Christmas Crafts

These are some of the items I made during Christmas:

Beach Ornaments- this was the first time for my friend's children to visit the ocean during our Disney trip. I collected sand and mini shells from the beach and placed them in plastic ornaments, added a light blue ribbon and tag with the name of the beach and the year.

Wedding Ornament- I attended 6 weddings this past year and for the 7th one I could not attend I took their wedding invite and cut it into strips and then curled them. I slip them into an extra large plastic ornament and added the ribbon from their invite for the top. It turned out great I might do this for every wedding I attend from now on.

No Sew-Fleece Blankets- I made 3 small blankets this year for the dogs. To make you need to fabrics laying on top of each other. Cut about a 2.5 x 2.5 inch square from each corner (this is so your blanket does not round or bunch during tying) then starting on one side you cut 1inch wide by 2.5-3inch long strips all the way down each side. Once done finish with tying the blankets together and voila.

Snowman Envelope- I used a strip of white paper and my Martha Stewart scoreboard to score the paper so it folded like a matchbook. I added the eyes using buttons, paper made hat, paper made nose and used my Martha Stewart holly punch. Then I attached a mini plastic bag and added kisses to the bag.

Rudolph Hershey's- wrapped a brown piece of card stock around the candy bar. Attached 2 google eyes, a red circle nose, and hand cut lite brown card stock antlers.

Melted Snowman Ornament- I used a large size clear plastic ornament and filled it with Epsom salt. I then added 5 peppercorns for the buttons and eyes. I fortunately had a carrot nose button in my scrap booking supplies and a top hat button. I added a Christmas plaid ribbon to the top and it was finished.

Santa-tizer- I wrapped a red card stock around the body of a Sanitizer bottle. Then added a 1/2 black ribbon around it and added a gold square over top of that.

Salt Dough Puzzle Piece Ornament- I used 1 cup of salt, 2 cups of all purpose flour, and 1 cup of Luke warm water. First you mix the dry and then added the water. After I kneaded the dough well I added liquid blue food coloring to make it blue, kneading the dough really well. I then rolled the dough out using flour and cut the puzzle pieces with a cookie cutter. I placed the cut outs on a cookie tray and cut out a hole using a straw. I baked the cut outs for 5 hours at 200F. I then set them out for a week to dry.

OSU Crayon Art- I downloaded an art piece for the O-H-I-O silhouettes and used a projector to make them the size I want. I then used a pencil to draw them on the canvas. Next I created a pattern of the crayons to achieve the effects I wanted and used Elmer's glue to attach them. I always break my crayons in half. I placed painter's tape over the top of the pencil drawing and melted the crayons. Next I painted the silhouettes black and it was finished.

Disney Shadow Box- created a 12x12 scrapbook page and placed it in a shadow box for a friend that went to Disney.

DG Shadow Box- my sister is a Delta Gamma and wanted to preserve the lay and rose she received for initiation. I placed them in a shadow box with her letters and symbol.

Winter Fest Crafts and Games

This year I volunteered along with one of my co-workers to be chair of the crafts and games at our Winter Fest. This is a time when all of our kids perform their songs they have been working hard on in music therapy and a time for our families to gather to celebrate the season. The theme this year was Christmas around the world. We decided to have our crafts and games split into 5 countries with a game and craft representing the country or holiday celebrated there. We chose Israel, Mexico, Africa, USA, and Sweden. Below are the pictures of the crafts and games we did as well as the posters that were designed by students.

Winter Therapy Ideas

One of my duties as a Occupational Therapy Assistant at my job is to complete a group project weekly. Last week we made water bottle penguins. This was perfect to work on fine motor skills and bilateral coordination. The kids had to hold the water bottles while using their preferred hand to put cottons balls into the bottles. Next I had precut the body, arms, and feet but to work on cutting you could have the kids cut out the pieces themselves, the kids used wet glue to paste them to the water bottle. I found the glue to not want to stick so well so we added a rubber band to help everything stay in place until the glue dried. Next we added the feather and tape around the top and glued the eyes and nose on.

This past week we made Christmas trees out of strips of paper by gluing to construction paper. Each child was given 6 different size strips of paper and were required to sequence the pieces in order from smallest to largest. Once sequenced they glued each piece down and added the trunk and a star. They then dipped a q-tip into white paint and added snow. Really easy and super cute!!!!

Christmas crafting and cooking

This season, as I prepare for Christmas I have been crafting like crazy thanks to Pinterest and even though I did not see this exact wreath, I did come up its the concept. It was simple o make but I did need help from my mom to hold the wreath while I glued. To start I gathered Christmas bulbs, a wired hanger, feather boa, and a hot glue gun. I opened the wire hanger and did my best to make it round (I used a tree trunk to help with the shape) and randomly looped the bulbs on the to the wreath. While my mom held the wreath I hot glued the bulbs together so that they would stay in place. I closed the wire hanger with pliers and then hot glued the feather boa to the back. Took me about a total of a half hour to complete and I love it!! I also spent last weekend busy making cookies. I made fruit drops, pistachio cookies, peanut butter cookies, no bakes, and sugar cookies!!! This weekend I am planning on finishing the Christmas gifts I am making. Photos will come after Christmas.

Busy, busy, busy

Where have the past four months gone? I have been so busy traveling, working, and crafting that I cannot believe it is December 2nd already. I have so much to blog about and cannot decide on where to start. I guess it would have to start with the fact that I passed my boards in October and am officially a Certified Occupational Therapy Asssistant. I love my job and could not ask for better kids and supportive staff. I love going to work every day and being challenged by the kids and staff, all in good ways. In September I travelled to Disney World with friends for a week. We had such an awesome time and I am starting to want to go back to Disney already. I didn't realize how much I would love being there and seeing everything. October kept me busy with studying for my boards and preparing for the fall, my favorite season/holiday. November saw me travel to Warsaw, KY which is a very small town right on the Ohio River. I missed peak season for the fall colors by a few weeks but in all it was absolutely beautiful. The town is extremely small, has only 2 traffic lights, is 20 minutes from another busier town, but has the gorgeous view of the river. There is also this beautiful bed and breakfast called the Riverside Inn, officially on my bucket list of places to stay/visit. I saw Rise of the Guardians last week while babysitting. The movie is fantastic for children with vivid colors and the joys of seeing Santa, the Easter Bunny, Tooth Fairy, and the Sandman but the storyline for adults is also important. Each character has been chosen by a higher power, in this case Mr. Moon, to bring a gift to the world. North (a.k.a. Santa) brings wonder, Tooth brings memories, Easter Bunny brings faith, Sandman brings dreams, and Jack Frost learns through the movie that he brings joy. The movie teaches that without these gifts in our lives there is fear, represented by the Boogey Man, but with these gifts and our belief in them we can succeed. I love this movie!!! Especially for the field that I am. The children I work with, the parents I converse with, and the coworkers I support all need this as a reminder because some days our job can seem overly challenging and we can lose sight of these precious gifts we have been given.

Big Girl Job!!

I have done it! I have finished college (for now) and have gotten myself a big girl job. I am a direct one-on-one tutor with children on the autism spectrum and I absolutely love it! Once I take my OTA boards in a few weeks I will then switch over to the therapy department (at the same facility) and will be able to work more one on one with kids needing extra therapy. I am so excited and even though my job can be challenging, it is one that I go home smiling about.

A Quarter of a Century Old

It's true....I am officially 25 and have been for the past 24 hours. Not exactly sure how I feel, I have always liked Birthdays and I don't feel any different, no feelings of being older and wiser. I guess I am excited that now my insurance goes down and I can officially rent a car without paying the extra fees. I also can fill in the 25-34 age group on surveys now! Still, my birthday felt like another day in passing. I'm not exactly sure what I expected but at the end of the day I can say for sure, I definitely missed my grandma more so than usual, even though last year she forgot my birthday she still called me and this year that phone call never came. I did spend my birthday with the ones I love by going to out for dinner, it was really nice even though there was an obvious cloud over my head. I can blame stress and work and exhaustion but I really think it was sadness. So even though I may not have said it yesterday to my family, thank you for being there on my birthday, love you all!

The Last Chapter of my Life as a S/OTA

I have been working extremely hard to become a certified Occupational Therapy Assistant and I am in my final stretch to become one. I am currently a Level II student working at a facility that is contracted through a developmental disabilities board. I am at a location the hires individuals diagnosed with a developmental disability to work on jobs they are contracted to perform. It is a completely different realm than what I am used too (which is the medical world) and within the past three days I have learned so much. It is a completely different setting than what I am used and along with learning about OT and gaining knowledge of my career and how to become a COTA, I am also learning about job production! Many companies come to our business and have us perform tasks. We have a group that collates glass dishes into a box for sale, those boxes you see at Target, Wal-Mart, Kohl's, we do them. We have another group folding t-shirts and sealing them in plastic bags for distribution to stores. The major project we have going on that many of our groups work on his bagging rice husks. First off, I never knew that rice was basically enclosed in this husk. Second off, I never knew how important rice husks could be in the steel world and more importantly in making steel wheels for trains. The husks are important because they won't melt or burn unless they are heated to 1,800 degrees F. This is important because as iron workers are melting and setting the steel wheels they need a product that will help maintain holes in the wheel (for the screws to attach) and will help cool the wheel down effectively without causing cooling errors. This is where these rice husks come into play. Iron workers throw the husk on and the holes are filled and the rice cools the steel down because the husks are a natural cooling agent. Learn something new everyday!!!! I also learned the difference between habilitation and rehabilitation. Habilitation is where everyone is constantly learning new where as rehabilitation is where there was an injury and the person is re-learning a task or knowledge.

A Hard one to Write....The day that was perfect

It has been 3 months (I started this on 02/23/12) since I originally began this post and each time I open up my blog to write I get stuck. I will jot a few sentences down and then I erase it all. Towards the end of February I lost my great-grandmother and it was and still is pretty hard for me to deal with, I think about her daily and still wish I had time with her. I was very close to my grandmother and have been at a loss for words since her passing. My grandmother was born in the '20s and was very independent, even in the later years of her life. She did not want to be a burden to anyone and even though sometimes it felt like a burden, I enjoyed my times with her. Everyone has that family member that can drive them crazy but it definitely was rewarding for me to have her for 24 years of my life. That is how I look at it now after her passing. I was extremely fortunate to have had my great-grandmother for 24 and 1/2 years of my life, most of my friends have either never met their great-grandparents or had them for only a few years of their life. My grandmother spoiled me rotten, I definitely do not deny that! She took my family and I to California to see the Red Woods and the Pacific Ocean, she took me on my 1st trip to NYC and she taught me the importance of an education. She always took me shopping and never said "no." I don't know why all the sudden I am able to write this post, I haven't had the words to post or I didn't feel the words did enough. When thinking on her final days I think about the Friday before she passed. I spent the entire day with her which is very rare since the past few months I was finishing school my winter quarter, but it was finals week and I took work off that day to be with her. I spent ten hours with the woman I knew and it was like old times again. She sat in her rocker while I laid on the floor or the couch and we watch her soaps, talked about family, looked through the paper, and listened to music. Even though caregivers and nurses were in and out it felt like old times, she slept when she wanted, as did I. The day was absolutely perfect and even though the looming illness was the big elephant in the room, it never once felt like we were being squished. I now thank God for that day I had with my grandmother and I think it was the closure I was looking for. Since her passing, I have been wanting this piece to come to me and allow me to move on, but unfortunately due to family issues since her passing it has been nearly impossible too, but I believe that day was my closure. I meant to visit my grandmother the Sunday before she passed and instead I stayed home to work on homework. I called and told her that I would then see her Tuesday but unfortunately that was not the case. I would see her that Monday night in a way that I wished never came. Right before she got really weak and ill, she handed me this card (that was our thing, I always sent her cards for any and every occasion) that I made her when I was really little. She handed me the card that told her if she ever were to get sick that I would take care of her because I did not want her to die. Whenever she handed me the card to read I would say that's the truth and I still don't want her to die. I cannot wait for the day that I can tell my kids about their great-great-grandmother and I hope that my future kids have that same relationship with theirs. Love you a bushel and a peck ;)

Stressed is dessert spelled backwards....

Um....I don't think so. At the end of my day I am not relaxing with dessert, I am piling stress on top of stress. I have been super crazy busy (obviously since my last post was January 1st) and really don't feel like I have accomplished much. I am in my last quarter of school and have two Level II fieldwork's and then I AM DONE!!! At least for now. A lot of changes will be happening in my life in the next couple of weeks so we'll see where my stress level gets me after that! :) My 12 habits are going okay, instead of starting one a month, I am doing them slowly all at the same time. I couldn't decide which one to start with and wanted to do my best at some of them so I am trying and it is I would say 70% successful! Some of the ones I wanted to try right away is read the Bible everyday (I am only 4 days behind and catching up fast), decrease my Dr. Pepper intake (I was going to say pop, but I really only drink the pepper), take my medicine regularly (doing it pretty much 100%), and attempting to get at least 7 hours of sleep (this so far is a great success).

2012 New Year's Resolution

A resolution is a determination or firmness of purpose. Typically upon a new year many individuals resolve to break bad habits, lose weight, quit smoking, etc. I decided that besides the typical resolutions that instead I was going, I am determined to gain or lose (respectively) 12 new or old habits. A habit is a behavior that is repeated on a regular basis and they tend to be subconscious. They say it takes 28 days to gain a habit, thus at the start of each month I am going to either quit a bad habit I have or gain a new one that I have always wanted to do. 12 months + 12 habits = an interesting 2012. I know it is going to be tough, but I have to have the determination or I'll quit while I am ahead. So for the next year, expect posts about my progress and what is going on, I may not say what habits I am working on but I am really excited and interested to see if I can hold up to my resolution for 2012.

Whoa, my blog has a 2012 archive!

So as I was looking through my blog today I got a reality jolt when I realized that following this blog post I will have 1 archive in the year 2012. Talk about a smack to the face! I am so excited and looking forward to this year, last year was a beyond amazing year and I had quite a few downs, but my ups definitely out weighed them. I already have so many plans for 2012 and am looking forward to the surprises that are upon me.