A Great Find

I really wanted a changing table, but I didn't want to spend the money and I wanted it to have drawers. I did a lot of garage sale and craigslist shopping and finally found this little gem. Not bad for 10 bucks?

Before.....

It needed lots of sanding.

Primer and more sanding. Then, painting. (Papa put some elbow grease into it too.)

And.........


Here you have it!

Don't you love it? I sure do. Can't wait to change a little newborn bum on here :)

I should mention that I won't get to use this for Madisyn. We are officially potty training right now. It's been two days and that is a whole other post to come.

Here's the before and after. Oh and the white handles came on it originally. Didn't even have to buy those. I'd say our repurposing project was a success.

There's one more project I can't wait to post about. Unfortunately the before pictures are still on David's phone. It's all coming soon though.

Pretty much all of our furniture was purchased on craigslist or a garage sale. Watch for a post with all the great things we got.

Special treatment

My sweet girl has had a fever of over 102 for the past 4 days.

Did I mention that it's been over 90 degrees here in WA this week.

102 body temp + 90 temp outside = one miserable girl

Not to mention, one worried, worn out mother and father.

She still has her fever. I'm just glad to say that the weather man predicts that next week is going to be in the high 70s. Perfect!

So, Madisyn has been getting a lot of special treatment lately. Those droopy tear filled eyes make mommy and daddy say yes to things that would normally be out of the question.

Tonight was no exception. See for yourself.

Yes. She's eating dinner upstairs in front of the TV. Odd...

....but she was a happy girl and those moments were too few and far between today.

Oh and one more thing.

I may have gotten some unexpected special treatment today too....

David may have placed the winning bid on eBay for one of these babies.

Oh wow. I can't even begin to say how excited I am to get this in the mail!

I am a little sad though. I don't want to say goodbye to my D60. It's been a wonderful camera. Hopefully it will find a new home with a lucky eBay bidder who appreciates it as much as I have. It's given me some beautiful photos and I learned everything I know on it.

I am ready to move on to a more "grown up" photographer's camera. After all, I did just order my first business cards. It's time for a professional camera to go with them.

Creating

I love looking at craft blogs. There are so many wonderful ideas out there.

I am finding that I have a ever growing list of things I want to make or repurpose. So, I started with something simple and much needed.

I have a bunch of ribbon. Why not put it to good use?

Aren't they cute?!

All you need is:

. ribbon

. buttons (or something for the center if you wish)

. a needle and thread

. a hot glue gun (to secure the embellishment in the middle)

. a lighter/matches (to keep the ends of the ribbon from fraying)

Here's a video tutorial . You only need to watch the first 3:30 minutes to make the flower.

You pretty much just do a simple running stitch along the very edge of one side of the ribbon and pull the thread tight to gather your flower. Then, you tie it off. There's not really much more to it. You can get creative with how you decorate the outside or the center. The sky is the limits with this one really. That's what I love about it.

You could attach them to a purse or shirt (anything really). I just attached them to clips for Madi's hair. I really needed some smaller bows/flowers for her hair and these are perfect!!

Happy creating :)

A shiny red trike!

...for Madi!

Madi's great grandma Jeanne contributed to the fund and we finally went to pick it up a week ago. THANKS GRANDMA!!

She loves it! In fact for the first few days we had some tears shed over Madi having to come to the table to eat with us instead of sitting on her new "BIKE!" (that's she sounds every time she says it)

Getting ready for the assembly with daddy.

She is quite the handy little girl :)

Vuala! Here you have it.

Taking it for a a test drive. vroooom!

My favorite feature is the wood panel on the back.

Something tells me she will be giving her little brother or sister (we find out this Monday!!!) lots of rides.

She's not too sure about how this whole pedal thing works quite yet.

So cute! Oh and her favorite part about the bike is the bell. Can't get enough of that!

Daddy showing her how to fly on her trike.

Something tells me she'll never quite master this one on her own.

If only it wasn't blustery and raining today we could go get some use out of it. Looking forward to the summer!!

Frozen....

GRAPES!

I just have to start out by saying that I like things cold...and when I say cold I mean REALLY cold. Ice water is the most satisfying thing any time of the year. Now, if I'm having hot apple cider or hot chocolate, I'm not going to put ice in it. If it's hot I like it really hot and if it's cold, I like it freezing cold!

With that said, one of my favorite snacks are grapes. I love red grapes when they are really hard. No squish to them whatsoever. The only problem is, they're kind of pricy right now and they only stay hard for a day or so after I bring them home. I just don't enjoy a soft grape.

2 days ago, I had a brilliant idea. Why not take them off the vine, wash them, put them in a ziplock and freeze them?

They have become one of my favorite treats! As soon as you put them in your mouth they thaw, pretty much instantly. They stay firm for a whole lot longer, and they satisfy my craving for something sweet and delicious!

Thank you frozen grapes. I think I will keep you around for a while :)

I know, I'm a little weird.

Back In Action

If you're not progressing, then you're regressing. This is a simple principle that I know all too well. Lately I've been pretty idol. I think I just got stuck in my "stay at home all day " rut. Madi and I play and we have a great time, but sometimes I just don't know what to do to spice things up. Or, even worse if I know what to do, I just don't actually do it. Sheesh!

So, the other day (Madi's sick day) I put Madisyn down for her nap around noon. She had already been asleep for about 1 1/2 hours. So, I figured she'd be waking up soon. I was about to grab the remote and find some meaningless show to watch, but then I thought (ok this is going to sound funny) why don't I read Twilight? Reading is much better than watching TV and I need to do it more...ok A LOT more. I've been told several times by several people to just read the first chapter and I won't be able to put it down. No, I haven't read Twilight! Don't judge me! haha :) Anyways, I went to ask my sis in law where the book was and she said to look downstairs in a big wooden cabinet. I made my way downstairs and opened the doors of the cabinet where I expected to find the book, pick it up and get lost in the world of vampires and werewolves. I didn't see what I was looking for, but this bright red book jumped out at me....

I've had a few impressions to pick this book up in the past, but I never followed through. I just figured I should probably just read the scriptures and skip the extra stuff. Nevertheless, I picked it up and started reading. Madi slept for another hour or so, which gave me plenty of time to read. I love this book! It gives me that extra kick in the pants that I need to make progression in my life. How could getting to know my Savior better not make me want to be more like Him? Alright, so now I found the motivation I needed to continue my spiritual progression. *pat on the back*

So, onto the next thing which probably seems totally random, but for me it's all connected. I'm not making any progression as far as exercise goes either. Therefore I'm regressing, which means inches are being added in places I don't want! My lack of physical activity is starting to catch up with me! I used to go walking with my girls (I miss that SOOOO much) at least 4 times a week as well as doing my work out video every other day, for the most part. Even when I was just walking, I didn't realize how much it was helping me stay in shape. It's so important to be healthy and I've never been a workout nut or anything. I just feel so much better when I'm doing SOMETHING most days of the week. As winter is soon approaching, the cold weather is keeping Madi and I inside most days (mostly by choice). I just need to be motivated and I think I have a way to do it. Starting is the hardest part for me. So, I had David dig through our dvds (which are in the garage for now) to grab my trusty Turbo Jam video. Can't wait to be back in shape and I'm sure Madi will appreciate having her energetic mommy back! When I don't exercise, I am the biggest lolly gagger all day long. I'm getting out of my rut! Starting tomorrow morning, I'll be jammin and getting healthy again.

Here's to progressing!!!

Nail Polish & Carpet....

....don't mix!

So....today Madi and I were having so much fun just hanging out at home. I got the bright idea to paint Madisyn's toenials and fingernails. I got out a towel and put it under her feet to protect the carpet of course. We got all ten toenails and five of her fingernails all sparkly pink. Then something HORRIBLE happened! The bottle of polish tipped over and missed the towel. OH NO! In my panic I ran to the computer and searched "how to remove nail polish from carpet". The first thing that stood out was to keep it wet. So, I poured water over it and started dabbing. I ran back to the computer and kept reading. After using just about every suggestion on there the stain was 90% gone. That's good, but not good enough. I put Madi down for her nap (poor thing was so confused why mommy was all of a sudden all flustered and was probably wondering why she still had five fingernails unpainted). Never the less she went to bed. I read a few more suggestions and tried the final cleaning product which worked like a charm. WINDOW CLEANER! The windex took the rest of the stain out and you can't even tell that I had a knucklehead moment while sitting on my in-law's carpet. OH THANK YOU SEARCH ENGINE AND WINDEX! Lesson learned. Don't use nail polish while sitting on the carpet especially when it's not YOUR carpet...and if you do then use windex to get it out :)

Blog Book?

I was just informed that there is a way to print your blog as a book!!!

I am so excited because...

1. My blog has been like my journal since the week before Madi was born

2. In the back of my mind, I always worry "what if my blog were to crash?"..or something horrible like that.

3. I put a lot of time into it (a little too much at times) and I would love to know that I can look back on it years from now, even if there's no such thing as blogspot.com!

There are several options for layouts, covers, contents and you can even have the comments printed underneath each post. If you don't want to print the book, you can just buy the PDF version of your blog for 8 bucks! Pretty fun if you ask me.

Go check it out!

SharedBook

Just a few things..

While blog hopping, I came across the blog of a friend who had a link to her family photo album. I have used Picasa to share my pics, but I'm not all that happy with the lack of storage space they provide. I'm always having to delete previous albums to make room for new ones. I have found th answer! Back to the friend's blog...she uses SHUTTERFLY. I took one look at the layout and I signed up to get me one! Oh yeah it's FREE by the way. It lets you use your site as a blog, or as a photo journal. You can post pictures, videos, and many other things. I'm really loving it! So, go check it out! From now on I'm going to add any new pictures to shutterfly and not picasa. Nothing against picasa really. I'm just needing something different.

With that said...here's a look at the current goings on here in this house of ours. ENJOY!

Really the main reason for the the first 3 pictures is to brag about my Madisyn. I just love this girl so much! She is such a joy. It's been awhile since I put a big flower or bow in her hair, due to the fact that she just pulls them out about 30 seconds after I put it on her. She just looked adorable and I couldn't help but capture her cuteness in action.

The neighbors next door have more animals than a huge farm might have, but fortunately Madi can't get enough of them. She is always going to say hi to the "peeg" (pig) and the "uries" (turkeys). It totally makes her day.

Since grandma and papa's house is much bigger than our previous one, there are many more drawers, cupboards, and treasures to get into. I get this look from her just about every time I catch her in the act :) Oh my girl.

There was a dead tree in the front yard that needed to be cut down. Well, down it came and later that night David and Papa Steve turned it to ashes. It was an incredible fire.

WOW!

We went roller skating on Labor Day with the fam. It was Madi's first time and my first time in too long.

Madi had the floor all to herself once it was closing time.

David is a pro, so I held onto him for dear life!

Ok....I'm so excited! These are the things I scored at the thrift store on 1/2 off day!!! I hardly ever find things that I really like, but as you can see I didn't do so bad this time. YAY!

Oh yeah!

See that tiny little chair? It was a decoration in the game room.... Now, it is Madisyn's closest companion. She carries this thing EVERYWHERE with her. Oh precious.

If you enjoyed these, there are many more where these came from...

Go check out the new pic site!!!!

Hugs & A Seat At The Table

I just love this picture. My little love bug is so sweet and I just can't get enough of those awesome hugs she gives me. She just started actually reaching out to me and snuggling up with me when she's tired and I am loving every moment of it!

We were going to use the bumbo seat we're borrowing for Madisyn's high chair, but we splerged ($25, I'm kidding about the splurging part) and got this perfect little booster high chair. I am so glad we did, cus Madisyn loves it and it's so easy.
The night we got home from getting her highchair, David made a delicious dinner, while I fed Madisyn. The funny thing is, even though Madi has a place at the table now, it happened to be covered in papers. So, we ate on the floor :) Oh well, what can you do?