Stormy Saturday

Posted in House and Home, Isabella/Munchkin by teamtradermom

Today’s the day a giant catastrophic storm is supposed to roar through our area. Jim Cantore from the Weather Channel is even here.

That’s not good.

However, so far the storms have been fairly mild. Some rain here. A few thunder claps there. Nothing that would suggest the end of the world. But you never know with Nebraska, it could change in an instant.

I used the inside time today to be both productive and relax. Isabella and I ran to the store for supplies (like water) and then we lazed around watching TV. We also took a nice long nap. That felt good. There’s nothing better than napping on a stormy day.

Before the nap I got the hall closet organized.

I forgot to take a before picture (oops!) but imagine it was something like this, only inside the closet:

I culled through our towels and sheets, getting rid of ones that were old or mismatched. I kept enough for each of us to have 3 towels each, and 3 sets of sheets (for me and CJ – Isabella’s bedding is stored in her room). I also went through all the toiletries, medicine, and other paraphernalia and organized it.

Putting frequently used meds on the turntable works great. It’s handy because everything can be “up front” with a quick turn.

I also corralled all the bulk stuff (big bin on the left) so that I know what I have and what I don’t.

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve run out and bought deodorant or something only to realize later I had an extra one on the floor of the closet. Hate that!

You can see that all my mani/pedi supplies were consolidated as well. Now I can just grab that whole bin and take it with me when I want to paint my nail, instead of searching for everything I need.

Feels good to check that project off the list.

Changing subjects….

Now to some random odds and ends from the week that I have been meaning to blog about but never got around to.

I love fresh flowers. I used to think they were an occasional treat but now I try and have them around the house all the time. Nothing brightens up a room better.

I bought a bouquet on sale for $5 the other day and split it up. This vase is sitting in our dining room.

And these little beauties went up in to Isabella’s room!

Funny how something so simple can make a big difference.

Remember how I told you about our puzzles at work?

Well we finished another one!

As you can see this was a 3-D one. I found it at a used toy store for $3 and thought, what the heck?

To be honest, I only put like 5 of the pieces together. I was too busy to help much this time around but the other gals did a bang up job!

We’ve already taken this one down and started puzzle #3. It’s a landscape scene with lots of water and sky. We’re about halfway done so far. I’ll share when we finish completely.

And now for a story about the Dog “Whisperer”

Samson was taken to the vet last week to have his leg looked at. He’d been limping around for a month or so. They x-rayed and found a sprained knee and really bad arthritis in both hips. He had never limped or shown any signs of the hip pain before. Doc said it’s because he’s so athletic and strong, that he was able to transfer the weight off his hips to his knees. But unfortunately, that’s how his knee got sprained. Anyway, he’s doing fine, just has to be on pain meds for a while. But we’re also supposed to keep him from running or playing too hard.

You tell me how we’re supposed to keep a lab from running?

Anyway, the other day, Samson started feeling his oats and grabbed one of Isabella’s stuffed toys and ran around the playroom with it. I yelled at him to stop and drop it and he ignored me. I yelled again and he just stood there with it in his mouth.

I was obviously having no effect on him.

Isabella calmly walked over to Samson, stood about a foot in front of his face and screamed, “DROP IT!!!!” at the top of her lungs.

Samson promptly opened his jaws and released his prisoner.

Isabella picked it up and brought it to me saying, “Here you go mommy. I got it back for you.”

Here’s hoping the big storm goes around us! Stay safe!

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9Apr2012

Egg-cellent Easter!

Posted in Family, Holidays and Seasons by teamtradermom

Sorry, couldn’t resist.

Easter this year was made much more fun by the fact that Isabella really got in to it. Last year she could sort of hunt for eggs and help die them and such but this year she REALLY enjoyed it! We had a ton of fun. Instead of me blabbering on and on about it, I’ll just show you the highlights, in pictures!

Coloring eggs!

(she sticks her tongue out when she concentrates)

(chocolate “nests” that I made, with M&M eggs, and a marshmallow bunny)

(Chocolate Oreo pudding cake (with a special blue whipped cream frosting and Easter sprinkles)!)

(someone’s keeping an eye on it…)

Easter morning!

Hunting for eggs!

Celebrating with the family at my parent’s house

(Rockin’ the Easter dress, with dramatic lighting for effect!)

Another egg hunt!

Live action video directly from the backyard!

(Making giant bubbles!!)

The after dinner siesta…(these 2 weren’t the only snoozers…CJ was out in the car sleeping!)

(My favorite part of Easter – the Reese’s peanut butter eggs!)

There you have it! I hope your Easter was as good as ours!

If you liked this, you might also like:

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6Apr2012

From the Mouths of Babes–Bedtime edition

Posted in From the Mouths of Babes by teamtradermom

Isabella says the funniest things at night when she’s talking herself to sleep. Tonight it was,

“Spiderman is a superhero. He is red and blue. That matches. Ironman wears a mask made out of iron. Spiderman wears a mask made of spiders. Batman has a mask like a bat. Robin’s mask looks like a robin. Wolverine wears a mask that looks like a wolver.”

If you liked this, you might also like:

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2Apr2012

Spring Things

Posted in Family, Holidays and Seasons, Isabella/Munchkin by teamtradermom

Don’t you just love this time of year? It has been unbelievably nice and warm here in Omaha lately. We were in the 80’s and 90’s all weekend and in to today.

No complaints from me. I’d much rather have warmth than cold; sun than snow; green than brown.

But I will miss my cute winter boots.

Remember that glass art project I did a couple Friday’s ago? Well we got them back last week and I forgot to show you how AWESOME everyone’s stuff turned out!

Ta da!

Aren’t they all great? Each one is unique and different, yet super cool. Mine is the second from the left on the bottom row.

Here’s the before pic:

And a close-up of the after!

I am super happy with it and I particularly like how the colors sparkle and shine when the light shines through the window. I plan to hang it in one of the windows above our door. I just have to figure out a way to do that…

Speaking of projects…I tackled another one on Sunday.

A co-worker friend had given me a doll cradle a while back that was hers as a baby. It was in great condition, just needed a little TLC in terms of dusting and touch up work.

(By the way, it was impossible to take a picture without Samson photo-bombing it. Apparently the cradle had some tantalizing smells on it that REALLY intrigued him!)

I decided to paint the wood white and re-upholster the bed part. I’ve done it once before so naturally I’m an old pro…

I started by pulling the bottom out and ripping off the old fabric. I found some cute flannel stuff at the fabric store that would work for a couple projects, this being one of them.

I first laid the board on the fabric so I’d know how much to cut.

Then I trimmed a nice rectangle, making sure I had a couple inches of trim around each side.

The next step involved some very intricate fastening measures that should really only be left to people who know what they’re doing.

In other words, I used duct tape.

I folded in each side and taped it down with a long strip.

Then I folded the corners in and secured those.

The back can be ugly since it’ll never be seen.

When all was said and done, the “bed” looked like this.

Then it was time to tackle the painting. I simply drug the cradle outside and sprayed the bejeezus out of it with white spray paint.

The finished project turned out really nice! Isabella is going to love it!

I plan to give it to her on Easter, and use it as a “basket” for all her other goodies.

And I’d be remiss if I didn’t include one final picture of the cradle with Samson in the background.

Somehow I managed to get this whole project done during Isabella’s nap time. Unbelievable.

Finally…you can’t have spring and Easter season without sugar cookies!

Isabella helped me make them yesterday. I got the dough prepared ahead of time and she helped with cutting them out.

At first she didn’t get the concept of using them as actual cutters. She would just set the cookie cutters on top and them pull them off leaving very faint outlines.

Eventually she got the idea though.

Not only did we do bunnies and butterflies and dog bones (for Samson of course), we also had to do Christmas trees and candy canes and gingerbread men.

Naturally.

Once they were baked and cooled, she helped me frost them too. She chose to use yellow and pink frosting.

They all turned out absolutely perfect! And they taste even better because they were made with love!

My last project of the day was to fix her Gingerbread Man doll which she has slept with every night since December. Mind you, “Ginger” was a toy of mine as a kid so he’s not exactly a spring chicken. As such, part of his shirt was coming unstitched and he head was, um, partly falling off.

So morbid.

I used the same fabric that I bought for the cradle to fix Ginger, basically just sewing a new “bib” on him (which also attached his head back to his neck).