The UN

When Jay and I lived in Queens we had many visitors. One year when Jay's parents were visiting us, we went to the UN and took a tour. Then we broke the rules and had a picnic lunch in their garden area. It was pretty fun that day.

Now when Jay and I are at home with our kids we no longer need to visit the UN because we are the UN at house Bradley. Basically Jay and I keep two small countries from fighting. Really in the end I think we are playing damage control because the smaller country, Chas, will soon be bigger than the current large country, Bonnie, and that small country is going to beat the crap out of the bigger country. I've seen it happen before.

Now that we've spent a few days at my sister's house it is fun to see the pecking order between the four little kids.

Currently Danny plays the role of a leader that create a war and then says not my fault. Currently some of his favorite things to say are: I didn't do it, It's not my fault, and Bonnie is doing ..... This cracks me up because 99.9% of the time I know it was him and that he did it.

Bonnie is a dictator of sorts. Whatever she wants, she takes - especially from Deano. Last night we were all eating popcorn and Bonnie had a full bowl. Deano wanted some and I told Bonnie to share - Deano came out of the deal with two pieces of popcorn. I just kind of laughed because later he found half a bag of popcorn on the counter and didn't share with Bonnie. He had so much fun moving popcorn from his plate to a space on the counter and back again.

I like to look at Deano as the underground resistance. He has the force of Mommy and Aunt Sally behind him and he wins much of the time. Like Chas, he will also grow to be larger than Danny and Bonnie and I have no doubt Chas and him will team up and beat the hell out of the older siblings. It will be a small war of sorts but be finished by nap time.

It has been fun watching how the change and interact with each other. Sometimes they play so wonderfully together and other times it is just frustrating as they continually pick on each other.

Sewing

A few months ago I bought a new Bernina. This last Tuesday I went to my first Mastering your Machine class and I learned so much. The first lesson I learned and put into effect yesterday was never touching the round nob the moves the needle up and down. Yesterday I did hands free sewing!

After I had bought my new machine, I had told my nieces that they could have my old machine. Plus I figured this way the girls can get better at sewing while not ruining their mom's machine. Since I'm here at there house all weekend I brought it over for them to give it a try.

We waited to begin sewing till three of the kids were down for their naps. That left only three kids awake, plus my brother was hanging out and Danny preferred to hang with Mike than the two sewing machines.

We got the machines out and I set them up. Then I began with the basics. We went over winding the bobbin, threading the machine and needle, and sewing not too fast. Although a certain blond haired niece just thought it was funny every time I told her to slow down. All in all I'd say the girls had a blast. They were working on projects for Christmas and I must say I was really proud that instead of wanting to buy things they thought it would be more fun to make them. My oldest niece put together a block of fabric and I was so impressed with how well it all looked together - I think she might have a flair for matching fabrics together.

Then slowing all the kids woke up and it was time to put the machines away before their littlest brother destroyed all that we had worked on. I found it to be such a fun afternoon myself.

The Joys of Children

I promised my sister a while back that, sure I'll watch your kids for a weekend. No big deal right? With her four and my two it adds up to six kids - I informed Jay last night I am done at three. I seriously was in bed by 9:30. I don't think the little ones were even in bed yet.

We have had some funny moments though.

This afternoon I tried to put Chas down for a second nap (he refuses to sleep and I really don't know what is going on). I walked into the kitchen where the three older kids (a 3 1/2 yr old, a 2 11/12 yr old, and a 1 1/2 yr old) sat eating their cracker snack. They all had this funny look on their face and got really quiet.

Next thing I know I hear Scooter, our dog, chomping away on crackers. They were getting such a kick out of feeding the dog. Apparently this is just a right. Of course I couldn't keep a straight face - it was totally funny. So I told them nicely, OK we need to stop feeding the dog.

Well that works part of the time. I'm going to need an extra car just to get Scooter home next week - I guarantee he is going to put on 15 pounds!

help

I'm currently sitting on the couch trying to create this post. My little boy has discovered the fun of pushing the on/off button on our mac. Anytime he sees me on the couch he comes a crawling and then grabbing at the computer. He is so freaking cute that most of the time it doesn't matter.

It's Over

Wow, I'm glad it's over. I'm glad we know who has won and what we have to look forward to in the next 4 years.

Conversations that clue you into my ditziness

On the way to voting last week.

Jay: So who should we vote for in the local elections?

Me: I don't know they aren't on Saturday Night Live. How should I know who to vote for.

Jay: Seriously?

Ah, I love to say things just to get him. I mean I have to get him to laugh after 10 years.

PS - this is my attempt to keep up with all the voting blogs I was forced to read.

Just can't stop

I've been sewing like a crazy fool lately. Actually I'm just figuring things out on my new machine and learning. Thankfully I'm taking a "master your machine" class because we all know I'd never sit still long enough to watch a video to tell me how to. So onto the exciting things I've been doing.

First, Jay had been bothering me to get a bedroom curtain made. I'd had the fabric for a long time but I was nervous because I didn't want to screw it up - I have a tendency to mess up my measurements.

I am really happy how the curtain turned out. The photo is not great but we've had nothing but nonstop cloudy days. So I just bit the bullet and took a photo.

Then today I got another wild hair. I made a small curtain for the window above the sink.

Unfortunately this photo didn't turn out as well as I had hoped. The lighting was just terrible. And for all who care Jay really hates the fruit tiles but I don't mind them so much.

Really what made all this sewing so easy was this:

So that cool thing to the right of the needles is a guide - I have no idea what the technical term would be. I just discovered this today. I just feed my fabric in and the guide helps me keep it straight. I was so freaking easy.

On another note if you are ever preparing a resume to send out to a potential employer - never, never write about yourself in the third person.

Oh something else - Bonnie told herself No No Bonnie today. I asked her if Bonnie was in trouble and she said yes. I thought it was pretty funny she was disciplining herself in the third person (I should point out that she is two and not creating resumes yet).

Really what made all this sewing so easy was this: