I love House Plans. I drew house plans from the time I was in junior high school. I re-arranged my bedroom countless times on paper. I 'built' several new homes for DH and me -- on paper. My math skills are nil, so I was not about to become an architect, but I can look at a blueprint and see what a house will look like and how it will (or won't) work for daily living. (Love the House related forums on GardenWeb.) I'm pretty good at navigating -- maps and directions. My mother may have taught me that. She'd take me to Marshall Field's in Chicago and have me find my way from the furniture department (upper floor) to the State Street exit. I'm NOT a good 'decorator' -- at least not the important small stuff that puts finishing touches on a room. I can envision the look I want, but am timid about hanging pictures, etc. (Not timid about painting a whole room a glossy Hershey Bar brown, and liking it.) I enjoy reading and writing. I'm a visual learner. Journalism was my major. Thank goodness for you artsy-craftsy people and for the Math Able!

I learned to sew from my mother who and made most of our clothes and all our doll clothes. She saved a piece of the cloth of everything she made for us and my sister and I are now cutting all those pieces into squares for a couple of quilts. We laugh ourselves to tears in the process. We were all in 4-H. We also sewed in home ec. Now, however, we would never be able to have machines at the middle school level due to parents' safety concerns, but the home ec teacher still teaches kids to sew by hand. They make stuffed animals and do cross stitch. I teach my 6th grade art students to weave, and we all make woven bags with twisted cord straps. That being said, things that we learned at home are no longer common. I am no longer amazed by how many kids don't know what their clothes are made out of, or have absolutely no idea how to thread a needle (that pointy thingy), they don't know yarn from string, they have never heard the word "stitch" and it is not unusual to have one not know how to tie a knot (velcro shoes you know). Before I started teaching I would have never imagined I'd have to demonstrate to my classes how to take the end of a piece of yarn and start rolling it into a ball, but now I do it all the time. Amazing. Bravo to you all who make stuff with your kids - I suspect you read to them to!

Hi Everyone, first of all I want to say Belle, I'm soooo sorry to hear you've lost your Dearest Brother. Sharing Your Sorrow and Sending My Love. Glad to hear your done with the 6 snowmen. Hope you can find time to post these. Luvs, I went into my craft room to find something to paint and ran across the book with my turkey napkin holder pattern. It's in the book "The Mice Will Play by Jan Spanik. Hope you get your project finished and posted soon. We are getting dumped on again so anything in our yard is all covered up with snow. Sometimes I have had DH sand down a project so I can repaint but most of the time it goes to the garbage. FM, hope your sore throat is getting better. Your always talking about redoing and it makes me want to get started on some of my rooms but I'll wait until it's a little nicer out. I've wanted to add onto our home for years and it never happened. Now I'm glad we didn't. I'm thinking I'd rather do more running around than cleaning. Anj, hope you had a nice dinner w/friends. The Science projec sounds like alot of work ahead. They always seem to turn out so nice and I love it when you share them with us. Kids are so funny. I had DGD here the other night. We went out to the kitchen so we could make Valentine houses. I passed some silent gas and DGD looked at me and said "Pewie Stikie, did you do that"? Had to admit it was me and I headed to the BR for some spray. When I got back she asked if I remembered at Christmas when her uncle went to the BR and it stunk really bad. Then she said "I think he forgot to flush the toilet, don't you Nana"? I said "NO, he forgot to turn on the air exchanger and use some spray. Why on earth did she have to remember this.lol Gotta Love Em... Back to how times have changed. We didn't have a color TV until I was in Jr High. Rotary phones, 8 track tape players and records were all part of my life growing up. When I think of the new technology coming it blows me away. I'm not sure I want to learn to sell a devise that we can do everything at home from work. The one thing I've loved this winter is my electronic start, steering wheel warmer and heated seats. It's so nice to sit at my desk and start the truck and when I go out it's all warm. It will also be nice to start it before I'm heading out this summer and it will be cool. Sure wouldn't want to give up all this so guess we better march on. Was great to see Bebe has been painting more beautiful roses for us to enjoy. I best get off here and head back in and try finding a project again before it's bed time. TCMDF, Punk

So I am going. to read through all of these suggestions afain! MIL is coming back in town so we want to just order something for the dining table so its already done and she doesnt try to talk my husband out of it (he is a pushover, lol) I actually saw some chairs at tuesday morning as a for now fix, do you a fhink the actual table is that bad,? because I guess we are just trying to find the right thing and dont want tocwaste tons of $$. do yall know if paint is expensive? have any of you done it by yourself.? I saw an article about how to save on smaller stuff like rugs and coffee tables I am going to look into! Dining table is a biggie. But I def want to keep the room so that it could match any paint color (like a white maybe, or grey) a coffee table and area rug. so whatever we bring in will work. i am going to re-look into ikea and post some pics too. I actually found a lot on pinterest too!