Summer fun; Pool, err... spa day!

Who needs a kiddie pool when you have a lukewarm-bathwater spa?!?

So we brought out the dive sticks, the pool noodles, and some kick boards and had ourselves a morning in the spa :)

Hurray for fun, easy and inexpensive summer fun!

Summer Fun; park day

Now that summer's here, we are spending lots of time outdoors (and if you know me, that's saying a lot about how much I love my kiddos because I am not fan of the summer sun!). Anyway, one of our summer plans was to visit a new park. So we loaded up some snacks, lots of water and a few sand toys and headed to a park down the hill.

We had planned on visiting 1 new park... but the kids had such fun exploring this new place that we'll be doing this again soon. Local friends, who wants to join us? It's funner with friends!

The day megan almost burned down the house

I should have known it was coming because she almost flooded the bathroom. Burning down the house only seemed like the next logical attempt.

Megan had woken up early one morning and asked if she could go downstairs. We said sure, and began to wake up and get drssed. Moments after getting our clothes on, we heard Mean yell, 'Lauren I made you bweakfast. It's oatmeal!'

Oatmeal requires a microwave so we gave eahcother a panicked look and Justin went downstairs. But before he reached the thrid step, he could smell the damage.

Smoke was literally billowing out of the mircowave:

Seems someone got herself a bowl, emptied a packet of oatmeal into it, scooted her chair over to the microwave and then pressed 'start'. She forgot a crucial part... liquid:

My house reeked of burnt food for days. I literally scrubbed the heck out of the mircowave and heated up some orange peel and vanilla, but it still smelled.

Leave it to Megan... she's the one and only reason as to why I have so many gray hair this early!

The most expensive and largest home improvement project yet... FLOORS!

Out of all of the home improvement projects we have done to date, I knew replacing our flooring would 1) be the most expensive, 2) the most involved and 3) give us the most bang for our buck.

All three were correct :) 

I love the look of wood, but Justin always worried about the durability of it with young children who spill often and with animals. So, we opted for tile with the look of wood planks.

Here's a couple before's:

Goodbye old carpet, ugly white tile with brown grout and outdated parquet:

We saved up since the moment we moved in. It's been almost 2 years of saving, saving, saving. And it was very, very involved. We had 3 men here every.single.day for 10 days straight. But the outcome? Better than we had hoped!

(And while the tile guys were here, we had lots of picnics due to no floors:.

and we made lots of artwork... because when else do you get to draw on your floors?!?) :)

And now, it's finally complete. It's by far, my favorite project. I absolutely love the clean and open look it gives.

(Don't mind the bottom of the island. We have to stain it)

We're adding crown molding next and the entire downstairs will be complete. I can almost taste the finish line! :)

Happy Birthday Yeo!

He's 17 years old now... 1 more year until he's a big, bad grown up and moving on :/ 

::sniff sniff::