Just Linking

Here are two places you should visit sometime Thursday:

First of all, head on over to Cally's place for a chance to win this awesome bag (and I almost didn't post about it because I really want to win, but I decided to be the bigger person and share the love).

And then get ready to spend some time and some cash over at Design Mom, where she's hosting Nie Nie Day with an auction and she'll be linking to tons of other blogs that are celebrating as well.

Characters

A big thank-you to Julie who let Josh borrow this Spider-Man costume. He has worn it every day. Lydia likes it too.

Then one day I found Lydia wandering around looking like this.

And I liked it too.

Summer Legs

The Cruze kids like to play outside. A lot. More than anything else. Now that school's started they are very sad that it's limited to a couple of hours a day. You can tell how much they prefer the great outdoors by examining their legs. All eight of the littlest limbs around here are a constantly evolving display of scrapes and bruises and mosquito bites. We have never gone through band-aids so quickly. Even Lydia, who does not get to go outside nearly as often as the big kids, fell off her bike once and got pretty scraped up. When the big three are out there it's only a matter of time before one of them comes in because they're bleeding. And every morning I can count on Josh complaining about how itchy he is (apparently Josh is much tastier than the others). I don't mind. I'm glad outside is where they want to be, you know, getting their exercise and using their imaginations and all that. It's worth a few boxes of band-aids.

In true Olympic spirit, I want to be a winner.

Have you heard of Grosgrain yet? Design Mom gave me a heads up a few days ago and I am enthralled. This really, really nice lady named Kathleen Dougherty likes to sew. She's got a blog and wanted to increase her hits so she had a brilliant idea. Why not give away hand-made clothes all the time? (That's a great way to make friends!) You enter her giveaways by linking to the post on her blog featuring the item you want to win. I want to win this:

Grosgrain: Garden Party Frock GIVEAWAY!!!!

You can expect periodic posts from me in the future featuring the cute clothes I want to win.

Don't you want it too? Well, you can't have it because I'm going to win.

First Day of School!

Again??

Yes it's here. Emma and Ben are having a good time but I'm beginning to think that the school day should start just a little later and end just a little earlier.

Scripture Totes

Last night I finally finished up these little scripture totes for Ben and Josh. (I was almost done with them last week, but then I got a copy of a long-anticipated, saga finale in my hands and well, you understand. Those 768 pages were not going to read themselves...priorities.) It's been awhile since I made a bag so I was glad for the practice. I learned several things and have a mental list of improvements for next time. But meanwhile the boys have something to carry their scriptures to church in and somewhere to put the papers and drawings they always come home with.

Jumping Boys

I just felt like the boys needed a post of their own.

Whenever Ben and Josh see the camera the first thing they request is for me to take photos of them jumping. It had been awhile, so I indulged them. It is very tricky to time it right and try to catch them both in the air. In the bottom two they are jumping off the ottoman.

More finished projects

I'm finally back to sewing a little. For some reason it's just taken forever to get back into since we moved. I picked up a nice little sewing table I found on craigslist and that has helped me find the motivation and time again. It's set up in the bonus room in one of the gables with a baby gate standing guard. Now that I can leave the sewing machine out and all the stuff in one place and half-finished projects have somewhere to hang out while they're waiting and the whole thing is so much easier. So Lydia and Emma each got their own shirred tops (Lydia's is all Joel Dewberry fabrics that I love and Emma's is from the fabric I won from Sew Mama Sew way back in March). Voila!

Baby Names

Thanks for all the name ideas...I can tell that all of you have a firm grasp on the type of girls' name that we're looking for: old fashioned, pretty, feminine.
There are many names that I really like but don't want to use. Either because they are taken by a close relative (Claire, Jenica, Julia (too close to Julie)), too similar to "Emma" (like pretty much any short name that starts and ends with a vowel: Ella, Anna), have nicknames I don't like (I like Elizabeth but not Lizzy or Liz), or are making a little bit too dramatic of a comeback (I love Sophia and Olivia, but worry about her being one of 10 in her grade growing up).
But like I said, these are all names that I think are beautiful, so many of them are not 100% out of the running.
I've had a list on my fridge for a couple of weeks. I keep adding new ones to consider and erasing the ones that lose their sparkle after looking at them for a few days or that have been 86ed by my handsome co-creator. I thought it would be fun to share this evolving list on my sidebar for awhile. (Feedback is welcome, but be nice...and no you don't actually get to vote.)

Saturday Projects

Oooh, I love a good productive Saturday. Those seem to be far and few between these days, and we know they will be nonexistent come soccer season (the big three are all playing this year). So we are taking full advantage of our August Saturdays...
Scott spent the last one doing this:
Doesn't that look so perfect? Now our trash can has somewhere to sit instead of on a dead patch of grass, and it's right off the back door so it's easy to take trash out.
I spent Lydia's nap (yeah, she still takes them most days) doing this:
I couldn't reach the top shelves, so those will have to wait till we can borrow a ladder, but I love the way they turned out. (I'll have to take another photo when they're all done, I've put all the stuff back on the shelves and found a big mirror for the mantel.) Hooray for Saturdays!