Monarch Post

growing seasons

 
The zinnias along our front porch outdid themselves this summer. With only a few August days in the 100's, they've really just reached their lovely peak.

I think giant zinnias are about the happiest flowers on planet earth.

Love 'em. They make me smile every time I stop to admire them.

 
Kinda like these two along the front porch on Monday too.

All ready to start a new school year. Excited, happy, nervous, a little wistful and sad too. That was me-- I'm guessing the kids probably felt about the same.

We have a bus for the first time in our neigbohood now. So they rode the bus to school on Monday morning. It was Sophey's first time riding to school on a bus. (Jess took the bus in kindergarten). There is something about putting my child on a bus, even if she's not a kindergarten, that makes me go all misty/blinky. Oh, rough mom morning.

I thought back to all four of my kids' first school days. Ainsley and Jesse were like... see ya... No big deal at all. Corbyn was literally pried off me (one tentacle at a time, like a giant octopus) by the other preschool carpool moms his first week. I can still remember his face, smashed up against the window (squid-like, again) in the back of the minivan driving away... oh, those were a rough few days too-- for the both of us. And then there was Sophey... so eager to start early preschool, she even hurried up the potty-training schedule on her own. But when it was time to go off to kindergarten, it was alligator tears. Big school equalled big tears every morning. She said she just missed me too much; it was too lonely to be gone that long every day. 

Finally, one morning in desperation, I had a frantic light bulb moment. (Why don't I have more non-desperate light bulb moments?) I grabbed a piece of cheapo craft felt, a glue gun, my pinking scissors and cut out two hearts. I glue-gunned them together (no time for glue to be drying), and then I held it to my heart. I explained to her that I had just put lots of love into the heart, and that whenever she felt sad or lonely she could hold her felt heart and my love would be right there with her. It worked. She kept it in her pocket at school, and it got us through the first few weeks of kindergarten.

I don't know what became of that heart... but it had served it's purpose beautifully!

 So thinking about all the moms going through the same thing right now, I made a few more "pocket hearts". This time with a little more style. But the idea is still really the thing here; you wouldn't want to spend too much time or effort on this one. It's definitely "the thought that counts" sort of a craft project idea. I'm blabbering now...

Anyway,

I used:

Leftover canvas, fabric, and denim scraps and a red Sharpie marker. I doodled a few designs, cut out the hearts (added lace to the fancy one!) and stitched two hearts together with my sewing machine. I left about a 1/2" opening on one side, so that a little stuffing and/or a note could be tucked into it also. I think it took me about 45 minutes to make all of them. (The plain denim one I made thinking of little boys, who might want to be more discreet with all that yucky love stuff ;)

As I think more about it now, wouldn't they be sweet for any age, tucked into a travellers' suitcase or in a book for a friend? 

So there's the project for you today. ( I know, a project-- don't faint on me here;)

... Along with some fancy kid butterfly coloring, and a couple of pitchers filled with those front porch zinnias...

I couldn't resist picking them anymore.

 
Happy kitchen hearts today, for sure.

Aren't they gorgeous? Just like you! Love, Kelly
 

I'm almost over it... and these are the last of the photos (I promise)

I'm almost over it... really... I am. I started looking at the last day of the beach and the photos. I love these shots of the kids-- the water and the suits and all the playing, they just made for the best compostions, I thought.

This is our last week before school starts. I can't believe it. I'm sorta blue today. I've enjoyed this summer so very much. I needed this summer. Like I haven't needed a summer since I was about nine years old myself. But Saturday we went back to school shopping and I was pretty okay with it. I'm getting a teensy bit excited to have a schedule again. We are turning into lazy blobs around here. I'm sure my studio is growing cobwebs by now. After this week, I'll get back to work and (hold your breath here) make something.  No more "how I spent my summer vacation photos" from here on out.

But until then... ahem, it was such a gorgeous day on our last day at Nags Head. Mike and I went out early to the beach. It was so peaceful and uncrowded. Crisp and windy and quiet. And then at about ten a.m., pods and pods of dolphins forty feet from the shore wove their way past us.  (I'll bet we saw over two hundred in an hour.) So magical. And what a great send off :)

The kids started joining us right after the dolphins had swam by.

When Jesse and Sophey noticed their big siblings and parents were all wearing their sunglasses, they ran back to the beach house and got theirs so they could lay out and be cool too. Oh, I wish they didn't have to grow up for a few more years.

At the end of our vacations Mike and I start with the begging and pleading for a family photo. But we had pretty good cooperation this year.

One, two.

  One, two, three.

One, two, three, four, five.

One, two, three, four, five, and six!

A lady walked over while we were taking all the photos and asked if she could take our photo so that we could all be in one picture together. Yay! BTW, I think this photo should also win me a 'brave woman blog award' with that straight-outa-bed-went-to-the-beach-hairdo. Holy crap.

Anyhoo, I'm going to spend one last week enjoying summer and getting my kids ready to start school, and then I'll be back to better blogging and some fun projects to share with you.

Really, I will. Pinky promise on that. xoKelly

 
   

island days

One day on our vacation the boys and Mike wanted to go golfing. And so of course, the girls and I went shopping and lunching :) We left Nags Head and ventured to the end of Bodie Island, and explored a town called Duck. Gorgeous place, although we thought the locals seemed a little snobby, but that never stops us from having fun.  
The photo above is an old window pane at the restaurant where we had lunch. Such a pretty collage of sea glass and sea shells.

 

 And the light fixtures next to the sea glass window were made from old plastic pop bottles spray painted and nailed to the trim. (I just love things like this, but you knew that already, didn't you ;)

Shopping and squirrel watching in a very woodsy area.

 
Had to stop and make our wishes...

Shops back the edge of the ocean everywhere here.

 
At one of those shops was this giant monarch butterfly photo-taking spot. (I know?!) Sophey took a turn, and then well...

 
 
I just had to too... Immediately after this photo was taken while we were still standing there, a monarch (I know?!) butterfly flew right in front of us and fluttered around the flowers for a couple of minutes. I couldn't get a shot of it; it didn't land anywhere long enough, but I will never forget the moment. It was an amazing synchronicity-filled experience to me.

We stopped and listened to an outdoor concert after shopping, and ate treats from a bakery we had found. Some guy had a bubble machine going and bubbles were floating everywhere at this evening concert. (Shoulda got a photo.) The sunset that evening at the pier was pretty amazing too. 

Another very lovely evening... we celebrated our wedding anniversay at an old seafood restaurant called Owens. Such a beautiful old place. My hub can really pick the joints.

And one last day we strolled around the other end of the isand. Actually, it's a small island of it's own, connected by a bridge, called Roanoke Island. This is the island where a group of the very first pilgrim settlers in America mysteriously vanished about five-hundred years ago.

(I know how to pick some joints too :)

This was a sailing school for children, those tiny little boats each had children sailors.  

 
 
 
 
Memories for keeping always. xoxoKelly  

  

  

don't be crabby... you're at the beach

 
The sign inside the entry of our beach house expressed my sentiments exactly.  The most relaxing, fun, and perfectly wonderful family vacation I think I've ever had. And the beach house was to die for darling too.

Oh, and this sign in our bedroom expressed the rest of my sentiments exactly too... 

I hardly know where to start from-- I took so many photos. But I guess I'll start at the beach house. We found it online last February. We hoped it would be as nice as the photos looked. (It's hard to know what you're really getting online). It was even better than the photos.

 

 
 

 
Entry

Stairs to the kitchen and living room.

 

Darling kitchen...

    with a table big enough for all of us to play cards on every night. We had the best time. Our kids are very funny people. Apparently I am a pretty funny person too-- with a bottle of wine from Kmart and a gin rummy game waaay too late at night...

Our living room was very cheery and big enough for all our lazy crew in the mornings. 
.   And the ocean. I am in LOVE with the ocean. Love. Love. Love it.

 
   
If you have the ocean and a giant wooden seahorse at the back of your house, what else do you really need in life? 

 
Fifteen minutes with the waves around my ankles and I felt my DNA unwind.

I love watching our kids play at the beach.

 
And I love sitting back and taking a million photos of them playing, can you tell?

This isn't the one we made by the way... but it was next to us and so fabulous.

    Back soon with part two of "how I spent my summer vacation" :)

(I hope this isn't like home movies for you, but I couldn't stop taking photos. It was the best week. North Carolina and the Outer Banks rock!)

~Kelly

Fair Trade Friday winner- Lisa!

I'm back (but you knew that since I'm here, huh? ). I think this was my very favorite family vacation ever. Perfect in a million ways.... I just downloaded all the photos and got a little "homesick" for N. Carolina and Nags Head.

But anyway,  I am late getting back here to announce the latest "Fair Trade Friday giveaway" winner. And since I'm late getting back to the blog world, I thought I'd apologize with an extra gift.

This is one of my all time favorite books, my copy of Gifts from the Sea, by Anne Morrow Lindbergh. It's her story of her love affair with the sea and the beach, she compares her stages of life as an American wife and mother with the shells she has combed from the beach. It's a wonderful book, and just as timely for today as it was when it was written in 1955.

I dressed it up with a sea colored ribbon, a shell I found at Nags Head beach, an old vintage pearl earring, and a few filmy flowers-- they remind me of the jellyfish we were all so fascinated by on this trip.

Lisa @ the bunnylog blog is the winner for this month. Lisa, I'll get your earrings ordered and I'll slip my book in the mail for you!

I'm still getting my land legs back here, you know how it is when you get home from a vacation... Frankly, I would trade my land legs for a mermaid's tail for another week at the beach, but no such luck ;)

I'll post again soon this time-- I've missed you guys! xoKelly