Valentine's Cards

The past three years I have become more creative with the boy's Valentine's Day cards to give to their classmates.  It always involves a photo of them and some little surprise or twist.  This year they didn't like any ideas that I presented except for these.  My eldest insisted that candy was part of the card.  Next year I told them I'm giving everyone toothbrushes!  

The templates came from the Florabella Collection and I moved the wording around so it would fit on a postcard sized card.  On the back of the cards I scanned in two different Tic Tac Toe boards created by the boys (I helped with one).  They made up age appropriate math problems for the kids to solve when they played the game.  The Good -N- Plenty candy was used to play the game.  Tic Tacs would also be appropriate to use.

I happened to sub in my oldest son's class on the day of the party and the game came in handy after a few students finished their Valentine's papers.  And yes, my son was told he that he had a very "creative card" from one of the girls in his class!

Part 3, Entertainment Cabinet

I took over the majority of the painting, but Liam and Luke lent a hand in the beginning.  Oszkar was working hard overseeing the painting portion.

Oszkar, Painting Overseer

Luke & Liam

We finally got to the stage in which we could buy the TV, install it and start filling the cabinets.  I suggested he build a little shelf to fit the cable box and blue-ray player under the TV which will be easy to remove if components change. Ryan installed lights in the upper cabinets.  There are still wires that need to be hidden but the sawdust is off the floor at least.  Door will be ordered shortly which include four glass paneled on the top and four regular doors on the bottom to hide the clutter of cookbooks, games, DVDs and scrap books.
I shrunk the curtains I had made about 10 years ago-opps!  So now I need to figure out if I want to add a different colored panel to the bottom or just get new curtains.

Nearly finished

Part 1
Part 2

Part 2, Entertainment Cabinet

We lived with saw dust and assorted tools in the living room for over three week.   It was slow going especially since we lost some ground due to the entire family being sick.  Our house was been turned somewhat upside down due to the minor construction.  He is what we have done thus far:

Ryan created the face of the cabinet on the ground and joined them with a biscuit joiner and glue.

He added glue before we raised the entire face of the cabinet in place.

The face is in place.

Ryan used many of my Grandfather Platt's woodworking tools.  Grandaddy was a full time minster but often helped out his brother Cecil in his cabinet making shop and made a lot of beautiful pieces of furniture including the desk in my boys room and a little dining room table for my dollhouse when I was a child.

Painting and lights as well as ordering eight doors, four upper with glass fronts and four lower.
Part 3