Feeling Good!

I spent all day yesterday getting the garage cleaned up and reorganized. Dwayne is a neat freak, I am a pack rat...the two rarely mix well. My hubby puts up with my pack ratishness, and I have been trying really hard to give up more and more stuff as I find that I don't need it. Yesterday, I threw away stuff, I packed up a whole van load of stuff and took it to Goodwill. In the process I gave my hubby some much needed working space in his garage. We had moved a whole bunch of things out to the garage when we thought we would be moving, but seeing how that is not looking like it is going to happen, we need to decide how we want our house to look, what we want brought back and what we don't want brought back in. It felt good to show him all my hard work last night. It paid off well for me, he gave me many compliments of how nice it looked and he is out there right now working on our tent poles for the canvas tent we will be using at 1812. Now today it is hard to get myself motivated to anything...lol.

Joining the work force...

It looks like I will be once again joining the work force. It has been years since I have had to go into an actual building and work all day, but starting next week I will be quickly reminded what that is like. I have been hired on to make candy at the Main Street Coffee shop. I had my interview today and I will start working 3 days a week (Monday, Wednesday, & Friday) 8:30am to 4:30pm. Those are really good hours for a mom who does not want to be away from her kids too much. I am so excited. I have wanted this job ever since I heard about it. Talk about awesome timing, just one week after my kiddos start school, I start to work. Plus, the lady who interviewed me said that the hours will probably be way less in the summer time...how perfect is that!

Our first meltdown.

I knew it would come, but I did think she would be able to make it at least the 3 days this week. Tobi cried this morning. There are boys at school that like to scare the girls, and she misses being at home, but between Daddy and I, we were able to calm the tears. We reminded her that we loved her, we missed her too, and that we are here when she gets home. Also, we pointed out what fun she has while she is there, that she likes her teacher, she has new friends to be with and that the weekend is coming. She has made some new friends at school, one we hear lots about is Tiffany Oren. They sit close by each other, plus Tobi remembers her from mega sports camp, so that helps.

Dora brought home a paper on soccer yesterday and since the deadline was Aug.30th, I quickly signed her up and mailed it out. The mega sports camp really got her excited about soccer and Dwayne and I are always on the look out for things for Dora to do, she needs to get out there and make friends. This little 3rd child of mine is a goofy one. She will occasionally talk of friends from school, but that is about it. Nothing about wanting to have them over, nothing about planning a huge birthday party with friends from school and no, absolutely no sleepovers for this girl. All my other kiddos like to do things with friends outside of school, even Tobi is already bugging me about wanting to invite a friend over for dinner, but not Dora. Besides grandparents, the only other place she will stay the night is at our friend's house, the Clouses. I think that is just because we do so much with them, that they feel like family to her.

Well, I am glad today is Friday, the kids will have a 3 day weekend to rest up before they return to school. Tobi may need all 3 days to recover. I do like the fact that the kiddos are kind of eased slowly back into school, 3 days this week, 4 days next week and then on the full school week. Tobi may need that slow transition, but I think in the end she will do fine. All of them will.

Everyone Survived

Lucky for us, everyone survived the first day of school. Tobi ran into a problem at lunch time, a little boy bit her bag cheese crackers. He even ripped the bag! That was the very first thing she told me when she got home. Then she said, "I did not eat them after that." Well, I would think not...lol. Dora loved her day. She really enjoys school. Sari talked non-stop about her day. Brighton just made it through the day. He does not like school. They all seemed to like taking their lunches, so far. Dora said she did not have enough to eat, so we sent more food in her lunch today. We went out to Chuck E Cheese last night to celebrate the first day of school. I even survived the day with no kids at home. I must say, I did sort of miss hearing some little voices during the day. I went and turned in an application for a job. That will be weird, I have not really worked outside the home for a really long time. I did medical coding at home for a long time, but I haven't even done that for at least 3 years now. Now, today I have lots to keep me busy. (And if I don't keep busy, Dwayne WILL find something for me to do...so, I better get to work...lol.)

First Day of School Pictures!

First day of school for my kiddos....Finally!


Dora is very ready!

Brighton will go if he has to go, not because he wants to go.

Tobi and Claudia are so ready they are outside wait for the bus!

Here comes the bus! Everyone on!

Now...what in the world am I going to do today. Oh yeah, get caught up on my blog...lol.

Stays Pictures!

I have been working hard on a new set of stays for our 1812 weekend. Here is the inside layer.

There is metal boning in most of these sewn in channels. This took tons of stitching. Thank goodness I have a sewing machine.

This is the outer layer being pinned on.

This is the pieces sewn together, with the binding hand sewn on. I just need to get these all laced up and then try them on Sari, I think I made them a little too big for me.

Camping Pictures!

OK...I have tons of pictures to share, here are just a few. We had so much fun at Spring Mill State Park.

Here my little beauties are not quite out of their beds yet. We have a huge tent and the kiddos all sleep side by side on their cots on one side of the tent, Dwayne and I get the other side.

Here my kiddos are checking out some of the pioneer games. I am sure they are all taking notes, so they will know what to play with when they go to Mississinewa 1812.


So, off to the next house. I love walking through each house, looking at the tables, the dishes, the cast iron pots, and just the over all look of the way people lived back then.


Can you walk on stilts? Dora did a really good job, Dwayne can do it, Sari tried, but was not the greatest, I am not sure if Brighton ever accomplished it, and Tobi...well, I am pretty sure she never made it either. ME...I did not even try.


What an absolutely beautiful family I have!

A week has flown by...

On Friday morning I set aside all my sewing projects to begin packing for a family weekend camping trip. We have not been camping in so long and I had to really redo my thought process from sewing to camping. I can be a very one track mind person when I am working on projects or reading. We headed down south to Mitchell, IN to stay at Spring Mill State Park. They have an awesome 1800s pioneer village to explore and really wanted to walk through it again. I have a huge tent that is so easy to set up. I love tents, I have way more than I need. I actually love camping equipment. I am one of those weird people who enjoy washing the dishes in "heated over the campfire" water, I love cooking over an open fire and I absolutely love playing in the fire. We had a very nicely secluded campsite right next to a creek. The kiddos had plenty of space to play. It was just a wonderful weekend. We even got to have lunch with Dwayne's sister in Indy on Sunday afternoon and then do a little window shopping while we were in the big city.

Monday morning it was off to St. Louis for Dwayne. He is there all this week and when the cat is away the mice will play. I have stated this before, but when my dear hubby heads off on business trips, I really slack off and I really become quite reclusive. I stayed up past 2am on Monday night, watching movies and working on redoing some of my re-enacting clothing. I had to go to band meeting Tuesday evening and when I got home I had a hard time getting into the groove of sewing again, so I went to bed around 11pm, quite early for me when Dwayne is not here. I am looking forward to working on a new project today, my first set of real stays, I plan to stay up as long as it takes to get them done. Then tomorrow I will be doing tons of cleaning since my hubby will be coming home that night and I have to get the house back into the order he is use to seeing. I hope to post some pictures of the progress I will be going through to make the stays, it is all very interesting for me.

Light Reading

My wonderful husband bought this book I have been wanting. I really wanted to read through this before I started redoing all the girl's clothes. I had a pretty good idea that I was not too far off on the guy's clothes, but I had a feeling I was not doing some things right with the girl's clothes. Well, it came in the mail yesterday, it is a short book and I had it all read last night. I was right, I have some serious redoing to do on the girl's clothes. That beautiful, fun crocheted lace on Dora's chemise...yeah, that is not period correct. Any floral material that I have bought is probably not period correct, and really linen should be used more often than cotton. I need to make my chemises over, which I already knew from some research that I have already done. Now, I really need to do some research on the Regency era, we can use clothes from that era at 1812, but not at Kohkohmah. Kohkohmah is more of the 1750s and obviously War of 1812 is in the 1800s...lol. Amazing how 50 years can make a huge difference in clothing. I am not too worried about this, because we will only be spending 1 day at Kohkohmah and the whole weekend at 1812, but when I get involved in something, I want to do it right. I have just started cutting out Brighton's coat, I had enough wool left over from Dwayne's coat to make Brighton a coat and possibly a cape for either Sari or myself. I will still need to buy a little more wool and it is hard to find right now. I will post some pictures of Brighton's coat as soon as I get it finished, I need to find some material to use as his lining and then I can start sewing.

A little fun...

I am suppose to be starting on a coat for Brighton. I went through and organized all my material and I found that I had just enough wool left from Dwayne's coat to make a coat for Brighton, as long as I am careful doing it. But before I can do that, I have to piece together some kind of pattern to fit Brighton. Dwayne's pattern is way too big for Brighton. I have pattern I bought last year that has a very "costumey" look to it, but if I try I can work with it to make it period correct and it is in Brighton's size. On the coat in this pattern, the buttons are on for looks, not to actually button up, which means I have to add paper to the pattern to make it meet in the center so it can button up, making it more functional and period correct. So, I am spending time looking at Dwayne's coat pattern, this other pattern and trying to make them match up. This is takes time and I don't always have the time. Just getting all the pieces laid out, then to try and remember what I need to do next...well, this past weekend, I just did not have enough time to really work on it. So, I decided to try something else that I could pick up and do between activities. I read on someone else's blog about them using hand crocheted lace on a chemise. I know how to crochet, so I thought I would try this out and crochet the lace right onto a chemise that I had already made. It turned out really cool. This is for Dora. I hope you can see the edging there that I have added. I can't wait to do it to more, but today I have the time to work on Brighton's pattern, so that will have to take my time.

New Pictures...

Here is the front of the coat...
Here is the back...

Here is about half way through finishing the pants...

And here they are all done, except the buttons,
which I do have done now.

Now I have a few more items to make for the guys, and then it is on to the girls new clothing...yea, much more fun stuff to make.

Dwayne has been doing an awesome job on our new rope bed. I have now finished his new pants. Pictures will come soon. My sewing is going really well so far. I spent all afternoon yesterday just cutting out some new patterns. I am not sure what I am what I am going to start next, I am excited about each project I have ahead of me. We had some of our re-enacting friends over Friday night and last night, just going over plans and sharing ideas. It has really helped Dwayne and I get excited and motivated for this October. This year's 1812 event falls on Dora's birthday, October 10th. I am going to try and figure out how to have an 1800s like birthday for her.

My little girls really enjoyed their first day of the Mega Sports Camp. Great job to Tonya and everyone who is helping out. The kids all looked like they were having a good time. Brighton had to leave early last night, but I know he is looking forward to helping out the rest of this week.

This week is State Fair Band day on Wednesday. I am going to ride the bus with Sari and spend the whole day there. I took my kiddos a couple of years ago and it was so expensive for a family, that I am just going this year. I know Sari has greatly enjoyed band, but she is ready for a little down time. I am ready for her to have a little down time...lol.