Kitchen update

I am working on the final touches--well, semi-final, to my kitchen. I am hoping to post the "after" pictures on Friday. Just to remind you, here is where we started. Actually, when we started out in the house 7 years ago, the cabinets were dark brown, the faux brick backsplash was peachyish with black faux soot marks???? and the floor was cream linoleum. I don't remember the light which means it was so bad that it was the first thing to go. The first color I painted the kitchen was red. And I painted the cabinets white. I loved the red, but with the yellow counters, it just gave me a McDonald's vibe. Then I painted the walls the ugliest shade of yellow you can imagine to match the counters. So, we are actually on our third reincarnation of the kitchen!

Controlling Car Chaos

Check out Julie's great idea over at Tattered Threads and Willing Hands. She made a little car organizer. It is such a practical, simple idea and I just LOVE it! With a summer full of baseball games coming up, we really do LIVE in our car. I am determined to be more auto-organized this year and this is going to be one of the first things I do to make that happen. I sure do love bloggers and their great ideas!

GOTCHA!

Do you know someone who is adopting from China--or really, anywhere? My friends, Angie and Jody, have a great idea for you. Check it out at Lil' Bow Peeps. And even if you aren't adopting, they have ADORABLE hair bows and accessories. I'm saying, if I had a girl.....she would have a GINORMOUS bow on her pretty little head everyday!

Key Lime Cove

As a little surprise for the boys, we went to Key Lime Cove in Gurnee yesterday. We also went to the Rainforest Cafe. I HIGHLY recommend Key Lime Cove if you are in the Chicago area. We have been to several indoor waterparks and this one was by far and away the best. It is new which is probably one of the reasons, but it is so clean and lovely. There were tons of staff to help out wherever you needed and TONS of stuff for the kids to do even when they weren't in the water. Honestly, a waterpark is wasted on Parker and Jack because they won't go down slides. We rode the lazy river 128 times. I don't actually know if it was that many, but it felt like it. Unfortunately, last night, Parker started complaining about his throat. Today, it got much worse and he actually wanted to go to the doctor. So, for the first time in his life, he has strep. He is still miserable, but hopefully the meds will kick in and take care of that. And, note to self, don't ever schedule a weekend getaway on the first weekend of the NCAA basketball tournament. Not if I want Travis to actually participate in our family activities anyway.

Banner

I know my blog banner is messed up. I'm working on it.

Good buys!

I had been wanting a mirror for my kitchen and I was going to try to wait until garage sale season but then I found this one at TJ Maxx.
It was marked down to $10 because of a crack in the frame.

I think I can put some wood putty on that and fix it right up. It's a really nice mirror with beveled glass. Well, it's not super nice seeing how it was only $15 to begin with, but I like it's bulk

These are all my deals from Hobby Lobby today. Their clearance was 90% off! That's like shopping at a garage sale! All of this together was just under $25.00 You can't really tell in the picture, but it's all pretty large-scale stuff. I think I'm most excited about the fringed pillows. I will be covering the pillow part and keeping the fringe. They were originally $50 EACH! YIPES! Of course, Hobby Lobby always has them on sale for 50% off, so you would have gotten them for $25 each. But I paid $5 for each of them. The fringe alone, would have cost me more than that. Jack insisted on buying the fleur de lis thing because, "Dr. Clark has them in his office." O.K. It is growing on me. I will likely be painting most of this stuff--definitely the red urn. I love the shape but it's too bright. It's metal so my boys can't break it!

It runs in the family

We were definitely raised with a can-do spirit. Why buy it if you can make it yourself!? There is a fabulous, and I mean FABULOUS store near my sister called Three French Hens. We made a quick visit last weekend. I would have liked to stayed longer but we had the crew with us which makes lingering very difficult. I have to add, though, that the owners of the store are very, very welcoming to children. They give them a cup of animal crackers and make you feel like it won't matter if your kid breaks something. That's very gracious of them, don't you think? Anyway, Tracy spied this flower arrangement and fell in love with everything except the price tag of $300.00 (which is actually pretty darn reasonable for an arrangement of this size) but, why buy it if you can make it!? So, she made a version that fit her table a little better. IT'S AWESOME! Don't you think!? I think she did a great job. She still spent quit a bit and that's with 1/2 off flowers and such but she did great!

Lil' Bow Peeps

If you are going to the Hearts At Home conference this weekend, be sure to look for this sign. It's the one I made for Angie and Jody. It is much cuter in person and it is HUGE--24 x 48! They started a business called Lil' Bow Peeps and they make the cutest hair bows and accessories. If I had a little girl, I would have one of their bows on her everyday!

The doctor's office

Just some random pictures of the boys playing outside on one of the only nice days we've had in the past 4 months.



-Jack had his kindergarten physical today. I forgot how very, very unpleasant that experience is for both my kid and me. Finger prick, TB test, and 3 shots. Yuck. I hate that look they give you when they are screaming in agony. It looks like, "Why are you holding me down and letting these people do this to me!?" Jack's little heart was just broken and it crushed me. I came closer to crying today at the doctor's office since the very first time Parker got a shot 7 1/2 years ago. It also made me send up a prayer of strength and comfort for all those mommy's and daddy's who have sick children who must endure this kind of event on a daily basis. On the bright side, this is the first time Jack has been to the doctor since his 3rd birthday. We are very blessed that neither of our kids has been sick (aside from an occasional cold/upset tummy) in well over a year. Trust me, I know how very blessed we are! I should add that normally I take my kids for a yearly visit to the doctor for a check-up. However, I skipped it last year with Jack because his birthday is in February which seems to be the height of cootie season and no way was I taking my healthy kid to the cootie-filled doctor office. By the way, he is in the 75th percantile in height and weight! That is just nuts! He is so skinny you can see his ribs!
-We aren't all that healthy, though, because as Parker was heading out the door for his ride to the bus stop, he said, "I think I'm going to throw up." And ran to the bathroom and did. No school for him today. He's had a little bit of a fever but other than being a little mopey, he seems fine.
-I told Jack he could buy whichever Lego he wanted at Target after the whole shot experience. Of course, he picked a big one. A big, expensive one. I cringed, but chalked it up to a sort of co-pay. He earned it, the poor little guy!
-I'm painting a big sign that will be at the Hearts At Home Conference this weekend and I'm pretty excited. Even though no one will know I painted it.
-My kitchen is almost complete and I will post pictures when it's done. It's close, I just need to make some final decisions.

Doughnutty Fun

Picture borrowed from here.

I just saw the most adorable thing at Rhoda's Southern Hospitality blog. Her guest blogger says that you always remember the plates you grew up eating on. I think that's fairly true. I actually remember serving dishes more than the plates!? But that's beside the point. Anyway, her everyday dishes have a kind of rainbow pattern around the rim and she uses them specifically because she wants her kids to remember that happy pattern. How sweet! Dang, I use plain white plates. Sorry boys. I made these little doughnuts last night too. Sooooooo easy and fun. Next time I do them I think I will make glaze instead of the cinnamon sugar. Don't get me wrong, these were great, but I want to see how a glaze works. I would also only dip one side in butter--one side is plenty! Yummy! And Parker and Jack LOVED them.

Dollar Tree Validation

This is Eddie Ross. He was on Design Star or another show like that (didn't win) and I stumbled upon his blog recently. Check it out HERE. I didn't watch the show he was on, but I did see a commercial and he appeared to be an overbearing jerk (it could have been the editing). However, anyone who is willing to shop Dollar Tree and Goodwill to outfit a beautiful table is all right with me. I was already a big believer in Dollar Tree, but it's nice to see that someone who actually knows what they are doing thinks so too!

Allstate, Jack's room and a sleepover

I love Allstate Insurance commercials. Their tag line is "that's our stand". Right now they are running one called "Back to Basics" and I love it. You can see it HERE, just click on "Back to Basics." They pull my heartstrings. However, I used to work for a personal injury attorney and one of the worst cases of insurance company abuse I've remember was committed by Allstate. We had a client who was a little old lady--about 75 years old, I believe. She was just driving along a main road one day when someone on a side road blew a stop sign and broadsided her. She broke her arm. The other driver was insured by Allstate who said that this little old lady was partially at fault so they would only be paying a portion of her car repairs and medical bills. They wanted something like a 60/40 split! Their reasoning was that in a phone interview, our client said that she didn't even see that other driver coming. Well, why would she!? The other driver was on a side road! I can't remember how that case ended but I'm pretty sure that her insurance ended up footing some of the bill--though I'm sure it wasn't the 40% that Allstate wanted. I learned a lot at that job. Some good and some bad.

Jack's room was clean for about 5 minutes before his birthday party so I took some pictures. He has informed me that he needs a big kid room now because he is 5. I don't know why he cares because he sleeps in the top bunk in Parker's room. I don't want to give up my last trace of little kid stuff! By the way, the castle poster by the bed is Jack's addition to the decor. ***edited*** Yep, this is the poster from the Eyewitness book. I'm tellin' ya', they LOVE those books!



We hosted our very first sleepover last night and it was a big success. NO bickering or fighting at all! Parker's buddy, Drew, came over and they did a great job of including Jack which was one of my concerns going into this. Drew has 2 older brothers so I think he is very sensitive to the needs of the "little brother." Whenever he is around, my own two kids don't even fight! Anyhoo, they didn't go to bed until 11:30 and now Parker is a whiny, crying brat. I wonder if he would take a nap!?