November Part 2.

Taking photos is savoring life intensely.
I saw that quote on pinterest loved it. Sometimes I slack on photo taking, because my house is too messy in the background or it isn't the "right" setting, the kids clothes are mis-matched --if in fact they even have pants on. HA! Or I don't want to be in the photo because I have no make-up on and 2 day old hair. However, photos capture not only a memory but emotions. And at the end of the day this is our life, messy, mis-matched and with no make-up and it's beautiful just the way it is and I want to remember our story.

Reading together. Lo is really gaining speed in her reading and is good at memorizing stories, so she loves to read to MW and MW loves to be read too.

Snow watch 2014.
There was word snow was suppose to come this day, so they set up camp at the sliding glass door to wait for it. It took 2 days but we finally got some. Must be nice to be able to get it wrong in your job routinely and still get to keep it. ;)

SNOW!!!

Yep, no coat {but snow pants!} in freezing temps. I asked him if he was cold---NOPE! He was only outside for 2 minutes trying to catch a snowflake on his tongue.

These. These are the moments I want to cherish forever. It's why I created an instagram wall and print these not quite frame worthy photos out, but still want to see them everyday photos.
Daddy is reading 'Twas the Night Before Christmas' somehow Chad has every word memorized, it blows me away.

Kindy craft project. It was to be a family effort so naturally Lo and mommy did all the work. I did the gluing but she did all the crafting. The only thing daddy and MW did was put their finger prints on a feather. I think it is the prettiest turkey evah.

So one day it was 70* and the next a polar vortex hit and it was 30* with even lower feels like temps. She rocks that hat. I call it the Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants hat, because it fits everyone who tries it on head. We bought it for daddy one year, but she sort of took it this year for recess. She looks way cuter in it anyway.

My BFF had a her 4th baby girl and 5th child the day before my birthday. We are all in love with her. She gives us all our baby fix. Lo unfortunately do to school rarely sees baby girl, so she was excited this night when she came to our house for a visit. She sang her Jesus loves me and held her tight.

Night time reading by our pink Christmas tree.

 Found our Christmas program dress in the hand me down box. She looks adorbs.

Kindy Thanksgiving Feast.

A little mini program.

MW loves to play make believe. He can sit for minutes just playing legos, pirates, doll house, etc. Lo never did that she is more of a baby doll and artsy kind of gal. Just love to capture his imagination.

My heart. We are having some great times just me and my little buddy.

We voted!

"Helping" me fold laundry. Mostly he just loves to watch Gilmore Girls with me. He belts out the theme song every time.

Waiting. oh so patiently for the LoLoSass to come out of school. Most days we have a good 15+minutes to kill in the car line. So bring on the legos and Frozen Free fall.

This boy and his imagination.

And to conclude November we had a 5 hours gymnastic practice the day before Thanksgiving and apparently 3 hours in and they are spent! I love these girls and coaching them. I love working with all their quirky personalities and motivating them to succeed.

Getting My Craft On

I think I mentioned a few posts back how crafting is lifeblood to me. I constantly have ideas swirling around in my head and many rooms in this home I want to tweak. I keep having to remind myself one room at a time or better yet project.

These are a few of my latest projects. Mother's Day gifts for the grandmas. I asked Lo make a picture of her favorite memory of each grandma and then we traced it onto tea towels.

       

Then I made the grandmas and myself {of course!} silhouette pendants. I was so proud of these and I love mine. 

I found 3 pendants at Hobby Lobby on clearance. Let me just say I spent 30 minutes in the jewelry aisle scouring high and low looking for the perfect pendant. All the while my kids are bouncing around and telling me how bored and hungry they are. {Happy Mother's Day!} Then after all was said and done and I finally found pendants, I walked by the end cap and there lo and behold was every pendant they had! MY LIFE! At that point I decided to not second guess myself and get the heck out of HL!  They were black. Which was nice, but if you know me you know my love affair of spray paint.

I painted the Gmas pendants gold (use krylon gold--it's the only lovely one and I am slightly addicted to that color!) And I painted mine lime green.

I asked my hubby what color I should paint mine---I was think a Hot color.

Chad responds with "Well, I don't come in a color."

Guys it took me 5 minutes to get his joke. 5 minutes!

After I painted them I printed off their silhouette photo. 

This proved to be the trickiest part. I used photoshop elements to size down their photo. Added some scrapbook paper and mod podged it all together. 

Then add a chain which apparently is only found at JoAnns.

The end.

My final project this week was my instagram wall. 

I have all these cute random photos of my kids that I want to see outside my phone.

I found a tutorial on pintrest on sizing them down to 4x4 in PSE and printing at Walgreens as 4x6s. 

Of course I had to add some flair to a few of the photos.

The frame is from a broken full length mirror. Spray painted in my favorite krylon gold. Add string by hot gluing it and burning your fingers at least 3 times even though I have special silcone hot glue tools. ;) Add photos and viola. And instagram wall! LOVE!

Basement one step closer to awesomeness. 

Now if I could only get motivated to catch up on my scrapbooking.

DIY with Sass {Gas Pump}

I am starting a new segment called "DIY with Sassafras" aka Leighton's Kidspiration.
She named the segment herself. I was going to go with Toddler DIY. BORING she said, how about Sassafras? It's your segment baby girl.

Sass comes up with all sorts of things to create. These are all completely from her mind, her ingenuity with little assistance from the 'rents. I figure A. I don't want to forget her cuteness. B. Maybe it will inspire you and your kids and C. Maybe she can put these in her portfolio someday.

I recently went on a rant to anyone who would listen about toys and the impending gifting of toys courtesy of Christmas and their birthdays. It dawned on me to really just sit back and take in HOW/WHY my kids play after the umpteenth time I yelled "GO PLAY WITH YOUR TOYS!!!!!"
1. I am bothered by the fact that we have an entire room dedicated to toys, that are seldom ever touched.
2. My kids' FAVORITE toys {and I kid you not} are in ORDER:
                 A jump rope and dog leashes.
                 Their pink pony and walker toy both scored at a garage sale for $1 each
                 Their Jake sword, or really anything they can use as a sword.
That's it. They just HAD to have a Jake and the NLP ship last year...played with 2x. As my mom always says I can't wait to buy this for $40 so I can sell it at a garage sale for $5. Truth.
3. My kids just like to be imaginative. I applaud this. I think we don't encourage it enough today. My kids like to be physical. They love to be outdoors riding bikes and scooter or just drawing with chalk.
4. Finally they love crafts. Even MW. They love to color and create. Guess that goes without saying when you are highly imaginative.

Therefore, I am over certain toys, especially after my daughter flips through a toy catalog and finds a toy gas pump and exclaims "we can make that!" And that is just what we did this fine morning. We do a lot of online shopping so we have just 1 or 7 extra boxes on hand.

Now for the Tutorial on your DIY Gas Pump:

1. Find large box.
2. Mom outline gas pump images.
3. Have your Little color, decorate and write their logo on gas pump.

4. Dig through recycling to find and empty contain that resembles a gas pump handle. We chose a small liquid creamer bottle.

5. Find some sort of tubing. We happen to have clear tubing lying around from another project. You could use rope, old phone cord...the possibilities are endless {be creative--see if your Little has any ideas.}
6. We hot glued the tubing to the creamer bottle, but depending on the cord you choose the attachment may very.
7. I cut an "X" in the side of the box and we slide the tube through, so as she pulled it out to "gas up her car." it would slide in and out easily without completely coming out.

8. Take the Littles out to try out their new gas pump on all their "cars!"

~Love Sass.

Leighton's Design Eye

So Lo got a Vtech Camera from her Auntie Misa and Uncle Kreg for Christmas. She uses it a lot.
Gina and Ginger try and not be jealous of her mad skills, you both still take really nice pictures. :)

I just had to share some, no you most likely do not need your vision checked, this is just her composition abstract style, or being 3 and bouncy...who knows. ;)

I am actually really impressed with this photo. Not bad.

She asked someone to take a pic of her and daddy. So sweet.

Now her artistic skills are not just limited to photography, oh no she is a crayon master.

Ok, now I don't know and correct me if I am wrong, but don't most kids forget the bodies and just draw arms and legs out of the head?! She did that once, I may have corrected her one time, she stopped drawing for ages and now this...and she is starting to get good at spelling our names...

Family Potrait

Now I have been told this 3x now by other people who work with small kids, 1 with an Art History/Therapy degree. They seldom see a 3 yo color this well inside the lines and this meticulously...just sayin' she has the art gene. :) I am pretty proud of her.

Lo has a very interesting design mind for sure...sort of curious to see where it leads her later in life. Chad and I are fairly sure she will be taking us shopping one day for outfits that don't embarrass her in public. ;)