Christmas

Ya, I know the title is pretty creative.

I am loving the warmth that christmas brings into my home. It is the greatest! On the wall in between the windows is my advent calendar that I made. I also added a christmas scripture on each day as well. I found a scripture advent calendar on pintrest and it is pinned on my board for anyone interested. Here are the list of fun things that are on them. December: 1-festival of lights (in Clemmons, NC) 2-Make a craft 3-Make snowflakes 4-Go to a store and make a list for santa 5-Get trapped in a snowglobe. (Make a snowglobe and put a picture of yourself in it) (instructions on our best bites blog) 6-watch movie with candy popcorn (recipe on our best bites blog) 7-Pick out a gift and buy for family 8-Fletcher parade 9-Get a candy cane off the tree 10-Read christmas story and act out nativity 11-Christmas cereal/go to Barnes and Noble and read christmas books 12-Hot chocolate with all the fixins 13-Bring a meal to someone in need 14-Christmas karaoke 15-Church christmas party 16-Make snowflake quesidillas 17-Go to grove park inn to look at the national gingerbread house competition 18-Make gingerbread house 19-Go see santa at the mall 20-Pick out a toy to donate 21-Christmas movie at the theatre 22-Make reindeer food 23-Decorate cookies 24-Put out milk for santa and reindeer food 25-open presents I am so stinking excited to do all this stuff with the boys. I really want them to think Christmas is magical! Any good ideas to add to?

Shots From This Week

Blake loving the little shopping cart at Earth Fare.

The cutest little nutter butter acorns I made from pintrest. Yummy and stinkin cute.

Nathan's kindergarten picture. This was taken a few days after we moved into the house and Nathan's skin was so dry and red and I didn't have time to take care of it before the picture. So we get a cute crooked smile from this kid.

The boys asleep on the way to my mom's for Thanksgiving.

Wouldn't ya know it? We got a flat tire on the way to Thanksgiving dinner in Knoxville. Luckily my husband and brother were in the car and I didn't have to deal with it!

Blake asked to hold my hand. He is so stinkin loving. He is always giving me hugs, kisses, and wanting to hold my hand. He is my baby, even though he is almost 3!

The Master Bedroom

Blah! I don't know what to do with this room. I have used up all my decorating stuff on this big house, and now I have nothing left to put in the bedroom. It is quite a large room but has an amazing view of the mountains and woods. I just want the inside to look nice now. This picture is kind of what I want it to look like, maybe a stone wall behind the bed or something. I know I want a metal bed, but it will be a while until I can get that, so until then I still need to figure something out. Any ideas?

Mantel

So the fireplace didn't have a mantel. I had to get one before christmas because I finally have a fireplace to hang my stockings on dang it, and they will be hung by the chimney with care if it is the last thing I do. I wanted a rustic mantel with wood that matched the floors and ceiling beams. I called my floor guy and he said he had nothing of the sort but I should try calling a saw mill. So I found one down the road from me and went to check things out. I got there and looked around their lumber yard and found an old piece of white oak that had been greyed from the sun. I loved it, so I told the very nice southern gentleman that I wanted that piece and he looked at me weird and said what do you need this for and I told him and he looked at me weird again. I asked him to cut it for me and he did and I gave him $13 for the piece of wood. I shoved it in my car and was on my way. I borrowed a hammer drill from a friend from church and drilled the holes in the stone and used wedge anchors and liquid nails to hang it up. All Alex helped me with was placing the beam on the two little pieces of wood. I am woman, hear me roar! Next up, get rid of the 1970's doors on the fireplace.

Getting My Life Back!

So my counters are in! Yahoo! They have been in for a few weeks now, but the day the plumbers were hooking everything up, I got some weird stomach bug and then had to catch up on stuff and then it was Thanksgiving! Ahhh, so I am just posting pictures of the kitchen (almost done). I am waiting on barstools to come in the mail and white subway tile backsplash (the counter people had to cut into the wall to get the counters in, so it needs backsplash pretty bad). I can tell I am getting my life back because: I can cook good meals, I am exercising again, I have a reward chart for the boys again, read christmas books to the boys tonight for an hour, I cut the boys hair myself (actually had time and didn't have to pay to take them somewhere), and I am couponing again (got a butt load of free stuff before and after thanksgiving at CVS, my favorite coupon hot spot). I love having my life back. I went two long months without doing the things I love and now I am more grateful for these little things now. So the house pictures......We are pretty much all settled with moving in. The first picture is the living room and then the dining room and kitchen. I also still need knobs for my cabinets (waiting on those to come in the mail, they were out of stock). I am loving my big (to me) kitchen, it is so nice have soooo much counter space! The boys also got new blankets for their beds ($7 at a gas station).

A Fun Party

So I went down to Columbia, South Carolina on Saturday to meet up with 2 of my good buds from BYU-Idaho. One my roomate almost the entire time I was there and the other my next door neighbor while there. We instantly became friends because we were all from the south in this cold foreign land of Rexburg, Idaho. Anyway, we all keep in touch pretty regularly and now we all live within 4 hours of each other. Between the 3 of us, we have 7 boys, not a single girl! It was fun and the boys had a blast running around the park the whole time!

Daddy Dates

While I was busy working on the house, we wanted the boys to be able to still have a life. Alex took the boys to a braves game in Atlanta, the circus, and a work party. I missed out on all these, but the boys had a blast! Blake actually was very very upset that he didn't get to ride the elephant and still talks about it.

Fall Soccer

Hummm...Nathan and soccer is really not much of a pair. Although he loves it and that is what really matters. He is a good player, just a bit timid. His last game he scored a goal...Wahoo!

Halloween

Not much to say about Halloween except that we went to a friends house and had a part-A and went trick or treating and it was lots of fun and the boys got lots of candy!