splatter painting

So I've been wanting to splatter paint for a while now and I'm not sure why I haven't done it sooner because it is sooo much fun.  A lot of people do that with kids because kids love it and the paintings look cool, you just have to do it outside because it is messy.  So I'm going to have to get some smaller canvases for kids to do something like that.

I have to say, mixing the paints took me a lot longer than the actual painting and even then I went a little overboard on the painting because I didn't want to be done yet. :)  Sometimes it looks a lot better with less splatters but that's ok.  The wind also helped me some so when I wanted to do a certain curvy line the wind would take the paint in a totally different direction.  :)  But I kind of like it and I like the colors because they're a lot like what I used on my other painting for the living room.  This one will be hanging on our tall wall going downstairs to the basement which is a big blank wall right now and I've been wanting to paint something for there for a while.

Well, I better go wash up all the painting stuff and I hope it doesn't take too long for it to dry.

Kade is 9

Well, I am officially getting old. :)  Kade had his very first birthday sleepover at our house yesterday, having 5 boys sleeping at our house.  We've had sleepovers with one friend at a time before but that's nothing in comparison to having 5 boys together.  Kade was so excited and I don't think we've ever had such bouncy, energetic and giggly boys at our house like that.  From the moment they came they were just laughing, running around and having a blast.  It is funny to me to see how different it is when boys get together versus girls getting together.

Some of the boys were actually so riled up at first that Ehren made all of them run laps around the house and they loved it.  They ran around outside for a while and then I took them to a miniature golf course.  It was great because we were the only ones there and it was the perfect weather for it too.  Then we came back home for cake and ice cream, more running outside and then it was time for the wii games.  With all the playstations and what I know else wii is really considered a little kid game system but they had so much fun with it and didn't want to stop playing.  Our house was echoing with silly giggles and laughs until after midnight when we told them to go to bed.  Even then it wasn't over because the laughing went on and on until like 2:30am when Ehren yelled down to them to be quiet. :)  After that they finally slept but were up around 7am with more giggling so there will be some very tired boys today.

So I was feeling pretty old because I was trying so hard to stay awake but could barely stay up until midnight when we herded the boys to bed.  Whatever happened to staying up all night and not even really feel it?  This morning I am just dragging my feet as if I hadn't slept for days. :)

But, I think it was a success.  Kade loved having his friends over and he was having a blast with them.  As the day was getting closer to his party he kept asking to invite more friends and I am just glad there weren't any more boys here because that was enough wildness with just 5 of them.  I guess we're heading towards a new age, almost junior high.  It's like we need to change as our kids are changing and growing up and they grow up so fast.  But it was great to see that they were all having a lot of fun and just enjoying being together.

cake was good but like with every other food, the boys barely sat down long
enough to eat anything because they were too busy playing

Not a very good picture of me but that's ok :)

nesting

So I just realized there are a few different "nestings" women experience.  The main one everyone refers to is when you're about to have a baby and I could so relate to that with each of my pregnancies.  But recently I am experiencing a different kind of nesting and some moms may or may not relate to that.  I might have been this way last year too but somehow I am feeling it a lot more this year.

And I realized I am "nesting" for going back to school. :)  It is like a Spring fever or something.  I want to organize all our closets, clean and declutter every room and every time I get something done I think of a new thing to do. :)  Last weekend I organized the mud room that has been a junk room for like a year.  It didn't even take me that long so I don't know why it took me so long to get it done.  Anyway, somehow the thought of kids starting school soon makes me want to organize everything, get all 3 kids' Fall and Winter clothes ready and pack away the clothes that are too small.

Maybe it's just me that I'm like this but I'm saying it's their fault, whoever thought of this 3 months summer break nonsense.  Who has 3 months off? :) I still can't believe our kids have no school for that long, even though they do have less time off during the year.  So, every year at around the 2nd week of August I go crazy with getting everything and everyone ready for school and some days I am really wishing the kids were in school already. :) In a way, I like getting things around the house done now because once the school starts there will be very little time for anything.  I am already sad about Anika going to kindergarten because she'll be gone until 3:30pm every day.  Both her and Emily will be gone and I know it will be an adjustment at first because they are such a huge help to me with Aveah and Carson. (Yeah - never mind the adjustment for the poor girls to be in school all day long without their moms and kids they know, I just think about how it's going to be for me. :))  It will be a lot quieter in the house too.  I am also bummed because our Elementary school cancelled their open house that usually happens at this time where you can go with your kids and meet their new teacher, see their classroom and where they will sit and now they will just have to figure it out all on the first day of school.  They are doing some major remodeling at the school and when I was there this last week I couldn't believe the mess.  I kind of wonder if they will actually finish it on time before the first day of school but they're saying they will.  Even for Kade it helps to go meet the new teacher before because right now all we know is her name, not even what she looks like and Kade gets very anxious about the new class, kids and the teacher.  So, it will be a bit more chaotic when the school starts this year and all the more reason to get everything at home done now.

I even pulled out my big canvases today that I had stored away for months and started my new painting project.  It's something new I'm trying so we'll see how it turns out but I'm excited to try it, just need to pick up some more paints.  I've been wanting to paint something for the big wall space around our stairs for a very long time but I had no ideas for it until now.  Funny how when you get motivated in some areas, it spreads into others as well. :)  And of course I'll post about it when it's done.

So, that has been consuming my days lately, along with searching for more recipes that are quick, taste good, at least semi-healthy :), and cheap.  It is not easy sometimes to cook for a lot of people in the house without getting in the rut of making the same old recipes over and over so I am trying to add some new ones to my menus.  Another area in my life I need to spice up a bit. :)  Happy "back to school nesting" to you!

garden

Just a few pictures to show what our garden is doing this year.  It's been very dry which we're not used to so I think it affects all the crops.  We've been getting some tomatoes the last 2-3 weeks and a few cucumbers but something killed off half of our cucumber plants early on.  I quick planted more seeds but those are behind now, only starting to get tiny cucumbers right now.  Nevertheless, it is so nice to get some fresh cucumbers and tomatoes to go with our lunch or dinner and the kids love them.  Well, Kade will not eat fresh tomatoes but he loves cucumbers so at least something.  Kason and Anika will eat just about any vegetables which makes me really happy because I wasn't like that as a kid.  They especially love any kind of bell peppers and pickles, and just eat them plain as a snack.  I am very happy about this year's bell peppers because they seem to be coming along great.  This is like the 3rd year I planted some and each year we didn't even get one good pepper so I can't wait to try some this year. One thing I'm not sure about is how do I know if the pepper is supposed to be dark green, light green or orange.  Some of them are light green right now but if they are the orange kind they should turn color later on.  Of course I mixed up the plants and didn't mark them well so now I have no idea which ones they are.  Oh well, at least they are producing.  Maybe they like the heat more than the tomatoes.

So here are a few pictures my dad has been asking for.  It's nothing great, but it's ok.  One day when the lawn is done and we decide on a good spot for a garden we'll make it bigger but for me this small scale gardening works because I don't have to take care of it too much. :)  There are no pictures of cucumbers because if we get 1 or 2, we eat them right away. :)

sleepovers

It is Kade's very first time at a camp this week.  He was very excited to go but also a bit scared about being away from us for 6 days.  He's never been apart from both of us for that long, but I could tell he was trying hard to be brave about it.  Last year there was no question about going to camp, he would have none of it even though a friend of his was going there.  So he is definitely growing up and wants to be so independent in everything.

Back at home, it has been another story.  Anika and Kason are both missing Kade and especially Kason wants to go to camp right now. :) And I'm sure he would be fine for the most part, not missing us or anything.  Both Kason and Ani are very much into sleepovers lately and since Kade is gone they've been wanting to go to someone's house for a sleepover.  Anika loves going to her cousin Emily's house and she slept there a couple times but I told her we can't do it in the middle of the week when their parents have to get ready for work early int he morning.  So when it was getting closer to bed time tonight,  since they couldn't go to anyone's house Ani and Kason decided to have their own sleepover.  Anika wanted to sleep in Kason's room and she said that tomorrow they would sleep in her room. :)  They are so cute together most of the times, play so nice and when it's just the 2 of them at our house you will always find them together.  I hope they stay close as they get older, it makes this mom's heart smile. :)

   

A mini photo session

This year some farmers around our house are planting wheat.  I've always loved family pictures with wheat as a background and now we have it in our back yard.  Anyway, we don't have a fancy camera, actually very far from it but it takes ok pictures for us.  I did think one of these summers I'll get a friend photographer to take some pictures of us because it makes a difference but I didn't do it this year and she's pretty booked.  Plus, once you set a date and the weather doesn't work out it's hard to reschedule.  But the most important thing is when the wheat is just right for pictures and it is so hard to know ahead of time.  It's been getting golden in color lately so I thought we needed to take the pictures soon if we wanted that but then Ehren came home yesterday and he says to me that across the road from us they already started harvesting the fields.  In my mind I'm like we better do it right now before they start to harvest the field behind our house.  And it was a nice sunny day so it was perfect.  Usually if we schedule any kind of a family photo shoot I stress over the outfits so everyone matches and I never have anything flattering to wear that matches the rest of the family and so on. :)  But it took me only about 15 minutes to pick out clothes for everyone which must be a record for me.  I knew the easiest is to go with white for the kids although I don't have much for white tops or dresses but then the shirt I like on Ehren is similar in colors to my dress and it worked great with the kids.

my favorite of all of us

So we got out there before the sun started setting, set up a tripod with our little Lumix digital camera and took a few shots.  The hardest thing every time is to get all the kids smiling nice, not fake smiling or looking down or covering their faces or whatever they do.  But it seems to me that it doesn't matter if we look into a tripod or if a photographer is taking pictures of them, it is hard to get them all looking nice.  And then there are those couple shots when the kids look all cute and I have no idea what is the face I'm making. :)  So it's not easy to get all of us looking great, but I didn't even care last night.  I just wanted to see how the pictures would turn out with the wheat field and using our camera.  I took a few more pictures of just the kids when we were done and those are cute too even though you can guess that we had to make Kade hold Anika's hand. :)

If you saw the pictures as they came directly from our camera, they didn't look great at all.  The colors weren't vibrant, just very plain.  But with the help of my good buddy Picasa the pictures turned out beautifully, at least for the camera we were using.  I'm still not done playing around with them and there is so much I could change on each picture, but here are a few I quickly enhanced.  I'm glad I got Ehren in on the pictures too because we have so few pictures of all of us as a family.

Not sure what I'm doing here, I am saying something to the kids so they pay attention to the light on the camera

our 2 little buddies

Fun at the pool

I could not have asked for a better day during the week than today.  We were all a bit worn out after a whole day at the cabin yesterday but since Ehren had to work today we had to come back home last night.  I was supposed to watch only Laadyn today so that in itself was a treat for me but then right as Ehren was leaving for work he told me "don't even get up, Laadyn is not coming today."  That was the best "good morning" I've gotten in a long time because I was so tired and sleeping in felt so good. :)  Our kids were quietly playing in their rooms so I didn't have to get going right away and I felt so spoiled because that doesn't usually happen.

There was quite a bit of cleaning to do since we were gone so much the last week so we tried to get as much done as we could until lunch time and then it was time to hit the pool.  Yes, I could have stayed and finished my house chores but spending a fun afternoon in the pool with my kids was so much better.  And I get to be with just the 3 of them so seldom that when I do I always want to do something fun so I can enjoy them. :)  And did we enjoy it!  We had the perfect weather for swimming and we had a blast chasing each other in the water, practicing some swimming moves, jumping off the diving board and so on.  I was glad there weren't too many people there too so I really couldn't have asked for a better afternoon.  We got home just minutes before Ehren got home from work so that worked out perfectly.

we had a lot more that we already ate the first day

It is just nice having days like that when you have nothing planned and can enjoy it rather than being in a rush the whole time getting everything on the agenda done.  It was one of those lazy days for me even though I still got a lot done in the morning.  We picked some strawberries yesterday and at first I thought we didn't pick that much so it wouldn't take me long to wash and cut the stems out but we got a ton of them which took me a while to clean and now I am looking up recipes for fresh strawberries because I don't want to freeze them.  If we still have a lot left in a couple days I will freeze them or make some jam but for now we've been enjoying them with everything. :)  I might have had a bit too much yesterday because even though they're like my favorite fruit I now see that there is such thing as eating too much of them.  I didn't think it was possible for me before :)

I hope everyone is having a fun summer wherever you are.  We still have almost 2 months to go but it seems to be going a lot faster than I thought it would.  Before I know it September will be here and I'll be sending my 3 lovelies to school.  I am getting ready for that already because it will be very different with my big helpers gone all day.

Anika is very cautious in the water but loves it.  She loves wearing some kind of floating device :)

It is a nice little pool and there aren't too many days when it's too packed which is nice.