Bathroom: Before & After

One of the best things about Pinterest is finding projects for you husband to do. Because every guy needs a few more things on his to do list, right?

I wish we could do a complete overhaul on our room and bathroom to create more closet space, but that is not really in the cards right now. We did take the carpet and vinyl out of the bathroom and put in tile. This is the before pic...

Brian also replaced the faucets, made some shelves and put a pretty border around the mirror to break it up some. After all, I can only handle so much refection at 6:00 a.m.  We are not really sure what to do with the lights since they are now not spaced evenly, but I guess we will figure that out one of these days.

You can't really see it well in the photo, but on the left wall under the picture we put up a piece of wood with pegs all along it for hanging towels, swimsuits, etc.  I'm loving that!

Now if I'm keeping it real...this mess of a closet is what you would see if you were to turn around. Whoever invented sliding closet doors should be locked up in a tiny jail cell with other people who invent awful things...like that hard, sealed plastic packaging that is impossible to open without coming close to losing a finger. Or the person who invented those stickers that make it impossible to open a DVD.

So anyway, these doors just won't stay on track, so they have been leaning up against the wall for about  10 months.

I was all excited when I found this solution on Pinterest (below) and thought I would do (or have Brian do) something similar minus the barn-like hinges. But apparently we can't do this because we don't have the right kind of door jambs or something.

So...what to do. What to do? I'm tired of these leaning doors in my way people so please give me some ideas.   :)

Life with a Wild Thing

When I was pregnant with Cole and found out we were going to have a boy I prayed that he would be "all boy." A little boy splashing through puddles, digging in the dirt, and riding tractors is what I envisioned.

I'm pretty sure God said, "Sure thing!" and double dipped Cole in the boy bucket. Then I think He chuckled and dipped him a third time.

On plenty of occasions I have had someone say to me, "You've got yourself a B.O.Y.!"

Of course when I was dreaming of what my boy would be like, I didn't really foresee the filthy walls, the mountain of crumbs that pile up under my table nightly, or the unique places he can find to relieve himself when using the bathroom seems way too boring. But I loooove my boy and wouldn't change a thing about him.

Tuesday morning I grabbed my little, wild thing and we set off for our first kayaking trip together in the sound. We paddled, we watched the ducks waddle along the bank, and we talked about currents.

My boy was so calm, and I was so thankful that he had not tipped us over in one of his bursts of energy that he normally has about every 10.5 seconds.

I asked, "Cole, how do you like kayaking?"

He paused for a moment and said, "Well...Mama...How do you make this thing pop a wheelie?"

That's my boy.

No Pain, No Gain!

We spend a good bit of time in our front yard fighting pirates, kicking balls, and making our way to the hammock. Being that our front yard consists entirely of sand - this translates into at least 547 pounds of sand being carried inside each week. Since sweeping is not my favorite activity I thought I should make a walkway to go around the yard. My neighbor has a walkway that she made with a mold, and she was sweet enough to let me borrow it.

I was up bright and early Saturday morning and determined to use every last bag of concrete that Brian was able to load into his truck. I had hired someone to mix batches of concrete while I filled the mold/rinsed/repeated. If you know me, you know that once I make up my mind to do something I want it done yesterday. I worked hard. Although I did wear gloves, the tips would break and concrete got under my nails. Because I didn't want to stop working, by the end of the day I had dried concrete solidly embedded under my nails and in my nail beds. And if you have worked with concrete (I had not) then you know that concrete burns your skin if left on there. Painful.

After five hours of work we had made 38 2'x2' molds.

My neighbor has tons of fun things embedded in her stones, so I decided to do that also. She gave me some things to get started with - I told you she's sweet. I also found a metal "4" that I decided to use since Cole just turned four. I added other things like an old measuring spoon from a set that my mama used forever and then gave to me, a lens cap, a fish hook, etc.

I also wrote our names and the name of the woman who owned the house and lived in it for almost all of the years since it was built in the 70s.

The bad news is that I still need more work done, and the guy who was helping me yesterday did not show up today. No surprise there because his fingers were at least as bad as mine. Maybe he will come back eventually!

If you decide you would like a cute, little walkway - here is a link to the mold. And be sure to get some heavy duty gloves and wash your hands OFTEN! 

And most importantly - if you need help with it - please don't call me. I'm pretty sure I will be busy washing my hair that day.

Girl Power

Back in March we had a bad storm one morning. After hearing a lot of crashing noises I looked out our back window and saw some outdoor shelves lift up and fly down our stairs into the pool gate. The meteorologists called what happened a microburst. I would have sworn we had some kind of small tornado. When it was over our pool deck was separated from the pool in many areas. Some frames (from bee hives) that Brian had on the ground were up on our second story deck. We also had major roof damage with shingles littering our yard and street.

Which leads us to...a new roof. I woke up this morning and sent Brian a message that said, "Call Africa and tell them to come get the herd of elephants off our roof." The roofers were up and at it before 7:00. When I walked outside I have to admit I was a little shocked to see a girl on the roof. I know, I know...girls can do these jobs. I once had a tough job myself when I owned a decorative concrete business. But I still smiled and thought: Girl Power!  :)
 
So here's superwoman up on the highest part of our roof gettin' it done...

I'll leave you with this...sorry.

Did you hear the joke about the roof?
Awww, never mind... It's over your head!

Yo Ho, Cole is Four!

Yo ho mateys! Cole turned four and we had a swashbucklin' good time at his party. This post is going to be photo overload because I love all these kiddos.

I'll also share some of the details in case anyone wants to know where things came from. I found these cute bottle invitations at Oriental Trading, and they were cheaper than printed invitations. Score! They came with sand, a cardboard eye patch, skeleton ring, labels for the outside of the bottles, and the invitation.

I wasn't so crazy about the invitation that came with the bottles, so I made my own and printed them. I used some graphics that I got from seller JazzyPatterns at etsy for the invitation (and other party elements.) The blocked off part is our address.

I didn't make much for the party, but I had this corn hole game that I had been wanting to make a design for. I had some pirate fabric, got some corn from my daddy, and whipped up some bags. Well...the game looked cute, but it didn't really work that well. I had the posters printed at Sam's photo lab as large prints, and the bags didn't slide across them well. It didn't really matter because the kids were really too interested in the pirate ship to play corn hole.

We had one heck of a pirate ship. It was a stroke of luck that we got to use this! To make a long story short, some photo clients told me about Bob and Lydia's ship, I chatted with them some, and we were soon making plans for them to bring it to the party.

Bob and Lydia worked HARD to get this all set up for the children. They are two of the smartest, kindest, and most interesting people I have met in a long time. If you would like to get in touch with them, shoot me an email and I will get their contact information to you.

Here is the ship all set up - complete with a fierce skeleton, rats, and a beaver walking the plank!

If you know Cole, you know that he is not speechless often. But let me tell you - when he came around the corner and saw this ship he didn't even have words for a while. It was so funny.

Lucy and Grayson boarded the ship for some fun...

See...I told you there was a beaver walking the plank. And did I mention there was TREASURE on board?

Cole and Kyndle had no trouble steering this mighty pirate ship...

Nor did Mason! What a crew! They enjoyed the ship so much.

One of Cole's sweet babysitter's agreed to be the head pirate for the party and lead the kids on a hunt for pirate treasure.


Pirate Dakota told the kids about the treasure, asked to see their meanest pirate faces, got them to talk like a pirate (Arrrr!), and taught them the secret pirate handshake - high tide, low tide, cannon ball! (High Clap, Low Clap, Fist Bump)

Next, the kids were all given pirate  names! If you happen to need some names, here you go:

BOY NAMES

Rowdy Red Beans, Captain Toothache, Two Toes Tommy, One Ear Eddie, Squiffy Stormchaser, Buccaneer Bart, Sam the Swashbuckler, Peg Leg Jack, Spike the Sea Wolf, Robby Redbeard, Hook Hand Harry, Stinky Boot Bob, Big Jamaica John

GIRL NAMES

Gunpowder Gertie, Shipwreck Sally, One Stump Sue, Bonny Barnacle, Blue-Eyed Bess,

Landlubber Lucy, Boisterous Bess, Kelly the Kidd, Cannon Ball Carla, Greedy Grace of the Sea, Calypso Clara

Henry cracked me up with his Stinky Boot Bob name!

The little pirates had to do three things in order to find the treasure.

#1  

It’s time to walk the plank if ye dare,

If ye make it across there will be prizes to share.

Creep down the stairs and into the backyard,

Line up at the plank – it won’t be too hard.

Don’t be ‘fraid of the gators – walk on by,

When you get to the end – you’ll get a bandana, an earring, and a patch for ya eye.

Everyone made it across the plank and was rewarded with their pirate accessories!

You can find the bandanas and earrings at Oriental Trading. The eye patches came with the swords, and I'll post a link to those later. 

#2

It’s time to move on, we can’t be late,

Our next clue will take us through the secret fence gate.

We must be very quiet, keep a finger on your lip,

Our job is to sneak up on a bad pirate ship.

We’ll blast it with cannonballs, you won’t be bored,

If you can hit the ship, you’ll earn a real pirate sword! 

The pirates blasted the ship (which I painted one day on some extra plywood I found under the house). Here's my tip for water balloons...don't buy nice, thick balloons. They don't burst!  :)  The swords came from Oriental Trading and had eye patches with them.

Go William! (A.K.A. One Ear Eddie)

All pirates got a quick briefing in sword handling:

Now that you’ve earned your swords you have to know the rules of the sea,

You must promise right now to keep your swords low when fighting…down by your knee.

If we see your swords swing up near someone’s face…

We’ll take your sword away and you’ll be a pirate disgrace.

 
 More fierce pirates...

We were soon moving on to:

#3

 Before we look for treasure there is one more thing we must do…

Every pirate needs a battle scar and a pirate tattoo!

Are you ready? Are you brave? Do you dare?

There’s treasure to be found, so hurry… line up behind a chair!

The kids all got tattoos. Just in case you don't know...tough pirates use salty sea water to apply their tattoos.

They also got battle scars. All you need to make battle scars is red lip liner, black eyeliner, red lipstick, and a rough sponge. Draw a jagged red line first. Then made black "stitches" through the red line.  Last, apply some red lipstick to the sponge and dab it around the scar.

Cole's DeeDee was our professional scar maker.

 Love, love, love these sweet and fun kids! ARRRRR!!!

And last, the pirates were ready to go find their treasure:

Alright little pirates, you’re getting hot,

There’s treasure to find and X marks the spot.

If you listen very carefully and do as you’re told,

You’ll find a chest full of jewels and coins of gold.

 Line up behind this flag - we’ll sneak down the road

We’ll chant and we’ll sing – it’s the pirate code.

 

 The kids lined up behind Pirate Dakota and they all marched down the road chanting together:

We are pirates! Get out of our way!We want treasure! Give us your silver!Give us your gold! ARRR!!

We ended up in a little, sliver of park where Pirate Dakota told the little ones this story:

A very long time ago, a pirate’s ship landed just out there where you see the water. The pirate was tired after a long journey so he came here to rest. He didn’t leave his treasure on the boat. He brought it with him so no one would steal it.Guess what happened?  He fell asleep!He woke up when he heard a canon firing…boom!He saw that someone was trying to sink his ship, so he ran back to his ship as fast as he could and sailed away before his ship was destroyed. And guess what? He was in such a hurry he forgot to take his treasure with him! It’s still here!Do you think you can find it? If you were a pirate, where would you go to rest?

 
And under the park bench...treasure was found! Whitley's expression is priceless!

I loved that One Ear Eddie was marching around with his name. Braeden shows off his treasure..

By the time we got back to the house the pirates were all hungry. I didn't make any fancy pirate food. It was hotdogs, sandwiches, and chips. They had worked up an appetite and chowed down as pirates do.

Cole has a best buddy at the Publix bakery (He calls her sweet potato, and she gives him TWO cookies when we visit) so it was a must that she make the cake for him. 

Cole made out like a pirate for sure when present time rolled around.

I didn't mention earlier that the pirate ship had working water cannons!  The photo below shows Cole working the control to shoot the water while Grayson and Zack splashed around and enjoyed a cool down.

It was a great day. I'm so thankful for our sweet family and friends that joined us and made it so special!

If anyone wants to snag any of the party photos of you kids (there are lots more than are shown here) your can find them here:
http://jillhiggins.shootproof.com/event/588024