Tuesday, April 30, 2013

Family Match!

With the pictures (and others) I found for this display, I made a Family Match game.  It is so much fun to play with the kids, and makes a great Sunday activity.  You can match picture to picture, like normal Memory, or you can match husband to wife, or for even some of the people we can mathch an old picture to a young picture.

I want to have a pedigree chart on hand so we can also test our skill at creating a picture pedigree with our cards.  Someday I plan to create an info card for each individual so that when we make a match we can review a few details about our ancestors.

I have the ancestors' names divided into 4 different colors for my mom's side, my dad's side, my husband's mom's side, and my husband's dad's side, so that if we want to focus on a specific line, it's easy to divide the cards.

I created a grid in my word processor (MS Word), then imported the pictures and added names.  I used that same template to make my backs which say "Family Match!"

No Sew (Baby) Poncho



Our baby LOVES fleece anything.  She was even at our neighbor's and wanted to snuggle a fleece robe!  Around Christmastime, I had this little fleece scrap and decided it would be really easy to slit a hole in the middle of it to turn it into a poncho for her to wear.  Sometimes it's so hard to put a jacket on a baby, but a poncho is easy!  I also found it wonderful to put on her when we're out in the stroller because it doesn't fall off like a regular blanket!  Now this may be considered a strangulation hazard, but I am always around her and she can take it off when it bugs her.  What's funny is she has one poncho out of this fabric and also one mini-blanket.  She's always trying to put the blanket on like her poncho!  I should probably just cut a hole it it, too!


After a few tries, I found I like a circle in the middle of the fabric, rather than a slit.  When I cut it, I quartered the fabric, cut a curve to create a hole a little bigger than her neck, then cut a slit down in front to provide enough room for her head to fit through. 


As for size, with the fabric folded in half, if you place a sweatshirt over it and make your fabric the width and height of the sweatshirt, and then cut your fringe, it's just right.


The kids also had some fleece blankets that we put holes in so they could have ponchos, too.  Now they can sleep with them, or wear them!  (But I wouldn't recommend sleeping in them).

Sunday, April 7, 2013

Picture Pedigree Display



Several years ago I wanted to gather and display pictures of our ancestors in our home.  I wanted to put the pictures close to the t.v. and entitle the entire display, "The Stuff I'm Made of."  I wanted our kids to become familiar with their ancestors' faces and remember what they're made of when they're tempted to watch something they shouldn't.

I wanted pictures of our ancestors when they were young, not old, so that we could remember them in their vibrancy.  I also wanted to be able to see the family resemblances, which is easier to do with young pictures.

I wanted to include details of our ancestors' lives such as their education, where they were married, their hobbies, eye color, hair color, height, where they lived, what their profession was, where they served a mission, etc.

I thought it would be fun to include pictures of things that remind us of them such as their school logo or a ball for the sport they liked most.  You can see that this last one didn't get included because those little extras would have just taken up too much space and caused too much clutter.

I tried to use background paper that would represent the people/person in the pictures.  For instance, if she was a teacher, I used paper with letters on it.  If he liked the outdoors, I used paper with grass.  For those who lived during the typewriter, I found a font that looked like a typewriter.  For those of us who lived during the Times New Roman phase, we got that.

I showed this during one of my RS lessons recently and several women were in awe over it.  The stake RS president is in our ward and she asked if I could bring it to share at a stake RS event.  It seemed to me to be a big hit there, too.  I've always thought it was cool, but I've always liked history stuff.  I didn't realize others would also like it, which is why I am writing this post.

The whole thing took 40+ hours.  Most of the time was spent gathering the information about the ancestors.  This project includes 4 generations.