!

Thursday, February 14, 2013

Word on the street, February 14

Happy Valentines Day, you guys! Wanna know what we love? You! And crafts! And cheesey cards:



Recently, Sam went to a baby shower for her sister Laura who is very pregnant with her second child. It's going to be a boy child, which is a bit of a shock for Sam's family which has been traditionally dominated by women. Thus, Sam had no choice but to break out the blue yarn for to make a going-home-from-the-hospital hat for her nephew.

Baby hats are stupid cute.

A while ago, Sam used this tutorial to make tiny pom pom tails for some bunnies. It was by far the easiest way she's found to make pom poms so she dug out a serving fork to make the pom for this hat.

It worked like a charm! Now her nephew can be as stylish and cozy coming home from the hospital as her niece was:


And just because, here is a picture of Evelyn sleeping wearing another hat made by Auntie Sam after visiting LSC at Applefest:

Because who's going to complain about too many baby pictures? We're willing to bet nobody who reads this blog.

Liz has been busying her crafty hands most of the time lately on more wedding flowers, but has recruited the help of her mom and sister/matron of honor to help cut petals.  For an easy alternate project and tiny apartment-cleaning effort, Liz tried out a new project recently - a wreath made of old greeting cards that people have given her.  She first saw the idea on Better Homes and Gardens and pinned the project to Pinterest a while ago.  A trip to the craft store for a wreath form and hanger was all it took to make this project come alive.

Pretty cards, no longer in a shoebox!
Liz is fortunate enough to have easy access to a die cut machine and various-sized circle dies, which is especially good considering that she would've probably driven herself crazy trying to cut perfect circles by hand.  Once the circles were cut, this project took 10 minutes of hot-gluing and the wreath was complete!  This is a great use for old cards that you may have held on to, but don't hold a lot of sentimental value.  Another easy organizing tip that Liz recommends: taking photos of knick-knacks that you own but end up just cluttering up your space because, let's face it, you don't use/appreciate all of those thing.  You can remember the cuteness of items or the thoughtfulness of the people who gifted the items to you, but you don't all of need those things messing up your environment.  Donate them, right now!  Or just make them into something else that you will appreciate, like this wreath.

Erica FINALLY got a new phone, and is able to take pictures with it--which is good since she doesn't have an actual camera.

She's been working on a baby blanket for her friend Erin, who is nearly months pregnant. And how the time has flown!  It seems like just a couple weeks ago, Erin told us on our annual girl's trip that she had something to tell us.

 It's all crumpled to keep the mystery alive in case Erin reads this

She's got some other presents in the works as well, but would rather keep it a surprise. And yes, this picture is of a lazy Saturday being snowed in, with Kevin playing video games and Erica knitting all day.

In addition to crafting for Baby Duckett and preparing to teach her first class at a craft store here in town, she has also begun to try her hand at couponing. So far she's not going to be seen on any TV shows saving 99% on groceries, but she is pretty excited to be stocked up on a couple things for a while, and saving money. She has taken some time to get a binder together to keep everything in order so she can actually find what she's looking for.


It doesn't seem crafty, but there was a lot of cutting involved.

In case you were curious, Xena is still adorable and fat.