The Greatest Gift

Children are gifts from God and the greatest gift parents can give their children is dedication back to God through Baptism.  Yesterday we had the pleasure of witnessing the baptism of our youngest grandchild, Macy Quinn.

  

Macy was all dolled up for her special day.

Big sister, Lauren, and big brother, Chandler, took a few minutes before the ceremony to catch up on whatever it is that little kids chatter about.  Chandler told Lauren, "you look beautiful today".  Lauren replied, "I have a owie on my knee!"

Macy accepted her gift of baptism without a peep.  

Pastor Ryan at Beautiful Savior Lutheran Church was absolutely wonderful.  He reminded all of us about the importance of spiritual gifts and included all of the siblings in the service.  Ethan was given the Baptism Candle and told to help Macy remember her spiritual birthday.  Lauren was handed the Baptism Certificate and was told to keep it in a safe place for her little sister.  Chandler was put in charge of the precious Baptism Medal for safekeeping.  They all beamed with pride to be included.

Left to right:  Drew with Macy, Kristen, Sponsors Aunt Sarah, Uncle Nate, and twin Uncles, Mark and Matt.  Front row:  Chandler, Lauren and Ethan with their special items from Pastor Ryan.

Oh what a special, wonderful day!

Critters

Been a while, huh?  I have a gazillion excuses, of course, but I won't bore you with them.  I'll just admit that I've been a bad blogger and confess that I haven't even checked in on my favorite blog friends either.  That's something I'm not very proud of and I'll try to do a better job.

I have another confession to make.  I tried to copy a crow.  Yep.  I found this awesome prim crow on etsy and tried to make my own.  Let me just say that my crow paled in comparison.

I'm still rather proud of my imitation, even though he does look a bit more like a mutant parrot than a crow.  As a matter of fact, he turned out so good that I wanted to make more primitive creatures because I love them so and I also love the way a little acrylic paint and a coat of Mod Podge magically transforms muslin into faux leather.

So, I did the right thing and ordered four patterns from Raven's Haven, including Edgar the Raven (the one I tried to DIY) designed by Stacey Mead, The Goode Wife of Washington County.  If you love prim, checking out her etsy shop is definitely a must.  Not only are her designs the "crow's toes", her patterns are wonderfully easy to understand and follow.

I haven't tackled the Edgar pattern yet, but I did use her pattern to make this adorable little dog.

The original pattern features cute little wings, but I decided to skip the wings and give him a bandanna scarf instead.  After all, if he's going to live here, he's got to be a farm dog, right?  He needs to be hanging to get the full effect of his chasing pose, but I haven't quite figured out where yet.  For now he just helps me cook and goodness knows I can use all the help I can muster in that department :)

The little fella looks a bit frisky though, don't you think?  I decided he needed someone to keep him in line and found the purrfect subject to fill the bill.  A cranky old cat, again, courtesy of Stacy Mead.

This old gal has zero tolerance for tom-foolery.  

Goodness, this is so much fun I can hardly wait to make some more!