Merry Christmas sweater!

Last night Gabe and I went to our church's ugly sweater Christmas party.  I had to force Gabe to wear his for the picture.  Most of the night he just wore a t-shirt.  My ensemble was a two-piece set.  Each sweater had its own shoulder pads, hence the football player look.  The sweater underneath very much resembled a sequins figure-skater's costume, and the outer cardigan was covered in beads. Note the zipper tassel---a separate beaded stocking that hung from the zipper.  No detail was forgotten on this little number.  I narrowly won a Starbuck's gift card for my sweaters.

Cassie had to borrow her sweater from a co-worker (elementary school teacher) while keeping the "cause" a secret so as not to offend.  Amanda's sweater was awful and this picture really doesn't do it justice.  Keri  has a gold sequined, white fur stocking sewn onto a fake red velvet shirt.  Need I say more?

24 weeks tomorrow...

There's also a new post after this one.

Gabe made me wet my pants.

Last night Gabe and I took ourselves on a date.  We splurged (not really a "splurge" for those of you not familiar with Qdoba) and went to Qdoba Mexican Grill for their fantastic grilled chicken quesadillas.  While there, Gabe was cracking me up.  He makes this face that I can't not laugh at hysterically.  Even thinking of it makes me laugh.  I don't know what it is, but it tickles my funny bone, like no other, every time.  Tears started coming out of my eyes and I lost control a little.  If you know what I mean.  And if you read the title, I think you do. The pregnancy surprises just keeeeep coming.

Favorite student quote of the week:

"She gave me an F?!!! That's so not fair! I didn't even do it (the work that was graded) !!!"
Ahhhh that precious sense of entitlement some of today's youth have.

And the runner up:

student 1: "Did you know Elvis died of constipation?"

student 2: "No he didn't!"

student 1: "Yeah, probably not. What is constipation, anyway?"

student 3: "Who's Elvis?"

student 1: (rushing over to me eagerly) "Mrs. Knipp, what's constipation and did Elvis die from it?"

Um, not in my job description?  And no, I'm pretty certain he did not.

It occurred to me around 4am that...

It's pretty amazing how much you can love a person you know nearly nothing about, when this person has been given to you.

Better pictures

Here are some better pictures taken in daylight.  This first one is a blockprint of M.C. Escher's done with iron-on copy transfer paper.  Do you remember the scene in Office Space when they take the copy machine out into a remote field and it shows in slow motion the group of guys brutally "killing" the machine.  This was almost me earlier today, but three different printers/copy machines later I was finally able to make it work. I think it's pretty cute.

This one is a butterfly applique cut out from an old sheet, along with black fabric paint:

This is a fabric applique from old fabric I had, along with black fabric paint:
I've got 3 blank onesies left, but I think I'm done for this weekend.  Hope you all had a nice weekend, too!

What I did today:

Today I woke up and decided to fix up some of the plain white onesies I had on hand.  I've had these old sheets for quite awhile (purchased from Unique Thrift Store months and months ago).  I really like how they turned out!

Step 1:  Have your apprentice cut out the part of the sheet you want to use as an applique.

Step 2: Iron pieces (unless they've never been washed, then you've got to wash and dry them first.)

Step 3: Cut iron-on fusable webbing to match your fabric shapes and iron onto the back.

Step 4: Iron onto onesie (or whatever it is your applique-ing).
I'll post some more pictures tomorrow.  Our champion camera can't take a decent picture without natural sunlight.  It's too dark out now.

Three things:

1. Yesterday it snowed here ALL day.  It was perhaps the fluffiest, most fake looking real snow I've ever seen--in my entire life.  It was beautiful.

2. It's kind of a long story, but a couple weeks ago I heard our school's band playing and recognized the music as  "you know, that song that goes: When we've been here ten thousand years..."  Gabe was quick to point out that I was in fact talking about Amazing Grace.  Maybe you've heard of it.  Still hoping this is caused by pregnancy.

3.  Today I hadn't felt much of our little miss moving around, so after lunch I began talking to her.  It occurred to me that it was probably too quiet to make her stir.  I really wanted her to stir.  So I rolled up some paper and put one end of the tube on my belly and spoke into the other end.  I urged her to wake up and move around for probably 5 minutes...and it worked! She moved all around for a good five minutes after that.  After that I felt a little guilty for waking her, but it was also a great feeling to --in a way-- interact with her. 

Merry Christmas!