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Wednesday, February 29, 2012

Still Organizing My Kitchen

Yesterday when I wrote about organizing my kitchen pantry, I still had more work to do.  The pantry, or at least that's what I call the tall cabinet in our kitchen, houses most of our can goods.  The cabinet to the right of it houses most of our boxed food.  Well, that cabinet was in need of some organization too.
Here is what it looked like before:

Tuesday, February 28, 2012

Mounds Brownies and Pantry Organization

I've been making some new desserts recently.  You can read about the other things I've made HERE and HERE.  Last night for Family Home Evening, we had Mounds Brownies for dessert.

I found the recipe HERE over at Katrina's Kitchen.


And the verdict is.....

Monday, February 27, 2012

Organizing My Food Storage

Thanks for stopping by. If you'd like to keep up with all of our craziness, be sure to follow along using one of the options on the right sidebar.

Today I'm going to show you how I organize my food storage.

Our church encourages us to be prepared and have a basic supply of food, water and money in savings.  You can read more about that HERE.  Today I'll show you how I organized my food storage.  We are still working on it, and try to stock up on items we use often.  We buy it when it's on sale or in bulk.  Usually we come home from the grocery store and just pile up the cans and boxes in the basement, thinking we'll get around to organizing it later.  Well, this is what it was looking like before I organized it:

Friday, February 24, 2012

Inspiration For The Weekend - 7

 It's another addition of "Inspiration For The Weekend".  Where I feature ideas and cool projects that I might be inspired to do over the weekend.  There are so many wonderful ideas out there, and it seems like I'm in a family photo mood.  I've been wanting to get some cute pictures of my kids blown up and display them in a fun creative way.  Here are a few great ideas I've found.


I am thinking of doing something like this in my upstairs hallway.
idea found HERE



Thursday, February 23, 2012

An Organized Dresser

Sweetie Pie has a lot of clothes,  and they get all messed up in her dresser drawers when she digs through them to find something to wear.  I've been looking for a better way to organizer her clothes in her drawers.

Becky over at Organizing Made Fun has found a great way to fit more clothes in your dresser drawers AND make it easy to see what clothes you have.


Wednesday, February 22, 2012

A Jumping Good Bargain

Last week I bought a trampoline.  It's one of those mini trampolines and it has a handle.  I have been looking for this type of trampoline for several months and finally found a good deal on one.


Tuesday, February 21, 2012

Not Your Ordinary Ice Cream Sandwich

Since I wasn't too pleased with last week's FHE treat, I thought I'd try to redeem myself by having ice cream sandwiches for last night's FHE dessert.
These were no ordinary ice cream sandwiches and they were delicious.
I found this recipe for cake and ice cream sandwiches from Laura over at Come Together Kids.

Monday, February 20, 2012

I Can Do Hard Things

As mentioned on Friday's post, I had plans to use the quote:

I CAN DO HARD THINGS

We are currently working with Sweetie Pie on 3 areas that need improvement: 
trying new foods/eating dinner,
being nice to her brother, and
cleaning. 

We even made up a simple chart using graph paper and hung it on the side of the fridge to help her keep track of when she does these things. 


Friday, February 17, 2012

Inspiration For The Weekend - 6

So on Fridays I do a post called "Inspiration for the weekend".  I feature ideas and cool projects that I might be inspired to do over the weekend.  There are so many wonderful ideas out there, I just thought I'd share some of the things I like.

Today's inspiration comes from an article found in the March 2010 Friend magazine.
The title of the article is called "I Can Do Hard Things"

I thought that was a pretty cool quote and searched for some sort of wall art or printable over at Pinterest.
Here are a few that I found:


this free printable is found HERE


this printable is found HERE


and this conversation block I found on Pinterest HERE and is being sold on etsy for $6.00

All of those are cute and they've given me an idea. 
I have plans for this quote and hopefully I'll get it done this weekend so I can show you on Monday.

Thursday, February 16, 2012

Another Sewing Project Completed

I'm on a sewing kick.  First Sweetie Pie and I sewed her 100th day project for school, then I sewed the girls matching princess skirts, and now I've completed their Easter/Spring dresses.

I mentioned in this post HERE about the fabric Sweetie Pie picked out.


Wednesday, February 15, 2012

Matching Skirts

Last week I mentioned I was making matching skirts for the girls HERE and got them almost done.  Just needed some more elastic. 


Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Our Valentine's FHE

As promised from yesterdays' post, I am back with the details of how our Valentine's Day themed Family Home Evening activity went.

I thought I'd make a good dinner, and by good I mean something the kids will eat.  That way they will be able to have plenty of this yummy treat I made.  We had fried chicken and homemade french fries.  The fries were not the hit I thought they'd be, and after some whinning and crying, the kids finally ate one so they could earn their Family Home Evening treat.

Here's the run down of our FHE:

Monday, February 13, 2012

Valentines Day FHE

With tomorrow being Valentine's Day, I thought we'd do a Valentine's themed Family Home Evening (FHE) tonight.

I saw this 'trails of love' activity over at Junk in their Trunk and decided to do my own version.


I'm going to use small patterned pieces of paper instead of candy as the trail.  I've been thinking about this for the last week and am excited to try it.  Maybe more excited than the kids will be to actually do it, we'll see.
I'll give you an update with how it went tomorrow.


What fun things do you have planned for Valentine's Day?

Friday, February 10, 2012

Inspiration For The Weekend - 5

I've got another Valentine's Day craft for you today.

Check out last weeks Inspiration For The Weekend to see how to make heart shaped paper clips.  They'd go well with this little notebook and make a cute gift for a sweet little girl.


Lucy over at Craftberry Bush made this cute little Valentine's Notebook.  Check out how she did it HERE.

This is such a cute idea.  You could put on different colored felt and cut the notebook in a different shape to make notebooks for other occassions.  How about something for the boys like a soccer ball, baseball,  or basketball.  What about egg shaped for Easter, or maybe get real fancy and do a flower shaped one?  Or you could not cut the notebook at all and just decorate it with felt for a personalized look.

Thursday, February 9, 2012

Sew Ambitious

I worked on the girls matching skirts mentioned HERE and finished Sweetie Pie's, but didn't have enough elastic to make one for the Babes.  I just bought elastic from Walmart and it came in a one yard package, but it wasn't enough for both girls.  So I headed over to Joann Fabrics last night and picked up more elastic - they sell it by the yard, so I got 5 yards.  That should do me for a while.  Don't know what I'll make with it.


Anyway, while at Joann's I had Sweetie Pie pick out some fabric so I can try my hand at making the girls matching dresses.  I was thinking of getting some winter or Christmas themed fabric on clearance but we saw this and decided to make some Easter/Spring shirts or dresses.  I don't have a pattern, I'm just going to use a dress or shirt they have to see what I come up with.  I'll keep you posted.  And I'll post pics of the skirts when I get the little one done.

Wednesday, February 8, 2012

Holey Moley






So I've had this mop/broom organizer for a while, a couple of  months actually, and yesterday I finally got around to putting it up.

It took way longer than I thought to hang that darn thing, but I perservered and got it done.












It attaches to the wall with five screws.  So that means I had to drill five 1/4 inch holes:


Then according to the directions I was to hammer in five plastic anchors.  Which I did.
The next step should have been easy, just place the organizer over the holes and screw in the screws.
But as in so many DIY projects, it's rarely easy....

Tuesday, February 7, 2012

A Spy and a Pickpocket

The other day I was watching the movie Never After with all three kids.  I thought it would have been some nice family time, snuggling up together.  The kids had a different idea.

Well, actually the Babes was more interested in my coat pockets than the movie.
Yeah, she was being a little pickpocket.  My gloves and keys had been taken and were laying on the floor.  And in true pickpocket fashion, she was too quick for me to get a picture of her.

The Spencinator decided to wear his spy glasses. I don't know, maybe it made the movie better.

And where was Sweetie Pie?  She was a little scared, you know how those fairy tales always have to have a villain.  She decided to watch from upstairs.

How does your family watch a movie together?

Monday, February 6, 2012

100th day of school

The 100th day of school is coming up.  In fact it is tomorrow.  A week or two ago, Sweetie Pie's first grade teacher sent home a note about making 100th day projects.  She wants the kids to use 100 objects to make something creative.  She doesn't want 100 things in  a bag.

I remember doing this for the Spencinator in first and second grade.  My favorite was his second grade project, it made me laugh.  The teacher sent home a very large paper hat and he had to decorate it with 100 things.  He chose to punch 100 holes in it.  Ha ha!

OK, back to what Sweetie Pie had to create.  She decided all on her own that she wanted to sew something and have 100 stitches.  How creative is that.  She told me a couple of the other kids ideas like 100 noodles on a string for a necklace, or 100 noodles glued to paper to make a rainbow.  I may be biased but I think hers is by far the most creative.

Friday, February 3, 2012

Inspiration For The Weekend - 4

With Valentine's Day coming up soon, I thought I'd share a cute idea by Jessica over at How About Orange. 

These heart shaped paperclips look so easy to make. 




Check out her easy tutorial HERE
This would be great not only for Valentine's Day, but for anniversaries too.
You could even give a set with a favorite book as a teacher gift.

Thursday, February 2, 2012

Be Prepared

I like to be prepared.   I'm a planner too, so maybe it comes with the territory.  While I'm not prepared for everything, I like to take some preventative measures to make my life easier.  So when the stomach bug hit our house a few days ago, starting with the Spencinator and making its way around to nearly every member in our family.  I wanted to make cleaning up all that puke as easy as possible.  Sleeping with buckets or trashcans by our beds for a few days was the norm.  You know, just in case you got sick in the middle of the night.


But what do you do for a baby who sleeps in a crib and can't get to the bucket if she starts to get sick in the middle of the night.....

Wednesday, February 1, 2012

Shoe Organization

When I reorganized the laundry room closet in THIS post, I needed to do something about all those shoes.