Easter

 I love a good celebration...I mean...who am I kidding? I can turn a "you made a 100 on a test" or "yeah...softball season is over" or "yipee! The new counter tops are in" into a reason to celebrate. But when did Easter become almost as stressful as Christmas? We don't shower our kids with gifts...they are ALWAYS happy with just a few things(which may or may not have backfired on me this year because NEITHER child can come up with ONE thing that they want for their birthdays!). So...because of that, I tend to get stressed out trying to find one PERFECT gift. For Easter baskets, both grandparents had the candy department covered, meaning...I wandered around Target for longer than I care to admit...trying to think of another idea. I ended up with flip flops, bathing suits, goggles, and pool toys. Let's just say...nobody passed out from excitement! HA!

 OK. That was a fail...but I still had half of my Easter expectations left. The typical "coordinating outfits". Ohhhhh! Yes. You all know what I mean. If I can just get ONE awesome picture with everyone all dressed up, it will be worth it. As a mother...you shop and shop and plan and shop and return and exchange and plan some more and IRON(that is big for me) and lay everything out the night before...just HOPING for a picture miracle.

 After taking about 80 pictures....I ended up with zero good ones of the kids together, zero family pics, two terrible pics of Brian and I, and a few of each kid by themselves. Hutt wouldn't smile, both kids got in trouble, Brian and I argued...and by then I was just frustrated....gave up...and went inside to have a glass of wine. Oh well...maybe next year. :0

 At least we had some great food and the weather was AWESOME!!! :) 

Holy Week

 I'm taking a break from TV and bloggy land to focus on Holy Week!
 See you next week! :0


Jesus said to her, "I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies; and whoever lives and believes in me will never die.
~ John 11:25-26.

Foyer

  A few weeks ago, I decided to give our Foyer a face-lift. Remember....I can't keep something the same for long. A few rugs, jars, a mirror from my grandmother...and my  "Wide World Atlas" book that I found at a thrift store for $2...and we went from this...

to this...

Tomorrow is my garage sale....and if I make through...with no tears...while I watch my baby clothes go up the driveway and until next Tuesday when everything in my kitchen is back in working order...a celebration cocktail will DEFINITELY be poured!  :)

Keepin' it Real

  I think it's easy in blogland to make your life seem pretty and perfect and crafty and clean and like you can do everything and you only post pictures of the "good" days. Well. Y'all. Look at this. My house is so messy at this very moment...that I think I'm getting a nervous tick. If you know me well...you know I H.A.T.E. clutter. I make at least two trips to the Goodwill every month and I relieve stress by organizing.  This next week may just kill me. The good part is this...in one week...I will have the new granite counter tops....that I have been dreaming about for five years. But the bad...is this.

Oh! And I tried to be a "fun" mom and let the kids write on the old counter tops before they took them away...which started out fun...

and led to this...

So that was a mothering FAIL.

My dining room looks like this...

And because I  wanted to see how much I could cram into one messy week...I decided to have a yard sale Saturday....so the rest of my house currently looks like a bomb went off while i gather and price everything that I haven't used in the last six months.

My sweet cousin gave me some new clothes for Hutt...that are still laying on the floor.

And my room....well...there are no words.

But..apparently that wasn't enough excitement. My favorite little buddy was in our bed last night because he was scared of the thunder....and then proceeded to throw up everywhere...bless his heart. Hence the mismatched sheets and old comforter on our bed. 

So...that has been our week thus far...and it's only Tuesday. I don't think we have anywhere to go but up! :)

Guest Room Changes

 In preparation for my cousin coming this past weekend...I wanted to spruce up the guest bedroom...at least that was the excuse I told Brian...mainly I was just already tired of the other way it was decorated. HA! So....I changed a few things around....unfortunately I forgot to take a "before" picture(typical) so I'll just TELL you what I did!

 The turquoise dresser started it all.

http://happylifeofhannah.blogspot.com/2011/02/hello-lova.html

 Then I changed out the old bed(iron and wood-painted white) with Hutton's old crib turned full size bed! Which made me feel better since that was the ONE time I was glad we had made the decision to buy the "conversion crib".

 I needed something on the wall over the bed...so I slapped some turquoise paint on the piece of art that came from my $20 goodwill frames...and painted the word "love" in yellow. This idea came from here:

http://www.housetweaking.com/

Dana's is WAY cooler...but mine only took approximately 2 minutes.

Two turquoise pillow cases to bring the turquoise to the other side of the room were $3.00 from Target. I already had the bedding.

 The bedside table came from another room in the house.

Lamp is from Walmart....$15 for the base and $10 for the shade.

I attached a yellow ribbon to a small mirror(hook will be changed later) to hang above the dresser.

Swirly white candle holder on the dresser came from Ross for $6.99.

Gold goblet/key holder came from goodwill for $1.75.

 My love art in the frame came from this site...http://sprik.blogspot.com/p/freebies.html

And last but not least...I needed a yellow pillow for the bed...but couldn't find one(in my budget) anywhere. So...I got creative. A couple of months ago...we bought some new white slipcovers for our ikea chairs...which are quite possibly the greatest things every invented.  They came with a new pillow cover..but i threw the pillow away a LONG time ago....and was about to just throw the slipcover away when I had an idea. I grabbed a yellow dishtowel from target and my no sew bonding...slapped the towel onto the pillow, ironed it, and stuffed it with...(this is the redneck part)old christmas dishtowels that were in my yardsale pile! HA! And guess what? It totally didn't look terrible..and it was FREE! How is THAT for budget? :)

Ta-da!

dishtowel

ikea pillow slipcover

redneck stuffing-HA!

 So...here is the room right before I headed to the airport!

No Sew Closet Curtain

  Remember this???

http://happylifeofhannah.blogspot.com/2011/01/ls-room-make-over.html

  I washed and dried Lainey's closet curtain...and oops...it shrunk...and looked pretty weird...like when I try a pair of pants on Hutton from last season..and the bottom of them hits his shins! HA!
 So....I decided to do something about it today. And it was a leap of faith...because if you have been reading this blog from the beginning...you know I don't sew. Even though I have a sewing machine. That I asked for for Christmas. 
  Anyway....I found a remnant of fabric at the store that I loved. It was only 7/8 of a yard...but I figured I could do SOMETHING with it. Plus it cost a grand total of $3.00. How could I pass that up?
 Taking a deep breath, I grabbed my iron, heat bonding stick on no sew stuff, Lainey's curtains, and a measuring tape...and I went to town. There seems to be a healthy dose of people in blog land who participate in the kraft of "no sew curtains"...so I figured I could join that club. And after a little over an hour....my finished project looked like THIS! 

And y'all..I'm not going to lie. I did a happy dance right there in Lainey's room. I was so dang proud of myself. It was redemption in a major way. Take THAT Mr. Sewing Machine. I don't need you after all. :)

PS. If there is even a remote chance that I put that fabric on upside down...please do not let me know...as it will squash all of my "do it yourself" happiness. :0

Random Thoughts...

 For the past week, my brain can't seem to come together and form a full post on one subject. Not sure why...but I AM pretty sure that you wouldn't want to read a post that says..."Today was pretty outside and we played in the backyard until dinner time"....The End.
 So...here are some various things I noticed over the past week...all scrunched into one post.

• I need sunshine. Like...in a major way...or I become sad and dreary and just want to curl up in bed. And after a week solid of clouds, rain, and cold...I was ready to run away to Mexico
• And I don't even LIKE Mexico...because on my HONEYMOON...I got Montezuma's Revenge...thought I was going to die...then proceeded to pass out on the beach(from dehydration)...and whisked into the shade on a lawn chair turned makeshift stretcher...while they poured water on me to "bring me back to life"
• I will NEVER go back
• Is there such a thing as the "terrible almost 4's"?
• Lainey was gone for three days on a 5th grade trip to Jekyll Island..and it was so quiet around here. I never realized how much she sings, whistles, talks...all the time. I missed her bunches and bunches
• On the contrary....I sometimes love a quiet house..like right now...so I can blog
• Note to self...don't drink wine from an iced-tea goblet because you don't want to dirty up another glass. You will almost certainly drink way more than you meant to...and pay for it the next day! ;)
• It's hard to loose weight when you love food and wine
• It's even worse when you have a tiny mother...(I want THAT gene..not the one that makes me a grump when I'm hungry)
• I am not a gardener
• I found THE CUTEST dress yesterday from....ROSS! Yes, I know...but you can't judge until you see it...which won't be today because I don't feel like getting up off of my hiney to take a picture and upload it.
• The kids and I (and Brian...if I can convince him) are color coordinating for Easter. I know it's dorky but I'm doing it anyway...because Lainey starts middle school next year and I have a feeling that not only will she NOT want to look like the rest of us...she probably won't even want her picture taken
• I'm stressing about middle school...Lord help us all
• My cousin...who I haven't seen in TWO years...is coming to visit on Thursday and we are going to party like it's 1999...except that actually I was in bed on NYE 1999 because I was pregnant with Lainey AND had the flu! Fun times....
• My love language is quality time...and finding out that ONE thing...answers a lot of relationship questions

 OK...Looks like my quiet time is over! Happy Monday! :)