Happy Easter!!

Just a quick post to wish everyone a Happy (albeit belated) Easter!! We had such a fantastic weekend with my whole family here!! I am hoping to get some photos edited in the next couple of days to post here, but, for now, I hope this one holds you over...


Getting a 1 year old and a 3 year old to look at the camera at the same time when the Easter Bunny has just visited them is not an easy task!! I think this turned out pretty good... Considering our severe handicap!! HaHaHa...

Love you guys!! I hope your week is wonderful!! :-)

It's Been A While...

It's been a while since I last blogged, so I thought I'd check in. We have been super busy trying to get settled in our new house. We absolutely LOVE our new house!! We are about 95% settled. Just a few more photos to hang, and a little more work in the garage (so my car will fit), and we'll be back to normal!! :-)

The girls are doing well. For Lent this year, I "gave up" Maddy's nap time on Tuesdays and Thursdays. During this time, we are doing some school stuff. So far, we've learned about the letters "M", "A", and "D". Maddy is LOVING this one-on-one time!! She can even write the letters "M" and "A" all on her own now. She is so proud when she does it, too!! It makes me so excited for her when she writes the letters all on her own. The "D" is a little tough, but she's still working on it!! This week we're going to give the letter "Y" a try. My goal is to have her be able to write her name first. Thanks to Pinterest, I've found quite a few activities that we can do during our school time. I plan to try a few new ones this week!!

This past week we checked out the story time at the library here. They read 2 books, had an activity for the kids between the books and a craft at the end. It was a little long for Amelia's attention span, but both of the girls seemed to really enjoy the time!! Last week's theme was Dr. Seuss. This week's theme will be St. Patrick's Day. Maddy is already talking about it!! :-)

Amelia is learning new words every day. Her favorite, however, is "no". Sometimes she says it with a cute little smirk on her face, and others she shouts it... Like when Maddy takes a toy from her!! She's really coming into her own lately. I'm loving her little personality that's coming out!!

I have taken on a new project for Easter gifts for the girls. This is likely to take up quite a bit of my time in the coming weeks, but I am hopeful that the end result will be worth all the effort. I am making "Busy Books" for the girls. If you are unfamiliar with what these are, you can google them, but they are basically a soft, sewn book that has activities on each page... Think: learning how to use a zipper, snaps, velcro, matching things, dressing a felt doll with felt clothes, etc. The idea is that they are quiet books to use at church, etc. I am still in the planning stages but am very excited to see the finished product!! If I can keep my act together, I'll take some photos along the way, so you can see the progress!! Let's not hold out too much hope on that, however. I didn't sleep last night because my brain was going 90 to nothing thinking about these books!! HaHaHa.

Bryan has gotten a job at work, since his training doesn't begin until May. He is happy to have some structure back in his life!! He is working in the International Student Affairs office on base. He has already met some really neat people who are here for training. He has also taken the first steps to completing his master's degree!! Woo Hoo!! I say that knowing that I won't be the one writing millions of papers. LoL. Obtaining his Master's is a necessary evil if he hopes to continue with his promotions at work, so here goes nothing!! :-)

Nash is thrilled with our new home. He likes his new yard. We bought a few new rugs for the house (the living room is hardwood). One of the new rugs is in front of the sink in the kitchen, and he really likes laying on that one!! I feel differently about his new-found "spot" since that's right in the middle of my work space in the kitchen, but if he's happy, I can work around him!! :-)

I guess that catches us up on everyone. I hope to blog again soon, but only time will tell if I remember to!! Maybe next time I'll have some photos of the girls!!

I hope everyone had a great weekend, and the week ahead is nothing but fantastic!!

Love you guys!!

Another Two Blog Night

Can you believe it?!?! I was on blog hiatus for SO long, and now every time I post, I make multiple posts!! HaHaHa.

Tonight, after making the busy bottles for the girls, I decided to make some quick and easy necklaces for them too... M's has Tinkerbell on it (of course) and A's is just plain and simple. I like them so much, I may make one for myself, too!! :-)

Here's a photo of the necklaces!!


G'night... This momma better get some rest!! 6:30 will be here EARLY!!

Love you guys!!

Busy Bottles

Hi Everyone! I've completed another project that I found on Pinterest!! I think the girls will really like this one. I am saving these for our road trip to Arkansas, so I won't have a review from them for another couple of weeks. I made them a little different from one another... based on their ages.

For Amelia, I put dice, PomPoms, glitter, foam shapes and some jeweled butterflies in a plastic bottle. Then, I filled the bottle with water. She can shake it and hear the dice rattling around, watch the glitter fall and the PomPoms spin around. I am hoping for at least 10-20 minutes of entertainment with this one... We'll see... If not, it was a super inexpensive project, so I'm not out much!!

For Maddy, I put all the same things in her bottle, but I filled it with rice. This makes it a look-and-find bottle. She can shake it and tell me what all she sees... There's even a Tinkerbell button hiding in there!!

Once I filled the bottles, I glued the lids on with Super Glue... No need to tempt fate with spillage in the car!! HaHaHa...

Here is a photo of the bottles!!


I hope everyone's week got off to a good start!! Talk to you soon!! :-)

Love you guys!!

Girls Week

Bryan has been out of town this week, so it's just been the girls and me... Oh, and that silly ole dog we have!! ;-) I have been trying really hard to involve the girls in our dinner arrangements since that's usually the toughest time of the day when I'm flying solo. I have been so excited about our meals this week, and M has been too. Here's what we've had so far...

Monday we ate like Mermaids... I made sushi sandwiches and they had Goldfish and sea shells with them. The sushi sandwiches were just PB&J, but I used the rolling pin and flattened the bread first, then rolled them up and sliced them so they looked like sushi. The "sea shells" were mandarin oranges. M was SO excited about this meal!! She had 3 sushi sandwiches!!! When I make her a PB&J normally, she eats the equivalent of 1 sandwich. I couldn't believe that changing the shape made such a huge difference!!!

Tuesday I just did baked chicken with fruit salad and bread, but M got to help make the fruit salad. I marinated the chicken in some salad dressing and just baked it in the oven... Nothing special, but it tasted good. I cut up all the fruit then had M help me put it in the bowl and stir it. The bread was just some hamburger buns I had in the fridge (we used up all the bread with our sushi sandwiches) that I toasted and put butter on. I cut them into strips (thanks for the idea, Mom), and the girls loved that!! Another successful meal!!

Wednesday I made mini bagel pizzas. M was very into the TV show she was watching and chose not to help with these, but she certainly could have helped!! I just opened the bagels, put a little sauce, pepperoni, black olives and cheese on them, then baked them for about 5 minutes. SUPER easy and the girls LOVED it!! We had grapes as a side dish. They both ate more than I ever expected them to!!

Tonight I made a ham steak, fruit and bread. A ate more of the ham than I did. I cut the steak in half intending for the girls to share one half and I'd eat the other half. M ate one little strip of their half and A ate the rest. When I saw how quickly she was devouring it, I slowed down on my half and ended up giving A about a 1/3 of my half!!! It was crazy!!! I think I may have found a new favorite for A!!! M said she didn't like "regular ham" whatever that means!! Maybe she'd prefer the lunchmeat variety?!?! Either way, they both ate another great dinner!!

Bryan should be home in time for dinner tomorrow night, so it's going to be a Papa Murphy's night for us!! I have DVR'd a couple of movies this week, so we may do pizza and a movie with the girls!!

We're all looking forward to having Daddy home tomorrow! We've done a little "FaceTime" with him on the phone while he's been away. FaceTime is the Apple version of Skype which we can do from our phones. Both of the girls have LOVED getting to see him! They both got to tell him good night tonight. It's so sweet to watch their faces light up when they see him! M likes to tell him all about her day and her toys (as if he doesn't know what toys we have). His only complaint is that he gets motion sick when she carries the phone around while talking. HaHaHa.

Well, I never imagined that I'd have enough for TWO blogs tonight, but I did!! To tell the truth, one of my projects has to be put on hold until Bryan gets home because I need a couple of 20 ounce soda bottles, and I've been trying to lay off the soda lately. I tried water bottles, but the opening isn't large enough for my project, and I didn't make it to the craft store today, so the other projects that are on deck will have to wait!! Wonder if we'll get out the door early enough tomorrow to get some more supplies?!?! :-)

Ok, well, I'll end this now!! I just wanted to share our week of fun food with everyone!! Talk to you later!!

Love you guys!! :-)

PUZZLES!!!

As promised, here's a quick post to show you my next craft endeavor...

We FINALLY got orders for our move to Little Rock, so I'm in full fledged move mode now!! Part of moving with a 1 year old and a 3 year old is packing the car. The drive from Corpus to Little Rock will take roughly 12 hours. We plan to split the drive into 2 days... The debate is still on as to how to split the drive. One of us feels that we should hit the road in the afternoon the first day and make that the "short day". The other of us feels that we should do the "long day" first, so the second day is not quite so torturous for the kiddos. It'll be interesting to see how the cards all play out. With that being said, activities in the car for the girls is a MUST. This will be the first time that I've driven any real distance with the girls alone. Bryan will be in his car caravan-ing, but I won't have anyone (Hi Mom!) to help me entertain, feed, tend to the kids. This is where the creativity MUST start!! I have lots of ideas for M. She's pretty easy to entertain since she's a little older and understands that if she throws something on the floor, it's gone until we stop. A, on the other hand, hasn't quite grasped that concept yet. LoL. It will be an interesting couple of days to say the least!!

This project is for M. As I mentioned, ideas come easier for her as her skills are much more advanced. I saw this idea on Pinterest, and added my own little twist to it... I made Popsicle Stick Puzzles!! All I did was print photographs, glue them to large Popsicle sticks and cut them apart. This gives M something big to hold onto and also keeps the photos from getting too bent, etc. The twist I added was putting a strip of magnet on each of the Popsicle sticks. Then, I bought a small cookie sheet at Wal*Mart so they had somewhere to stick!! She now has 3 new Popsicle stick puzzles that will stick to the cookie sheet so they aren't sliding all over the place in the car!! I also took a puzzle that I made for the treat bags for A's Bubble Guppies birthday party and put magnets on the back of those pieces to make another puzzle. M has 4 new magnetic puzzles to occupy some of her time in the car for the long drive!! I hope she LOVES them!!

Oh, and I was worried that since the photos didn't have a lot of color variation, they may be a little tough for her (she IS only 3), I numbered the Popsicle sticks (a different color for each puzzle) so that she can have that as a little "crutch". The LAST thing I want is for her to get frustrated while I'm trying to drive and can't help her!!! That wouldn't be fun for ANYONE!!! :-)

So, here are the puzzles!!!




Sorry they aren't all oriented correctly... Blogger wouldn't let me turn them... ;-)

I have another project that I did this week, but the recipient hasn't seen it yet, so once it's unveiled, I'll see if I can get a photo of it... :-)

Hope you've had a great week!! It's almost the weekend!!! :-)

Love you guys!!

New Dresses!!!

Hi!! This may be some sort of a record for me as of lately... ANOTHER blog?? Already?? :-)

I have been scouring the website Pinterest lately. For those of you that aren't sure what Pinterest is, it's a type of social networking site where people can "pin" on "boards (virtual cork boards)" items that they have found on the Internet that they like. Some are do it yourself projects. Some are recipes. Some are just things they like that they would like to buy. As you peruse the site, you can, in turn, re-pin anything you see that you like. It's basically a digital idea book that you create for yourself. The danger of this site is that you can spend hours "pinning" things, but never going any farther. I have been guilty of this as of lately, so I've decided to start actually doing some of the projects I've found. Here is one that I did last night. This literally took me an hour and a half of my time... And now each of the girls have new sweater dresses!!

I had some old sweaters in the closet that I do not see myself wearing anymore, so I converted them to dresses for the girls. I am going to re-do the hem on A's dress because I am not thrilled with the way it looks, but other than that, I am pretty pleased with how they turned out!! Without further adieu, here they are!!!





As one of my friends put it in her blog when she made a similar dress for her sweet little girl, "I love my children so much. I would give them the shirt off my back. Or, you know, the old crappy one in the back of my closet that I don't wear anymore." HaHaHa. I couldn't have said it better myself!! No, really, to be able to re-purpose something like this is GREAT!! Maddy is very much into wearing dresses right now, so this is right up her alley!! :-)

Have a great weekend everyone!! Hopefully I'll be up to some more "Pinteresting" soon, and I'll have more to blog about!! :-)

Love you guys!