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I finally finished our anniversary & Cancun trip posts from this summer...

Anniversary

Cancun

Decorating Help Needed!

This post is for all my friends and family who have that natural talent when it comes to decorating.  Now that I am home (which I LOVE), I am beginning to notice things around the house that I would like to change/update.  This, obviously, in the grand scheme of things is not important.  However, it is fun.

When we bought our house, we literally did nothing after we moved in, other than move our stuff and hang a few things on the walls, etc.  The only room in the house we have painted or done anything of our own to is Logan's room (which, one day, I will get around to taking pictures & posting them for you to see).

Right now, I am in need of some help with the space on top of my kitchen cabinets.  The previous owners had some silver platters decorating the tops of one of the spaces, and I really liked it, so I copied.  Here's what it looks like now (please excuse the mess - I did not clean for the pictures)...

I really like the platters up there, however, I have needed the platters a few times and it's a huge pain to get them down each time, clean them before I can use them, and then return them later.  I really want to have access to my platters, so I need to do something different up there.

The other two areas that we have cabinets, I really had no idea what to do and stuck a couple things on top, but they are desperately in need of help.

The big platter on this one is from our wedding.  We had the guests sign it and I really love it.  I want to try to continue to incorporate it somewhere, but it just doesn't really work where it is.  I just put it there because I really wanted it displayed somewhere.

 

One of those bottles is an Aggie wine bottle, one is from Cape Cod and is in the shape of a light house, and the other is the bottle of wine that my family had at dinner when they surprised me after Brandon proposed.  They are not necessary to keep up there, again, they are just something I had to stick there. 

Now that I'm home, we're also on one income, so I don't have much to go out and just buy whatever.  So, I'm looking for some VERY CHEAP ideas of things I could do up here.  I know there is this thing called "Pinterest" now and you're probably thinking I should just go look for ideas there, but honestly, I don't have the time, and when I have looked for stuff on there it still seems somewhat pricey.

Or, I'm not above accepting hand me downs.  I was the little sister and got hand me downs all the time growing up.  So if you have some stuff in your home that you no longer want and are tired of it taking up space/collecting dust, and you honestly feel it would look good in my kitchen, feel free to send it my way ;-)

Please feel free to leave comments with some ideas/suggestions for me.  If you have links to things, that would be helpful too.  Thanks!! :)

Ps. Please also excuse the wallpaper - that was not my choice. Like I said earlier, we did NOTHING with the house when we moved in it.  I would love to remove it and have the walls textured & painted, but I'm not about to do that myself, and we can't really pay someone right now.  So just pretend it's prettier than it is :) (besides - it could be a LOT worse)

1 Year Pics & Family Pics

I have a sweet friend, Jennifer, who is REALLY good at taking pictures.  We have used her the past couple years to take pictures of Brandon & I and then also Logan after he was born (all of the pics on the right of my blog, except the one of the dogs, were taken by Jennifer).  She's amazing :)

The morning of Logan's birthday party happened to be when we had scheduled to take some pictures with her to document Logan at 1 and also to get some much needed family shots.

To say I loved how they turned out would be an understatement.  Jennifer has always done wonderful pictures for us, but this time I was just so in love with them all.  Maybe the cute little 1 year old had something to do with it, but it's also her amazing talent in capturing the crazy, active, little one year old at just the right moments.  Looking at these pictures just reminds me of how blessed I am.  Being a wife and a mother are the best gifts (aside from salvation) that God has given me.  Having these pictures are so precious to me.

There are too many to share them all, so here are just a few of my favorites (in no particular order - this is just the order they downloaded)...

The first time Jennifer took pictures for us, we did this...

So we repeated it when we had maternity pictures taken...

Jennifer had a clever idea to do it again...so cute that Logan turned around to see what we were doing.  Ha! :)

Also, I'm apparently a liar since that was more than a few pictures...I just couldn't help it.  I love way too many!  Anyway, I hope you enjoy the pictures, but if not, that's ok, because I LOVE them and that's all that matters :)

I wish I could send EVERYONE a Christmas card, but since I can't, I will share it with everyone here...Merry Christmas!!

Cleaning 101

*edit* - just realized this is a ridiculously long post, with no pictures of Logan - feel free to not read it :)

Ok, so maybe that title is a little bit of false advertising.  I am not qualified to "teach" a Cleaning 101 class - I need to be taking one.  It should really probably be titled "Crazy 101"  Ha!  However, as I've been trying to clean up from Logan's party, and get some organizing done around the house, I have used lots of little tips and tricks that I've learned over the years, and just felt like sharing them.  They probably aren't new to others, but I just felt like writing them down.  Some of these, I really wish I had some pictures to go with, but I don't, so you'll just have to make your own pictures in your head - although some of it, you will probably be glad I DON'T have pictures and you won't want to make the pictures in your head.  Ha! :)

Lets start in the kitchen...

I might be a little crazy for a couple reasons (ok so maybe there's more, but 2 in relation to washing dishes).  I wash most of my pots, pans, and serving dishes by hand.  Because of this, I use a couple different cleaning "tools" for washing dishes.  I know, washing dishes isn't exactly rocket science, so why in the world do I need more than just a sponge?  Well, maybe I'm OCD, or maybe I'm too much of a perfectionist, or maybe I'm just plain crazy, but here's my reasoning/methods.  I mostly wash dishes with rags.  I got a whole bunch for super cheap at walmart, and the great thing about them is you just throw them in the wash machine when you're done and they're nice, clean & sanitized when they're done.  Sponges are ok too, and you can actually put sponges in the dishwasher to sanitize them, but I feel like they don't last as long as rags and I hate having to constantly replace them (rags are cheaper too).  I also have a dish brush.  This is something everyone should have if they don't.  They are super at scrubbing and what I love best, is they easily clean some of the harder things to clean.  Have you ever tried to wash a cheese grater with a sponge or rag?  It's such a pain because you really have to scrub in one directions so not to ruin your sponge or rag and there's always still a few spots where you missed some of the cheese film (for lack of a better word) and you have to go back and clean it again.  Well a brush you can scrub every which direction, and it rarely leaves any cheese film.  Awesome!

And, if that wasn't enough to make you think I'm crazy, listen to this - I basically pre-wash all of my dishes before putting them in the dishwasher.  I completely scrub/rinse them to make sure they don't have any specks of food on them.  The dishwasher is pretty much a sanitizer for my dishes, not a washer.  I do this because I feel like it keeps my dishwasher working better, and gets my dishes a whole lot cleaner.  I pretty much never have bits of food stuck on my dishes and I rarely have spots.  Although, for the no spots, we have terribly hard water here, and so I do use jet dry and I also don't use the heated dry cycle.  I found that the heated dry cause the hard water deposits to stick to my dishes, so I just let the dishes air dry.

Also, Dishwasher Magic is GREAT for cleaning your dishwasher and helping to remove hard water deposits.  You do need to do it somewhat regularly to prevent build up and if you already have build up you may have to use it a couple times to remove the current build up.  Although, if the build up is really bad, like the dishwasher that came with our house, you may just have to sell it to your dad for his rent house and get yourself a new one ;-)

Now let me tell you some things NOT to do in the kitchen...

Do NOT forget to wash your George Foreman Grill plates before moving, and then for whatever reason, choose not to use the grill for approximately 4 years.  Once you do decide to use it, and you take it out, you will discover that there is grease stuck to it that will take you 1/2 of your child's nap time just to scrub it off.  It will not come completely off, and you will get frustrated, and just decide that hopefully it won't kill you to use it sometime, and that maybe, if you're really lucky, after you use it and wash it the next time, it will come clean *cross fingers, hope, & pray it does* (Wasn't that a nice sentence too? Ha!) This is also something that a dish brush is GREAT for.  Way better than sponge or rag IMHO.

Do NOT neglect your kitchen floors.  Once you have a baby, that baby will start crawling.  That baby will want to spend 90% of his day in the kitchen, on the tile floor.  You will realize just how disgusting that floor really is.  It will then cause you to clean it once a week (or maybe 2 weeks if things get crazy) like it should have been cleaned for the last 4 years you lived here.  If you don't have dogs, you can probably stand to go a little bit longer.  However, if you don't have dogs, once said baby starts feeding himself, you will have no one to clean up after the baby.  Therefore, you'll have to clean up the food he drops to prevent him from eating hours/days/weeks later when he's playing on the floor in the kitchen.

Do NOT forget to look up in your kitchen.  I am not the tallest person, so I rarely look at anything that is more than 5 ft. 4 in. off the floor.  If you forget to look up, one day, when you do, you will see the grossest amount of dust sitting on, and hanging from (yes hanging from - yuck!) your curtains.  You will decide you never liked the curtains anyway, and you will have your husband take them all down for you.  Once he does this though, you will discover that the previous owners painted around where the brackets are, so you will now have white rectangles above your windows.  However, this is way better than the alternative.

Now on to some other general places/things...

If you have dogs or children, or in my case - both, and you have carpet, then you likely have stains in your carpet.  A neat, cheap, effective cleaning solution is just white vinegar and water.  It's amazing the things it will take out of the carpet - dog throw-up, baby spit-up, dog poop, baby poop, dog pee, baby pee, the list goes on - ha!  If you have a squirt bottle, you can mix it up and just spray it on the spot.  If you don't, just mix it up and poor a little on the spot.  Get a rag, blot/gently rub the spot and then repeat until the spot is done.  Use paper towels to blot dry.  Some of the tougher spots you may have to come back to, but it does a pretty good job the first time especially if you can get to it right away.

I hate dusting - always have.  It was one of my least favorite chores growing up.  However, now that they have swifter cloths and dusters, it's way better.  I still don't like doing it, but at least now all the dust gets trapped in the cloth/duster and all you have to do is throw it away.  No more stirring up the dust, or having to rinse your rag a million times.  Only negative though is they aren't cheap :(

I am terrible with organizing/dealing with clutter.  I've always been that way as long as I can remember.  I was always getting in trouble when I was little for having a messy room.  I'm trying to get better, but I still struggle with it a lot.  Especially with paper.  I'm very open to new ideas/suggestions for helping to organize/de-clutter my home.

If you have a stand up shower with glass walls/doors, I've found that the best thing to keep them clean is to use a squeegee after each shower.  It seems laborious at first, but it really is a time saver if you live somewhere with hard water.  Another trick for this that we learned from our previous owners is to put Rain-X (actually for cars - you have to get it at an automotive store) on the glass about once a week or so and the water just beads right off (you don't have to use a squeegee if you choose this method).

I'm a little bit OCD with my laundry too.  I have to start the water first, then add the soap, then I swirl it around a little.  I know - crazy.  But, I feel like it does a better job of distributing the soap, and therefore resulting in cleaner clothes.  I also use fabric softener & dryer sheets with most of the laundry as I like my clothes to smell good.  However, clothes always smell better when they hang to dry that go through the dryer.  I, however, am not will to do the extra work & wait the extra time it takes to hang dry.  The dryer also is awesome at getting the wrinkles out.  However, do not be like me sometimes and forget your clothes in the dryer because they then result in wrinkly clothes, which then causes you to re-run the dryer to de-wrinkle, which then causes your clothes to wear out faster, fade more, not smell as fresh and even shrink :(  We used to be really bad about that, but now that I'm home, I'm a lot better about it.

My last tip is the greatest vacuuming tip ever...get your husband to do it.  They are awesome at it! ;-)

I'm sure that as soon as I hit "publish" on this post, I will think of some more and kick myself, but these are just the ones that have come to mind recently and I've thought "I should blog about that." Ha!  Anyway, I hope you enjoyed my "CrazyCleaning 101" :)

*edit 2* - decided to throw this in for those of you that stuck it out to the end ;-)

Cutest vikings ever!

Logan's 1st Birthday Party

Yesterday, we celebrated Logan's first birthday with family.  It was so much fun, and we are so blessed to have such wonderful family!

One of my favorite authors/illustrators is Eric Carle.  One of my favorite stories of his is The Very Hungry Caterpillar.  So when I found a picture of a hungry caterpillar cupcake cake, I knew I had to make it, and we had to do a Very Hungry Caterpillar party for Logan's birthday.

I have to say, for my first attempt, I think it turned out pretty good!

We also made a Hungry Caterpillar out of lanterns for decoration.  Isn't he cute?

A few more details...

(we had to use grapes instead of plums - there were no plums to be found this time of year - ha!)

Caterpillar Food

Did you look closely? Ha!

Logan was very blessed with lots of wonderful gifts.

(The teddy bear is not a gift, but he has been very attached to it since his 12 month picture.  The rocking chair was from my parents.  It was mine when I was little.)

Getting ready to open his gifts!

He was only semi interested in opening presents, but after he opened the first toy, he pretty much only wanted to play at that point.  He got lots of fun toys, some much needed clothes, books, a pair of TOMS (so cute!), straw sippy cups, and a red wagon!  He is one blessed little boy!

After gifts, it was time for cake!

(Sorry about the terrible coloring of the photo - we had bad lighting, and I have no photoshop or photoshop skills, so you'll just have to accept this poor quality photo :) )

Not sure what to think of it!

Hmm...

Hey, this stuff's not too bad!

Yum!

He did not end up eating a whole lot of the cake, and after he was finished, he definitely needed a bath.  This resulted in a very unhappy Logan.  He does not like having his hair washed, so there was a lot of screaming and crying at this point.  Luckily, after he was bathed and redressed, he got to play with his new toys and was quickly happy again.  Unfortunately, I have no pictures after this point because I was busy trying to get dinner finished, served, feed Logan, and spend time with our family.  Oh well!

It was a great party, and we are definitely very blessed.  Thanks to all of our family for loving on our sweet boy!