Loop Hair Bows

I have been wanting to make Molly some of these loop hair bows but I didn't know how. I finally found out how to on the Internet. They are really easy! Here's how!

*You will need some korker ribbon of your choosing. Whatever colors or patterns you like that will match with the clothes you want to wear them with.

*sharp scissors

*clear nail polish, an E6000, a lighter or some other type of instrument to seal your ribbon ends so they won't fray.

*needle and thread

*hot glue gun/hot glue

*alligator prong clip or a barrette

*embellishments for the top

Cut your ribbon into strips of the same length. You will need 2 to 3 different lengths of ribbon. I stacked my bows 2 lengths deep but 3 lengths is really cute too. The length of ribbon size changes how big the circumference of the bow is. So if you want your bow to be about 3 inches in circumference when it's complete, then your first layer of ribbon needs to be 7 inches long. The next layer of ribbon needs to be 6 inches long. And if you did a third layer, it would need to be 5 inches long. You will also want to decrease the amount of layers down too. If you want a bigger bow, cut your ribbon 1 inch longer per layer. Does that make sense? I am a total visual person so I have to see what it looks like to understand. Hopefully this picture will make more sense than my instructions do.

Take your first layer of ribbon all together and fold directly in half with the patterns facing inward.

Put your needle through the center.

Then fan out the layers and put another stitch though so the layers will stay where you want them.

Flip it over so the pattern side is down.

Then take one layer at a time, fold it over and sew it up.

When you are finished with it, you can use either side of the bow because they will look the same.

Then repeat the same procedure for each layer.

After they are all sewn together, hot glue some type of cute embellishment to the top to cover the stitching. Then hot glue it to the alligator prong.

And Wah Lah!

Sam's Cake

Jens' friends are so fun to have around. They are always hanging out at our house.... even when Jens is out of town! We love having them in our home. One of his friends, Sam, is always giving me tips on my cooking/baking. He is always telling me things to throw in a cake to make it more moist or more dense. He tells me what spices to use when I cook to make my food "pop with flavor". He cracks me up! I just remind him that he is only 13 and doesn't know what he is talking about. But he watches Food Network all the time so he thinks that he is an expert.

He made me a cake just to prove it. And I have to admit, he did a really good job! It tasted great! His frosting was even from scratch and he wrote my name in green frosting on top. It was really cute. Thanks for the cake Sam. It was just as good as you said it would be!

The Lake House

We spent a week in this beautiful house on Lake Pend O'Rielle in Sandpoint, Idaho with our friends, the Parry's and the Johnson's.

Idaho....... Yes Idaho. Who would have thought! Sandpoint is north of Coeur d'Alene and about 60 miles away from the Canadian border. It is WAY up there in the panhandle of Idaho. You have to fly into Spokane to get there.

The house was amazingly beautiful with the most gorgeous views all the way around!

The owner had her brother make this canoe for the light above the kitchen bar.

My favorite room in the house was the breezeway. It had a glass garage type door that we would close down at night and during the day it stayed open so we could enjoy the fresh air.

It had a zip line in the trees.

We had our own private dock that the kids lived on.

There was a beach spot that the kids could build sandcastles in.

The Johnson's made the 13 hour drive up and hauled their boat. It made the week so fun to just be able to go out any time of the day and just have fun in the boat.

Sidney is knee boarding in this picture.

Sidney and Jens on the tube

Jack, Reed, and Cade rafting in the little raft.

We all had a fun time in the kayak and the canoe. Even little Caden took the kayak out.

On July 4th, we BBQ'ed hamburgers, went boating all day and that night we had the kids put on a talent show for us. They had all been working on what to perform for a month and it was really good! We were totally entertained! The 2 top winners got and iPod Shuffle!

Some of the talents were:

Sidney danced

Reed did a magic trick

Jens, Tyus, Garrett and Isaac did an impersonation of us mom's at Zumba! It was too funny!

Hannah did a gymnastics routine

Molly did the splits......... And Gracie sang and Brayden did an impersonation of Jeff.

At the end of the night the city of Sandpoint shot fireworks off from City Beach, which was across the lake from us so the fireworks came at us. They were really pretty to watch over the water.

The kids spent their time fishing from the dock.......

and from the water.......

from the grass and from the boat.

We drove over to Trestle Creek. It was so pretty there. I loved all the tall pine trees.

I felt like I was in FORKS!

(all Twilight fans will know what I mean)

My cute family!

My kiddo's with the Parry's kids.

(You should see people's faces whenever we walk into a restaurant with all the kids.)

On our flight home, the captain said, "hi" to Cade and asked if he wanted to sit up in the cockpit with him. Cade thought he was awesome!

This was the most fun trip in the most beautiful place!