January 2013

January started off with a little sledding at our friend's house.  The kids had so much fun.  Their cousin Dax came along too and they were all smiles for about 45 minutes and then they were all done.  The crying started and we headed for home. 

 Here is Dave and Kale on the toboggan that I had as a kid.  It still works!

 Dax, Emelia, and Ava took a turn on the sled!

 Here's my little owl, Emelia!  She just laughed and giggled all the way down the hill.

 Here they all are going for a ride!

 Emelia and Kale took several trips down the hill and usually stayed at the bottom to play for a while in the snow!  Fun was had by all!

 Ava ended up sick the last week of January and we had to go pick her up from school.  She tried going back for one day, but ended up with a fever.  Kale is pretending he is calling school and has his tool box with his medical equipment so he can fix her!  He is so funny! Then Emelia followed her and Kale wasn't too far behind. 


Here are random pictures throughout the month....some not in order, but I wanted to do this in January and here it is mid February!  So here goes!

 One of my projects I wanted to accomplish before I went back to work after Christmas was to organize my basement tubs. I got it finished and with my garage sale last fall I was able to empty out over 20 tubs! 

 Here's Daddy and the kids.  I think he was reading, but ended up getting tackled.

 Emelia Rose sporting some pigtails!

 Here's a picture of the kids and their new shirts.  My friend that we met while Ethan was sick made these.  Aren't they adorable!

 Here is one of my many projects in January.  I made 100 wedding invitations for our friends in Arkansas.  He is the rodeo clown for Ethan's Rodeo.

 Here's a card we did at stamp club.

 Emelia Rose being goofy hiding under her bed.

 This is the same card as above, but modified for stamp camp.

 Ava lost her first tooth!  She was so excited!

 I dyed my hair dark.....still not decided if I like it or not, but I've had it for a few weeks now!  Guess I can always dye it again!

 These are the invitations I did for my nephews 2nd birthday!

 Another stamp camp card.

 We celebrated Aunt Hannah's 14th birthday.

 The kids hanging out in our bedroom!

 Project for February.  Dave is finally going to work on our mudroom area.  So hopefully come the end of February I will have pictures to share.

That's it for the month!  It's been a good year thus far!  Looking forward to spring when we can get outside to play more!

Valentine Decor

I love to decorate.....surprise, surprise, but I've never gotten to decorate for Valentine's Day before.  My husband does not like the "Hallmark" holiday, but I do and I love how my mantle turned out.  The bird house was one of the first things I bought for our house and I try to incorporate it for every holiday.  I love the little heart banner I made on my cricut.  I made another little heart banner by just using one of my heart punches, a little hot glue, and some jute.  I've had the LOVE sign forever and the heart wreath I'm pretty proud of because it is just some greenery that I had in our old house and I wired it into the shape of a heart.  I spent.....$0 to make my mantle festive for the holiday!  I'm already planning what's in store for spring/Easter.  Easter is a little early this year though so I'm going to have to do some extra thinking so I can use what I have for both!

 Here's a picture of it from a little further back.  I painted the decorative piece on the front of our fireplace before I decorated for Christmas and I really like it still.  Hope you enjoy and get inspired to decorate at your own house!

Organizing With the Weimans 101

We didn't really get to declutter/pitch anything before we moved due to me having three kids and Dave working on the house non-stop.  So needless to say when we moved everything just got put somewhere and the next two pictures give you a little insight on what our pantry has looked like for the past 5 months.  I was off a couple weeks at Christmas and had a couple things on my "to do" list and the pantry organization was one of those things.  Here are the BEFOR pictures.  Note the bottom part where if you don't know what to do with it then just throw it in the bottom of the pantry.  Nothing was really out of date as I had gone through that a few months ago after I went through my Grandma's cubboards and pitched items that were well over 5 years old so that being said I thought I should do as I preach and come home and do it to my own house.

So that is the before, and here is the AFTER

 

 I found these plastic storage baskets at Menards and then also found the same ones in different sizes at Wal-Mart.  The labels are part of the Martha Stewart collection that they have at Staples.  They are chalkboard stickers and I used a permanent white marker on them for labels.  Note the wine glasses.  Dave and I LOVE to entertain and we haven't had our wine glasses from the old house in our new on so now they finally have a home.

 I'd like to put another shelf up high and one just above the cans so that I can have another layer for stacking my canned goods.  The top shelf I would like for things that I don't use everyday like the cupcake holder and miscellaneous other gadgets, but I was told that there were some other projects to be finished first.

 We keep our microwave in our pantry and have ever since we have lived in our old house.  We like that it keeps it off of our counter.  You don't have to have anything fancy either when you hide it in your pantry.  The shelving underneath was from Lowes I believe, it was from the old house and works well to house pans and bowls.  Right now I have a few cookbooks on the bottom, but I would like to put those on a shelf after I get the top shelf in place.

 I did sort our canned goods, but I have seen some interesting ideas on how to organize them further such as magazine holders. They are good for now though.

Here's a close up of my labels.  I LOVE having my baking supplies in a basket that I can just pull out and bring to the counter.  We have a little overflow to the left and right, but those are things that we don't use all that often, liquor is to the left and crackers, bread crumbs, etc are to the right.

I didn't get new containers for everthing, but I am thinking about it!!  I love things to match, but for now this is what they were in and at least they are labeled.  We have our own cake pop container.  Ava got one for Christmas and her Daddy and her spent until 3:00 in the afternoon making cake pops.  Let's just say that the kitchen was a disaster.  The other two are for icing and sprinkles....maybe I should downsize the amount we have, but at least I will have what I need when I go to use it.  We have a TON of cookie cutters that I've collected over the years.

I didn't think I had one, but found one on my phone of where the coffee pot is.  It works out nicely and Dave's mess stays in the pantry.  I'm thinking about moving the snack box a little higher, but for now it is good.  Bad thing is that Kale can reach all the snacks without my help!

 

Here is a picture (out of order) that was taken before I got "label happy".  I LOVE anything with a label and that is my goal to get my entire house organized and labeled.  Dave just rolls his eyes and lets me go!  The shelf on the left has the coffee pot. I guess I didn't take a picture of that, but we put outlets for both the coffee pot and the microwave so we don't have that on the counter either.  Can you tell that I like to keep my counters clutter free! Up next is my bedroom cabinet and closet.