2015: The Year of the Tortoise Shell

I hope your holiday was filled with much love and laughter!  I know we had a wonderful family filled break that was both busy and relaxing at the same time.  December is always such an exciting, magical time, but it's exhausting too.  I've come to really look forward to the calm that January brings.  And with that, I have some very exciting news.  After two full years of closet storage, my tortoise shell has been hung!

 Our bathroom chalkboard's very first message, especially for today:

There is something so fulfilling about crossing a tiny to do project of your list that's been sitting there for awhile just waiting for action to be taken.  And there's no time better than the month of January to reignite your motivation to get these little things taken care of once and for all.  This shall be the year of the tortoise shell for our family.  We're not taking on anything new until we deal with the little things that have been patiently waiting in the wings for far too long.  Slow and steady.  No pressure.  No growing lists.  

Happy January to you!

Happy Turkey Day 2014!

In honor of the big day of thanks, we decorated our basement play fort with a few festive Thanksgiving decorations including a 'Turkey Town' sign I painted.  The stain on the fort is new.  I completed that fun job a week ago and it involved a coat of stain and three coats of Safecoat Acrylacq to seal in the odors.  Even so, we had to open windows, turn on fans and keep the fire going while the fumes left our house.  Good times:).

We also made up crafted a couple fun and festive items for use at the 'kid table' at our Thanksgiving Day celebration.

Lucky and Charm used Sharpie Oil Paint Pens to write 'Thanksgiving' on some rocks from Michael's.

The fun comes when trying to come up with new words using the letters from the word 'Thanksgiving'.

This

king

van

We also made a set of stones with the word 'Christmas' written on them since we'll be celebrating Christmas and Thanksgiving in one day with my in-laws this year.

 star

shim

They will be stored in little burlap bags I picked up somewhere along the way...perhaps the dollar bin at Target?

We also made some feather pencils for completing the Thanksgiving place mat word finds that I found at Michaels on super clearance.  I wanted some neutral colored feathers, but these bright guys were all Joann's had, and that is where I was when I had this project on the mind, so we went with them.  We just washi taped them onto standard pencils for a little festive flare:)!  The idea was courtesy of Pinterest:).

I hope you have a wonderful and safe Thanksgiving weekend!  

A Superhero Carnival

Charm turned five this year, and ever since his astronaut birthday was over last year, he'd been dreaming of a superhero party.  My mind was trying to come up with a way to make these parties fun, but less work every year, so I came up with the idea of having a carnival party where the games had superhero names.  For example, a bean bag toss became the Captain America Toss by adding a shield to the target.  My plan was to reuse these games every year for a carnival party that is themed to whatever Charm or Lucky or Clover are interested in at the time.

It sort of worked this year, as in, some of the games were reused for Lucky's party.  Mostly, however, these parties are lots of work, and I've decided that I'll do them every other year from now on.  Bill's not on board with every other year birthday parties, so next year, he's planning on doing all the party planning himself.  I'm excited for the break and can't wait to see what he comes up with:)!!

Here is Charm's Superhero Carnival Party:

Waiting for friends:)!

Superhero 'photo booth' and props!

Looking out on the back yard carnival

 Let the Carnival begin:

Superhero Pong

(superhero stickers on ping pong balls)

Super Plinko

The Avenger Ring Toss

(We also had a Spiderman Can Toss using tin can banks from the dollar store that were stacked like a pyramid.  Spiderman foam balls were used to knock the can pyramid over.  I don't have a picture of this game:(.)

The Captain America Toss with Bean Bags

Save the Superhero

(Plank and pool were from his shark pirate party.  I found Avenger dive sticks on clearance at Target and the kids had to use tongs or a net to 'save' them while standing on the plank.)

Hulk Smash was the favorite game of the day!  We just wrapped up a bunch of empty boxes and had kids stack a tower with them and knock them down with Hulk fists!)

The Avenger Triple Threat:

I had this stand on hand already and used it to have the kids try to get a ball into the different levels.

The Avenger Drop:

Charm decorated the clothes pins to look like little Avenger characters, and we had the kiddos attempt to drop them into these containers.  

We also had the 'Hulk Hole in One' with a putting green.  Kids earned tickets when they putted the ball into the hole!

Our lemonade stand turned into the snack and prize station!  (I repainted the sign that rests on the top of the Lemonade Sign.)

This cake, made by a local baker, was AMAZING!

The kids did a potato sack race, and then Bill convinced the parents to participate as well.  It was awesome!  

Another fun birthday celebration for the Charm-meister!!

Clover's Nursery

Clover is coming up on eleven months old already.  My mind can barely comprehend how fast this year has gone!  Bill and I spent last fall dreaming about, shopping for and creating this room which was finished a day or two before Clover arrived last December.

This closet was the only closet that had shelving in it when we bought our house in 2010.  The rest of the house had holes in the closets where shelving used to be.  This was my tease closet, because the 'California Closet' label on it told me that at one point this house was full of the high end closet system.  Ironically, we almost ripped the shelves out of the closet ourselves in order to come up with something more useful.  (I wish I had a 'before' picture of the closet since it only had the top two shelves and hanging rods at the top initially.) Instead, I tracked down this wardrobe unit from IKEA, which was identical in color to the off white California Closet shelves.  Bill painted and added lower closet rods on either side of the unit for Clover to reach when he's a couple years older.  The wardrobe is attached to the back wall of the closet for safety's sake, as well.

Also, we removed the doors to the closet, since they were big and this room is small.  Curtains were our solution for closet 'doors' though in all honesty, they are rarely closed unless Lucky and Charm are playing peekaboo with Clover:).

 Bill made the 'built ins' on either side of the window using IKEA Besta storage pieces as the base and shelves.  He made a base and added crown molding which was an adventure for him. I lined the back of the upper bookcases with wrapping paper.

This vintage paint by number was my inspiration for the whole room.  

Happy Weekend!!