Giveaway

Finally it's giveaway time...

I've played with the idea of celebrating my blogging anniversary, but always felt weird about it, although I'm not sure exactly why. This year I decided to bite the bullet and just do it! So, leave a comment with your email address and let me know which one of these fabulous prizes you'd like me to send your way. 

If you've been lurking out there and haven't left a comment before, this would be the perfect opportunity. I'd love to know just how many readers I've got, and who knows, you just might win.

You could choose this 2012 Seasons of Mackinac calendar,

or one of these two hand-appliqued pillow covers.

 

The navy one is 18 X 18 (about 45.75 cm X 45.75 cm,) the red and green one is a touch smaller at 17 1/4 inches by 17 1/4 inches (about 44 X 44 cm.) Both have a zipper on the back so you can insert a pillow form. I bought them when I was in Egypt, visiting my mom, back in 2010, and had intended to give them away right after I got back, but somehow I never got around to it.  I am willing to ship internationally and will be just as happy if a first time commenter or someone I've known for ages wins. So go ahead and comment - even if you never have before.

Next week, say on Wednesday evening, I'll draw three names and email the winners. Good luck!

On a completely different note, I hear that Arnold Line will begin running again on Tuesday. Wahoo!!  Such good news. Usually this time of year the Straits of Mackinac look like this:

 It's been such an odd winter - we don't really have any ice at all this year. Sure ice chunks blow in and out every few days but there is a lot of open water...

I'm Still Here, Really

I didn't forget about the giveaway - really I didn't. Life just kind of got in the way. I have been so crazy busy this school year that I just haven't had much time to post. I know I have alluded to it before, but I have never really said exactly what has me so darn busy this year. 

Financially, Michigan is in a bit of trouble, and of of the ways our governor tried to save money was by cutting the funding for K-12 schools. So, for our little school to make ends meet, we had to make some pretty drastic cuts.

One of those cuts was a teacher. Thankfully she retired and no one was let go. But either way we were one staff member short and the school board decided that the best solution was to rearrange our elementary students.  Since we are a K-12 school with only about 85 kids, we have always had combined grades: a K-1 split, a 2-3, a 4-5, and a 6-7; the high school students move from class to class just like in other high schools.

Given the numbers of students in each grade it was decided to combine the 4th, 5th, 6th, and 7th grades into one group. (Keep in mind that those four grades contained a total of 15 students.) I'm not saying it was a good solution to the problem, or a bad solution to the problem. It was just the solution. The plan was to keep the four grades together for two years - until the number of students in the group would be too large keep in one classroom. Oh yes, and our special education teacher was cut to half time.

So, as you can imagine I've been busy - teaching 4th - 7th grade math as well as science to the 4th and 5th graders in the morning, and then teaching math, science and social studies to the 2nd and 3rd graders in the afternoon.   I'm trying my best to cover all the material, give each student the individual attention they need, plan meaningful lessons and activities, and grade and return work in a timely manner - not to mention have a life outside of work.

 

You can imagine how I felt when, earlier this week, the superintendent told us the that the school would most likely be able to separate the 4th - 7th grade group next year and that our special ed. teacher would be able to come back full time. We'll still be down a teacher, and I'm sure things won't be back to "normal," but it's a step back toward "normal," and that will be a good thing...

Four

Today The Quilted Turtle turns four.

Four years,

471 posts,

160 followers

and more new friends than I can count.

Starting a blog was actually my husband's idea. Back in 2008, for Valentine's Day, he bought me my DSLR camera. So with camera in hand and support from my good friend, Maggie, off I went into the blogosphere. The rest, as they say, is history.

I've really enjoyed this space. Though sometimes I think I must bore people. My life isn't that exciting - just kids, crafts and a dash of Mackinac; not much drama. But that's just the way I like it.

As a way to celebrate my little anniversary, and show you all how much I appreciate your comments and kind words, I am having a give away.  Check back in a day or two to see what I've got to share...

Moonlight Madness

 

Last night we had a  gorgeous full moon. It lit up the Grand Hotel so beautifully this morning as I walked to work (at about 6:00) I just couldn't resist taking a few pictures. 

By about 7:15, as the moon was setting over St. Ignace, the scene looked more like this. Cold, quiet, and so very peaceful...

To Brighten Your Day

If you have kids at home, you've got to make a batch of this dough. It's playdough that actually conducts electricity, and let me tell you - it's really cool and so easy to make.

Conductive Dough Recipe 

(found here)

1 cup water
1 1/2 cups flour
1/4 cup salt
3 Tbsp. cream of tartar*
1 Tbsp. vegetable oil
 food coloring (optional)

(*9 Tbsp. of  lemon juice may be substituted)

1. Mix water, 1cup of the flour, salt, cream of tartar, vegetable oil, and food coloring in a pot.
2. Cook over medium heat  stirring constantly.
3. The mixture will start to boil and then get chunky.
4. Keep stirring the mixture until it forms a ball.
5. Once a ball forms in the middle of the pot, place it on a lightly floured board. The ball will be very hot. Flatten it out and let it cool for a couple minutes before kneading
6. Slowly knead the remaining flour into the ball until you are happy with the consistency
7. Store in an airtight container. While in the container, water from the dough will create condensation - it's normal - just knead the dough after getting it out.

I just can't tell you how much fun the kids have been having with this stuff. We didn't have any of the fancy equipment they suggested, so we just used 9V batteries and pulled LEDs out of a string of Christmas lights.

(If the LEDs don't light, you may have to pull them out of the dough and stick them back in the other way. They'll only light with the electricity going in one direction. You'll also want to make sure the pieces of dough touching the contacts on the top of the battery do not touch one another. If they do touch, there is the possibility that the battery will overheat and rupture.)

I had so much fun watching my five and seven year-old build electric circuits and then troubleshoot when the lights wouldn't light. Sigh. Such good science. I am so going to use this stuff with my 4th and 5th graders at school...

Three Cheers

 

Lots of little girls are cheerleaders on Mackinac Island.

(Elementary school age.)

This year two young men

have been welcomed into the squad.

After all, who can resist pom-pons and

super-cool dance moves?

Not my son.

He's taking a bit of flack from
a couple of the other kids at school,

but he doesn't seem to care.

I try to remind him to be true to himself

and not worry about what other people say.

So far, so good...

The End

Saturday is it - after the 5:00 pm boat Arnold line is shutting down ferry service to Mackinac Island for the season. That means from now till spring, we'll have to fly to the mainland or cross the ice. With all the oddly warm weather we've been having, I doubt we'll have a good ice bridge this year. But that's OK. Not having an ice bridge some years makes you really appreciate having it when we do get one.

Luckily we've laid in supplies and my husband or I will still be able to fly to the mainland once a month or so to stock up. Plus, my parents rented an apartment on the island for the winter, so I know my mom will gladly bring groceries over with her when she pops in for a visit.

2 hrs. after initial post edited to add:

I happened to bump into our Police Chief tonight and he told me the boat will likely be done this evening. Apparently, the last boat spent two hours stuck in the ice  and finally had to call the U.S. Coast Guard to break the boat free. My parents are quite glad they decided to fly to the island today...

Yummy

2011 Teacher Gifts

This year the kids passed out these delicious goodies to their teachers and babysitters. It's all you need for hot cocoa  - on a stick. I got the idea (again) from Marie. (She's just full of good ideas!) They were super easy and very child friendly to make, but the best part was making the homemade marshmallows! I'd never made them before. They were so good! Especially right after we cut them; so much smoother than the store bought ones...

Mackinac Moments

I took this as I was leaving school after a staff meeting last week. Thanks to a weeks worth of 40 degree days (about 4 degrees C), our snow was gone and another teacher and I were gearing up for the walk home. Luckily, she was willing to wait a moment or two so I could snap some photos of the setting sun.

If I had taken this photo yesterday, the ground would be much whiter. We were lucky enough to get four or five inches of snow Thursday night, and are back on our snowmobiles...

Silhouette Valentines

I love Valentine's Day. I know Valentines are just silly little pieces of paper, but I've just always just loved them. I think it's because I have such fond memories of Valentine's Day from my childhood. I wasn't exactly popular in elementary school, but on Valentine's Day everyone was nice I got cards from all the other kids. Sure, they didn't have a choice, but as a kid I don't remember being really aware of that fact.  (I may have also been in denial...) When I was little we always bought our cards, but these days I've been trying to make homemade ones. (Check out our Valentines past here and here.)

 I instantly fell in love with the idea of a silhouette card when I found them at this lovely little shop, but $15.00 for cards for each of us just wasn't in the family budget (as a teacher I need Valentines, too.) I've been feeling a bit braver with photoshop lately, so I thought I'd try to make them myself.

I started by taking a profile picture of each child in front of a plain background. (Think plain white wall with good light and few shadows.) Then, using photoshop, I edited out that background, changed the colors around, and added the text. The thought bubbles, heart and circles were right there in photoshop so all I had to worry about was the placement. I really loved the boarder in the cards on Etsy, and thought the scalloped boarder I found here would do the trick. (You should pop in over there - she's got lots of great free downloads, and even more stuff for paying members.) The boarder is a separate layer in photoshop, so it was a good way for me to tackle learning how to use them. (So easy!) I uploaded the finished images to my favorite photo printing site and, at only ten cents per print,  was able to get a class set for less than $3.00 per child. I'm really happy with how they turned out - cute, personal and best of all - homemade.

Are you planning anything interesting for Valentine's Day?

Granted

Lots of heavy wet snow fell on

Mackinac Island

yesterday and today,

so lots of us got outside and enjoyed it!

Sadly, the temperatures have been hovering right around

freezing, so it's melting quickly. We're

keeping our fingers crossed that

we'll get more tomorrow...

Lego Cake Pops

So my first attempt at cake pops was pretty much a complete failure. I saw the idea for Lego head cake pops  here and thought they would be perfect for my son to take to school for his birthday treat. Unfortunately, I didn't quite grasp the appropriate size of the pops. When I make them again, they'll be a lot smaller...

I thought they should be, well, cupcake size. Not a good idea. They were so heavy that the pops buckled under their own weight. Luckily, I made six extras, so there were enough unbroken ones for the 21 kindergarten and first graders in my son's class. (On Mackinac all our elementary classes are splits. The first graders attend school alone in the morning and the kindergartners join them after lunch.)

The day we made them was one of those days where nothing seemed to go right. Not only did the pops bend the sticks and crack, but we also had problems with the candy melts (the yellow coating). And I'm a direction reader! I read them all - and yes, I read them before we got started.

The candy melts (Wilton brand) did not want to melt well, and even when they did liquefy, we had to add shortening to get them liquidy enough to coat the pops. But even then the coating wasn't smooth. Luckily the kids weren't the least bit critical. They identified them immediately as Lego guys and hastily began attacking them (complete with zombie noises.)  The kids didn't care that they were lumpy, cracked, and on bent sticks - because, while they looked nothing like we wanted them to,  they were really tasty!

I'll let you know how round two goes. Right now: Cake Pops - 1, Liz & Miranda - 0...

A Christmas Wish

Dear Santa,

All I want for Christmas is for Mackinac Island to look like this. This whole riding my bike in 20 degree weather thing is getting kind of old. A nice winter storm, that no one had to drive in, would be perfect.

Thank you, Santa, and drive safe!

Liz

An Island Treat

I know there are a few of you out there who pop in here from time to time just to see what is going on Mackinac Island. Well, today you will not be disappointed! Wednesday night was the Mackinac Island Public School's annual Christmas Program, and I thought you might enjoy it. It certainly isn't going to win any awards and the sound quality isn't the best, but our island kids are pretty darn cute.

The program included pre-school through high school students (although only the elementary grades are included in the 32 minute portion above.) At the end, for the sign language song, you can see all of our kindergarten through 7th graders, and, if you look very carefully at the left hand side of the screen, my disembodied hands leading the song...

Lost

A plane bound for Mackinac Island crashed last night. I rode over to the island on the 11:00 am boat this morning and we could see several Coast Guard boats still searching the Straits. I don't know many details, other than the Search and Rescue Team finally found the wreckage along the shore near St. Ignace this afternoon.

Both the pilot and the passenger died and both left families behind. My heart goes out to all of them - and to the pilot's work family at Great Lakes Air. I've flown across the Straits from St. Ignace to Mackinac many times, and I always felt safe in the  knowledge that I'd land on the other side. I have complete faith in both the staff and equipment at Great Lakes Air, but moments like these remind me to savor each and every day I am lucky enough to get. You never know when your time is going to be up.

Now, I need to go tuck my little ones in one more time and let them know just how much I love them...

Thankful

 

Today I am feeling very thankful for my husband. He has cooked our entire Thanksgiving feast - single-handedly. Well, I did my part by cleaning the kitchen as he cooked, (it's been through three cleanings so far,) and I set the table. I know, I'm very lucky. He is a much better cook than I am, at least in a modern kitchen. He enjoys cooking where I usually just see it as a chore.

Tonight we will be enjoying: spinach salad, winter fruit salad, baked pineapple, mashed potatoes, rutabaga, green bean casserole (with homemade mushroom sauce) and Beef Wellington with morel mushrooms. (Excuse me while I wipe the drool from my chin.) For desert we have pecan pie, pumpkin pie and apple pie - all with real whipped cream. I won't be getting on a scale for a while because all those pies average out to a half a pie per person. Yum!

Minifig Cupcakes

I went for easy this year on the Lego-themed birthday cake and didn't make one. I opted to make cupcakes instead. Not very fancy, I know, but my son was pleased. He loved biting off the heads of the extra chocolate minifigs!

(These molds (here and here) made it easy. I looked for them on eBay but they weren't really any cheaper since I would have had to pay for shipping.)

A Family Affair

My husband can't resist getting in on the Halloween action...

I decided to be a jellyfish this year. Thanks to my husband's great idea to recycle the EL wire from last year's costumes, I was a phosphorescent jellyfish. He did all the wiring to make my tentacles glow, but otherwise it was easy.

I started with a clear plastic umbrella I got a t Wal-Mart for $12.00. I measured the circumference of the widest part and bought that much fabric plus a 1/4 yard more. (I think I ended up buying about 3 1/2 yards.) I sewed the two cut ends so I had a large tube, and then added a casing for a drawstring into both selvage ends. One end I made as tight as I could and poked the end of the umbrella through it - covering the umbrella. The other end, I drew up tightly inside the umbrella and tied tightly around the handle.

I cut small slits in the fabric to allow the EL wire to hang down through the fabric. Finally I sewed long strips of tulle and wired ribbon around the bottom edge of the umbrella to create the tentacles. I also added a bunch of tentacles to the handles to try to camouflage it, and then I just wore black so I could fade in to the background. The small blue circles were made from glow-stick bracelets I sewed to the outside just before we went out to trick-or-treat.

Hubby decided to be an angler fish...

He paper-mâchéd the fish body around a balloon, painted it, and added the EL wire to highlight the fins and the tail. The eyes were made from ping pong balls, cut in half, and illuminated by LEDs from behind. The teeth were done in glow in the dark Fimo clay.

I think we looked pretty cool - one of the Island high school kids said we were "epic," which, I think, is a good thing...

Lego Minifig Birthday Shirt

Remember that Lego birthday party we did earlier this fall? It's taken me forever to get this post together, but I couldn't not make my son a Lego birthday shirt.

I searched for a pre-made lego minifig pattern (for you non-legoers, a minifig is the technical term for the little Lego people) but I couldn't find one. No biggie - I made my own. If you would like to use it, click on the image below and download it. You probably can just print it out, but I opened it in Word, reset the margins to .5 inch all the way around the and inserted the image. At full size it should be 7.5 inches across by 10 inches tall. At least, that's how I did it. I suppose you could also just print it out and resize it on a copier...

I did not use the raw edge technique for this applique, so there is no seam allowance included in the pattern. Instead, I traced the pieces onto fusible-web and appliqued it that way.

The dashed lines are to help you with placement. The head and the hands go underneath the shirt, as does the top of the pants. For the face, I just used a colon and a parenthesis :) that I resized until I was happy with it. For the number, just print the number you need in a font you like and resize it until you are happy with it. Then trace it onto your fusible web upside down - that way it will be correct when you iron it onto the shirt.

If you aren't sure how to do applique, you could use the tutorial here. However, I did not use a zig-zag stitch like in the tutorial, I straight stitched about 1/8 of an inch inside the edge of each piece (using my edge stitch foot) and sealed the edges of the fabric with Fray Check. It's been through the wash five or six times so far and it still looks great! (Though I do wash it inside out.)

What do you think?

Mackinac Moments

The days may have gotten shorter,
but, despite the rain and the chill in the air,
they are every bit as beautiful.