Bedroom Makeover

Last week when I was stripping the bunk beds to clean all the sheets and blankets after Livie came down with the flu, I decided I was sick and tired of trying to make bunk beds. Don't get me wrong. I am thrilled and thankful that Sue (my mom-in-law) gave them to us. They're terrific. But, they also happen to be a MAJOR pain in the butt to make, let alone change sheets and bedding on. I used to drag a kitchen chair in there to climb up on the top bunk to make it. It was annoying as heck! So as I was trying to put the clean fitted sheet on the top bunk I said, "Screw this!" and decided to do a little rearranging. Livie was laying down in our bed, watching cartoons, and I knew if she had more puking action, I'd hear her and could run to help her. But, until that happened, I wanted to get this room done. I moved the dresser and the toy shelf into the hallway. Pulled off the mattresses. Then managed BY MYSELF to pull the top bunk off the bottom bunk. And I did that without destroying the wall or the bed in the process. Amazing, I know. I'm not known for my coordination. Well, once I got it down, I tried putting the beds in all different configurations. Wanting to have them as just single beds with a nightstand in between. Well, an invisible nightstand, since I didn't actually have one. But, that's not important. Anyway, every way I rearranged the beds left me scratching my head. Either they were too big to get to the closet or too big to close the door. It just wasn't working. So I had to call Pete and say, "You know Honey when I get an idea in my head and I just do it and then it doesn't quite work out the way I had hoped?". I could just picture the eyes rolling back into his head as he said, "What. did. you. do?" ;-) I told him how I moved the bunk beds and now I was stuck - almost quite literally - in the room with no solutions. He actually thought having them as 2 twin beds was a good idea, but he told me to "wait until he got home" to do any more about it. I didn't QUITE listen to that and did a bit more arranging, coming up with what I thought was the best solution and waited for him to get home to see what he thought. He liked what I had done, but still wanted to try out a few other ways (which I had already tried, but that's ok), so we moved and arranged and eventually he agreed that having the beds seperated and the dresser in the closet was the best option. I went out and bought them nightstands and new bedskirts to go with it all.

So, this was the BEFORE:



Cute, but way too annoying!!

Oh! .. and while I was searching online for bedskirts, I came across this picture at Pottery Barn Kids - my favorite place that I never shop at. ;-) I loved the balls, but to get 3 for each of the girls, it would've cost me a good $250-270, so I opted to try and make them myself. Granted, I couldn't make them in the big sizes they show, because I wanted to keep it under $60, but I did smaller sizes and I think they look cute. :-)

So, after all that, this is the AFTER:

This is Madie's bed and you'll see that she has an Uppercase Living expression up high on her wall. It was high, because that's where the bunk beds were. So, I have some butterfly expressions I'm going to put on that wall when they come in to fill it up a bit.

This is Livie's bed now. It's over by the window and Olive, our cat, has made this her new favorite place to be. She sits there and looks out the window all day long.

Of course, there has to be a Star Wars poster in their very girly room. Just made her put it on the door and not her wall. ;-)

So, there you have it. Beds that are easy to make and a little extra something here and there to make it all fit together. I made those balls when I was in IN. Aunt Phyl, Nancy, Mom, and I sat around chatting while I glued all the flowers on. It was tedious, but well worth the savings. I ended up spending $57 on them instead of the $250. Granted the PBKids are always more spectacular, but they are still cute, I think. :-)

Glasses

GLASSES. They are something I got when I was in Kindergarten. Just a couple months or so after my 6th birthday. And, that is exactly where my children have been led. They have inherited my accursed bad vision!! I took them in for a routine check-up and low and behold, Noah needed glasses! I was shocked. With Madie, I noticed that she wasn't able to read things at a distance, but didn't notice that at all with Noah. But, apparently he was having trouble too, so we ordered them and picked them up this morning.



Don't ask me why Livie insists on sticking her tongue out in every picture I take now. Silly head.

We tried several pairs on, but as soon as Noah saw these Superman glasses, those were the ones he wanted. Hands down. They are a little wider that he probably should've gotten, but they're cute and I really like them. He was so excited when he got them and had been eagerly awaiting them for the past 2 weeks. When he put them on, he was pushing them up and down and saying, "I can't see that, but (moves his glasses up) now I can!". :-) Well, after about a half hour, the novelty of the glasses had worn off and I noticed he had taken them off. I asked him why he wasn't wearing his glasses and I was told that they were now "annoying". So, I've been making him wear them in interviles. The first intervile was for 15 min and I swear he watched the clock the entire time until he could take them off. :-) Then he had a half hour break before having to wear them for another half hour. Then another break. He's now wearing them for an hour. Hopefully by Tues when they're back in school he'll be ok with wearing them the whole day. He just looks so grown up now. I looked at Madie the same way when she first got them. She didn't quite look like my Madie just like Noah now doesn't quite look like my Noah. But, now I can't picture Madie without her glasses and I'm sure in a couple weeks he'll be used to them and I'll be used to seeing him in them. He's a cutie either way. Just wish my poor kids could've made it past the age of 6 before they needed them.

Madie's glasses are a little smaller on her face and are brown instead of purple. And, they have cute little white flowers on the sides of them. She's got a stigmatism now though, just like me. The eye doctor said she's going down the exact same path as I did. Except at her age I already had contacts, so I guess she's a little different.

The only thing I'm hoping is that Livie will escape my genes and follow after her daddy who didn't get glasses until college. Like he said, "She has my blue eyes, so there's hope!". Because if not, she might end up looking like this picture!!!! (she had to try on glasses at Walmart since we all got new glasses and she didn't) ;-)

Our Nature Hike

On Wednesday, we headed down to Warsaw to visit the Trolinger side of the family. It was actually the first fairly nice day we had since we arrived in IN and the kids had been talking about wanting to visit a forest, so we all headed to the Winona Lake Greenway, which is a series of paths that travel around town there - most of which are in the wooded area. I think only one path actually goes through the little Winona Lake shop area. Anywho...



We headed down towards the creek (I call it a crik, but Pete mocks me, so I'll refer to it as CREEK for this entry).

There has been a lot of rain in that area recently, so the creek was pretty high. The kids loved throwing rocks in it.

Here Nana and Madie are walking towards us with some of the treasures they've found. I believe we came back with a bowl full of rocks, sticks, wildflowers, plate fungus, and pine cones.

Noah LOVES big sticks. He calls them "Lucky Sticks" and whenever he finds a thick stick, he brings it home. It's never a long, skinny stick. Always a relatively short, thick stick. Well, this was thick, but super-DUPER long! He was thrilled!!!! After some convincing he realized that we couldn't strap it to the van and bring it home, so he left it for another time.

We were walking towards the campground area when a friend of Nana and Papa's drove up and they stopped to chat. His name is Dane and he's been doing a lot of the restoration in Winona. When I was at Grace College, Winona was a shell of what it used to be. There was so much potential there for historical restoration and Dane, with some other local people, have literally changed Winona into a new town. I wanted to go up to him and shake his hand and thank him for everything he's done, but I can get a little excitable, so I thought it best not to freak the guy out and embarrass my in-laws at the same time. ;-) So, instead I took this picture of Pete and Livie on a little bridge on the Greenway.

We took a path that Dane suggested and it took us up some tall hills and down a really steep hill, that was muddy and nearly made me slide down on my butt, taking Madie with me!! Thankfully we all made it down on our feet without killing ourselves in the process. :-) We all ended up with extremely muddy shoes though.

As we were walking, a couple small vehicles drove up. They were putting in posts with plaques on them, listing the name of the trees in the area as well as a desription about each tree. The kids thought this was pretty cool.

We took a brief moment to stop and take a picture of them on one of the fallen logs on the pathway. It was a little sunny, so they had to squint to see Pete as he took the photo. :-)

Here's Papa and Noah walkin' along. You can't really see, but Noah found a slightly smaller stick that his previous monstrousity and was using it as a walking stick. Thankfully Papa kept an eye out, because I think Noah nearly knocked him in the head with it a good half dozen times!

Madie found an animal hole towards the end of the walk. We all took guesses as to what might be living in there, but we figured with our luck with skunks, that's probably what it was. The kids just had the best time and still are talking about their forest adventure. They love the outdoors and are now begging us to take them camping - much to Pete's excitement and much to my dismay. Guess I'll have to buck up and give it a shot. Pete loves camping and the kids have actually camped in our backyard before, but we might actually try it at the local park sometime soon. I've never camped, so we'll see how that goes. Wonder if they'd be willing to camp in the Holiday Inn parking lot, while I got a room upstairs? I would TOTALLY go camping if we could do that!! ;-)

We're Back and Look at the Fun We Had!

Well, we just got back from our short 4-dayer in IN. We went out and stayed with mom and dad for a couple days and got to see my Aunt Phyl and Nancy who were out visiting mom for a week. It was fun getting a chance to see them and chat and catch up. I saw Aunt Phyl briefly over Christmas and hadn't seen Nancy since my wedding! So, it had been a while. I came down with a cold on Tues night and continuously felt worse as the days have gone on, so that kinda sucked, but it was fun nonetheless.



Here we are enjoying our Goshen fav - pizza and Mancinos breadsticks! Yum!!! Pete didn't eat lunch, just to leave more room in his stomach for breadsticks. :-)

We, of course, brought our Wii and got Phyl and Nancy to play. Here they are racing cows on Wii Play. Mom cracked up the whole time watching them.

Here's cute little Wrigley sleeping on Jeff, I believe. Well, she was sleeping, but she woke up just as we were taking the picture. When she's asleep, with her tongue hanging out, she looks dead and it's hilarious.

The ultimate was getting them to play Mariokart. They screamed and laughed and it was hilarious!!!! I don't know if Mariokart is for the over 60 crowd. ;-)

And, amazingly, we talked dad into signing up for Facebook. Em and I walked him through it and despite his postings referring to me as the "Facebook Nazi", I was really helpful and kind to him throughout the process. I think there was only minor amounts of yelling and pointing. ;-) Now, because he types about 3 words per minute, he's not quite able to keep up with the demand. He's made quite a few friends these past 3 days and trying to keep up with them as been challenging for him, but he's catching on quickly. He took Pete with him on Mon afternoon to buy a new computer and Pete got it set up for him and mom there on their new desk. He set up their links to the blogs and sports pages and email, so it's just a click away for them. Dad spent most of Monday night reading his sis's blog and I spent most of Monday afternoon showing mom this blog and my dad blog as well. I think they're both excited to have gotten the help to make it into the new century.

All in all, despite the sicknesses we all had, it was a really fun couple of days. We got to catch up and I got to hear stories about my mom's side of the family that I don't know a whole lot about and that was really cool! :-)

Just a Note

We're leaving in the a.m. to go to IN for a few days. We're going to see my Aunt Phyl and Aunt Nancy who are visiting my parents this week. Haven't seen Phyl but briefly over Christmas and haven't seen Nancy since, I believe, my wedding! So, it'll be fun to catch up with them for a couple of days. And, of course the rest of my family as well. ;-) Then we're headed down to see the Trolinger side of the family for a couple days. Should be fun!! Haven't really seen any of them since Christmas, except for an evening when Pete's parents came out for dinner back at the beginning of Feb, so we're looking forward to a few days away to enjoy with everyone. That means I won't be on here for a few days. But, when I get back I should have lots of pictures and stories to share hopefully. :-) Livie and Madie battled the flu last week, so please be praying that the rest of us will stay well and the coughs/cold that Noah and Livie now have aren't passed on to anyone else. And, of course, prayers for safe travels would be great too! Won't have email/internet/blog access for those 4 days, so hope everyone has a great week and we'll be up and running again on Thursday!!! :-)

Flashback Friday

I'm sitting here today, taking care of my little girl. She woke up this morning puking sadly - not quite was I was expecting from her at 7am. I'm sure she got it from her sister, who had the same thing Tuesday night. Anyway, she's laying in my bed watching cartoons while I'm sitting here typing. She's just eaten a little something and starting to feel better thankfully. So, when I was thinking of doing an entry for "Flashback Friday", I knew I had to do something about her - my sweet little puker. :-) I found this picture, taken just a couple weeks after she was born. I remember marvelling over how tiny she was. She was my smallest at 6lbs 12oz and her little legs were so long and skinny. The baby fat hadn't come in yet. She'd look at ya with those dark blue eyes and just seemed to take everything in. Madie and Noah always caught her attention the most. Still do. ;-) Now my baby girl is 3 yrs old and doesn't need me as much as she did back when she was first born. But, today, with her feeling yucky, I get to take care of her just like I did back then. They grow up too fast, don't they?