Hoo's Cute?

This little owl, that's who!

I whipped this up, kinda making it up as I went. I did find inspiration on Google images and Etsy, but I drew up a draft on craft paper and cut away. It was quite liberating to just cut and hack away without using a pattern. I love how rustic and rough he looks. I recycled some of David's clothes plus used scraps of fabric in my stash. I love how he turned out! I made it for Malachi, though I'm not sure if he'll get it for his birthday, for our trip to Alberta or for Christmas. Abby keeps calling it a chicken which makes me laugh. I think he needs a name. Any ideas?

Checkin' In

I can hardly believe that September is over... tomorrow is that last day!? What?!? How did that happen? Well, I can tell you that this weather has been amazing and it hasn't even felt much like September. Though the trees are changing and our city is looking beautiful! Let's get right to it this week:

• We voted on Tuesday. Confession: I think this is only the second time I've voted and the last time it was because I had turned 18 and was finally of legal age to vote. I've been remiss, but we are beginning now and will teach our children the importance of it. Talk about convenient, though, we were at the mall and the advance polls were set up. We showed our IDs and voted and were through the process in under 15 minutes (with children in tow). The littles were given these cute certificates that I'll put away in their keepsake boxes.

(I interrupted her movie)

• I needed a Superman t-shirt. They're hard to find (especially if you're cheap like me), so I made one. I used this method again.

• Jen, here's my no shampoo update: tomorrow marks 5 weeks. I am still doing the baking soda/apple cider vinegar about every other day. You're supposed to be able to wait 3-4 days, but my hair hyper produces oil and it's still less than shampooing every day. I also had my haircut last week and wasn't about to skip the wash, it's my favourite part of going for a haircut, so I'm not entirely sure if that meant I was starting over or not. I bought these multi-purpose bottles from the dollar store and they have measurements on them, which make mixing super easy. This is the method I've been using: Baking soda mixture 2Tbsp soda to 8 oz. water. Rub into scalp (don't wet your hair first) and rinse. Apple cider vinegar mixture 2 oz. ACV to 6 oz. water (1-3 ratio) plus 4 drops peppermint essential oil. Rub into scalp and rinse. These squeeze bottles are great, I just put the spout right to the scalp and squeeze away. My hair feels great - I probably won't buy shampoo again.

• David's filled holes and mounted the soon-to-be microwave on the little's kitchen. We're close to prime and paint time. I've picked colours and I'm so excited.

(David got a whole bag of tiles for $2 and they became my springboard for colour)

• I found these ugly canvas prints for $2 each - a great find for a Christmas project I'm working on. That won't hit blog world until after Christmas.

• Remember this? Well, I picked up a blue one for Malachi at Once Upon a Child for $5 (regular price is $10 - I had a coupon) and will be re-panelling his, too. No sponge bob for him.
• We're getting our first family pics since Malachi's arrival. We're tentatively booked for Tuesday. They probably won't hit the blog until after Christmas (sorry, but we want some surprises)

and finally....

• WE'RE GOING "HOME" TO ALBERTA FOR CHRISTMAS! We haven't been for 2 years and my mom is the only one of both of our families who's met Malachi. We're sooooo excited and we get to go for TWO WEEKS! I can hear our mom's crying with joy!

Checkin' In

September is half way through already! I can hardly believe it. The days have only now become cool and I am relishing every moment of it. It was an incredible summer, but I am never sad to see fall's return. The air conditioners come out of the windows and the fall breeze is invited in while I enjoy yummy fall drinks.

Let's get started, here's a few things I wanted to share with you.

• This is our "Ebenezer stone". You can read about the original stone in 1 Samuel 7. We wanted to mark our seventh anniversary with something that could be a reminder for us of God's grace in our marriage. David found this rock and it's perfect.

• our last in-house date night we played Killer Bunnies. We haven't played in quite some time and it was a fun time. I call this Killer Bunnies by candlelight:

(the green tape is our snack barriers - don't want to get those cards gummed up!)

(one of David's favourite bunny weapons)

• I am loving our double stroller, but as with any umbrella stroller it lacks a cup holder, so I made my own. Now I can have my water or tea or latte to go. It works great. Inspired by this post.

• David's made some great progress on the littles' play kitchen. I am so excited to get to the painting and decorating part. I am so impressed with what David's done with that cabinet.

• Thanks to Pinterest, I found this great pumpkin syrup recipe for lattes. YUM! It's easy and and WAY cheaper than Starbucks.

• Our branch got it's fall makeover again and this year we added this lovely little friend for our fall scene.

P.S. I am appreciating this point form blog style. It means that I can blog about a lot of little things without taking a whole bunch of time and boring you with extra words. Any thoughts?

Checkin' In

Today is "Friday" - hooray! I am looking forward to having my David home for two days for sure! Here's a few things that I've been wanting to share:

• I found a great tutorial for turning your favourite bar soap into a liquid body wash. I've told you how much I love Pumpkin soap and now I love it even more. These three bottles were made out of one bar of soap. It will last a lot longer this way.

• This is how far David's gotten on the kitchen project, though he's working on it more this "weekend".

• Have I mentioned that David works every weekend? His days off are Tuesday and Wednesday and this has now become our weekend... in case you were wondering.
• Abby lives for Papa/daughter dates. The current deal is that they'll go on the next one when she is completely potty trained. This is taking way too long for her liking (mine too for that matter). Anyway, Abby will pick out her fanciest dress and shoes for her date. It's so cute. Here's Abby dressed up to get married - she loves to pretend she's getting married.

• I've made another notebook cover - it was a birthday gift.

• I have a unique name and because of that I don't often see my name on personalized items or in public places. I got the idea to google map my name. Apparently, there is a Coralee Drive, a Coralee Lane, two Coralee Avenues and a Coralee Loop. I then used the street view option to find a street sign, just so I could take a screenshot of it and use it. A little vain, I realize, but a little fun, too.

• We found an online ink store in CANADA! that sells computer ink for super cheap. We used a dealfind voucher and got 4 cartridges of each color and black for under $30 (including shipping). We'll be ordering from them again... when we finally run out after this batch.
• I've had the privilege of doing the ads for our ladies committee and it's been so fun. I'll have to show you some of them sometime.
• When we changed to MagicJack, it was a good excuse for me to design new family contact cards. I had a lot of fun with these ones.

• Hope you all have a great week. We're having an amazing warm fall so far, we could continue our summer list with no problems.

A Month of Tea

I was generously invited to a friend's birthday party last night. Of course that meant a gift and of course that meant that I got to have some creative time - hooray! This gift came out of a sudden inspiration. Remember my tea collection? Well, it's only gotten larger. I've had to move it into a cupboard which is a little more difficult for people to pick through. I have dreams of other solutions (scroll down in the link), but that will have to wait for now. Anyway, most people either stick with "regular" tea (Earl Grey/Orange Pekoe) or choose from the front row. Well, my friend likes tea and I have tea to spare, so here's my gift idea: A month of tea! I packaged 30 different varieties of tea with a tea cup and saucer. I numbered each individually wrapped tea and included a chart with their brands, names and kind. I had so much fun with this one.

Loose teas, I put into tea bags and sewed on dangle tags and put in the larger envelopes. I sewed the envelopes with my sewing machine and used tape to close them. Next I put  square or round tea bags into the smaller envelopes - some of them are factory wrapped individually, others are not. Finally, I made pyramid boxes for the pyramid tea bags and the one flowering tea bud. I choose a variety of patterned scrapbooking papers in similar colours to keep it simple and classy.

This is a gift that I'd have love to receive and can't wait to give again. (Hope you don't mind, Patty~Jean). I think that I might make an advent calendar of teas this year for me and my David to enjoy throughout December. 

The heart in the middle indicates my current favourite kind of tea. Celestial Seasonings, Honey Vanilla White Chai.... yum! This was a great creativi-tea time!

Summer List 2011 Wrap Up

It's been a great time! I am so glad that we decided to give it a go. No, we didn't do everything on our list. That never really was my intention - though we gave it a good go. I really wanted to give us a reference point of ideas for what to do on our "weekends". David's job requires him to work weekends, so for the most part Tuesday and Wednesday have become our Saturday and Sunday. Anyway, last week we checked off a few more. We have a few fall-ish type things on the list, so we'll probably just keep it going, but officially the summer is over and so, here's our wrap up.

Items we checked off last week:

• Cars 2 movie - David went with his friend, Dawson and they saw it in IMAX 3D!
• Swimming - we went to the Kildonan Park outdoor pool and it was so great! Next summer we will be going more than once.

 (Abby takes awhile to 'warm' up to the water, but then doesn't want to leave)

(Malachi in the Mei Tai after his swim)

• Millenium library - I love libraries and this is Winnipeg's BIG one. We didn't stay long as the littles were tired, but we took home a pile of books and I would love to go back without the littles for a library date with my David.

(there are fun creatures in this library)

Items we crossed off as missed or unable to attend due to scheduling:

• camping at Bird's Hill Park - we decided that our Abby wasn't ready for this one and without gear, we weren't really ready either. Maybe next summer.
• Goldeyes baseball game - David closed at work a lot of the summer and we found it difficult to coordinate his schedule, our parenting class schedule and babysitting. 
• The Fringe festival - we just missed it, we don't read the paper or watch the news etc and so we missed it. No biggie, neither one of us were too heartbroken over that.
• Happy Feet movie in Assiniboine Park - David had to work that night
• Music Festival (specifically Folk Fest) - we were broke
• Disposable camera from a toddler's perspective - have you seen how expensive disposable cameras are these days?! We decided to skip it for now and maybe we'll get Abby a kiddie digital for Christmas and we can follow her for a day through her eyes.
• Nature scavenger hunt - we decided that it was a bit more of an effort than we wanted to put in, in order to do it in a way that Abby would enjoy participating in. Laziness is my only reason.

Items we didn't get to and may or may not complete before the snow flies:

• reading date - we can do this any time of year, but we have done picnic type reading dates that are nice outside. We don't often get quiet time to just read, so we've learned that this can be an enjoyable shoulder to shoulder time
• fly a kite - we don't actually have one, but we could borrow one
• go out for gelato
• water 'fight' 
• play in a sprinkler or some fun water toy
• corn maze
• decorate the house - for an un-occassion just because
• go to Old Revival House Co. - this one's for me and I don't want to take the children
• backyard movie theatre - this would be a great group date night and I'd love to do it this fall, yet
• bake - technically I did this, but I put it on the list to do with Abby (I'm not a lover of kitchen domesticity so this hasn't been a priority for me)
• family time at the Prayer Furnace (city prayer house of prayer) - we'd like to do this on a regular basis, but haven't made it yet
• Kung Fu Panda 2 movie - missed the theatre, but can wait for the DVD

Overall, it's been a great way to accommodate Gingras Family Adventures this summer. We are definitely doing it again next year thank you for "joining" in on our adventures.

T-shirt Skirt for Me

I made this skirt quite awhile ago. It was supposed to be a practise skirt, but I have worn it a couple of times in public. There are a few flaws, which I will fix next time I make it. It's comfy and easy and one of those projects that looks like it took a lot more effort than it did. I used 4 of David's old undershirts that he had retired to my fabric collection. I saw one on Pinterest and looked at the pics on the blog link. I didn't read how the blogger did it, I just winged it. I want to go second hand shopping for t-shirts now and make a bunch.

Checkin' In

Checkin' in with a few things I wanted to share with you.

• I never showed you pics from Malachi's first haircut (they were taken on my phone and I only recently got them onto the computer) he was only 5 months old!

• David didn't have a chance to work on the children's play kitchen this week, but we were given stove knobs from friends who replaced their stove and a faucet from friends who own an apartment block and had dud taps in their scrap bin. Great finds for their kitchen.
• I've joined the party a little late, but one week in and I'm loving it so far!
• I sewed a new bag - inspired by this (found on Pinterest)... I just made it up as I went along. It's my first zipper closed bag and though I'd change a few things, it's working just fine.

• PSLs are coming to Winnipeg this Friday - I asked David to stop in on his way home from work to get us some. Calgary has been enjoying theirs since Tuesday.
• we're fighting fall colds, baby is teething and dolly is potty training, so it's been a challenging week at home. It was SOOOO good to be in church this morning!!!!
• we checked off more of our summer list and since it's September, I think we'll do a wrap up post next. We've decided that we want to do a winter fun list, too.
• It's time to book family pictures - it will be our first since Malachi joined the Gingras clan.
• I'm loving the fall weather and can't wait to pack away our window air conditioners so that we can open the windows again.
• Our parenting class is officially done now, though it feels like we just started on the work. It was a great course and so encouraging to be with other families who are like minded and going through some of the same challenges as we are.
• I miss my David. Two days a week just aren't enough!
• There's still time to donate to Maggie's Walk for the Smile Train

Maggie's Walk

Friends of ours have a darling little girl who was born with a bilateral cleft lip and palate. After several surgeries already (Maggie's not quite one yet), the surgeons still aren't finished. Fortunately, these surgeries are covered by health care here, but this is not the case in many countries. Deryk and Donna (Maggie's parents) have joined the Smile Train, a not for profit organization that teams up with and empowers local doctors in developing countries to perform cleft lip and palate surgeries at no cost. They are hosting a fundraising event they've name Maggie's Walk. Their goal is to raise as much as they can to see that as many children get a happy new smile and a bright future. The walk will be taking place on September 25 here in Winnipeg. Unfortunately, we will not be able to attend as a family. David's schedule at work currently includes every Sunday. This is disappointing for us as we really wanted to stand up and support Deryk and Donna in this venture. I decided, though, that I could write to you all about this great event and organization. Please visit the website for Maggie's Walk and Smile Train for more information. If you feel like you could contribute, you can send donations through this link and it goes under Maggie's name to the Smile Train. Donations will be accepted through this link until the end of September. Thanks for your consideration.