I've Been Ironing My Walls

For reals. Apparently this is a trick that's been around for a while, but I just learned about it. Did you know you can take fabric covered in stiffener and IRON IT TO YOUR WALL? And it just peels off without any damage or even any residue! Awesome, right? This would have been PERFECT as an apartment dweller.

So I made a picture frame! This is what I did:

• I painted both sides of the fabric with stiffener and let it dry. I put the fabric in between two pieces of parchment paper and ironed it a little to make it straighter (If you have fabric stiffener in a spray bottle, you probably wouldn't have to do this)
• Then I cut out my frame shape, allowing about a quarter of an inch on the inside to hold the picture to the wall.
• I placed the frame on the wall and put a piece of parchment paper over it to protect the wall, and I ironed that sucker right on there.
• Then I ran my fingernail under the inside edge and put the picture in. Ta-da!

I also put some elephants next to the light switch in Atticus's room because they're cute.

And here's some other stuff I've been working on for the past couple months.

I "upcycled" (I'm still not sure what this word means... what makes it different from just recycling?) one of those giant Christmas popcorn tins into toy storage for the girls room. It's a fox applique that I made based off of a fox illustration I saw somewhere. I just embroidered it onto a white dish towel and mod podged it onto the can. The pink stripe is just a ribbon covering up a gap, because I didn't measure the dish towel, and it wasn't quite big enough. I have 3 babies, okay?

Some wall "art" I made for the girls room. A kind of woodland theme has arisen in there.

More fun with fabric stiffener! I used a tutorial from here, and I still don't have it quite right, but basically I made a stuffed animal fox, covered it with fabric stiffener, dried it, took the stuffing out and put some LED Christmas lights in it.

Also, I had my first attempt at redoing furniture. This is supposed to be a distressed side table, and it turned out okay, but mostly it was a really good learning experience. Next time should go must better.

I also redid our pantry, and pictures of that are coming soon!

Babies!

Little Boy Blue

It was a purple cupcake. Can you guess what color the frosting was?

Words! And We Can Understand Them!

P.S. We are taking donations for a Flip, or looking for a good price on a used one!

P.P.S He knows where his teeth and cheeks are, he was just done playing the game.

Set of Three of Two

Series One: My Sister is Delicious

Series Two: The Camera is Fascinating.

Series Three: Jane is Happy

Lunchtime

Why? Because

Why, you might ask, am I at 4:00 pm standing at our kitchen sink that is full of dirty dishes, wearing my husband's left shoe and my pajamas (not again, but still), while sniffing at some Tupperware that was holding heaven knows what while yelling at my child to stop ramming a rocketship into the dog?

The short answer would be that I am a mom.

This is the long answer, with many explanations:

Atticus is obsessed with putting shoes on people's feet. Anytime he finds a shoe, he'll either put them on himself, or come find us and put them on our feet. He did this while I was standing at the sink full of dirty dishes, which I should explain also.

You see, I have two 5 month old twin girls and a year and a half old boy. When I have 5 minutes that is not being filled with a dirty diaper, baby food, crying, or teaching -someone who doesn't speak English- how to be a person, I have a priority list. The list changes from time to time depending on what smells the worst in the house and just how eye twitchingly crazy I feel, but for the most part it's like this:

1. Drink something, eat something, go to the bathroom since I've probably been holding it for at least half an hour.
2. Individual playtime with the babies.
3. Sit down for as long as the kids will let me.

You will notice that cleaning is not on that list, which is why it changes depending on what smells bad. Cleaning out the fridge went to the top of the list today.

I will now explain the rocketship. A couple of days after Christmas, Meijer.com was having an awesome After Christmas sale. I mean AWESOME. I found a Radio Flyer Retro Rocket Ship for super duper cheap, and I just knew Atticus would love it for his 2nd birthday. So I ordered it. Last night it came... and we saw the weight restrictions. We realized that Atticus, who now weighs about 35 pounds and is over 3 feet tall, could very well be too big for it by May 15th. So we let him open it. This morning, I remembered that I hate toys like this. This is why: Atticus climbs onto the 4 wheeled car/airplane/rocket ship, and immediately starts ramming into Blake. He thinks it's hilarious. So I have tried my hardest to teach him to stop, and for the most part he doesn't do this anymore... until he found a way around my restrictions.

So now let's put the whole picture together.

I am still in my pajamas because I just haven't gotten that far today. The leftovers have been dumped into the trash and the containers are in the sink. I put the girls down for a nap, push my sleeves back and dive into the dishes. Atticus runs into the kitchen saying "Shoooooooo! Shooooo! Uuuuuunnn!" I lift up my left foot while rinsing out bottles for the dishwasher, and he crams it on there. As soon as he turns around I kick it off my foot, and he comes back yelling "UUUUUUUUUNNNNN!!!!" So I put it back on. He looks at me, nods his head approvingly, and walks out of the kitchen. I continue with the dishes. I come to one that held a mystery food, and realize that it smells a little... Dean Martin-ey. No... I haven't let the food go THAT long... could whatever was in here possibly have fermented? I take another sniff and hear WHAM! Atticus giggles and the dog skitters around, looking for a safe place. Still holding the possibly alcoholic Tupperware in my hand, I peek around the corner. Instead of riding the rocket ship into the dog, Atticus has PICKED IT UP and is CHUCKING IT at the dog. This thing weighs 17 pounds.

At this point, when I honestly feel like giving the kids to my neighbor, getting in the car and going to live on a beach anywhere away from the 4 feet of snow I'm living in right now, I have a thought-

I am going to miss this someday.

What We've Been Up To Part Two

Since the girls have started getting bigger, I've needed to give the girls a couple of extra bottles in the late afternoon. I refuse to buy a couple of Podee's since the girls will be able to hold their own bottles soon, but in the meantime I've needed to get creative...

Liz's bottle may or may not be resting on the bum of a sock monkey.

Cute Jane being cute.

Cute Liz being cute.

It's rough to be an indoor dog with a huge soft pillow and more than enough food.

Atticus reading his Thomas the Train book that he got from Gigi and Grumpy for Christmas. He loves the trains and Sir Topham Hatt!

What We've Been Up To

Our old TV started making a high pitched noise when it was turned off (yes... off) so we got a new one. We LOVE our new TV, but it's half an inch too wide for our armoire. We decided to move it into Atticus's room to store some of his toys...

...And sometimes him.

When I see these pictures, I always think of "Daddy's gonna kill Ralphie!"

The girls hold hands all the time now, which usually leads to tasting each others hands. This is Jane eating Liz's hands.

She really is happy to be Elizabeth!

I hate winter, but it does have a few nice moments.