Ray's Perfect Valentine's Dinner

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Bacon Wrapped Pineapple with BBQ Dipping Sauce
Bacon, Lettuce, Tomato Sandwich with Mircle Whip (minus tomato and added cheese)
Chocolate Cake tower with Chocolate mousse and crushed Oreos with Oreo Ice Cream

That's Ray's "Love Language" :)

I *Heart* Crayons

I promise this is my last "melting crayons" craft for a while. It's a phase, and I'm happy to say, I'm almost through it. It's been fun at the Darwins'! I want to note that I did this project during rest time. There's way to much melted wax and fire for me to consider letting my little guys help. They have enjoyed playing with the results.

I originally heard about this idea from Wendi and Heather. You can check out the Family Fun write-up here. I Googled around a little, and here's my interpretation of Crayon Hearts.

1. De-paper and separate crayons by color families. They don't have to match perfect, just get the greens with the greens, etc. Break them up into little pieces.


2. Get a shallow pan of water boiling. I tried to find recyclable glass containers to melt the crayons in. I couldn't find enough, but found some sippy cups that no longer have spouts that were ready to be trashed. They now have a new found use. DON'T use anything you want to keep and then use for food. This stuff isn't coming off easy.


3. I started melting the red. I used bamboo skewers to stir it as it melted. This didn't take long.


4. I poured the red first into little heart shaped ice cube trays I got at JoAnn's for a buck-fifty each. As I poured a color, I set another color in the water to start melting. You want the color to set up slightly before adding the next.


5. I just followed the rules of ROY G. BIV (although, we stopped at blue), let them set up for about 30 minutes and popped them out. I felt like a mad chemist stirring the batches and pouring them into the little hearts. Easy and fun! Also, I kept the containers to use next time.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Much love to all! This is part of the cool mail that Heather sent me. It's going to look great this spring with different flowers displayed in it. I'm so excited! I would add pictures of the great little socks Miranda got from Lindsey and the cool dinosaur that Sam got from Michael, but they are being worn and played with. Thanks, Heather!

I finished Miranda's teacher gifts last night. I'm really happy with how they turned out. Here's a picture of one of the finished cards:

And this is a picture of the cards all wrapped up. I put 5 different cards in each package with the envelopes behind a little note of thanks on the front. I hope they like them :)

Teeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeese!

Just for fun...........

Sam saying "TEEEEEEESE" to the camera :)

Miranda's Watercolors

Here's the results......tada!

I'll admit, it made me a little nervous to have my young'un working over a hot plate. I hovered, she followed directions, and these are the fronts to the beautiful cards her teachers will receive.

Watercolor with Crayons!

I wanted to share a really cool kid craft that my good friend Wendi told me about. First of all, let me say she is the QUEEN of card making. I don't hold a candle to her, but I intend to have a little fun with Miranda and make some pretty little teach V-day gifts. The plan is to whip up 4 or 5 of these for each of her teachers and put them together as a little stationery gift. I'll update you with her actual cards later.

Here's a little tutorial I made for my many, many readers.

First, gather your supplies. You'll need:

• watercolor paper (I got a tablet of 12 sheets at Michael's for less than $5)



• crayons (tear ALL the paper off...the crayon melts quickly and you don't want to have to wrestle with that paper when the creative juices are flowing.)



• adhesive (a glue stick will work in a crunch. Wendi suggests Mono Adhesive...permanent)



• masking tape



• electric griddle



• foil



• cardstock or pre-folded cards



• envelopes

Here are the steps:

1. Tear your paper into the size you want your art to be. I wanted to use mine as cards, so I tore them a little smaller than the cards, making sure I could back them with a cardstock to make a little frame. Now, I'm not the best tearer, so I use this little tearing ruler, but it's totally not necessary.



2. Cover your cool griddle with foil. Tape the paper to the foil with masking tape. This serves two purposes. One, it will hold the paper down while you color. Two, it will make a nice clean border on the paper after you color and remove the tape.




3. Turn the griddle to about 250 degrees. Play with this...I started at 200, but found it melted better/faster at 250.




4. I used an oven mitt on my left hand to hold the foil. I probably should have taped it somewhere to keep it still. Miranda obviously isn't going to be doing this by herself, so I'll probably hold it for her with the mitt.



5. Color! Wendi said flower pictures work really well because you can't do a lot of detail and it's kind of distorted like a watercolor. Fill in ALL the white space with color.



6. I popped the whole piece of foil, pictures and all, in the freezer for a quick cool down. I turned the griddle off.




7. When the wax was cool, I simply removed the masking tape, mounted the picture on the black cardstock and then mounted that on the card. I'll have Miranda sign her name very tiny (artsy) with a pencil in the white part.

Here's the sample Wendi just emailed me that her little girl did. She taped the border a little wider and used glitter crayons for part of the flower! LOVE IT!

Please, exercise caution around the hot plate. It was really just warm, but it's still something to be very careful around. This is probably a great activity for older elementary school kids.

Have fun!

Another Candle on the Cake

So, I'm 32 now. It's all good. Really, the 30s are the new 20s. I got a great new soup pot and medium skillet from my family. Both in my favorite color...red. I also got several cards and vase of flowers and a box of chocolate from Monica. With my birthday money (am I 7?....I *heart* birthday money) I've gotten a new study bible, highlighters and I will get a new digital food scale from Weight Watchers that figures the points. I'm really happy with my little haul :)

I was asking my mom about my birth story. I've heard it a million times, but wanted to make sure I had all the details straight to put them in here. So here it goes....

It was a very, VERY cold night in February. If you're from the panhandle of Texas, you know how cold it can get. I've often heard, "There's nothing between the North Pole and [insert name of panhandle town here] but a barbed wire fence." It was snowing like crazy...a real blizzard. My mom and dad had gone to bed, and when she stretched at midnight her water broke. She had to convince my dad to NOT take a shower and start heading to the hospital. The door was frozen shut on the house, and he had to kick it down. They drove to the hospital in the El Camino (which they later noticed had a flat), and got to the hospital about 1:30am.

They got settled in and the nurse told them the doctor wasn't going to make it. He couldn't get to the hospital because of all the snow. My mom asked him if he had ever delivered a baby and said, "Oh, yeah. Lots of babies." She later found out I was the first. I was born about 2:30am.

They tried to call my grandparents, but the lines were down. They somehow managed to get in touch with one of my dad's friends. He slipped and slid over to my mom's parents' house and told them the good news. My grandmother was recovering from a really bed accident, but my grandfather got up and started putting his suit on complete with tie. My grandmother asked him what he was doing and he said, "I'm going to see my grandbaby."

So that's how I made my grand entrance!

New Book

I finished The Memory Keeper's Daughter a few weeks ago. It was a so-so book. The first half was interesting and then the ending had me kind of scratching my head. I'm still not sure how I feel about the whole thing. Book club is next week. I usually have a better understanding of the book after discussing it with the ladies, so we'll see.

I've got a non-fiction book on the night stand now. I enjoy a little Oprah from time to time, and Dr. Oz days are my faves. This book is a little bogged down with his humor, but the message is clear and easy to understand. I'm on chapter 3 right now. Anyone else out there reading it? I'll comment more on it as I digest it (hehe:).

There's one of the things I've been wanting to add....let's see if we can focus long enough to get to the other 9 before week's end!

Mind Blogging

I've talked with some of you about this, but it seems like I'm ALWAYS blogging away in my head. Before blogs, I was constantly writing thank you notes or emails. Is this a disorder? Do I need medication? I've got about 10 items of interest I'd like to share, but I can't seem to sit down and get it all out in a post. I'm going to write them down as they come to me so I don't forget them, so stay tuned....I've got some good stuff!