stuff i made

even though I wasn't busy blogging all summer,

I was busy making stuff

this is a bench I made for my mom

I won't lie, it's awesome

plans from the amazing ana white

for the rustic pottery bench

so my only not happiness about this is our lame lumber store

they're helpful, just not big enough to have what I want

if I don't want to drive to park city for home depot...

(because I was making this the day of her birthday)

...I buy the wood there

it's way more than ana estimates wood should cost

plus they have never heard of a 1 by 3

so I have to figure out how to do it with 1 by 4 boards

that are far from straight

in this instance things worked out

I also altered the top because I knew this bench

would be for plants

so the slats would be better than a solid top

for dripping water

then black stain

then poly spray

then hooray

friends, I know I live in Wyoming and all

but I am not a lumberjack

I'm still kind of scared of the saw

and I don't know any of the right names for tools

Derek, hand me Filipe the turner

the point: you can totally do this

back to school

tonight was the best party ever

to celebrate school starting tomorrow

I've already cried thinking about summer ending...

....when I got the kindergarten information packet in the mail

....when I was telling my friend about the cute letter in the information packet

about how the teacher was going to love the kids like her own

....when my sister moved away to college

.....when I snuggled in bed with Lily all night and looked at the picture of us when she was a baby

....during a special dad prayer before bed to keep her brave and true through the year

I hope I'm good because school's in the morning

and I really am excited for her and how wonderful kindergarten is

I loved school

so tonight we went for a nienie style-ish celebration feast

only old school lunch style

lily's crown: she's going to north elementary

they're the north stars

placecards. my hub in kindergarten

grandpa & grandma

some sisters that weren't in town but are cute nonetheless

ha ha I said nonetheless

the hawaiian crown for my sister heading back to byu-hawaii

aww cute. i still remember that dress's skirt has 7 layers of wonderful

I realized that I mostly loved that I didn't buy anything for this party

besides some food but not much of that either

it just took:

37 minutes of raspberry picking

derek to clean up max's cocoa krispies from yesterday...or maybe 4 days ago

a dig through the party bucket

the surplus new school supply pile and a stapler

finding some olden day pictures on the computer

a google search for 'wolverine'

the party favorites channel from the tv

ha ha. my middle school sister's mascot is the wolverines.

while I don't think the 5-year-old appreciated the lunch-ladyness that went into the menu planning, my dad did so it's all good

baked sweet potato fries

sloppy joes....slop-sloppy joes ya

good eats macaroni & cheese

green beans

a dandee raspberry & cream cake

afterwards we did the new school clothes fashion show

somehow the dancing involved robots, pirates, cats and hobos

sorry for non-attenders, it's not a video

I am such a proud proud momma

Max and I will miss her tomorrow

I love that I got the real & true smile in her eyes smile

she's happy and she's ready

sorry

I would have blogged more this summer but Max wouldn't let go of me.

And when a little human as handsome as he is with the dark dark eyes and the eyelashes and the summer blonde hair and the lips and the belly and the toesies asks you to play trains all day you pretty much do it.

No matter how loud he sometimes might roar.