First Day of MDO for MW

Last Tuesday it was Micah's turn to go to "school."
To say he was a little excited is an understatement. Just watch the video clip below to see.


IMG 3813 from Michele Keethler on Vimeo.

This kid is so full of life, it is contagious. He has been begging and begging to go to school for a year now. I was never one for Mom's Day Out and Lo certainly never went, but he wants to go. I tried to talk him out of it, but there was no changing his mind. Every morning he asks if it is MDO day.

I will say it is kind of nice to have 4 hours to get things done or just let the voices in my head talk to one another without being constantly interrupted by a need to be fed, wiped, helped, dressed and so on.

He was so excited to pick out his lunch box and he loves that they go swimming every time. I am glad he loves it and I am glad it is flexible. If it stops being fun or life gets in the way then we stop for a month or two and start back up later.

I am a strong believer in just letting kids be kids. I don't do pre-K, simply because they have their whole lives to be in school, so why start at 3. MDO seems like a happy medium. Only one day/week full of mostly fun and play with just a bit of learning tossed in = perfection.

Here is his chalkboard print. I love that he wants to be a Helicopter Driver. :)

FREEDOM!!

I am going to miss my little buddy though. I am trying to soak up this last year with just him at home all day. I miss Lo, but she had my full attention for two years pre MW and now it's his turn to get all my focus.

The things he says to me. For the record I wasn't sad and didn't cry because it was only one day.

He is incapable of taking a normal picture.

His first craft an Apple for the letter A.

This was from my time hop this past week. I was sort of feeling like a mom failure because MW has zero interest in writing and learning letters. Last year I tried and tried but gave up making him trace letters, one year later he comes running out of his room exclaiming MOM! Look I wrote my name all by myself. {albeit out of order, but hey that is a start!!} I was reminded that not all is lost he will and can learn.

So what did mommy do while MW was gone?

Painted the fireplace. AH!

BEFORE

AFTER

I thought about doing a vlog about this, but maybe when it's all done.

I have been slowly redecorating the living room over the last 6 months. And I have been dying to paint that fireplace for.ev.er. Chad was not on board. And well, something that permenate I needed him to be on board. So I did lots and lots and lots of pintrest-ing and researching on this. I finally wore Chad down with my incessant talk about it. He caved. He really just wanted me to shut up about it. Whatever I will take it. 

Except. Then I couldn't pull the trigger. 

So of course I continued to go on and on about it and lost countless hours of sleep over it.

Finally on the day of MDO I just went for it. I was so freakin nervous. I was having heart palpitations the entire time. 

I kept stepping back thinking dear Lord what am I doing?!!? But there was no turning back. I finished and texted a photo to Chad he said it looked good. I of course then shared the photo to Facebook because where else do you get validation from? HA!

I didn't love it at first. I didn't hate it. But I most certainly wasn't sure I did the right thing.

It took about 24 hours for me to fall in love with it. I think simply because it was such a stark contrast to the original, but now I am so happy I did it. I love it. The room no longer seems like a tomb. 

So there you go what I did on MDO.

Silhouette Wall Collage

I have these large walls in my basement that were in need of some love.

I love collages, but every time I try it is an utter failure. I would stare at other's collages and wonder why do their's look good?! 

Here is what I figured out:

1. Balance. Get a few matching shape frames to weight the collage.

2. Create a center line. While some of the frames are ON the line there is still a symmetrical line.

3. Colors. Make a scheme.

4. Lay out your collage, then take pictures so you can see it in a new way. 

5.  Cut out paper to match your frames exactly so you can tape them on the wall and tweak as needed. This is the most important step. Less nail holes in the end. 

{too high, BUT the center lines are marked so tweaking was a breeze-ish}

     Ex. I measured, did math, and hung up all the little papers and when I took 4 steps back realized the WHOLE collage was way too high. While annoyed, at least there were no nail holes and 3 tweaks later it was at the perfect height.

6. Shop goodwill for frames. All of these frames were goodwill or garage sale. Who cares what the ugly picture inside is, look for shape and lines. Pictures can be ripped out and replaced. Cheap!

And while those aren't riveting ancedotes, maybe other people who are scared of collages or OCD may find this helpful.

This whole thing came about because I am in love with silhouettes. It borders on obsession. However, I don't want just any silhouette I want my family. So we took photos and I lovingly turned them into my favorite silhouettes.  

 

I really love how it all turned out and it is the first collage I haven't torn down 3 days after putting it up.

Up close look at their silhouettes.

iPod Photo drop

Look at me 2 posts in 2 days.

Today I finally took the 3 minutes needed to load my iPod photos on my computer. Why? Because today we said good-bye to our "Zach Morris" phones and joined the technology age and got our first smart phones...evah. This is all made possible by my wonderful parents who added us to their plan, which some how made it affordable for us otherwise it could have been another 6 years. HA!

{Taken today. Lo picked out my color}

So without further ado the iPod dump. Apparently this goes clear back to May.

At the end of May I took my level 2s to districts to compete! It was a super fun weekend and we took home 3rd. Not too bad.

Unfortunately while I was gone we got the news that Chad's grandfather had passed away. We are so thankful for his life and that he is now pain free and living life with Jesus in heaven. It is such a blessing to us to know we will all be re-united again one day.
These photos are from the funeral we had some time to waste between the service and graveside. So why not got to the park in your Sunday best?!

It was a tad unseasonably hot for early May here, which required early swim suits wear and water fun.

Rainbow toes! Yes, those are my son's feet at the end. I know people think I am nuts for painting his toes, but in his 3yo mind it is just fun to paint things...I am sure as the sun rises in the East that one day he will realize that only girls paint their nails and will run screaming from our nail brushes.

 Let me show you my level of lazy...somehow these loaded upside down...not even going back to fix it. Um, once again my son in princess dress up. What can I say he loves to dress up.

Went to a friend's birthday and her son apparently needed all the ice pops! HA!

Our little neighborhood garden. It is out of control now...we shall see what we produce.

More dress up. See they can dress gender appropriate sometimes. HA!

Ah, a little craft project for me. So I heart instagram and have all these cute photos I want out, but let's face it not really frame worthy. So I came up with a way to display my IG photos. I loved how it turned out.

Summer sprinkler romp that lasted what 2-3 minutes?!?! Sounds about right.

Meg and I getting our sweat on. We are trying hard to get back into shape. Trying being the operative word...HA! What can I say we like chocolate too much.

First pool swim of the summer. Now that it is June you would think we would go more, but now it's all rainy every other day...boo.

Whilst preparing for my garage sale, Lo stumbled upon a boxed up collector's edition Olympic Kid gymnastic doll. Her eyes lit up. This doll was given to me on my 15th birthday. I love cabbage patches and it was during the 1996 Magnificent Seven's run {getting us the GOLD!} Gosh, I still get goosebumps remembering that moment. This doll hasn't been outside that box for 16 years! When Lo saw her I just knew she had found a home. I am sort of all toy story when it comes to toys and dolls and I literally felt bad that this cabbage patch had never been loved until today. {yes, I am a weirdo}. So my little pre-teamer for working so hard to move up she is now yours. {I actually have no idea what she named her...I should ask. HA!}

More "vintage" toy finds. Daddy's bat mobile from his childhood!

During the garage sale they made rainbow loom bracelets and sold hand-drawn pictures and made $4. $4 people. All for just being freakin' cute. They decided to donate their monies to their churches. Super cool.

Garage Sale helper...

My creative thinker. Car port for her cars.

Here is Lo's finished dresser! I went with the tiffany blue and white with krylon gold handles.
I was leaning that way anyway, but when I walked down the aisle of Ace and found a gallon of mis-tint tiffany blue for $5 I took it as a sign.

I think her room is nearly complete...for today. HA!

This boy is my love bear. He snuggles and snuggles...even if it is all night in my bed. {Whole other story} MW just can't get enough momma loves. Who am I kidding I can't get enough of this boy.