Mind Bender

What do these items have in common?

Our BEST sleeping bag.

Jouster's ONLY pair of flip flops.

Duchess' FAVORITE pair of mud boots.

Prince Charming's NEW pair of flip flops.

The King's MOST COMFORTABLE pair of knock around shoes.

Our HIGH QUALITY garden hoses.

Maiden's BRAND NEW golf bag.

And no, the answer is not the adjectives in the sentences.

The one thing that all of the above have in common is:

Our beloved Pooch. Doesn't he look innocent? He puts on a dumb act when I ask him how things got chewed up...like he can't understand Human. He won't answer, he just perks up his ears, cocks his head to the side, and gives me the sad puppy dog look. It's as if he's saying, "I'm sorry. I have a problem. It's an addiction I can't control. I need help." It works. Instead of being reprimanded, he gets a pat on the head with encouraging words, "That's okay Pooch. We still love you. Just try harder next time." He agrees with a paw shake.

Then I yell at everyone in the family, "Don't leave your stuff outside. Don't kick your shoes off under the trampoline. When you hang anything on the line, keep it out of Pooch's reach. Don't pull the garden hose near Pooch's house. It's your own fault if Pooch chews up something that's important to you." The blame gets shifted from the dog to the kids. Pooch likes it that way. Needless to say, he has me wrapped around his little dew claw.

And just in case that innocent face makes you question whether or not I am telling you the truth, I have proof:

I'm Back!

Hello my blogging friends. Oh, how I have missed you. I didn't intentionally want to take such a long break from the blogosphere, but somehow it 'just' happened.

This morning I checked in on all my friends. Wow! I have missed a lot. My friend Katie just adopted a new baby and recently found out she's expecting. Far Side of Fifty is in the hospital. Allison and Meredith are taking a break. Julie is not on her way to Ethiopia yet. Kimmie's little one is as beautiful as ever...and I feel so bad that I didn't make any skirts for her daughter to take on her mission trip. Chris, Sheri, and Jodi I can keep up on through facebook, but it's still fun to go to their blogs. Weaver Mom--are you still out there :-)? Did I miss anyone?

I'm still trying to learn the SEO business. I got a little overwhelmed with the idea of work, homeschooling, family, etc. and nearly threw in the towel. But I am over that and diving in head first this week. I am ready to optimize my first website. Tomorrow is the big day of making my initial changes to the site I've been working on. I am a little nervous and apprehensive. What if I am not good enough? I have a perfectionist attitude and would rather do nothing at all (in all areas of my life) than to try and fail. Anyone else like that? I suppose I need counseling, but paying someone $125/hour really messes with the 'perfect' balance I like to see in our bank account. I know. I have a problem. Enough of my emotional issues. Let's talk about fun stuff.

I want to show you what I made for my niece before we went to Colorado. I had made some HUGE bibs for Prince Charming out of hand towels and decided my sister needed some for her little one.

Here is Prince Charming modeling one of his. These bibs are great. They lay over the lap and keep the pants clean.

Since I had to make them for a little girl, I decided to embellish them and make them a little more feminine.

The "M" stands for me. Just kidding. Her name starts with an M too. I used the blanket stitch on my machine to applique the fabric onto the towels.

I love this lavender color with the green. But my all time favorite is this one:

My friend Rapunzel has an embroidery machine and we got together to make this personalized one. Scribe's (age 11) comment when he saw it was, "Don't you think that could be vanity, mom?" I suppose it is a little vane, but she's my niece, and my goddaughter, and I like to think she looks like me.

What do you think? I'm pretty sure she loves her vanity bib as much as I do!