The Stockings Were Hung...

My husband made this super great sign for our stockings since we don't really have anywhere else to hang them. 

We used old barn wood, silver drawer pulls, and he burned in our words "The stockings were hung…"

It worked out perfectly!

Cowboy Boot Stockings

After several years of looking for western Christmas stockings, we just couldn't seem to find what we wanted. So, to the drawing board...

Start by drawing the shape you want of a piece of cardboard of paper. Draw it a bit bigger than you want the finished product to end up. 

I had a HUGE pile of old jeans and knew I wanted wrangler pockets on the stockings. With this in mind, I laid the stocking on top of the jeans where I wanted and traced. You want to cut this side out along the traced line.

Stop cutting right at the side seam. Flip over your pattern and trace the outline of the other side of the boot and then cut it out.

Once One side is cut out, flip it over so the backside is what you see. Line it up on another piece of jean/cloth. Trace this and cut it out just like you did with the first piece.

Once you have one side traced and cut out, open the jeans and trace the rest of the boot. Then cut this out too.

I knew I wanted an easy hanger for the stockings, so I used the thick seam of the jeans. No extra sewing :)

Just cut to the desired length and stitch onto the inside of the back side of the stocking.

Make sure to line up the wrong sides facing. 

It is slightly off which was okay with me since there would be items in the stockings at some point anyway.

Pin the two sides together making sure the edges are together. Sew it up, and turn it right side out. You may need to use a pen or scissors or the tip of something to help push out the corners and tip of the boot.

I attempted to sew on initials. I wrote initials in chalk and permanent marker to follow with my sewing machine. I decided not to do it, but it sure would look neat if you choose to. 

Merry Christmas in July! 

Buzz LightYear Cake

For my sons birthday way bake in December (yes, I'm that far behind!) he wanted a buzz lightyear cake. 

We started with a 9x13 cake and then carved it into a rocket shape. We split it in two and cut the top layer into a square.

This was the first time we tried a special filling. We found this stuff at walmart. 

My husband dirty icing the cake.

To make the wings, we just used leftover cake. 

We put them on cardboard covered with tin foil. Make sure to make the cardboard long enough to push the extra into the sides of the cake.  

Detail work.

It takes the longest.

But it is pretty awesome to see it come together.

To attach the wings, we just pushed them into the side of the cake.

Finished product.

I think he likes it!

Happy birthday buddy!

Discovery Children's Museum day

Another place to visit in Las Vegas for the little ones is Discovery Children's Museum (previously known as Lied Discovery Museum). We spent an entire afternoon in this new 3 or 4 story hands-on museum. 

We started at the top where we got to be detectives trying to figure out some answers based on the clues we found. The clues incorporated many different senses including sight, smell, and touch.

Here they panning through sand to find various clues.

After the mystery exhibit, they had a inventors station that included legos, building flying machines (in the first picture they are watching their flying machine float down), building that can sustain earthquakes, and so much more.

Next was the art section. Draw, color, cut, magnify various materials to see patterns, the list goes on!

This was the place the kids got to pretend to run a town. In the first picture (sorry, the lighting was terrible for pictures) they are chefs. The second picture is a grocery store where they can go shopping or they can pretend they work at the store in the many different jobs at a grocery store. The last picture is in a vet clinic. They had an airport, bank, and wind turbine plant.

In the center of each level was a tower that has various learning and interactive activities. You can move to and from each level in this one tower. We didn't even get to all the cool activities inside the tower there were so many!

Another fun area was the water world they created. They have rain coats for the kids and many different pools of water with music activities, building activities, and buckets, balls, and squirt areas. My little man was soaked despite the raincoat he was wearing.

The last place we visited was a dress up, puppet show, theatre, castle and ship place.

The first step was to dress up for the play.

Then the play. We had a director running the curtains and narrating and another person in the booth running the lighting and sounds. 

The last thing we did was the mambo out of the museum. Right before they close they make announcements of the closing time. When it is time to leave they have some of the employees go around to some loud fun mambo music gathering those who are left. They create a train and take everyone out to the front of the museum where the customers go through a line of high fives and thank yous and goodbyes from the rest of the employees. It was a very fun and creative way to leave an amazingly fun place.