Excuses, excuses

I always wonder why people have blogs when they don't ever update them. I guess I've turned into one of those people. Life has just been a lot of the same--carpooling, soccer practice, piano lessons, soccer practice, work, soccer games, scouts, soccer practice, laundry and soccer. But I have been working on a fun little project over the past month that I am now ready to "unveil." Nope, I'm not pregnant...

I decided to redecorate the girls' room! Their room was cute, but it has been the same since they were babies, and I was tired of it. Plus, we decided that bunk beds would give them a lot more room to spread out in since they have to share a room, so it was time for a complete overhaul. Here is the before, for those of you who don't remember...
That is right after we moved in, before we replaced the carpet (and door knobs, apparently), but it still gives a basic idea of the look.

I drew my inspiration from Pottery Barn Kids and Land of Nod. Unfortunately my budget wasn't quite large enough. Just for kicks I started adding bedding to my "cart" on the Land of Nod website and when I was done the total was over...gulp...$700.00. Just the bedding mind you--that doesn't include new furniture or accessories. But I think I did a pretty good job without spending nearly that much, if I do say so myself.

I liked the wall color and the chandelier in this room:
But I thought the bedding was a bit too childish. I loved the bunk beds and the names on the wall in this room:

And this is the massively expensive bedding I found that I loved from Land of Nod:
I liked that it mixed a variety of colors and patterns. Chloe is into purple and Audrey is into pink, so I wanted to incorporate both into the room and bedding. Here is what I came up with...

Of course it doesn't look nearly as good as those professional magazine shots, but oh well. It is really cute in person! I color-matched the paint color from the PBkids room, so it actually is the same color. The bunk beds were not the $1500 ones from PBkids, but a nice knock off from Walmart.com.

The bedding was one of my favorite finds. The quilt sets were perfect and a steal at $40 each from Home Goods. Audrey's is pink, Chloe's is purple. The polka dot sheets were from Target. Once I saw those birds on the throw pillows we decided to go with a nature inspired bird theme and I just love how it all turned out!
I re-painted the dresser and changed the hardware. I also found that perfect lamp--I don't know if you can tell it has a little bird on it. I found those cute little mini-bird houses at Michael's and painted them. I still want to put them in shadow boxes up on the walls. Then the vinyl birds and birdhouse came from online. I love them! My friend did the girls' names on the walls.
I also love the chandelier. I had seen one in the PBkids room that was flowery so I went into the store to see it. (It's the one in the first magazine picture.) I decided that I liked it enough I was willing to splurge and spend $90 on it. When they held it up for me in the store it was cute, but there was no light!! It was just a decoration. They wanted $90 for some ribbon and paper flowers! So I found my chandelier at trusty Walmart.com and added my own ribbon ($1.50) and flowers ($3). I think it turned out pretty cool. I tell the girls their room looks like twin fairies live in it.
Notice the real bird's nest on the shelf!! I still have a bit more to do (the shadow boxes, a rug, etc.) but I think it is a fun new look!

Easter dresses--better late than never!

The kids got to wear their Easter clothes today. Well, I didn't actually get the boys anything, but the girls looked adorable. I love Easter dresses!!! Lincoln didn't even go to church--he is still sick and we want to keep him away from any possible asthma triggers. Just being outside seems to make him a lot worse. I still wanted a picture with him in it though--unfortunately there were none of all four of them where everyone was looking normally at the camera, but oh well!


P.S. Chloe's tooth came out on Wednesday, so the girls are officially twins again!

What are they teaching cub scouts these days?!

Isaac's cub scout leader, Rochelle, (who is also a very good friend of mine) called me up the other day to share this story of what happened this week at scouts. Beware: some content may not be suitable for young children! ;) Hee, hee!

Apparently at scouts they were learning about different types of tools, so Rochelle had gone online to a "word-search generator" used by schools and home schooling parents all over the country to create a tool word search. All she had to do was type in the names of the tools the boys were to find and it would hide them and fill in all the letters. It claimed to have a strict filter in place to avoid any type of inappropriate words from being generated. Well, maybe it wasn't quite strict enough.

A few minutes into the searching, one of the boys found the word "sex" and announced it to everyone. Isaac found it soon enough himself and all the boys were snickering and saying the forbidden word repeatedly. The leaders were trying to get them back on track and one of them said, "Now boys, sex is not a tool." Isaac promptly responded, "It is if you are trying to have a baby!"

At least we know he was listening when we had that little talk a few months ago...

Low key Easter

Well, we are sick again. I know, that's a shocker. It started with the kids all getting nasty coughs on the way to Chicago. Lincoln's is still so awful--I'm truly surprised we made it through this weekend without a trip to the hospital. Anyway, Ryan and I started to feel a little under the weather yesterday, but this morning I was like, "Easter baskets? Who cares?! Let me sleep!!!" We both dragged ourselves out of bed and down to supervise the whole Easter candy extravaganza and egg hunt. Then we turned on conference and promptly crashed on the couch. I think I heard maybe one half of one talk in the first session. I slept for the 2 hours between sessions and then gave it another go. I heard a bit more of the next session. I'm hoping that after this day of rest we will both be better tomorrow.

While we were unconscious on the couch, the kids got very industrious. They hid and re-hid the eggs dozens of times. They kindly decorated the bunny cake for me.

And they decided we needed to eat our Easter dinner al fresco. Never mind that we don't have patio furniture (the backyard is our next major home improvement project--started on Saturday, actually--notice the huge pine tree that is now chopped down in the picture.) They flipped over the Barbie Jeep for Ryan and I to use as a table next to their picnic table. They even made name tags and had music playing (Christmas music, but at least it was a holiday, even if it was the wrong one!) As we were bringing dinner out the wind picked up and they decided it was too cold to eat out there. It was a nice idea, though!

Pine Wood Derby

I'll admit I didn't have high expectations going into Isaac's first Pinewood Derby. We (read: Ryan and Isaac) had very little time to work on the car because of our trip to Chicago and other things that had been going on before we left. It was really kind of a last minute thing. And the Raingutter Regatta a few months ago ended in a bitterly disappointed Isaac who was struggling to hold the tears in. :( But--things went a lot better than I expected! In fact, Isaac's car was the fastest of all the Wolves so he is moving on to the District Championships!


The kids LOVED it! Lincoln kept asking when it was his turn to race.

Notice the intense concentration as he places his car on the track...

Isaac's car pulls into the lead!
Winner of the Wolves with his car, called "The Million Dollar Car." It certainly wasn't as fancy as some of the others, but it was faster than some of them and I guess that's all that matters!

Her first one!

Audrey has been grinning constantly since last Tuesday when she lost her first tooth. I have caught her studying her reflection in the mirror quite a few times as well. I thought Chloe was going to lose her first that same day, but it's still hanging on by a thread.

He cracks me up!

The other day I was upstairs getting ready and I heard Lincoln calling for help. He didn't sound too distressed so I said I would be down in a minute. When I finally got downstairs, I couldn't find him anywhere. I heard him say something about the door being locked and I noticed the bathroom light was on. I unlocked the door and found him like this...

For some unknown reason he had locked himself in the bathroom, stripped and climbed into the sink but he was unable to escape. He always provided comic relief!

The Windy City

Warning: Long and lots of pictures!! :) Enjoy at your leisure...

We drove up to Chicago on Tuesday morning after Carthage. We met Erin and Royal there as well as my mom, Kristian and Amy and Dylanie and Lucas who had driven in from Columbus for Spring Break. (We missed my Dad and Dave, who were both out of town.) We started off the excitement by taking a bus into the city, exploring Navy Pier and indulging on some Deep Dish Chicago Pizza.

The girls and Dylanie latched right on to each other.

Audrey, Dylanie, Lincoln, Isaac and Chloe

A fun statue at Navy PierLincoln loved throwing rocks into Lake Michigan

As did Isaac
Wow! Riding the bus was so fun!
On Wednesday we hit Michigan Avenue. The boys went to the Lego Store and we had a girls morning out at the American Girls Doll Store. Grammie got the girls each a doll (Audrey chose Kaya and Chloe chose Felicity.) Now I want one. After a picnic lunch we explored Millennium Park.

Dylanie and Audrey enjoying the Hershey store.
Lincoln discovers the giant silver jelly bean.
Isaac and Lucas became fast friends.
Lincoln worships Kristian. He kept telling him over and over, "You're the best Kristian ever!"
On Thursday we decided to go to the Field Museum. We carefully plotted our route on public transport (2 buses and a train.) Unfortunately we got a bit turned around after coming out of the subway and ended up walking for about 45 minutes in the freezing cold Chicago wind in the WRONG DIRECTION! So eventually we ended up at the Museum and enjoyed it quite a bit. It is HUGE--we didn't even come close to seeing everything. But there was something for everyone--Isaac really wanted to see the DNA exhibit and Audrey had to see the Indians. We saw a cool exhibit on Wooly Mammoths too and Egyptians and Dinosaurs. After the dinosaur exhibit Lincoln was pretending to be a T-Rex and he bit Kristian on the back of the leg. It was hysterical, but I felt bad when he told us the next day that it had left a little welt and broken the skin!! We froze again on the way home, but it was worth it.

Siblings--me, Erin and Kristian looking at us like we are crazy.

All of the cousins at the museum! Audrey, Lincoln, Dylanie, Royal, Isaac, Lucas and Chloe. If we had only waited a few more weeks they could have been joined by the newest addition when Erin has her baby!
Friday morning we had to go to Eleven City Diner for the BEST BREAKFAST ON THE PLANET!! It is a quaint, quirky Jewish diner and their Challah French Toast is to die for. I would go back to Chicago just for that. My mom and Kristian and Amy headed home then and Ryan took the big kids out to do more exploring of the big city. They tried to do some geocaching, but weren't able to find what they were looking for. Lincoln had picked up a really bad cough, so we stayed home with Erin and Royal and took it easy.

The kids check out Uncle Dave's stomping grounds.
Cute cousins--Royal and Lincoln are only six weeks apart, and good friends.
We ran into these scary Chicago gangstas...
I loved Erin's apartment! It was in Ukrainian Village--it was older and had wood floors and this giant picture window overlooking the street with huge window sills. The kids loved playing there.
Here they are in front on the Sesame Street-like steps the day we left. We left on Saturday morning and the kids did great on the 2 day drive home.
Whew! Super-long post, but I wanted to do it in one instead of dragging it out for the next few days...