Living Small

For our anniversary this weekend, we went to a bed and breakfast. We got to stay in a Texas Tiny House and oh it was so wonderful! I've been wanting to see inside one of those tiny homes for a long time. Saturday morning after breakfast, the owner gave us a tour of the other tiny homes as well as the other buildings they have on their property. He had done all the remodeling and building on the other homes (not the TTH ones) and S and he enjoyed talking woodworking for a while. It was way better than staying at a hotel!

We would absolutely love to live in one of these one day but....what to do with the children? Hmm. Details, details.

To the left when you walk in. 

Straight ahead when you walk in. 

To the right of that window. The ladder leads to the loft and bed.

A view of the whole living room from the loft. 

Looking back at the front door. 

To the very right when you walk in, is the kitchen. 

Looking up at the "bedroom."

The bath. River rock on the shower floor and ceiling tin on the walls. 

 One thing that sets the Texas Tiny Homes apart from other tiny homes is they use 90-something percent repurposed materials.

Salvaged sink.  When is the last time you saw 2 separate faucets?

Old windows saved from another house or building.

Old doors with doorknobs just like in my grandmother's house. 

All these antique details are really neat. 

And OH! the beautiful smell of all the wood! The hardwood floors were also antique. It was just beautifully made.

Good-bye Little House! We would love to live in you one day!

It's easy to imagine, while you are staying there, that you could actually live that small. Then you come home and walk abound your regular house and think HOW? Well, we don't need to go that radical with our simplifying right now, but I do wonder how much less we could live with.

I mean, instead shelves full of games, couldn't we just have a few decks of cards? You can play a lot of games with cards! Books are important, but you could get a Kindle or a Nook and do without shelves and shelves of books. (I don't want to, but you could.)

The bigger the area you live in, the more you fill it. If there is a shelf or mantle, you have to put things on them. We definitely do not live with just the necessities. And if we ever did get a tiny home, it would have to be bigger than the one we spent the night in. Still, I would love to go smaller. How about the Ingalls' home? That one would work just fine for me.

Except with A/C.

Hey, we're talking about simplifying, not losing our minds!

I'm Either a Really Great Crafter or a Great Pinner

Can't take credit for any of the ideas. Every single one was either inspired or copied straight off of Pinterest! How I love Pinterest! In the olden days I would have had to flip through old magazines for inspiration.

Wow there's a lot of pink in this post.

Baby Bee loved passing out Valentines. And getting candy.

Bee's shirt was just 2 hearts put on with Wonder Under. And some heart pants we got somewhere. 

Of course a bird shirt for Little Bit. She loves birds. 

Little Bit's balloon was fragile and fell apart during the party. But it worked well. 

She made her own shirt. It's very light and subtle but it was just a doily used as a stencil. 

Sweetheart's box won a prize. A few years ago she was absolutely heart broken when another robot box beat hers out. She was excited to win yesterday (and to eat the pretzel she got from the snack bar!) but it amazed me the difference in her reaction compared to a few years ago. Sometimes maturing happens very gradually and we don't always notice it's been going on!

We had a great time at the party and no one broke any bones. Success!!

Now tonight we are going to have a special dinner on our china and celebrate Valentine's Day together as a family. I think that's fun. I wish more people just celebrated together instead of making it strictly about couples. It hurts a lot of people.

Having said that, S and I do plan to do something special together. Just not tonight. Restaurants are going to be really crowded tonight! Date nights are important and time as a couple is important too.

Off to wrap up the school week, get the grocery shopping done, and finish cleaning up the house for our special dinner! Busy day!

Have a great weekend everyone!

Valentine Boxes

I made sure to take pictures of our Valentine boxes this year but then realized I didn't take any with the girls holding their box.

And THAT'S what I want to remember. How they looked and how proud they were of their box! So I will take those before we leave for our skating party today. But here they are:

Little Bit's Lalaloopsy hot air balloon. Got the basket from Grandma. Bought the doilies and washi tape and balloon but some of those things served double duty for the shirts we made. 

Of course this one is Baby Bee's! Made from a cereal box wrapped in upside down Christmas wrapping paper, painted, construction paper, duct tape. Free.

Sweetheart's cupcake. Bought a paint bucket for $2 at the hardware store. Used a balloon we bought for Little Bit's box and bought tissue paper. Not too bad.

All boxes inspired or copied straight from Pinterest. Thank you Pinterest! They also worked hard on their Valentines. Bee painted 6 pieces of paper and I printed the To and From on top of the painting and cut each sheet up into 9 cards. 

Working hard!!!

Dollar store stickers add the finishing touch. Total cost: $1

And Little Bit opted to do part store-bought and part homemade.

And Sweetheart made all hers from an idea in her American Girl magazine. Will have to get a picture of hers later.

I'm very proud of all the girls for their hard work! And we made Valentine shirts! I'll get pics of those later too!

It's Friday!

Love on your people this weekend!

 

 

Take your car for a spin.

Enjoy some time outside (maybe...brr!)

 

And whatever you do, don't get in trouble!

Have a great weekend!

We're Back Baby!

Sunday was the first time we've been able to go to the beach. Mind you, we've been going to the island all winter to eat lunch after church (at least once a month) and grab some ice cream. And sometimes walk around. But this was an actual, real, bonafide beach trip.

There was sand digging.

And ball throwing.

And lots of boogie boarding.

And I had a new chair.

...in all my glory! ha!

The End.

Afternoon School

So the other day I experimented with running the errands in the morning and putting school off until after lunch. It worked BEAUTIFULLY!! I didn't nearly pass out in the grocery store and school still got done. We've continued the trend this week and we've been able to eat at home because Mama still had energy. This morning we did a Target run and I paid bills while the girls are enjoying the beautiful weather outside. But it's almost time to come in...

Anyway, I mentioned on Facebook about how afternoon school went great and all my homeschool homies start admitting how they've fallen asleep while reading aloud in the afternoons. Cracked me up!! I have never fallen asleep during school! Now don't get me wrong, I slept through most of the fall but I called school off first! :) I just thought that was funny. Anyone else doze off while teaching? (Also, if homeschoolers can achieve the results they do with obviously sleep-deprived moms at the wheel....just think what we could do with enough sleep!)



Looking forward to a field trip tomorrow and S is going to join us! It's about an hour and a half away from home so it'll feel like a mini vacation. Can't wait! AND...we have a date night this weekend too! (With a gift card!) It's going to be a great weekend!

Also...planning to finish Sweetheart's curtains
*found rugs for around $20 each for the girls' rooms
*hoping to hang some wall art up in Little Bit's room
*more than anything--I want a clean house!

The Anniversary

The registry book. I don't think half the guests signed it as the room was so crowded they couldn't see the table!

Two of the photo boards and the Willow Tree figure my sister bought them.

The other 2 photo boards and our attempt to cover the vending machines behind them! 

The punch table. 

The cake, which thankfully did not end up on Cake Wrecks.

Behind the cake table. 

A table for people to leave cards they brought or to write a card.

My parents (center) with some dear friends. 

Sweetheart and Gnat served punch and did a great job!

And someone actually got a picture of me and S together! 

It was a great party--Mom and Dad had fun--and I'm glad it's over!!

Now? It's time to get ready for this little one to join our family!