And The Winner of My Birthday Giveaway is.... & What I did on my Birthday

And the winner, chosen by Random Number Generator, of these beautiful cards I made using my background papers from Week One of The Artistic Mother workshop for my birthday giveaway is Mandy of Eight is Enough. She is one of the participants of The Artistic Mother Art Group I am hosting here on my blog where we are going through the 12 projects in The Artistic Mother workshop together, blogging about it and encouraging one another. (And we are still accepting  participants if you would like to join in the fun.) She is a homeschooling mother of 8. Fun and encouraging person. She also does beautiful layouts for her scrapbook pages. Congratulations, Mandy.

I would also like to say a big thank you to everyone who wished me a happy birthday. And what did I do for my birthday weekend? The children and I did art most of the day. We made more ATC's, artist trading cards, and greeting cards from our background papers from Week One. Just more practice for making the poetry journal, our project for Week Two.

And on Sunday after church, our neighborhood was having a block party. We all met at the park at the back of the neighborhood. There were blowup slides and jumping things for the kids, hot dogs, music, frisbee, riding scooters and skateboards and face painting, etc. Another mom from the neighborhood who I haven't seen in a while brought several hula hoops, and I hula hooped. It was so much fun. I'm hooked. It's something I can do with the kids while getting in shape at the same time. I hadn't done this since I was a kid. So I was surprised when I was able to do it. The reason I was able to was because the hoops were of better quality than the ones you buy for the kids. They are bigger around in diameter. It makes a huge difference. So trust me, if you had one of these hoops, you could do it, too. She also showed me a few tricks. And she told about this website where you can take online hooping classes. Looks interesting. They have a section, I think under FAQ's, where they show you how to make your own hoops.

And here is a picture of my 9 year old daughter, Emily of Super Stitches, hula hooping with several at the same time. This was her first time she was successful with hula hooping. I told you, it's the hoop you use that makes all the difference. Emily has an awesome blog; so check it out.

I would also like to share with you that my 16 year old daughter has a blog as well called What To Wear. It's cute and fun.

And also for those of you who may not be aware, I also having sewing, fashion and style blog. So please look around and see what you think. Click here.