Family Picture Time

Yesterday we went to get our family pictures done.  Whitney screamed & screamed for almost the entire time so we'll have to see if we got any good ones when we get them back.  I took some new pictures for our wall & got some really cute ones. Tommy was being so sweet!

My HAPPY place

I'm sure everyone has a "happy place". The beach is my HAPPY place. We went this week & even in the wind I still loved it.  It's just so calming & beautiful.

I'm really hating my body right now, but I figure I need record of every pregnancy so here is a picture of my 23 week (5 month) belly.

There was no building sand castles as every time we attempted Whitney would stomp it out or Tommy would slowly sweep it away.

Whitney's face was cracking me up.  This is her "brace against the wind" face.

And since she is a cheeser she saw me taking her picture & had to smile.

I'm thinking about framing this picture.  Every walk we go on Tommy is chasing away the birds or ducks so having a picture of him doing it in my happy place is picture that really melts my heart.

Since we are on the subject of happy places. Fall hikes are my second favorite place to be.

 We all needed a pit stop & when it is fall every place is beautiful.  The kids had fun in the leaves.

  

 We had to cut our hiking short because it started to pour rain so to kill time before dinner we went to a candy factory.  The kids thought it was pretty great & I'm glad we don't live near one or we might be gaining some weight! (happy place #3?!) :)

Tommy's Potty Party!

About a month ago Tommy came up to me all stressed out saying "poop" & holding his bum.  I assumed that meant he wanted a diaper change, but nope... he wanted to go in the potty!  I didn't really encourage him for a couple of weeks because one day he was into it & the next wanted nothing to do with the potty.  I finally decided to start an old school potty chart & it worked like a charm. We put an ice cream cone at the bottom & told him he'd get an ice cream party when he filled up all of the stickers.  He loved it & often would get off the potty & do a little dance & say "party, party, party!"  He finally got the last sticker late last Friday night so we dropped everything to go do his "potty party"!

 The ice cream parlor wasn't too exciting...

 so we decided to go to Chuck E. Cheese for some rides to make it feel more like a party.  

He was pretty happy with his "party".

Vic was a little deflated that a full potty chart didn't mean he was 100% potty trained.  I would say he is 90%  pee trained, but it may be awhile for the other to come so we made a much bigger potty chart this time.  I still have to remind him most of the time, but occasionally he goes without any nudging so I can't wait until that is how it is 100% of the time. We are just tickled pink he is doing it earlier than we planned so hopefully we won't have 3 kids in diapers! :)

Boy or Girl?!

2.12.13

I was so shocked!  This pregnancy is so exact to the one with Whitney that I was SURE it was a girl, but we do boys great so we are really excited for the next wild thing to arrive! :D 

September Update

September FLEW by so here's a few pictures to try to cover it all...

I turned 29!  Tommy loves blowing out birthday candles so he was of course my little helper.  Ben's family came up to help me celebrate my birthday weekend & this picture of Kiersten is all the proof I have. I kept forgetting my camera!  We went bowling for the 1st time in quite a few years & I have definitely not improved.  We also went to the zoo, park, & played LOTS of games! :)

Tommy & Whitney love jumping in the crib together.  Here they are at Tommy's favorite friend, Andrew's house.

Silly boys

 I've tried to pull out the craft box a lot more this month & Tommy & Whitney love it.  Here they are with their sock puppets.  Tommy loved his so much he made me draw pictures of them for the fridge & they are constantly pulling them out to play with. 

 This summer was brutally hot & humid so we could never stand to be outside. Now that fall is here the kids are loving spending lots of time outside on their bikes & at the park.

 I thought Tommy loved the sand at the beach & why he was obsessed with talking about the beach, but he calls this little pool the beach so I guess sand or water makes him happy.  This is the first time we got Whitney to relax quite a bit more in the water.  She was hesitant at first but by the end she was jumping off the edge of the pool to Vic.

 Here's a fun bouncy course at the Autumn Festival. The kids could play all day on this, but we finally had to end it because Whitney needed help getting through it & it was too tiring for us oldies!

 We've taken the kids to a couple of different pumpkin patch/wagon tours.  They are really loving everything about fall!  In this picture you can see Tommy's poor nose sore.  It was so hard to look at him the first couple of days; it looked so bad!  He did it running down the driveway.  Our driveway is kind of steep so he enjoys the speed he picks up if he runs down it.  Now I cringe every time he does it!

 We also got to find out what we are having for baby #3 so check back for that!!!

Piano Makeover

My piano Makeover!  Four years ago we inherited Vic's parent's piano that was as beat up as they come.

We 1st left it in the garage so we could refinish it, but it was too intimidating so we finally brought it inside & I always hated what an eye sore it was.  When we moved to Indiana I was determined to leave it in the garage until I refinished it so there it sat the last 9 months. Last week I went to visit teach a family & the little kids were so excited to show off their piano talents that I realized it didn't matter how ugly my makeover turned out to be, I wanted our piano in the house.  I originally planned to sand it down & apply a new stain, but after I started sanding I realized that would take a lifetime so I settled for spray paint!

 Here's a close up of how beat up it was!

 Yup, that is a star engraved right on the front.

I had a really hard time finding someone that didn't pull the entire piano apart so I thought I'd do a quick how to of how I did it.  I read all about spray painting on the All Things Thrifty blog, did a light sanding, taped off the keys & petals, & then primed it with 4 cans of primer.  I can't believe how much better primer covered everything. (You can see in this picture I practiced my final look on the bench first as I was nervous!)

 Then I spray painted it my final color & it looked like a brown blob. I played with the idea of glazing it since that is so trendy right now, but I already had the stain that matches my other furniture so I decided to save $20 & use that. I am happy I did as it gave it a very different look.

 To get that streaky wood grain look I had to use sponges & press down with 3 fingers for every stroke. My hands were very sticky with stain, but I am very happy with the outcome.  Had I known it was going to turn out so well I would have followed the advice to put wood fill in all of the deep gashes & chips to have given it a sleeker  smooth look, but I'm just happy it is sitting in my house without sticking out like a sore thumb!

Idaho Part 4: Sutherland Reunion

We ended our trip with a Sutherland family reunion.  Here is Vic's parents, siblings & nieces/nephews. 

45 all together.  

Our charming little family!

 On day 1 we sat around the lodge playing games all day so I didn't take any pictures.

On day 2 we went to the Steadman's family ranch.  Here is Vic on the zipline.

 Vic & his brothers & older nephews went down the slide over & over trying to get as creative as possible with tubes, body chains, etc.  He had a lot of fun acting like a 12 year old boy again.

 Tommy entertained himself running up & down the hill by people going down. 

(He didn't like the slide which was a bummer cuz I thought he would have really liked it, but it was a bit too big & scarry for him & Whitney.) 

 Whitney insisted on being in the shade or this little house so that's where I spent my day.

 When we got back to camp Vic's sisters did carnival games for the little kids.  

Go Fish was Tommy's favorite.

 Whitney doing her version of the bing-bag toss.

The 3rd & 4th days we played games, packed up, & Vic's family had their "secret" meeting so needless to say I didn't take any pictures of that excitement.
I hate when my kids (and me!) are dirty so I didn't take a lot of pictures, but in hind sight I don't think we will get that filthy again so I should have taken pictures as our griminess would probably have been pretty entertaining after the fact!

At the end of our trip we got to visit some of our closest friends & I feel like that is what made me really miss home as we always keep in touch with family, but our friends are the ones we saw on a weekly basis & what made up our every day life in Idaho.  We are so fortunate to have made friends with quality good people that make us feel good about ourselves & are fun.  Vic said his favorite part of the trip was seeing me laugh  good & hard with friends.  I guess we need to work on that here in Indiana!

Idaho Part 3: Dad's House

I think Tommy's favorite part of the trip was at my Dad's house.  For a 2 year old boy, not much can compete with tractors, horses, dogs, chickens, & a bouncy house!

Vic & I haven't rode horses together in years so it was fun to be able to do that again.

Vic is a pretty crazy rider & scares me with his lack of control, but he sure loves it!

Tommy got to go on his 1st ride & I think he could have done it all day long.  Every time my dad pulled him back to this area to tie the horse up Tommy would point back & say "more"!

Zoom in & you can see Tommy's giant smile riding the tractor with Grandpa!

Whitney didn't want anything to do with the animals, but she sure thought this bounce house was great.

My dad turned 60 this year so we did a little party for him in the park.  I did a book about why he's loved at age 60 & it was really fun to see everyone's answers & get to see more sides of my dad.  I gave my sister the assignment of finding a picture of my dad at each decade (age 10, 20, 30, etc.) and she not only found the pictures, but made this amazingly adorable banner!  I loved seeing how Dad aged every 10 years. 40 really is the prime before you really start noticing balding & wrinkles!

Here's a close up of the beads, buttons, ribbon, & stamp details!

We found stuff around Dad's house for centerpieces to make it truly all about him.

I assigned cupcakes to Katie & she knocked that out of the ballpark too!  They were not only cute, but super yummy!  The score cupcakes on the left have a rocking "K" just like my dad's brand.  In the middle is oreo cupcakes with a horseshoe, a horse you can only see the head of, & cowboy hats. To the right is raspberry lemon cupcakes, YUM!

I made fresh lemonade which I may never do again.  It was yummy, but I couldn't believe how many lemons are needed!  Needless to say, we ran out! 

 I always forget to take more pictures of people at the party.  I better start a group shot tradition after this!  here is Dad playing with the kids, but people in the background :)

 And a few more blurry, but people there!

 We played this silly game where you shoot the chickens out & people try to catch them in their pants. 

This party really was back-woods cowboy all the way, haha! 

 Tommy thought it was hilarious & chased the chickens all over.

 Lana found the perfect boot pinata for the adult one.  Dad wanted to show off his muscles & break his own pinata, but instead hit it so hard he broke the bat ...so we used a lug wrench!