This is how we roll- or bounce

This is what happens in our home when we take furniture apart:

More Flower Clips

I was making some more of these tonight and I wanted to show you a new way I found to attach the clips. I saw it on some headbands at the store and I copied the great idea.

3 Ways to cuteness:

Slide a head band through

or clip it to an elastic head band

or just slide the clip through

When I first learned to make these, I glued the clip to a rectangular piece of felt and then glued that to the flower. I actually like that better if I know it will be used solely as a clip, but with this circle version, there's some more versatility. I don't have a fancy camera, so if you can't tell, it's just a circle piece of felt with 2 slits that I glued to the flower.

Karate Kids

I had my friend's three sons over here last night for a bit and the 5 boys were hilarious together. There was lots of running and laughing and jumping off of things. Here's a small sampling of the evening.

Motorcycle Improvements

What?

Doesn't everyone have an extra motorcycle engine hanging from the ceiling of their garage? No? Hmmm....

Jon bought this engine because the engine he currently has, has some issues. He's still getting everything together before he starts working on it. So this has been hanging in the garage for about a week now. I know he's eager to start working on it (one of the things he's missing from the bike right now is 2nd gear. No big deal, right?).

Jon took the boys with him one day to get some parts and before they went into the first store, he told them that they weren't allowed to touch any of the motorcycles or anything else. But then they walked in and saw some kid sized motorcycles.

These are seriously happy faces!

Sean keeps asking when we're going to buy him a little motorcycle. I remind him that he can't even ride his bike without training wheels yet, so there's no WAY I'm getting him a motorcycle. I guess these boys will just have to keep dreaming until Jon teaches them to ride.

Sean's Gun

Jon had some wood leftover from a couple projects and wanted to make a gun for Sean. He made a little handgun first which is pretty awesome. Then he made a rifle.

Sean is totally serious when he has it. He's sure it's his job to secure the perimeter.

He asked for his camo jacket since he already had camo shorts and flip-flops.

Sean on patrol:

Jon has since made a couple modifications to the rifle. The barrel pointed up a bit, so he straightened it out. He also gave it a pretty sweet trigger. The boys love it so much. Sean's friend asked him today if he was going to paint it and Sean said he didn't want it painted. I agree that it's cool just the way it is now.

New Chairs for the Boys

I saw these plans on Ana-White.com for some deck/beach/camping/whatever chairs for kids. I told Jon our boys needed a set and he agreed. We went shopping for fabric and found some super cute stuff that was even 50% off!! We had enough fabric out of one yard (of each color/print) to make 3 chairs. Saturday I sewed the slings while Jon built the frames. Sean actually helped me with sewing up the edges of one sling. He really wanted to work the pedal of the sewing machine. Driving practice perhaps?

Jon put one together and brought it to the kids to try out. Matthew climbed up and leaned back with a big grin. Then Sean took a turn and announced that "it's really comforty." Jon still had to stain them before I could post pictures.

Aren't they precious? Don't you want a set for your family too? They ran about $12 per chair. I made 3 slings in about 2 hours (with a few distractions like thread breaking and getting snacks for the kids) and Jon took a bit longer building (again with distractions....) but they were all done in a day. The longest part was waiting for the stain to dry.

For Safety's Sake

For those of you who may have been concerned for my kids' safety, the guard rails are UP!!

Jon also made a little rope ladder for Sean on the side. We all can't get enough of this bed. It's seriously so cool!

Bunk beds for the boys

Jon made bunk beds for the boys and we put them in the room last night! I am so impressed with how amazing they look. Jon did a great job and the boys were super excited to have them up finally. They watched Jon do some of the building and Sean even helped with the painting. It was a fun project.

This picture was before the ladder was up.

This sums up how Matthew feels about the beds.

They love climbing up and down the ladder.

Matthew has learned that you can't jump on the top bunk or you bonk your head on the ceiling.

Sean was being silly and shy for this video.

The light makes it look like their room is changing colors, sorry about that.

Jon had a lot of fun building this. He got some new tools out of it too. He just has to make some safety rails now to complete it. We prayed that the kids wouldn't fall out and they woke up unharmed this morning, so that was nice. Sean has never fallen out of bed so I wasn't too concerned, but Matthew sometimes does. He did great though and I'm just so glad that the boys have some space to play in their room now.

Tag Blankets

I "taught" a class on how to make tag blankets a couple weeks ago. I don't feel like I lead the group as well as I should have. I really just wanted to make one myself, and I feel badly about that now, but whatever. As I was shopping for fabric I came across some cute shark material and Sean was really insistent that he needed a new one and that I could have his old one. It's seriously cute fabric, so I caved. Here's how it turned out:

I LOVE the blue ribbon!

Sean wanted some pictures of him with his new blanket.

It's a hit!

I wanted to make a girl one too and one of my friends is having a baby girl in May or June so I found this cute fabric:

I also made a little burp cloth to go with it. My aunt gave me a pattern years ago and it was fun to do a couple little sewing projects.

A Project for Projects

I wanted to make a place that Sean and Matthew could hang up all their drawings and colorings, and whatever else they make. Sean tends to get attached to his artwork, so I wanted a way for him to decide what he keeps, and what we throw out because we are not saving every little thing forever. I saw this Ruler Clip Rail on this blog here. It looked easy enough, and my mom said she had an extra meter stick at school, so I think I spent $1.19 on clothes pins and a couple hours with Sean and it was done!

Sean loves to make faces for the camera lately.

The original plan called for jumbo clips, but I wanted to have more, so I used 9 regular sized ones. Sean picked the colors and helped paint about half of them. My OCD was a challenge for me. I really wanted to have them done my way, but I was able to let some imperfections slide. I was going to glue the clothes pins down, but I couldn't find my glue gun and the plans said to screw them in anyway. Jon had exactly what I needed in his collection of nails and screws and I got it all done before he came home from work.

What I love about this is that it can only hold a limited number of beautiful pieces of the boys' art. They get to decide what stays and what goes. I will try to help the boys avoid becoming pack rats like I once was. (Amy visited once when she was in college and I was in middle school and got rid of all my saved school work from 2nd and 3rd grade- it was serious!) Sean's only request was that we hang it low enough that he can reach the clips. Simple enough. A friend of mine made one of these using ribbon instead of a meter stick and it is also super cute.

See what I mean?