A Birthday Gift

A few weeks ago my eldest and I found a lovely little lunch box that we thought we would fill with art materials and fun activities for my nephew who was turning three. We planned to make jello play dough and bean bags, at the very least. Of course, by the time we were done, we no longer had room in the lunch box, so we had to find a tote.

Using a freezer paper stencil cut from a printout I designed, we personalized a brown tote.

The bean bags were also personalized, with lowercase on one side…

and caps on the other.

We also made a few drawstring bags to hold some of the other goodies we pulled together for the tote.

It was a fun distraction from all the craziness of preparing the house for the market, and we had a blast making the play dough and talking about what to put in the bag. It’s also been a while since I’ve sat in front of my sewing machine… it was nice to know that I can still sew straight lines.

Overall, it was just so nice to take some time to make something again.

Ducks in a Row

Four days after our house was “officially” on the market, we received an offer which we accepted the following day. Of course, we’ll find out what happens after the home inspection on Tuesday, but it appears that all the work devoted to getting the place ship-shape worked to our advantage.

I am amazed, and saddened. Don’t get me wrong, I am incredibly grateful that we might be able to sell our home in this economy with very little time on the market, but I was banking on having the extra time to say good bye to it. Now that we’re talking home inspections and closing dates, my heart is breaking just a bit every day as I think of a new use for that fabulous closet we didn’t utlize, or re-think the color for one of the bedrooms, or watch the kids run int their crazy circles all over the first floor… or the worst of them all, how I won’t spend another Christmas with my little ones. Oh!

But the home is going to a nice family with little ones of their own, three to be precise! So it will still be filled with laughter, love, and the crazy padding of tiny feet on the floor. That’s more than I could have expected, and I’m so very happy that another set of children will be there to enjoy all the house has to offer!

Now the time I had set aside to begin my winter projects and to think about and prepare how to dole out my time with thoughtful mindfulness this autumn will be spent preparing for a move that is coming altoghether too soon, yet not quick enough. It will be wonderful to have all the family together again, and we’ll have a new town to explore and new friends to meet. And a beach! We’ll have a beach within a short five minute walk and even though I can’t see the water from our new temporary home, I can see it if I walk to the end of the driveway!

And I’ve also managed to squeak in some creative time in the week I had off! I won’t show what I’ve been up to in this post, but I am planning to get some pictures up sometime this week… you know, before the next round of craziness begins!

(I did manage to get the craft room / studio completed in time to work in it with the kids. BOY was that chalkboard wall a bit of work!)

Coming Up for Air

It has been a long, yet altogther too short summer here in this house o’mine. Although I gave myself permission to be creative and capture the moments in which I was doing any activity that might be construed as meaningful in that particular manner, what I failed to realize is how overwhelming all the work would become. I can’t remember another time where I felt stretched quite so thin; between the contractors, the cleaning and de-cluttering, the visitor we hosted for six weeks, the kids, and the commuting husband, the details all began to blur into one long, endless trial of endurance.

Now I’m on the other side, and seemingly I’ve missed the summer. Where did it go?

And God help me, I’m going to start into my Christmas knitting any day now.

I have big plans for the next few months… big, BIG plans.

Now, does anyone want to buy my house??