Look what I did

For some unknown reason, I decided to devote the last week of my life to making a halloween costume for Ella. She wanted to be a fairy and since patterns and costume fabric were on sale at JoAnn's I decided to tackle the project. I am not sure why I felt that a couple of semesters of high school Home Ec were adequate preparation for this but the pattern touted itself as Easy so I felt up to the challenge. I was surprised by a few things.

• First, that I found it fun.
• Second, even though I have never sewed an article of clothing, I can do darts and sleeves. I was unable to master the zipper, but as my friend Emilee quickly and kindly showed me, it is MUCH easier with a zipper foot (I blame this error on the ward's machine that I was using as it did not have a zipper foot). Thanks to her wonderful teaching though, I feel prepared to handle it next time (with the proper equipment of course).
• Third, it was actually cheaper. Pattern: 99 cents, Fabric: about $5 and wings: $3.49.
• And finally, it actually turned out cute. I can sew clothes, or at least fairy costumes. Maybe I do have one talent!
  
  

The many faces of Ella

We spent the weekend in Cincinnati looking at houses, attending my nephew's baptism and enjoying the company of all six of my sibs. As those of you from big families may know, it is an unusual event to have everyone together (we were actually missing a spouse and 4 kids) but all of the Wilson kids were there. We took advantage of the opportunity and went to have a family picture taken. This is an undertaking with 20 some people and especially with 9 children, but with a my brother, Scott, and his family moving to Okinawa next month, we had to do it. I am posting these unedited proofs from the shoot so that you can see the many faces of my sweet daughter Ella. She was obviously having a good time with this. I think if you click on the picture, it will get bigger so you can see her expressions. She was making us all laugh and, to her credit, she did make it easy to eliminate many of the 135 pictures that they took. Enjoy!

Sarah's Second Birthday

Saturday was Sarah's second birthday and we celebrated in grand style! Here are some pics of her day.

We were unable to go to our favorite pumpkin festival with Grandma and Grandpa Wahlquist this year since they moved away from Pittsburgh, so we decided to check out a local pumpkin festival. It was no Traxx farms, but the kids enjoyed a corn maze, a hayride, climbing on hay bales and choosing a pumpkin. The one in the picture below weighs 500 lbs.

We have a little tradition that Marc tries to take the birthday child out to lunch on their birthday. Marc was covering a UT soccer game at lunch time, so he and Sarah went to dinner at 2 Toots Grill, where the little electric train delivers your food. Marc said Sarah was fascinated.
After a thrilling date with dad, she came home and opened her presents. It did not take her long to figure it out (with the help of her sibs).

And finally a little birthday cake.

Sometimes it is hard to believe she has been here for two years and other times (when I remember the early days of Sarah) I am surprised that we made it to the two year mark. She is such a sweet little girl and we are so blessed to have her in our family.

Shaggy no more

Since she is almost two years old and is constantly brushing hair from her face, I decided it was probably time for Sarah's first real haircut. One of my friends from church cuts hair so she agreed to do the honors. Here is my princess before. I wanted to cut it really short like it was when it was in this pic but I thought Marc would probably kill me. I still think I might do it next time because I think it is so dang cute.

This is what we ended up with...a few inches shorter with some layers and still a few curls on the sides and back. And she is still too cute for words.