I had a WONDERFUL day today. I had tons of fun planning for today too...I really did. This year I was really in to caleb's birthday party. I wanted it to be cute, fun, and all about Caleb. I put photos of him out from each year, his scrapbooks out, his baby books, etc. He picked out the foods and snacks, drinks, etc. I think I really enjoyed the planning and prep because I really was embracing what a party was/is all about...celebrating that special person. In this case it was Caleb and "8" was hitting me pretty hard.
8 sounds so "old" compared to the first 7...at least to me it does. I simply can't believe he is 8. I can't believe how fast the past 7 years has gone. I love him sooooo very much. I am overcome today with how very much I love this little guy....well, big boy. I have been singing "You are My Sunshine" to him since he was a baby, along with so many other routines and traditions.
I think he really enjoyed today too. I pray that he will always enjoy his birthdays and we will always take the time to remember what they are all about....celebrating, remembering, and embracing.

Happy Birthday Caleb
I love you more than you can ever know

On the way home from swim lessons today I got pretty frustrated. Frustrated with my kiddos...the constant tattling, the fussing with each other, the overall lack of kindness and love being shown for one another. It's just exhausting!

SO...I decided to challenge them.

I told them that they were going to have some challenges to complete that they had to do TOGETHER. Completely together with sharing ideas and explaining things. I got em' all pumped up about it. :0)

This was the first set of challenges:
all of these challenges used their wooden blocks:
1~ build a structure using 10-15 blocks that is at least 12 inches tall (I gave them a tape measure)
...if there is any arguing or unkind words, I would knock down the structure for them to start over... (it didn't happen though)

2~build a structure using no more than 15 blocks that is at least 18 inches tall. This time they had to take turns, one after the other, one by one

3~build a structure using no more than 10 blocks that is at least 18 inches tall. They had to take turns and talk/ask/explain before each block they put on. This was great because it helped them understand each other. (I sat nearby for this one to help). For example, Caleb wanted to put a long block upright....Georgia didn't like it BUT Caleb said "Georgia, turning it this way makes it a lot taller". She then understood better and was ok with it. :0)

They did GREAT!

The next challenge though...they are still working on...it's not nearly as easy nor going as well.
~Draw a PICTURE that has at least 6 different shapes and 15 different colors. They have to be part of a picture though...not just shapes drawn. The picture has to tell me who (characters) and when/where (setting).

Oh my oh my...the arguing and tears came full force. I made them talk for at least 3 minutes, nobody was allowed to pick up a crayon yet. They had to talk about what they wanted in the picture. That went pretty well. But once they started drawing, Caleb wanted to take control. "NO, I don't want any people in it. We always draw people". "No, the stem of the flower has to be green." "(scratch out)...birds doN'T have beaks like that"....
Ugh.
tears
tears
tears
fits.


I stopped them every now and then to talk about compromise.
I stopped them again to discuss that the picture is NOT Caleb's picture. It is supposed to be made by both of them, including their ideas and wants.

After the 3rd (and longest) discussion, it seemed to finally work. They are currently drawing nicely and talking to each other. :0)

I think this is going to be a part of our daily activities.... "challenge time".

What about your kiddos? Is the summer bringing new challenges and opportunities?
:0)

The easiest project I have done lately...by far....is to make hooded towels! SO easy and adorable!

My kids have hooded towels that they use EVERY time they take a bath or shower. My Sis gave them to the kids for Christmas YEARS ago and we still love them (and wouldn't want to live without them!). Every summer we spend a lot of time in the water, at pools, etc. and I'm always dragging around beach towels. Beach towels are too big for the kids to really use well and they hate carrying them. So this year I decided to incorporate our daily tool into our summer lives....hooded towels! Since they are so easy for bathing, they are sure to make pool trips easier too!

Here are the directions that I followed and it's super easy to do! :0) (I also made the tote they show for Georgia and a different little bag for Caleb)

This is how easy it is:
buy a towel and hand towel of your choice. You will only use HALF of the HAND TOWEL so if you want to make two hooded towels then buy two bath towels but one hand towel. OR you can make a cute little bag with the left over hand towel half (that's what I did). :0)

Cut the hand towel in half vertically...well, lay it out horizontally and cut UP through the center...does that make sense?
Fold that half in half (good sides facing each other) and sew a curved line the straight across. (go to the folded side, go down about 3 inches from the top and start there. Sew in a curve up towards the top and then straight across.
(this is actually after I sewed it once with a straight stitch and was about to go over it again with a zig zag stitch. Hopefully you can somewhat see the curve and line)

(I also trimmed off the excess ...especially at the corner... so it wasn't too bulky)
Turn it right side out.


Find the center of your bath towel and pin the bottom edge of the hood to it. The bottom of your hood should already be hemmed...the hem that was already on the towel, same for your bath towel. SO, the center of the hood, meets the center of the towel and you pin them together.


Sew straight across with a zig zag stitch.

That's it! :0)
Here it is:
Georgia's was easiest because the towel had the same print/pattern on both sides. Caleb's didn't....and I forgot about that! SO, I didn't intend to make the hood opposite of the towel NOR did I intend to make the bag stripes on one side, solid on the other! BUT...it matches the towel and HE LOVES THEM THAT WAY! Gotta love when accidents turn out better than what was intended! :0)



Now, for Georgia I used her left over hand towel to make a little tote like the one on the DIY tutorial. She loves it!

For Caleb I wanted to make him a bag that was a little less girlie. So I simply cut off the good edges and folded it in half. Then I took some ribbon that coordinated but didn't seem to "pretty" and pinned it in place at the top (both tops). I sewed those on. Then I sewed it together, sewing around the other three sides. I turned it right-side-out and that was it!

they keep their goggles and a water bottle or snack inside their bag. Now they can easily carry their towel and necessities without any complaining! It makes us all happier! :0)

(Jen...if you happen to read this, I promise I am making yours TOMORROW!!!) :0)

My husband and I have very different views on what makes a store a great store and what "Best Buy" means to us. My husband's FAVORITE store is Best Buy. My favorite store is Goodwill, where I find all of MY best buys! :0)

Today I want to share one of them with you.

I walked into Goodwill not too long ago...ok, a couple months ago really but who is counting? I fell in love with this piece before I even completely saw it! I saw it from the side/back and wasn't sure exactly what it was but I knew something important: it was different than any other furniture piece I have AND there was a good chance that it was pretty inexpensive (I was at Goodwill after all!) :0)
When I first saw it though there was a couple standing at it, looking it over. All I could think was "Walk away, walk away, walk away....and as SOON as you do, I'm grabbing that tag off of it!". Sure enough, I walked over close and waited...they turned and walked away (I think I gave them time for approximately 3 steps away) and I grabbed that tag. THEN I looked the piece over better. I lifted it and found it to be heavy and made of solid wood, I noticed the price...$34!!! (that's good in my book), and there was nothing broken on it! YEA YEA YEA!

I paid for it, had it loaded in my car, and brought it home so I could transform it (2 months later...but again, who is counting?).

I was so excited about the piece I showed it to my neighbors and friends. I was happy that other people had the same excited and awed reaction that I did.

I finally decided to tackle this baby! I knew I wanted to paint it and put a color wash on it. I wasn't sure what colors but I knew that first I needed to figure out where it was going to go in my home. I brought it inside and figured that out, which helped me decide on what colors to paint it.

First I primed it. I thought I was going to sand it...I decided to give primer a try. SPRAYPAINT primer at that....it took two cans, a couple of coats...and the priming was done!

The I decided to paint it green. This is the green that I used in my guest bathroom many moons ago, it's called Herb Tea. I love it in my bathroom so I figured it can't be too bad. I painted just one good coat on it.

Last I had to figure out how I wanted to "age" it...I saw all over blogland about glazing furniture. You use 4 parts glaze to 1 part paint. I ran to Home Depot for a quart of glaze and talked to one of my favorite employees there...she does a lot of refinishing of furniture and she told me how "addictive" color glazing can be! She told me how she does it: a chip brush, dry painting, and sometimes a little rubbing with a cloth....and I got what I needed. I decided to use the dark brown paint that I have left from painting my formal dining (we don't use it for that though) room.

I grabbed a rubbermaid container (so I could close it up and keep the leftover paint) and mixed the glaze and paint. Super easy.

Then I started painting. I kind of dry brushed, kind of not....did a lot of rubbing off with a wash cloth. It wasn't hard BUT I did learn a lesson...I started painting around 8:00 AM and it was going great. Then it got much warmer outside and the glaze started drying MUCH faster by 9:00 AM....so it didn't turn out perfect. I have some areas that are darker than I wanted, some areas that needed to be rubbed better.... but they dried before I could get to them.

Here is a leg of the bench...before the color glaze and after the color glaze...

BUT it was my first time doing a color glaze, first time doing any sort of painting technique on furniture...and I LOVE the result. It looks so much better! I just love it.


When I was almost finished Caleb came outside (I paint on the front porch) and said "Mom, it looks a lot OLDER now since you painted like that, it looks OLD!" I smiled and said "YEA! Good, it's supposed to!" He was so glad that I liked his comment and he laughed that I wanted it to be that way.

Here ya go...before and afters....



Thanks for stopping by!
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It's summer and for us that means time at home...all together! We LOVE it but I have to make sure my son doesn't watch tv and/or play video games all day long. Believe me, if allowed, he WOULD!
So, I try to make sure to give my kiddos plenty of things at their fingertips to encourage them. We made homemade sidewalk paint yesterday, today we are baking miniature fruit pizzas. We have something NEW to do/try for almost each day. Since I keep kiddos in my home (other people's kiddos for some extra cash), it means that we don't go running around, go swimming anywhere, ETC. That means that we find all the fun we need...here at home!

I decided I needed a little help keeping my kids encouraged. This is what I came up with. We are only 3 days in and it is working WONDERFULLY!
(Caleb wants to make sure you know that he DID earn 4 the first day, we forgot to check "read" after he read at bedtime...) :0)

Each category has a minimum time limit...30 minutes. That seems like enough time that they truly get going...for example....if there was no time limit and my son wanted to check off "create" then he would probably take the easy way and just make a quick card for a friend with paper/crayons/markers. That's not what I had in mind for "create" SO I knew I needed a time minimum. It works wonders! Caleb has stretched his thinking and come up with some CUTE things! Yesterday he made a "summer snowman"...out of my leftover styrofoam balls...the snowman was made with a puddle at the bottom and parts falling off of him (melting). Today caleb used colored craft sticks and space stickers to make "the solar system"!!! This is with NO suggestions from me! YEA!
Here are some flowers Georgia made....

For learning, the kids can work on anything...practice handwriting, do some pages from a workbook, read from the computer (guided), etc. Yesterday Caleb wanted to learn about insects (his favorite topic). He wanted to learn about "the most deadly insects, the most venomous insects, and the largest insects". So I googled it, saved the websites...and let him read all about it! I watched some of it with him and quizzed him after.

The exercising one is great for the minimum...it keeps playing as just playing and not exercising. They can't call playing on the trampoline exercise when it only lasts 15 minutes. Yesterday they both wanted to check off exercise so we took a family walk/bike ride for 30 minutes. It was wonderful!

Oh...the after part....my kiddos don't get their check over the category unless they: tell me about what they learned/read/etc. AND cleaned up any mess they may have made in the process. :0)

Another great part...it makes ME be more involved...less computer time for me and more interacting with the kids! That's ALWAYS a good thing!

I haven't decided on the "prizes" yet and I told them that I will pick the prize. It won't always be buying something...it may be going to get ice cream together or a special outing to a new park...

My new tip #2:
Here is my new found friend for limiting.......rubberbands! My kids can go through 8 plastic cups a day each of allowed. (one of the downfalls to all of your cups looking the exact same!) It was driving me crazy! SO, I grabbed some rubberbands. Caleb's is the thick one, Georgia's is the thin one. Each morning I grab a clean cup and put the rubber bands on them. Those are the cups they are to use ALL DAY! If they want something to drink they have to find their cup with the rubber band! I can't tell you how easy this is and how EXTREMELY WELL it is working! WOOOHOOO!

What are you doing differently for the summer? :0)

You are going to LOVE this summertime project! It's super easy and super fun! (and turns out GREAT!). And who doesn't love to tie dye?....this time without any rubberbands or buckets full of dye!

I first saw this here and knew I had to try it. My son's field day was coming up so I thought that would be a perfect time to give it a try (although we will be making more at our "First day of summer party" later in June!....we'll do more colors on those). So I decided to do just one color, his school color. I let my neighbor know that I would be happy to make some for her kiddos too.

This is what I did:
got the shirts wet and wrung them out
twisted them and put them in the jar (I thought this was kinda' hard, they kept untwisting when I would try to put them in the jar...turns out that's ok! All of mine that were super tight twisted had too much white on them!)

As you are putting them in the jar, sprinkle some dye on the fabric. There is no rhyme or reason to it, just pour a bit in and around on each layer of fabric.

I used Tulip dye. I thought it would be a pain because it requires salt BUT it wasn't! While you are working on the shirts, have a pot of water on the stove, heat it up and add the salt to the water. I didn't do exact measurements, I just added a bunch of salt (more than the directions said because I had more water than what they said...)

Once you layer twisted shirt and powder dye all the way to the top, pack it in pretty good..you don't want things super loose.

Then pour the hot salty water in and fill up the jar. Put the lids on tight and put them out in the sun for at least 3 hours.

Then I rinsed them off in my driveway with the hose, brought them in and threw them in the washing machine. Dried em and that was it! :0) They turned out great!

After that I knew I wanted to make a stencil and paint something on the back of the shirts. I had high expectations of elaborate wording (much like the jar I made for Caleb's teacher). I used freezer paper and my SD and gave it a try....six times...!!! AHHH! it was horrible. Little letters were a nightmare. SO I decided to go simple....a huge pawprint. It was VERY easy and worked wonderfully. I ironed the stencil onto the shirts, painted with fabric paint, and pulled the stencil off. Super easy and quick.

I think they turned out pretty good and the kids loved em'. It was my first time doing freezer paper stenciling and it won't be my last!

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I was so excited to do this project! I made a really simple frame in February but it didn't turn out great. I was ready to give etching another chance.
I grabbed some contact paper I already had on hand and a jar I already had as well (I bought a few the last time I went to Ikea) :0) I wanted to make something special for Caleb's teacher.
Here it is!
I used my Silhouette SD and cut out the name of the school and the paw print. Then I put the contact paper on the jar. It was a bit tricky...curved items aren't nearly as easy as something flat. I actually made two of these..the first one turned out OK but had quite a few little places where I didn't work hard enough to get the creases out. There is NO WAY you're going to get the contact paper completely flat but the goal is to get out as many creases/folds as you can that are connected to an open area.
(this photo is taken before I finished working on it...you have to get out more folds than that and don't forget to put little pieces back in...like inside the "e" I just forgot to take another photo later)
Then paint on LOTS of the etching cream.
let it sit for 5 minutes
Scrape the cream back into the bottle (just with my sponge brush..most of it...I didn't try to get all of it, just some...the cream isn't cheap!)
Rub off all the cream under regular running tap water.
When it's all off, peel off the contact paper.
Clean it with glass cleaner.
***the first time I did this I didn't think it had worked! I thought I was rubbing it all off!...until it dried and then I saw it! hee hee hee***

Voila!

I made the jar and two little glasses for "pens" and "pencils". I added a bit of ribbon, then filled them all (forgot to take pictures of the glasses filled). the jar was filled with cookies made especially for her with her favorite candy, the glasses with...well...pens and pencils!

**the glasses were adorable square glasses, they were a nice size, and SUPER thick/heavy..yet they came from the DOLLAR STORE!!!! YEA!

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