Sewing Fabric Bowls - Keepers

We recently had a Keepers meeting at our house where the girls learned to make Fabric Bowls.  The uses for these bowls vary, you can keep sewing notions in them, craft supplies, school odds and ends, etc. 

 

First the girls cut 3/4" strips of 100% cotton fabric

 

Then they wrapped the strips around cotton clothesline cording and sewed with a zig-zag stich to attach the ropes together into a circle.

 

Once they sewed the base of their bowl as wide as they wanted, (for a medium sized bowl about 3 1/2" in diameter) they held the base up against the side of their machine to create the sides of their bowl.

 

Everyone intently working on their projects...

 

A few of the girls made trivets and coasters instead of bowls.  One mom was talking about making a rug the same way.  There are lots of different things to make using fabric and rope!

 Lillia and Mom made homemade funnel-cakes for a fun snack after the meeting was over..yum!

 

Zoë and I are in our last year of Keeper's so our mom's thought it would be a good idea for us to teach a class this year.  We learned how to make fabric bowls last year and thought it would be a fun and easy sewing project to teach our fellow Keeper's at Home girls :)

This picture was just too cute not to include in the post!  Benjamin sure seems to enjoy being held by Faith! :)

Skate, Skate, Skate!

Wow, it's been a while since I've posted here on the Sanger family blog! :-/ Sorry about that!  Life seems to be speeding by very fast for our family and we are keeping busy for sure!  Here's a post about a recent event we enjoyed hosting at the Mt. Gretna Rollerink!!  :)

 

For the past few years we've rented the rink for an evening of skating during the winter and it's something we all look forward to!

 

 Our competitive natures always come out during the relay races! :P

 

There is an organ on the stage so we had Uncle Norman play a few songs for us as we skated

 3 hours of skating with over 100 of our friends is a great way to spend an evening!! :)

 

 



Our Adventure in the Ice Storm

This past week we had a little adventure when an ice storm hit and our electricity went out for three days.  The weight from the ice on the trees caused a lot of branches to break and damage the power lines. We had no lights, no running water, no heat.  Thankfully we have flashlights and candles for light and a woodstove for heat!  As for the water... to flush toilets we filled the tanks with melted snow, and for dishes and personal hygiene, dad brought jugs of water home that we heated on the woodstove.  Hope commented that we were "camping in the house" when we brought in the propane camp stove to make some hot meals. We emptied the freezers and refrigerators into ice chests and set them outside in the snow to keep the food from spoiling. It was a memory making three days that's for sure!  We survived though and we made some memories we won't soon forget! :)

 

melting snow in front of the wood stove...

 

David thought having no lights was a fun adventure and he ran around with his monkey headlamp on reading books and playing with toys during the power outage :)

 



 Our sweet little boy just sat and smiled as he watched the action go on around him :)

 

I went out and took some pictures around our house the day after the storm.

 

 

I love icicles!

 

 Our feathered friends enjoyed snacks at the bird tree...

 

 

We are very thankful to have our electricity on once again! =D

Macramé Bracelets - Keepers

Yes, this enjoyable meeting was about two weeks ago and I'm just now getting it put on here!!  This was Aunt Jeanine's meeting and she had someone else teach us how to make macramé bracelets...her daughter, Joanna! :)

 We made two bracelets at this meeting, an adjustable charm bracelet and a square knot macrame bracelet.

 Before we did the square knot macrame bracelet we did a practice run with rope so we could see the bigger version of what we were about to do.

Measure a yard and 14" of two different color braiding cords.  The two different colors make it a little easier to do the square bracelet.  Measure 12 inches from the bottom of one end of your two strings. Make a loop above that and knot, this will be where you fasten your bracelet closed with a bead at the end.  Tape down the 12 inches of cord at one end and your loop at the top.  Cross your pink cord (or whatever color you choose :) under the two strands taped down and over the blue cord.  Now take your blue (for example) cord and go under the taped down cords and through the pink loop on the other side and pull snug.  Now your pink cord will be on the opposite side of which you started.  Always make sure the first cord you loop is the one you always start off with, in our case, pink.  If not the edges of your bracelet will turn out multi-colored and it won't look as neat.

 You can also add beads onto your cord as you are making it to give it a finishing touch.

We measured our wrists and then when our bracelet was that length we finished it off.

Thanks to Joanna for teaching us this fun and easy way to make bracelets!

We got to make a cool snack after our meeting...snowmen heads out of rice cakes spread with cream cheese and decorated with raisins, craisins, and a piece of an apricot!