{piNterEst to MasTer cHef...aNd soMe raNdomS iN beTweeN}

I'm not sure where I have found the time lately to do a bunch of projects, but I've gone pinterest happy and have had a blast doing a few little things here and there!

 

Pinterest Project #1 -

We've been married 10 years.....have never had a bed (meaning like a "real" bed with a headboard, etc).....and the master bedroom is always the LAST room in our house to have anything done to it!!  So I was so excited when our friends were throwing out this old, beat up door and asked if we wanted it!  I knew right away I would make a head board out of it!!  :)

 

This is the "before".......

 

 

I painted it, distressed it, banged it up with a hammer, scratched it with a screwdriver and VIOLA......I love how it turned out and how much different our bed looks with a headboard!!  Now I just need to find something perfect to go above it and some cute new pillows to pull in the orange!!!  :)

 

Pinterest Project #2 -

I've always loved the canvas look!  And I am OBSESSED with hanging pictures in my house!  I think there is a picture hanging in every nook and cranny of the house!  And since we just got our family pics done, this was the PERFECT project for me to be able to display all the cute pics that I love and want all over the place!!  

This project was so fun and pretty easy to do!  I bought some wood pieces at Home Depot....Jeremiah cut them to 12 x12....I painted the sides of them a turqoise blue color (that matches an accent wall in my family room)....ordered 12 x 12 prints at Costco for only $2.99 each.....mod podged them on and TA DA!!!!  :)

Pinterest Project #3-

Nothing too impressive with this one....just used a dead area in the hallway where we enter the house from the garage to make a little area with a calendar, cork board and some hooks for the kids to hang backpacks!  I bought these wood pieces at Home Depot, painted them and put the hooks on.

 

Pinterest Project #4-

Chore Charts for the kids!  This was fun too!  To make the magnets, I printed out certain chores with a certain dollar amount for each chore (like 25 cents, 50 cents, etc) on the computer, then I bought little glass round pieces (can't remember what they are called) and round magnets.  I mod podged the paper to the glass piece, glued the magnet on the back and the magnets were ready!

 

Then I bought a frame at Michaels and 8x12 pieces of metal from Home Depot.  I took the glass out of the frame and put the metal then a piece of scrapbook paper in front of the metal and that was it......the magets stick perfectly and the kids are so amazed at the "magic" of this project!!  :)  And they are SUPER eager to do chores now just because of the fun way it is presented to them!  Yay!!

 

That's it for Pinterest projects!  I am really not sure when the heck I had the time to do all that in the last month!  This little monkey keeps me pretty busy these days!  He's a major Mama's boy and wants me to hold him all day long.....or he screams to let me know he is pissed!!  :-/ 

It's a good thing he's a cutie pie!!  And I am in love with his little teeth!  He has 3 on top now and 2 on bottom!  I CANNOT believe that in 2 weeks, he is going to be a ONE YEAR OLD!!!  That means I have exactly 2 weeks to get him walking.....I will not allow him to turn 1 without being a walker!!!  :)  (And just because I just said that out loud, I know he will not be walking by his birthday)!!  :(

I LOVE going to Ayden's class to help out every week....I love looking on the walls when I am there to find all of Ayden's work!  It's so fun to see his writing assignments that change each week!  Last week he wrote all about his Puppi!  And this week it was about his favorite games!  I read a bunch of the other kids and I was so happy that Ayden was the only kid that didn't list a video game as one of his favorite games......poor kid is deprived I guess!!!  :)

This cracked me up the other day when we were grocery shopping!  This is how I get my grocery shopping done with all 3 kids!  First, we go to the aisle that has magazines and books.  Ayden and Zoey both pick a book and read it as I shop!  I'm usually repeating "walk and read....walk and read" up and down the aisles as I try to warn them before they bump into anything!  This keeps them quite busy and I love it.....

 

And then we head over to the milk....and I just put a couple gallons of milk next to this little guy and he is a happy camper....double fisting his milk!!  :)

 

Jeremiah was super excited about the space shuttle flying over!  He wanted me to come pick him up at work on Friday morning and go to Disneyland since it was flying over there.  I wasn't interested!  He then found out it was gonna be flying close to his work, so he got on the roof of his building and it literally went DIRECTLY over his head....he took this pic....and he might have talked about it for at least 3 hours afterwards (yeah, that is the nerd I am married to)!!  ;-)

 

 

We were on our way home on Saturday evening and the sky was SO PRETTY!!  These pics don't do it justice, but it was so pink and orange and amazing!!  I love the pretty sky with the palm trees lining the streets!!  Gotta love Cali (although we are SO SICK of the heat....enough already....it is making me and everyone else in this household grumpy)!!!!

 

 

And last, but not least, I love being married to a Master Chef!  It's so nice having a hubby that likes to cook and always wants to try new recipes!!  I only wish he could cook during the week for us!  But I definitely take advantage of it on the weekends!!  Tonight he made some yummy Sweet Potato Gnocchi!!  Mmmm!!  It was so delicious!!  And he likes to dress for the occassion too (haha....still in his church clothes)!!  :)

So yummy!!  Gnocchi and salad!!  Mmmm!!



{oVerScheDulEd}

I'm not sure why I feel the need to post this today......maybe so that in 20 - 30 years when my kids are having kids, I can show them all I did for them when they were young.  Or maybe it's so that I can pull this post up the next time someone is whining and complaining that they are SO bored and that I NEVER let them do anything!  Either way.....I think my point will be proven!  Here was our day today.....

 

7:20 to 8 am - Walk Ayden to school

9 am - Take Zoey to her friend Annie's house for a playdate

11 am - Zoey goes to school with friend Annie

11:15 am - Take Maddix to my friend Lori's so I can help in Ayden's classroom

11:30 to 12:30 pm - Help in Ayden's classroom

12:45 pm - Pick up Maddix

2 pm - Pick Zoey up from school

2 pm - Ayden goes from school to his friend's house for a playdate

2:45 pm - Take Zoey to her friend London's house for a playdate (#2 if you are keeping track)

4 pm - Zoey and her friend London come to our house to play cuz they got bored at her house

4:25 pm - Take London home

4:30 pm - Pick up Ayden at his friend's house

4:45 pm - Take Ayden to piano lessons

5:15 pm - Pick up Ayden at piano lessons

5:30 pm - Take Ayden to soccer

6:45 pm - Soccer ends and pick up McDonald's dinner for kids

7 pm - Home.....homework to finish, kids to bathe, stories to read, kiddies to tuck in (thank goodness there was a daddy here to hand them off to!!  It is days like this that I am so thankful that I have a partner in crime....can't even imagine being a single mom on days like this)!

 

Seriously.....I was a taxi cab driver today.  Whoever said that being a "stay at home" mom was an easy job obviously never did it.  This is way harder than any 9-5 job I've ever worked, even harder than my teaching jobs where I was responsible for 30 kids every day of the week, and so much harder than my job as a "college student"!  Oh.....those were the days!  The days when I THOUGHT things were hard!  If I only knew then what I know now!  And I am sure in 10 years, when I am dealing with teenagers, I will look back on these little "taxi cab/overscheduled" days and say "if I only knew then what I know now" and will realize that life "back then" really wasn't all that hard!

 

Anyway, now that I have the chance to look back on our day, this is one of those "not so proud" Mommy moments when I realize I may have overloaded my kids today!  Perhaps I could (and should) say "no" to one or more of those activities.....playdates with friends, piano lessons, soccer teams, helping in the classrooms, etc.  But then I think back to what I dreamed about "Mommyhood" being and it really did look like this.....maybe not ALL of it in one day, but I always wanted to be a soccer mom, couldn't wait for my kids to take (piano) lessons, lived for the day that it would FINALLY be MY TURN to go into the classroom as a MOMMY (and not a teacher) and help for one hour, and who doesn't want their kids to have 3 different friends in the same day as them over for a playdate?!?!?  So.....I will suck it up!  And count my blessing!  And although that "40 hour work week" job was a walk in the park compared to the  24/7 job I currently have as Mommy.....I must keep reminding myself that this is EXACTLY what I want to be doing and there is no way I would give it all up to be away from our home.  I signed up for this.  I love this (especially at the end of the day when all the littles are tucked in bed fast asleep).  I live this.

 

With that being said, as I sit here exhausted, irritable, grumpy and a little impatient.....I think I need to learn to say "no" to things and realize that "more" is not always "better"!

{PiaNo mAn and A rEadEr}

Ayden started piano lessons last week!!  He has been so excited for about a year to take piano lessons and he FINALLY got to start this week!!  I am so excited too!  He is just beginning, so it is no fun yet, but I love the sound of the piano throughout my house, so I hope (and hope and hope) that one day someone will be playing some pretty cool songs on there!

 

I totally remember piano lessons when I was Ayden's age....and I love that I practiced on this very same piano that is in our house today....does that make it an antique?!?!!  I remember my piano teachers name and I could probabaly spot her in a crowd if I were to run into her (and only if she still looked the same as she did 20 plus years ago)!  My favorite part was getting a sticker after every lesson!  My least favorite part was practicing!  For now, Ayden is loving it all!  I know there will come a day when he doesn't want to practice or maybe even play anymore.  But I will try to keep encouraging him because that is one of my hugest regrets....quitting piano....and I would give anything to be able to play today!  Hey, maybe I need to take lessons along side him!!  ;-)

 

And now that I have kids of my own, I am not surprised at all why I always wanted to do what my brother did.  I think the 2nd and 3rd kids just get exposed to whatever the oldest does and eventually they will follow in their footsteps!  :)  Zoey and Maddix love to hear Ayden practicing the piano!

We have found a favorite treat for Maddix!  When we were getting Jamba Juice the other day, they asked if Maddix could hold a cup and they put a smoothie into the cutest smallest cup and put the cutest smallest straw in there!  And he is in heaven drinking it!!  :)



 

In Maddix news, he is STILL not walking!  And I am losing my patience!!  I am ready for him to be done crawling....since this is what his legs look like!!  Maybe I just need to clean my floor better!?!?!?  :-/

 

 

Zoey has started to read!  Starting a couple weeks ago, she started bringing home reading books from her preschool and she is an obsessed reader!  She opens the book the minute we get home from school and pretty much reads each book 100 times before going back to school to read it for her teacher, pick something out of the treasure chest and pick a new book!  She is on her 4th or 5th book now and is ready so well!  It is so nice and refreshing to have her interested in reading because it's almost like pulling teeth to get Ayden to read!  I remember from my teaching days that girls were definitely more interested in reading the boys.....so hopefully Ayden will learn a few things from Zoey and like it as much!  :)

 

Here is a video of Zoey reading a book to us!  And in typical Zoey fashion, she had to read it when it was HER idea and when SHE wanted to read it!  And don't mind the "bum bum" problem that Ayden announced in the middle of the video that forced him to rush off to the bathroom!!  :-/  Oh the joys of boys!!!!  :)

 

{sOccEr sTudS}

Saturday was a big day!!  First day of soccer games for not just Ayden, but Zoey too!!!  They were both so excited about their games!!  We are officially committing our Saturdays to soccer....we spent all morning on the field (from 8 am to noon) watching games!  With 2 kids in soccer now and a baby in the stroller, I am officially considering myself a true "soccer mom"!  And I like that title....soccer is so fun to me and I really hope that at least one of my kids keeps with the sport as they get older!! :)

 

 

We were hesitant about signing Ayden up for soccer this year and were so closer to putting him in winter baseball instead!  This is his 3rd year playing soccer and the first 2 years, he was pretty clueless!  I am so glad we tried again because this year is totally different!  We are seeing a different side to him....he pays attention to the coach, he actually tried in the game and I think he really "gets" the sport now!  It's such a nice change!  Jeremiah and I both said we really enjoyed the game on Saturday!  It's nice to hear the coach yell, "pass the ball to Ayden".....instead of "Ayden, pass the ball"!  HA!  He scored 2 goals on Saturday and was the only one to score on his team!  It was so exciting to see the excitement in his face after he scored....I might have gotten a little teary eyed under my sunglasses after the first one because I was so proud!  This was his 1st goal EVER.....he only scored 1 time in the previous 2 seasons.....and that was in the other team's goal!  :-/  So we were all happy for him!  I hope it wasn't a fluke and that he plays just as well next week!!

 

It was hot and he was sweaty!!!!

 

 

Gooooooooo #11................

 

This was his 1st goal of the game in action.....

 

 

He shoots.....

 

And by the look of his face, you can tell.......HE SCORED!!!!!!

 

Goal #2......

 

 

He shoots.....

 

And once again....that look on his face says it all!!  Priceless!!  Oh how I wish I had those 2 goals on video!!  Hopefully there will be a "next time" for me to get a video!

 

 

 

The hardest part of the whole day was keeping this little monkey occupied.....

 

Time for a water break.....

 

Thank goodness for cell phones to keep babies entertained......

 

 

....and big sisters to play tug-of-war with....

 

I swear it will be easier when he is walking....am I kidding myself?!?!!?

 

Zoey has been watching Ayden play sports for years!!  It was finally her turn and she was SO EXCITED!!  When she got her uniform, she slept in it the first night!  :)  We always wondered how Zoey would do at things like this cuz she is more shy, doesn't like new things and hasn't proven to be the most "coordinated" or "athletic" one in our family!!

 

We were all pleasantly surprised!!  She had a couple little fits and "I caaaaaaan't do it" here and there, but not bad for our little firecracker!!

 

I just think she looks so stinking cute!  I'm not sure if it's her cute little puffy ponytail, her matching headband or just seeing her as an "athlete" instead of the normal dainty and elegant princess that she usually looks like!  HA!

 

There were a couple times that she looked like she was trying to dry her fingernails when she ran, but for the most part, we were surprised that she could actually run!  That may sound funny, but there was a time when she ran kind of silly and we wondered if she would ever play a sport!  HA!

 

Good girl Zoey Grace!!  We are so proud of you and can't wait for you to score your 1st goal!!!  :)

{raNdoM - nEsS}

Zoey came downstairs dressed in this little getup the other day and as I looked at her, I couldn't help but wondering where on earth my little baby girl went!  She has changed so much this year and is getting so tall!!  Her legs look so long in this picture and it's sad (and exciting at the same time) to see my little girl growing up!!

 

 

I'm so lucky to have a hubby that is a good sport and willling to be my hairdresser when I need my hair done and want to save $100!!  I said bye-bye to blonde again and am enjoying the darker look for fall.....now if it would only "feel" like fall, I would be super happy!  :)

 

 

Ayden has had a cough for about a month...ever since school started!  I think it is an allergy thing!  On Tuesday, he started getting really bad and was wheezing a lot and I could see his chest retracting and his breathing seemed labored......so after we put him to bed at 8 pm and realized his coughing was so bad there was no way any of us would've slept that night, Jeremiah took him into urgent care and he had to do breathing treatments in the office before he could come home.  When we were awaken by Ayden coughing REALLY bad at 1 am, I ended up at Walgreens filling a prescription for an inhaler in the middle of the night while Jeremiah put him in a steamy shower to help him breathe!  The whole breathing sicknesses are super scary to me!  We are wondering if this is an asthma thing....I guess I need to do some research on asthma!!

 

He had to stay home from school on Wednesday and laid on the couch literally from 7 am - 1 pm.....his little buddy, Maddix, stayed right by his side!!  :)

Poor guy!!  So glad he is all better now!!  :)

We are REALLY tired of this extreme heat wave we've been having that has lasted over a month!  Ugh!  It is disgusting!!  It is September and feels like Arizona in July!!!  :(  I am ready for fall and for the leaves to change colors and for it to get dark earlier and for soups for dinner and football games!  Most of all, I am just excited for some cooler air and to get to start wearing jeans again!

 

But in the meantime, we are trying to beat the heat whatever way we can!!  And if that means otter pops......

 

.....and swimming.....then that is what you will find us doing until we can wear our jeans and eat our soups!!  :)