The Babes Perform

The "Babes with Batons" performed last night. It was so good!!! The little girls did a great job!!! So did my Jr. High and HS Lines. We ended up with 51 girls that took part in the camp. Taelor is the one with the big pink bow in her hair (you have to dress the part!). She's got a natural ability for twirling and it's a little scary. She's never actually "taken a lesson" from me other than at camp. She does watch me teach, however, and it's amazing what she's picked up just from watching lessons.
The rest of the family is doing well. Addi is enjoying have me all to herself while Taelor is at school and I can really say that not babysitting anymore has been a blessing. I've really enjoyed getting to do more with Addi and help more at Taelor's class. And, I'm a more pleasant person when Jake gets home from work, too.

Babes Perform

Tonight was our twirling camp performance. Most of these pictures are just of Taelor (big pink bow in her hair), but we ended up with 51 at camp. It was a lot of fun and the crowd loved it. The girls did a great job. This year, the song was Hannah Montana's "Best of Both Worlds" so they had a blast!! They do better when it's a song they know (and also happen to love).
Now that this is over, I'm ready to fall into bed for seeevvverrralll hours!!!! I hope to not wake up for a while. Jake's nice enough he's going to let me sleep in tomorrow morning and get Taelor ready for school.
Not much else has been happening in our world - it's kind of nice!!!

Babes with Batons

Camp has begun. It's been a good first two days - but I'm exhausted. It's like being a jazzercise instructor. I probably should figure out how to do it every day! It's a lot of fun, but I am tired. We've got 51 campers this year and we've had a lot of fun with them. They are performing to Hannah Montana's "Best of Both Worlds". The girls are wild for Hannah Montana anything. I think the only thing better would have been a song from High School Musical!!!!

Falling in Love

Ok, so I'm not really "falling in love" with anybody; just with a new hobby!!!

I started learning how to sew last year when I decided to redo Taelor's room. It was very easy; cut sqaure pieces of fabric and sew straight edges together. The seams were even frayed so that you couldn't see whether the seams were straight or not! So that started my sewing.

Then I had to learn how to sew flags for my twirlers flag batons. That was a necessesity that had to get done and since I'm the sponsor, I got to do it.

So I got brave and did another quilt for Addi this year since we moved the two of them into the same room together. Her's also turned out very cute.

Now to my current obsession - updating my house!!! I loved my comforter - black microsuede with tan on the reverse side. But the pillow shams that came with it were so boring and just plain ugly. So I decided after Christmas to take some X-mas money and update my room. I really had no idea what I was doing, but I gave it a try and here's what I've accomplished so far. I did all the pillows on the bed - the shams, the throw pillows, the body pillow cases that are covered up.


Now, just to clarify - the beautiful quilt hanging on the wall was NOT MY PROJECT!!! My mom has taken up quilting and this was the one she made for me. I'm not that gifted yet and frankly, I want more immediate gratification. I think this one took a year to do!










My next project was the curtains. I've never really liked the curtains in my room, but I hate buying them. So I just kept what I had!
This is what I changed to!! I love it. And they were very simple to do.

I still have a few more pillows to make for my bed - some red to tie the red in the wall in with my bed. But those will have to wait for the weekend.

My next sewing project will be in my living room. Time for new pillows and curtains in there!!

New Beginnings

I'm so excited. I have been teaching piano for about 2 1/2 years now and really enjoy it. But all of my student's have been taking from someone else and have come to me after their teacher has moved. So I always get to pick up somewhere in the middle with their lessons. Tomorrow I start teaching my first true beginner. I haven't met her yet, but her mom sounded great on the phone and is very excited for her daughter to start. She's in 1st grade. I'm thrilled because I get to start from the very beginning and kind of "re-teach" myself some things but also train her to do things the way I want them done. Sounds selfish, but when you teach private lessons, you have your own way of teaching. When you start with someone at the very beginning, you pick out what's important to you fundamentally and really focus on that; you get a chance to help them develop their practice schedules, the intensity with which they approach it, and just learn your way of doing things. Probably doesn't make much sence, but it does to me. So I'm very excited about it.
Also tonight I met with my HS twirling line for the 1st time since football season. It's always fun to work with them a) because they are great twirlers b) because most of the time it's fun and c) I enjoy being part of their lives. And tonight was our 1st practice in 2 months. So I've missed them. And it's just like starting over after having a long break - more new beginnings.

More Pictures (and bragging time)

I've put up a new slideshow. We put up bunk beds for the girls, and since this is Addi's first big girl bed, we had to take pictures!! On a side note - I made the quilts for their beds. Taelor's was my first sewing project last year for her 5th birthday. It was so much fun, I made one for Addi this year. It was so easy!
The rest of the pictures are of the wedding and the events surrounding the big event. I have to say that my girls looked so cute for the wedding! So look if you have time!

Back to School!!!

Taelor went back to school this morning. I really enjoyed Christmas Break and for the most part, enjoyed having her back at home. There were times when she really antagonized Addi, but there were also times when just her and I got to do things. I've had the chance this fall to spend so much time with Addi by herself, but not Taelor. So spending time with her was nice.
But life is back to chaos again! It's only the 1st day back and I don't know why I was worried about not having enough to do without babysitting!!!! And I guess I'm still keeping kids on occassion, but not on a set schedule. Yesterday I kept a teacher's kid (the teacher's had to go back yesterday) and today and tomorrow I'm going to keep little one while his mother studies for her realtor test. And then there's All-Region Band this month and my "Babes with Batons" twirling camp for the elementary kids. Last year, we had 72 girls. So I won't be sitting around pining for something to do. Life is busy, but I love it that way! I like having things to do!

They're hitched!

Well, I have a new sister! Ryan & Ashley got married tonight! She was gorgeous and the ceremony was beautiful. Everything was very nice. Both of the girls were in the wedding and much to my surprise, Addi actually walked down the aisle. We were surprised that she even did that. Once she got to the front, she sat down with us, but I was proud of her for making her way to the stage. She actually took Ashley's spot front and center, then saw Jake and went to sit with our family! This was Taelor's 2nd time to be a flower girl and she did a great job.
I'll post some more pics of the wedding tomorrow. But for now, it's off to bed. It's much easier being on the groom's side of the family than the bride's, but there is still a lot to be cleaned up after it's all over. I now feel sorry for my parents after I got married. We had a TON of decorations for our wedding, reception too. Sorry mom and dad!!!

Life is full of changes

Ok, so this may not be the earth shattering news that it sounded like in my last post, but it's still big news in my life. I am no longer babysitting. Jake is thrilled about it and I'm coming around to being excited, too. I'll miss the income that it helped provide, but I guess we'll figure out how to make things work like everyone else does!
It's going to be strange not having "anything" to do during the day now. I'll still be teaching twirling and piano in the evenings, so I'm still working. But it's going to take some getting used to not having to chase children around during the day and keeping stuff from getting destroyed!!! There will still be plenty of things to "do", I know that, but it will just be different.

Several Random Thoughts

Ok, I saw this on Chrissy's blog and gave it a try for fun! It really was fun and who knows how accurate it is. I'm sure it depends on which pictures you pick to upload. But it was fun to see who the computer thinks the girls look more like - me or Jake. I think as Addi gets older she looks more like me. But I've always thought Taelor looked a LOT more like me than she did Jake, but the computer thought otherwise. But it was still fun. You should try it!
Christmas has come and gone! Now we are getting ready for a wedding. My brother is getting married on Saturday. Ashley is precious and we're so excited to have her as part of our family. I love Jake and I love being part of his family, but I have to admit that I'm a little jealous that she'll get to have the "Bufe" name the rest of her life. I don't know how to explain it. I guess I'm just very proud to be a Bufe. In a lot of things I do (twirling, band, anything with school) when people find out I'm a Bufe they are always so impressed. It doesn't usually get me anywhere (although occassionally it does), but people just know what the Bufe name stands for. I'm just proud that people have such respect for my mom and dad and want to live up to the standards that they have set.
I'll post some Christmas pictures as soon as I figure out how to download them from my new camera. I set it up with the software and just assumed that it would be as simple as the other camera was. Well, it's not. At least not yet. All it's going to take is reading the book, but that takes time and I'm too busy telling Taelor not to antagonize Addi!!! Or telling Addi to quit hurting Taelor's feelings! It's time for school to start again.
I have more news to share, but it'll have to wait until later (no, I'm NOT pregnant!). And we're not moving, just news about my life and what is now going to be a lot different.
Happy New Year everyone!

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