Crafting Fun

Recently I decided that I wanted to get back into crafting. So I have a couple of projects I would love to show. Take into consideration that my photography skills leave something to be desired.

First I made a bulletin board/white board of sorts. Since I'm currently having a love affair with Pinterest, there are tons of ideas floating around that I want to copy recreate.

To make the cork portion, I cut down the tiles to the size of frames that I bought. I took a stencil and painted a border on two of the sides and let it dry. Since I was doing a four frame set, I did this again. Make sure that the glass is no longer in the frame, otherwise you can't actually use the cork as a bulletin board.

To make the "white boards" I took fabric swatches that I had lying around and wrapped them around the backing of the frame, as if I were upholstering a chair seat. Using hot glue, I secured the fabric to the board. Then I put it back in the frame making sure that the glass was on the fabric since the glass is the part you write on with dry-erase markers. 

Original frames

Completed white board frame

This is how the whole thing looks on the wall.

All in all, I was pretty pleased with how it turned out. It was also a pretty quick and simple project. Just as a tip, make sure that the fabric is light enough so that you can see what you write on the glass. 

Thanksgiving

This year for Thanksgiving we fled the cooling weather in Virginia for a warmer Arizona climate. Matt's parents generously made it possible for us to spend Thanksgiving there at the home of Matt's oldest sister, Ashby. We had such a great time! On the morning of Thanksgiving, we participated in a Turkey Trot being put on in Ashby's neighborhood. There was a great turnout and our crew had made custom Turkey Trot T-Shirts for the event.

The whole crew (minus Stacey's husband, Cade)

The happy couple

After the feast, some of us adults took the kids to see the Muppet Movie. We all thoroughly enjoyed it. We were sad to see the trip end, we love being with family. We headed back to Richmond for the home stretch of the semester.

*All photos courtesy of Ashby Hatch*

Halloween

So for Halloween we went to our ward's Halloween Party on the Saturday before Halloween. The Primary was in charge of it, and since I'm one of the choristers, I went early to help set up for the party. Part of the activity was putting together care packages to send to troops in Iraq so there was kind of a patriotic/ARMY theme. It was great fun and turned out very well.

This is me with my little ARMY buddy.
He is one of the great kids in Junior Primary

My husband decided to be Captain America, so I suppose
it was appropriate that I dressed up as a n ARMY soldier.

An Overdue Update

So there are many things to update you on. I'll try not to be longwinded since I know that would be super boring.

First off, my birthday (yes, I realize that it was nearly three months ago, but who's counting?). Matt and I went up to northern Virginia to stay with his parents for the weekend. Matt had bought me tickets to see...

I had never seen it before and it was being performed at the Kennedy Center in D.C. the weekend of my birthday. I loved it. It was very moving and I'm so glad I got to see it. 

This is us right before the show

On Saturday (my actual birthday) we got to watch General Conference which we loved, and then I got to open presents (yay!). Karen and Bill really made my birthday special, especially since I'm so far away from my family.

I got a great new purse, some books, earrings, and a temple bag. Definitely a great birthday! A Stringham family tradition that came from Karen's family is an ice cream birthday cake. It's delicious! Karen made it and colored the frosting purple since it's my favorite color.

Thank you all for making my birthday so special. And special thanks to my wonderful parents for making it all possible!