Birthday Party

I was not good about taking pictures of the kids' party but thankfully, Alice did. She put them in a smilebox and hopefully I can figure out how to post it here.....Enjoy :)

Make a Smilebox slideshow

Bad Day

Update....after writing this post and ranting I signed onto facebook. I saw that one of my friends is dealing with the loss of her Mom. She has been battling cancer for the 2nd time and she had been hospitalized and had surgery yesterday. We were praying for her but Jesus called her home yesterday. My day is nothing in comparison to that!! I am so thankful for all my family and friends and am praying for Michelle and her family!!

Well, it's only 9am and since midnight I have experienced the following....Being awakened by the dog (after about 30 min of sleep) throwing up, Being awakened by a phone call saying the Health Dept where I work is closed because of the ice storm even though I am off today. I had to get up and call the next people on the list. Then Grayson wakes up with diarrhea and a horrible diaper rash. We get a bath and get breakfast and I sit down at 8 to get some coffee. I call Mark to see if he made it to work. Well, he made it but crashed onthe way there. He is thankfully ok but will probably get a ticket and a fine. He just had a fender bender in his work car about 2 months ago. Then Grayson needs another diaper change. Poor Baby!! The dogs are barking so I go to let them in and see that Mark did not take out the trash bag from last night and the dogs have torn it out all over the garage. Then Caroline decides to NOT use the potty and go #2 in her cloth training pants......Wow! I hope the day gets better cause it's only 9am!!!! I am thankful nothing is worse than it is, but I was hoping to get a lot done today since we are iced in.....Satan is on the prowl, but I won't let him win!!

Birthday Cakes

Mark and I spent the evening Friday making cakes for the kids birthday party on Saturday. I baked and frosted them. I decorated "Tinkerbell" and Mark did the tractor for Grayson. We had so much fun. It is something we really enjoy doing together. It would be nice if their birthday's were a little farther apart but that's ok. The kids loved them!!

Check-ups

The kids went for their Well Child check-ups on Friday. They are so big now that they get to wear these little gowns....they thought they were big stuff!! They both did great and are healthy as can be! They got their flu vaccine and got the Flumist in their nose. They did good with it though. We will be back at that office in a few short weeks with a newborn getting a checkup!! I can't believe that it has been 3 years since we took Caroline for her 2 week check up!! They grow soooo fast...

Entertrainment

Monday was Caroline's 3rd birthday! We went to Entertrainmet in West Chester. The kids loved the train display and the play area. They had a lot of fun. We went to eat at IHOP afterwards. Caroline said she wanted to eat yogurt so that is where we went.

Tuesday was Mark's Birthday. I decided to surprise him and take him a cake at work. I was going to order a cookie bouquet but it was crazy expensive. Well the kids and I got all the way to the Wal-mart near Mark's work and I realized I forgot my wallet. Problem since I was almost an hour from home. I called Mark and told him my plan and had to go to his work and get his debit card. We then followed the GPS to a closer Wal-Mart but lo and behold it wasn't a Super center. I didn't even know they had regular Wal-Mart's anymore. There was a gamestop next door and Mark wanted a Wii game for his BDay. I went in and asked for the game and guess what.....it's Discontinued!! Can the day get worse....OH YES! We drove around for about 30 min more to find a super center and got what we needed. We get to the checkout and they ask for ID when I go to use Mark's debit card. They NEVER ask for ID. Well, we couldn't buy anything in the cart. I lost it in the car. I finally got my self together and got the kids some lunch at McDonald's. We were near a Meijer so we went in there and the kids ate in the cart while I got everything we needed ( I also needed some groceries for his BDay dinner that night). We got him a cake and balloons and finally made it back to his office. The kids and I were so worn out that we didn't even go in. He came to the car window and got his cake and took it back in his office. We tried to make his day special!! Ever have one of THOSE days, where EVERYTHING goes wrong?? Grayson's Bday was yesterday....Pics to come later! Their party is Saturday and then the CRAZY Bday week is OVER!!!

Laundry Soap

I originally wrote this post a few weeks ago. I am linking it up with the laundry party over at The Masked Mommy. Thanks for stopping by my blog and go make some laundry soap!!


Since being pregnant I have craved the smell of bounce sheets! I have done this with every pregnancy. My Husband even came up with the idea to put a dryer sheet in my pillow case so it would smell good! I said it would be great if they bottled that smell. Well, I found a clean linen scent by Glade that smells a lot like it. I bought the Glade plug-ins and the air freshener. My house is going to smell like a laundromat :) Speaking of laundry.....

Want to make your own laundry soap? You just need 1 bar of this:





And 1 Cup of this:

And 1 cup of this:

Grate the bar of soap using a fine cheese grater or a food processor.

Mix bar of soap with the powders and put in a pretty jar ( inspired by Susie Harris).

Use 1 Tbs for regular wash or 2 Tbs for heavy soil.

Way cheaper than laundry soap and it smells and works great! The ingredients can be a little hard to find but most grocery stores have them. Wal-mart only carries the Borax not the soap or Wash Soda.

Look what I found!

I needed a washable cover to fit this...


And I found this....

I love my Swiffer Wet Jet. It is so convenient for the laminate flooring and tile we have in much of our house! I hate how much the little pads cost though! I have been looking for a washable cover that doesn't wrap around the head because that covers the little sprayer. After wasting $8 on one that didn't fit, I found this one by Method. I tried it on there and it seems to fit well. It adheres to the Velcro. It is slightly longer than the swiffer but that's ok. I can't wait to try it and see how it cleans....too bad I just did all the floors last night :)

New Look for the New Year....for the Closet!

There is a walk-in closet in our 4th bedroom. It has become the junk closet. Everything was thrown in there. Mark uses it to store his Patrol uniforms and stuff. He gets dressed in there in the mornings. It also holds all of my craft/scrapbooking stuff. It was TERRIBLY disorganized! After Christmas it got so bad that you couldn't even walk in there. So, I took everything out....first time in 4 years it had been completely empty! Here are a few before pics....

Here is the closet EMPTY!!

I can't believe all this stuff was in that closet!! At this point I was regretting my decision to drag all of it out...I was thinking I would never get through it all.

Ahhh....Finally done! Everything has a home and a labeled home at that! We will see how long it lasts :) I hope we can keep it up!







I love my ribbons all organized and waiting to be on a package or card or in a scrapbook! And look, you can still see the wall....it's not covered with junk!

I even have room for a little desk space and a chair....Can't wait to use my new space to create. The best part is it is in the kids' playroom so i can put the gate in the doorway and be in the same room with them. Maybe I will actually get some scrapbooking done!

And look what else we did....A friend of my mom's GAVE us this playhouse! They had it in their basement and we decided it was to nice for the backyard. We moved things around in the playroom and made room. The kids LOVE it!!! Caroline asked us to get her a bed in her house. They will have so much fun in there!

Winter Mantle

After I took the Christmas decorations down, I decided to leave out the snowmen. I found this banner at Target in the dollar spot. It's not working though.....no significant snow this year yet :) Is that a stool on the couch? Yep! I just vacuumed and hadn't put everything back yet. Notice the time out chair in the corner :)

Sick boy!

Poor Grayson! Caroline woke up early Sat. morning with a slight fever but has been fine otherwise. She never did have a fever again, just a runny nose. Well poor Grayson boy woke up at 4 this AM with a fever. He just looks like he doesn't feel good. He has the runny nose too. Another missed church day :( Mark and I did get to go to a wonderful marriage conference yesterday though. It was really interesting and had lots of great ideas on communication and such. If you ever get a chance to go to hear Dr. Gary Chapman....GO!

Family Pictures

We took the kids to get their Birthday pictures done the other day. I am going to try and post a few to share. Not sure if I am "allowed" to post as they were taken by a National Studio but they gave us a CD and it doesn't have any instructions saying how we can use them so here goes... Enjoy!

Disney Storybook

Some of you may have already seen some of these pages. I love my Storybook Creator by Creative Memories. I did this Disney book a while back from 2006 when Caroline was 4 months old. My birthday wish is to order it in print. One of the things I love about digital scrapbooking is that you can essentially scrapbook for free. I have made the book and have it saved and can order it when we have the extra money. It's great, no need to spend the $ to buy the paper, stickers, album etc. Anyway this book is 12X12 and has 27 pages but here are just a few (hope I can figure out how to upload them, it is taking FOREVER! :). Enjoy!