Accomplishments

It's been a productive day... finally!   

 It seems like I've been working on these bibs for a month, but it's only been just over two weeks - since the 2nd.  Finally, they are completely finished ... all 27 of them.

 I didn't think about needing that many snaps, so I had to use what I had.  So some of the snaps are black, some pearly white and some huge, ugly bronze looking ones.  All of these were intended for western shirts I was going to make my guys, but since I never seems to get to those, I figured it would be better to use what I have on hand than to buy more ... especially since I would have had to get them at the pricey local quilt shop.  I'm not even sure they would have them.  And we were just at Walmart (100 miles away) yesterday!  Guess I better put them on my list for the next trip there, so I will have some on hand.

 Here's my other big accomplishment - shelves!  I really wanted an enclosed cabinet here, something like a vanity cabinet, but after looking at Home Depot, Walmart and Kmart, I figured out that I would be paying at least $60 for something that looked decent, and would only hold a few little items.  The original idea was to keep sharp items I didn't want the kids to have access to on those shelves, but it's nice to be able to keep more supplies there too.

So what's up there?  The top shelf has a few of my favorite and most used books - The Farmer's Wife quilt, along with printed paper piecing patterns in the big green binder.  I want to get back to trying to do some of those.  My hexagon quilt pieces are up there in the container too.  I haven't had much time for handwork anymore since the baby is more active when he's nursing, and would just try to grab whatever I try to work on.  Now, when he's awake and alert, I visit with him while I nurse.  When he needs to go to sleep, I read.

The middle shelf has three containers of threads - black/white/grey, bright/dark, and light/pastel.  A friend gave me most of these when cleaning out her mother's stash.  Many of them are old, and none are name brand.  I have a few nice name brand spools of quilting threads, but only a few, and those are set aside for specific projects.  Also on that shelf are my crochet hooks, and a smaller, more manageable box of hexagons to stitch.  I've used up all the papers I have for that project (600 of them!) and will have to stitch the hexagons together before I can do anything else.  I want a fairly random pattern, but I can never truly do random.  I have to do "planned random" - which if you think about it, is an oxymoron.  Anyway, the big box with stars and stripes holds all my miscellaneous notions - elastic, fold over elastic, velcro, buttons, marking pens and pencils, elastic thread, and so on.

 

The shelf on the bottom holds my bobbins, scissors, rotary cutter, pins, and a couple inspirational pictures.

This cross stitch was done by one of my best friends from a long time ago.  We were going to a ladies' Christmas meeting and were supposed to take a gift.  The gift exchange was done by a draw of numbers - whoever got number one got to pick their gift first, number two could steal that gift or open their own, and so on.  I knew what her gift was, and thankfully was able to pick it :)  I knew because I had helped her pick out the frame, and wrap it ;)  Regardless of how deviously I ended up with it, this will always make me smile when I see it.

This other piece of artwork is something I put together with a cheap frame and some scrapbook papers.  It says "You are His workmanship."

 

Okay, you knew I couldn't do a post without some cute baby pictures, right?  This is the first time I have seen him tuck his arms behind his head.  I found him asleep like that.  His brothers used to do this all the time - especially the three year old.  Looks pretty comfy!

He's been in such a good mood lately, and his skin has been much clearer.

Saturday I took the baby, and my 19 year old daughter to the town 100 miles away.  My daughter sells Premier Designs Jewelry, and had a show down there, so the baby and I did some shopping while she did her show.

 

The boys stayed home and went sledding with Dad.

... or they played with sticks.  The three year old didn't care for sledding.  I thought he might not be thrilled with it.  He's afraid of everything.  But he likes sticks ... and goggles.  So he had a good time.

The seven year old is a regular kamikazi. 

There's a pretty decent hill in town for sledding.  It's steeper than it looks in the picture.  After they finished sledding, they went and picked up our fruits and veggies from the co-op, then watched a movie.  We ended up not getting home until midnight.  My daughter had some clothes shopping she needed to do to get some dress slacks for her new job, and then she wanted to get together with a friend for dinner in a town 12 miles further away.  We had a nice visit though (her mom came too, so I had someone to visit with).  It was a good day for everyone.

Order and Organization

"Let all things be done decently and in order." I Corinthians 14:40

That was part of the passage our pastor preached on this morning.  I am a total failure at doing things decently and in order.  I run around like a chicken with my head cut off, frustrated and constantly upset that I can't seem to find time for the things to do, and when I do make time to do them, I can't find the things I need in order to get them done.  I've decided it's high time to do something about that.

Today, I decided I was going to sew after lunch, when everyone else typically takes a Sunday afternoon nap.  Not that I couldn't use a nap myself, but I'm very frustrated that I've spent so much time on a simple project like making new bibs.  So after feeding the baby, I put him in the living room in the swing, so he could nap there instead of his crib, which I recently moved my sewing machine next to.  And I was sewing along just fine, until all these thoughts came to me and I had to stop and get them down where I would remember them.  Anyway, I got to thinking that I not only need a place for everything, but also a time for everything.  I recently read a great piece of advise on a blog somewhere (sorry I can't remember where) that advised having a place for everything.  Okay, I've heard that before.  But then she said, if there's something you want to keep, but can't find a place for it, get rid of something else so it will have a place.  Duh.  Why didn't I ever think of that?  My problem is that I have too many things I'm trying to keep, and not enough space for the things I actually want or need.  Okay so that's the plan for the organization.  Now for the orderliness.

It occurred to me as I was sewing, that I ought to set aside Sunday afternoons to do all my sewing.  I can cut things out and prep them during the week, especially while supervising napping daycare kids, and then if I get a chance in the evening to sew a bit, that's great.  If not, I'll have everything ready for Sunday afternoon.  Then I got to thinking, I just need a routine time for each thing I need to do during the week - homeschool prep, preschool prep, doing the finances, processing the mail, etc.  I don't do well with an hour-by-hour schedule, but a simple routine of "Monday morning I'm going to___" might work.  Or maybe I'll give the hourly schedule another try.  It would probably greatly reduce the chaos of the daycare.  We'll see.  I have to think about that some more.  But for now, I need to get back to my sewing before everyone wakes up from their naps!

A Short Night

Last night was a very short night.  I crawled into bed shortly after midnight, which is normal for me, following a late night nursing session and getting all those last minute things done that can only be done after all the kids are in bed.  It seems like I get them all done, and then think up "just one more" thing I need to do before bed, and before you know it, it's tomorrow before I even get to sleep.  

Anyway, this is pretty typical for me.  But last night, I had just drifted off when I heard the baby spitting up.  I knew it was a lot.  I turned on a soft light and found that the poor thing had thrown up everything he had eaten.  So at 1 am, I was bathing a baby, changing bedding, running a load of laundry, and sanitizing everything in sight.  The baby didn't seem to mind.  He was all smiles.  It didn't seem to bother him even when he was dry heaving.  He'd get sick, then grin the biggest grin.  He seemed to think it was quite an accomplishment to have both Mom and Dad get up with him in the middle of the night.  Anyway, not to be gross or anything, but he was still trying to get sick even after his bath, and I was worried he might choke if I laid him down in bed and fell asleep.  So I sat up with him, holding him until after 3 am, until I was pretty sure he was sound asleep and didn't seem to be getting sick anymore.  He woke again at 6 wanting to nurse.  I fed him then tried to go back to sleep.  I had to be up by 7 to get ready for the daycare, so there wasn't much sleeping involved. I hoped to go back to sleep for a bit this morning after the daycare kids arrived, and before my daughter headed off to her first day of her new job, leaving her to watch the kids until 10 or so.  (This is her first real job, so she was pretty happy to go.)  Would you believe I couldn't sleep?  Not even for five minutes!!  I was actually surprised how well I was able to get through the day without being too tired. 

 So here it is, nearly 11 pm, and I'm still working on a few of those "one last things" before I head to bed "early."  HA.  Anyway, I did manage to get those bibs turned right side out.  Half of them are pinned closed where I turned them and ready to be top-stitched.  Three of them are top stitched.  I was amazed at how peaceful it was for me to be able to sew in the bedroom with the door shut.  Nobody interrupting, no noise.  It was nice.  (Of course the kids were in bed too, which was nice.)  Anyway, can you believe it can take anyone so long to make bibs?  Ugh.  It's very frustrating.  It seems like I ought to be able to whip these out in an afternoon.  And I could, if there were nothing else to do.  But there is...  Anyway, I guess there is some consolation in the fact that there are 27 of them.  I've been wanting to start one of those other quilts - either the Lil' Twister or the Kaleidoscope quilt I'm making from another set of fat quarters I won last year.  That quilt is going to be for my daughter, and I want to have it done for her to take to college this fall, so I think I probably ought to work on that one first...  We'll see.  I told myself I wouldn't start anything else until these bibs are done.  As for today, I'm just happy I managed to get anything done.

The baby seems better tonight.  He hasn't been sick again since 8 am, and he managed to hold down all his feedings, including some applesauce tonight.  All he did all day was nurse every once in awhile, and lay in his crib.  He didn't really sleep much, but didn't want to be up and around.  Hopefully he's beyond the bellyache.  He was in a good mood tonight and very vocal about having some real food at the dinner table.  I'm hoping he's in the mood to sleep tonight.  I sure could use it! Wish me luck.  Goodnight ~

The Second Half of the Organizing

 I managed to get everything loaded onto the shelf we had to move yesterday.  The section on the left was the one that was in the bedroom.  It blocks a window now, but we don't open it anyway, and it's on the south side of the house so it tends to make it pretty warm in the summer.  Not that we're anywhere near summer.  That doesn't come around here until July.  And no, I'm not exaggerating.

 So now this is all of our homeschool stuff for this year, including reference books like atlases, dictionaries, small encyclopedias, etc. and all the different crayons, markers, and so on.  Seems like a lot for only one student, doesn't it?  But we don't use textbooks, so each subject is a series of real books instead.  I love homeschooling this way!  It makes all the subjects really come alive.  I didn't ever get a chance to make up the homeschooling plan for the week, but this is a big step in the right direction.  At least now I ought to be able to find everything I need when I need it!

 So here's a peek at my next project (or you could also call this "starting another project despite the fact that I haven't finished any others recently!")  I won most of this fabric a couple weeks ago, but wanted to add a bit to it.

 There were two greys in the stack I won (paired with the black and white dots in the picture below.) I decided to pick up another grey (the one on the top of the pile), and a couple of different black and white prints.
 

 The top two prints are new.  I'm not sure I need both greys and black and whites though.  I'll have to see once I get to playing with it.  I may just stick with one or the other.

 One of the blues had purple in it, and I thought it might be nice to add some purples, so I picked up three different fat prints.  I think they really add to the quilt.  This is intended to be a child's quilt using the Lil' Twister ruler.

I absolutely love this print, so I had to buy a few yards.  I'm thinking of using it for the border and backing.  The print really deserves to be used as a huge piece, so a backing is perfect.  I'd love to make a skirt out of this stuff.  Maybe I should have bought a whole bolt - lol.  I seriously LOVE this print. :)

I don't know when I'll get to sew this, but I'm hoping to start it as soon as the bibs are finished.  Of course I have fabric picked out and set aside for at least 4 or more (definitely more) other quilts too, so we'll see if I get to it anytime soon.  I used my store credit to pay for much of this anyway.  Everything other than the black was just fat quarters, and 9 of the pieces are ones I won, so I don't feel too guilty about it :)

How the Rest of Saturday Went

 I showed you the three year old's  lunch.  Here's what I had. How's that for a tomato?  It was bigger than my bread!  I made a BLT for myself.  Our daughter has been working up at the Bible camp and didn't get home until late this afternoon.  (We get all our fruits and vegetables from a co-op called BountifulBaskets.org and it's wonderful.  We always get good stuff and it is very inexpensive.  We've changed our eating habits since we started getting those baskets about a year ago - the kids all love most of what we get.  It's fun to try new things too!  They have sites all across the US, so you ought to see if it's available near you.  I highly recommend it!)

My husband took the seven year old out to lunch and then over to his parent's house to put together a cabinet for them.  We watched Courageous the other night, and it encourages men to be the head of their family adn more involved in their children's lives, which he is trying to do.  If you haven't seen it, I highly recommend the movie.  While they were busy with that, I took the little ones to the grocery store and the thrift store.  I managed to find two pair of ice skates (one pair of hockey skates and one pair of figure skates) for the seven year old.  He's been going skating every week with the homeschool group but had outgrown his skates from last year.  Things are so cheap at the thrift store that I was able to get the next two sizes of skates so we don't have to pay the rental fee anymore!  I just cut my weekly ice-skating fees in half :)

 Here's the project that took up the rest of my day.  This is what our bedroom used to look like.  Definitely crowded...

 ...especially on my side of the bed.

 And here's what it looks like  now.  We moved the big black bookshelf out, turned the bed sideways and moved my indoor sewing machine into the bedroom.  It has been living in the dining room.  That was good in the sense that I could use it when the daycare kids were napping, but bad in the sense that the kids could get into it.  Plus it was always a little messy around there.  (I'm sure you can understand.)  The recliner is a new one too.  We bought that with part of my husband's Christmas bonus from work because I was doing so much sleeping in the recliner when I fed the baby at night, and the other one didn't have a high enough back or enough back and leg support.

 Now I have room to get to my side of the bed, and this also uncovered a vent, which was what actually prompted this change to begin with.  I've been freezing at night, and figured if I was cold, then the baby probably was too.  I've been dressing him warmly, but still, when you sleep, your body slows down and you're just naturally colder.

 Of course this change is great for me, but not so good for my husband.  He has a mere 15 inches of walkway between him and his dresser.  It's a tight squeeze, but he thinks it will be fine.

 I had him throw together this shelf for me too.  I say throw together because the braces are actually plant hangers, and the top is an 8 inch wide board that was left over from another project.  The braces are 10 inches wide.  We plan to get a different board when we get the chance, but for now I needed somewhere to put diapering supplies.  The bonus to it being a plant hanger is that I could easily hang a couple of toys from it too.  There wasn't room by the wall for the mobile we had attached to the bed, so I put a hook in the ceiling and hung a rocket mobile with ribbon.

 The crib is smashed tightly up against my side of the bed, and I knew the baby would be distracted being able to see me so I put a blanket over the edge of the crib to hide myself from him.

There's another blanket on the front side - so we can walk around in the room without disturbing him. I'm going to make some tab curtain type of blockers that will only hang on the outside of the crib, and attach to the top with velcro ... eventually.  For now the blankets will have to work.

When I'm not using it, the sewing machine is covered with it's hard plastic cover.  The machine sits down in the table, flush with the tabletop, so the cover isn't on tight, but I'm confident no child could move it from inside the crib.  The table has a section that will fold closed if the machine is removed, but then I don't get much sewing done because it's a pain to open it and set everything up only to have to close it again (which is what I've had to do with it in the dining room, to keep the daycare kids out of it). Under the folded out section I have my works in progress, and the black lamp is an Ottlite I got for Christmas a year ago.  I would like to get either a shelf, or preferably a hanging cabinet to put above the machine to hold sewing supplies up and out of reach too, so I'll have to look for something like that.  I will have to do all my cutting in the other room (I like to use the kitchen bar for that), and larger ironing will have to be done out there, which is inconvenient.  But I have a small ironing board without legs that will fit fairly well on the little table next to the recliner for pressing quilt blocks.


So, I'm sore and tired, and still have to finish putting a bunch of stuff on the black shelf we moved out of this room.  I'll have to show you that project when I get it all done.  I'm excited about that too, because it doubles my storage for homeschool books and preschool supplies.  More on that when it gets finished (which will need to be done tomorrow, before I'm back to daycare duties Monday morning.  For now though I'm really happy with the sewing space and can't wait to put it to use (you know, after I get everything else done...)  It's been a good day.

Childs' Play

 I love that my boys love each other.

 They all like to snuggle and roughhouse.

 Makes a mother's heart smile ;)

 The baby is learning to sit up on his own.  He's not quite there yet, but he can sit up when he's holding onto something.  He sits up in the bathtub by holding the edge of the baby tub.  He's enjoying his new skills.

This is what the three year old picked out for his own lunch today.  I was making BLT's, and he said, "No Bacon!!"  When I had the fridge open, he pulled out the radishes, celery and mini cucumbers.  He ended up eating three of the mini cucumbers (each about 5 inches long!).  All that's left of the celery on his plate here are the strings!  And this was just the first helping.  He had double that much, easily - and two slices of bread. He asked for a third slice of bread but I didn't give it to him.  My daughter used to eat like this when she was little.  She would get into a loaf of bread and finish the whole thing off.  When we went out to eat, she would order a side salad, then fill up on the free saltine crackers on the table and take the salad home for dinner.  I guess birds of a feather flock together.  She and the three year old have an extra close bond.  Funny that they share this trait too.

 Last night my husband and I took the 7 year old  to a performance of Sylvester and the Magic Pebble - a children's book (written by the author of Shrek) that was being performed by actors with masks and puppets.  It was pretty well done, but hokey (at least according to my husband and I).  The seven year old loved it though, so we didn't tell him we thought it was hokey :)  We have a pretty good local fine arts council that  does a fairly good job of bringing unique and interesting "culture" to our little town.  We only have about 2,000 people in town, but we are fortunate enough to occasionally have the Utah Symphony Orchestra come to town too.  They do a good job getting good programing here.  (Oh and here's a little interesting fact for you.  There are more people in Denver, Colorado than there are in the entire state of Wyoming.  We do love our uncrowded, wide-open spaces out here!!)

On the sewing front, I managed to finish step two on the bibs this week - sewing them together (though not all on the same day).  Now I need to turn them, top stitch, and add snaps.  I figure I can turn them while daycare kids are here, so I probably won't work on them over the weekend.  I might finish a couple just so we have nice ones to keep in the diaper bag for when we eat out though.  We'll see. 

For now though, I need to run to the store, then to the thrift store.  I still need to add a barn to the mural I'm working on at church, and I'd like to make  time to  create  a better homeschool plan - at least for next week.  I've been winging it all year and it's not going as well as I would like.  We do okay, but I'm finding myself thinking each day, "Now where were we?  What was it I wanted to do next?"  So a more concrete plan should help.  We've been homeschooling for 15 years now, so I don't mind winging it, and I don't get too stressed out about a schedule.  As long as we're making progress we're good.  The seven year old is the only one in school right now anyway, and he's doing 4th-5th grade work despite being 2nd grade age, so like I said, I'm not too worried about it.  It would just make it easier on me each day to not have to think twice about what the "next thing" is.  I also really need to put up new house numbers and a new daycare sign on the side of the house, do some re-arranging to make the bedroom more functional, and prep my preschool projects for the week for the daycare. Anyway, that's my (way too full) plan for the day (oh yeah, and it's already 1:30!). We'll see how much I get done!  For now, I'm off to the store. 

It's a Good Day

 It's always a good day when you receive a sweet package in the mail - wrapped up with ribbon and everything.

It's even sweeter when you unwrap the package to find a beautiful assortment of fat quarters!  This is a bundle I won from The Intrepid Thread through Maureen Cracknell Handmade.  I love this color palette And I already know what I'm going to make.

  

 A Lil' Twister quilt!  I love that quilt pattern.  I wanted to make my daughter a quilt from that method, but she doesn't care for it, *gasp* - I didn't think there was anyone out there that didn't like that pattern!  So, winning this set of fat quarters gives me the perfect excuse to try out that ruler :)  I think the color combo will be perfect for that quilt.  I might even add in a little more black, as there is one fabric with black circles, and I think it would be nice to even it out a bit or else it might stick out too much.  There are three oranges, three turquoises and two grey and one grey with black.  I'm thinking I will add another grey and two more black/whites. 

I believe I told you about the wishing well contest our local bank had at Christmas time to encourage people to shop locally in our little town.  We put our local receipts into a wishing well in the bank and they drew several winners, who were then awarded a bank check made out to the winner and the business the receipt was from - so you could spend the identical amount as the receipt you won with at that same store.  I won a $65 check to our local quilt shop in that drawing.  I don't think I ever blogged about it, but I used some of that credit to buy special rulers and notions I'd had my eye on, as well as a new quilt pattern to go along with one of the specialty rulers.  The Lil Twister ruler was one of the things I bought.  I still have about $20 credit at the quilt shop because there wasn't anything else I felt like I had to have, and I wanted to keep a credit so I could spend money there when I wanted to :)  So maybe I'll try to rush down there after the daycare kids leave today and see what fabrics they have in blacks and greys.  I seriously need to do some sewing!!

Productivity

Okay, all those negative things I said about being frustrated that I can never get anything done ... I take it back.  I'm feeling really productive at the moment.  Over the last couple days, I've gotten a lot of things done.   

 I made baby food the same day I cut out all those bibs.  This is the easy way to do it. I baked a dozen apples, then pealed back a section of the skin and spooned out the flesh of the apple.

 It's easy to get all the good stuff out and you don't have to peel the apple, which is the part I hate doing.

 The pulp then goes into a blender and then the pureed applesauce is poured into ice cube trays and frozen.  Once it's frozen, I pop it out of the trays and put it in zip lock bags so I can take out as many cubes as I need for each feeding.  Super easy, and super cheap.


Once I got started I figured I might as well make up everything - so there are a couple of cubes of blackberries we had left (I'm not sure he'll like those - they're pretty seedy) and a quart size bag of blueberries. 

That was all done on Friday, with a busy day with the daycare kids.  I also managed to do extra preschool crafts, and meet a parent who is new to town and is looking for daycare.  The picture above was taken this evening, but I thought it was cute, so I wanted to share.  He was sent to the chair tonight because he purposely knocked down a pile of towels his brother had just folded.  I guess now we know why he was being ornery.  This one keeps me on my toes, and is a good source of entertainment.  Friday I was cutting up some fresh pears for lunch in the daycare and he got so excited when he saw them.  He yelled, "Parents!"  I just cracked up and shook my head.  At least he likes all sorts of fresh fruits and veggies - even if he doesn't know their real names. :)
 

Now I'll share with you a huge project I managed to take on thanks to the little man in that picture.  Our church building is pretty outdated.  It needs a lot of work, and we just haven't gotten organized enough to tackle any of it.  Well, the three year old decided to help motivate us when we were at teen group a week and a half ago. 
 

He pulled half a sheet of this lovely green wallpaper off the nursery wall.  The room in this picture is right next to the nursery, but the colors and wallpaper are the same in both rooms.  Or at least they were.

This is that lovely wallpaper that has shiny gold in it.  Can you see it in the pictures?  This is really heavy wallpaper, and thankfully it came off cleanly in sheets.  Once we saw what he had done, we just pealed it off the whole room - in about 3 minutes.

This is what the nursery looks like now.  Better?  I love the colors.  They look bluer in the pictures than they are.  The blues have a lot more green in them than they appear in the pictures.

The black section is my big idea.  Me and my big ideas.  I always manage to take a manageable task and make it ten times more time consuming.  The black on this wall is magnetic primer.  In other words, primer with metal in it.  The wall is probably 10 feet or so.  And I had the bright idea to paint a mural on it, so we can buy cute magnets for the kids to use on it.  Of course being the one who thinks up the project tends to get you volunteered for the project too.  I'm really not complaining though.  I think it's a lot of fun.  I can't wait to get it all done :)  The plan is to have a construction site, farm, and water (lake or ocean), and maybe a train track running through the whole scene.  We'll see how that all works out.

We also still need to touch up around the edges, paint all the trim, and the cubby storage unit.  I'm hoping to get all that done by next Sunday, so the kids can be back in that room.  Yeah.  We'll see.  After that, I'd like to do the room next to it, which is my SPARKS classroom (the one in the pictures).  I'm thinking I'd like to use greens in there, and paint half a globe on the bottom section and children dressed in outfits from around the world just above the middle border strip, with words saying "Jesus loves the children of the world" curving above the earth.  I forgot to mention that we're planning on putting a verse on the wall of the nursery too.  Of course having those two rooms done will mean the other three classrooms really ought to be done.  My husband has already come up with some ideas for his teen classroom, and the other two rooms will probably just get painted a solid color.  So see how my "little" idea has sprouted into a whole yard full of dandelions?  I guess this will be an ongoing project for quite some time.

This is another project I completed at the church tonight.

The bulletin board in the foyer usually only gets decorated at Christmas, and when it isn't decorated, it is covered with faded burlap.  It really just needs to be recovered or something, but nobody really knows what to do with it.  I agreed to decorate the church for Christmas, which again lead to me inheriting the job of decorating the foyer bulletin board year round.  I enjoy doing that sort of thing, and again I'm really not complaining.  Our pastor and his wife are in their 80's, and she has taken care of it all these years, so she is very happy to have someone else take over the task. 

The center says "Love is" and each of the large red hearts has a phrase on it from I Corinthians 13 "Love is patient (long-suffering), love is kind," etc.

I'm not thrilled with the look.  I had intended to use a silver wrapping paper for the background, but there wasn't enough.  The only paper I had enough of was this red, which is a nice paper, but it makes the hearts disappear.  If I had known I would be using that, I would have just used the pink and white hearts.  Oh well.  It's done now, and it isn't bad.  The silver pen doesn't show up as well as I'd like either, but live and learn.  Next time I'll stick with black.