The Simple Life

catching up...

slowly trying to catch up my pictures and happenings on here.

and on my photo blog too, i think it's easier to do it all at the end of the month!

yard work...

levi pruned the trees in the front yard...and took out a couple of them too, his friend steve was here to help too. i raked up the leaves in the front yard. not looking forward to the back. i lost count how many times i raked the leaves last fall...then i said i'll leave the rest for the spring. well...now it's here and i want it cleaned up but i don't want to do it all!

we had lunch outside, i had to bring their little table out, the picnic table is buried in storage.

levi made chicken teriyaki sandwiches for lunch. i mixed two recipes from pinterest to make the potato slices.

anthony loved standing in the holes where the trees used to be! little prairie dog!

ouch...

this is what happens when i tell levi to take anthony and stand at the back of the church. instead he took him outside, and he fell down the steps and scraped his face up! geez...

still he's pretty handsome...

and now nineteen months old!

fresh eggs...

our neighbors asked if we could take care of their chickens for the weekend, and of course the girls were excited! and scared of the rooster...isa has already been pecked on last week! so far we still counted 13...they come home tonight.

we went to check for eggs after we got out of church...we found 2, gulianna was scared to grab one because one of the chickens was sitting in the coop. but then she was excited because it was an aqua one. her favorite color!

i wanted a picture of both of them holding the eggs...here isa is pouting because gulianna got the aqua one...geeez! soon we will have our own chickens...i can see the egg fights and yolk every where now...well probably once anthony gets involved.

actually isa was very careful with hers. they brought them home and washed them forever. i told them that we have to gather the eggs otherwise they will turn into little baby chicks if the mom's sit on them for a long time! ever since then gulianna has been opening up the fridge every 5 minutes checking on her egg! now she just wants her egg back so she can carry it every where!

today...

i usually dislike bringing snacks to church. and toys.

one...shouldn't really be eating in church.

two...it annoys me.

three...i don't like the mess people leave behind.

 i once saw a lady whip out a full course meal out of her picnic cooler on wheels diaper bag. it was ridiculous, yet entertaining to see what she was actually going to pull out next. if i remember right she started of with yogurt and granola. then she moved on to mini sandwiches and crackers...complete with capri suns, and i can't remember what they had for dessert but i was almost sure she was going to pull out the china and serve cheesecake. i bet she serves her casserole during her date night at the movies!honestly people! stay home if you are that starving!

and the toys. ugh! don't get me started on the toys. they are a distraction to everyone...and they just make your kids louder NOT quieter. i also remember watching a little boy set up a full train track and train in the back of church. no i'm not exaggerating...complete train set. i did my share and gave her a few looks. well, she deserved it! i guess if your kid absolutely can't survive sitting in church, please don't allow them to bring a battery operated toy!

yes i'm the mean mother that doesn't bring toys to entertain my children during church. they are to sit there and listen and sing and pray when they are supposed to. that is how i trained them and that is what they will do! for the most part they are good, occasionally they fight over the hymn books if they don't have their own.

last week gulianna sat in the front singing with the primary and isa thought she was going up to sing as well. i told her it was just gulianna and she had to sit with me. we had front row seats to keep an eye on gulianna. bad idea. after they would sing she would throw a fit and loudly yell "no, that's my jesus. that's my jesus song." most people thought it was kinda funny...i was ready to beat her! i tried to grab her arm but in her never whispering voice she yells "ouch...your hurting my arm. don't touch me!" can you believe it!?

anthony is one busy boy. so we've been bringing either cereal or goldfish crackers. today was goldfish. my girls know that whatever we bring is for him only...but then they get there and they act like they're starving to death. hello...you just had breakfast and hour ago...and isa most likely had something in nursery.

any way, so here he was sitting happily eating the last of his goldfish and isa starts whining that she wants some. "no they are for anthony." the second she starts making a scene i tell her she can have one. then she pouts. i tell her to hurry because they are almost all gone. she still pouts. finally when she is ready, she is happy again and eager to grab a goldfish and there is ONE left. they both stare it down and then arms come flying to grab that last goldfish...when suddenly the heavens open and split the goldfish perfectly in half and they each got a piece. see? just as jesus fed the multitude with a few loaves of bread and a couple fish; a miracle happened in church as they both contently ate their share of one tiny goldfish.

and then it was over because it was the last one.

too bad that miracle only lasted a couple seconds.

 

freshly bathed...

all clean and ready for bed! gulianna and isa sure got some sun these past two days, almost a little too much!

isabella isn't pictured, she'd rather pout instead!

gulianna "mom take a picture of my scary face!"

anthony "she's crazy."

work in progress...

starting today? ugh...everytime i open this door, i shut it!

this is my future scrapbooking room...aka the "sun room." before it was used to house however many dogs...and they used it as their bathroom too. levi ripped out the carpet, or "furrpet" as i like to call it, swept it and then colton unloaded all my stuff in here. actually no that's not how it went. he was suppose to unload it here, instead he put the trailer load of stuff that didn't need to go in here. and all my stuff went in the chicken coop. ya i remember now. i was mad. so i had to switch everything, and dig for my scrapbooking stuff it was completely piled high in the other storage place. aka chicken coop.

anyway...this is where it is now. since i've been trying to scrapbook i've had to go through every box to find what i needed. first up was photo printer paper...then my tools, then my stamps...etc...so everything is everywhere now.

my job is to clear it out so levi can start to work on it. finally! new wiring and sheetrock, this will be the only room that has "real" walls...sheetrock, everything else is cheap woodpanelling fake walls. levi wanted me to move it all to the chicken coop, but there is no way it is all going to fit over there, it's completely full! so either i stack it all in my bedroom...OR...i move my hutch into the house right next to the kitchen table...yep, that's what i'm doing. actually it is what i was going to do when we started moving furniture in and he said no way! hmmm....

the only problem is that my big black hutch is 7 ft 3/8 inch tall and this room is 6 ft 11 inches tall...can you believe it!? so i'm sure hoping that when he rips off the hideous ceiling...we will have some room to work with? please i hope so, or i guess were cutting an inch off my hutch. there is a lot of windows...i have to decide which one(s) to cover up. i need some wall space for my decor. but i will love all the light to work in!

remodeling...as you can afford it...ugh, such a pain. i envy people that have money and can remodel in a matter of weeks, instead of months... without waiting! oh well...at least we are out of debt. almost...paying off our car loan this fall! enough complaining...i know i know.

ok...off to tackle this mess.

lost & found 2 scrapbook pages...

more scrapbook pages for jen over at the project girl!

you know that little strip on the bottom of the 12×12 patterned papers that shows the pattern on the back side? well i love to use that on my pages! sometimes if i only have that one sheet, but need another little piece to coordinate, this works perfect! and i added that cute little bicycle stamp, fits perfect in that little collage on the patterned paper.

i found that my butterfly stamp is just about the same size as my butterfly punch…so i layered the punch on top of the stamp! love it!

this "19" sticker worked perfect for my page...isabella and anthony are 19 months apart!

products used: my mind's eye lost & found 2, heidi swapp stamps.

green...

*saturday night just as i was starting this post, levi came walking in the house with crutches...in pain, we thought he broke his leg, he fell through the top stair at his mom's place, luckily his workbelt caught and he didn't fall all the way down. he's fine now, so glad no broken bones, just very bruised!

our "chocolate treats" didn't last but a couple days...in this house!

we got up at 7 this morning to go and get our bountiful basket! finally! i've been wanting to order these since we lived in rigby. gulianna was so excited, she wanted to go, but when the morning came, she was sound asleep. i woke her up and told her she could stay, but she insisted on going!

we've had such warm weather the past couple weeks! in the upper 50's, saturday it was 61 degrees! our grass is starting to turn green, and it's really green over by the wood pile. can't wait for summer!

bountiful baskets...

finally! here's are produce from our first bountiful basket.

$15 bucks! +$8.50 for the "mexican pack"

can't wait for more! check it out http://bountifulbaskets.org

 

more scrapbook pages...

here's my layouts i created with the march kit from express the moment.

when i start to scrapbook the first thing i do is pull out my photos that i want to work with...i look at the photos and see what colors i can pull.

from there i start collecting paper first, then embellishments that coordinate. i lay it all out together and then start building my page. sometimes i already have an idea or a certain look i want to create, other times i just start from scratch.

for this one i knew exactly how i wanted it to look!

it's now one of my favorites!

i LOVE these page protectors, you can add lots of photos!

i added more embellishments on top with pop dots for more dimension!

i win!

it always pays to enter contests and giveaways!

design house digital had there 'mad march memories blog hop' this past weekend with lots of fun giveaways on their designer's blogs...and i won on gennifer bursett's!

i won! and my name is first :)

pretty exciting! and her's is the one i wanted to win the most!

so for the next couple of month's i get to be a guest designer on her creative team! lucky lucky!

yay ME! ...that's me sounding like london tipton...ha ha!

matching...

i tend to "screen capture" my blog when the top photo matches my banner! like yesterday...

here's a couple more i had saved...

it's hard for me to have a general blog look...i love to change it up every month or so!

lucky page...

here the 12x12 page i was scrapbooking yesterday for the project girl...

more details on jen's blog!

products: everything is my mind's eye lost & found 2, alphabet stamps are heidi swapp.

scrappin'...

working on my layout for jen allyson!

post will be up tomorrow at the project girl blog!

still here...

i thought that since we got our internet again...i'd be blogging a lot more...NOT.

what do i do ALL day?! ha ha!

working on projects, taking care of kids, cleaning, changing diapers...etc. life! i finally made isabella an apron that i've been promising since last fall. i made gulianna one when we moved here...and then i never made hers. she loves it! hung up are pictures in the laundry room this morning.

i'm going to do laundry today, ugh! i've never really been "behind" on laundry...i just take a day and wash everything, once a week...but lately i haven't been wanting to be in our little laundry room. the furnace closet stinks, as well as the hole in the floor that is covered up with a board and some carpet scraps. can't wait til levi gets the tile done! how many times have i said that? so...i have a lot of clothes to wash, from the past couple of weeks. doesn't help that the girls think they have to change twenty times a day!

i'm going work on some layouts for jen allyson this afternoon...and maybe sew another apron. but then i look outside and it's been so nice i should be painting bed frames and sanding doors! we'll see how many things i can start on today...