picnic table

so I got lucky and got a free picnic table from freecycle.....but this is what it looked like. it had been a family with 3 small kids craft table. and clearly they did a lot of painting, with purple. but it was free and other than the paint in good shape.....



so i set off with the sander and with not as much effort as i was expecting i turned it into this...and i absolutely love it. there are still little bits of paint left here and there but i think they give it character and i left them on purpose....

i think it turned out very well. it was a fun project, that hopefully will get some use when i move.

washable doesn't always mean from hands...

so today we decided to try out stamps.....I knew it was kind of risky because ink could be messy, and their fingers would be a mess and lots of other reasons....but we are trying very hard to find new and mommy approved things to do so i thouhgt I would give it a try.
I found some cute stamps for a buck of things they were into and some semi cheap stamp pads that said washable, easy clean up, and non-toxic. so i decided to believe the package and get them, it was also nice because they were not as expensive as some other ones i found.
so today i set up the high chairs at the table and buckled the kids in and it took a minute for them to figrue it out...but they got it...

of course first henry wanted to put it on his hand. which he clearly tried, but no ink was on the stamp yet so it didn't work. but once he figured out the paper part we were off and running...

see, he figured out what the goal was...

as with everything, he was pretty serious and focued on what he was doing.

Abbie had it down to. she went from the sstamp pad to the paper between each stamp and caught on very quickly, before herny in fact.

now you see everything was going fine, until....

we ended up with a flower on the dining room table, and ink on hernys fingers. so i went to try and wipe the WASHABLE and EASY TO CLEAN ink off the table, well it was nto very easy at all. so I figured i should try henrys hands before things got worse. but that went okay.

Then, we came across the hard part....Abbie ended up with ink on her face, all over her hands, and on her BRAND NEW dress that was moms FAVORITE purchase yesturday. so i was a little worried that the ink would not come out, so i threw it in the washer and thankfull it is now completely ink free and clean which is good. however, i got the ink off of abbies face adn high chair with a simple washcloth, but her hands.....oh my...

I have tried soap, someone suggested comet, a lot of water, baby wipes were suggested, and just endless scrubbing....and her hands are still pink!!!!

I have looked online and there are lots of options: windex, salt and soap, toothpaste, baby wipes and greasy lotion, and many others....so i may try those after nap time.

but the label said it was washable, henrys green and red hands are back to normal, her cloths are clean, her face is clean so what is up with her hands?????
in the end though....they really enjoyed it and seem to want moer...I just have to figure out how to keep their hands out of the ink next time apparently..gloves?

one of those weeks...

it was just one of those weeks,
the kids were whiney,
they were restless from not being able to go outside,
we didn't leave the house 2 days because we had no car,
they were picky eaters,
not good nappers,
hard adjusting back from dad for 4 days
it was miserable hot outside,
i wasn't sleeping,
i was just drained after a very long weekend,
things with the house are not going well, or at least not moving forward,
my parents have been crazy this week,
jusst a long week where nothing seems to be working out how i wanted...
but now it is almost over...in 67 minutes to be exact...
i am very happy for it to be done...hoping for more fun and relaxation next week.

girls weekend

this weekend I went up to ojai with my mom, cousin, and aunt.....
we did it once a few years ago and it was a fun trip....lots of paitence but fun.
so this year we headed back and there was one thing that we knew we haqd to do when we went back.....

we had to have strawberry shortcake.....we had it last time and ti is huge and amazing...and the fact that the resturant also has pesto sauce is just an added bonus.

we also rode horses....at am amazing place....I would love to stay there and next time we go we just might. my horse was really good this year, his name wasRocky. we rode in the "woods" a bit and up on a hill where we could see the ocean, it was fun, i was on a horse, there were cowboys....i enjoyed it.

we also picked blueberries that are apparently amazing...i did not try any.

but it was fun to pick them and there were so many more than last time which made it much more fun.

we also did a making strides cancer walk which was very fun....it was the first anual one walk in ventura county and it was a fun thing t oparticipate in....and amazingly everyone made it so i was very proud of them for finishing.

here are the 4 of us with our homemade t shirts before we started the walk.....it was very cold that morning.

overall the trip was fun, but was also very very very stressful and required a ton of patience which is someting i greatly lack, so i am now out of patience for a while.

we also went to a great farmers marker and got some homemade breads that were great and some fresh strwberries that were amazing and soem salsa for my dad to try.

The Fair!!!!

well there are only a few things i look forward to every year...and none of them are holidays or birthdays.
and last sunday i happen to go to one of my favorite places...THE FAIR!!!
i always have a great time, and always come away very happy and generally with my arms full.
this year it was an exciting month because i got to be reminded of it multiple times, which was absolutely amazing because i was reminded not the one doing the reminding so i knew it was important to someone other than me which was AMAZING.
then we got there and thankfully the drive there had no traffic, found a great free parking spot, got in easily no lines,...and then it began.
we wandered around for a while as always checking out the games and seeing which prizes we wanted. then we did out first play on the giant water prize game as we do every year...unfortunately this year wasn't as good as last year we didnt win the first time but that was okay. we continued wandering around to more games...
first he won me the moneky in a banana simply because that way i would have what my brother wanted which was cute and sweet in a weird way.
then he won a blue dog, then he won a husky that was adorable and who is now sitting in my room with the monkey...
finally after many failed attempts from both of us at the giant prize water game we simply watched and we noticed a trend...every time number seven won...so we waited and wandered some more...until finally number 7 was open so i sat down and magically i won...yay!!! i got a giant teddy bear that was a lot of different colors, he is very big and very soft and now sitting in his room with other momentos from out adventures...i love it.
we also had funnel cake because we are at the fair and funnel cake is a must, we did include strawberries this time...it was yummg.
then as always, not sure why, we got fresh squeezed lemonade in a special fair cup.
then we went on the giant ferris wheel with all of our new friends and it was a great night....
finally we headed home for a movie and sleep...it was amazing as always..

I LOVE THE FAIR!!

my weekend...

well...now that ive done some stuff for the kids, i think its time to tell you about my weekend which was GREAT!!! there are still more posts of what the little ones and I have been up to but for now...my weekend.

so this weekend, i really had no plans. but somehow I didn't do much sitting around this weekend...
it started right after work with my mom and I heading to the bank to situate my bank accounts which somehow got my name taken off of them, we also applied for a credit card...hope I don't get into to much trouble. then it was home where Taylor was and he all on his own said " so we are seatbelt shopping tomorrow right" i was very surprised, i had only mentioned it to him the weekend before and he has a reputation for not remembering ANYTHING. so when he brought it up I was super excited. he had even made a plan of more than just seatbelt shopping.
so we woke up semi early for a saturday morning and headed to cars and coffee which is a fun place for us to see cool cars and generally just chat and catch up since we don't always see each other often. then we headed to my grandparents and got breakfast on the way. while there we cleaned up the garage a bit while waiting to sell soem wheels. then after that it was off to pick a part...or 2 pick a parts...we wandered around the aisles of half torn apart cars and unfortunately only found one Z and no seatbelts were in it. so it ended up not working but we will go back and hopefully succeed in finding me seatbelts for my goal of making my own seat belt purse(with some help from a friend). then we headed home where we talked online(yes we are weird but he was upstairs and i was downstairs, hard to yell that far). then that night I went and watched two little boys, 6 and 7 years old. this is only the second time ive watched them but they are cool and really fun. they are both "all boy" which is what i totally love ,so it was really fun.then sunday morning I got up and watched the new PBR that was recorded and then started getting stuff crossed of my to-do list. I cleaned my car: got the junk out, vacumed the carpets, dried up as much water as i could, got the wood chips out of the back, checked and refilled all the fluids, and dusted off the dashboard. then i did some homework which needed to be finished. then i got lucky and got a free DVD shelf off criagslist so i set up a pickup time for that (and can I tell you how excited I am to see the shelf full and in my new house, i really like it). then i went on an adventure to go pick up a wii. I have wanted one for a while but have always second guessed whether or not I would actually use it...but I finally decided to make the plunge when I found one for pretty cheap and I told my self that if I do not use it in a month, then I can sell it for at least what I paid most likely more. so we will see what happens. then last night I picked up the dvd shelf, filled it up with the DVDs i have and then got everything ready for this week.
overall it was a good weekend, got all my to-do list done, got some cool new stuff, relaxed, got to hang out with my brother, and it was just a great weekend....

lately life has been really good. I enjoy school. I love my job, and im loving finding things for us to do. I enjoy my free time which gets filled up with reading, movies, rodeos, cars, friends, and a lot of fun lately, everything has been amazing with a certain someone ....and just life is good......now to get a house and it will officially be PERFECT!!

thats my rambling for the day...but i had to share my weekend because i really enjoyed it.

Swimming...

so we have gone swimming a few times this summer and im sure we will more but some of the pictures are really cute so I thouhgt i would share them...