Three Projects...

i recently finished three "around the house" projects...and i am so glad to have them done:)

meet our shoe basket, it didn't used to have a liner, but i measured out the interior dimensions and sewed one up in the course of a couple of old school Care Bears episodes.

much better! now maybe we won't get mounds of sand on our tile:)

the next project i was super excited about because we finally took down our horrid vertical blinds (sorry no before picture) but you know the kind right? long, attached at the top and they get stuck all the time or come off all the time when your 2.5 year old pretends they are roads for his cars...and the plastic or vinyl they are made out of would break all the time at the place they were connected at the top...annoying!

so i went to a "no sale garage sale" swap kind of deal a while ago, and found a LONG curtain rod, with some brackets and thought, "that is ideal for our sliding door problem!" and then it sat in the garage for a while.  Then i bought a drop cloth with intents to make it into the curtains...it was too small.   Then a couple of weeks later i bought another drop cloth...bigger this time.  Then i looked around for ideas for a couple of weeks (you can see how this process was very long right?) anyway, long story short (too late Jen!) i decided on trying out this method of making a zig zag pattern, or chevron, using squares instead of piecing triangles together, which sounded like more work than i wanted to do:)  

i tried out this method really with the intent to make a baby quilt for baby girl who is due in November, but this was a good way to get a feel for the process and see if i liked it.  Turns out i like it a lot in small doses, but i don't think i want to do a whole quilt of it...another reason i'm not a quilter..i digress...

but i couldn't decide on a specific color scheme, so i decided to go with all colors, in a kind of color blocking/ ombre kind of effect...i don't know if it actually gives that effect, but i do like it A LOT!

yay for curtains!

the third project, was something i really needed! being pregnant and having some vein issues in one leg, gave rise to the idea that i NEEDED an ottoman when i sit on the couch.  NEED!  so i looked and looked for a table to make into an ottoman...cause i am cheap and felt like i wanted to make one instead of buy one for upwards of $150 for the size i wanted.

so i found this table at Goodwill for $30. It's BIG:)

getting ready to paint, i used a plastic table cloth for my drop cloth...at this point i got attacked by ANTS, so no more pictures of the paint process! sorry, but i will say i didn't prime (GASP) this time, because i wanted to sand it and have wood show through at the end. I sprayed it on (much to the kids' frustration, they wanted to help), Krylon Navy color spray paint.

i stenciled the smaller drop cloth with doilies, what looks like brown is actually gold, it's sparkly:)

there's Avery...gives you some size reference.  ***EDIT/ADDED: the table is topped with a 3 inch thick piece of foam from Joann's, which i got when their foam was on sale a week or so ago.  The fabric is staple gunned onto the table, around the foam.

distressed legs...

AHHHHH....so nice to be able to put my feet up! I love it!!!!

total cost: table $30, drop cloth $15 (i think), paint $4, foam (on sale) $30ish, sandpaper and paint i already had....so for about $80 i have an ottoman!!! yahooo!!!

Today is Christian's Birthday...

Christian Hartley Wilson was born a year ago today, he weighed 7lbs. 9 oz. and was absolutely perfect!!!  We remember today as a very happy day when he entered our family, and blessed us with his sweet, loving spirit.  He had "old-soul" eyes...we recognized that pretty early on...and we found out, he was a very patient little guy as well.

the spirit in our home while he was with us, really was different.  It is hard to describe, but it was very sweet and peaceful, even when things got stressful with his being in the hospital etc.

Today our little family is one member short, but we feel his spirit with us.  We visited his memorial marker today, with new flowers, a birthday balloon, and pinwheels to make it festive:)  

We also ate cupcakes (thanks Doti for making them!) in honor of his first birthday.

We are very thankful that Christian came to our family, if just for a short time on Earth. We know that we will be together with him again.

Happy Birthday, we love you sweet Christian...and we miss you very much.

Miss A turns 5!!!

this is our Avery. She turned 5 today (aug 12th).  Amazing to think that it's already been five years since she arrived in our family.  She is dynamic and lovely, smart and friendly.  She loves art; painting, drawing, stamping, coloring...anything like that. She is opinionated and sassy at times, but always very loving.  She LOVES babies, she LOVES her brothers, even though she'll tell you sometimes they annoy her:)  Avery LOVES to wear skirts, she REALLY LOVES chocolate...she ADORES her daddy, and she likes her mom okay too;)

we love having her in our family.  she is a spot of sunshine and a stinker, all rolled into one:) happy birthday my love!

Happy Birthday and Tom Sawyer...

Today is Kendall's Birthday!!!! He's 31...and so AWESOME!  he's a great dad, a fantastic husband, he works really hard for our family and is good at pretty much everything:)  We love him SO much and hope that he is having a GREAT birthday (even though he has to work;( but we made him a special breakfast, gave him presents and i'm taking him out tonight...then a family party on Sunday, which is actually Avery's birthday:)  we have to do joint family parties for them...two birthdays in 5 days just requires it!!!

so happy birthday to the BEST guy i know:) love you honey!!!


today we had a Tom Sawyer experience...have you read the classic by Mark Twain? There is a part in it where Tom has to whitewash the fence and he convinces other kids in the neighborhood to help him, without them really realizing it, he just proposes it as something fun or that he only wants to do because it's so fun and they end up begging to help....

i digress...

I had some fun patriotic decorations up (until this morning) (no comments on how long they were up:)) and this was one grouping of them...see the beans in the jars???

so i was taking everything down and i thought it would be good to separate out all the beans into colors and put them away separated so if i wanted to use them for something else, they'd already be color separated...so i proposed it to the kids as a project for them (and me:) to do together and a way they could "help mommy" and they thought it was awesome! they got right to work and were awesome at it!!!  we had three bowls to put the colors in and they did almost the entire large bowl of mixed beans (i helped some:))!!! 

i was very impressed with them, they were really good helpers (i already knew they were but this was kind of tedious and they didn't complain at all:))

good lessons learned from Tom Sawyer:)

first day of school...almost 2 weeks later...

ethan started school July 19...so two weeks later, i figure is a good time to post pics:)

big first grader...good example of the LARGE gap in his mouth from those two front teeth that are missing:)  

sibling shot:)  they sure love ethan, as do we all.  what a sweet 7 year old boy he is.  opinionated, passionate, stubborn, thoughtful, sweet, loving, cuddly, smart and curious.  he loves to learn, and really enjoys school, we are proud of him and love him to pieces...just like those two jokers next to him:)  

sweet little people