Treasures Old and New

We are blessed to have a large home.  We are also blessed to have family members who live in places too small for all their stuff.  Some of it was moved out recently, so James and I went to see what we could find that got left behind.  He found a soccer ball and that was good enough for him, lol.

I found a treasure!  A long time ago, in a galaxy in which I had a different last name, I L-O-V-E-D the Pets.com Dog.  Well, before he sold car title loans anyway.

Reporting live from the scene...

"Don't give up!  Don't give up!!" and "It's a Stuffed Thing, I love Stuffed Things!" are my 2 favorite lines, and I will probably repeat them them until my family finds something new for me to obsess over.
Here is his 5 minutes of fame: on a You Tube video--my favorite quotes are at :30 and :45, but if you watch til the end, you'll see him as a balloon in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, and the reporters singing, it's funny.

Anyway, James adores this puppet!  It's so funny, what kids will suddenly be really into--he even slept with it that night (and yes, Teddy was jealous, lol.)

Before moving on....  I loved Jim Henson--from Kermit to the Muppet Show to his movies, they're all what I've grown up with.  I remember being in the movie theater in 1984 and watching The Muppets Take Manhattan! I remember crying at the marriage scene at the end, and in fact that may be why I love weddings sooooo much :)  Anyway, I saw this picture a few years ago and had it taped to my desk's hutch, but it ended up being lost as time passed.  I think it looks like Jim Henson and Kermit are talking to each other....

 and then I luckily caught this exchange as well:

I can't believe I managed to catch a similar moment between James and this puppet!  "I prayed for this child, and the Lord has granted me what I asked of him." 1 Samuel 1:27  Our Lord's Mercy and Grace astounds me......

We finally hung quite a few pieces of "wall art" in James's room:
The "Command Center" is something I've wanted to have for a while now.  With James's school schedule, and his homework every night, we needed a way to keep up-to-date.  I made these 2 huge pin-boards out of cardboard and a twin-sized sheet--yup, that's it!  Easiest thing to do, without having to invest money in it in case we never use it, and we no longer have a twin-size bed, so the sheets were perfect for upcycling!

Command Center, reporting for duty, ma'am

I've collected these little Snoopy figures that come on the tiny boxes of Russell Stover candy, and because I love them, I've kept them away from James (and his habit to chew on anything, much like a dog, lol) until now.  So after showing me he is mature enough to take care of my collection, I made some display shelves and now they're up on the wall, free from the box they've been stuffed into for 8 years or so!

Here they are marching around my paint bottles, lol

He's standing on his bed, leaning over so his face is in the picture--I have a weird kid, I know :)

I should go take another picture now, to show the shelves when they're full--there's 22 figurines total.  One shelf was a matching game from Melissa and Doug, and the other was a puzzle box that held 3 puzzles.  The puzzle box severely cut my husband's hand right after we bought it, so I took that box and along with the Melissa and Doug one, painted them, attached them to fabric-covered cardboard, and added fishing line to keep the Snoopies (Snoopys?) on the shelves since they had a tendency to fall off when someone walked by them.

We also decorated a pumpkin with these Harvest Costumes for your Pumpkin.  I tried to find a link online but I can't.  So, imagine a Mr. Potato Head-type set, only with small sharp dowels to stick into the pumpkin.  No cutting involved, very child-friendly, and we had a blast:

See how the pieces go in?  And excuse the hubby's feet there.....

And of course, the Pets.com Dog showed up just in time for an interview:

That look of pure happiness is what keeps me going every day.....