Crafty Measures

I've been trying to decorate the kids rooms with minimal budget effects, so I've turned to crafting... And here's what I made for their rooms:

I made the kids each a Martha Stewart style bulletin board to match their bedrooms. Sophie's is the lavendar one, Ben's room is Star Wars themed (of course :)) so he has the planets one and Nina's room is still Tinker Bell themed so hers is the pink and yellow butterfly one in the middle. It was actually super easy and I learned how to do it at a mother-daughter activity day. The green canvas with flowers is something I painted for Sophie to match her bed spread. I'm not sure I was ready for just how many coats of each color it was going to take to paint it, but after a few days of work on it it was finally done. The green "S" which is kind of camouflaged in front of the bulletin boards was the fastest project and probably only took me 45 minutes to paint.

Anywho, I guess the urge to decorate has driven me to take crafty measures. I am happy to say though that the kids have been pleased with my efforts and Ben is thankful for his Star Wars room every night in his bed-time prayers and that makes me feel happy.:)

Getting Settled

Okay, I have major guilt that I haven't been commenting on everyones' blogs, (so sorry) but I have been reading all the posts and I've been wanting to comment... Soon I'm going to have a real schedule, things are getting much more settled around here and with Sophie and Ben in school and preschool now I know life is going to start getting back to normal. But here's what I've been up to in the mean time:

House stuff:

We got our blinds up finally!! Oh, I can't even say how much of an improvement this has made! And slowly but surely we are unpacking all the rooms. We now just have our room to unpack. Yay for progress.

And here's some house pics:


This loft area upstairs is one of our favorite spaces in the house - it's pretty much a replica of our family room in Maryland, so it feels very comfy and homey to us.

School stuff:

Sophie has been back in school for over a week now and is doing well. Ben started preschool, but promptly got sick so wasn't able to go the rest of the week. The one day that he did go was a good day. His teachers said he had a small break down during snack time, but quickly recovered and honestly I call the first day with only one break down a success. Ben usually had a harder time adjusting to new situations. He couldn't stop talking about preschool and so wanted to go even when he was sick.

My bday:

I am now 31. How did this happen? As if it wasn't annoying enough to turn 30!;) I had a good birthday. Adrian got a babysitter and we found a lovely Japanese steakhouse (my favorite type of restaurant) like a Bennihana. It was SO yummy!! Tepanyaki is still #1 in my book, but this place was a close second. After dinner we went to a movie, House Bunny, which I wouldn't recommend, but had some very funny moments. Earlier in the day I went to the mall and got myself a couple sweater hoodies - happy birthday to me.:) I plan on stretching my birthday out a little though and I'll probably get myself more presents this week. Birthdays last at least a week right?!

Fun night out with Jenny:

Last night it was so fun to have a girls night with Jenny. We went to the Claim Jumper and had some seriously awesome food! I had to laugh and laugh when my dessert, a brownie sundae, came out and it was bigger than my head!!! It was yummy, but I barely made a dent in this beast of a dessert before I was completely stuffed. It was so fun to chat and laugh with Jenny and I can't tell you how grateful I am to have such a great friend here in Colorado!

You can't see Jenny's dessert very well in this picture, but it was also ginormous. The sheer size of our treats made us get out our cel phones to take pictures!:)

Boxes Boxes Everywhere

Wow, I've been missing in action for a while now! It's been a crazy busy time with unpacking and school and preschool starting so blogging has sort of taken a back-seat. It has been hectic, but finally we are starting to uncover our floor at home and in fact the whole main level is unpacked! Yay! We still have lots of unpacking of clothes and books etc. and we haven't even started to think about all the boxes in the basement. Unpacking is so not fun, but hopefully if we keep on plugging away it will be done soon.

Sophie started 4th grade yesterday. She had a good first day and said she made friends and likes her teacher. I got to meet her teacher earlier this week she seems like a wonderful energetic teacher.

Ben went to his preschool get-to-know-you open house yesterday and will start on Monday. He'll be going to preschool at the elementary school that Sophie goes to and he was overjoyed to get a school T-shirt that looks just like Sophie's. There are a couple boys from our ward in the same preschool so that's very happy too.

Nina has been running around like a crazy child going up and down our stairs constantly. My first project was to unpack and fix up the playroom and she loves spending time in there with her play kitchen and all the Barbies or "princesses". She's been much happier since we moved into the house - the extended stay place we were in before did not have a lot of room to play. I think she, Ben, and Sophie will be excited when they put our grass in. That is suppose to happen sometime in the next week or so. I can't wait for the landscaping to get done either actually, it will be so nice to look out and see grass instead of dirt.

I hope to take some pictures of the house soon and put them on here. I know my Mom really wanted to see how the porch and kitchen turned out so stay tuned for an update.:)

This is not what you want to see 2 days after you buy your house!

Holy cow, yes that is a TORNADO!! It touched down literally about 1/2 to 1 mile from our house!!! Can you believe it?? Where did we move to?? I'm a little worried right now, but here's the story...

I was outside with Nina walking around our house, because she loves being outside. Well the sky started to get really black to the East of us and I looked up and saw the clouds swirling together with a needle shaped coming down from the center. I stared at it for probably 10 seconds dumbfounded and then ran to tell Adrian to come and see it. At that point we couldn't see it touching down. Well I went into the house and looked out the back windows and saw it touching down in a big open field in the distance, just stirring up dust. Within minutes though the plum of dust at it's base turned black and it seemed to be getting bigger so I told Adrian we needed to get all the kids in the car and go.... Fast.


During all this we also grabbed the camera because it was just so unbelievable! When Sophie and Ben looked out our back window as the twister started getting closer to us they both got really scared and Ben was saying he didn't like Colorado anymore - poor guy. I tried to reassure him that everything was going to be okay, but both and he and Sophie were pretty shaken. Who am I kidding - we were all pretty shaken. Although Sophie gave us a little comic relief in the car and asked if I was going to blog about it!!:) Once we drove to a safe distance we pulled over like everybody else on the rode and watched it. It had started breaking up by that point and we were just hoping our house would be safe.


And our house is safe. The only damage reported in our area was a fallen tree so everything is completely fine. It's just so crazy isn't it?? Definitely not the kind of thing you want to see out your back window 2 days after you buy your house, but we have found out that damaging twisters are not very common in our area and thankfully that was the case with this one. The tornado that touched down near us was 1 of 3 that touched down as part of a crazy weather front that blew through within about 30 minutes. So we are all safe and sound and grateful that no one was hurt. What a nutty thing!

I See What You Mean

I haven't done an art history pic in a while so I thought today would be a great day to do a piece of art from Colorado.

I See What You Mean, by Lawrence Argent

This huge blue bear peeks in on the Colorado Convention Center in Dever. The artist who created him had this to say about his art,

“My public artworks are part of a larger whole. I am an artist that utilizes assorted mediums and venues to engage the viewer in questioning the assumed and provide a vehicle by which stimulus opens a plethora of responses that defy verbal articulation.”

Nice! I love this bear!! I think it's so visually stunning and fun! I really don't know anything deep about the work at all, but think it is one of the cutest works of installation art I've ever seen. It's not often that you can call of huge work of art "cute", but I think its okay for this one!:) Hope it brings you a smile!

Happy Music

When confronted with a difficult situation in my formative years I would always turn to melancholy music to comfort myself. This included a wide sampling of tunes from Janis Joplin and Patsy Cline to Love and Rockets and of course my ever consistent fave The Cure. I can mark all the hard times in my life with a specific album that I listened to ad nauseum. When I moved in high school it was REM Dead Letter Office ("Pale Blue Eyes" being my very favorite and most likely to be heard on repeat) and The Smiths Best Of Part I. During this time I also made a cheerful (of course not really) mix tape which I named "Still Falls the Rain". I still have this tape and really like it, but it is admittedly a downer. Months later when I had made very few friends at my new school and was a complete loner it was Peter Murphy Deep and other more sinisterly sad music that I turned to. When I broke up with a boyfriend in the first weeks of my sophomore year at BYU I turned to The Cure Wild Mood Swings (mostly the song "Jupiter Crash" listened to a mind-numbing volume which of course drove my long-suffering and country music enthusiast roommates crazy). Okay, enough of that. I'm sure you get the picture... Rough times. Sad music.

Well that was the past... I have turned over a new leaf and I've been listening to happy music!! And what would you know, but it's been really helpful!! Why didn't I think of this before??!! :) I've been focusing on happy music through out our move, even though everyone has been so completely warm and friendly here in Colorado. I guess it's just that new kid on the block feeling that's hard and I know it will pass soon enough. But in the mean time here's a couple of groups that have been helping me with the happy!!

Abba - (We have Abba Gold.) Can you listen to Abba and not be happy?? Especially if you are picturing and almost hearing Pierce Brosnan singing to "SOS"?!! Oh, Abba is awesome! Pierce Brosnan singing Abba is painfully awesome!!:) I still really need to buy the Mama Mia movie soundtrack. I must admit though that I've gotten into trouble with Adrian over Abba lately because I always used to make fun of his love of the Swedish discoers... That was before I went to see Mama Mia. But now I freely admit I'm hooked!! Adrian I am sorry for abusing you when you sang along to "Fernando" those many years ago! I now understand the positive power of Abba and will never make fun of you again!!:) We can both sing along to "Fernando" with gusto!!


Adam and the Ants/ Adam Ant - Seriously another bunch of hilarious smile inducing songs!! Just this morning in the car I was listening to "Stand and Deliver" (click on this link for the 80's-tacular music video). I was singing along like a crazy person - the kids got a kick out of it. "Apollo 9" is great too and another completely 80's video! If you are unfamiliar, Adam used to dress up in full on pirate-ish costume and make-up during their hay-day in the 80's. "Stand and Deliver" is about a flashy highway-man who goes around trying to steal peoples' stuff, but is upset by how badly all his victims are dressed and the horrible music they are listening to... It's pretty funny if you listen to the words. And I honestly wonder if Johnny Depp took some inspiration for Jack Sparrow from Adam Ant's highway-man. My brother introduced me to Adam Ant in the 80's and I remember he had a poster or an Adam Ant album cover on his bedroom wall. Fun memories...What happy stuff do you like to listen to?? This is a new thing for me so I'd love to hear any joyful recommendations you have!:)

Our Weekly Update

Things are coming along as we move towards the closing on our house this week. We had our walk-thru on Friday and thankfully there wasn't a whole lot of work to do to finish up the house - the builder just needs to do a few dry wall repairs and some touch up paint. We are so excited to get into the house and get settled. There has been some unseasonably cold weather going on so I can't wait to unpack our clothes so I can have a bigger hoodie selection!:)

This week we also registered Sophie for school and Ben for preschool. It's such a relief to have figured all that stuff out. We even finished buying all the school supplies, but still need to get Sophie and Ben some more school clothes. Sophie is so excited for school to start because she has already made some friends through church who will be going to the same school. I am so glad that the transition is going smoothly thus far.

I have some news too - I've already been extended a calling as a CTR 5 teacher, so I will be teaching Ben! I think it's going to be fun! Four and 5 year olds are adorable and it will be fun to get to spend time with my sweet Ben and see him interacting with his class. I'm going to be team teaching with a very nice sister. I am a little worried about not getting to know as many people being in primary, but I'll just have to make sure I attend as many enrichment activities as I can to get my social time in. Really though, already I've been able to have fun going to movies with Jenny, Stacey has had us over for dinner, and Sophie has had a playdate with a church class friend. Our welcome to Colorado has been wonderful!

So right now we are kind of in wait mode and my days have been filled with getting the kids ready for school and looking for the best prices on washers, dryers, and fridges... And of course we have been watching the Olympics!! Michael Phelps is a ROCK STAR!! It has been so exciting to watch all of his swims! I've been watching a lot of volleyball too and am amazed by how good the American women's beach volleyball team is - wow!! I've been really hoping to catch some equestrian coverage, but right now with basic cable in our apartment I've only been able to watch the stuff on NBC. I also love synchronized swimming!! It's kind of weird I know, but I hope they'll show some coverage of it soon! So that's our weekly update. Hope everyone has had a great week!