I had a very nice birthday! So many sweet and kind birthday wishes. My little fella spent a very long time blowing up these balloons for me as a surprise. He doesn't know how to tie them, so he used dental floss to tie them. He also made me such a sweet card, telling me thank you for everything I do for him. I made a home-made banana cream pie instead of birthday cake. I got to eat them on the new desert dishes. I wasn't going to get the dessert dishes, but my parents gave me birthday money, so I decided I would get them after all!
And as always in our little home we are making tea and coffee! It is a staple at our home.
Megan and I went shopping on Saturday down town. It was a rainy day, but we had a lot of fun anyways and enjoyed some McDonald's coffee and hot chocolate. This is a cute little shop downtown that I found a wax melt is a Chai tea scent. I've been looking and looking for Chai tea wax melts. It is by Boulevard and it is called Sugared Chai.
I took Tristyn some lunch at work and enjoyed getting a hug from my wonderful son. So hard to believe he is a young man now, boy does time go so very fast.
Steven and I have been doing a lot of projects on our little house, so we went to get a few supplies. I am so tempted to post a photo of how cute our little house looks painted, but the white accents are not all complete, so I will wait. I do love the color of our home now!
My girls had been wanting me to change the curtains in our living room, because they clashed with the outside of our newly painted house. So today I found these curtains at Target. I really like them. I hope the girls will like them...I guess I will find out after they are done with school.
Here are my birthday dishes. Some of them are in the dishwasher, so they are not all in this photo, but I do love them. They look so vintage to me. I truly did need some new ones, as my old dishes were all scratched up and just didn't look so nice. I love the Pioneer Women's Kitchen ware.
Now I have to work on laundry and finish tidying our little home. It finally feels like fall today. I love feeling the crisp coolness in the air. It just seems so fresh. Well, that is a little snap shot of our week! Happy Monday.
This is the wax melt I fell in love with. It is called Cider House Donuts. I usually don't love fall scented wax, but this one is perfection. It is not too sweet or spicy, it is just right. I found this at Wal-mart.
Now that it's fall, I've been cooking a lot more, so I've been not only using my dish washer, but also hand-washing dishes as well. I have some dish washing gloves that I like to use to help my hands not get so dried out. I wanted to share what my grandma Kelly uses to dry her dishes. They are called Flour Sack Towels and you can get them at Wal-mart. They are large, light weight and cotton and they are amazing for drying dishes. I also use them to dust. I picked up an extra pack at the store yesterday.
This is a free app called Kitchen Dial and it is wonderful to find out kitchen conversions in a snap. Like how many Tablespoons in an Ounce. It is very easy to use and I've already used it many times.
Today I am cleaning my kitchen floors. I have had this Bissell Steam Mop for about ten years now. It is wonderful and the steam naturally disinfects the floor with no harsh chemicals needed. It has washable cotton pads so it is always fresh and clean. I also washed the headboards and walls in our little Disney guest room this morning. Our house is coming along nicely, it is painted grey with black shutters. Steven did that part, but he hired someone who is scraping and painting all the white areas so they are all fresh and nice. I am going to repaint the outside doors a dark red color. The blue just doesn't look right. Steven is going to get new screen doors for the front and back door as well. I will post a photo as soon as it's all complete.
I actually decided to get a total of six bins for Megan's room. As of now she is only using two, but this way she has options to keep more if she would like with out it looking cluttered. I put chalk board stickers on each one so we can always change the label's title easily.
I am doing a lot of laundry today. I am working on three loads of ours and a couple loads for Tristyn and Kaylee. Tomorrow is my birthday, so my present was some new dishes from the Pioneer Women at Wal-mart. I just love her stuff. My old dishes were in really bad shape with fork marks just all over them. I also got some really pretty glasses and bowls and a butter dish. Needless to say I had to get rid of my old items so they are in a box waiting to go to Good will. I am going to run those there this morning after I clean the toilets. I don't care for that job, but I wear disposable gloves so that helps me to feel better about it.
Tristyn and Kaylee came over for dinner last night. I made roast beef with mashed potatoes and gravy from the roast beef drippings, I cooked quite a few ears of fresh corn and then cut it off the cob and added a bit of butter. I also made another batch of those dinner rolls and had side salads or organic spring mix with toppings people could add if they liked. It was a lot of work, but such a nice meal and so nice to have a bit of time with Tristyn and Kaylee. They are pretty busy with school and their jobs. My cousin Teri shared a blog with me that I love, it is called gdonna.com the g stands for grandma. She is a neat lady, and likes to do things the old fashioned way. I've already learned a lot from reading her blog. Well, I think I will treat myself to a cup of coffee with a lot of half and half before I have to tackle those toilets. Have a wonderful day.
Here is Justin and Xavier all dressed up after picture day at school on Friday. They look so handsome.
A while ago Justin was given a lot of like new Nike shoes. Normally I only buy what we need but Justin loves shoes so I let him keep them all. He still has his toy box in his closet, so this leaves very little room for his shoes. I saw these little shoe boxes at Wal-mart for 94 cents each and thought this could help his closet a great deal. I also labeled his shoes so it is very easy to tell which pair is in which box easily.
A few things have changed around my little kitchen this weekend!
Here is the before shots of my bread box and napkin holder.
Here is the napkin holder all painted in my favorite shade of blue!
Here is the finished bread box! I should call it a coffee box, as that is what I use it for.
I forgot to take a before shot of this, but I painted it too!
Here is the front door before...
Here is the after, it may be hard to tell in the photos, but the door is a darker shade of blue than what I painted our bread box. I also painted the outside of the kitchen door. Steven is painting our little house this weekend. I will post the pictures as soon as it's all complete.
I am not a huge fan of fall candles, but I did get one. It is called Pumkin Cupcake from Bath & Body Works. I actually liked the label so I got the candle. It does have a nice scent also. I thought the lid was pretty cute. I only burn my kitchen candles in the mornings and sometimes in the evenings or when it's a rainy day, so they actually last me quite a long time.
Justin had a friend over Friday evening. Megan had two friends stay the night, so as always we had a house full of children. I love children so my house always seems to be the sleep over house. It works out nicely due to the fact we have a nice little family room down stairs, so they have a place to entertain. Tristyn used to always host sleep overs down stairs with two or three friends at a time. I can't believe he is already grown up and getting ready to get married. Time goes so very fast and I realize just how precious the moments we get to share with our loved ones truly are. My little Megan makes a lot of messes around the house, and it used to frustrate me, but then I thought how thankful I am to have her and I really am blessed to get to take care of my family. I really love being a homemaker, I enjoy cleaning, organizing and tidying our little home. I love planning meals and going to get groceries and making home made food for my family and I. I love being free to run the children something to school if they forget it, and picking them up every day. I even enjoy doing laundry. Someone once asked me if I ever get bored, and honestly I always seem to have something to do, and I never really get bored. When Justin, my youngest child started school, it was an adjustment to learn to have such silence during the day, but I did get used to it. I still do miss them when they are at school, but feel blessed that they have such good schools to attend. Well, I better end this post and go finish some laundry. (My never ending job!!!)
A couple of friends of ours invited us to eat a dinner at Yoder's Kitchen yesterday evening. Duane grew up in Yoder and speaks Dutch. He went to school with the Amish family who runs Yoder's Kitchen. It is located on their home stead. They have a large simple room with very large tables all together, and a kitchen right off of the room where the Amish ladies prepare the food and the Amsih husband serves it. I can honestly say, I have never tasted better food anywhere! It was just unbelievable. They serve two meats, three side dishes and then the best pie in the world for dessert. (Which you get to choose from three different pies.) They pass all of the food down the table twice. You have a choice of iced tea or water to drink. It cost $20.00 per person including tip. It was worth every penny. They say you have to make your reservations months in advance, and you have to have a group of I believe 12 or more, as it is private and they only take groups. There is no electricity, so that means no air conditioning, but it was a beautiful evening yesterday, and we were very comfortable. It is located at 7016 E. Red Rock Road in Yoder, Ks. The phone number is 620-465-2551 and once you get to Yoder, you turn at the school house and go for a bit over two miles, until you come to a sign that says Yoder's Kitchen. We also like to eat at the Carriage Crossing, and the food their is quite good, but nothing compared to Yoder's Kitchen. My husband and I brought the children home a loaf of home made wheat bread. I understand you can call and have them make you a pie if you are in the area and would like to try it. I had the banana cream pie and it was melt in your mouth delicious. I wish I could have taken photos of the inside, but I wanted to be respectful as the Amish don't believe in having their photos taken, so I just took a photo of the outside area. I did get one of their cook books, so I am excited to try some new recipes. I am honestly inspired by the food those Amish ladies made. I just thought I would share in case anyone would like to give them a try. Happy Sunday!
I thought I'd better take a before shot of our little home. This weekend it is going to be painted. Steven is painting it grey with black shutters and white accents. I am so excited! I thought I'd take a photo of my new summer wreath. I got this from Target. I waited for it to go on sale at the end of the season. I'm so glad that I got one before they were sold out!
Today is a rainy morning, so of course I am burning my candles.
I've got my Charles "Pa" Ingalls CD playing in my basement while I work to tidy and organize things down there. I love this CD. I got in in Mansfield, Mo on a visit to Laura Ingalls Wilder's home museum. It is Pa's actual fiddle playing some of the songs he would play for his family so many years in the past.
This morning I packed up some old books that the girls no longer read. They are the American Girl books. I am actually holding onto these for when I have grandchildren some day. I don't hold onto many things, but these were special and such good books to read to young girls, or if they are old enough, they can read them themselves! I always enjoyed reading these books to my girls, as they are very interesting.
So I packed those items in a bin and put them in the closet. Now Megan can access to these items, but the don't have to look so cluttered in her room. I also dusted the shelves and if you notice I have two bins and a little box so she can keep certain items in them and the room still looks clutter free!
This is the little Lug bag I got for Lauren to use for her cheer bag. She is doing both cheer and volleyball at the same time, so she needs to bring a lot of sports gear. I love all of the pockets in these Lug bags. They have a magnetic pocket on the front for easy access to your phone. A pocket to put shoes into. I love this feature, it keeps the dirty shoes away from the rest of your items. I think I counted that it had eight pockets on the outside of the bag, not including the main compartment. These remind me of Travelon Purse's only a lot larger.
I thought it might be fun to do some before and after shots of our home in the mornings. I wish I would have thought to photograph the living room and kitchen before.
I just love the transformation from messy to neat and tidy. I had to spot treat Justin's bed to get a little chocolate off the comforter, which is why there is a wet spot. I do this with our furniture as well. I let Megan eat on our brown couches downstairs, and those needed to be spot cleaned this morning. The little hanging dolphin, Justin won for me at the fair. He is always thinking of me and that touches my heart.
Here are the girls lunches for school and a little breakfast and water for volleyball. They have to get there at six am every morning for practice.
Here is some of the scents I've been melting this week. This morning I've got three different scents melting. In my room I have Pink Velvet, in Megan's room I have Sugared Lavender Twist and in our living room I have Iced Mocha Latte. The other day I was in a fall kind of mood, so I melted some At The Fair. I also tried a brand of wax melts I found at Aldi in Red Velvet Cake. I did not care for this wax, and will most likely never purchase it from Aldi again. It had a very light throw and had kind of a chemically kind of smell.
The girls have been having their Volleyball games, and Lauren has been cheering. Justin has his school pictures taken today, so he dressed in his Sunday best and looked like such a little fella leaving for school this morning. Tristyn and Kaylee have been busy with college classes and working. Something that touched my heart this week, my sweet niece, Madison texted me and told me she loves reading my blog. I just love her so much, and feel so blessed to have such an amazing family. Two of the people I hold very dear in my heart are going through some tuff times right now, so if you could say a little prayer for them, I'd appreciate it. I am trying not to worry, but it is kind of hard not to. That is a little snap shot of our week. I will post photos of our little house when we get it painted. Have a great weekend!
