happy new year

September 14, 20111 Comment

My father in law wrote the following poem about the start of a new year being in the fall:

I agree. I always felt that the start of a new year was when school started.

I loved the anticipation of starting school.

I hope I can instill that love of starting something new in my kiddos.

As for the little guy he has been asking for almost two weeks when he gets to start school.

Today was the day.

He was up at 6:30 and said, “Can I go to school now?”

He had a great first day and I know this year will be a fantastic year for him…and our family!

He is in Pre-K at the same fabulous school that he attended last year. I wrote about choosing his school here.

I couldn’t be happier with the choice!

home is…the start of a new year.

a rambling catch up

September 1, 2011Leave a comment

Wow.

July was crazy busy.

And, what…where did August go?!

I have lots of catch up posts to put together about some of our summer adventures…

Bella Beach with Meme and Topher
The 4th Annual Playgroup Birthday Party
Our cross country trip to visit family in New York

I promise to get to them.

More for me than anything.

The little guy asked me if we still had things to cross off on our summer list.

Yes, we have a few.

And, a few will wait until next summer.

For now, I am going to embrace September.

I love the changing seasons.

I used to love the beginning of a new school year.

I look forward to the sounds of football coming from the TV or radio, cool evenings, crisp mornings and sunlight streaming through leaves that are trying to hold on to their green color just a little bit longer.

Ryan has been traveling a lot. Like, every week. It’s just the way things are. It’s the life we have chosen.

He’s tired.

I’m tired.

And, we just push on.

He texted me today from Northern California and said, “Would love some hardcore family time on Saturday.”

So, I will plan some hardcore family time for us.

Maybe cross some things off of our summer list.

Oh, and we have a birthday to celebrate on Monday.

Ryan will be 39.

Oh, and we welcomed a new little bundle into the extended family on Tuesday.

My sister-in-law texted us on Tuesday afternoon and said, “Think I might be in labor.”

Less than 4 hours later she texted us again and said, “SHE is here!”

Welcome little Katherine Grace to our extended family. She is surrounded by brothers and boy cousins…and has our baby girl to help show her the ropes!

Speaking of baby girl, she will be 2 a week from today!

Two. Years. Old.

Wow.

home is…hardcore family time.

never enough

August 19, 20112 Comments

although we’ve checked things off our summer list, and had a fun filled summer…with 3 weeks left to go I feel like I haven’t done enough.
are my kids happy?
are they having a good summer?
do I snap at them too much when I am tired and just need a break?
it’s exhausting keeping them occupied.
then add on the projects that I try to jam in around the house, blogging, time to craft, laundry, cleaning up after everybody…and, maybe, just maybe a little downtime or time for myself.
my exercise routine has gone to hell because I am so concerned about doing things for the kids.
which, of course, makes me more on edge…exercise is my only release sometimes.
and, of course, now I’m just being negative, complaining, bitching.
my worst nightmare is that I will be thought of as a negative person.
home is…hoping my kids think I am a good mom because I don’t always feel that way.

play outside every day

August 16, 20114 Comments

As you know we have been working on making our yard kid and family friendly this summer.

Our backyard was a clean slate as far as kids toys and activities were concerned. Up until this summer we got by with a few riding toys, a hose, some balls, and the dog water buckets.

This summer it changed.

I saw it coming last summer and had a plan in place. I knew what I wanted to do, but also knew I couldn’t get it done by myself.

You can see the progress of the plan here, here, here and here.

We have some professionals coming in a few weeks to finish the job, and I will post an update when they are done. I think it will take until next summer to really see how things turn out, but we are happy with the progress.

Our latest addition was an easy one that came from an idea I saw on Pinterest.

As I told you in this post, we don’t have a chalk friendly sidewalk or driveway at our house, so I have had to come up with other ideas.

So, along with the sandwich board chalkboard, I also made a large 4′ x 4′ chalkboard that we hung up on the fence.

I bought a precut 4′ x 4′ piece of plywood, primed it, and painted it with chalkboard paint. Ryan hung it up on the fence with screws (we also added some extra blocking with a 1′ x 4′ where he attached it to the fence).

All we had to do was add chalk.

I think I will also hang some of the buckets of chalk like I did with the sandwich board.

It adds some fun to the backyard and is definitely nicer to look at than the fence. I also think we will be able to use it for some fun photo opportunities in the backyard!

home is…family friendly backyards!

*I am linking up with Today’s Creative Blog…

drills, crib parts, and chalk…oh my!

August 6, 20117 Comments

We finally have summer here in the Pacific Northwest and some of the projects that we have had planned for our backyard are finally getting done.

I went out last week to add some features to the playhouse and found out that our drill had bitten the dust, so I had to wait for Ryan to decide which drill he wanted to replace it with and the kids and I worked on a “drill-less” water wall project instead.

Ryan came home with a drill the other night and due to the fact that I was working on another project (someone is getting a room redesign that I will blog about soon) I did not get to use the drill until this morning.

The sidewalk and driveway at our house are an aggregate and do not get along well with sidewalk chalk, so I have had to come up with other ideas for using the chalk…one of which was our deck that was in desperate need of refinishing (that is now done) and our fence. While both were fine alternatives for the short term, I needed a long term solution to our dilemma.

I used more recalled crib parts to make an outdoor sandwich board style chalkboard!

Here is a crude tutorial on how I did it…really, the photos are very fuzzy, sorry!

First, I bought pre-cut pieces of plywood at Home Depot, primed them, and painted them with chalkboard paint. Of course, I don’t have any photos of that process, but it’s pretty simple.

Here are the crib parts that I used…they are the small ends of the crib (the large ends were given away as a headboard and footboard for a full size bed as they were still safe to be used that way).

Next, I lined the sides up next to each other and added hinges that I found in the door hardware aisle at Home Depot.

After that I added chain to the side to keep them from opening up all the way while the kids are drawing on the boards.

Then, I screwed the painted plywood to the crib panels.

See, you can see the texture of our driveway…not chalk friendly at all.

Also, do you notice my husband filling water balloons?! He was preparing for a water balloon battle with the boys next door that should happen later today.

So, pretty easy and I feel good about my reuse of the recalled crib parts!

I also added “s” hooks to the chain to hang some cute buckets I had sitting around to hold the chalk!

I have another chalkboard project that I will blog about in the next little while…stay tuned!

home is…mommies who can use power tools!

*linking up with Today’s Creative Blog…

water wall

August 2, 20114 Comments

I’m finally getting around to reusing some items that have been sitting around our house for one reason or another now that we can play outside in the beautiful weather!

For instance, we have parts from the little guys crib, which was recalled, that I have been saving for some kind of project and I have come up with two. Here is the first…

We made a “water wall”…much like the one below that I found on Pinterest.

created at: 06/21/2011

I decided to use what we had lying around and instead of a piece of fence, I used the mattress support!

We also had to replace a hose this past weekend (have you ever heard of the peanut in the hose prank?!), so I had plenty of extra hose lying around.

I was able to attach our bottles and tubing with zip ties instead of wing nuts…and we can change our water path on a whim!

We were limited on bottle choices as our recycling was picked up this morning, but I will be saving plastic containers to change our wall up in the next few weeks.

Ours was pretty simple, but I am only dealing with a four year old and almost two year old so it was entertaining for them!

We will be adding some toys to their playhouse in the next week or so, and doing some landscaping in the next month or so.

I am hoping that the water wall will help to water some of the plants we have planned near the playhouse!

home is…fun summer projects!

*today I am linking up with Today’s Creative Blog…

check one off the list…kind of

June 27, 20111 Comment

This is actually something we did on June 5th, but I am just getting around to blogging about it.

The plan a was to walk to Bridgeport Village, have lunch, get frozen yogurt, play at the play structure and walk home. We were a bit slow to get going and by the time we were dressed and ready I realized that the tires on the BOB were flat and our little home pump wasn’t working to blow them up.

On to plan b…

One of the reasons I wanted to walk was because I hadn’t re-installed the carseats in my car. So, now I had to get the carseats in the car so we could drive up to Bridgeport for our adventure. No big deal as they had to go back in the car anyway.

So, a quick drive over to Bridgeport and we were on our adventure! Superhero capes and all!

The kids chose bagels for lunch. We have frequented the Noah’s over there since we moved into our house. The employees who have been at that store for a while know us by name and have watched the kids grow up. It’s comfortable, quick and kid friendly.

After lunch, Lola {baby girl} was upset because she didn’t think she was done eating. I told her that she would be happy about our next stop and to just follow me. We walked down the sidewalk to Peachwave and the kids got to pick out their own frozen yogurt and toppings. It was a definite hit and will definitely be a regular stop this summer.

Beau Bo {the little guy’s nickname from his sister} was ready to go to the playstructure. He was ready to walk, but I opted to drive across the street since we were without the stroller and I did not know how long Lola would last since we were creeping up on naptime.

The kids played together, independently, and with others. It was a wonderful morning!

We’ll walk up there another day this summer to make our “official” check on our list!

home is…having fun with our summer list!

3 years…happy blogiversary to me

June 23, 2011Leave a comment

It’s been 3 years since I started blogging.

When I started, it was mainly to write about interior design and green living as I had just decided to stay at home full-time with the little guy and left a job/profession/career that I LOVE.

It was hard to deal with the fact that I would no longer call myself an interior designer.

I was wrong.

I will always be an interior designer.

Just like I will, thanks to the little guy and baby girl, always be a mom.

My blogging has evolved.

I once had 3 blogs.

Now I just have one and I think I will keep it that way.

Happy blogiversary to me!

Here is a flashback to one of my very first posts.

home is…being a blogger.

{nana and bops visit} day 4

June 22, 20111 Comment

This post should have been written a month ago…sorry for the delay. Better late than never, right?!

Day 4 of Nana and Bops visit was Saturday, May 21st!.

This was our full day at the beach.

After getting to bed late on Friday night, baby girl woke up crying at 2 am. I ended up sleeping with her upstairs and at some point the little guy joined us in the bed, too.

I cooked breakfast for everybody while the kids were occupied by Nana and Bops and Ryan was taking the dogs out for a walk on the beach.

We had eggs, bacon, fresh fruit and english muffins.

Then we got dressed and headed down to the beach to hit low tide.

We spent almost two hours playing on the beach with buckets and shovels.

Baby girl was exhausted and I took a little extra walk around the neighborhood before heading back to the house for lunch. She fell asleep on my back in the Ergo and had a little bit of a nap.

We had lunch and then Ryan and I headed out to get some fresh fish for dinner.

After taking a drive through Lincoln City and buying some steak and other supplies at Safeway we headed south back towards Mojo Coffee. We grabbed a Stumptown and stopped at the Crab Shack to get some fresh halibut for dinner.

We had a great dinner of fish, corn, roasted potatoes, and salad.

After dinner I headed out to try to get baby girl to sleep in the ergo again, but she didn’t want to miss out on anything. So, we said goodnight to the ocean with Nana, Bops and the little guy and headed back up to the house where Ryan had a campfire ready for roasting marshmallows…well, almost ready. We waited a bit while he worked on the fire and then roasted marshmallows.

I put baby girl to bed and Ryan took the little guy on a late night walk to say goodnight to the ocean again.

I have an interesting story to tell about what I saw in the sky when they were gone, but I will save that post for later.

Here are some photos from the day.

I made this collage using Picasa and the tutorial from Emily at Jones Design Company. I am thrilled to be using my old friend Picasa as this will make blogging with photos so much easier for me!