And Another Thing...

Whew! What a great weekend!

This weekend was a whirlwind of activity.  On Friday, we went to our orthodontist's annual ics skating party.  I didn't get any pictures of this, I was way too busy eating pizza, pigging out at the chocolate fountain and ice skating with the kiddos to photograph anything.  Suffice it to say, it rocked!

When we got home, we had to bathe the girls and get them into bed so we could all get up early for Olivia's First Communion!  But first, I put Olivia's hair up in rag curlers.  It was so much fun and she looked so cute!

So when I was done, I shooed her off to bed and finished getting the house ready.  Then we were up early and bustin' our butts to get out the door on time for Olivia's mass.

Ben and Braidon served this mass so I thought I'd include ths shot of them and our beautiful church. 

Olivia in the dress my mom made for her, the sweater I knit for her and my own First Communion viel re-made to be a little more modern.

Olivia with my dad, because my dad made his First Communion this spring too!   After 40 some odd years, he finally relented and became a Catholic.  Olivia actually made her first communion at the Easter vigil with my dad.  This is technically her second communion.

Olivia with Grandma and Grandpa.

Olivia with Grammy and Papaw.

Olivia with Mama and Daddy.

It was a great mass,  Olivia got to read the second reading and enjoyed spending the morning in the limelight for her special event.   It's not very often in our house that you get a whole day just for you!  After mass, we went home and started getting ready for the party, of which I have no pictures beacause I have apparently taken leave of my senses.  I don't know what's wrong with me, people...

On Sunday, we got up and a bee-yutiful morning!  Oliver's parents stayed the night, so Oliver made french toast for everyone to selebrate Mother's Day.  It's super yummy french toast, and uf you ever spend the night at our house, chances are, you'll wake up in the morning to find Oliver in the kitchen, frying up a batch.  Yes, he deep fries his french toast.  Yum-o!

Then we spent the morning outside chatting with Oliver's parents and generally enjoying the first really fabulous day we've had this spring.

Good times :o)

Olivia's Room

We've been working on redecoratin Olivia's room for far too long now.  It was all supposed to be done over Christmas break, but as you can see, we're hopeless procrastinators.  We finally made some huge progress this weekend and I thought I'd share what we've been up to.

Oliver built a dollhouse bookcase for Olivia and I got to finish it today.

Here is the "before" picture.  I atcually liked the way it looked unfinished, but Oliver said he didn't make it to be unfinished so I had to paint it.

I painted the roof with brown chalkboard paint so Olivia can use it as a drawing surface.  I painted the body of the bookcase with white kid proof paint so hopefully it will be easy to keep clean.  Olivia and I took a trip to Joann this morning and picked out cute fabric that has the feel of vintage wallpaper.  We hot glued this to the back board of the bookcase.  We also picked up some pre-painted wooden flowers and a butterfly and used them to make a little yard scene on the side that will be visible.  So much cuter than plain white!

Here it is all installed in her room!  I love this so much!  It came out exactly as I had envisioned it and I LOVE the fabric.  If I had seen this when I was shopping for fbric, I would have made a duvet cover for her out of it. 

This is a banner I made for her a few weeks ago.  I had to wait until the new bookcase was installed becasue the old one was too tall.  It was totally worth the wait and it is lovely in her room.

So, there are a few more things to do.  I have to finish her quilt.  HAVE TO!!!  It's been sitting since before Christmas and I'm starting to feel terribly guilty about it.  I was going to have a friend quilt it for me, but I think now I will just tie it and then figure out some sort of binding for it.  I really need to get it done so keep on me about it!  I also need to put her valance together.  I'm just going to tie ribbons in various colors and patterns on a dowel and hang it.  It really just needs to cover the top of the ugle blinds so you can't see them during the day.  Oh!  We also hung her pink lights today.  She is DYING to go to bed so she can turn them on.  Hopefully Oliver will get some shelve thrown together for her closet soon so that we can get the dresser out and give her a nightstand.  Her room is really tiny and the less furniture the better, especially since we put the full size bed in there. 

I think that's it for Olivia's room!  If I can get my stuff together, I'll put up a post about the upstairs hallway (we painted it a deep, bright blue yesterday and it is quite dramatic!).

The Great American Girl Place Adventure

Olivia and Anna both celebrated a birthday this month and a while back my mom and I decided to celebrate with a trip to Chicago and American Girl Place.  Oh. My. Goodness.  Nearly 36 hours of fabulous girlie-girl adventure and excitement.  Wow.

Oh my were they excited about staying in a fancy hotel room.

We even had a lake view.  It's there. Waaaaaaay in the distance, right in the middle.  I swear.

All "dolled" up and on our way!

Right in front of the store and so excited!

Ah... The promised land.

Julie, the newsest member of our family.

Molly and Kit in their new summer dresses.

Grandma and the girls waiting to be seated for dinner.

Oh my goodness, a fancier dinner there never was.

All the pink lemonade a girl could want.

"The best day of my LIFE!!!!" Olivia exclaimed as we were leaving.  I am so happy that Grandma and I got to be a part of this fabulous memory with them. 

The Nutcracker, sweet

The girls playing ring-around-the-rosie with a whole gaggle of other girls during the Sugar Plum Tea before the performance.  It was so much fun to see so many girls having so much fun!

More fun pre-performance.

This was Saragh's first Nutcracker and she was thrilled with the whole thing!  Here she is anxiously awaiting the beginning of the ballet.  I remember two other little girls being just as excited for their first Nutcracker.

These two are old hats at this Nutcracker thing.  They were just as excited this year as they were last year and I think they loved it even more this time.

Very fuzzy picture, but it shows you how good our seats were.  We try to get the first row balcony so that the girls have an uninterrupted view of the ballet.  They can stand here and move around a bit more than they could on the main floor.

Catching Up: Halloween

Catching Up: Halloween Party

We went to a Halloween party in Ann Arbor with some friends of ours and had a great time!  We played games, went through a haunted house, roasted marshmallows, played in a drum circle and hula hooped.  It was a really fantastic evening.

Wordless Wednesday: 40 years of love

And the Dance Begins Again

Dance classes started again this month with a flurry of excitement and a little anxiousness.  We switched dance studios this year because of some social issues at the other dance studio.  I hope that this year brings us lots of joy and very little social stress.

Anna is taking a Pre Jazz/Hip-hop class this year and I am quite certain that she has found her home.  As soon as the teacher put on the music she started dancing and wiggling and giggling.  It was great to see her that excited!

Olivia is in a Ballet/Tap class and is, of course, loving it.  I think she would perish slowly and painfully if she could not dance.  It's in her bones.   The little girl who is all arms and legs right now, turns into a graceful ballerina on the dance floor.  It's amazing to behold.

More Not-so-Extreme Home Makeover

I got a sudden urge to craft and decorate the other day, and this is the product.  I have been staring at this chest for several weeks and thinking that it would make a nice extra seat if only it had a cushion.  So I rooted around in my fabrics and found this fabulous floral canvas (a $0.99 find at the thrift store!).  I ripped up a floor cushion that was no longer in use and re-used the stuffing for the chest cushion.  

The blue pillow cover (the pillow forms are from Ikea) was made from some thrifted corduroy and a fabric that I love called Vertigo.  I have used that fabric on everything from cloth napkins, to yarn bags to a pillowcase top for my niece.  I'm out now, so I'll have to go buy a few more yards soon.

The white pillow cover is a hand embroidered pillow case that I picked up at a neighbor's garage sale.  I love that little lady!

It took me a little over an hour to sew all that up and it cost me absolutely no extra money since I had it all in my stash.  I love it when I can bright up and beautify my home so easily and cheaply!

Not-so-Extreme home makeover

Since we can't sell our house and buy a new one right now, I am on a mission to give our current dwelling a little face lift.  The front part of our house is quite dark since it faces north and is under the cover of a porch.  So I wanted to do what I could to brighten up our little entryway so that it is as welcoming as it can be for our guests.

The picture quality is horrible, but like I said, it's very dark right here.  Anyway, this gives you an idea of the area.  This is our nature table and I decided to confine the nature to the blue tray because it tends to get knocked off and scattered.  Trust me, it's safer this way :o)

I've been working on this welcome display for a few days now and I am very happy with it.  I got the template for the framed work from Sew Mama Sew.  They're having a handsewing bonanza over there right now, so go check it out if you haven't already.  As you can see, my finished product differed quite a bit from the original.  I think that's okay; I like my funky, groovy house.  It matches the real one!

Let me know what you think of it.