My blog is getting a facelift. California style. A nip here, a tuck there, a little botox on the side. ;)
Things are TOTALLY under construction right now so please excuse the mess! It will take a day or two before I get everything up and running the right way since I can’t put life on hold for my blog design.
I want to remember that Kole’s favorite movie is Tinkerbell and whenever I turn it on he is absolutely glued to the TV. It’s the only movie he will watch from start to finish. I have tried to get him to watch Cars and other “boy” shows time and time again but nothing holds his attention like the fairies of Pixie Hollow. It is adorable and hilarious and strangely appropriate for the life he lives surrounded by so many girls. This bit of information should come in handy someday. :)
I want to remember that not long ago Ellie was so upset about some bushes and flowers we pulled out of the front yard that she decided to run away. Apparently they were favorites of hers and she didn’t appreciate the change. She packed a suitcase and told us she was leaving for good. Trying desperately to keep straight faces, Kenny and I asked her a few important questions –
“What will you eat?”
“I guess I will have to go to Vons and steal some donuts.”
Where are you going?
“To Utah to grandma and grandpa’s house. They have a pool and grandpa is retired now. He will play with me.”
She made it out the door and to the mailboxes and then slowly came back and told us maybe she would run away tomorrow. We told her we were so glad she decided to wait because we would miss her more than we could handle.
Later I checked her suitcase and she had packed two swim suits and a pair of pajamas.
I want to remember how Kenny lights up whenever he talks about our kids. We had short meetings with each of the girls’ teachers last week to set goals for the school year and it made me smile listening to him talk about our girls. His eyes sparkle and he speaks about them like they are the most amazing little people in the world. I always knew he would be a good dad, but he has exceeded my expectations beyond measure.
I want to remember the way Kole climbs on me and says “lap!” My lap is his favorite place to be and you won’t hear me complaining about it.
I want to remember the way that Ellie calls a Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup a “Reese” and a Jolly Rancher a “Jolly Ranch.” They are two of her favorite treats and I don’t think she knows the right way to pronounce them. I haven’t told her the correct way because I think her version is better. I hope nobody else tells her for a long time.
I want to remember the way that made me feel.
We are still laying out outfits at the beginning of each week. LOVE THIS. It is working so well for us. These are her outfits for this week. As is usually the case, she was in a dress mood. :)
Everything else to the left of her weekly outfits are long sleeved tops that aren’t worn as much. Winter clothes for the couple of months that it cools off around here.
Below the winter shirts is a shelf I use for the girls’ pony and pet shop village. I keep these toys here because this shelf is easy for them to reach and they play with these toys often.
Below that shelf is where I keep tank tops and short sleeved shirts. Weather appropriate clothes for most of the year. For the few months it cools off here, I flip the racks and put the warmer clothes down below and summer tops up high. That way Addie can reach her clothes. :)
The middle is open shelving where I store a few extra games. The lowest shelf holds all of the girls’ “breakables.” Random ceramics they’ve made, piggy banks, a tea set. All that girly stuff that they want to be able to reach, but that also needs to be up and away from a certain two year old.
Summer dresses down below. We are still wearing sleeveless stuff around here. It has been so hot lately!
I cleaned out so many clothes that by the time I finished I had two empty drawers! Love that. I’m sure they will be filled soon, but what a nice feeling in the mean time.
Addison also has a dresser in her room so I went through those clothes as well (seriously, this little project took several days!).
Then days later they look like this again. It’s ok. I’m good with chaos. As long as it’s controlled chaos.
p.s This week has been busy with new house stuff so if you’ve emailed me and haven’t heard back I’m so sorry and I will get back to you – probably over the weekend. After I de-stress from this week by re-organizing our junk drawer. :)
Hi everyone! I was planning on posting something quite different than what I’m sharing tonight. My mom called me this afternoon to tell me she had been evacuated from her home. It has been raining steadily since Sunday in my hometown and the rain caused a huge dike to break. My mom’s home wasn’t hit, but many close friends’ and neighbors’ homes were destroyed. It has been so sad today hearing the news about the flood and seeing how many of our friends were affected. My dad, along with others, spent the day shoveling mud out of a close friends home. Luckily no one was hurt, but so many homes/belongings have been ruined. My mom said they were told to evacuate so quickly they didn’t have time to grab much. She grabbed a quilt my grandma made and a diet coke. That made me smile. Way to prioritize mom. :) The dike is located right next to where I went to High School (I’ve walked over it hundreds of times) and when I saw the news clip today I couldn’t believe it! So much water. It was heartbreaking seeing my beautiful home town in such a sad state. I feel like I need to be there helping in some way.
Click here to watch a news clip of the dike that broke and some of the homes that were flooded if you are interested.
I don’t really know why I’m blogging about this except that this blog is always a reflection of what’s on my mind and right now, this is all I can think about. I woke up feeling sad this morning remembering September 11th. Then this happened and officially made it a very sad day for me. Hope your day went better than mine! I am going to bed tonight grateful that my family and friends are safe. And hoping that things will feel a bit more sunny tomorrow.
Enjoy and Happy Fall!
Thanks for all of the sweet comments yesterday! So much fun hearing from all of you. Well worth dealing with all of the spam. :) I’m popping in quick today to share my new favorite Target find. Because what fun is a new Target find if you don’t share it with everyone else?
Well. In one hour it will be September 6th. And September 6, 2012 happens to be mine and Kenny’s 15th anniversary. I was going to do a fun anniversary post, but aside from the usual craziness a typical Wednesday brings, Kenny and I have spent most of our day discussing fireplaces with our builder, architect, designer and framers. And now it’s late and Kenny is asleep on the couch and I should be asleep on the couch so an anniversary post isn’t going to happen. But that’s ok. Because our 15 year anniversary post would look a lot like our 13 year anniversary post since we haven’t changed much in the last forever. We have decided to celebrate huge this year. By giving each other a new house. And maybe dinner for two. :)
(Kenny – I still love you most. And if we are still married by the time this house is built we are going to celebrate big time. Probably by buying window coverings. But at least the house will be finished. And we will still be together. Finishing each other’s sentences, trying to outwit each other with sarcasm, faking our way through parenting and arguing over who is a better driver. When we both know it’s me. Keep your eye on the prize.)
When you walk in the entry you can see straight into the formal living room which has a wall of french doors. I wanted to walk in the front door and immediately see the yard and pool.
K – I didn’t mean to do this but how cool is this picture!? Looks like Kenny is tiny and walking on our window. Clearly I have mad photography skills. Or I just take so many pictures that something cool is bound to pop up in a photograph every now and again. Nah. Mad photography skills.
(It’s my anniversary, humor me.)
And in other house related news I am still in the process of figuring out wood floors. We ordered a box of some that we really like and I laid it out in my kitchen to get a feel for it. It’s nice seeing it during different times of the day and in different lighting.
I’m looking for floors that have wide planks, that are distressed, and dark but not too dark. The sample to the right has a little too much red in it for me. I still don’t know if this is the one. Much to Kenny’s dismay. He could care less what we get. He just wants decisions made.
I decided I’d try the fishy cracker test on my samples…
I had an extra 4×6 slot so I used a large journaling card to display his year one stats. All of my babies had huge heads! They get it from Kenny. I’d say it’s because they are all so smart, but I have a small head so I’m not going to say that. Even though I just did. I do have big hair though – does that count?
I still need to print out this post to add to his album with his birthday layout. It’s written by Kole himself so I think it’s an important addition. :)
The next layout is just some random pics from March/April (around his birthday)…
These pictures of him in his frog towel are some of my favorites so I didn’t want to shrink them down to 4×3 like I do with most of my vertical pictures. So I ordered some new page protectors (Design B) with the large vertical 4×6 slots. Perfect!
Then I toss some of this Sweet Baby Ray’s Barbecue Sauce over it. I love BBQ sauce and this is by far my favorite store bought sauce. Toss the BBQ chicken in a roll, boil some corn on the cob and dinner. is. served. DONE.
Another one of my favorite go-to’s for quick dinners is “boil-in-bag” rice. LOVE this stuff. You pull out the bag and plop it in some boiling water. It’s done in 10 minutes. Cut the bag open and let the rice sit for a bit to cool and wa-la! Easy, tasty rice that was no mess to cook. (The “no mess” is my favorite part.)
Better Homes and Gardens Kitchen and Bath magazines. I can’t get enough of them! I am always drawn to the same things in kitchen/bath photographs which makes me feel a lot more confident in the way I am designing our new house.
Cetaphil lotion and daily facial miosturizer/sunscreen. This stuff is THE BEST. I mentioned in my make-up post that I wear sunscreen every single day under my make-up and Cetaphil is my favorite. I have to wear sunscreen daily because my skin is so fair and I live in such a sunny climate. Best secret to looking young – wear your sunscreen. Or so I’m told. :) My dermatologist recommended Cetaphil for daily sunscreen (and lotion) use. A little bit goes a long way so one bottle lasts a long time. It has a little shine to it which I like because I have dry skin. It gives my skin a bit of a glow! I always order it through Amazon (I included the link above) because I can’t ever find the facial moisturizer in stores.
Another favorite product of mine is regular old Pond’s cold cream. Several of you tried my favorite mascara out and loved it (YEA! Makes me so happy!) but wondered how I remove it. Pond’s is the best for removing make-up. I’ve tried several other products for removing make-up but always come back to Pond’s. I use this every night to remove my make-up before I wash my face.
These are my favorite newish pajamas that I have LIVED IN this summer when I’m home. I bought them at the Gap Outlet and the material is so soft and comfy and stretchy. I never want to take them off! Another favorite are my Ugg house shoes. A fun Christmas gift last year. I know. You’re thinking who wears Ugg house shoes in August? Um that would be me. Weather doesn’t change that much around here and my kitchen tile is so hard and cold. I always like house shoes on when I’m home. I’m excited to put less tile and more wood in my new house. But I bet I still wear the house shoes. :)
Close-up of the print on the pajama pants. Grey with coral flowers. Cute, right!? They make me want to join Ellie in her crusade to pass a law declaring that every day be pajama day.
I know I mentioned my favorite cereal Bran Chex in my last favorites post but I have to also say how much I love the containers that hold them. I found these at the Container Store and this one container holds three boxes of Bran Chex! Talk about a space saver.
Really ALL of my pantry containers and baskets are favorites of mine. This is by far my favorite organized space. I love that it looks good but is also so practical and easy to keep organized. The OXO containers have been perfect for keeping food fresh and visible. I doubled my pantry space when I got rid of the boxes and started using these containers. WOOT WOOT! Love them all. (You can see where I bought all of my pantry containers in this post).
We bought these necklaces for the girls on our back to school shopping spree. They are from Justice and my girls begged me to buy them. It wasn’t a hard sale because I love the necklaces too.
You might think this is lousy photography, but no. This is just my boy stacking at lightning speed. (And ok – slightly lousy photography.) He does this with all of the upstairs pillows on the beds too. Moves them all to my bed in a big heap. As soon as he sees I’ve put them back, he gets to work stacking them all in one place again.
A couple of weeks ago while we were at a picnic for one of the girls’ summer camps Kole kept himself busy with the sidewalk chalk.
My little divas had a fabulous day. Loved their teachers. Loved seeing all of their friends again. Loved their new sparkly shoes that light up with each step signaling to the world that they are coming a mile away. I loved seeing them so happy. And I loved having an hour and a half of peace during Kole’s nap (bliss!). And I loved that I didn’t get nearly as emotional as I usually do. A few tears, but nothing I couldn’t hide under my sunglasses. Like I said – the day was a success!
I got lots of questions yesterday about where I shop for my girls. Nothing special. I just head to the mall. All of the malls in San Diego are outdoor malls. They are very sunny, happy places to be. :) Here is a breakdown of where I bought the outfits in the picture I shared:
I wrote each day of the week on the bags (twice so El and Ad each have their own) and then cut a small hole in them to slip the hanger through. LOVE IT! The bags hold their socks and accessories and remind my girls what they are wearing each day.
A few more examples:
A lot of the ideas I’d seen on Pinterest were great, but took up too much closet space. I love that the outfits/bags fit nicely in the girls’ closets and everything we need is all in one place ready to go! I also love that this didn’t cost a cent and took me about two minutes to put together. I’m so excited about my new system for organizing outfits! One more way to minimize stress in the morning. Which we desperately need. Because a certain two year old is so good at maximizing it.
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