Tuesday, January 17, 2012

My Dad's Train

My dad was not the type of person to save a lot "stuff" from his childhood.  One item that did make it through the years was his treasured American Flyer train.  However, for many, many years (30+) this train sat in an uncovered metal pail in the garage of our old house in Woodridge.  A couple years back the train made its way to our house when we borrowed it to show Aidan the train cars.  I cleaned the train cars up a bit at that time and thought that was about it.  But, last Christmas we had the idea to try and get the train up and running as a gift to my mom to keep at her house.

A year later we finally made that a reality.  Cort and his dad were great in talking to train people, figuring out what track it needed, seeing if the transformer worked,  and finally setting it up and getting it going.  While the kids and I were hanging out in the family room, I heard odd sounds coming from the living room.  Cort called us all over and sure enough the train was running!

It truly is something special to be able to see my children have such joy from something that used to bring my dad so much joy too.  I cannot wait to set it up (or have Cort set it up I should say!) at my Mom's so all the grandkids can enjoy it whenever they're there. 

Cole watching the train
 So excited!
 The kids watching the train
 The rusty old transformer-hey, it still works!
 Mia working the train
 The cars and barbies watching the train with the kids

 So happy!
 The train-probably from about the mid-50's

Sunday, January 15, 2012

2nd Annual Valentine's Day Craft Night

Last night I got together with my girlfriends for our 2nd Annual Valentine's Craft Night.  We have all been sucked into yet another timesucker-Pinterest!  We had all seen a really cute craft idea here that we liked so we decided to use it as inspiration.  :)  It was pretty easy and we were able to pick everything up at either Michael's or Hobby Lobby.  Scroll down to see our steps and then the finished product!

Step 1-Painting our "conversation hearts"

 Letting the hearts dry
 Pam painting one of her hearts (right after this picture, her brush went tumbling down her clothes-the good news is the paint came out!  :)
Step 2: Sticking the letters on to spell each name (we figured stickers would be easier than trying to paint the names on)
 Erica and Aaron's hearts
 Our fam
 Step 3: Lining up the ribbon and glue gunning the hearts on the ribbon
 Bow tying and glue gunning
 Pam's finished product!
 Obligatory self-timer group shot  :)
The finished product hanging in my house-love it!!!

And because I don't think I ever shared last year's craft, here you go...

The inspiration came from here: Heart Shaped Wreath

This project was pretty simple, all it required was a heart shaped foam wreath (cheap at Michaels), red felt, and lots of straight pins.  Let me tell you though, the wreath turned out adrorable, but it was time consuming cutting out all those circles!!
Our finished products
Being silly
On my door-can't wait to hang it up again this year!

1 month until Valentine's Day!