Another year older....

Discovering that my birthday was to land on a Sunday was a wee-bit disappointing considering that I wake up alone every Sunday since David likes to get to the church practically at the crack of dawn (he's a hardworking worship & arts pastor). However, looking back, every special occasion that lands on a Sunday always starts well. While I may be alone, every special Sunday, I wake up, realize what "holiday" it is and jump out of bed, come around the hallway and lay eyes upon my pleasant surprise that David so fabulously leaves for me.

This time it was this beautiful bouquet of flowers, a sweet card from David, and an adorable handmade card from Liam (with the help of daddy). So special. After church, lunch, and a much needed and deserved (since it's my b-day n' all) nap, we headed out for birthday fun. I got my FREE coffee from Dutch Bros (I know I am a cheapskate, but I am proud of it). I got maybe a couple of sips out of a delicious DECAF almond joy blended coffee snazzed up with whipped cream....until Liam started freaking out in the car yelling "cotti! cotti! peeez, cotti?" Yes, our almost 2 year old loves "cotti". Thankfully it was decaf, but he seriously freaks out about it. We went to starbucks late the other night and I didn't finish my DECAF skinny vanilla latte before we went to bed. I apparently left it on the table because the next morning I found Liam sitting at the dining room table eating his toast and holding his starbucks "cotti". The only thing missing was a pair of slippers and a newspaper.

Anywho, I didn't mean to veer off on a tangent, back to the birthday, back to ME. :)
David had put together a fun dinner party for me at Red Robin where we met up with a few friends and I got to use my FREE birthday burger coupon. I highly recommend taking advantage of FREE burgers once a year.

David wanted me to open a present from him first, so I did....there are pictures to follow, narrating my husband's sick and clever since of humor....


Opening the present and slightly annoyed that David is making a scene by standing up walking around trying to get all these pictures.....
I opened it up. It was a cute black scrapbook with a white damask print on the front. Not bad, good job David! He insists that I open up the scrapbook and says he got it started for me already.

Getting excited I'm thinking, "Oh my gosh, my husband probably took some cute pics of Liam and I and tried his hand at scrapbooking! How sweet".....remember, these were JUST thoughts....

Instead, this is what I found: a ziploc baggy holding a smashed gutsy looking bug of some sort.....I was sooooooooooooo confused and SOOOOO grossed out and slightly embarrassed at this point, thinking "Is my husband some kind of sick minded psycho gift giver?"......Then he explained, these were his words:"Since I couldn't get you a Cricut, I got you a grasshopper!" Funny and clever, yet still slightly sick and twisted. He made me laugh. :)What to my surprise ;), was my real gift? An actual Cricut! Wahoo! David coordinated with friends and family to do a gift pool on getting me a much coveted and desired Cricut machine.
Despite the crazy loud restaurant, the fact that Liam was acting more like a devil child by throwing everything in reach, a rude waitress and a smashed grasshopper in a body bag joining us for dinner, it ended well and I was very happy turning 26!

Thank you everybody, and I love you, David....oh so much!

Ruffle Re-Fashion Fury!!!

Ok, so, I stalk blogs like I do...for this very reason!. Look at this adorable tutorial from Alexis at My Mama Made It. It's amazingly easy!

As soon as I saw it, I dug through my shirt drawer searching desperately for a long-sleeved tee that would work for this re-fashion. I am in love with it!!! Don't act surprised if you see me wearing ruffles on everything now!

This is me VERY happy about the way it turned out!
I made the mistake of not taking a before pic of the shirt, but I happened to have the same one in a different color, so, you'll get the idea.

Before....After....!!!! (ok, so, remember I said they're different but the same...)Ok, so I didn't mean for this to be so much of a boob shot...that's what happens when you try to get artsy when taking photos of yourself with one hand! But look at those ruffles!More ruffles....and cute scrabble tile pendant! :)

Happy Friday....I work today....boo!

To the rest of you.....Go make ruffles!

Embellish me....

So, I got a little carried away with creating a new blog header. Thanks to my friend, Leah (great name, I know!), introducing me to scrapblog.com. I had sooooo much fun doing it! It was so easy. It was like scrapbooking with all the fun embellishments right at your fingertips! Even better, there was no mess to clean up!

What do you think? Too cluttered and crazy? Let me know!

Check out the website!
Happy Tuesday!

It's Rainin' Babies!....Hallelujah

Party time! The babies are coming....

Tonight I hosted my friend, Michelle's, baby shower. Everything looked so cute! As you probably saw in my last post, I used the Martha Stewart polka dot line (which I scored for super cheap at Big Lots!) for most of the theme for the party.

I avoided awkward shower games and was too lazy to come up with word scrambles. Instead, I brought out a scale. Everyone's face was priceless when that thing showed up. It was a simple, yet fun, way to give away a prize. Everyone weighed their purses and whoever had the heaviest purse, won the prize. :) Simple. Sweet. Then I did another purse game where you had to find things in your purse that began with the letters of the baby's name, K-Y-L-E-A-H. That was fun and quick. Lastly, I set the timer for 15 minutes when we started opening presents. When the timer went off, whoever brought the gift that Michelle was currently unwrapping, you guessed it, won a prize. Short and sweet. I know. But, that was what was nice about it. More time to eat and chat.

Cute cute cupcakes! Cupcakes are cute. But, cupcakes with flags? Come on now. SO adorable. More credit goes to Martha.
My own personal plug for Bebe-Leche! She's opening her Booby Blanket nursing cover. :) Check us out!

The big group of ladies. 17 of us total. Perfect size.
My super cute friend, Cindy. She is also expecting and is due in 2 weeks! She looks amazing. I am helping with her baby shower 2 days from now. Fun fun!
Not sure why I am showing you napkins, but, they are another Martha Stewart bargain find....so, I must.
The favor basket.
This picture is too cute! The letters were cutout leftovers from the Cricut project! Chelsea arranged them so cute with the candles.
Cute book I found that has funny little drawings and saying about the miseries of pregnancy. Everybody chose a page that they related to while being pregnant and wrote a personal message to Michelle.
Cute Cricut cut out.....thanks to Michelle (guest of honor). I had to use her Cricut to make a bunch of stuff for her own shower! How lame am I? I know. I just went over to her house and wouldn't let her come upstairs while I used her stuff. Hmmmmm...hint hint....this should be a subtle idea for my upcoming birthday present. David, are you reading this? :)

The magic Cricut cut out. Thank you Michelle. I stamped the polka dots on the white letters. They needed a pop. And the ribbon? Matched perfectly!

More lanterns hanging above the drink station. Notice my Liam shrine wall. He's so cute. :)
Party favors in the basket were chocolate dipped shortbread cookies.

The cute spread. My friend Chelsea hand painted that cute bowl! She's pretty awesome!

Michelle's (mommy-to-be) special seat of honor with a canopy hung special for her!
Cute glass votives with pink flowers and polka dots.....thank you, Dollartree.
Paper lanterns I found at Joann's for $1 each. The dotted garland was a Martha Stewart find that went along with the cupcake toppers and party favors.I stole this sign from my little sis who happens to be stocking up on baby decor, even though she isn't pregnant and doesn't have any babies....yet. :) Thanks sis! Oh, and the flower was attached with a glue dot to cover up the sticky spot where the price tag left some grime. Chelsea's brilliant idea (she loves to embellish).
Cute personalized candy bars. Another thanks to Martha for coming up with stinkin adorable stuff and offering print wizards online to teach us how to make them personal! We love you, Martha.....even though you are a criminal, we love you.
More of the table set up. The fruit was watermelon and cantaloupe balls that matched the colors of the shower perfectly and stayed consistent with the polka dot theme.
Michelle and me. My hair was a disaster, I know. But, this was at the end of the shower and after the clean up. I was pretty much a wreck. She looks so cute pregnant! She only has 4 weeks left and she still has ankles and a happy glow. Oh to look that good in the last days of expecting....


All in all, it was a good shower with good friends honoring a fabulously sweet girl! Love you Michelle! May you have that baby early....;)

Thank you, Martha...

I realize that it has been forever since I last posted anything. However, my life has been crazy busy lately and has yet to slow down. Traveling, a constant flow of company, a sudden boom in Bebe-Leche business, LIAM and his daily adventures of pooping in the tub, church events, birthday parties, and last, but not least, party planning. Yes, I am getting ready for a big baby shower for a dear friend. I am hosting the shower at my house on Sunday night.

I wanted to post something, so, I thought I'd give you a sneak peek into what I've been up to. The above picture is my inspiration for the entire shower. I actually scored big time on most of the stuff pictured above (thank you, Martha) for $2 a package at Big Lots! Martha Stewart? At Big Lots? I know, right?!!! Awesome. It's gonna be super cute.

Anywho, I will hopefully get a chance to take some good pics of it all and I will have some more to post! Until then.....enjoy the sunshine.

The BIG Five year...Fabulous Friday

Wow. Five years of marriage already. It's been great. It's gone by so fast. I can honestly say that I am soooooooooo much more in love now than I was five years ago (which at the time, I didn't think was possible). But, I guess that happens when you marry your bestest friend! :)

Our special day couldn't be more perfect.....and it's not even over yet. The morning started out with David fixing a fabulous family breakfast (which he does almost every Friday or Saturday). Then, I snuck out and went and got David's wedding band engraved (I just told him I was gonna have it cleaned since it was looking mighty shabby). I had it say "I'm so glad you found me"----which is a spin off of the song he wrote for me and sang the night he proposed, entitled "I'm so glad I found you". So, yeah, pretty darn sweet. I know. :)

Anywho, his ring looks fabulous. It gets better. He bought me a super cute trendy black dress! I bought him 2 fun shirts too. :) But wait, he bought me a diamond band!!! I've been hinting at wanting a diamond band to wear below my wedding set for a while now...I kept saying "at five years.....at five years....." Well, my hinting worked! I got my beautiful sparkly bling. :)

To make the morning even better, David, Liam, Winston & I all walked across the street to our neighbors yard sale. Much to my delight I found a darling toy box/bench seat thingy for $5!!! It is so adorable (I will post pics soon!). My plan is to paint it black and make a seat cushion on the top and have it be Liam's special reading nook and toy box for his room. Darling I tell you.

David walked away from the sale carrying the bench, Liam was walking Winston, and I was carrying 5 vinyl records that David scored with (some way old U2 albums, Bruce Springsteen, and some others). He got them for a buck a piece and is planning on selling them on ebay. I love frugality that turns into a profit. Life is good.

The day only got better from here. Craigslist luck was on my side today. I check this stinking site literally like daily.....making sure I am not missing out on something fabulous. I am always checking for a train table for Liam and an old 6' folding table to do this to. I finally found one!!! It was a whopping $5.oo! I found a train table too! It's practically brand new! :)

My sister Sarah is watching Liam for the night and part of tomorrow, so we can, you know, get stuff done. Literally. Our project for the weekend is to finish making over our bedroom. Literally. We are redoing our bedroom----paint n' all. :)

So, after running fabulous Craigslist errands all around Spokane, we had a late lunch around 3:00 and by 5:00 we were falling asleep in the car (which was full of tables). We decided to head home and take a.....NAP! :) What better else to do when the kiddo is gone? SLEEP! So, yes, we took a nap around 6:30 pm. I am awake now. David is still sleeping. We are planning on doing a late dinner date out.

Awwww.....what a fabulous Friday.

All Things Mother

For Mother's Day this year, I made my mom 2 scrabble tile pendants and went all sentimental on her. I made her cry so I consider it a major success. I used old vintage pictures of her mother, who passed away 25 years ago. Both of her parents are gone. :( So sad. So I can only imagine how hard Mother's Day must truly be when you don't have a mother to cherish on this special day.

Unfortunately I don't have pictures of the necklaces. But, I do have a picture of the card I made my mom. This vintage picture is of my grandmother, Esther, as a little girl. The picture is too cute! I also used a mini-version of this one for one of the scrabble tile pendants.

Everything about this picture is so unique. She was beautiful. Her cute little dress. Her pose. Her shoes. Everything. Love it. Wish I knew her. Here's the inside of the card.

So, that's what I did for my mom.

Moving on....David surprised me on Saturday while I was gone to a baby shower. He managed to do a ton of yard work in 2 hours.

I got home and saw this pretty planter next to the garage outside filled with one of our lily plants. So pretty! I have been begging for a large planter out there! He also weeded the entire flower bed and planted some morning glory's. Thanks babe.

That's not all. Sunday morning, Mother's Day, I woke up and literally dragged myself out of bed only to peek around the corner to see if there was a surprise waiting for me on the table (David gets up way too early on Sundays, he has to be at the church super early, so I am usually with Liam until about 10:30, when we head over to the church). He has this tradition of setting up my "surprise" before I get up, then I see it once I am awake! To my pleasing surprise I found a card and presents! Yay.
David has always bought me Clinique Happy perfume ever since we were dating (way back in 2002). I was currently out of perfume, so this was perfect! It came with this cute orange tote-beach-bag. Love it.
Later we went to lunch at the Bardenay where I had eggs benedict. We spent some time at the park. I got to take a 2+ hour nap. Then we capped the evening eating pizza and watching Xmen (the first one) in honor of Wolverine: The origin. Also, I ended up sewing 5 pillows that night while we "watched" the movie. I'll post pics of the pillow projects later.

Anywho, it was a fabulous mother's day. I have a fabulous son and an even more fabulous husband. Life is good.