To my lobster

Happy Anniversary!   
Thank you for not giving up on me all those years ago.
Thank you for leading me through the happy and carrying me through the sad. 
You are my lobster.....and I love you.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iU39sqEQOms

kitchen 'mis'treatments

Here is my kitchen before my new mistreatments.  The grass shade was here when we moved in and we kept it because it was custom and surely expensive.  I did my time- I lived with them for 3 years.  The kids art area was getting out of control.  They are both now in school and it rarely gets used.  My kitchen was stressing me out and Lord knows I already stress enough in the kitchen.  I wanted a big change.

Once I decided on it, those babies came down and out in a heartbeat.  And then I realized that I put up bulletin boards to hide the many MAJOR holes in the walls from the previous owners.  We will be repainting and sprucing up the kitchen at a later time so the holes will have to wait.   

My mom was coming in town for a short visit and we like to work on projects.  This one would be an easy one right?  Find some fabric and hang it up on a new shiny rod.  As always, not that easy. 

In all my cheapness, I bought a skinny curtain rod and rings on sale. I put that thing up so high and wide like I have been taught that it drooped on either side and wouldn't hold one shower curtain. If I brought it in any it wouldn't hide the holes.  (I only used one support because i wanted to be able to close them all the way)

Enter the Nester, surely you have heard of her famous mistreatments. After realizing that a thicker rod wouldn't hide the holes either, I decided to try her ring on the nail head tactic so I could go all the way to the end of the wall..  And I LOVE them! 

Oh and I have to say that this fabric was definitely made for me.  I was going to go with some sort of red toile but couldn't find anything.  I've been eyeing Nester's buffalo check curtain for years and recently Carrie's too.  I found this at a fabric store that I didn't even know existed in my town in the clearance corner marked down to $8 a yard!  Also, the check fabric made cutting the fabric on a straight line SO EASY.  I didn't even hem them because when we do work on the kitchen I want to be able to have them made into curtains. 

I hung the iron thing in the middle to hide more holes!

{And now I know that my kitchen is the hardest room in the house to photograph, geez.}

I'm off to go work out so I can have more energy to work on more projects.  Mainly, art supply organization in a different location. (-:

Popo

Our family lost a great man yesterday.  Rest in Peace Popo.

Organizing the Roo's closet

  Two summers ago, while my two kids were playing with eachother, you would find Lego men playing in pony houses, and little pets in airplanes.  I would pride myself on letting them use their imaginations but I would be the one taking care of the aftermath.  They had no clue how to pick it all up and so I thought it would be no big deal to dump it all into two bins and be done with it.  But what I found is that they were just dumping and not really playing.  Fast foward to now and Roo's 'little things' bins were driving me crazy.  You see, they are now both in school and few are the days that they really have that time to just play together. When they do get that precious time, do you know what they want to play with?  All of the Little People stuff that I boxed up in a clear plastic container for storage!  Lightbulb.  The time had come for me to seperate all of her little things (with her help) and put some "away" for storage.  Maybe then the dumping would stop and she could better enjoy her things.  But I thought to myself, "I don't have cute boxes, pails and baskets"!  And then I thought, "Its a little girls' closet for crying out loud".  She'll be fine with what we have.  So this is what I did:

1.  I took EVERYTHING out of the closet.
2.  I got Roo started on sorting all of her little toys into the awesome boxes.
3.  While she was doing this, I went through her clothes.
4.  Printed picture labels from a word document because she's not quite a reader yet and slapped the on with some clear packing tape.  Fancy.
5.  Rearranged the layout a bit and cleaned and vaccuumed.
6.  Got excited about the cute baskets that I did find that I will be using in my pantry!

     

So this is a long post to say don't wait until you have the perfect stuff.  I'm so glad this is done and now when I 'm out and do find some cute storage stuff on sale, I know just how many to buy. 

"Drink your water people....."

I don't know why but one of my favorite quotes from Tony in P90X is "Drink your water people!"  I've been hearing him say that to me in my head over and over lately.  Maybe it's because our heater has been running constantly and I am about to shrivel up. 

 Up until a year ago, I was sucking down diet coke like it was water.  But it's clearly not.  I've stopped drinking diet coke but some days I realize that all I've had to drink is coffee in the morning, Shakeology, Recovery drink and a small glass of water at dinner.  Not good.  I've been trying to get better about drinking more water so I've gotten my trusty pink bottle and started taking her around with me again.  It's working because I have already finished a full one today (that's good for me!).  And for the record, I totally needed it after that HIIT workout!

Valentine Decorations

I normally don't decorate for holidays but my neighbor down the street has inspired me.  She decorates for every single holiday/occasion and her girls love it!  Also, blogland is filled with beautifully decorated mantels of love.  I couldn't resist.

To make the topiaries I "smushed" a gazillion little squares of tissue paper into syrofoam balls with a wooden skewer.  No glue just lots of poking.  It took forever but I kept on because I didn't want my kids to see me not finish what I started (-: 

While your smushing all of those squares, you might want to set up another craft for a certain someone since poking into styrofoam isn't easy for a 5 year old.  I found this wooden Love sign at Hobby Lobby.  It was supposed to be a frame but we took that part out of the O.  I was inspired by Erin's hearts I would show you a picture of the finished product but I don't have one.  But we will probably finish it soon since we are in the middle of an arctic blast here in Texas.

We are both at our best when we are crafting!

These things just make me happy.

Happy Valentines Day!