{halloween}

my plan was to keep it simple this year but i have to admit that i almost lost my sanity doing sienna's face. i must have said "please stay still" about thousand times. the result was well worth it, i think.



we went to our church's halloween party. by the time this picture was taken, the butterfly had flown to a more peaceful place. the bouncy castle was just too much for such a delicate creature. :)



the kids decorated pumpkins.

halloween is my least favorite holiday. sienna is super sensitive and gets scared so easily. she's had nightmares and you can just tell she's all freaked out. i wish people thought of little kids when they decorate their front yards and decide what costume to wear.

when i dropped her off at school today, i saw so many freaky costumes. sigh.

can't wait for Christmas and the beautiful spirit it brings with it. 

{i'm dreaming of a white christmas...}

...actually i'm not. it feels cold enough in the mornings that i'm dreading the arrival of the white stuff. i'm not ready for it yet.

but i am getting ready for Christmas.

my family lives in Finland and if i want to save in postage costs, i have to send my Christmas parcels to them in october. so usually i start thinking about Christmas in october. i really should start in september so that i'd have a month to figure out gifts. i'm always panicking when it's the end of october and i still haven't figured out what to send my family.

anyways...

i saw this Christmas count down santa on pinterest and i just had to make one right away. the original idea is from here.

ps. i scanned my santa and made it into a microsoft word document (two santas/ 8" x 11" paper). if you'd like me to send you the file, just leave me your e-mail address. then you can just print the santas.

{pumpkin, pencil gift for a teacher and fun with bubbles}

sienna made this "stained glass" pumpkin.

she glued tissue paper squares on plastic sheet protector. added some glue on top. after it dried, i cut it into a pumpkin shape.

the plastic comes off and you're left with a durable tissue paper pumpkin.



sienna saw mister maker  making this pencil and decided to make one too. i had to help a lot. you glue white tissue paper on a paper towel roll. let it dry, then paint it as shown. you then make a cardstock paper cone and glue it on one end. at the other end is a cut up pink sponge to block that end. permanent marker is used to do the details.

sienna gave this to her teacher. we put small chocolate bars and a mini arbonne lotion inside. we didn't know when we were making it that it was her teacher's birthday. she can store pencils or candy in it. great teacher gift if you have the patience to make one. 

sienna and i made felt animals (a kit she got for her birthday). i turned my bear into a picture.

then i have to share this cool thing with you. i went on a fieldtrip to the space & science center with sienna's class. we saw an imax movie about bugs and then the kids made amazing stuff with bubble solution. they made huge (and i mean huge) bubbles on a tray. when they popped, the kids used pennies to measure the diameter and the circumference of their bubble to see whose bubble was the biggest. they also dropped pennies inside their big bubbles. you just had to wet the pennies in the bubble solution and they would make it into the bubble without popping it. they also made snowmen and flowers by making various size bubbles. one of the coolest thing was to see sienna make a smaller bubble inside a big one. the trick is to wet the straw so it won't pop the bubble. as long as things(even hands) are wet, you can put it in a bubble and not pop it. to make the huge bubbles, kids had to learn to blow very gently and slowly. the tray had to be wiped with the bubble solution so it was wet too.



the bubble solution the kids used was better than the kind you buy in a store.

here's a basic bubble solution recipe:

1 part water

1 part Johnson's baby shampoo

1 - 3 tsp glycerine (for about a litre of solution)

and here's a recipe for a thicker, stronger bubble solution (strong enough to last 10 seconds or so):

3 parts Johnson's baby shampoo

1 part water

1 - 3 tsp glycerine (for about a litre of solution)

add the glycerine one teaspoon at a time and test for strength.

glycerine can be bought in most drug stores.

you can use a drinking straw to blow the bubbles. cut & bend one end as shown in the above picture.

i really, really encourage you to have bubble fun with your kids. sienna's class had a blast! :) 

{guest blog post}

exciting! i got to do another guest blog post for Rebecca Cooper's blog "simple as that".

click here  to have a peek. :)

{it's raining cats & dogs but it's ok}

some stuff we've made lately...

a princess out of a toilet paper roll.



Sienna colored such a cute, happy picture at school.



another doodle sample. simple fun for simple minds. :)



i printed pumpkins on cardstock and Sienna painted them with metallic & glitter watercolors.



i just made this huge pumpkin ornament this morning.

quick instructions

cut strips out of orange poster paper.

you need:

1 strip of 2" x 12"

2 strips of 2" x 14"

2 strips of 2" x 18"

2 strips of 2" x 22"

gather the strips in this order: 22", 18", 14", 12", 14", 18", 22".

use big paperclips to hold the strips together.

make leaves out of green paper. sorry, no template. i just free cut mine.

cut a 1/2" x 6" strip out of black paper. curl it around a pencil, wait few seconds so the curl will hold.

attach it all together with the paperclips. tie a string to one of the paperclips and hang it up. easy, peasy. :)

if you want to make a smaller pumpkin, just make the strips half the size of mine.

1" = 2.54cm

{hi there!}

(image found on the internet, no source mentioned)

"You know it was a good day if you didn't hit or bite anyone." (Nathaniel Parizek, age 4)

are you having a good day? :)

{thanksgiving long weekend trip, day 4, drive home}

all good things come to an end. just to prolong our return home, we decided to take the long way home. i've always wanted to see Lake Louise. i wasn't disappointed - it was beautiful. a secluded, majestic place. a grand old hotel with much history behind it. the lake itself was more turqoise than it shows in the pictures. there were people kayaking. it was very serene.

hienoa että pysähdyttiin myös ostamaan naposteltavaa reissuun - löysin lisää salmiakkikolikoita. :)

 

there was even a lady dressed in a fancy, old-fashioned dress, playing the harp.



no lack of beautiful vistas, that's for sure. the above lake is the Abraham Lake where we stopped. absolutely gorgeous! it was so suprising not to see cabins and boats on the lake as we were out of the national park area. a hidden gem!



the Abraham Lake just kept going, and going, and going.

Sienna kept writing "poems". the radio was playing great music. no need to read as watching the scenary was my main occupation.



bye, bye mountains! hope to see you again soon.

{wow!}

going through our vacation pictures still. i thought this one deserved a blog post of it's own.

Abraham lake, Alberta, Canada.

my heart just about bursted, that's how breathtaking this lake was. huge, turqoise lake. gorgeous yellow fall trees reflecting on it. you see the color of this lake better in the picture of Sienna i posted earlier. unbelievable colors.

God is the best artist. hands down!

this blog post is part of:

{thanksgiving weekend trip to the mountains, day 3}

we started day 3 of our trip with very sore legs (despite soaking in the hot tub the night before). so instead of going on another hard hike, we just went for a walk near downtown Canmore and checked out the boutiques on main street. had lunch. Sienna played in a playground. 
then we drove up a mountain to a nice residential area, parked and went for a lovely forest walk. we took silly photos, played hide-and-seek, etc.

then we went out to eat and decided to top off the day with a walk to the hoodoos.
my pictures don't do justice to the colorful leaves. they were bright yellow or orange. stunning scenary, for sure.