Summer Is Fun

Right? YES! It is!!

We are having a blast here in good old Utah. We got here Tuesday evening after a very uneventful day of travel (on stand-by nonetheless.... and we got on every flight!) where my kids were perfectly behaved and did everything I asked. It was just terrific.

Since then we have already:

-Enjoyed the cooler weather (I am loving the dry heat! No humidity! My hair isn't a 'fro!)
-Gone swimming
-Seen and beautified several hair clients
-Celebrated my dad's 60th! birthday (with more to come)
-Had a campout in the backyard
-Played in the sprinklers and with the slip 'n slide numerous times
-Seen and played with cousins, grandparents, aunts, and uncles
-Gone to see Cars 2
-Gone shopping (oh my, but how I have missed Utah shopping) and out to eat (And my, how I have missed Utah restaurants!)
-Jumped on the trampoline too many times to count
-Played played and played some more
-Gone to see fireworks at Taylorsville Dayz
-And today we are heading down to St. George for a few days to meet up with my sister Rachel and her clan as well as go boating, maybe see another movie, shop, and also see a show at Tuacahn!

Lots of fun. Too much sometimes :) But it's good and we're having a blast and there is much more to come! I am so excited for next Saturday when my handsome hubsters will be joining us.

I love summer.

Blowin' Bubbles

What is it about blowing bubbles into a cup of milk with a crazy straw that is just so much fun?

Peace out Yo'

Oh yeah, M really like the bubbles too, if you couldn't tell.

Go and pick up some straws today and let your kids make "milk-cream cones" (as my kids like to call them) tonight at dinner. It won't disappoint :)

The Tale of the Turquoise Piano

A little over a month ago, Andy asked me what I wanted for Mother's Day. I told him a card and breakfast in bed would be great, seeing as how he was unemployed at the time :)

Well, he had other ideas....

A loooong time ago I had mentioned a decorating blog to him called All Things Thrifty. I know the girl who started it. Her husband and I are friends and we grew up together and also our parents are still great friends. Anyway, several months ago, she had done a post on painting pianos. We had been given an old, typical, upright, ugly, brown piano by my wonderful brother and his lovely wife before moving here. I can play, but haven't in years. I knew I wanted my kids to learn, so we went ahead and took the thing. And there it sat in our living room. An ugly old eyesore.

Andy decided to paint it for me as my Mother's Day gift. Oh my goodness. I was excited. At first I thought to do a classic, typical color. Cream or black. But, if you've noticed my home decor, everything is cream or black with a little red thrown in. I like it, and I am typically one to go for more classic things, but I have been wanting to become more daring and colorful in my decorating. Once Andy mentioned that we should paint it an actual color, I googled "painted pianos" and then the possibilities became endless. I chose turquoise and I am SO glad I did. I am in L.O.V.E with it. Take a look...Andy started taking it apart so quickly once we decided to do it that this was the best "before" picture that I have.

All taped up and ready to prime. Per Brooke's recommendation, we used Kilz Primer.


My hunky hubby painting away. After it was painted, he glazed it to make it look antiqued.

I know I have more pictures of the actual process, but I can't seem to find them in my picture folder right now. Oh well...

Anyway, here is the final product!

I'm not quite finished with the bench. That is the material I am covering it with, but I still need to get some foam to put under it.


Andy added a few wooden scrollwork details. I love it! Also, for some reason, it looks like different colors in different pictures. Not quite sure why, kinda weird. But it is definitely a bright turquoise blue color!

He also got all new silver hardware for it (the old stuff was gold) and he painted the pedals as well.

I absolutely love it so much that sometimes I just go in the living room and sit and stare at it. I also love that it is the first thing people see when they come in my house. It is such a great statement piece.

Thank you my Love! Amazing Mother's Day indeed...

And Then, All Of The Sudden, The School Year Ended and It Was Summer...

I don't know how it happened, but the school year is over. It feels like that rainy first day of the year was only a few weeks ago. It may have had something to do with the fact that I birthed a baby whale, and for some reason that makes my life fly by at some sort of light-inducing speed. Babies tend to do that to their mothers...

Anywho, the last day of school was Friday and this morning was absolutely splendid not having to wake early, but instead, getting to lounge in my bed, leisurly nurse and then play with my baby, make chocolate-chip pancakes for breakfast at 10 (10 o'clock people! I can't remember the last time I ate breakfast that late...)

Here's a sneek at our last day of school festivities, which included our Treat Day (kid's choice) of homemade oreo cookies and red velvet cupcakes with cream cheese frosting: We also went to our pool for the Splash Party and had pizza and soda. It was quite a fun day and I am so excited for summer. Especially after I get my "to-do's" done which include (but are not limited to) the following:

-Re-organize and clean out the clothes that have been outgrown and/or trashed
-Re-organize bedrooms, closets, drawers
-Clean out toyroom and toyboxes

This is just for starters. It is my most dreaded task twice a year. I don't know why I hate it so.... but I do.


Back to this morning.... After we ate, we did chores and reading (I'm reading my children Fablehaven and they are enamored with it already and we're only on chapter 4) and then we went for a walk/bike ride. Also, the kids played "school" (which continues to crack me up. It is like, their favorite game. Really? School?! Yes) Poor Magnus was decorated as an Arts and Crafts project. I felt really bad after one of the stickers got stuck and I thought "I'll rip it off really fast like a band-aid" except it kept slipping out of my fingers and by the time I finally got it off he was screaming. No more stickers on my baby.

Ahhhhh well, I hope you're all having a happy summer too.

I better go continue to work on my to-do's.... Have a Happy Monday!

Shtuff

I am feeling soooooo lazy these days. It is Hotter than Hades around here lately. My thermometer currently reads 99 degrees.

Yup. 99 degrees. It makes me s.l.o.w and sluggish and gives me a lack in motivation, which, I really need right now. I still haven't replaced the winter clothes in my kids' drawers with summer clothes (I really should be digging those out right now...) and I think Baron is running around outside somewhere with a long sleeved shirt on and some shorts from last summer that are way too small. And I'm sure he's covered in melted popsicle...

Well anyway, here's a little hodgepodge of stuff going on around here. First of all, this cute little dog:
hit her goal weight. If that confuses you, you can read about it HERE. She's healthy as can be now and acts like a puppy entirely too much of the time for my liking. Oh well, we'll keep her. I guess :)

She also just had her 3rd birthday. We gave her a treat cake and she snarfed them up so fast (it's been awhile since she had treats.... her diet, remember? :) that I thought she would puke. Luckily, they didn't make a re-appearance.



Okay, you might need to sit down for this one.... I mean, if you're not already, that would be kind of weird, but just the same.

I planted some flowers.

I'll give you a few seconds to get over your shock....

Are you ready yet? Okay, well then, let me tell the truth. I bought flowers and Andy planted them (that landscaping job 7 years ago did come in handy!)

Alright, back to my flowers :) I had a friend tell me that at Lowe's they have a little "flowers in distress" section (cute way to put it, no?) and all the flowers are 75% off. I have really been wanting to spruce up our yard but it's hard seeing as how we rent and I don't want to waste money on landscaping a place I don't own. Well, I found a bunch of flowers (that didn't seem too bad for being in "distress") and I found a few huge pots, added a couple hanging baskets and a cute place to hang them and voila! A 100% improvement. I really like driving up to my house now and seeing all of the happy, bright colors sitting on my porch and in front of my house. I love flowers.

Cute, right? Okay, well, even if you think they look like pooh, just tell me they're cute :)

And last, but certainly not least, we have this crazy fog. These pictures were taken only a few days ago. Isn't it so weird? I've been getting up at 5:30 to go running (with a friend and also my trusty pup) in the mornings (good thing I pay $65/month for a gym membership....) and last Monday I went out and saw this: It was kinda creepy. It was so thick I could practically chew it. Plus, by the time I finished running, my hair was a huge frizz ball. Yikes.

Not much else has been going on. We've gone swimming a lot since the pool opened. The last day of school is tomorrow and in a week and a half we take off for a looooong vacation to Utah. I can't wait, I am really excited to be lazy and let my mom take care of me :) In other news, Andy's job is going awesome, the kids are just so dang cute and I want to eat them up, and we're all happy and healthy. What a life.... I sure love mine.

A Red Carpet Affair

Laylah turned 8, and we had a party, oh yes, we did!

I have to go back a bit. Ever since I had children, I dreamed about their 8th birthday party (seriously, call me crazy, but I really did). We have a tradition in my family that when you turn 8, you get to have your birthday party at The Lion House. My cousins did it, my sisters did it, and I did it. It was one of my very favorite birthday parties and I have wonderful memories of that special day. Well, as soon as we found out that we'd be moving away from Utah (and The Lion House) one of the first things I thought was, "Oh no! What am I going to do for my kids' 8th birthday parties?!" I know, so silly. But, needless to say, I wanted to do an awesome and memorable birthday party for this special age.

Once again, my dear, party-genius friend Ira helped Laylah and I come up with a great party idea and we were excited to put it all together. We decided on a Hollywood Red Carpet theme. It was so much fun and it all went smashingly.

For the invites, everyone had their "ticket" to get into the Red Carpet Premiere. They also recieved their Hollywood Star with their name on it.

Each invite was full of stars and movie-themed confetti (I'm sure all of the parents just loved when their daughters opened it up ;)

Invites were signed, sealed and delivered


The evening of the party, we were ready for all of the starlets to arrive on the red carpet...

And into Hollywood...


The red carpet continued into the "lounge"

The VIP dining (find instruction on the cute balloon banner HERE)

Place settings along with special tickets for the premiere and concessions later on in the evening


A star-studded event

The craft station

Glam it up!

Our Hollywood cupcakes.... is that popcorn on top? Nope! Check it out HERE how to make these darling cupcakes

Food ready.... little finger sandwiches-ham and cheese on wheat, turkey wraps, and chicken salad on croissants, caesar salad, fruit kabobs with whipped fruit dip, chips and salsa, and sparkling, bubbly, pink lemonade

On the little black table are the goody bags filled with movie theatre treats (popcorn, fun size milk duds, and a big diamond ring.... well, ring pop, that is :)


We added these cute magnet frames to each of the girls goody bags after we added a picture we took at the party, and after they had a chance to dry.

After all the girls arrived, we started off at the craft table. We decorated our cute picture frames and also bejeweled sunglasses. After all, what's a celebrity without their sunglasses?!

When everyone was finished getting their craft on, we moved it to the VIP dining room and ate until we couldn't eat another bite!


Well, until the cupcakes came out! Then everyone made room for some treats after we sang Happy Birthday to the special girl.

When the cupcakes had disappeared off of everyone's plate we gathered to open gifts

(P.S. You might happen to notice my completely amazing, beautiful TURQUOISE piano in the background.... a post on that to come!)

The girls had a blast opening gifts and admiring Laylah's fun, new stuff.

We then moved it to the Glam Station where we did nails, make-up, and hair to get ready for the Paparazzi! Each girl received a gold and silver beaded necklace as well as a sparkly pink bow in their hair that also went home with them.

Cute girl ready to strut her stuff on the red carpet!

While we waited for the paparazzi to descend on the red carpet we took turns practicing our red carpet walks and poses. These girls are good!

I had several friends come with their cameras to be my paparazzi and the girls came walking down the red carpet and stopped to pose for pictures. They wore their glam,bejeweled glasses, sparkly bows, and lovely necklaces. They all looked fab!

I then took the girls up one by one so I could get a picture of them on their own and put that picture in their frame they had decorated to take home. We printed the pictures out before the party was over and I had just finished putting them all together when the parents arrived to take the girls home. Phew!

After the red carpet walk, it was time to go down to the premiere in the theatre room...


We converted the playroom into our theatre room and the movie of the night was none other then.... "Justin Bieber, Never Say Never" and the girls were thrilled!

Of course we had to have our movie treats:popcorn, soda, and fun size candy bars. Each girl got to add the cute striped (re-usable) straw to their goody bag to take home.

They all eagerly handed over their tickets to get into the movie and receive their goodies!

Completely enthralled with the movie

Ooohhh, cute Justin, nearly life-size in our play-turned-theatre-room :)

While I was upstairs putting the pictures and frames together and attempting to clean up a bit, I heard some shrieking and laughing. I ran downstairs to check on the girls and found them doing this:

Oh, so funny.

When the movie ended, we passed out stuffed to the brim goody bags and sent each decked out, darling diva, read-carpet walker, home with their parents.

It was a wonderfully fun party and Laylah had such a great time. The Hollywood Red Carpet Party was a success!