What I've been up to lately...

It's obvious I make very little time to blog regularly even though I think daily about all of the cool stuff that I want to share.  So here's a small update...

Dancer got her first pair of pointe shoes a few weeks ago.  She's an incredible dancer but I made her wait a bit longer than most girls do to go on pointe {she'll be 14 in July}.  I wanted to be sure that she had the proper strength to do pointe and because I wanted her feet to be done growing so that I wouldn't be spending $50 on a pair of shoes that she would outgrow in a few months.  Actually, she's not as excited about pointe as lots of girls are.  I think she's just doing this because it's the next step that her teachers want her to take.  We've dodged the pointe questions for a few years now, so now it's time to have her try it and see it it's something she wants to pursue.

Just days ago I finished sewing the ribbons and the elastics on her shoes.  I watched a few YouTube videos on the correct placement of the ribbons and different ways of attaching them and then picked the one I felt best about.  Her ribbons have elastic sewn into them, so the placement of them was a little bit more work than regular ribbons.  The elastic on the ribbons has to hit her Achilles tendon when the ribbons are tied.  I've also been working on breaking in her shoes for her, too.  There also seems to be a few different ways of tying the ribbons, so she's been practicing and seeing which way works best for her.  Her first pointe class starts this Wednesday, wish her luck.

Now on to something a little more fun ('cause trust me, there was nothing fun about sewing on those ribbons and elastics).  A few weeks ago a received a package in the mail.  I hadn't ordered anything, so of course I wondered what it was before I had a chance to open it.  As it turns out, I had won a cookbook sweepstakes from Kashi.  I don't think I even remember entering it.    The cookbook I won is called, "Get Cooking:  150 Simple Recipes to Get You Started in the Kitchen" by Mollie Katzen (author of Moosewood Cookbook {which at some point in my past, I owned}.  Winning stuff is so cool and this cookbook is perfect for me because I am stooooooopid when it comes to using my kitchen. 

Most of my time lately has been spent working my volunteer job.  I'm on the Board of our area homeschool support group and cooperative.  I've been working on getting our new website(s) up and running.  We have our main webpage, our BigTent group (which our membership will be moving to shortly as our way of communicating with each other), and because I want our members to be able to make the most out of BigTent and not get lost having to learn a new platform, I've been creating this a website for them, too.

So there's a bit of what I've been up to lately.  I'm heading down to Walgreens in a bit to try my hand at this couponing craze that has hit the blog-o-sphere.  You've been living under a rock if you aren't aware of it.  I have a few coupons saved up from various places, as well as, having printed a few of the internet.  Some of them are going to be stacked on top of the store coupons and sales that Walgreens has going.  I also think I'm prepared to try out their Register Rewards program, too.  With the stacking, sales, and RR's I should be able to get some really great stuff for a fraction of their normal price.  I'll post an update on how it all turned out, sometime this week.

I love my Mondays

After taking all of last month to really focus on my house cleaning, I'm ready to start adding exercise back into my daily life.  I also want to start a small garden this year.  I don't know if that's going to happen yet.  I still have yet to get my hubs to go and get the lumber that I need for a sq-ft garden.

I love my Mondays.  There's nowhere we have to go on Mondays right now.  Starting in June Dancer will have summer dance on Monday evenings but only for the month of June.  I might take lessons, too, I haven't decided yet.  It all comes down to what we can afford.

It will be time to register for all of the summer activities soon.  Dancer has decided what she wants to take and I have them all down on the calendar now.  I think it's just the right amount of activities, just like the balance we have now.  Summer swim lessons have been replaced with summer dance lessons.  She is good at all of the swim strokes but never wanted to take it further into swim team.  It's just not her thing even though she was so good at it.  The only summer activity that goes into August is golf.  Her summer activities cost nearly $400 but we'll have that cost covered when we get our tax refunds back.  The cost of her activities also help me out at tax time with a credit on our state income taxes.

Lately she's been getting into graphic design.  I need to be looking for a decent computer program that will give her more to play with than just Paint and the other free stuff that she finds online.  I suppose I could get her a yearly subscription to Picnik.  I think I've told her about BigHugeLabs but I'm not sure.  It's neat to see her pick up similar interests to mine.  I love playing around with graphic design and website/blog building.  She picked it up, too, but I don't think I really had much influence on that, it's just something she's interested in.

I've been looking for free online courses to further my knowledge of HTML/CSS and website/blog design, so I might feel more comfortable branching out and doing freelance work for other people.  I love doing it as a hobby for myself and for friends but I'd love to take it to the next level.  I prefer designing blogs over actually having to fill content.