Must be too many irons in the fire!

Man, oh man. I haven't posted since September 5th! Where exactly does the time go? I must be having fun...Don't they say that time flys when you're having fun? Well, we did have something extra special happen last Friday, September 21st...we got a very special addition to our little herd of alpacas. She is just a doll! She doesn't have a name yet. And no, we HADN'T considered Delilah! She was born bright and early in the pouring rain! So much for alpacas being born between 8 a.m. and 12 noon! Ha, ha! Oh, and so much for them being born on a sunny day! Well, it did clear off and turn into a bright and very warm day until about noon when the wind switched and it turned cold again. I am just happy it got warm shortly after she had her and she was able to dry off and get used to her new legs and surroundings while it was warm out instead of the bitter cold we had the few days before her birth.


Isn't she just the sweetest?

My son turns 7 today! We had his birthday festivities this past weekend. He's still crazy about Pirates and being the Aaaaaaaaartistic being that I am, I just had to create a Pirate party he would never forget. The cake was extra fun to make:


The cake surrounded with lots of loot

I sent the kiddos out to find pieces of eight all over the house, yard, and way out to the woods. My favorite clue was found out in our patch of woods, found hanging from a stake:

Hum, hum alpacas

Have ye any food?

Avast matie! Avast matie! Three bags full

One that isn’t opened

And one we don’t use

And one covered with a lid, which hides ye next clue


The kids had a great time with the water balloon fight despite NOT being able to create two giant pirate ships from cardboard boxes like I had intended. I had the kids walk the plank blind folded (a wooden board stradled across two cement blocks). The best part, I drew sharks with sidewalk chalk circling the plank and even had a shark emerging from the water ready to bite it's next victim. I should have gotten a picture before the kiddos threw water all over it during the water balloon fight. It was VERY cool! Makes me want to draw again!



Now, on a more crafty note. I joined in on the cloth-along going on with my looming dishcloth group over on yahoo. The group unanimously decided to include any type of dishcloths and NOT limit them to loomed ones. Here are my crocheted dishcloth dresses:



I decided to design an alpaca winter hat using the Fair Isle or Standed Color knitting method. I intend on looming my hat. It would make a cute bag too!
© 2007 Karen J. Gielen. All rights reserved. This design is my own creation. I was not able to find a pattern anywhere and had to make my own. Please do not copy, take or distribute without my written consent!

Have a great day!

RLS - Nightmare on County Rd 155

It's maddening. The more tired I am, the worse it gets. Night after night it is a ficious cycle. I am going crazy with it. How can it affect just one leg? I am trapped in a nightmare but I am not even sleeping! At midnight I got back out of bed to research this horrible disorder. I need to work on cutting caffeine from my diet. I need to try adding more folate. I could have severe kidney failure. Oh boy, this gets worse. Looks like I can expect it to get even worse as I age. Oh, wonderful!


Amanda in her Sunday best at Granny and Grandfather's Anniversary Celebration 8-26-07

We finally brought our alpacas home! It took a few days for them to settle in but now they are right at home. I just love going out there and feeding and stroking their soft coats. Our baby boy, Samson, is so friendly and just the cutest little puff ball of fur. You could just hug and squeeze him. I am well into reading this book on of the ranches gave as a gift to us on handling and herding Alpacas. No wonder I like them so much, their mannerisms resemble cats in so many ways. They even use a communial toilet area and do not go all over the pasture.


Paige in her Sunday best at Granny and Grandfather's Anniversary Celebration 8-26-07

Go to go feed the alpacas...

Up With The Chickens

Children are funny. My son has been attending summer school since July 9th and every day he has to go to school I have to shake him awake to get him up and ready for school (he needs to be out the door by 7:20 a.m.). He doesn't have school on Fridays and can sleep in if his little heart so desires. Wouldn't you know it, he is up with the chickens on Fridays. He was up at 6:00 a.m. this morning wide eyed and bushy tailed! My day to sleep in too, you know! My youngest was really crabby this morning too. During school days she sleeps til 9:00. Today she was up at 6:00 a.m. too and CRABBY! A mother can't win sometimes.

My husband took this photo at Twin Harbors, MN. It was a port we discovered by accident while looking for some other attractions driving along the north shore. We spent a couple hours near this port watching and waiting for the ships to leave dock so my husband could see it head back out to open water. There was this peer that went way out into the lake with a fog horn on the tip. That day it was incredibly foggy and there was this giant sign warning people to stand clear since the decibles of the fog horn could knock a person over. We didn't get to hear the fog horn on the peer but the ships horn was blarring as it head out to open water. There were two ships at port when we were there. One was able to leave port without any trouble, but the second one had to turn back into port and try the process again. It was a longer ship and was closer to the shoreline. It looked as though it was having trouble with the shallow water and rocks near shore.

This little tugboat is what brought us near the habor in Twin Ports. I spotted a sign that said tugboat tours while driving through Twin Ports. Turns out, it was just a tour where you got to look around the little tugboat while it was ported. We thought we might be able to board the tugboat and get a "tour" of the shoreline. Although we didn't board this tugboat, we were glad we came to the peer since we got to see a ship leave shore and got to see it up close. After we left Twin Harbors we headed up the north shore to Split Rock lighthouse. Up in the lighthouse is some of the most beautiful views of the lake and shoreline!


View from Split Rock Lighthouse

Catcicles

Ok, I know it's hot. It has to be hot when even the kids think it's hot. They thought the kittens were hot too apparently. They thought they were being nice to the poor little kitty when they put her in the freezer. If I hadn't gone out to the freezer to look for something to make for supper we would have had catcicles! I just wanted to ask my four year old if she did it and she must have thought I was really upset, I chased her all around the yard -- man she's fast! I sat the kids down in the house when everything settled down and explained to them that no matter how nice they thought they were being to the kittens, they would have killed the poor things. Oh, the things little children do.

I haven't posted in a while since I am so darn busy with all of the preperations for my parents 50th. I have completed the program flyer, you can see what it looks like here. Now I am working on the cake design. I was able to create a beautiful sugar rose from sugar paste this afternoon. I am practicing up so the cake is the best it can be. My intentions are to make white roses and dust them with edible gold dust. I took a picture of it and will post when I get my disc filled up. I just have finishing touches to make to the video presentation and that should be good to go. Now I just need to figure out how to project it from my computer onto a projector screen or the wall.

Our Little Getaway

Last month my hubby and I managed to sneak away up north to Duluth, MN for a weekend (with baby in tow) leaving the other five kiddos behind. We had a wonderful time sight-seeing at Split Rock Lighthouse, Gooseberry Falls, and Twin Harbors. I had the pleasure of getting a Suddenly Slender seaweed wrap and was able to shed 6 lbs! No, I haven't gained it back and it is a whole month later. My hubby treated me to it for our anniversary. Duluth is the only location in the entire state of MN that has an authorized wrap facility. That got me thinking...maybe I should open one down here in central MN. Well, I sent for the info from Suddenly Slender and after reviewing the info and doing a little research, I determined it wasn't the right direction for me. I would love for someone else to open up a facility closer to me, however, you would have a guaranteed return customer!

Until next time...

Just call me creADHDivkj!

I've self diagnosed myself with creative ADHD. I have so many creative ideas swimming like made around in my head and I can't seem to stay focused on one idea for very long and then I am off and working on another idea. I should change my nickname from cre8tivkj to creADHDivkj, LOL! Here are some projects I've been working on...

I've had flip flops on my brain lately. First a gal in my looming dishcloths group mentioned she would love to see a flip flop dishcloth pattern so I set out to make one (more on that in a bit). I worked on that for several days making my chart and making my prototype and reworking the pattern, etc., etc...Then my stepdaughter's 10th birthday party quickly decended upon me and I had to quick figure out something "cool" to put on her cake. I got the crazy idea I was going to make a flip flop shaped cake. I hunted my fool head off for days looking for flip flop cake pans to no avail. I decided I was just going to have to make my own pans. Yes, you read it right, I had to MAKE my own pans! I then set out figuring out how I was going to do that. I found in the grocery store a foil roasting pan (the disposable kind you use to roast a turkey in) I decided I could some how form it into the desired shape. WRONG! I bent and twisted and formed and fussed and messed with that crazy thing for more than an hour. It was 10:30 on Monday evening (the night before my stepdaughter's birthday), I was getting desperate. It seems like inspiration always strikes me when my time is running out. I finally decided to cut out of cardboard the shape of the flip flop, cover the shape in tin foil and then cut the sides from the disposable foil pan and form the sides around my flip flop bottoms, clip the corners (as you would clip material when sewing to form corners) and I secured the foil pan together with heavy duty packing tape on the bottom of the pan. I went to bed apprehensive if this would even work. The next morning I sat and thought for a moment, I couldn't possible bake anything in this pan (the tape would not hold up to the heat) so I brain stormed for a bit and thought of making a nobake cheesecake. I got excited when I realized that the crushed graham crackers would look like sand on the beach and I was going to crush extra crackers and scatter them around the cake once I pulled the form from around the cake (I forgot all about this creative thought, however, when the 6, 8, 9, and 10 year old girls and boys started showing up for the party and the noise in my house went up 20 notches, LOL!). Here's the finished cake:


Coolest Flip Flop Birthday Cake Ever!

I completed my daughter's beach themed birthday party by making her a cute beach scene banner she and her friends and brother's and sister's could get their pictures taken with. The kid's really got a kick out of this banner. They laughed and laughed getting their pictures taken as a "Surfer Dude" and a "Hawaiian Hoola Dancer". Kaden and Sam (my boys) took turns being the "Hawaiian Hoola Dancer" and "Surfer Dude":


Sam poses as the "Surfer Dude" while Kaden poses as the "Hawaiian Hoola Dancer"


The proud birthday girl adored her flip flop cake.

Now, back to the flip flop dishcloths I am designing. I have completed my first test pattern and I have two ladies lined up to test two more prototypes and I will be ready to release my design. I have a really neat idea to jazz up the design (I promise, you won't be dissapointed). Stay tuned for pictures and the FREE pattern for you to try out for yourself.

Another creative project I recently completed is the blog banner and blog button I made for my friend Vivian McKnight. I really enjoy reading Vivian's posts on her blog and on the Yahoo groups we both belong to so I handpicked her to help me write a big project I am working on (yet another creative project in the works). As a big THANK YOU gift to her I wanted to design something just for her. She told me what she envisioned for her blog and the following picture formed in my mind:


Vivian's Blog Banner

I am almost finished with my parent's 50th Wedding Anniversary video presentation. It's been a huge, time consuming (but enjoyable) project. I've added so much since my mom and dad got a sneak peek. I was able to work some things in that are very meaninful to them and I do hope everyone enjoys watching what I've so enjoyed putting together. I wish I could share this BIG project here on my blog, but unfortunately, it is 125 MB and would never upload to the web. It is nearly 30 minutes long and contains video clips, music, photos, and voice over narrations.

3 a.m. wake up call!

BEEP BEEP BEEP! ALERT! FIRE! GET OUT OF THE HOUSE! BEEP BEEP BEEP! ALERT! FIRE! GET OUT OF THE HOUSE... Imagine gettting a wake up call at 3 a.m. that your house is on fire! That is exactly what happened to my family last night. I flew out of bed so fast, I was the first one up. I screamed at my husband "LEE! FIRE!" and ran into the hallway to grab our little girls. But, there wasn't any smoke. My husband jumped out of bed and together we ran through the house trying to find the fire. Our inline smoke detector also detects carbon monoxide and we thought maybe this is what set it off.

We ran downstairs to check on the kids in the basement. They were all up, eyes wide with fright. We checked every room and found no smoke, no fire. I told my husband to go outside and see if he could see any smoke coming from the roof. No smoke. We were puzzled. Our sleepy minds couldn't figure out what had happened.

The alarm started up again...BEEP BEEP BEEP! ALERT! FIRE! GET OUT OF THE HOUSE! BEEP BEEP BEEP! ALERT! FIRE! GET OUT OF THE HOUSE... We suddenly remembered that we had a plug in carbon monoxide detector we could plug in and see if it was going off due to carbon monoxide. But where was it? The last anyone had seen it was in our office. 3 a.m. is not the best time to look for something that someone thought they saw somewhere. We are still recovering from a whole house move and things are still unpacked and we still have boxes stacked in our closet. We couldn't find the carbon monoxide detector.

The alarm had shut off at this point so we could only assume it had malfunctioned. The only other way to set off this alarm is to purposely press the button to test the alarm. No one had pressed the button. We milled around the house for awhile, uncertain what had happened, relunctant to go back to bed.

After we decided it was safe to go back to bed, a bad thunderstorm came through and my husband climbed back out of bed and turned on the t.v. to track the storm. I drifted off to sleep, the thought of determining a fire escape plan for myself, my husband, and our two girls upstairs. We have already figured out an escape plan and a meeting place for the four kids we have in the basement. Our eldest daughter has a removeable ladder on her bunk bed and it is perfect to hook up into the window wells so each of the kids can climb out and run to safety to the swingset. Please, please, do not wait until 3 a.m. to figure out an escape plan! Do not wait until your mind is half asleep like we did. This 3 a.m. wake up call woke us up to the fact we hadn't planned anything.

Below are some websites that are great for helping you determine an escape plan for you and your family:

Home Fire Escape Plan

Exit Drills in the Home

Don't Let This Happen to Your Home

Saying Fairwell

O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?
~1 Corinthians 15:55


There has been much loss for us within the past year. We lost a brother (my brother-in-law) last fall; last week my dear aunt (my mother's oldest sister) passed away; I just heard yesterday that one of my sister's friends (a sweet, sweet lady that was a bride's maid in her wedding) passed away this weekend; and now we lost our cat Beauty. We believe she was run over on the road or was taken by an owl. She never came home the night before last, when they are gone that long, they normally do not return.

I spent most of the day on Friday driving down to my parent's house in southwest Minnesota so I could attend my aunt's funeral Saturday morning. I hadn't seen my aunt in many, many years. The course of our lives leads us in directions far far away from those we love sometimes and I hadn't had a chance to see her or to say goodbye. Her funeral was my only chance to say fairwell. Even though I came down with the flu on Thursday night, I still insisted on driving down so I could attend her funeral. I drove down with a fever and aches all over my body. I drove down with two little girls that weren't feeling well either. Amanda had gotten sick the day before I had and still wasn't eating much and was very whiny. My other daughter Paige got sick on Friday evening when we were sitting in my parent's living room. She got sick all over me. My mother had just handed her off to me and the movement must of been just enough to completely upset her stomach.

I said goodbye to my aunt Saturday morning. She looked just as she did the last time I saw her. She resembles my mother and my grandmother a great deal. Her passing makes me realize my own parents death may not be far behind. My husband has said the same about his parents. His father has been dealing with failing health ever since he had a couple strokes last summer. On Sunday we saw him, he doesn't look well. My husband is bracing himself for his death...

O death where is thy sting?