the shed {oh, the marvelous shed}

Our shed is complete. It actually has been complete for several weeks now, but I've been way behind on my blog post. I'm catching up and life is good. Life is especially good with the shed. I've been very careful about what I put in it. I have gone through most everything I own and tossed out the junk, kept the keepsake stuff, and reorganized most of the entire house. When I was in college, I moved every year to a new house, with new roommates, and so I grew very weary of moving stuff. Since then, I told myself I'd never be a pack rat again. It's a good feeling, not being a pack rat and all. I try to keep only the basics. If I don't use it within 6 months, out the door it goes. Clutter will bring you down my friends, it will bring you down. It's nice coming home to a clean house. Everything is really coming together and I owe it all to our shed. Well, actually I owe it all to the special men that built the shed-my sweet boyfriend, his dad, and a family friend. I've done lots of redecorating and moving of furniture in the house since the shed was built. That'll be a whole'nother post, so be sure to check back soon. I still have a few Pinterest ideas floating around in this ole' noggin' of mine, but I did get one project done this weekend. I'm so stinkin' proud of it. I'll post pictures of that soon as well.

I hope everyone is having a great Monday!

chirp chirp {bird houses}

My kids love all things artsy and crafty. When it comes to our arts and crafts projects, we aren't the most environmentally friendly folks. I could not tell you how much paper we go through a month from tracing, painting, and building things. But you know, the kids are having fun, we have tons of masterpieces made, and I love the fact they can express themselves in such ways. We can't hug trees all the time, especially when there is art to be made.

The other week, we went outside of our paper makin' skills and we painted wooden bird houses. Ooooo! Ahhhhh! Yes, there was much excitement in my children's eyes; so much in fact, these little jokester's woke me up at 7:30am on a Saturday morning to paint these bad boys. The actual idea of buying bird houses came from little ole' Avery. He drank a juice box one day and then wanted me to cut a hole in it for birds. I was quite impressed that he came up with the idea. I haven't seen where they've done this at school so it was amazing to see what his little brain came up with. I didn't think the cardboard juice box would withstand Mother Nature, so I headed to the good ole' Hobby Lobby and picked up what would soon be bird house masterpieces.

Look at the kiddo's working so hard! I wish I could concentrate that well at the crack of dawn.

No birdies are residing in these beautiful houses yet, but we check them often and are anticipating the sweet sounds of chirp.chirp.chirp soon!

Easter {let's celebrate our Risen King}

I think I counted a grand total of 6 Easter egg hunts that Avery had this Easter season. Between my family, school, and his dad's side, the child had no shortage of Easter eggs. Trevor had 2 egg hunts that I know of. These two guys loved hunting eggs. I don't think they even really cared about the candy inside, they just liked the idea of finding eggs.

We had a semi-non-traditional Easter this year. We had our Church Easter Egg Hunt the weekend before Easter. Chris and I didn't have the kiddos Easter, so the Easter bunny came early. And to celebrate Easter with my Mom's family, we celebrated Easter the Saturday night after Easter weekend. It wasn't the traditions I grew up with, but memories were made and lots of fun was had.

one fish two fish red silver fish blue fish

Our family has multiplied by 3 now. We have now added 2 fish tanks and 3 fish to our family. Chris and I have been implementing positive reinforcement rewards to the kiddos for good behavior. Avery had to sleep in his own bed for 3 nights in a row (without mommy), get 5 smiley faces on his behavior chart, and try broccoli (which he loved!) to receive his prize. Trevor had to have good behavior, clean his play room and keep it clean during Spring Break,  and try new foods (hated broccoli) to get his. Needless to say, Trevor received his prize before Avery. It seems Avery doesn't like to sleep without mommy in his room, even when being bribed, but he finally made it and now both boys have fish tanks and fish.

We introduce to you, Muddy, Buddy, and Little Rat.

I'm not sure if the arrow is pointing to Muddy or Buddy, but the other fish was hiding out in his fake seaweed. Little Rat seems to be enjoying his spacious home and has been a swimming fool.

I'm not sure how Muddy and Buddy got their names, but Trevor is mighty proud of his new pet friends.

Avery thinks Little Rat is the coolest. I keep asking him where Little Rat's name came from and his reply, "Mal-Mart" (Wal-Mart). I don't think he understands the question, but it's cute to hear him say it nonetheless.

According to Avery, the little ship in Little Rat's aquarium is his school. He goes there while he's at school. He even went up to the aquarium this morning and said, "Wittle Rat, have funs a 'tool, I loves you." Melted my heart.

Just pray neither one of the boys ask for a snake, lizard, or frog next time. This is about as close to an amphibian or reptile as I'm going to get!

brightness {bring your sunglasses}

I love color! Bright, beautiful, bold colors. I have no shame in my game. Walls are meant to be painted and by golly I'm ah-paintin'em'! I often times find random pictures to formulate a color scheme for my webpages or cupcake toppers that I make, but this time the random picture is for my bedroom and bathroom.

source

Aren't the colors just lovely? 

As soon as I saw this picture, off to Wal-Mart I went with my mind spinning with ideas. I was always told not to paint your bedroom red. Supposedly it will give you nightmares and bring bad luck, so turquoise won that battle by a long shot. However, that did not exclude red from the bathroom. Oh, red paint, how we have a love hate relationship now. Who's bright idea was it to paint red walls anyway? Oh, mine, ahem. 

Anyone want to take a lil' gamble on how many coats it is going to take to make my walls pretty red? 

Hint: I've already got one coat on and it ain't lookin' perty.

Here are some  photos of the rooms. Please excuse the fuzzy, used my cell phone instead of my nice camera, can't really get a good feel of what it really looks like pictures. 

I'll be posting more of the progress soon. As well as other things we've been up to!

Happy Thursday!

cha-cha-changes {a post in which I catch you up on our life}

Goodness gracious alive! I've got so many blog post to catch up on. Mainly pictures of my goofy boys, but blog post nonetheless. I just have this strange obsession with wanting to edit my pictures, but never having enough time to do so. Anyone else have this issue? Raise your hand if you do. Whew!  I knew I wasn't the only one.

We've got BIG changes going on at our hizzle-fo-shizzle. No, I'm not preggers, and no we're not engaged. We are building a SHED! Yes friends, a shed. A shed that will soon be filled with all of our, ahem, junk excess valuables. I couldn't be more excited. I'm visually doing cartwheels around our house because we are going to have so much more room.Chris and I are moving our room to the master bedroom, which is now a playroom/junk room, and each of the boys will finally have their own rooms.Yippee!!!

I'm excited to start painting and decorating our bedroom. I've got Pinterest ideas bouncing off my cranial walls right now. Oh, the excitement is pouring out. I know we are on a tiiiiiiiight budget, but a few DIY crafts can change a room in a second.

Stay tuned for upcoming post. New colors, new rooms, new pictures, new cha-cha-changes!