Our Easter pics

The past two days in Los Angeles have been summer weather - we spent today having a spring break lemonade stand with the kids and yesterday included a trip to the beach, but Easter weekend was very "spring-like" and I think we're headed that way tomorrow, too... Here are some sweet pics from our weekend.

Sewing in the car

There's a first for everything. Today in between having 2 of my nieces over for a spring break sleepover, "sponsoring" a lemonade stand and generally being crazy Auntie Lala... I'm sewing in the car. I told my sister that I'm trying to be the auntie I couldn't be over the last few tired months. So today I'm carting around 4 kids between 4-6.5 years old. (getting lots of awesome looks) In my 4 and a half down minutes in the car, I'm working on the final (hand stitched) portions of a dress pattern (Anna Maria Horner's socialite dress)... Hope to finish it today and wear it tomorrow.

Bergamot outing

We visited daddy today at one of his offices and since we were in Santa Monica, and it was spring break, and mommy was craving the green mint lemonade you can only get at bergamot station... Well... I pressed our luck and we had a great outing. We practiced our "museum walking" in the tiny non-threatening galleries (we only visited 2) and saw some art that actually really inspired the kids. Mimi wants to go home and draw "right now"! And we didn't have any tantrums or mishaps, we were even complimented on good behavior by a curator...
And I got my mint lemonade.

The design director and art

Mimi looked at this just now and asked, "hey mom! Where is the other half of her?" I explained, well, mommy's friend, Tori, made it for me... It's inspired by a picture mommy took (show her the pic)... "so then, that's you?"

Salt and pepper shakers

How sweet are these? They just arrived at my house (via www.PotteryBarn.com)

Mimi's morning projects

Nearly every day now we are waking up to some new artwork from Mimi. Today is Z's birthday party and before mom, dad or Z were awake she'd made these crowns for them. She had designs for evereyone at the party to make them too. (if you haven't guessed, his theme today is dinosaurs...)

Backyard Sale - date changed

Ok. I sent out a message to everyone on the list and got a ton of responses requesting I change the date of the sale to April 24th.
So it's changed!
hope you can come.

Quilt #6 - a car quilt for ze artiste

A really simple square quilt for Ze Artiste's birthday today. It's backed with a very garish but soft boyish truck flannel. I bought a great fat quarter pack that I used for this and Ace's quilt. (he loves it)

Yellow quilt - finished

Well, it's done! The yellow and grey quilt is happily complete. I think this is my 5th complete quilt... :) and many more in the works!

Collage... Streams of Mercy Never Ceasing

Um... Where have I been, you ask? (I'm still here.) What have I been doing, you ask? (trying to catch up on sleep and get over a sinus infection and a broken heart)
Nutshell: Ace is gone. Transferrred down to a home close to his momma, who thanked me profusely for all I'd done for her and her baby. Still, I'm exhausted... Emotionally and physically. Not thinking we will attempt fost/adopt another time after two heartbreaking situations with AJ and now Ace.
Today after Palm Sunday services (and a little detour to get a certain 5.5yo's ears pierced)... I came home and worked on collages, slept some while J took the kids out for dinner and then spent another 3 hours working on this collage.
It's based on the old hymn, "come thou fount of every blessing"... And the imagery is based on experiences I had while doing archeology one summer in Israel. We were digging in Northern Israel where the source of the Jordan River springs out of a dark cave in some cliffs not unlike this one I made. Today I felt the need for the "streams of mercy never ceasing"