man, it's crazy late

What on earth am I doing starting a post at this time of night? I didn't even have caffeine. Why am I so jazzed up?!

I've been downloading and editing photos. I love to do that. I catch myself smiling...





We went to Trader Joe's today, and they had sunflowers. Absolute genius. Whoever decided to market sunflowers to Ohioans in January is an absolute genius. I nabbed 'em up quick and copycatted Meg even quicker.





I'm all about being yourself. Being original. Except for when I'm not. Like when I want to make my house feel like her house. I keep going back to her "Home Sweet Home" button on her blog and just staring at the pictures. It's like some kind of visual therapy.

Honestly, though, I couldn't handle her house. Too much stuff. It would get to me. It is nice, though, to look at her photos again and again. It would be a lovely place to spend an afternoon.

My version of Meg's happy, colorful style is less "abundant"... more ordered. More edited. More high strung? I don't let the kids mix their playdoh, after all. A lot less funky. Although, I admit, there are times that I just might consider wearing glitter sneakers. But, then I'd reconsider and wear black ballet flats. Because that's me. And that's why I have 67 readers and Meg has a trillion.

But... anyway...

I took some photos of SpareOom tonight. Just in case you were thinking these Mama Nights of mine were all glamorous. I wanted to be able to set you straight on that. And I wanted to show you my new crafting chair :)



ta da! courtesy of IKEA.

Oh, and my style has a little more of a modern dose mixed in than Meg's does... and not much at all of that chippy paint business. Okay. Enough about Meg. But, I had to give her due credit. It's not cool to copy and act like it's your own brilliance at work.

Going around the room with my iPhone...



There are two sets of mirrored sliding doors in this room. They aren't the prettiest things around, but they reflect so much light that I actually like them. I also like that sweater I have on. It sparkles a little bit.



Can you tell in the photo? Just a little bit of metallic thread. Festive. Hive & Honey from Piperlime.

Moving counterclockwise...



That collage wall is a blatant copy. Although, honestly, it was subconscious at the time.

Really!



The partially open door with the light on is the half bath.



And just beyond that is the laundry room.



Then, using the ironing board as a reference point, we come to the pit of despair. This corner will look very different very soon. It must.

Tonight I made a pile to throw away...



And a pile to give away...



Ahhhhh. Doesn't that just make you feel good? I'll bet that's why I'm so energized!

Past the pit now. This time use the vacuum as a reference point...



And back again to where we started off.





Gorgeoso, no?

This room is very bright owing to the 3 large flourescent light fixtures...



... and the resulting glare on the concrete floor.

ha ha.

just kidding.



About the glare. Not about the concrete.

So, yup. It's lovely. It's also very, very warm since we close the vents in there all winter (note sarcasm). But it's been GREAT so far. It may not be much at this point, but I can still make pretty things in it!



I'll leave you with something nicer to look at than flourescent lights and concrete. I've been searching Pinterest and Google for all kinds of organizing ideas... fabric organizing, ribbon organizing, wrapping paper organizing. The works. My mind has been full to overflowing with pretty pictures of orderly loveliness :) I don't know that the results of my efforts are quite so inspiring, but it does feel good to have things much more efficiently and attractively set up.



Why did I never think to save fabric scraps in a glass container before? Thank you, Pinterest!





All right. Time to rest this head. Tomorrow will be here before long. Friday, Friday! We're planning on lighting a fire in the fireplace and playing Settlers of Catan tomorrow night. And, Saturday, we work on the bedroom!

Have a great weekend, guys!

mama night and... a craft room?

I ran out of time to show you the rest of my pictures on Friday. People needed to eat and all that.

The nerve.

Before I started my last post, I walked around the house with my camera... just snapping whatever I wanted to share. I made it downstairs to the family room, but not beyond that. I wanted to show you some more of SpareOom.



The whole big deal SpareOom Makeover is a ways away still, but I'm thinking I can so something to this room this winter.



I've started organizing all the JUNK. Which is a good place to start. Taking lots and lots of things to Goodwill. They've been there too long. Since the move. I'm not good at downsizing, apparently.

Last April, I was daydreaming about creating some little sewing space in the laundry room. Just daydreaming, because the laundry room isn't done, either. I just reread this post (the title totally made me laugh) and I was struck by how my daydreams for a space like this are still the same. Especially in winter. A place to go when it's too cold to go anywhere else, but you really just need a little time to regroup.

quick note: I'm not talking about a replacement for time spent in prayer and quiet reflection, journaling, reading the Word of God. I mean when you need to make something, listen to music... loudly because you aren't using the white noise maker, and be surrounded by pretty color for a few hours. Maybe not everyone benefits from this kind of evening as much as I do, but... I do!

Meg has an amazing craft room. Just last week, she posted new photos of it. I was able to get a feel for the layout better than before. And guess what? It's tiny! That made me think. How could I carve out a little nook of brightly colored inspiration? How could I use what I already have and make it work for me? In JANUARY???

ha ha. I'm being dramatic about the winter now. But, seriously, it has been a real problem in the past. I think, partly because we've been so proactive with my winter weirdness this year, it's not nearly as bad as I make it out to be. But, I still find myself thinking of planting flower seeds or sitting by the pool on a regular basis :)



I have my Mama Nights on Thursday nights... most weeks. Last week Sam brought pad thai home for dinner. I kiss him, kiss the kids, head to Spare Oom, crank pandora, and do whatever for the next 4-5 hours. What a blessing. Seriously. I don't take it for granted. It's a huge, huge blessing.

And my children are a huge blessing, too. I must think so... I keep having them :) I don't want to communicate that they are anything else. I love them to bits. Remember, though... they are always here. ha ha. For realz! Think about that for a minute. NONE of them go to school NONE of them hop on a bus. That's our choice and I wouldn't have it any other way... it just means I need to be purposeful about a little rest. Rest from work, rest from demands, and rest from my small, precious crowd. I'm a better mama for it. A better wife.

Plus, we have pretty things in our home the next day!

Thursday is also my big cleaning day. So, I kind of wipe myself out on purpose, knowing that I'll have the evening completely off. I get so much done. It's awesome.



So, I grabbed my pad thai, cranked Jack Johnson (the happiest... especially his Curious George children's station... not really kiddie music), and made something. Or a few things.

Friday, when I walked around with my camera, I took photos of the new additions.



Pom pom trim on Punkin's pillowcase.

And I know a pennant banner is hardly news, but it was new to Brother. And he loved it. Camo on one side...



... muted yellow on the other. Not pastel... mustardy, but still bright enough.



Punkin and Brother share this room, as you may recall. I have had to try to figure out how to decorate a space for an (almost) 5 year old boy and a 7 year old girly girl. Not. easy. The pom pom trim and the yellow side of dude's banner are to appease her. She didn't want camo. Of any kind.

It's coming along. I hope to share a little official progress soon, but there are still some key projects I want to finish up first. For now, it's looking like this...



Which I like. But, Punkin wants more pink. Stat.

Or just some pink.

In about 2 years, Baby will move in with Punkin, Little Dude will get his own room, and she can revel in all the pink she wants. For now, I'm thinking a pillow is about all I can work in to a room shared with a boy.

Speaking of Baby, we ordered a crib for her this weekend. She's getting to the weight limit on her bassinet. It will still have to go in our room... her "nursery" is still her older sisters' bedroom. But, I've decided to go ahead and start decorating the nursery as hers. That way, when SweetP and Shug get to move in to Bedroom 4, I won't have two bare rooms at once. And the nursery will be closer to done... homier... when she finally does get to go in there.

The vintage dresser will stay when Bedroom 2 becomes her nursery. I made a little happy banner for her.



Makes me smile :)

This week, I have to use my Mama Night to start thinking about birthdays. Little Dude and SweetP have birthdays on the same weekend in mid-February. And dude wants Star Wars. A Millenium Falcon cake. ha. And costumes. For all the kids.

We'll see about that.

great weekend

twenty twelve

Hey, everyone.

If there's anyone still there, that is. Y'all have been more than patient with my scarce posts during the last twelve months. Thank you for checking back in with us!

I feel like I could write a million different things tonight, but because there are so many thoughts running around in my little head, I'm not sure what to actually pick and choose. So, I'll just go to my photos and be random :)

I got an iPhone for Christmas. I seriously had no idea what I had been missing.

I cleaned the children's bathroom the other day, and there was my iPhone - and Instagram. This is how visual people clean a bathroom. They make photo collages and post them for their friends on Facebook.



Do you like my nifty 5 sign? Etsy. When the Christmas decorations start coming down, I get in a funk. Every. stinkin. year. January and February are hard months here in Ohio. We only get snow a few times. The rest of the time it's cold, wet, gray, and muddy. Bleh! So, Sam let me go a little wild on Etsy after New Year's. This five is one of the first things to arrive on the doorstep. Just a little red. A little cheerfulness. Makes me smile everytime I pass the bathroom :) Good buy.



I'm doing this photo project I decided to call "Catch 36". I turned 36 back in November and the idea is basically just to try to photograph the moments that make up each week until I turn 37. My whole 36th year in photos. Not one each day, but enough to get the feel for a week or to atleast have a 2 page layout for each week. There isn't really a formula for each layout, though. I'm kind of making things up as I go along. Adapting as needed. This week, for example, I decided I wanted portraits of the kiddos. So, I took posed shots. Different than the candids and still lifes I've focused on in previous weeks. But, the portraits give a great opportunity to get each child's face - close up - all in one week's time. So far so good.



I love this one.

Baby's doing great :) Four and a half months already! She's such a love. Such a blessing.



Did I ever tell you all that we got a new camera? Yes, again. Now we're shooting with a Canon 5D Mark II. I'm learning. It would be nice if cameras all pretty much worked the same way, but they don't. Not even within Canon. So, I'm trying to get the hang of all the little buttons and options and modes and whatnot. I'm shooting in manual, which I feel good about, but I definitely still feel like I want to keep improving.

Some of the shots I'm sharing tonight are iPhone pics. I think it's pretty obvious which ones just from the quality of the photos. Some are square, like this...



... which I can. not. believe. I'm. showing. you.

This is, of course, Spare Oom. The holidays were hard on Spare Oom. In all the busyness, stuff just kept getting tossed back there. A mess, people. Seriously. But, I have it almost all cleared out now. Anyway, these square photos are Instagram pics. They're edited that way, so I can't post them in the format I usually use. I like the squares, though. I think they look cheery.



I've been here a lot. Like, a whole lot. I'm on a mission to get rid of the stuff we don't use... want... need. We're not rolling around in lots of extra space here, and there's just no sense in keeping stuff just so it can clutter up life. No sense, I tell you.

Let's see. What else is house related?



Sam is still chipping away at Bedroom 4. SweetP and Shug will be in there. Baby doesn't have a nursery, yet, because they're sleeping in the room that will, eventually, be hers (Bedroom 2). She's happy as a clam sleeping in a bassinet in our room, though. I like having the babies close by when they're little anyway.



I've been a crafty little thing all weekend. It started Thursday night. Once it gets cold, I'm not really much for going out for my regular "Mama Nights". So, I stayed in and decided to just hole up in (newly semi-orderly) Spare Oom.



Printed some pictures and gathered some bits and pieces.



And made a collage wall near the sewing machine table I have set up in there.



Very therapeutic. Helped chase away some of that post-holiday bleh.

Sam found some questions online - some blog he was reading - designed to help husbands and wives talk together about the past year and the new year coming up. Each question is meant to be thought through in several different areas of life... spiritual, physical, etc. One of the questions was along the lines of this: "If you could sum up your hopes for the coming year in one word, what would that word be?" Since we're still deep in the throes of improving this house and since this is where I'm documenting that process, I thought this question might be interesting applied to our 2012 goals for the house. I came up with a phrase instead of a word.

Baby Steps.

Baby Steps because, first and foremost, Baby won't be a baby forever. The house isn't going anywhere, but her babyhood is. And the childhood of all of our children. These are days I'm never going to see more than once. The house has to take a backseat. But, also, Baby Steps because I think we can still make progress, but it's going to be incremental. I know, it's always been incremental, but the increments just got much, much smaller. Still. A little something here and a little something there add up to a bigger something eventually.

I haven't bought much to decorate the house, yet. The house budget is always going to things like new doors, paint, or supplies. That's changing this year. I may not be able to take hours out of an afternoon to paint trim, but I can order fun new pillow covers from Etsy (which I did), or finally get something on the walls. If I just keep adding one more pretty thing - consistently - throughout the year, we'll have a much more welcoming home by the time the world ends.

I mean, by the end of twenty twelve ;)

But, it would be nice if Baby got her own room before preschool. Or sooner.