the fashion diva

princess grace was able to be in a little fashion show at a local store.
it was so fun!
she got to choose her outfit (which were offered at a discounted price afterwards), walk the catwalk, and be the fashion diva that we all knew she was.
here are the pictures that the store took.
i think they captured her little, or not so little, personality just....right....

garage

when the hubsters came home during lunch on friday we ended up cleaning out the car a bit. (i'ts amazing what two boys who spend very little time in a car can do). while he was wiping out the cup holders and windexing everything in the back seat i was wandering aimlessly in the garage.
me wandering is a bad thing.
i spotted a can of spray paint.....a very bad thing.
you should know by now i need an spray paint intervention. even the 10 year old neighbor asks me what i am going to paint today.
because i started this project on a whim i did not get a before picture, but here is what i did:

this door was some bizarre, maybe not even primed pinkish greige color. i used real paint for the door. i see a greige? door and i want it painted black. i finally have A door painted black. the front door color is mandated by the HOA. it's purple.....i can live with that :)

the spray paint was used to spray the risers white. i did 2-3 coats of satin white. i then used my black outdoor satin paint that i used for the door to paint the treads. i then sprayed the treads after they dried with a sealant. i loved the stairs. the white is too white, but i like it. now this is a garage done at the last minute, so i did not even sand, fill or take time. it's for fun.
the white was a bit too much so i painted return with honor on the risers.

you likey?
i'm not quite ready to do all the stairs in the house yet, but it's a great trial run!
(oh and really the door is in horrible, horrible shape. let's just say there's duct tape on the door as well as massive dents, and the previous owner painted a ten foot span of the garage blue. i'ts weird, but that project is WAAAAAAYYYY low on the list)

family rules

i'm on pinterest, and i tell you it's like craft crack.....totally addicting. the hubsters honey-do list has tripled in 3 weeks, conveniently while he was gone. after finding so many cute ideas, i found one that i liked. family rules, subway style. so i made my own.
clearly, everyone's "rules" are different ;)

bowling with the smith's

my kids love bowling, however you wouldn't know it hearing how much whining was going on, but nonetheless i braved the whines and went bowling. bowling with friends is a thousand times better than bowling alone. dont think anyone broke 100, but.....a fun time had by all!

scouts can be dangerous

tonight in scouts the hubsters taught jp and my 7 other scouts to do several knots. let's hope that he puts them to good use.

please note this was actually before he learned to tie the "real" knots. let's hope princess grace is a fast runner.


"today i am thankful for lego's"

Fall

i love fall time in virgina. it makes me happy. cooler weather, warm blankets and the smell of the air. that combination of dying leaves and cold air. divine! the best sounds of fall? the three cutest kids in the world playing fiercely in a pile of freshly raked leaves. that is childhood to me. raking leaves into piles to slide, jump, fall or push friends into. Love the fall!

"today i am grateful for friends that save my behind some days"

never give up

my sister, we'll call her myrtle budge, has a blog about her family life called, never give up. it's a family motto of sorts.
as mentioned in a previous post this sister and her family are hanging out with those of us living on the right coast, so we get to spend plenty of quality time together. our family is loving it. our activity of choice is the pool.
on myrtle's cleaning day, i got to hang out at the pool with the 2 kids who had done their chores, we'll call them megs and soul man. soul man and megs decided to jump off the diving board. soul man has a little daredevil streak and was doing flips, epic cannon balls and jack-knives. megs is way more cautious and generally does a basic jump off the board. well, with chanting and cheering from the peanut gallery, megs started to try and do a dive. she was not necessarily successful in a perfect dive, but what she was successful in doing was impressing me.
she continued to try to dive for 30 minutes. get up on the board, hearing words of advice from me and from a random girl, who apparently was a diver. she kept trying. she even got a bloody nose, wiped it off and kept right on trying.
she never did execute a dive worthy of greg louganis, but she managed to show that you never give up, and that sometimes children do listen to what you say.

never give up!

more july 4th fun

after james's baptism we had dinner and fun at the parent's house. we celebrated hammy's 1st birthday with cake and fireworks. it is so much fun to have more family around. the more the merrier!

the whole nation celebrates this boy's birthday. how lucky!

sol getting crazy with sparklers.

i had to post a picture of a pants-less princess grace. on the way to james's baptism she spilled chocolate milk all over her dress. she walked around the church skirt/dress-less until grandma could bring a beautiful fancy "spinny" dress she could wear. the "spinny-dress" was not firework safe :)

things i dont want to forget

many things in life go fast. time, the fastest of them all. i love to keep track of some of the things my kids do that are funny by writing them in a little notebook, or in a file in my email box. it's a great reminder of the cute, or not so cute, things my kids say. here's a quick sampling:

jp - as an 8 year old, jp's humor is developing quite rapidly. however his joke telling prowess is not quite there yet. here's a recently told joke. "why did the chicken cross the road" "he wanted food on the other side" some jokes are better than others.....obviously.

baby e - jp burped and baby e turned to him and said "nice one! how'd it taste? jp responds "not bad. kind of like orange soda" baby e responds "cool. could be worse"
where do they come up with this stuff?

princess grace - she calls skirts - girks, when she wants to smell something at the store she will ask "mommy can i hmmmm that?" clearly everytime we smell something we say hmmmmm.

seriously

how could i leave this?

or this.....

or this......?

trust me. it was not easy. i vow to return very quickly.

anyone want to join me?

riverbend

gma and papa took us all to riverbend park to see the bluebells. the bluebells were beautiful, but the walk and river view were even moreso. we did not do the full 2.5 mile walk, but enough that princess grace saw "whales" and "sharks". we saw a tree that had been gnawed on by beavers, tracks left by birds and other wildlife, and tons of little seashells that made their way home to be counted over and over again.




if you ever doubt the power of disney, this is a picture of princess grace standing over the frog pond for 20 minutes telling the frog to "come here, frog and let me kiss you" "i be a princess!!".

the princess

this is what my day consists of: princess grace dressing up as a princess. so much fun! part of her bday presents were princess dress-ups, frilly jammie jams, princess barbies, a princess oven, princess crown and another princess tea set. we are princess decked out here!

we even got baby red wood in on the act.

red wood!

those of you looking at this picture totally know where it was taken......don't blame me. it's princess grace's fault!

we've been hanging out with this darling baby this week. it's so much fun! especially cause i don't have to get up at night with her. look at that awesome red hair!

oh....her mom's pretty cute too :)

reason 1990283 i love my kids

tonight during prayer baby e prayed that he could make it to the gate and get as far as mommy has gotten.

confused?

cute though right......

except

it's about a wii game people! he wants to pass a level (or a gate) in my sims:kingdom.

what have i done?

more gone

i totally needed an excuse to post this picture. classic jp!
he lost his second upper tooth at school. he was brave enough to pull it out himself. he tried to stick it back in later, but that's beside the point. what a cutie, huh? :)

rip my love

my poor phone died an uneventful death. we've had a long history together...well 3 years is a long time technology wise. i could have gotten a new phone anytime, but i love her.
she stopped ringing last month. i still held hope that i didn't need the phone to ring.
enter monday morning. early release for school. me shopping forgetting it was early release monday.
baby e sat in the school office for 45 minutes waiting for me to get there, all because i never heard my phone ring.
it took him 30 seconds to get over it. he looked at me and said "now can we go rent the wii game from blockbuster". love this kid. we got 2 video games for him and my new phone is on the way!

my favorite christmas letter

we all get lovely heartwarming christmas cards from friends and loved ones, dont we? well my favorite one happens to be from a fabulous seven year old boy to santa on christmas eve night.
it reads:

dear santa.
i beleave in you. please dont wake jack he will ruin your suit. please give us good presents!
signiture_____________


santa did oblige and initialed his note and stayed away from jack, the dog, to avoid any doggy drool on his expensive suit.
btw - did you know santa prefers silk?

their tree

i'm sort of a mean mom. my kids are not allowed to decorate my christmas tree. so in order to create harmony in our home they have their own tree. i do think that this is the last year we will be able to have a small tree.

every year the kids get to pick out a new ornament from the store. we have an ornament for every child for each year of their life. it's a fun tradition, started by accident. don't you love those kinds of traditions! i will post pictures of this years picks later.

howdy there pilgrim

Somehow i was volunteered to be class room parent for baby e's kindergarten class without my knowledge. it's not something i would typically do, however there are perks to the job. i get to go to all the in-class functions. this week they had a special snack, which consisted of me popping 12 bags of popcorn. easy enough. any effort is worth it for this cute litle boy with teacup ears!