While the Husband is away the wife will...

PAINT!

Our bathrooms were just the cheap builder grade flat paint. The kids are getting older and bigger and we needed to get their bathroom painted in good paint before the drywall got damaged. *** As a side note...the night before I decided to do this, Brody got up in the night and didn't realize that the toilet seat was down. He peed ALL over the bathroom. Funniest thing ever at midnight! Thus the need for some waterproof paint! ***

I don't know what I was going for, something creative and different that worked with the bath accessories we already have. I did the whole bathroom in the oatmeal color and the stripes are a grey-ish blue and a green. The green looks almost yellow in some light. I wanted it light since they don't have a window.

I drew out the stripes with a 6 inch wide by 24 inch long ruler and a trusty red scripture marking pencil. I taped it out and then kept working my way over. I used "Frog Tape" The guy at Lowes reccomended it. I would HIGHLY reccomend it over the 3M blue stuff. Its the same price, but I had the best lines without any paint bleeding through. It came off so nice without peeling the paint. I am impressed by it.

The kids and I had a good time...now we have to think of what we'll do next...

BEFORE

AFTER

Blastball Photos

Brody's 2010 Blastball Professional Photos

The Neutrons

(In case you couldn't tell...Brody is the bright white boy third over that looks like he is in pain! He is a funny picture taker these days)

Letterboxing

I heard about Letterboxing last year, but never got up the nerve to do it until today. Letterboxing is a nationwide organization (letterboxing.org) and you can go on and find local letterboxes. You are given clues on where to go and it is sort of a little treasure hunt. When you find it, you use a stamp in the log book and then the box will have a stamp in it for you to record in your own little log book. I took a picture of my kids at each place and just bought cheap brag books to put the picture beside the stamp as a fun little letterboxing scrapbook.

So like I mentioned, today was my first time. I had directions to five local letterboxes and I had packed a picnic thinking we'd have a really fun afternoon. It was fun...but it was an adventure.

I forgot bug spray.

The directions had said that the first box was in a park. I was picturing like a grassy field/playground. Nope, it was like a wilderness park. It was probably close to a mile hike into the box. We had planned on eating lunch at this pond near the treasure - but I refused to stop. Ella cried the whole way in because she was hungry. I was so eaten up by mosquitos by the time we found the box all I wanted to do was run out. I ended up carrying Ella out and Brody cried because he thought we were going to get eaten.

Brody and Ella taking a rest during our flee from our first letterbox

We got to the car and my legs just started to swell. I don't just get a mosquito bite - it looks like the mosquitoes hit my legs multiple times with a regulation size baseball bat. Seriously I thought I was going to die from itchiness. Brody even asked me on the way home - "Mommy are we going to die?" He takes things very literally. I ought to watch how I phrase things. The kids fortunately didn't seem to inherit my response to mosquito bites and after some food they were all better.

I ditched my plan and we only went to one other letterbox today. Ironically it was at a hospital. I thought about going in and getting a cortisone shot, but didn't want to pay the hundreds of dollars it would cost.

Our second letterbox at the hospital (the kids are holding their stamps from the box) They look thrilled, huh?

We will go again, but I will be buying lots of bug spray and I will probably wear pants even in the heat.

Happy Half Birthdays Kidos!

My sister Stephanie decided long ago that she would celebrate the kids half birthdays with them instead of their birthdays. Partly because she loved celebrating her half birthday growing up, and partly because she was always away at school in January for the kids real birthdays. Either way - my kids are spoiled and adored by their aunt.

Saturday night we celebrated with a swim party and bbq at Grandpa and Grandma's house. Dinner was followed by presents and then topped off with individually decorated cakes for each Brody and Ella.

Brody showing off his new Cars clock for his room. He asked me several weeks ago for a clock for his room so he'd know when it was time to get up...he doesn't need this - he gets up too early as it is.
In case the clock doesn't get the job done, he now has a new Cars wrist watch to help him keep track of the time. (He can't tell time...but he is learning, ever so slowly.)

Ella checking out her new jewelry box. She loves this. She carries it around the house now calling it "my present" Stephanie even put a few old costume jewelry pieces in there for her. Ella is a girly girl and loves to wear "bracips" and necklaces.

Aunt Stephanie with Brody and his cake (a white wall tire from Lightining McQueen)

Aunt Stephanie with Ella and her cake (a sparkly flower cake)

Brody "Michael Phelps"

Brody has turned into a fish. His swimming skills have far surpassed our expectations for this summer. The pool has become a more dangerous place - but a whole new world for him!

Long Weekend Project

Anyone remember this....

(The Before Pictures)

We were given this hutch as a hand me down when we got married...7 1/2 years ago. I had intentions of doing something to it, but never have for one reason or another. Now that we have our own house and are more settled it was time!


The After Photos

New straight lines, new black paint, new hardware. We are so happy with the transformation. Now if we only had all new living room and dining room furniture to go with it...sigh

4th of July

We spent our weekend AT HOME relaxing and getting things done around the house. It was NICE! AND! IT RAINED almost every day. We LOVED it! (as did our yard and garden!)

We went to church on the 4th and we were bummed because we got their after the opening song and we missed being able to sing the Star Spangled Banner. Brandon and I both love the Sundays with patriotic songs. We got asked to sub for Brody's primary class while his teachers (a husband and wife) have a new baby. It was fun to see Brody in his primary element. He is a good singer and he is quite talkative in class (not a big surprise). He knew quite a few of the answers which made us feel good....the mostly irreverent scripture study isn't all for naught.

We came home and had a roast dinner and waited as long as we could before going on the driveway to do a few fireworks. After last weekends show, we decided we'd just use the leftover fireworks from last year instead of getting a bunch more. It was great. We did enough (just before dark) to make it memorable for the kids. After we got them tucked in we were able to watch our whole neighborhood as it was lit up with fireworks. The whole skyline was exploding with colors. I love the national pride that comes with Independence Day. Seeing all the fireworks and knowing what it all represents makes me very grateful for the country we have.

Ella - wearing her princess nightgown (we did as much as we could before doing fireworks but still getting them in bed!)

Brody's all american pj's

Daddy's helpers. The wind wasn't cooperating and lighting them wasn't an easy task

SPARKLERS! Brody liked them, Ella needed help with hers so their aren't any pics of her holding them, but she liked them ok.

The kids reactions to these "electric bomb" fireworks. They aren't my favorite either. It is a crazy strobe light that changes colors and then sounds like a gun went off. Not so fun.

Ella really didn't like them

Because it was too cute not to film...

Fireworks!

Providence Village had their fireworks on Saturday the 26th of June. We kept the kids up late anticipating a fun night...we were slightly disappointed.

They loved the M&M's I brought as a treat.

They loved watching the first few (LOVE the look on Ella's face! I had the camera on her and ready to see her first reaction)

And then they were done. They whined about going home and the ants, and whatever else came to their little minds. We barely made it through the whole show.

But church the next day was just about as awful as it could have been. We decided it wasn't worth the fireworks not on the 4th to have had cranky kids at church.

Brody's First Dentist Appointment

And he did GREAT!

He got through the xrays, cleaning and exam with no complaints. No cavities either! Yeah!