We're Home // Summertime

Well hello dusty ol’ thing; I’ve come to catch up over a cup of coffee and the most fantastic afternoon light beaming in over my shoulder. It’s my favorite place to sit in our new home; with my back to the bay window and all the light peaking through the backyard trees into the dining room. When we started looking for a house I had no idea it was going to be so emotional or take so long; in March after 8 months and 3 contracts that fell through (thankfully) we ended up here. A 3 bedroom 2 bathroom house with nice long back deck and a great outdoor space for the kids in a wonderful family friendly neighborhood just 2 miles from Target. We just kept saying over and over again it’s perfect for us; it meets all of out needs and some of our wants; it’s ours! Thankfully the previous owner kept everything in excellent condition so there is only minor updating needed but nothing immediate (I mean technically yes you can live with a duck themed ceiling fan in one of the bedrooms). Prior to moving in we painted the kitchen and dining Colorado Gray and the living room and entry way Moonshine, both by Benjamin Moore. I had great visions of painting most of the house and getting it all cozy with personal touches this summer by life had other ideas and by life I mean two rambunctious boys! Looking back I’m thankful I’ve had a few extra months to really hone in on what I want in this space and what will best fit our daily living.

This summer was wonderful and being four days into the new school year has only confirmed how glorious summer really is. We had standing play dates with our bible study group weekly but besides that we just beat to our own drum. The gym, the splash pad, the lake, Grammys, the library; we got into a little routine of after breakfast getting out of the house until lunch time then coming home to eat, take naps, and relax until Dad got home.

Speaking of Dad, in June he was ordained as a Calvary Chapel Pastor! As in yes, I’m a pastor’s wife. I know, right? How did God miss that critical error? I guess if anyone doubts that God doesn’t call the qualified but qualifies the called then they can just look at us and see wow, God really does change lives! There is nothing good in me except Jesus. It’s been so exciting to watch Davy obey God’s calling and to get a peek into what that entails. He still works four days a week at his 9-5er but spends one day a week at the church.

Towards the end of the summer I tried to bottle up as many lazy days as possible by enforcing we don’t get out of our jammies all day or we just take it really easy. This summer I have learned to love being home; love spending time playing in the boy’s rooms or cuddling watching a movie or taking a family walk out to check the mail or just walking around saying yes, this is home. And now here we are at the start of the school year and I have a kindergartener. Let that soak in. But more on that another day.

The 25 {6-10}

I challenged myself this past year by completing 25 personal goals...to read the full list go here and to read (and see) the details of 1-5 go here.

6. Write a friend a letter at least once a month (12 total)
It took me a few months to get into this one but once I started I didn’t want to stop! I loved being able to pull out a piece of stationary and send a little note to someone who was on my mind. Technically I didn’t write one friend a month but rather 12 total throughout the year; I even sent 2 packages! This will be something I’ll continue through this year and probably forever because it’s something about putting the red flag up on your mailbox that makes you feel really good!

7. Stick to a cash budget for an entire month
Nope, not in the slightest! We love our debit cards, we love out little treats, and I didn’t even attempt this one. In 2013 I’m already seeing us tighten up on our budget and putting extra money in savings all in prep for the baby’s arrival but I still want to try this at least one month this coming year.

8. Take a 7 day fast from all forms of social media
This was hard! And to make it even harder I combined this and #21 together for a week of living off the grid. I work a desk job which requires lots of distractions to get me through the day and during my breaks I always turn to Facebook or Twitter or Instragram for relief so day one was killer. I wrote some, I thought a lot, and I felt silly for feeling so weak. Social media is my connection to the world throughout the day; it’s my outlet and it keeps me from making too many personal spreadsheets. The next day it got a little easier and so did the third. By the fourth day however I will really missing it again. I patiently made it through all 7 days before peaking at anything and felt refreshed because of it. To help with the process I deleted all my social media apps during the week and made myself a nice long TO DO list of things I could be doing other than social media. Surprisingly the day of freedom (or the day of shackling back up depending how you look at it) I browsed for a bit but then shut it off and went about my day. I HIGHLY recommend cutting yourself off for a week or even longer to feel stimulation in other areas of your life other than finding out what the world is doing every hour of the day.

　
9. Bake something new and challenging each month (12 total)
Loved this challenge! I ended up cooking as well as baking because things as astonishing as tilapia had to make the list! Some I tried and will never make again like the complicated messy annoying cake pops or the disappointing cheesecake bars and others have become my favorite like the browned butter heath bar cookie dough or the ever easy and wonderful quiche.
Cake Pops
Triple chocolate cake w/ new base recipe,
Tilapia
Black garlic
Decadence white chocolate brownies
Apple oatmeal cinnamon cookies,
Roasted brussle spouts
Raspberry lemon cheesecake bars
Ice cream
Quiche (variety)
Mini cannoli cups
Browned butter w/ heath cookies

10. Fill most frames in the house with fresh pictures
I did this so early in the year I feel like it’s time for another refresh…maybe I should take the pictures from #5 and do a little makeover!

{give yourself} Fifteen minutes.

Sometimes in my head I play out how I would write a post, really think it through, and then forget to ever write it! That’s exactly what happened with the following! 

Weeks (maybe months) ago Roni wrote a great post about feeling overwhelmed about a daunting task and intern it never gets done; case in point, cleaning that big junk room. She talked about giving yourself a 15 minute time limit and work on what you can in those 15 minutes then walk away; it’s a short enough amount of time to not feel swallowed by the task. Feeling inspired I set out to work on the one place in my house that is never clean…my bedroom. It should be my sanctuary, my retreat but instead it’s my oh-crap-people-are-coming-over-throw-everything-in-here room. Seeing that I don’t have octopus arms I knew I couldn’t clean the entire wreck in this time limit so I focused on the closet.

Oh how I wish so bad this was a staged picture but nope, that’s my little ol’ disaster of a closet. I’m a terrible wife and make Davy keep his clothes in the office because there is NO WAY this thing is big enough for two people. The shirt cubicles store about half of what I’ve put in there…the other half has dove off onto the floor; the shoe drawers always remain open with mismatches shoes strung about. The floor is literally covered with clothes because a. I have no counter space to throw them and b. a laundry basket can’t fit in the closet!

And here is what it looks like 15 minutes later! I picked up all the fallen clothes and refolded them into their proper cubby. I rearranged the bags on the floor so my drawers could actually be pulled all the way out. I placed shoes with their match and neatly stacked in the right place. I picked up all the junk that has accumulated on the floor and put it away. It felt so nice to see what things could look like after 15 minutes of refocusing my attention. And after those 15 minutes were up I immediately hung up all the clean shirts off the floor so the closet was complete.

And get this…I felt so motivated I went on to clean the entire room! The disaster center was transformed into a bedroom complete with clean floors, clean dresser tops, and a made bed!

I DARE you to try this task! It was great motivation to snap a before and after picture of the space. I bet your biggest challenge is going to be stopping after 15 minutes!

Two truths and a lie.

Two truths and a lie; you decide. 

1. I’ve worked out 5 times this week!  1^st cardio session was after our trip Sunday when I felt as big as a house eating all those sweets. Two mornings I was at the gym before work doing cardio and two nights were my favorite sweat dripping insane cardio class. I feel great!  

2. My house is incredibly clean! I was sick of all the mess so each night I’ve been working on one room making it perfect. Sweeping, dusting, putting things were they belong and not in another junk pile. I’ve even made boxes for trash and donations so I can get rid of all the extra crap for good!

3. Last night I was heating up my dinner plate when Moses came over and asked for a piece of broccoli…as in actually wanted vegetables. I gave him one and he munched down and asked for more. After that he proceeded to eat half the broccoli off my plate literally piling it into his mouth. I would go hungry every night if it meant my baby was begging for greens! 

Jump on the wagon.

If you’re reading this on Google Reader you may not have noticed my newest addition to the side bar; that little red and white button is my newest addiction. Pinterest.

I’ve been hearing about it for months from Blog Land and friends and sisters but have purposely avoided getting it in fear it will do to me what it’s done to everyone; start an addiction.

If you’re not on it yet, do it. If you’re not following me yet, do it. If I’m not following you yet, tell me so I can do it! You can never follow too many people because I feel like the more people pin the less work I have to do by typing in searches.

Of course searches have become my new best friend when it comes to making my house a priority….oh my gosh people have some good ideas. The DIY sections, the style sections, the food sections, they all get me. I’m not one to tag dream homes and vacations because honestly I don’t have time to sit and lust. I’m looking for things I can make, do, things to inspire a new outfit and new house projects. And yes I will unfollow any board that pins adorable little babies stuffed in adorable little thing because oh my gosh my ovaries cannot handle it the cuteness!

I love that within 1 minuet Pinterest changed my mom’s mind about the entire color scheme she was thinking about doing in her living room. “Oh…” she said, “those colors don’t really look good together”. You can literally pull 1000’s of pictures in an instant and save yourself hours of searching websites and blogs for different ideas.

I’m addicted, everyone else is addicted, and you should be too!

When I tried to sign up it put me on a “waiting list” and I still haven’t got an email telling me I’m invited. However I did just ask my sister, she shot me an email invite, and within seconds I was logged in. SOOO if you want an invite just ask me and I’ll send one your way; no one should have to wait to start Pinning!

How to have a free weekend and catch Baby Rabies:

Being new to home improvements/ craft projects there are some things I’m learning along the way. The biggest one so far is paint brush vs. roller; who would have known a roller can cover a surface 5 times faster than a brush and yield 80% less frustration! Hand painting the edges and drawers were no big deal but when I tried to use a paint brush to cover a 5 foot surface it was dang near impossible; the primer was already drying in the time it took to cover the entire surface and when I went to do long stroke (to make it look pretty) it was pulling my dry paint up! For the next coat I tried out a small roller and oh.my.gosh, genius! I’m not kidding when I say what took two hours took me 20 minutes during round two! Now I just need to apply the paint color, let everything dry, and the biggest painting project will be complete!

This weekend was operation Don’t Spend Monday and we were (pretty much) successful. I would be ashamed to tell ya’ll about our 6 day eating out streak and the total cost of our stupidity; to make things right we immediately stopped spending money for a few days. The strike was poorly planned with the lack of food in our house so Friday night we had to make a small trip to Publix but the rest of the weekend we were spending free! We played at the house, went to the gym (free child care and guess pass thanks to Davy’s part time job), and spent time with our parents. It was definitely hard not to visit Chick Fil A, Target, or Starbucks but we need to start making better spending choices and if it means not stepping foot in Target then we have to do it! Moses had a blast in child care at the gym and we all left feeling good about our mid day exercise so it may become a regular weekend family outing.

I was worried about how I was going to get a gift for the birthday party we attended Sunday but I remembered I had a store credit to a Toy store (pure blessing is what that is) and took Moses (his first time in an actual “toy store” and not isle in Target) to picked out something special.

This may be semi creepster of me but I have to share a picture of the birthday girl. She is not only extremely welled behaved and “chill” but she is adorable and super petite and makes my heart go pitter patter. When she came out in her bathing suit it was one of those moments when you see a baby and your all the sudden figuring out the fastest way to make another baby (something people like to refer to as Baby Rabies) and oh my gosh I died inside and even start typing like a Valley girl because I get so excited about babies . I was standing right next to her Mom and Grandma trying to take a picture of this cuteness; yes, I’m that creepy lady at the party.

Yes, she is wearing a tiny weeny yellow polka dot bikini!

Mish. Mosh.

Last night’s projects were….just as wonderful as I imagined! I had big hopes for what we could accomplish in two hours and after we assessed the situation I may have been slightly overzealous. We decided to tackle the two smaller furniture pieces first and took our time doing a good job. I’m so happy how things turned out and how nice and crisp the black-now-white furniture looks. I turned our mud room into the craft space and will leave everything in their to dry for a couple days so I don’t ding up the 4 coats of paint before they are fully dry. I’m already thinking what I can do tonight in my 1.5 hour block of free time that doesn’t involve cleaning the house. I’m thinking sanding more furniture!

Moses has gone #2 in the potty two days in a row! TMI? I think not! He used to #2 all the time and never pee pee but now that we are seriously training he decided to get toilet shy with the poo poo which is delaying the official diaper-to-BigBoyUndies transition. The fact that he has (on his own) headed back to the bathroom to take care of business has been a joyous occasion in our house. We reward pee pee in the potty with 1 or 2 M&M’s but we stupidly made the mistake of telling him he could get a big treat for #2 in the potty. You can imagine my surprise when I walk into the living room yesterday morning and Moses is eating half a cupcake his Daddy gave him as a reward. We’ve got to figure out a new “big” treat that doesn’t involve 20g of sugar at 8am!

In case we’re not Facebook or Twitter friends I’ll share the picture that brightened my day late afternoon. To say my afternoon turned crappy is an understatement but unexpectedly leaving work early to get Moses from school turned my frown upside down. 

House love.

As you can see there is not much free time in my 24 hour day. The “Friends or Decompress” two hour block is an either/or situation and commonly includes folding laundry while watching TV. What’s not on the chart is the rest of the laundry, anything deeper than light cleaning, grocery shopping, exercising, and running errands. The biggest things that suffer are deep cleaning, organizing, and crafting. Even though I despise some of my house décor I’ve left it the same month after month because other priorities have taken precedence. Well…craft time has come!

It started with a much needed trip to the fabric store to find my inspiration for covering the couch pillows. After that is has played out into a full on redesign. After huge success with rearranging our living room a few weeks ago (even Davy’s bachelor friends complimented how much more “homey” it felt) I’m feeling invincible with other projects. Tonight one of my best friends (and DIY lover) is coming over to start sanding, priming, and painting the next phase of the makeover with me. I honestly have never been so excited to watch piece by piece of a project come together. When it comes down to it I already own a lot of the staple pieces needed to make a house feel like a home; now they just need to be painted, covered, or re purposed to become my vision. Seeing my daily time allowance please be patient with before and after photos because it may take weeks before there is a final photo to show!