Happy Thanksgiving

This is Ethan caught slightly off guard just as he got home from school yesterday. They had celebrated their "feast" and he came home with a "pattern pouch" and a headdress. Cute picture.
But I cropped it.
It's amazing what I can crop out, and what slices of my world I can choose to show you in this little window of my life. This is the original picture, pre-cropping. I thought it would fun to show you the "real me", well at least my real kitchen as it looks every day without being "dressed" for pictures. I even included labels... so enjoy!

A: Our old step back cupboard. When we acquired this house (it was my great grandma's, then my great aunt's, then my parent's but my sister rented it from them, then mine, then my cousin rented it, and now we own it....phew!) this piece of furniture was in two pieces in two different rooms. Both pieces were painted white. The bottom piece had contact paper stuck all over the top of it. My MIL stripped it for us. She was concerned that the woods were different colors...but we love it. We keep 90% of our kitchen "stuff" here. According to this picture, 75% of it must be in the dishwasher at this moment.

B: A big ole bowl of Halloween candy. My kids are notorious for forgetting that they have candy in the house... Me? Not so forgetful.

C: The TV we watch most in the house. It will stop working in Feb 2009 unless we do something. We are old fashioned and we live under a rock.... no cable or satellite here. Oh, it's available- we just choose to go with out.

D: This little spot constitutes 33.3% of our total counter space in this kitchen.

E: Apples!! Justin is making applesauce for Thanksgiving as I type this.

F: Ethan's other Thanksgiving project... a place mat. He has been playing a combination chess/checkers game on it ever since he brought it home.

G: Cate's coat. Cate is one of the little ones I watch. We don't really have a great place to put coats so hers usually ends up on a chair. And speaking of chairs you may notice that we only have two...one on either end of the table. The chairs that came with the table have all fallen apart. We bought two replacement chairs and use benches on the long sides of the table. Justin made one... one is an antique.

H: The never ending pile... do you have one of these? There is always crap lying around on the step back. Its so annoying. As you can see there is a dust mask lying there.... wtf?

So.... what do you think? I'm not really sure why I did that... but it was fun. I sometimes feel like we only show the good and polished pieces of ourselves out here in blog land. And why wouldn't we?? I am totally guilty of this. I know my life is a cluttered mess, but here in this little space I can pretend it's not. But after I cropped the picture (to show Ethan off better) and compared it to the original, I laughed and thought, gosh... look at all I cut out!! So much about who I really am. All the nitty gritty. The cluttered fridge, covered with pictures of my kids, and my nieces and nephews and friend's kids, and the notes that come home from school (the trees!!! the trees!!! think of the trees! good lord stop sending notes home!) the scrubbed up table, and the gross low ceiling and the dirty floor. But lots of living takes place here in our kitchen... so I am happy to have invited you here too!!!

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving!!

Turkey Day Decorations

A few years ago I went to a fantastic fabric store in downtown Rochester, which has since gone out of business. It was when I was just starting to do crafty/sewing "stuff"so in my naivete I didn't realize just how totally awesome the store was. Too bad, because I would have bought a lot more stuff! I did grab up some of these mattress springs, without a clue as to what I would do with them when I got home, but they looked fun.
Inspiration struck, and I made springy-turkey decorations, or as my friend Sue calls them "boingy things".

I traced each of my kids hands onto brown felt and then made a stuffed turkey out of it... sort of like what is happening over at Bella Dia, then sort of slid them onto the spring (the wire goes right through the body of the turkey). I love getting these out every year. My children seem to be growing up so quickly (don't you hate how that happens?) and this is a nice reminder of when they were smaller. The very first year I had these on display I had a bundle of wheat stalks inside each one. It looked pretty neat that way. Maybe I'll have to go get some more.

The next year I saw a great Thanksgiving banner at pottery barn kids (the link may not be the actual one as it was a few years ago and they don't make it any more- but it's close). Of course after looking at the gazillion dollar price tag, I thought, "Hey I can make that! And so I did. I think this is year three with the banner and year four with the boingy things.

I also made a funky-looking turkey table decoration. But since I don't have a nice table to put this on he gets hung on the door. (Don't you just love the little baby sock lying there? It belongs to the wee one who is sleeping in my lap right now.)
I love that the Thanksgiving decorations are somewhat sparse and simple- just like I think the holiday should be. OK, well, maybe not sparse... I do love a nice big Thanksgiving meal, but I like how Thanksgiving brings me back to what is really important... the small stuff, right? (I wrote the post in the link in 2006)

And speaking of small stuff, check this out....

our hen's very first egg!!! Discovered last night by a very excited 11 year old! Oh- and don't forget to leave me a comment, any comment, just say "Hi" and you'll be entered into my making amends drawing.

Turkeys!

The 1st graders in my children's school do a project called "Gorgeous Gobblers" every November. They bring home an outline of a turkey on white card stock with instructions to decorate him in any many and with any medium they choose. And the family can help! This is the turkey Hudson (and I) made back when he was in 1st grade. Every November since his creation he hangs on a wall or a door to help us usher in Thanksgiving Day.

And this is the one Ethan made last night. I just provided the materials and cut out a few felt feathers and get did the rest. I love it! It has to go back to school to be hung in the hall with all the other Gorgeous Gobblers, but he'll be part of our permanent Thanksgiving collection soon as well.

I feel a little guilty because I didn't save the one Alex made, and it would be so cool to have all three displayed together... but Alex used cereal to decorate hers, so it deteriorated. Too bad. I wish I had had the for thought to at least photograph it.