Homemade fun

Sometimes I wonder why we waste our money on toys and why I waste my time cleaning them up day after day. When really my kids can have so much fun with nature and their imaginations!

Sunbathing on the "Pirate ship" deck!

Hours of fun playing with a "roly-poly" potato bug!

Making "food water" out of Remmy's dog food and water bowl.

(with my new kitchen spatula)

Homemade snorkel for the backyard swimming pool.

Oh how I love my children!! 

Catch up!

So it has been a little while...ok so a BIG while since I last posted. I think about our family blog quite often and wish I never let it fall behind...and eventually off of my "to do" list. First of all I had baby #3 on May 7, 2011. Before I left the hospital, either they recently had a meeting about the safety of newborns or all the nurses had recently had a bad experience with the wee little ones, they were ALL so very good at telling me the importance of keeping my baby safe. (Which they were very good at doing with my 2 previous children, but never this persistent and frightening) They specifically mentioned, "do NOT post pictures on the internet".

So here I am, being sent home from the hospital and so excited to share my little bundle of joy with friends and family, yet so very frightened at the same time. I decided not to post any pictures for a while...then I was still frightened so I decided to wait a little longer. Before I knew it my baby girl became a big sister and the fear came back just the same. So, again, I waited to post. As I mentioned earlier, I thought about it a lot and really wanted to get back to posting on our blog. So I am actually going to work at getting regular posts again! HOORAY! I am going to try to catch you up on what has been going on in our family for the past few years...er...at least start where we are now and fill you in if as I go.

We usually have family pictures taken in the fall. 1. So, we have a recent picture for our Christmas cards (yes, I am old fashioned and still mail Christmas cards!) and 2. A few years ago we had a death in the family and I promised myself that we would always have a current family picture incase anything happened to any one of us. Sometimes, they don't always happen in the fall, but they happen before Christmas! Anyway, these pictures are from our family pictures taken by Ali Brown, Jared's cousin's wife and so they aren't the most recent, but they are more recent than my last post! I must add that I love how she was with my kids and the fact that she included their ideas.-we got some pretty interesting shots. She was good to keep them involved and make them feel important.

Landon is now turning 7years in July. What a great big brother he has been. He just finished up 1st grade and is very excited to be moving on to 2nd grade.


 



Calvin just turned 5 years old. Boy, how they grow fast. He just finished up his second year of Pre-School and will be starting Kindergarten in the fall. He is very excited for this and he gets to have the same teacher that Landon had in Kindergarten.
 

Madelyn just turned 3years old. She is now old enough to start Pre-School in the fall and she is very excited and ready for it. She is a great little helper to me and loves her sister...sometimes a little too much!







Amelia is 1.5 years old and she is such a curious girl. She loves to climb EVERYTHING! She is learning new things everyday.

 

So now I have at least updated you on how much we have grown. We have baby #5 due in October, actually the day after Amelia's birthday! We'll see when this baby actually comes. We still live in our home that we love dearly, play in, and "live" in! We love spending time together and love to play in the water. Summer is my favorite time of year so therefore I assume it is my families favorite too! We enjoy going for walks/bike rides around the neighborhood. Time goes by so fast I hope that we can take advantage of the time we have together to grow and learn and make memories!

Sharpie Markers

This morning Calvin woke up 30 minutes later than usual...or so I thought! Was it worth the extra 30 minutes of sleep? I'm still trying to decide.

I went in the boys room to get Calvin out of his crib before he woke Landon up and WOW did I get a surprise.

I had used a black Sharpie yesterday to label a bag of clothing I put away of Landon's that he doesn't fit in anymore, and absentmindedly, I must have left the marker on their dresser where Cal could reach it. This was my "Good morning" SURPRISE!

This is what I saw 1st.

Then, I saw it on his 3 blankets he had in his crib with him. I picked him up out of his crib realized how bad it really was. I took him to Jared and asked him to hold him. I was so upset, I began to cry. I was so frustrated with myself and him, I didn't know what to do.

He and I just sat on the couch for a while and then I realized that it's times like these (in the future) that you wish you had pictures. As frustrated as I was I began taking pictures which helped me to realize that one day I will laugh about it. I think what frustrated me the most is the hard work and effort I put into his cute little sailboat blanket, for it to be "personalized" by him so fast.

Every bar on the inside of his crib had a nice little scribble on them.

Jared got the dresser and crib sparkling clean by using, believe it or not, toothpaste with baking soda and an old toothbrush. The Magic Eraser didn't even touch it compared to the toothpaste. The wall still has some on it and the blankets.....well, I'm still working on those. At the moment the ink is now blue instead of black. I have pretty much accepted the fact that it will NOT come out.

A few projects...

For some reason I am thinking life as I know it ends after baby #3 so I am trying to get all my "projects" done before then...but for some reason, as I finish 1 item, 3 more have been added to the list. I'm beginning to wonder if I will be successful at this rate.

Here are a few of the projects I have completed along with some fun pics of the boys!

Matching sailboat quilts for the boys (which I started FOREVER ago) and fish pillows to go along with. Landon's blanket has blue outline around the sailboats while Calvin's has green. (Basically the only way to tell them apart) and the fish on the pillows have coordinating eye colors; blue and green. (their names are also on the back of the pillows)

While purchasing the piping for the pillows above, Landon saw this shark fabric and REALLY wanted it. I bought some and made him a little apron out of it, since he's getting a too big for the one he has. He loves to put his apron on and help me make bread.

We received this little toddler bed from my Sister-in-law, which came in handy when we were out of our house during the BIG construction. Now that we are having another baby, we need a crib and I asked Landon if he would be willing to move to another bed and give his bed up to Calvin, who would be giving his crib up for the baby. The only way I could get him to change beds was if I painted his "new" bed darker blue. So I have painted it blue (which once was white), sanded it down to antique it, and then applied a glaze to finish it off. I'm not sure about how it turned out yet, but Landon was so excited he came home from school and climbed right into it! I didn't get any close up pics beause I'm not real sure about how it turned out and plus my camera is being really fuzzy that the ones I did take turned out horrible--this project brings with it another project--repaint their room!

Calvin was even pretty excited about it. He played on it the whole time Landon was at school.

This is how I have been keeping up on the dishes, so that I have time to do my fun projects. But...don't forget, you must have your snow boots on in order to do the dishes!

Calvin and I went out shopping today. He insisted that he walk and carry our goods while I push an empty stroller.