Mother's & Father's Day Mugs

Sorry to those of you who tune in for triplet updates... this is one is merely about hand/foot prints.
I have noticed in the past few months that at least half of the traffic on our blog each day is due to people stumbling across us in search engines after searching something about hand and/or footprints art projects (it kind of makes me laugh!). I had no intention of making this blog about anything other than our family's navigation through the world with triplets, but I also want to make it the most meaningful/useful to our readers. So... I have added some direct links over to the right hand side of our blog that will take our readers directly to a specific project.

While doing so, I remembered that I have never blogged about the Mother's and Father's Day mugs that I have made in the past.
I started out by making my mom, Jason's mom and myself a mug for the first Mother's Day after Quin was born (she was just 7 and a half weeks). We have a local paint your own pottery place, Paint A Pot, where I purchased the un-fired mugs. They let me bring home all of the paints/supplies. I found it difficult to paint not knowing exactly how the coloring would turn out, and it was tricky to paint on the rough ceramics. With that in mind, they still turned out okay.
I tried to use her finger to make the dragon fly, but it didn't work - so I tried to free hand/fix it. I did use her fingertips to make the caterpillar on the handle. Inspired by the first mugs, I did the same for Mother's Day after the triplets were born. I each of their footprints as the flower stems, and Quin's fingerprints for each of the flower blossom. Because the babies' feet were so small, I was able to fit three flowers on each mug.

I also made Jason a mug for Jason's first Father's Day. Unfortunately I didn't use a dark enough color for the angel's body (which was made from Quin's footprint). It is faintly visible when looking at the actual mug, but not so much on film :( Her handprints were the wings.

On a similar note... we made the woman who watches our kids a birthday card! I painted the palm of each child's hand a different color and their fingers yellow. I added the frosting and flames after the base was dry.

I love the way Gianna's cupcake turned out!

I hope this is helpful to those of you out there searching for some fun memories to help preserve your own kiddos hand/footprints forever. I LOVE getting out some of their old projects - it is amazing how fast their little hands/feet grow!

One Fine Face

That was the name of the song that Quin danced to for her big dance recital. And boy - even after applying enough makeup on her to make a street girl jealous (and more makeup than I wear in a month) - I think my Quinners had more than just a 'fine' face! :)

Quin had her big dance recital a few weeks ago - and she did as well as expected.
Her nerves were on a roller coaster the week before. Because she really had no idea what to expect, I think it was more a fear of the unknown.
She struggled at the dance rehearsal, watching her teacher off stage instead of doing the routine. She only did about a third of the dance.
There were two performances - one Friday night and the second Saturday morning. She did increasingly better each time.
By Sunday morning she was in full tears because she couldn't go 'dance on the stage anymore!'.
I was so proud of her! She did a great job - especially for her first stage performance!

Tulip Time

Last month (yeah, I am very behind on my posts!), we made our way down to Holland for Tulip Time. There were many, many beautiful tulips like these... But... I can't lie! Just like in the past few years (here and here) we really just went for the FOOD! I love the rich Dutch traditions, the costumes and wooden shoes, the dancing... but it really is the food that I am head over heals for ;)

Unlike Quin, who took three years to even somewhat appreciate the greasy goodies, the triplets aren't afraid to dig in. They are unanimous with their favorite though... the French Fries!After Ellery's personal bowl of food was gone, she grabbed the tub o' fries and completely hogged them - she is a fry girl through and through!
Gianna
Even Easton enjoyed his bowl full!
I promise they ate more than fries!

Quin ate enough to be considered a meal, but not as much as most four year olds would love to eat! She cracks me up! I suppose this is a good thing.Since it is Tulip Time, after all, we headed over to some tulip fields. This is the closest picture that I was able to capture of the four of them with tulips behind them - ha! Quin was trying to get them to lay on their bellies next to her, but they wanted nothing to do with that pose. We worked hard to get the babes to be 'gentle' to the flowers, but it was a struggle. We eventually settled for kisses - hee, hee!
Ellery loved running from each type of tulip, and looking at their colors - she really had no need to kiss them though! At least one of them helped save me from the 'tulip police'.
This was my favorite. Easton just couldn't resist digging in the dirt whenever there was a few extra seconds. Such a boy! Another Tulip Time down in the books... After looking back at the old Tulip Time posts, I can't believe how fast it seems like the kiddos have grown. I can't imagine how big they will seem by next year!