a gift to give - Easter bunnies & chocolate

Look! I actually did something crafty...


We're moving in less than a week (for real this time) and I just couldn't resist giving our current neighbors one last gift for the holidays! I already shared this Easter bunny, but yesterday during the kids' naps I whipped up 5 more to use as gifts for the neighbors.


I wanted to give them some sort of a treat, too, so I filled empty bottles of Starbucks Frappucino bottles full of Easter candy.

{a bunny's not complete without its cottontail}

Instead of using ribbon around the lid, I cut strips of decorative paper and glued them, followed by a circle punch from green, a scallop punch of pink and a Happy Easter greeting from the Boos Family (printed off from the computer) to go on top.

Mikayla loves going to the neighbors to hand out treats. We'll just have to wait until the rain goes away...it's been a wet one today.

Want the tutorial to make one of these bunnies for yourself? Visit my Stampin' Up! blog to find it.

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It's amazing how quickly a year goes by!
This was our "sweet tweet" we gave last year for Easter.

here's the scoop

In my last post (5 1/2 weeks ago!) the title was "25 days to the BIG MOVE".

Well...those 25 days have now come and gone and we're still living in our "old home" (as Mikayla calls it). The long story short? Our buyers had an issue with their loan and it took 2 weeks to straighten it all out. Which means, we are behind in everything by 2 weeks. BUT, we are extremely thankful that it's all still happening...because at one point there was a 50/50 chance that it might not. We were supposed to move 2 weeks ago, and then we were supposed to move this weekend, but the appraisal paperwork on our current home took longer than expected (go figure!), so we had to postpone our move and we are supposed to move sometime next week or next weekend.

All in all this process has taught us to trust in Our Provider, have patience, and learn to live simply (because so many things have been in boxes for the past 3+ weeks!!).

We are way ahead on the packing (which is a good thing), so I thought I would take a few minutes to share a couple of {sneak peeks} of the new home! These will serve good for some "before" shots...I can't wait to be able to share the "after" once we're all settled in.

Just a sampling for now...

{Master Bathroom}

It's true...in our old "master bathroom" (if you can call it that), we didn't have a bath tub and only had one sink. My husband used the guest bathroom with the kids, and I got my own teeny tiny bathroom! Looking forward to spreading out a bit more in the new house. Although, I guess that means more to clean, huh?

{The Back Deck}We're looking forward to having people over to hang out in our new backyard. We've never had a deck before, so it will be fun to set up some patio furniture to enjoy those warm summer nights!


{The Entryway}I just love the light fixtures in this new house (well, minus the few burnt out light bulbs in the entryway). I also adore this high front window as it lets in lots of light to the entryway.


{Eat-In Kitchen}In the new house, we have both a formal dining area (which we most likely will not be using as such), as well as an eat-in kitchen. It is a beautiful space that I can't wait to put our kitchen table!


{The Kitchen}Having a kitchen island is going to be so much fun! We've already ordered bar stools that will tuck under the countertops perfectly (well, at least we hope!) These light fixtures are adorable and look at all the cupboard space on that island!! We don't plan on painting the entire interior of the home, but the kitchen is on our list of walls to paint...we want to paint it a color that makes the beautiful cabinets *pop* a bit more.


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I've had a few extra minutes while my parents have been in town to take my Stampin' Up! stuff out to their house and enjoy some lazy days while the kids play and my mom and I craft (with the postponing of the moving dates, I'm very grateful for that time to get away!). Check out my Stampin' Up! blog to see all the craftiness that I've been up to.

Isn't this the cutest little bunny?
Go check out my {other} blog to find the tutorial.

home sweet {almost} home

25 days to the BIG MOVE!!

signing off

Life has become a little too hectic for me to keep up with this blog in a timely fashion. I have been disappointed in how little I have posted these last few months and instead of making myself feel guilty about it, I've decided to take a break from blogging until things get back to normal and I can be a little more consistent.

What's the big change??

We are officially moving!!!

We are SO BLESSED to be given the opportunity to "move up" into a new home coming up in 32 DAYS! This will be a time of excitement, stress, and lots of packing (and unpacking), cleaning, painting, and so much more! I'll most likely be checking in from time to time, but I probably won't be back until sometime in April after we get settled. Who knows...maybe I'll miss it all too much and be back sooner! I can't wait to share the story of our house and how it all came to be.

I'd love to keep in touch, so if you'd like to find me on Facebook, I check in there on a regular basis to see what's up with everyone and to share little tidbits of what's going on with us.

Thank you for your support and I anticipate the day I can be back FOR GOOD to share my craftiness, organizing obsession (I'll have a new house to organize!), and of course to show off my BLUE EYED BLESSINGS!

Valentine projects from the past

Didn't I say not too long ago that I was back? Ummm....

Sorry about that.

I really meant to get back into the swing of things, but you know one thing after another and it's 2 weeks later!

This week has gone by in a blur as we were given an offer on our house on Tuesday morning (late Monday night) and were out looking for houses by Wednesday afternoon. We already had been watching this one house quite closely and after accepting the offer on our home, it finally became reality that we could act on the one WE wanted. Now it's just a waiting game. Hopefully we'll get a response soon!

In the meantime, since I'm not doing much for Valentine's Day this year I thought I would share some things from last year in case you're new and wondering where all the "good stuff" is!? (I promise I really used to be a consistent blogger!)

Candy Bucket

Valentine Decor 2009

Mailboxes

Valentine Surprise Scavenger Hunt

Valentine Wreath Makeover

I also recently had a Valentine's workshop for Stampin' Up! and we made some cute projects. Visit my Stampin' Up! blog to take a peek!

i'm going to be in trouble one day...

...for posting these pictures!!

Can't you just see these in Austin's highschool Senior year slideshow?

Oh, and don't forget to notice his shoes!

My poor dad...
he should have known that I would be plastering this up on my blog!

Mikayla has brought "dress up" to a whole new meaning these last few days. My sister got her a box full of dress up clothes for Christmas and she has been really into it lately. Every 15 minutes she's in a new outfit. Next time this happens I will have to take pictures with every change of clothes. She's going to do well at hosting an awards show one day with all of the quick wardrobe changes she makes!

Here's a cute one from Christmas Eve.

Hope you all had a great weekend!!

* * * * * * * * * * * * *

Update on the house selling:
We had one showing on Saturday afternoon.
Let it begin!!
(don't know what I'm talking about? check out Friday's post!)

you haven't given up on me have you?

It's been 30 days since I've blogged last....30 DAYS!!!

That's one month.

One month without a single word from someone who usually has a lot to say!

Did you miss me?

Even just a tiny bit?

I suppose I just needed that little break after the New Year to get some priorities straight, but have no fear I haven't given up on blogging forever!!

So, what's with being absent, you might ask? Mostly it's because I just wasn't in the mood (I experienced a little bit of the post-holiday blues.) But, one HUGE reason is we have decided to put our house on the market! For the last 2 weeks we have been busy getting our house ready - inside and out - to show off to any potential buyers. It became "official" as of yesterday. We decided that it was time to start looking for something a little bit bigger to spread out. We LOVE our house, so it's bittersweet. I have faith that there will be the right house for us to again call "home" and the right buyers will take great care of our first little home we've had for 5 1/2 years.

These might be the only recent pictures I've taken of the kids this month (except for our trip to Great Wolf Lodge - coming soon!) and the first time they've gotten to play outside in months...even if it was for only 15 minutes. Look how happy they are to play with sticks!

{See our "for sale" sign?!}
Stay with me! I'll be back to share more...promise!

P.S. I have 972 unread messages in my Google Reader.
I have a feeling I'm going to have a hard time catching up!

have yourself a very merry Christmas!

I just wanted to wish everyone a very merry Christmas. I hope you enjoy this special time with family and friends...and remember to take a moment to reflect on the true meaning of Christmas ~ to celebrate Christ's birth!

Blessings to you in the New Year!

{to see all the other Christmas photo cards I was able to design this year,
head on over to HB Creative Design!}

day 20

Day 20 of "25 Days to Christmas"...

Go to church all dressed up in our Christmas clothes!
{this was after the kids playing in their church classes...
can you tell by the shaggy braids and rosy red cheeks?}

I can't believe Christmas is 4 days away...are you ready?!

i should be wrapping presents...

Yes, there are many, many presents still to be wrapped, but instead, I've decided to use my time in other ways...like blogging!

Yesterday (Friday) my sister and family came into town and they are staying at my parents' house for the next 10 days. After naps, the kids and I decided to head on over there to spend the rest of the evening with family since Ryan was going out after work for a poker night!

Day 18 of our "25 Days to Christmas" activity for the day was to decorate cookies with the cousins! We actually did 2 activities on Friday and ended up also going to a local church to watch the new Christmas Veggie Tales movie. {Please excuse the not-so-good-quality pictures...the camera was having an off night!}

Cookie Time!

Cousin Jacob

Cousin Noah
Every little sprinkle in place...
Cousin Hailey just observed.
Death by sprinkles!!
Heading out to the movie.
Sugar overload!!
(cousin Hunter joined us after the cookies)
WE LOVE COUSIN TIME!!

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The activity for Day 19 (today) was one of those "quick, think of something to do!" kind of days. I had mentioned in an earlier post that I wouldn't have all of the activities pre-planned at the beginning of the month. Usually I just think of something we can do the night before or maybe there's something we already have planned for the evening that becomes the activity. This way I make sure it's going to fit into the schedule. Well, finally at 7:00 PM, after some begging and pleading from Mikayla to do the activity for the day, I came up with a quickie...

SNOW-POPCORN BALLS!
(I added a few red sprinkles for fun!)
I'll spare you the pictures in the kitchen. We were rushing because bed time was fast approaching, but the recipe we used is Best Ever Popcorn Balls found at allrecipes.com

Diggin' in!

Cheers!

We ended the evening with reading Frosty the Snowman and then it was off to bed!

Hope everyone is having a wonderful weekend!
I should really try to get caught up on reading all of your blogs (I'm so behind...sorry!!), but the wrapping of presents has got to get done!

spread the JOY

Happy Friday Everyone!!

I'm excited to share that my JOY card from Christmas 2006 is one of many being featured on Tip Junkie today and you can go over and vote for your favorite card! If it's mine...excellent! If not, no big deal! *wink*

more Christmas fun - join in!

Yikes! Can you believe we only have 1 week until Christmas?!

I must admit we've been having a blast with our 25 Days of Christmas activities and it has truly helped us enjoy the holiday season just a little bit more. However, there still seems like there's so much to do, but a lot can happen in 7 days, right?

As part of Liz's Countdown to Christmas,
I'm sharing this week's activities...
{click on each collage to view larger}

On Monday (Day 14), our activity was all about trees! We made paper stand up trees and the kids got to use my circle punches again to punch out patterned papers. We even punched out some stars to add a little bit extra. This wasn't anything too complicated and it actually didn't last long, but they had fun nonetheless.
After dinner, the kids got to decorate sugar cones with green frosting and sprinkles. The perfect edible Christmas tree!

On Tuesday (Day 15) we spent the evening with some dear friends of ours, the Newton family. We enjoyed spaghetti & meatballs for dinner and the kids had ice cream sundaes for dessert! The kids exchanged books...a tradition we started last year. Earlier in the day, Mikayla and Austin helped wrap Ellie & Claire's books...boy did they have fun with the tape!
On Wednesday morning (Day 16), we headed over to my friend Sarah's house for a little play date with the kids (and the moms). We thought it would be fun if they did a little craft, so the kids made reindeer by painting their hands and feet, which they loved! It was a pretty simple activity, but we had fun.

Yesterday (Day 17), after dinner the kids decorated some coffee cups with stickers and then we made some "hot-cold cocoa" that the kids could take with them in the car while we drove around to look at lights. We didn't go anywhere too spectacular...just drove around the neighborhoods in our town. At this age, the kids are excited over any kind of lights!
That's us! How about you?
Hope you're soaking in all of the fun of the season!

Ryan has all of next week off, so we're looking forward to that. My sister and family are in town starting today, so I'm sure we'll be spending lots of time at my mom and dad's. Christmas card to be sent, presents to be wrapped, more gifts to make...and the list goes on. But most of all lots of fun to be had!