Weekly Wrap-Up - January 6

I don't think I've quite wrapped my mind around the fact that it's 2014! Weren't we just worrying about Y2K? (yes, I'm old . . .) anyway . . .

We started the week off at Mama and Papa's house. We had tons of fun there.

Sunday was sewing day! I REALLY should have taken pictures, the girls brought their sewing machine with them, and Mama got her machine out, so they had quite the sewing party going on.  Ashlyn and Mama made the purple skirt that Mama gave her (as fabric and a promise) for Christmas. She has a shirt that matches it PERFECTLY, so she's thrilled with her new outfit. Mama had some pink knit fabric that we realized would be cute paired with a t-shirt and made into a t-shirt dress for Lexie and Lexie also had a shirt that she wanted to find fabric for and make into a t-shirt dress so we headed out shopping. We found a purple t-shirt that looks great with the pink fabric, and then hit the JACKPOT at the clearance table at JoAnn's Fabric! We found some adorable fabric to go with Lexie's shirt, but also ended up getting fabric to make a shirt and skirt for Ashlyn and 2 or 3 more dresses (some summer) for Lexie. She's at a size now where finding "play dresses" without spending $30+ each doesn't happen, so, since she REALLY prefers dresses, making her dresses is the best option.

Monday, we headed to a friend's house. The kids all get along great and pretty much as soon as we walked in the door they all were off playing and having a blast. At lunch the kids were all trying to figure out a way for us to just stay there for a few weeks, it's great to see how well all the kids get along! In the afternoon we went over to their 70 acres of woods. The cars had barely stopped when Lexie and Ashlyn and the 3 boys disappeared into the woods and we didn't see them until it was almost time to leave!  The boys' dad was working clearing trees, so he saw them a few times, and snapped the picture of them as they popped up over the bank when he called them :)  The boys told the girls their clothes were too bright. Lexie HATES pants of any kind but concedes grudgingly that pants are a better option for playing with M&N in the woods, but she won't do jeans, so she was wearing hot pink sweat pants. Ashlyn was wearing jeans and a gray jacket, so not too bad . . . the boys told them they needed camouflage LOL.

When they finally came in, frozen solid and CAKED with mud, they begged for us to stay for supper. We compromised and went out to eat together, before heading home. M asked if we could come over sometime when it snowed. . . ummm . . . you live 3 hours from us, on a mountain, that doesn't sound like a drive I want to make in the snow, sorry . . . his solution was that we could come BEFORE it snowed and just stay with them until the snow melts LOL. My kids thought it was a great idea too us moms were more non-committal.

Back and my parents' house I did laundry. I threw the girls' muddy clothes in by themselves and ran a rinse cycle. At the end of the rinse, the entire inside of the washer, up to the waterline, was CAKED with mud! Those were some MUD-DY clothes! I ran another empty rinse cycle and the machine was clean.

Tuesday we went to another friend's house. The kids were all smart enough to stay inside most of the time that day (they did go feed the neighbor's horses), but still had lots of fun.  The big girls helped E with her new sewing machine, Little Bit happily played with their VERY TOLERANT dog most of the day LOL.  Ashlyn also really enjoyed playing with the 1 yr old he's a sweetie :)

Wednesday morning the girls fit in some more sewing, getting some work on one of Lexie's dresses and finishing up Ashlyn's skirt, before we headed home.

And we got home just in time for MORE SNOW!!! Thursday morning we madly ran errands to get them in before the bad weather hit, and then it snowed Thursday night and was BITTERLY COLD on Friday.

Thursday afternoon we packed up all the Christmas stuff, but it's still in bins stacked in the hallway because it's been SOOO cold, and SOOO icy that I haven't been willing to carry the boxes out to the garage to store them away. We were all amused at how "big" the living room felt when we took the tree down. I told the girls, next time we start to feel like some part of our house is too small, we just need to move some other large, bulky thing into the space for a couple weeks and then take it back out, it'll seem plenty big again :)

Sabbath was cold, but clear, so we headed to church, but I wasn't feeling great, and Rodney, who'd planned to come later, and bring food for lunch at the church, discovered his car wouldn't start, so I came home after Sabbath school, and stayed home while he went back for church and lunch.  I have to admit, I LOVED having a couple hours to just sit quietly and listen to podcasts of a favorite pastor's sermons (I heard 3 sermons and could actually pay attention without distractions!). I honestly think my body was just reminding me that I had been around people ALL.THE.TIME. for the last couple of weeks and I desperately needed some alone time to recharge. By late afternoon I was feeling fine.

So that was our busy week. Friday was the only day that we did "normal" school, but we got in tons of "PE" and "home ec" and listening to some great literature and science CDs in the car during all our driving around, so it was an educational week, just even more "unschoolish" than usual :)