Getting In The Groove Again

Have you ever come home from a wonderful vacation and tried to jump back into normal life?

It's not easy.

Especially when you spent a week in Florida with you parents, 5 siblings and their spouses plus 17 grand kids.

In one house.

For one one week.

At the beach.

Am I repeating myself?

 

Anyway, it was great.

 

 

 

Then we came home.....

 

 

I sat in a lounge chair in our back yard trying not to move a muscle.

Trying to hold on to the memories.

Bragging (via text) to my two younger siblings who were still driving back to VA about how wonderful the weather was here and how I wasn't doing anything but relaxing.

 

Yup.

That's what I said.

 

Then a ball got stuck on the roof and our boys tried to get it down.

With rocks.

Life is always interesting.



 

Teacher appreciation week was also last week.

I had fun creating a few things for our wonderful teachers and staff.

Beau specifically asked that I find or make a piece of jewelry for his teacher.

He wanted it to say "I love you".

I had fun making it and thought it was sweet of him to want that for her.

 

 

You know those bloggers that have beautiful homes?

You know.

The ones that show your their home one day and then the next day they post again with the new flooring they installed the evening before.

On a whim.

With only a toothpick and a paint scraper as her tools.

She actually did it all by herself while she took care of her 4 kids and 3 dogs.

Look at her go.

 

Yeah that's not me.

We have started the demolition of our flooring.

We are down to the nasty, gritty concrete that forces me to wear shoes all the time because I can't stand the feel of it on my bare feet.

Yup.

That's the stage we're in.

It's a stage we will remain in for a while.

We're buying a new back door.

Ahhh!

It's good to be back!

Join Me For Coffee? {A New Sign}

Why have they not made an authentic smelling coffee candle?

The kind that fills not only your nose but your whole head with that aroma that makes you want to crunch right into the whole coffee bean.

The aroma that makes non coffee drinkers wish they were coffee drinkers.

Why?

How hard can it be you candle makers?

I am a coffee lover.
Not a connoisseur mind you.
Just a lover of coffee.
I like coffee you can chew.
Yup.
I said chew.

I will admit that I drink a latte every morning.
I'm not ashamed.
You can chew espresso too.

Unfortunately this slice of coffee went off to new lands.
I sold it to my brother-in-law in Virginia.
It will be for sale at his store there.

Bottoms up you coffee fans.
Chew that coffee down!

(and somebody get busy on that candle)

Renewed, Upcycled, Recycled , Cube Footstool

I can't even begin to tell you how long I've wanted to do this sort of project.

Let us hear the story of how it came to be...

 

So Derek and the two older boys went on a men & boys camping trip this last weekend.

Fun for them, fun for me.

Now those of you who have been around for a while will remember I have a third son.

My in laws (who are awesome btw) called and asked if they could keep him for the day.

I may have interrupted them before they finished asking with a hearty yes!

 

I love my kids.

I do.

But in the back of my mind I've been wishing for a trip to HomeGoods.

I wanted it to be the kind of trip that memories are made of.

But not the kind where memories must be paid for because they were accidentally broken.

 

I browsed through HomeGoods at my leisure.

I. looked. At. Everything.

Twice.

At the end of my browsing then I set one measly item on the counter and asked if they could mark it down even more for me since the lid was missing.

They did.

Nice people those HomeGooders.

I rushed home with my burn-your-eyeballs-pink-cube.

I yanked out my burlap coffee bag that I had been hoarding for just such a moment.

(Not sure who I was hoarding it from? Perhaps myself?)

I realized as I lovingly draped my coffee friend over the pink cube that the pink cube was still showing through.

I ran outside with my pink cube and quickly sprayed it down with some black spray paint.

Then I went to stapling....

 

 

 

The lid was next.

Not very exciting.

I cut.

I screwed my planks to another piece of wood.

I stained.

I stuffed.

I stapled.

I banged tacks around it. 

 

And I was happy.

Toothpaste - It's Not Just For Teeth Anymore!

Do you use toothpaste?

I mean really use it?

 

Yes I see you have shiny white teeth, but come on!

We can make it do so much more!

 

Let's take a look...

Sorry about the blur

 

So if you're a mother and if your kids have ever gotten into the markers then you're going to need this one.

My youngest is one of those kinda kids and his brothers are his suppliers.

They leave markers out that just lay there, begging to be used in the naughtiest of ways.

 

On one two three such days he decided to add some decoration to my living room coffee table.

Now luckily this coffee table is very rough and rustic, so they weren't glaringly obvious.

 

Anyway, after staring at them day after day, I remembered...

TOOTHPASTE.

So I went and brushed my teeth.

When I came back I rubbed some onto the marker spots...

Let it marinate...

AND VIOLA!

Okay, so they aren't gone all the way.

In real life though you don't even see them unless you know where to look.

Plus, as I mentioned, this table is very rustic so... ya know.

I could have most likely done it again and gotten them all the way out, but I was happy already.

I will mention that it kinda dries out the finish of your wood.

I simply applied some olive oil to remedy that.

 



 

Now here's another pretty cool one.

Once again, if you have kids then you have scratched DVD's and CD's.

I had many of them.

I did this with CD's that would skip and stall.

VIOLA!

No skipping.

No stalling.

I did this with DVD's that would freeze up due to scratches.

VIOLA!

No freezing.

 

Okay, so this is a miracle worker but it's not a magic wand.

If you've got scratches that you can stick your fingernail in then probably not going to work for ya.

Sorry.

Now I got this handy little tip from this lovely lady's blog.

(via Pinterest)

Now she suggests using Kids CREST toothpaste.

I had no Crest, but I did have Kids Colegate.

Worked great!

As she mentions, you may have to do it more than once on some of them.

Check out her post because she gives you the step-by-step that I am obviously not doing for you.

 

Have anymore toothpaste miracles?

Do share...



Etsy Spring Fling & A New CHRIST IS.. Sign

If I had a dollar for every time someone has emailed me about this sign...

I still wouldn't be rich.

But, I would have made a decent chunk of change.

 

I painted a few.

I plan to paint more.

Sometime...

 

 

You can find this lovely gray and white one here.

 

Or this dark brown stained and creamy white one here.

 

And lastly, this rustic, weathered gray and white one here.

Believe it or not, this one is my favorite.

It actually didn't photograph as neat as (I think) it looks in real life.

 

So to celebrate the glorious arrival of Spring and of these new items, I am having a SPRING FLING sale!

Stop by my Etsy Store and pick out something special for yourself or someone dear to you.

 

Enter the code SPRINGFLING when you checkout and get 10% off!

Sale will end on Monday, April 8th.