living the GOOD life: all the other stuff :)

Sunshine

I wouldn't be surprised if I'm not the only one who could relate to this post.

Take a minute to read it. And then take a minute to let the sun shine for you.

(edit: Wow, I just re-read that last sentence. Ignore the cheesiness, please.)

Jul 31, 2010 11:09:45 AM | all the other stuff :)

Why I love Craig's List (and Goodwill. And yard sales.)

(Other possible titles for this post: "Why my love for spray paint is justified" or "Proof that buying a paint sprayer is a good investment"or "Buying new is dumb." Get the point?)

This morning, I slept in. Actually, I got up at 8:30, but lately, that is totally sleeping in, big time. And actually, I was awake for the last 45 minutes. And I was looking around my bedroom, and got curious about how much we had actually spent on furnishing said bedroom. The curiosity continued, so I tallied up the entire house.

Ready for this?

If we don't count the piano and Kevin's massive TV, we have only spent $4,000 furnishing our ENTIRE HOUSE. Spread out over 8 and 1/2 years.

We have a pretty good sized house, you know. And if I do say so myself, I think our house is pretty cute.

That includes beds, dressers, couches, love seats, chairs, tables, desks, futon, shelves, entertainment center, end tables, bedside tables, ottoman, benches, lamps, and yes, the ping pong table.

The majority of that budget was spent in the family room, because as I've mentioned before, I prefer new couches. And really, most of the furniture in there was bought new. So that accounts for about half of that $4,000.

See why I can't bring myself to buy a dining set for $600, when I paid $30 for ours?

And why when I see a little girl's bedroom set listed on Craig's List for $1,900, and see that they originally paid $4,000 for it, I am a little disgusted? Especially since Emily's furniture is WAY cuter, and I paid less than $100 for all of it.

Jul 28, 2010 9:05:51 AM | all the other stuff :), Home

just a few of the things making me happy right now

1. a little girl who has decided she loves to vacuum.

2. two little blond heads hugging on my legs.

3. fresh veggies from my garden.

Jul 13, 2010 8:34:41 PM | all the other stuff :)

Hello from Florida

This is the view from where we are staying.

Does it get any better than this?

Kevin's first appointment at the Mayo Clinic is first thing in the morning.

Much more later.

But first, one last thing:

People are amazing. Never lose faith in the people of this world, because there is so much good out there.

Jun 27, 2010 8:14:24 PM | all the other stuff :)

Our summer so far...

Ben is not a fan of his swimming suit. At all. In fact, it rather irks him that we make him wear anything in the pool at all. That includes floaties or a life jacket. He also doesn't want us to hold him in the pool, at all. Our solution? We stay home and he plays with the hose.

Emily lost her first tooth! The tooth fairy forgot the come the first night, but made up for it the second.

Only my husband would think this new toy was a necessity. About four feet tall, one of the kids can sit inside of there and roll down the hill...or through the house...or down the street. You know, whatever. It currently resides in my front room. Very practical, no? But very, very fun.

By the way, we had to blow up each of those sections separately. It took us 45 minutes.

Aww, isn't he cute?

No. He's not. Not at all. He's a screaming, crying, tantrum-throwing tiny monster who has kidnapped my Benson. Please tell me this will all be over soon? I would honestly estimate that he spends 60% of his waking moments crying. Why? We don't beat him, if that's what you're wondering. We just don't let him do whatever he wants, whenever he wants to. We are super, duper mean parents.

In other news:

We leave for Florida a week from tomorrow!! Mayo Clinic sounds better and better with every minute that I have to listen to Ben scream.

The kids went to Vacation Bible School (VBS) at the church that Emily went to preschool at. It was interesting, to say the least. I will just say, their form of worship was a completely new experience for me. But the kids really, really loved it. They learned bible stories, sang, did crafts and played games. Plus, they had a space theme, so Daniel was happy. However, when the kids were all trying to see who could yell, "Our God is good, praise God!" the loudest (and boy, they were loud!), Daniel told the boy sitting next to him, "Heavenly Father wants us to be reverent, so I'm not going to shout like that."

Jun 19, 2010 9:35:26 PM | all the other stuff :), our FAMILY of SIX

A "My anatomy test is done and I finally have time to blog!" post

Did you know it's summer?

Mother Nature doesn't. Well, she has the hot, hot, hot part down. Oh, and the humidity. Definitely has that down.

But sunshine? Well, apparently sunshine must be followed by severe thunderstorms. Thunderstorms that tear branches off the trees in back of our house and scatter 8 foot limbs all over our lawn. Storms that blow our chair from our front yard into the street where they are in turn run over.

I'm not really complaining. I love it.

But the kids wish we could go swimming more.

Jun 19, 2010 8:57:49 PM | all the other stuff :)

Lame excuse for a blog post

I still have soccer pictures to post.

My Utah trip to blog about.

Tons of family pictures.

I definitely need to do a post about Vacation Bible School.

Will get to those later. Maybe.

In other news:

Emily tested into a regular Kindergarten class! A little bummed she won't be in the all day, every day class, but so SO proud of her! She is a whiz with reading and math now, it's amazing!

I've become reacquainted with my pre-Benson weight.We are now working on pre-Jacob. I hope to become close friends with that one, soon. To put that into perspective for all my friends and family out of state, if the last time you saw me was Mike's wedding a year ago then I have lost 30 pounds. If the last time you saw me was earlier this spring, then I have lost 15 pounds. Total lost since Ben was born: 60 pounds (Yes, I gained 60 pounds with him, as I did with Daniel and Jacob. Don't judge me.) I guess you have to take away his 8 pounds, and all the other birth stuff, but that still puts me around 40-45 pounds LOST. And they are never, ever coming back.

Brownsburg Relief Society meeting, next Tuesday at 7pm. BE THERE! Our church grounds are embarrassing, so you better come help us fix that.

The weather right now is awesome. It has been raining every day, but it will rain for a few hours, then be sunny, then rain again. Huge lightening and thunder storms, and even a tornado warning last night. As long as I get in my two or three hours of sunshine a day, I would love for it to rain every single day.

I went to the library this morning and studied for three hours. I only got through a chapter and a half of anatomy. We shall see if it did any good when I take my first test on Saturday.

AND, now I am going to go study some more.

Jun 15, 2010 4:38:02 PM | all the other stuff :)