An Old Hobby

It took me about two and a half weeks to get to it.  I got a little bored during the day.  My house wasn’t clean, but who wants to do that when there are millions of other ways to waste time?  There is only so much time you can spend looking at cool projects on Pintrest before the overwhelming urge to do something gets me out of the chair!
One of my goals this year has been to pick up painting again.  I painted in college.  I’m so grateful to have had the college experience I had.  We were allowed to take as many classes as we wanted to each semester.  After I got my feet under me in school I added at least one art class each semester to my schedule.  I recall skipping a fair amount of classes in college, but I bet I never missed my art classes.
From time to time I would pick up my brushes, but I never had the time or space to devote to it.  I do now.
For some reason, I have been on an oyster kick.  First I made hinted around to Allen that I wanted one of these beauties  from Alison Evans for Mother’s Day.

He delivered 3, but instead of satisfying my oyster urge, it increased it.  Now I want one or six of each.  Sorry sweetie!
And look at this

I’ve also been really drawn to other oyster art.
Look at this lovely from the Savannah artist Bellamy Murphy.

It inspired me to pick up my brushes and do my own poor attempts at some oyster art.
Working with acrylics is all new to me and while I want to get better, I sort of just want to go back to oils, so I can be comfortable.  Part of  it is that I am a bit of a perfectionist.  These are far from perfect.  However, they are a start.

I’ve got a ways to go, but life is long.

What do you want to be?

Jackson’s homework last week had a journal prompt asking what he wanted to be when he grows up.  I had not asked him lately.  We were tickled over what he wrote.

Can you read it?

 

He wrote “Bordr Protekson”.  he also drew a picture of the bad guy dropping his package.

Someone has been watching a lot of Border Wars.  Have you seen the show?  We are fans!

He has since told me that he wants to be the one who rides the ATVs.

Miller wants to be a Border Protection Officer too. 

What a pair they would make on the border!

What our afternoons look like

Now that we are back in the swing of things as far as school goes, we are making new routines for other parts of our day.
Directly after school or activities, I make Jackson do his home work, so he is free to do the fun stuff.  1st Grade is no joke and he has about 45 minutes of homework a night.  Ugh!
As soon as that is complete we usually head outside where boys of all sizes gather to ride any thing with wheels.

Because Miller wants to be out there, I have to be out there, and I’ve {unfortunately} fallen into the role of traffic cop out there. 
The day I took these pictures wasn’t that busy of a day. { Which is why I could step inside and grab my camera.}  Typically there are between 7 and 10 kids out there in the afternoons.

The role of traffic cop is to look for cars, then yell “CAR!” when one comes barreling down the street or over the bridge.  At that time, I am met with a mixture of indifference or rebellion from boys who just don’t want to share the road with cars.

This means I can’t really fix dinner or go potty if I need to, but it is so worth it. 

The boys are learning far more than how to pedal bikes and push scooters.
One of my favorite things about our neighborhood is that most of the kids are good kids.

While none of these boys wear helmets on their own bikes, I tell them that our rule is that they need helmets to ride our Rip Riders.  They do it.  I keep waiting on the back talk, it hasn’t come {yet}!
So thankful that my guys have good older kids around them to look up to.  Let’s hope it stays that way!

Boys Room

With both boys at school all day, I find myself with time to do things that I’ve never been able to do before.  Maybe I had time to do them, but didn’t really want to do them. 
We generally keep it well picked up, but the dressers end up being in a pile quite a bit.Today I decided to spend a few minutes clearing the flat surfaces in their room. 
After I finished I realized that their room is  so nice during the day.  The light pours in.  I wanted to to document what their room is like at this stage of their lives.

The large bed and dressers came with our house.  It would not be the furniture I would choose, but it works.  I do miss having my own furniture, though.
The room was even painted perfectly for boys.
Last winter we moved Miller from a toddler bed to a twin bed.  He loves it.
We also added the rug last winter.  The floor was beginning to show a good bit of wear.
Miller’s bed sits in this little alcove between the two closets.  I’ve tried centering it, but it keeps moving over to the right corner.  I think he likes it there.

I bought a large map to go over Miller’s bed.  Of course those oddly placed outlets drive. me. insane.  However, “Safety Dad” has vetoed my plan for now.  {I say he’d only pull it down on himself ONCE!}

Just because it has one of those long heavy metal tubes that it hangs from, Allen feels like it might get pulled down.  psssh.

Some of the bedding is from Jackson’s old room in MD, the large quilt is from Overstocks.com and Miller’s is a hand me down Pottery Barn Kids from a friend.  It’s all bright and colorful and works well together. 
A little vignette at the top of their built in shelf.  {I made the robots hold hands.}

This small shelf holds tons of stuff.  I bought the baskets from Pottery Barn Outlet a few years ago.  So useful.  I can never have enough storage containers!

We still use the rocker.  When Allen and I check on the boys on our way to bed, Miller is sleeping in the rocker about half of the time.

When my sister and I were young we shared a room.  It was tough, but it also taught me a lot about negotiation and sharing. 
When we moved to this house with really large furniture, Miller was still in a crib, so we put him in with Jackson since the other room was a bit smaller and much more crowded. Poor Miller still calls it “Jackson's room” and does not yet recognize that it is his room too.  Maybe Jackson is doing some weird chanting while Miller sleeps? “My room, my room!”
Even though Miller could easily go to the other room now, I like having them together.  There is something so sweet about my sweet babies breathing the same air as they sleep.  At night they usually go right to sleep.  I’ve asked them both and they both claim to want to be in the same room for now.
Honestly, they wake each other up in the mornings, but they do remarkably well.    In a year or two we may have to re-evaluate the situation, but for now, it really works!

Hockey?

Our little neighborhood is very diverse and we have neighbors from all over the place.  This summer we had some Canadians move in.  They have been here a short time, but it already seems like they have been here all along.
We always say that stereotypes are stereotypes for a reason.
Our Canadian neighbors came with a pile of hockey sticks.
They were kind enough to show Jackson how to play street hockey recently
We didn’t know how to hold them.  {Miller used his hockey stick as a hatchet and tried to chop down trees.}
We may have to have a bit more practice to catch that hockey fever.

Barefoot, flip flops and Crocs are the appropriate footwear when playing street hockey in the Bahamas.
This guy is not Canadian, he’s Dutch.
I feel so fortunate to be able to live this life and give our children this experience.  Even if hockey is totally weird to me!

Yeow!!!!

Last week we hit one of our favorite beaches for some fun in the sun before heading back to school.

Right after Jackson got in the water, he pops right out screaming his head off.  This was the same beach where he cut his foot, so that was my first thought…but no it wasn’t that.
He started screaming “LICE!, LICE!, LICE!”  we are so classy!  He was referring to “sea lice” which are jellyfish eggs.  Those suckers hurt like a B**** when they get under your skin.
Turns out it was not LICE! but was an actual jellyfish sting. 
TO THE FACE!

The big bruise to the temple had nothing to do with the jellyfish—that was his brother.
See how he is making a pitiful face?  He really did hurt.  It got him good and he was really uncomfortable for about half an hour.  Poor baby!
He managed to pull it together and have fun with the boys.

They are all holding up their treasures from that day.
Love those kids!

LEGO PARTY! 1 & 2

This year we decided that we HAD to have a LEGO party.  The boys are pretty obsessed with Legos, so it was a no brainer what to do for their party theme.
It did take me a little longer in the brains department to decide that we needed to do two separate parties.   It was a genius move or completely ridiculous to have two parties on the same day, but two parties in one day worked well for us!
Lego is such a classic toy and has such classic colors, it was so fun to put it all together.

The decorations
Our doors sported an initial “wreath” that we switched out between parties.

These hung over our dining room table

We put out candy on the table and the children LOVED that!

Did you know they make Lego candy?  They do and you can even build with it!

We had lots of our large sets put together and set out as decorations.

The food was pretty simple and classic.  Cookies, cupcakes, pizza, and chips.  Classic party foods.

Miller wanted blue cupcakes.  They remind me of something…Smurfy!

Jackson chose his new favorite color…ORANGE!

I made these minifigure sugar cookies and was pleased with how well they turned out.

I also made the marshmallow pops.  Not too hard to make and they turned out pretty cute.




Our activities were easy and the children loved them.  They had free play with Legos as they arrived.


The children colored minifigure heads to play with the next game.


We also had the Lego Clutch Powers movie playing in the background.

The children decided to turn themselves into minifigures.

Pin the head on the minifigure

Then we had them guess how many Legos are in the jar.

In case you were wondering… it was 94
The boys got to make a wish after we sang to them.  I bet they wished for more Legos!!!
Jackson took four blows to blow out his one candle.  After three blows he promptly spit a Lego candy out of his mouth onto the table and finished blowing out his candle.

Too bad we didn’t get a picture of that move!  But we do have proof!

The Guests are part of what makes a party so special.
My sister came for the party and I only have half a picture of her Boo!
This guy is a real hoot and he couldn’t get enough of the Lego candy!


Jackson was on a sugar high all day!

Each of our guests went home with a Lego goodie bag.

The bags had a a set of minifigure crayons, a coloring book {that was a real family collaboration to put together}, a Lego sticker and a Lego minifigure.

The boys absolutely loved their parties, which was exactly what we wanted!