Girl's Night Out

A couple of weeks ago I got together with my sister-in-laws, Jill and Jenny. I've been tempted to change my name to Jane, but that might get a little confusing. While they look like sisters already, I would have to lose a bunch of weight, cut my hair and dye it blond to look like these cuties!

Jenny just had little Austin back in January and hasn't had a chance to get out of the house much (he was born 7 weeks early and contracted RSV a week before our outing), so we ventured to the mall to get some delicious Chick-fil-a for dinner at the food court and then we walked around for a bit. We went into Forever XXI and found these awesome headbands ("awesome headbands" is said with thick sarcasm and a role of the eyes)!!!

I know I was born in the 80's and I love 80's movies and music, but is this really back in style!??!

Seriously!? Maybe I should have bought one...

Staying out of debt...

In February, my Visiting Teachers came over to visit with me. Each month we are assigned a topic from the Ensign, which is a magazine produced by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints with uplifting articles and current news of the members around the world. February's article touched on "Managing Resources Wisely and Staying Out of Debt". We discussed ways in which staying out of debt makes us more self-reliant and essentially more happy. After my Visiting Teachers left, I was determined to pay off some of our debt.

The following day, I looked over our finances and decided that we could afford to pay off 1 of my 2 school loans. I went online to pay, only to see that I had a $0.00 balance. I called the borrower immediately and told them I would like to pay off the remainder of my loan. The woman put me on hold and then came back and said my Lender had "Forgiven my Debt" because I had been diligently paying for years. I was shocked...almost $1,000.00 had been forgiven. The woman on the phone told me I would be getting a letter in the mail within two weeks indicating a "paid in full" status of the loan.

A few weeks later, I received a check in the mail for the last payment that was made to my Lender, not only did they forgive the balance, but they also returned my last payment.

Just another tender mercy from the Lord to our little family. We are truly blessed!

Spectrum 10K

Last weekend Matthew and I drove down to Saint George with some friends for my 10K. We left Thursday afternoon and stayed until Saturday afternoon. The weather was beautiful and the resort we stayed at was amazing.

My friend, Jen, ran the race with me. It started up Snow Canyon State Park and finished in Ivins, UT. The run down the canyon was amazing. One of my favorite parts of the race was looking down the canyon and seeing the entire canyon filled with people wondering what goals they were reaching and why they were out running. I loved the race and I would do it again in a heart beat.

I was having problems with my IT Band and decided to change my form and run more from the middle of my foot to toe instead of heel to toe. I got some pretty sweet blisters because I wasn't used to the form and most of the race was downhill, but I still ran sub 10 minute miles and finished in 58:05.

We had such a great weekend with our friends eating far too much food and getting some much needed relaxation from everyday life! My Salt Lake 10 Miler is next weekend! Woot!

Hey Valedictorian!

My wonderful husband was named Bachelor's Degree Valedictorian for 2010 for the College of Technology and Computing!!!

I couldn't be more excited for him!! :D When he forwarded me the email this morning, I was in shock and then the tears just fell!!! I am so proud of him and everything he's accomplished. This is going to be such a wonderful experience for him!! There are seriously no words for how proud of him I am! :D

He'll be speaking at his convocation on April 30th and I will be sure to post lots of pictures and gushing comments about him!! AH-mazing!!!

Frigid 5K in Provo, UT

Saturday, February 27th was my first of four races for the next two months. I ran the Frigid 5K in Provo. It was a really small race, only about 100 people ran it, and they didn't make a big deal about it, but it was good practice.

The course was a figure eight and it ended up being mostly on the Provo River Trail. The weather was perfect. I even go too hot in my winter running clothes.

And of course, it wouldn't be a race without thinking about my dad. My iPod was on shuffle and played "Standing Outside The Fire" by Garth Brooks.It's a great motivating song, especially the video. It's one of my daddy's favorites. It might be strange, but I feel him close to me when I run and I truly love it. He continues to inspire me everyday.

Training has been going really well. I'm running three times a week and doing cycling/spin classes at the gym twice a week along with strength training that is killing me!!! I love feeling sore and knowing that it's hopefully doing something. My longest distance is tomorrow: 7 Miles and in two weeks I have my 10K in Saint George. Bring it on! :D

My cute running friends: Jen, Anne, and Me First time through the finish line, half way there! The Finish!!! Wahoo!

The Bag Lady

I've found a love for bags, especially when I can make them into whatever I want, all the while choosing the perfect fabric for each person/bag. I decided to make my cute sister-in-law, Jenny, some practical bags that she could use for her job. She's a 3rd grade teacher and is constantly bringing stuff to and from her class room every day.

I looked at two different patterns and then merged the two to create hers. I actually made one for me first to make sure the measurements and everything turned out okay. I use mine all the time and would love to make more, soon hopefully!! My sewing list is about a mile long! :D

Jenny and her cute bags!

They are cotton on the outside and canvas inside. The straps are also double lined with canvas and then the cotton overlay. Super sturdy and oh so cute! :D

My cute Bernina, was able to embroider "Made with love" on the inside.

The other bag I made, I love just as much. It definitely has its own function. I was able to start and finish it conference weekend and am so happy with the finished product. The bag is gigantic!!! I brought it to work a few times and people made fun of me, so now I use it for my Nursery bag and it couldn't be more perfect. The pattern is by Amy Butler and is available for purchase here. I made the large Betty Shopper Bag and I love it. I'd like to try the smaller version one of these days and compare them.

People have asked me about the Amy Butler patterns. They aren't the easiest to read/follow/understand. I suggest reading through all of the instructions a couple times before starting the project, but for the most part I didn't think it was that bad.

The fabric I used was an Amy Butler Home Decor fabric that was pricey, but I fell in love and it was the first sewing project I did for myself, so it was justified. The inside fabric was Moda fabric that I also love. The bag has surprised me in durability, especially as the straps are just knotted through grommets.

Outside Bag

Inside of the bag: large enough to fit my scriptures on one side...

...and my crayons and materials on the other. It also have 4 VERY large pockets, two on each side.

Girl's Camp 2009

Girl's Camp was months ago, but I've had several of you ask me what exactly I was up to in this post. Our Girl's Camp theme was: I Strive to Be G.R.E.E.N. (Grateful, Respectful, Energetic, Example and Nice). Each day at camp we focused on one of the acronyms of G.R.E.E.N.

I wanted to get the girls excited for Camp, so I decided to pass out little treats with cute sayings on them the last month before camp. One of the focuses, was to be "Green" or environmentally friendly, so I found a font online that had different pictures and symbols which represented recycling, tree huggers, etc. I also used this font throughout the process.

Barnum's Animal Crackers with the saying: "Don't worry about living like an animal for a week, we do it all the time". Then there is a recycling symbol below that and the Girl's Camp theme at the bottom.

This treat was Chocolate Covered Cinnamon Bears that said: "YW Field Guide to Bear Identification" in a Bear font that I found online for free :D This also included a recycling symbol and the Camp Theme at the bottom.

Pop Rocks: "Camp Rocks"

Fruit & Nut Granola Bar: "There a little Fruit and Nut in all of us"

Another idea I did, but didn't take a picture of:
Little Baggy with 2 Golden Grahams, 1 small marshmallow and 1 chocolate chip: "Want S'more?"



Each ward was in charge of providing notebooks for the music, instead of making each leader their own, since our turnover is really high, I decided to make 1 for each position (YW President, 1st Counselor, 2nd Counselor, Secretary, Camp Director, Camp Assist. Director).

For one of our pre-camp activities the girls decorated their binders and they will get to keep them when they turn 18. They all turned out so cute and I think the girls really enjoyed making them.

Now, onto the main event. As soon as I heard about the theme, I went crazy and started thinking about all of the fun things I could create. Last year we purchased canvas totes from Robert's and decorated them with puff paints and fabric stars. I wanted to do something more practical, so this is what I came up with:

We took these swatches...

and after trying 3 different kinds of canvas, we found the one that would work perfectly...

we started cutting, and measuring...

all the while, trying to keep track of whose was whose...
my mother-in-law was a saint to help me out, and the sewing began...
the project was finally starting to take shape...
The final project....a drawstring backpack and matching journal.

Two cute pockets in the front of the backpack, one for the journal and one for a water bottle.

The journal below I made with the help of my sweet friend (2nd Counselor at the time) Dorothy. She was a saint through all of my madness. We also used her mother's embroidery machine to embroider each of the girl's names on the inside of their journal.
Our older girls, came and helped us pick out a button that would fit each girl's personality and make them original. I was so impressed with their skills and how mindful they were of each girl.

I found some of this fabric at the fabric store and knew I had to create something and incorporate it into our theme somehow...

so I made these little buttons for their backpacks.

Then I took all of the scraps...

and made a cute fabric banner for our cabin! It includes a piece from each girl's fabric that they chose for the backpack and journals, although they didn't know what they were choosing the fabric for.

While the girls were away at flag ceremony, we put the backpacks with all sorts of goodies on the table.

Our Girl's Camp flag below: It includes two separate pieces from each of the different fabric. The girls put their names on the squares at the top and their year of camp on the rectangles at the bottom. My favorite part...we used glow-in-the-dark puff paint!!!!

And finally, one of the crafts we made at camp was a block with the Mutual Theme on it.
Front:

Back:

I realize now, this is an extremely LONG post with lots of pictures, but I've been wanting to share for a long time! About two weeks after Girl's Camp ended, I was released. And a short month or two later my husband and I were called as the Nursery Leaders. Now we spend our Sundays playing with 18 month to 3 year olds and have enjoyed their little spirits and their ever abundant energy.