What is a good day?

So what makes a good day? For me, being the task oriented neurotic that I am, getting things checked off my "To Do" list makes the day good. Well...there are other things, like little boy snuggles and hearing my first grader read me a whole book by herself. But doing "To Do" things helps.

So what made yesterday and today good? Getting the kids winter clothes out and ready. As easy as sounds, this actually takes some time. Here's my process:
1) Go through summer clothes and divide by size.
2) Put the smaller size in the consignment "To Sell" pile.
3) Get out all the winter clothes that I have been collecting at end-of-season sales and consignment sales.
4) Put larger summer clothes in the place where the winter clothes came out of (specific, I know).
5) Put winter clothes in drawers.
6) Hang clothes to consign in the top of the closet.

Whew! All that work, but it makes me feel like I've done something worthwhile and that's always good.

So...that was kind of a really boring post, but thanks for reading anyway!!

Tomorrow is my birthday so I'll have to think of something good to post.

Totally Thomas

We took the kids to a Day out With Thomas in Salisbury, NC. They loved it...and got completely worn out in the process. Here are the pics of our fun day.

Seeing Thomas for the first time.

Thomas is a real working steam engine and has the smoke and soot to prove it.
Yes and the smoke is very smelly.

"Look at all that smoke mom."



Meeting the owner of the railway, Sir Topham Hatt.

Getting some tats.

Riding the for really real Thomas. We got a great seat by the window.

Looking towards the front of the train towards Thomas.
There were tons of other things to do as well, like a jumping castle, Bob the Builder show, and lots of train tables to play with. All in all, a great day letting the kids see one of their favorite characters.

Ponytail Braid

For a while now, Julie and I have been enjoying playing with new hairstyles. This is one I thought up for today.

1) Make a little ponytail at the top of the head.

2) Braid the ponytail and have your lovely assistant hold it for you.

3) Take that braid and combine it into a ponytail below the first one.

4) Continue doing that around the right side of the head. I put in 4 ponytails.

5) Pull all the hair over into a side ponytail. I added a few bobby pins to help it stay up.




6) Add a cute ribbon and you're done.

Fabulous Fall

Today is the first official day of Fall. I love the fact that on the first day of Fall, my flowers are still blooming!! I thought you might like some pictures.

These are my vinca.

Hollyhock - This beauty hasn't bloomed since July...until today.
Gotta love Fall showers that give us Sept. flowers.

I've been looking at fall wreaths for years, but hadn't found any I loved. But I found this one at Walmart for $10. I loved the fact that it was just leaves, the symbol of fall. To complete my front door scape, I bought these purple asters at Lowes for $6 each. Then I picked up some cute baskets to put the flowers in. They were on clearance at Walmart - love clearance. So...here's the final product. What do you think?

I also decided to put up fall decorations inside as well. I've had the leaf garland for about 2 years, but never did anything with it. Now I have. See my fall wagon picture below.

Enjoy your first day of FALL!!!

Look what I did Today

I decided it's time to do some projects around the house. We bought our house 6 years ago and it was new. Everything looked great. But...6 years and 2 kids later, things aren't as nice as they used to be.

I decided the first and easiest projects are painting projects. Back in July Glidden gave away a free quart of paint on their website. I chose Warm Caramel. I didn't really know what I wanted to do with it at the time, but I liked the color. Well, now I know!!

Before

After

The best part was I did this all today. I love fast projects! This was, seriously, the easiest painting project I've ever done. Since it was just the bottom half of the wall, I didn't have any pictures to take down, I didn't have to use a ladder. Since it was the hallway, I didn't have any furniture to move. And one quart of paint will cover the bottom of my hallway, EXACTLY, with none left. Pretty good for a day's work, huh?