Easter Family Home Evening

I quickly wanted to post this amazing Easter Family Home Evening that I found while searching online. I was hoping to use my creativity to come up with something really fun for my kids but time has gotten away from me. Odd, you would think being on bedrest for the last 4 weeks would have left plenty of time for fhe prep :) However, now that we made it to 34 weeks I am downgraded to partial bedrest (WAHOO!), which means I know have to fight the urge to completely overdo it and make up for the last 4 weeks :) With all that said I found this great family home evening all ready to go...all you need to do is print it out. I LOVE that is focuses on what happened to the Savior every day for the last week of his mortal life, and in turn WE will be focusing on our Savior every day this week as well. I hope you and your families have a wonderful Easter!!

Easter All Week Long FHE

Duct tape really DOES fix everything...

Tell me I am not the only mother that has resorted to duct taping a diaper onto my child!! I am too big and too pregnant to be chasing him around all day putting his diaper back on. Happy Saturday everyone!! :)

MINI fabric Easter baskets

When I was making about a million fabric yo yos for THIS project, I had a flash of inspiration. As I was tightening one of the yo yos I thought if you actually made one inside out, left it much looser before you knotted the thread, and attached a ribbon for a handle, it just might make something cute! Here's what I did:

If you've every used a yo yo maker before you know that this is backwards :) I had to have the fabric in backwards so the pattern would end up on the outside.

This is what it looked like before I tightened the thread

This is what it looked like after I loosely tightened the thread, leaving a big open space to make your "basket". I also trimmed around the edges to make the ruffle more even.

And here is one of the finished product. See, it really is MINI :)

To finish them off I just sewed on a small piece of ribbon for the handle, and there ya go!

The thing I love about these is I think the possibilities for these cute little baskets are endless! When I was little every year on Easter we would have a jelly bean hunt when we woke up in the morning. I think these mini baskets will be adorable for our jelly bean hunt. I was also thinking they would be adorable place settings for an Easter Brunch or make cute little gift bags. Thanks for stopping by! :)

A is for...

Adorable!! :)

I love decorating a nursery and I had fun making a little something for Avrie's room this week. All you need is a big paper mache letter, obviously I chose A for Avrie. I got mine at Joanns Craft store a few weeks ago.

Then you need these items to help you make a BUNCH of fabric yo-y0s

Add a little hot glue once all your yo-yos are done and this is the finished product:

Here is the final product! I was so happy with how it turned out, it really adds a bright pop of color that is perfect for my babies sweet room. If I can convince my husband to hang up a few things tonight I'll post pics of the whole room tomorrow :)

"Tangled" family home evening

I must say....I am SO excited about this family home evening. It was very simple to plan and it will be simple and quick to execute as well. Plus my kids will love it because we are going to be watching part of the new Disney movie "Tangled"! Here's a few things you need to make this family home evening work :)

I don't know about you but I LOVED this movie! As I was watching it for the first time last week the story struck me as so profound. Let's see if this sounds familiar: a beautiful young girl is born of royal birth. However, as she gets older she is told lie after lie to try and keep her from fulfilling her full potential. She struggles between believing these lies or going out on her own and finding out who she really is...only to learn she truly is the daughter of the King. HELLO!! I couldn't keep the tears from coming as I thought about this beautiful message. We are ALL daughters and sons of a King, and once we are sent to this earth it is so easy to forget. Satan is everywhere around us, trying to deceive us, tear us down, and doubt our divinity at every turn. By listening to these lies we become trapped, and it is only when we realize these lies for what they are that we can fulfill our true missions on earth and rediscover our divine heritage.

What a powerful message to teach our children!! We are going to start off the night by watching the scene in the movie where Rapunzel asks her "mother" if she can go out into the world. The "mother" then goes on to fill her with doubts and tells her lie after lie to keep her from leaving her and finding out the truth.

After we watch that clip we are going to relate the story of Rapunzel to our story. We are going to talk about how we are daughter's of our Heavenly Father, a King, and how Satan will do everything in his power to lie, deceive and scare us to keep us from reaching our divine potential.

Now for the fun activity. I thought this would be a great activity for the kids to try and distinguish the lies that Satan would have us believe, and the truths we can receive from a loving Heavenly Father. Remember that yellow yarn you needed?? Here's why! :)

The yellow yarn is of course representing Rapunzel's hair :) I am going to take that yellow yarn and have my husband string it ALL through the house. The catch is every few feet the yarn will break off into two pieces going in different directions. Attached to the yarn will be something Heavenly Father wants us to know and something Satan would have us believe. Whichever one is the truth from Heavenly Father will lead to other questions whereas the lie from Satan will lead to a dead end. We will have these crossroads in the yarn several times throughout the house and finally they yarn will end in my bedroom tied to my bed. On my bed I will have the crowns for all the kids with signs that say both "Daughter of a King" and "Son of a King." The moral is if we listen to our Father in Heaven we CAN reach and find our full potential, as daughters and sons of a King.

These are just little signs I made up for the kids that I will print out and have sitting next to their crowns.

I hope you all have a wonderful week and enjoy this family home evening...I can't wait! :)

Memories

I gotta be honest here...I really struggle with bedrest. I'm sure anyone that has to do it feels the exact same way. It just goes against everything I am to lay around all day and do pretty much nothing. The things that bring me so much joy like teaching my kids, or doing fun activities with them, or keeping a nice organized home are all out the window. Now obviously, it is TOTALLY worth it to get sweet little Avrie here safe and sound...but it doesn't change the fact that I really struggle with it. This time I around I have tried to be a lot less dramatic about it and really look on the bright side. So far I think its going pretty well. One thing I have tried to do is find productive activities I can do while I am taking it easy. One thing I have been so excited about is getting back into digital scrapbooking! Now, be warned: I am NOT that great at it. Nope, I'm really not, but it feels so good to be doing it and I have loved looking back at the pages I have done and remembered some really good times in our lives. And thats what this post is all about: Good times are ahead!! Bedrest WILL end, I WILL be able to be the kind of mom that I want to again, and great things are in store for this little family of mine! So if you are at all interested, join me for a little scrapbook stroll down memory lane! :)

I love this page because when Kendall was little she was the BEST eater! I mean seriously, that girl would eat anything you put in front of her, obviously including pumpkin pie :)

This was Skylar's spring dance recital last year. I LOVED watching her perform...she loves the stage and comes to life up there.

This one pretty much speaks for itself...he is all boy and LOVES making messes.

This page was a fun one because of all the things it reminded me of that you CAN'T see. Skylar was crying for ever because I had to do her hair and Kendall is not wearing a skirt because she had peed her pants an hour before church and we were desperately trying to get it washed and dried before church :)

The love of my life...what more can I say??

This is Skylar's preschool picture, I couldn't believe how grown up she looked.

This was the beginning of a wonderful tradition for the Johnson Family girls. Every year we all go to Gardner Village for Witches Night and our Annual Witchie Awards!!

We have spent countless hours at the aquarium over the years, and this time we were lucky enough to go with our good friends, the Hanson's.

MY boy :) He has been such a joy to me since his birth. He has me completely wrapped around his little finger.

I LOVED throwing this murder mystery party with great friends from our old neighborhood. We had a ball and every person that came was a great sport and made the night wonderful.

Our most recent family picture. I love the outfits my friend helped me pick out, I loved the location my friend picked out, and I LOVED the pictures that she took! :) Oh yeah, and she did a kick-butt job on my makeup too!

I really loved seeing this page because it reminded me how worth it this whole yucky bedrest thing is. I was on bedrest for almost 5 weeks with Britton, but it was SO worth it to be able to take my big, healthy, ALMOST full-term baby home with me. Hopefully Avrie will do the same thing :)

I just picked this one because I really love that smile on Kendall's face :) We had a great time that summer with our Lagoon season passes.

If you made it this far...congratulations!! This post was really for me. Life is so good, and there is so much more to come. My limitations are a struggle for me, but they are a blessing as well. It motivates me to do more and be better when I can and not take for granted the simple things like taking care of my children and keeping up my home. Here's to making lots more memories!! :)

Fabric flowers even I can make!

With all the spare time I have had on bedrest lately I decided to search the internet for different ways to make fabric flowers. As you can see HERE and HERE I am a big fan of fabric yo-yo's but really wanted to try something different.

I was a little overwhelmed at all the different way you can make fabric flowers, but I finally found a tutorial that was just what I was looking for. I LOVE these flowers because the more frayed and imperfect they are....the better they look! :) And all you need to get started is a strip of fabric, needle and thread, and cute button for the center. Please check out the tutorial HERE if you want to make some of your own :) These are just handful that I have made this week...I love that the possibilities are endless!!

I made this with only a 1 inch thick strip that was about 24 inches long.

The next two were made with one inch strips but the length was about 44 inches like shown in the tutorial.

Favorite thing about these flowers?? You don't need exact measurements!! I am super impatient when it comes to crafting so I LOVE when I can just cut a strip of fabric and not have to worry about the exact dimensions. I also love the frayed, vintage look and all the different possibilities for these. I have already made some into headbands, clips, or pins! Let me know if you try these out...they are so fun!!

Bubbles, Anyone?

I don't know about at your house, but my kids LOVE bubble baths! Every time we say its time for a bath they beg for bubbles. With Easter coming up I have trying to think of fun, inexpensive things to fill their little Easter baskets with...and what would be better than their own, individual homemade bubble bath??

Here's what you need:

1/2 C clear or light colored shampoo

3/4 C water

1/4 teaspoon salt

food coloring

essential oils (optional)

You simply mix the shampoo, water, and salt. Once it is completely combined and has started to thicken add a TEENSY amount of food coloring. Seriously, a little bit goes a long ways :) Then if you want you can add a few drops of essential oil (I did lavender, maybe it will help calm the crazies down before bed ;)

I put the finished product in empty body wash containers that I have been saving...you never know when they may come in handy! Then I printed off these little labels that I made for each of my kids. I just picked something they were into right now and this is what I came up with :)

Britton's Monster Bubbles

Kendall's Ballerina Bubbles

Skylar's Princess Bubbles

This was a fun, easy, and REALLY inexpensive homemade gift for my kids that I think they will get lots of enjoyment out of. What fun things are you putting in your kids Easter baskets??

General Conference "UN"Wrap-up Family Home Evening

Ok, the "UN"Wrap-up part will all make sense in a minute :)

For Fhe tomorrow I really wanted to focus on the messages we heard in conference this weekend. I don't know if your home is like mine, but no matter how hard I try its tough to get my kids to pay really good attention for that long (I mean, they are 5, 3, and 1!:) I wanted to make sure we focused on a few talks that had messages that my young ones could understand. Here is what I have come up with:

First we are going to say several times together the 6th Article of Faith. Feel free to copy and print off the printable I made for it...I laminated mine so we will have it for future use.

Then we are going to talk about how lucky we are to have a modern day Prophet that speaks with Heavenly Father and Jesus and then talks to us. Then we will talk about things we remember from conference and how Heavenly Father gives us little “gifts” of truth and knowledge when we listen to the prophets and apostles. ACTIVITY: In a basket we will have several items wrapped up in wrapping paper. These are items that represent different topics we heard about in General Conference. The kids will take turns unwrapping each gift one at a time and we will discuss who spoke about the topic and one or two key points they mentioned. These are the speakers, their topic, and what I am wrapping up.

President Monson / Temples / Picture of a Temple

President Eyring / Serving Others / Completed Hygiene Kits

Elder Scott / Love to spouse and children / Heart-shaped Box

Elder Pratt / Tithing / Tithing Slip and Envelope

Elder Perry / Keep the Sabbath Day Holy / Sunday Books and Activities

In with the packages that I wrapped I have included these cards below. They just have a small picture of the speaker and one line from their talk that summed up the topic or that I wanted the kids to hear again.

Get it?! General Conference "UN"Wrap-up?! Oh my goodness, I am such a dork :) But I hope you can use this idea and some of the printables to reinforce some of the WONDERFUL messages that we heard this weekend :)