Quirky, animal lovin' girl

I've mentioned it a million times, I know, but my girl looooooves her stuffed animals, specifically her Beanie Babies. And love isn't a strong enough word because sometimes I think she literally thinks they're real. She loves on them, pets them, talks to them, feeds them, and as the picture below shows, she leashes them:

 

Jake and Lauren were watching a movie when she brought out her two animals, one of which was attached to it's leash (jump rope). Then she tied the rope to the foot rest and turned to them and said, 'okay Butterscotch and Puppy. Now sit here next to me and don't bark. Or whine. Be good girls'.

Apparently they listened because I didn't hear a peep outta them :o)

Crazy girl.

Fresh mattress... ahhhhh ;)

I love my boy, I really do, but I don't like his bladder. (Can I say that?) You see, his bladder (rather, the contents of it) have done a number on his padded, cushy, pricey mattress. We have a mattress protector, but apparently we have an el-cheapo one because pee soaked through on a number of occasions:(. Obviously we're going to replace it when he's got better bladder control, but for the time being, I can't stomach the thought of him laying on pee. Blah.

So, I cleaned his mattress. I lifted the mattress and box springs off the bed and thoroughly vacuumed and dusted.

Then I lay the mattress back into place and made my own special concoction.  You could just use straight baking soda I suppose, but I poured about 1 cup of baking soda into a plastic baggie and added in 4 drops of peppermint essential oil (lavender smells pretty nice but I heard from a friend that lavender essential oil is harmful to growing boys, so I opted for a safer scent). Then I thoroughly shook up the baggie.

Using a kitchen strainer, I sprinkled the baking soda mixture all over the mattress and let it sit for an hour or two more.

Using the hose end of my vacuum, I thoroughly vacuumed the mattress. Bye, bye dust mites and other nasty things. The baking soda helps draw up any moisture and deep dirtiness. It deodorizes and leaves the mattress smelling fresh and clean. I also love the faint scent of mint left by the essential oil.

And that's it. I love a good cleaning secret. Do you have any you'd be willing to share? ;)

DIsneyland 2012

We gave up our Disneyland passes a couple years ago when we began feeling convicted about spending big money on extravagant things such as this. Yes, Disneyland is fun and we have enjoyed ourselves, but we're pretty content in our decision not to have passes ;) Plus, it's nice to take our kids there occasionally when it's a treat for them, rather than something that's done monthly. Not to say that that's what it's like for anyone else, or that passes are wrong by any means, just that that's what we've discovered for our family :)

 

So when my mom offered us her passes (she bought a three day pass and they were about to expire before she'd have a chance to go again), we jumped at the chance! We wanted to have an entire day just to spend with our big kids so we got our babysitter and enjoyed a day to ourselves ;)

 

We met a few friends,

rode lots of rides,

our big boy got to participate in the Star Wars academy(!!!),

and we got some yummy treats too!

Oh! And lets not forget the tram/bus ride from the parking lot to the park... my kids thought they were big stuff riding in a seat all alone ;)

My man and I had such a great day with Lauren and Jake. Thanks again mom for offering up your tickets ;)

Silhouette art

Our new house has alot of wall space. A lot. This makes me crazy excited because it means I will now have ample amounts of wall space to decorate, create and craft on. Ahhh!!! And so, that's exactly the reason why I made some silhouette art... with a little twist ;) 

 

I'll share my own tutorial with you all because it's CRAZY easy ;)

 

First off, I snapped a picture of my girl:

 

Then I uploaded it onto the computer, and printed it off as an 8x10 on cardstock paper. (Note: the picture quality doesn't matter, ie don't edit the picture, because you won't be seeing this part anyway):

Then I cut out her head, being extra careful around facial features:

and turned it around:

I opted to paint my silhouttes but you could keep them white as well I suppose (if you had a dark background):

I glued them on some fun, coordinating scrapbook paper, framed them with some frames I scored at Hobby Lobby for 75% off, and viola!

These will make a great addition to our upstairs hallway ;)

Go make your own and enjoy!

Pee Wee sports

 

Since Lauren is doing horseback riding lessons, we asked Jake what special activity he wanted to do this season. We've done swimming, gymnastics, soccer and painting classes, which left us with a couple options... karate or Pee Wee sports, which introduces kids to basketball, soccer and baseball.

Not surprisingly, my boy who loves anything that involves hitting or kicking a ball, chose Pee Wee sports.

So, that's what we do now every Wed afternoon and Jake couldn't be more proud of himself. The kids are either his age or a little younger, as opposed to the last soccer league he was a part of where the kids were literally double his size and (age sometimes!).

So while it hasn't really been a challenge for him yet, he is very proud of himself when he made several goals. I'm not sure we'll join again, only because it's a little too easy for him at this point, but it's good for his self concept, so we'll hang with it for the next 2 months ;)

Way to go bubba!

PreK and Kinder cooking; Apple Smiles!

In both PreK and Kindergarten this week, the kids are learning about Johnny Appleseed; not only his role in history, but also learning about his faith and his love for Jesus.

 

And I was asked to come in like I did last year and cook with them weekly.... this week with aples. I was excited to be back in my 'class' cooking with them again. I missed their sweet little faces ;)

 

The kids each brought 2 apples from home . With help from their teachers, they weighed their apples (against bears- in the second pic below), measured them with string, and measured their height by balancing bears on top of one another and counting the bears to see how 'high' their apples were. Then with their apple worksheets, they drew what their apples looked like and made some notes about them. It was a cute learning activity.

 

And when it was over, the kids came and sat with me and I taught them how to make apple smiles.

They each got two apple slices and spread peanut butter (or yogurt for one child who was allergic and Lauren who loathes peanut butter- strange child):

Then they added a few mini marshmallows to one side of the apple, put the other slice on and viola... apple smiles :)

The kids had a fun time and I was so happy to be back hanging with my kiddos and watching some new skills (and friendships!) develop :)

Goodbye old table...

I have been antsy lately, wanting to craft and be creative but not wanting to create new wall art or accessories until we move in and I can see where art is needed. Plus, we have enough boxes as it is ;)

 

So, instead of buying anything, I just repainted something.

 

We've had this little table and chairs for a few years now. And while it's not the prettiest thing, it's been functional. But over the past weekend, it went from boring and functional to cute and functional (if I do say so myself).

 

Here's the before:

 

 

(By the way, Lauren was so small :( Where did the time go?!?!)

 

So, first things first, I got this primer from one of our best friends who works at a paint shop (yeah for employee discounts!). I primered all of the chairs and table. And no, no sanding with this spray, which is exactly the reason I chose it!

 

 

Then I painted. And painted some more. And yes, even more. I LOVE red, so it was worth the three coats.

Then I enlisted my sweet hubby to put my plan into action. He did some technical stuff that required measuring and math. That's where I checked out but you can see what he did at least ;)

And then, I painted the table, he sanded it a bit to make it look distressed, I painted some letters, and...

voila!

Finally, we added a couple coats of clear satin polyurethane to it to make it kid proof.

I'm really pleased with how well it turned out. I love that it'll match our new kitchen (when we're done with remodeling it), I love that it's distressed... and I love the saying as constant reminders to our children how much God loves them;)

LLC; Popcorn day!

LLC this week was all about popcorn!

The kids started by making a popcorn craft. They colored a popcorn picture, rolled up some yellow tissue paper to look like kernels, and then glued them on. It was cute.

Then, the taste testing began. Each kiddos got little cups of a variety of popcorn flavors. Then they got a score sheet and some stickers. They tasted a sample, and then rated the flavor (1-5) based on how much they liked they like it. There was butter, kettle, regular, caramel, chocolate, cheese and ranch. My fave was caramel, Jake's was the cheese, and Megan... well, she liked every single one of them ;)

Next up, an old school popcorn popper (is that the technical name?) was brought out and the kids watched as the kernels turned into popcorn. It was cute to see their excitement :)

And with that freshly popped popcorn, we went outside and had a popcorn fight! The birds must have loved us after we left ;)

 

Anyway, another fun LLC day with my two smallest Brownies. Thanks again Mandy for all of the time and effort you put into our fun filled days. We appreciate it more than you know ;)