Wednesday, August 31, 2011

Fabric Bulletin Board


Over the years of raising my gang, I have become very reliant on using the bulletin board to keep track of everything that is going on in our schedule.  With six kids this was essential.  This year is my second oldest's senior year.  I know from experience that the paperwork from school is an unbelievable amount senior year so I needed a better system.  


I created a school notebook.  Each one of the five kids still in school will get a section and the dividers have pockets for those essential papers due back at school. Those with extra-curricular activities like Drill Team and Cheer, as well as India with her college papers, got another section:










In the meantime, what to do with the old bulletin board.  This was a large one to accommodate all of the different categories (8 sections: one kiddo per section plus one for family activities and one for over-all school info). I decided it will be used more for correspondence, college visitation info, invites, photos, notes and the general silliness which reigns around here.  


I started with some fabric that I bought from Indonesia.  My Sweetheart is a Dutch-Indo from Holland so having a part of him incorporated in each room of my house is essential.  I gathered some jute and thumbtacks, my trusty rechargeable glue gun and my 13 year-old, Andrew.  He and I spent the day laying out the grid.  This is how it turned out:






For the over-all effect on my kitchen wall:



Now we are ready for the new school year.  One more week...

Saturday, August 13, 2011

Volunteering - Family Style

Yesterday I was on Facebook and in my feed was a plea from our local thrift shop looking for volunteers to help sort and put away donations filling their shop.  I didn't even think about it when I volunteered a few of my kids to go with me to help out.  Later, when I told them I had volunteered my girls to go with me, my sons wanted to come along.  This morning as we were getting ready to head out, my oldest son said he wanted to go with us.  Since he is so busy with work, this was a pleasant surprise.






After spending a couple of hours at the thrift shop we all walked away feeling good about our day and about ourselves. 

We took a lunch break over at DQ and laughed and chatted about how much fun we had and how we can't wait to go back to help some more.

Then over to church.



My oldest went to work straightening up the praise band area from the general untidiness left behind from Vacation Bible School.  While he worked the rest of us found work to do until the church was back in order.  

It was a fantastic day and we all feel great having helped others.  We discussed this and decided to do this at least monthly, if not more often.  

Volunteering warms the heart.