Walkin' in High Cotton

I don’t really have a post prepared for today. Last night Mr. Fix-It got off early, and we ate dinner early, and the kids all got in the shower early, and we had early bedtime with a book…

And you’re wondering how on earth this equates to me not having time to write, right? Well, we sat down and watched a movie together instead of just vegging out on the couch–which would usually be my writing time. It was a glorious, quiet evening–although the movie wasn’t all that great and our remote control is being funny so the volume was a little LOUD-soft-LOUD-soft the whole time.

All this long-winded personal life story is just to say this–I don’t have a blogging schedule, so I don’t have a real post today.

But I’m working on one! (Thanks for the inspiration, Aurie!) And I’m excited by how it’s going so far.

In the meantime, I thought I would share a couple other blog links that I think you might enjoy.

I don’t know about you, but I love reading about big families. And I’m not talking about our little 5-some, I mean big families!

One reason is that big families have to come up with solutions, or drown. Us smaller families sometimes can muddle through a lot longer in the chaos before we really give up. Mom’s of Many (I love that “title”!) have lots of experience and tips to share!

And one of my favorite groups to follow is 4 Moms, 35 Kids every 4th Thursday of the month, from Raising Olives, Life in a Shoe, Smockity Frocks, and The Common Room.

They’re all Christian, homeschooling, large families and they chat about everything from biblical dating models to haircuts and nail clipping.

This week, my favorite question/answer is from Connie over at Smockity Frocks:

Q: How do you deal with grooming? Do you trim nails on a schedule or just when your kids looks like Wolverine? Same with haircuts. 

A: I go with the Wolverine method, trying to double check everyone before church on Sundays. Our goal is to have no more than one at a time who looks like a ragamuffin. It usually works.

That’s real, folks. That’s mom advice from in the trenches. That’s the kind of motherhood I can understand and feel encouraged by. A little bit of humor, a whole lot of love, and everything else sorta falls into place.

I really encourage you to look them up. I peruse their blogs regularly and you’ll find them on my Links I Love page.

Have a good weekend!

Tags: blogging, large family, links, organization

I’ve always been a book lover and a reader, but the last few years it’s come in spurts.

Sometimes I just don’t seem to have the time or I’m totally exhausted and just want to mindlessly veg out with my few moments of spare time. Other times I can’t seem to get my nose out of a book and you’ll find me snatching a few paragraphs in line at the bank, while waiting for my lunch to heat in the microwave, or even while Mr. Fix-It is filling up the truck with gas. (I can not read while riding in the car. It makes my normal car sickness 1000 times worse! I can barely stand to read a map while riding.)

But this year I’m inspired and determined!

{This whole post, by the way, is totally inspired by Monica over at Homesteading by Faith. She is just as crazy busy as I am, but she manages to read and cook from scratch and redecorate her house and blog about it all too…Such an inspiration!}

This is my reading list for 2012.

I’ve already started The Money Saving Mom’s Budget by Crystal Paine and Good Girls Don’t Have to Dress Bad by Shari Braendel and am rolling right through them. They’re excellent! They both have a very down to earth, conversational style that makes them easy to read and easy for me to connect with.

I’ve started updating my Links I Love page, by the way. If you’re wondering how I picked some of these, those are the blogs and ladies that inspire me. Most of these were recommended at one time or another by them.

The whole stack is non-fiction. I don't find myself reading as much new fiction any more--just my old favorites. Every once in a while I'll try something new by a favorite author and try it.

There’s gardening books, crafting and business books, homemaking books, and a couple family and marriage books. I found some used, two at the thrift store, and then I went through my shelves while doing this house-wide purge and found a bunch of practically brand new books that I must have bought a while ago and just never got around to.

I did manage to fit the whole stack on the bottom of my nightstand–which I then covered with a pretty flower fabric so that Mr. Fix-It wouldn’t see how many were under there. Now the top is nice and neat for a change. Mr. Fix-It doesn’t mind the books themselves so much as he does the piles everywhere.

I came across this lovely figurine that was a Christmas ornament, and now decorates my nightstand.

I’m also joining Aurie over at Our Good Life to read the bible in 90 days, starting February 1st. I figure that gives me enough time to either read it again or read a good bible study later in the year. (Who would imagine I would be talking about reading the whole bible more than once in a year?!)

What do you like to read?

Tags: books, faith

I talked before about hitting our upstairs projects hard while I was home for 4 days a few weeks ago. We’ve kept at it, although things have slowed down a little bit since I’m back at work. Since our upstairs is basically the kids rooms with the Playroom in between, we’ve been working back and forth through them all instead of working one room at a time. This has really helped with my “shop our house first” budget and we’re still making good progress!

This use to be the boys room.

Now it looks like this!

We stacked the boys bunk beds again–but this time there’s no crib in the room and I’m amazed how much space they suddenly have!

When we bought the Ladybug’s first bed, we made some long-range decisions about furniture buying that we’ve stuck with–and been happy with! We decided to go ahead and just get her a true “big girl bed” (a twin, with a twin mattress and box springs) rather than a toddler bed that would use her crib mattress and then turn around and get another crib mattress for the Cowboy coming behind her and then turn around and have to get her another bed and mattress anyway. We got some adjustable bed rails from Target and her transition was smooth as silk.

The boys have even been making their beds every morning. Well, we call it "straightening" because they can pull the covers up, but they can't tuck anything in by themselves.

When we found out that the Speedracer was coming along right behind the Cowboy, we decided we were going to do the same thing (for the same reasons), but that eventually the boys were going to need bunk beds in that little room. So we bought bunk beds and set them up and the Cowboy slept on the bottom with a rail, and Speedracer was across the room in the crib.

Those weekly clothes hangers are lifesavers--and the perfect divider for a shared closet! Although I haven't figured out the 5 day week thing yet. Don't we wear clothes on the weekends too?

However; when we decided to move Speedracer out of the crib, we didn’t feel that the Cowboy was old enough to sleep on the top bunk yet. So we took the bunk beds down and went to two beds. No problem.

And now we’ve stacked them again and the Cowboy is sleeping on top (and he loves it!)

See the sloped ceiling? That's a problem in our whole upstairs. My father in law added that side shelf for me and we use it for hand-me-downs, sleeping bags, and off season clothes.

Here’s the tricky part about modern bunk beds if you’re in the market–MOST OF THEM DON’T UN-STACK. I’m not kidding. Being able to unstack them and each of the boys eventually have their own bed was a big deal to me and we shopped high and low for ones that actually unstack into two separate beds. Most of them are not designed to do that. I was surprised.

Actually, it was also hard to find twin-over-twin because apparently everyone has a huge house and most of them are twin-over-full.

Most of them are also cheaply made, fake wood, or hollow metal. Not at all what I remember of our bunk beds growing up.

Ours are twin-over-twin Kendall bunk beds by Pottery Barn.

Expensive? Yes. (Although we got them on clearance because they discontinued that color which saved us a couple hundred, and we got free shipping and set up with a coupon, plus we purchased online so we got 3% back to Upromise savings.)

Quality? Yes.

More hand-me-down storage, sorted by size.

If you can afford it (or save up for them) I would highly recommend them. They are real wood, and they are solid, and they are nice stacked or individual. And don’t forget that since they unstack you’re actually getting two beds. If you divide the price in half, you’ll see that they’re not too far off of a regular furniture store price for a single bed.

This is going to set the tone for our new decorating scheme.

Now I have to think about using that empty space. Desk? Shelves for toys and books? I’m wondering if we can consolidate the boys into one dresser rather than two. Still so much to do!

Tags: boys, decorating, family time, organizing

I went to wrap Speedracer’s birthday presents on Saturday and it turns out that we didn’t have any more tape.

He acted shy about pictures at first.

So I headed to my gift bag stash.

The Ladybug was his gift-opening assistant.

And we didn’t have any gift bags big enough for a couple of his presents.

He just got a glimpse of the next one...

So great, what now?

When all else fails, use ribbon. That’s my new motto.

A few glue dots and some ribbon and we were good to go.

We replaced the stick horse Penny ate with a stick-DRAGON. He even roars!

He asked for a green ice cream cake. It wasn’t the most creative cake I’ve come up with, but it fit the request. You just make a filling of whip cream, chopped-up Oreo cookies, hot fudge, and pudding mix and spread it between layers of ice cream sandwiches. Then you frost the whole thing with whip cream and freeze it for several hours. Tastes yummy.

And he got a remote controlled tank--which has been busy running over everything in sight.

His special birthday dinner was…drumroll please…peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and chips! It was one of the easiest birthday dinners I’ve done yet!

And who doesn't love to get batteries for their birthday?!

It was a good evening with family. They got to play with his new toys and they’ve been galloping around the house on their stick-transports every moment they’ve been home. (Boy, I’m tired of that roaring dragon head already.)

We also continued our home revamp this weekend. We scrubbed the kitchen from top to bottom, and then stacked the boys bunk beds. They’ve been having a blast playing that the bottom bunk in the inside of a covered wagon and they have to peek out around the corner to shoot the bad guys. I’ll have more pictures of how our 3-room upstairs re-fresh project is coming along tomorrow.

But I have a question for you–how do you do birthday parties? I keep going back and forth about not over-doing it, or under-acknowledging it. I don’t think we’ve quite hit on what works best for us, yet–as a family tradition or as part of our household budget. I’d love to hear how you make it work.

Tags: birthday, family time, family traditions, Speedracer

Would you like to take a walk with me? I’ll tell you a story.

A story about a little boy who just turned 4 on Sunday. And the momma who’s still crying about it–on the inside.

He was a surprise for us.

So was his dark hair.

We were expecting those blue eyes though.

They’re sort of a family tradition.

We didn’t pick his name until just before he was born, in the labor and delivery room that morning. It surprised our Doctor when we said we hadn’t decided yet. Grayson or Waylon?

She had also delivered our other two, so she felt pretty confident in telling us her opinion on our short list. “Grayson? Where did that come from? You can’t have a Ruby and and a Wyatt and a Grayson.”

I think she was right. Too many baby name books. We decided to go with our gut.

I didn’t expect the spelling and pronunciation to be quite so challenging for so many people, though. Everyone loves to add a D. And an E. And apparently if that doesn’t work, you can always throw in another A or two.

And I laugh because folks always ask “like Waylon Jennings?”

“Yep, it’s spelled just like that”… [glance down at the paper] ...”and apparently you don’t know much about him either.” {grin}

I’ve been told that he has “the baby” syndrome. I don’t necessarily see that.

I have noticed that he doesn’t like to do chores.

And tends to pout his way into one of his siblings helping him with, well, everything.

And that he thinks he owns my lap and has no qualms about telling someone else to “Move, Wy-att!”

But I think it’s more about the dimples than his age.

He has his father’s dimples.

Mr. Fix-It’s simply immune to them because he’s spent so many years on the other side of them, and he just takes their powers for granted. Those who have dimples can’t appreciate what it does to those of us who don’t.

The baby years are special, but these pre-school years are amazing too.

This time of discovering who he is and what he likes.

Watching him pull back and think and decide if he’s going to be a leader or a follower with other kids…this one is really interesting around here since both if his siblings are born leaders. (The Ladybug is a group/social leader type, and the Cowboy is a trail-blazing, independent leader type.)

I read a lot about parenting these days. I want to do a good job. (And I can use all the help I can find!) But I’m so…flabbergasted by all the writing about how not to lose yourself in your role as mother. How to maintain your own identity while mothering. I really struggle to understand this perspective because balance is certainly critical and we are all multidimensional beings, but it seems that people tend to portray motherhood as a job.

Motherhood is not something I do.

From the very first time I felt that tiny little fluttering kick inside, Mother is something I became.

Is there more to me than just motherhood? Yes. But there’s no me outside of being a mother. From the moment the Ladybug was conceived, I become a mother who…cooks, a mother who works, a mother who crafts, a mother who farms…just as after my wedding I became a wife with every hobby and personality quirk and professional skill. There is no me separate from who I am as a wife–or as a mother.

Only by fully embracing motherhood as part of my personality, of my self, rather than as a temporary role I play, can I find both balance and fulfillment.

And I can’t believe it’s taken me so long to figure this out!

Happy Birthday, my Speedracer!

Look how much you’ve taught me in your 4 years!

Tags: birthday, motherhood, Speedracer, work life balance

Remember my little list from yesterday? My “refresh myself” list?

Yep, did that.

Feeling better already.

Here's a random picture I found that made me smile and brush away tears. They grow so fast! These little years won't last! I need to treasure them!

Isn’t it strange how God sends you unexpected blessings just when you need them most? We’ve been having some knock down, drag out, screaming banshee battles with our boys lately over first time obedience. Some of it’s been very ugly and heart-rending. No mother likes to see her children acting like demon-spawn and Tuesday evening was tough around here. But last night my little crew were just so good. They were helpful. They were cheerful. They were obedient…they were loading the dishwasher by themselves when I came in from the chores!

And they were loving.

Oh the hugs that were passed around…the cuddles we enjoyed on the couch…it was balm to my tired heart!

Oh yeah, and a picture of Penny looking guilty with my muck boots. Again. Apparently the Christmas toy theory didn't work.

And just for the record, I’m not far enough along in this journey to even begin to give parenting advice. But I’d like to share something I’m learning. I’m coming to understand that if it’s not first time obedience, then it’s not actually obedience at all. And the whole point of obedience to parents is that it lays the foundation for and models obedience to God. Each time I’ve reminded my children recently that we expect them to Obey Immediately, Obey Completely, and Obey Cheerfully, I’ve heard the Father whispering to my heart…“I expect you to obey immediately, obey completely, and obey cheerfully. How’s the going lately?”

Walking in our mudroom you'd think we lived in Texas!

Then at bedtime I tucked them into their nice, clean beds, in their nice, neat rooms and we whispered for a moment about more of our decorating plans. About stacking our bunk beds. About hanging cowboy pictures. About making a cushion for the new desk chair and a cover for the new sewing machine.

Pallet Shelves I saw on Pinterest. I think they might be awesome in the boys' room.

And oh, the ideas I’ve seen lately. Some of them are crazy–an actual Cinderella pumpkin carriage bed? Let’s be real.  Each to their own, I guess. But some of it is very creative and do-able. I’m looking for things that are fun, but not too theme-y or too age-specific. I want the rooms to grow with them to some degree–but not be inappropriate for them right now either. We’re not going to be re-doing them every 3 years.

Love the idea of lamps and shelves with the bunks! {credit}

But oh, I want them to like it too! I want them to be happy there. I want them to be relaxed and feel refreshed and secure when they’re there. I want it to inspire them, and make them smile to walk in. (And make them want to keep it neat and clean!) And there’s always that concern about it being my style, rather than theirs.

Don't you love the bold colors and mix of patterns? {credit}

So once again I’m feeling inspired and ready to have the weekend off to get busy again!

Question–how much do you involve (or would you involve) your kiddos in arranging and decorating their own room? What problems (or great solutions!) have come out of a “teamwork” approach with your children in something like this?

Tags: faith, family time, homemaking

I’m having a hard time keeping my enthusiasm up this week. I feel like I’ve been going hard since last weekend and I’m just tired. It’s mental and physical this time, not just mental and emotional (like usual). I’ve been trying to revamp my diet, be more active, and cut back the caffeine (again) and my poor body is just like…WHAAAAAT  ARE YOU DOING TO ME??!!

This is boys when they're supervised.

I’ve been trotting endlessly up and down the stairs with all this cleaning and organizing and my new commitment to better supervision and more family time upstairs and my legs are killing me. In a good way, so I’ve been told.

Ok, and in an effort for all honesty and soul-bearing disclosure, “trotting” sounds so light and active and lalala I’m Cinderella dancing around while I mop the floor. What I’ve been doing is huffing and puffing and dragging myself up by the handrail while hauling baskets and boxes and bags of junk (and furniture!) up and down with me.

This is boys when they're not supervisors. (Or think they're not supervised.)

Sometimes it feels like we just gallop along at 100 miles an hour until we drop dead with exhaustion.

Boy, this blog is super encouraging today, huh? {grin}

Supervised boys are helpful, productive, accomplished.

But here’s a few things I’m reminding myself to do today. Things that help me reset my mind and heart to the task before me.

• Stop and give myself 5 concentrated minutes to PRAY for my family. 5 minutes doesn’t seem like much, but I’ve found that it only takes those short intentional moments to get my mind refocused from the worldly to eternal, and from myself to others. And I tend to continue long past 5 minutes and begin multi-tasking again, but without that intentional stop, I won’t even get started.

Unsupervised boys are rough and rowdy and rambuncious.

• Give myself 5 minutes outside to just stand (or sit) and watch the animals. Not rush around and fill water buckets or throw feed or examine them for any minute indications of sickness. Just stand and watch them. Listen to them shuffle through the field. Listen to them huff and grunt and mumble to each other. Watch their ears flick and their eyes rove and their tails switch back and forth. Just watch.

Unsupervised boys are loud with laughter and giggles and grunts and FUN.

• Give myself 15 minutes (which we all know will turn into 40 minutes!) on Pinterest (won’t you come follow me?!) and BHG to glean some more inspiration for our home projects.

And one of my favorite things?

• Give myself 15 minutes to sit and organize or edit pictures. Nothing makes my heart sing like looking through pictures of our wonderful life and beautiful blessings. Sometimes it brings tears to my eyes I just feel so overwhelmed by how blessed we are. (Pray for our poor camera! I think it might be on it’s last leg and the “new camera” savings jar is not overflowing.)

I’ll be doing all of these today.

How do you reset when you get physically and emotionally out of whack?

Tags: boys, working mom balance

We are still working hard with our purge and clean and re-organize. And it’s going great. It really is. Here’s a few of the pictures I couldn’t get uploaded on Monday.  (Peruse at your own risk.)

Our upstairs consists of the Ladybug’s tiny bedroom. A small bathroom. The boys not so big room. (Seeing a theme here?) and what I guess is technically the “loft.” The open, designated space at the top of the stairs. One day it will probably be a sitting room, library, and sewing space.

But  right now, it’s the Playroom.

This chaos is what I started out with last Friday.

The upstairs is pretty kid-safe, so we tend to be a little (ok, probably a lot) lenient on them playing up there unsupervised. Our house is small. If they’re doing something they should be, you can usually hear them through the floor (or not hear them, as the case may be.)  And we do have some very firm rules we’ve enforced consistently to maintain control.

• Absolutely no playing in the bathroom. Ever. You potty, wash hands, and get out. (There was an unfortunate series of events involving toothpaste and Selsun Blue. Once.)
• Absolutely no food, snacks, gum, candy, treats, fruit, fruit snacks, leftovers, crackers, suckers, juice, juice pouches, water, water bottles, drinks, cans, cups, or other ingestable forms of anything are allowed upstairs. (There was an unfortunate series of events involving honey and Crystal Lite powered mixers. Once.)
• Absolutely no pens, pencils, colored pencils, markers, crayons, giant-overized pencils, white-board markers, chalk, paint, paintbrushes, scissors, glue, tape, glue dots, glitter pens, glitter glue pens, or any other writing utensils or craft supplies are allowed upstairs. (There was a sticker incident. Once. And a pen incident.)

The first pass eliminated everything that was trash or didn't belong upstairs to begin with. Everything broken, missing parts, or just plain ole' junk.

This mess is also a confluence of the regular holiday chaos. The keyboard belongs downstairs, but the Christmas tree was in it’s usual spot. The top of the playhouse/barn that Mr. Fix-It built them is also stacked to the ceiling with Christmas boxes that needed to be put away. And we’ve been home a lot more than usual so the playing has been far ranging and involved a wider spectrum of toys than usual. But it was still totally out of control and partially (ok, mostly) my fault from just general neglect.

Playroom messes rarely (ok, ok, never) get better if you just close your eyes and go back downstairs. (As a matter of fact, they can actually get worse and worse, if you can imagine!)

The second pass involved sorting keeps from donates, and then putting like with like.

But this post is title “Part 1″ because we’re not stopping with just neat this time. Oh no. We’re going with an all out transformation. We’re growing up over here. We’re learning new habits about how to respect our home and our possessions. We’re going to use our spaces more efficiently and simplify down to that which is precious, rather than just that which is mine. We’re going to use our spaces to encourage the growth of our minds and character, as well as enjoy ourselves.

This? Over. Gone. Done. Finished. What's new? Respecting our home and possessions.

I’ll also be writing about some of the budget-friendly steps we’re taking because our budget is very small. Very small. As in, practically nothing other than paint if we can help it. Most of our work is re-organizing and re-purposing. We’re “shopping” our own house. See that red chair? It’s going to be come our reading nook chair out by the window in the Playroom (no more little pink table and chairs).

We’re so excited. The better it looks as we go along, the more enthusiastic the kids and I are about it. More pictures to come!

Do you have any big home projects on the horizons for the New Year?

Tags: homemaking, kids, organization, playroom

Part of our time off yesterday involved getting out in the fresh air and flexing our muscles. The ones in our arms and the ones in our heads.

It was a bit chilly out there!

I love seeing all the lessons in reading and math and physics my kids pick up while we’re out there. (Science and biology are just sort of a given.)

We talked about how and why ice forms in water when it’s cold. And how ice displaces water so you have to strategically fill the buckets in the winter to maintain a supply of consumable water when the hoses are frozen.

We moved the sheep, so we had to move the water trough for them.

We talked about volume how many gallons it takes to fill the water buckets and how we calculate how much the animals are drinking based on gallons divided by number of sheep.

The kids discovered that you can't roll an oval in a straight line...

We counted noses and calculated how much feed per head, then how much feed per bag, and then how many bags per day. I was impressed with the Cowboy’s grasp of the math–but that might be because he feeds with me every day and sees how many bags we use each day.

It just goes around in a circle back to the beginning point...

I’m not sure how much of the calculating Speedracer really grasps, but he’s learned enough to count noses and count scoops with us. I think the biggest thing is to show them that what they’re learning is important and applicable to everyday life.

Even with two people pushing.

There’s also a great element of hands-on problem-solving. The Ladybug and the Cowboy tried rolling that water trough in a pointless circle a good three or four times before they gave up and tried another way. That kind of experience of getting the job done with diligence, but being open-minded to new methods in the process is just priceless.

They had to modify their strategy.

They did end up completely stumped trying to figure out how to man-handle it over the fence. (Last time they did this, the bucket was only half the size of this one.) They didn’t quite have enough muscle to heave it over the cross bar and modify the angle in mid-push to clear that last couple inches of fence wire. I swing it over for them so they could keep going.

The hose brigade.

The Ladybug also had to read the feed bags to know which was for the sheep/cows and which was for our horse. She struggles with reading and I’ve noticed that having “real” reading to do seems to encourage and motivate her a lot more. She’s very excited about some cooking projects we have coming up and I think reading the cookbook is going to be a big help for her.

I can't get over how competent and grown up my girl is sometimes.

The Cowboy’s always been my big helper, but I’ve seen some marked improvement with Speedracer lately too. I don’t know if it’s just that he’s finally maturing a little bit, or if we’re finally drilling it into him that he has to help out. But he helped unload groceries the other day (and I mean more than just dragging one loaf of bread along while howling that it’s too heavy) , and has been feeding the dog and cat without fussing lately.

It’s been a great encouragement to me. When they’re fussing and fighting about their chores I start to worry that we’re expecting to much from them. When they work well and don’t fuss, I feel like we’re on the right track.

Do you worry sometimes that you’re asking too much of your kids with their chores and expectations? This is constantly on my mind. I don’t want them to go sour on working diligently.

Tags: family time, farm chores, farming with kids

Do you get to be off for Martin Luther King, Jr. Day?

How about Lee-Jackson Day?

I’m still enjoying a Friday to Monday, 4 day weekend. Yeah!

And the kiddos only get Monday, so Friday I was home on my own. Yeah! I think.

At first I didn’t know what to do with myself, but then I started cleaning. (I’ll have pictures later this week, but right now I’m having computer/picture/blog communication issues. Yeah, lots of fun.)

And I cleaned and cleaned and cleaned. I sorted and purged. I took a truckload of clothes and toys and stuff I didn’t even realize we owned to the DAV thrift store. (That’s Disabled American Veterans, btw.) We bagged up dress-up clothes that no one can squeeze into, a stack of family fun from the game cabinet (to make room for new Christmas games!), a Hot Wheels track set, 2 play barns, and that crazy Zhu-Zhu tunnel-wheel thing that I’ve always hated.

I sorted a few boxes of magazines down to a few pages of recipes and crafts and we let go of a few books that we’ve outgrown.

I talked to the kids and we decided to share our play kitchen and our pink plastic preschool table to make room for a big-kids table (which is coming from our attic) and the Ladybug gave up her 3 Barbie dolls, 8 of her stuff animals, and 2 baby dolls (like 1/20th of her collection!) to make room for a “new” desk (which is coming from our garage).

Today we’ll be here dusting and vacuuming and moving our new furniture in place. We’ll be talking about hanging a blackboard and making a reading circle, re-stacking the bunk beds and repurposing a cabinet for the upstairs bathroom. We’ll be whispering about new paint and pictures for the walls and a curtain by our new reading nook.

It’s so nice to be out from under all this stuff we didn’t even realize we had!

How’s your weekend been?

Tags: family time, homemaking, kids, organizing