Christmas Decorating...Yeah!!!

It was alot of fun decorating this year.  In my last house I decorated in browns, golds, oranges and greens.  I LOVED my tree and then we would do the fun kids tree downstairs.  This year my entire house is different colors, so of course, I lay awake at night in August wondering how am I going to decorate my house for Christmas.  I don't want to buy a bunch of new decorations and what am I going to do with all my beautiful brown, orange and gold things.  Well, one night in September it came to me. {Yes, sadly, these things keep me up at night}.  My mom willing took all my beautiful brown things (and they will look great in her house...if she ever gets her tree up).  I used alot of what I already had, made most of the things and purchased a few new things, like the pretty deer above.  I loved these and we are deer lovers in our home, so they were perfect.

It was exciting to get to decorate a real fireplace this year and of course the boys wanted their stocking hung by the chimney.

Most of my decorating took place in the dinning room.  I had so much fun working with all the sparkly red, green and blue! 

I think my favorite thing is my twigs with the little ornaments hanging on them that I already had.

 

This was also fun to make and I love LOVE this ribbon.  I had to go buy a few more spools of it for gift wrapping!  

Hunter & I made these trees out of glitter paper.  Super Easy.  You make a cone (you can find templets online like this one), then I just cut out circles and stapled them to the top.  Easy Peasy!

I also added this to the dining room.  I still have some work to do with it, but it is so much better than a blank wall!!!

And here is the tree.  I just did not have good luck getting a good picture and the boys have somewhat destroyed it a bit.  The 2 year old has been the cause of many ornaments being moved up to the top.  

I also love doing and advent calendar every year for the boys.  We try to have an activity to do every day.  Often they go along with a bible verse, but sometime they do not.  It depends on the day.  We do read a verse every day; however, as well. 

I hung it on the fun bulletin board I made.  I covered it in leftover fabric, which I did not have enough of, so then I painted the frame cream and hot glued dry lima beans around the edge.  I really like the way it turned out.  

Until next time...

The Boy's (Blue & Orange & Outer Space with Bunk Beds) Room

Sorry for the large break in posting on here.  I blame by perfectionism/procrastination.  I have been wanting to post some of the decorating progress in my home, but I haven't wanted to post anything because I have not fully (to my expectations) completed anything.  Well, I am learning that that may take a while so I figure I will show you what I have gotten accomplished.  The boys room took me a long time to decide what to do.  I asked the boys what they wanted and Hunter told me blue walls and a rocket ship and all the planets painted on his walls.  Hayden said no blue, he wanted orange.  Well, we had to compromise.  Here is what we came up with.  I still have some projects that I would like to do, I'll leave you in suspense, but here is what the boys room looks like right now.

Well, I tried to use what we had.  I loved the green book shelf and dresser from the "cowboy nursery" from our old  house.   I thought it looked really good with the other colors and was very excited it could be reused.  I also reused the stars from that room and painted them orange along with the frames.  

The boys also got their very requested bunk beds, which they really had no choice about since we are putting 3 boys in  one room.  

I got all the great pictures from this book which was inspired from here.

I have also been waiting for about 4 years to hang my clip boards on the wall.

So, not the best picture but here is the set up with the crib.  I was going to make bedding for the crib, but decided it won't be in there long.  Like I said, its not quite done, but looks alot better than it did.  That's for sure!!!

Organizing the Playroom...

So one of the first projects that we did in our new home was to get the playroom somewhat organized; which, understand, is a constant work in progress...We pulled this room together with things we already had, which made it pretty easy to do, and inexpensive.  It all started with our old media cabinet.  It was to big for our new space so we figured it would make a great toy cabinet.  It is still going to be painted white, but that will come with time.  For now it is housing a lot of toys large and small.  I will show pictures of the inside of the cabinet in a future post as it is also still a work in progress.  I find we have to live with things a while to see how to best organize them rather than do and redoing over and over.  We also re-purposed the white shelves.  They were left in the boys room when we moved and we didn't really care for their placement, so we thought they would be perfect for more storage and it makes the toys look a bit like art, if that is possible for toys.   I also had to put a sitting area in the room.  I had these wing chairs and thought they would work well.  I love it for reading and it is a great place to sit and just watch the boys play.  I also think it helps the room not just look like a big toy room.  
This shelf is one that was used in our old playroom along with the baskets.  I also will be painting this shelf white, but it works for now.  I tried to keep this room bright, colorful and fun.  It was an adjustment having the play room on the main floor.  In our old home it was in the basement.  But it has been nice as they enjoy going in there and playing and having it set up this way it is also easy for them to clean up, which is nice for me...

Here is the way the room looked before we moved in.  I think with the new paint color, white curtains and other changes we have made, it has really brightened up the room and it is working for our family and making it feel like our home.

It is a stormy day today so it sounds good to curl up right here with a good book and listen to the rain...well, maybe I'll curl up with 3 boys and a good book instead...

A Super Spider-Man Birthday Party

So I had the pleasure of putting together this Super Spider-Man Birthday party for my, now,  4 year old.  This is my 11th party I have had for one of my boys.  Hard to believe.  This one was fun, but man; I hope I never have to work with red fondant ever again!!!  My cake didn't turn out quite how I was hoping, but the boys all loved it and that is truly what matters! 

We had to include lost of sweets.  I can't have a birthday party for this boy without jelly beans.

I went with very simple, but super, snacks.  

This was a fun project.  I'm not a huge fan of goody bags, but I do like to send the kids home with something.  Usually it is a sugar cookie.  To the sugar cookies I added super hero capes.  They seemed to be a big hit with all of them.  They were easy to make too.  Well, I made them easy anyhow.  I was by no means going for perfection, that's for sure.

Here is how I made them:

I cut fabric in a half circle then the circle in half.  To get a good half circle I tied a marker to a string and held it at one end then made the circle (kind of like a compass).  After cutting them and then cutting them in half I did the same thing making a smaller half circle at the top and cutting that out.  If you feel inclined, this is when you could hem the fabric.  I skipped this step.  It just didn't seem worth it for 14 capes that would probably be ruined faster than the time it took me to make them.  At this point, I sewed on a ribbon at the top and then used fabric tape to tape hook and loop so they would be safe and easy to put on and off.  This kids enjoyed this and my 3 boys have enjoyed running around the house after each other in them!

These are the invitations that I made.  I only wish that I had this picture before I made them...oh well, what are you gonna do!

The weather was so beautiful we spent alot of time out in the yard and they kids enjoyed doing an super hero training course.

We had a super time, that's for sure!!! 

New Beginnings...

Sorry for the major gap between blogs.  These last few months have been crazy, to say the least.  We thought about and decided to sell our house (kind-a out of the blue to me) in a weeks time, then put it on the market and sold it as well as bought a new home in 6 days. 6 weeks later we moved during that time we were also taking Foster Parenting classes as we are intending on becoming foster parents soon!  Also trying to continue the boys activities and have some summer fun. 

 But busyness is not what this post is about today.    It is about new beginnings and the fear, work, worry, stress, fun, excitement, joy, new memories, etc...that can bring.

So it all starting innocently enough.  Keith and I were talking about  few different things.  New flooring (I had white carpet in my dinning room...I have 3 boys) and trying to figure out how to configure bunk beds in a 10X10 bedroom in order to fit the said 3 boys when we receive a foster child.  We only had 3 bedrooms on the main floor and weren't ready for anyone to be in the basement bedroom.  So as we discussed this my Dear Husband said, "I wonder if it is even worth the money to put flooring in (I'm thinking...yes it is, do you see the white carpet) let me call the our Realtor and just see what homes are selling for in our area."  We had been seeing pretty low prices and didn't want to put much more money into our home.  We had just finished the basement.  Anyhow, the Realtor came out and much to our surprise homes like our were selling very well.  So after mulling it over for a week or so, mostly me coming up with reasons we shouldn't and Keith coming up with reasons we should, we decided to put it on the market and see how it would do.  I was just trusting God knowing if he didn't want us to move, our house wouldn't sell.  We really gave the whole situation up to Him.  And boy did He ever take over!!!

So after calling our Realtor to let him know, we were going to go for it, he came out and did his thing and it went up Tuesday morning.  I will never forget driving by my house that Monday night after he had put the sign out.  I was sick!!!  I really really did not want to leave my home.  The home I have brought all of my babies home to.  All the birthday parties, late night feedings.  All the work in the BASEMENT!!!  I was still trusting God.  Not joyfully though, that's for sure.  Between showings and having to have the kids out of the house and keep the place perfect (Did I mention I have 3 Young Boys) I had had it.  I lost 6 lbs. in a week.  I was a wreck!!!  We had 6 showings in 4 days and hadn't heard anything.  I wasn't sure what to think and then it happened...Sunday morning 8am.  Of course we are getting ready to head to church and our Realtor calls.  Someone has placed an offer.  I left this part up to Keith, so I can't give to many details.  But after talking it over with a few people at church, praying and talking some more, we decided to go for it! 

In the meantime, the Saturday before I had found a home I really liked.  It was what we were looking for minus 1 bedroom.  But the bedrooms were significantly larger.  It was our favorite we had found in the perfect area etc...so we figured, hey if we are selling our house today, we might as well buy one too, right!  And that is just what we did.  God really did work out all the details!  The moves went smoothly, thanks to everyone that helped!!!

Through all of this I was; however, still dealing with the yeah God really just did an amazing thing, but I still don't want to move.  I liked my house.  We could fit 3 boys in a 10X10 room.  It would be fine!

God kept bring me back to this verse:

Genesis 12: 1-4

The Lord had said to Abram, “Go from your country, your people and your father’s household to the land I will show you.

² “I will make you into a great nation, 
    and I will bless you; 
I will make your name great,
    and you will be a blessing.^[a] 
3 I will bless those who bless you,
    and whoever curses you I will curse; 
and all peoples on earth
    will be blessed through you. ”^[b]

⁴ So Abram went, as the Lord had told him; and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he set out from Harran. ⁵ He took his wife Sarai, his nephew Lot, all the possessions they had accumulated and the people they had acquired in Harran, and they set out for the land of Canaan, and they arrived there.

I was reminded that God made this work, we left it up to Him and we said we trusted that it was what he wanted us to do then who am I to sit and complain.  God has blessed us with a beautiful home.  One that I hope to be content in for many year, unless he tells us to move on.  I am trusting that He has great plans for us in this home He has given to us and I pray that we take advantage of every opportunity he gives us.  

And hey, getting to come up with new decorating and organizing ideas for our new home and cooking in a much larger kitchen ain't so bad either.  God is good!  To bad I had to throw my little temper tantrum before I figured it out!  

Hopefully I will be able to show off some great before and afters soon!!! 

Until then!

End of School...

So; although it has been a few weeks ago, we had the end of the school year.  I don't send lunch every day. He often eats hot lunch; so the last lunch I sent was 6 days out.  He really like the lunch. One of his favorite cold lunches is a bagel with cream cheese.


And being that this is my first "end of school year" gift, I had no idea what to give.  I knew his teacher enjoyed gardening, so I decided to get her a plant and gift card to a local nursery.  My son made a card and I laminated it.  I hope she enjoyed it.  I thought it turned out pretty cute.  Sorry the pictures are so poor.  I took this at night at was experimenting with my camera.   

Well, hopefully I will get back to blogging soon.  We move one week from today; and hopefully life will be back to "normal" soon!  We are enjoying summer so far, aside from all the boxes!

I know I know...

Okay, so I have been gone for a month...so sorry.  Life for me has turned a bit upside down lately.  We have decided to sell our home and move due to the fact that we are planning on becoming foster parents and a bit more space could be useful.  Anyhow, blogging has slowed down
A. because I have been quite busy with moving stuff and
B. I haven't had to much creativity going on. All my stuff is getting put in boxes.
We have completed letter "C"; however, I have not gotten that posted yet.  I've been going really slow.  Sorry.

My reason for posting tonight is just an amazing thing God taught me today.  I love the way God works.  My husband and I are taking our churches membership classes.  Today they were talking about "quite times" etc... and the man that spoke did a nice job.  He keep hitting on a point that I knew well; although, I am very poor at applying like I should.  The point being, we need to TAKE TIME; BE STILL and BE QUITE and spend time with the God of the Universe.  How hard that is.  But WHY??? HE IS THE GOD OF THE UNIVERSE!!!  I am bad a making time in a quite place where I can be still so I can not just talk to God, but truly have a conversation with Him, meaning I listen too.

Moving on to this evening as I was putting my boys to bed it was raining and thundering a bit and we were laying in bed listening with windows closed.  It wasn't raining hard and I was telling the boys that in order to hear the rain you need to lay still and be quiet.  As I was saying it, it hit me...Yeah, just like we need to do in order to hear God. What a great example it was to me.  God wants to have a conversation with us and wants us to delight in Him and spend time with him; but if we are to busy shifting around, talking and just not taking the time to listen to what He has to say we are missing out.  How often the noise of the world around us can also drown out Gods voice if we let it.  As we were listening to the rain, the air conditioning turned on and we couldn't hear the rain anymore.  Only if I would have turned it off could we have heard it.  I often feel like I can just "tune stuff out", but I need to realize I should just  turn it off or go somewhere else.  It also realized tonight it takes focus and concentration to listen to gentile rain.  I need to apply that to my quite time.  So often my mind wonders to so many different things because I am not focusing on Him, but on my needs, wants and what I think is important.

This was such a fun lesson to work through with the boys.  I tried to explain this to them as well as we were listing.  Telling them that we need to take time to be still before God and just listen.  I'm not sure how much soaked in, but I am excited to use this lesson again soon.  This summer I am going to start working through the Kids of Integrity information that was recommended to me by a friend of mine and I am going to begin with attentiveness, so what a great thing to bring back up to remind the kids about listening.  And what a great reminder for myself...

As I am going through this moving situation (I didn't really want to move, but apparently God wanted us to) I have been working through some serious emotions, so I really need to take this to heart and apply it daily to my life, not just through this situation, but continually!

Psalm 46:10
“Be still, and know that I am God. I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth!” 

The Letter B...

So I have finally gotten around to posting about the letter "B"... we had fun doing our activities to go along with the letter B. Nature helped us out a bit too!

First we worked on the Big B.  We made a letter B out of Bubble Wrap.

We also painted with the Bubble Paper

Then we made a small "b" boat

We read the B Book...many times

We also made Banana muffins.  You can find my recipe that I use here.

He had his "B" Lunch.  Brown Bear Crackers; Apple Boats with Bear passengers; Blueberry yogurt with more bears & a Bone; Blueberry Bagel letter "B" and more Bones and last but not least Berries with more Bear Sprinkles.  

Last but not least...we had a Bumble Bee land on our back door and would not go away after alot of banging. It was kind of weird, but I have to say, I have never seen a bee that close. I hope to get C done in a more timely manor.

In case you have been wondering where I have been...

So I am a bit behind on my creative inspiration. The month of March was crazy and I am trying to catch up on life. My oldest turned 6, then the next week we left for vacation and then the next week I hosted and attended Easter celebrations.

I had intended on having all kinds of car activities to show you; however, after much planning, we didn't do many of them.  We dealt with the stomach flu on both the way there and home.  We did get a couple of my activities completed, but sorry no pictures.  What I did for the boys was go through their books and pick out some of their favorites.  Then I came up with easy car crafts to go along with the books.

The first activity that we did went with the book Goodnight Gorilla.  This is a really fun book...

After reading the book we made keys.  I used this template for the keys.

I cut the key portion out and punched a hole in it.  I made three for each boy.  Then we strung them on pipe cleaners.

The second activity that we did was gorilla masks.  This the template I used for that.

I also cut these out and the eye holes.  They colored them and then I taped a craft stick on.  

After this they eat a banana snack.  This activity took about an hour, so it passed the time well and the boys had fun pretending they were the sneaky gorilla.