Making Do & Happy!

it was the first day of school.
i was running, running, running
trying to pull everything together for class that night.

got to the shop, only to realize i had left my cake stands at home!
can't have dessert without my stands!

no need to fear! fat quarters was here!!!

i grabbed the stand and the spools of stuff
from around the shop
and used them in a pinch.



liked it soooo much better than plain ol' cake stands!

who knew!



p.s. if you want one of those stands, there is at least one left at the shop!

Day ONE & TWO - Maui!!!

Day ONE was in Maui
when you port, you port at a shipping dock. not exactly what i thought of when i thought of maui,
but oh well.
most of us didn't have excursions in maui, which meant if we wanted to go somewhere, we were footin' it.
and we did.

you can see from the lower left picture that our ship wasn't too far from a small beach
and so off we went.
shawn, shawn's sister in law, and i took all the children that you see below to this beach.



we stayed there til lunch time.
there is a buoy about a 1/4 mile out that shawn, gavin and hannah all swam to.
shawn wasn't happy that we didn't a picture.

the kids had a great time, shawn tried to relax and us girls enjoyed the sun :)

here's where i get the best parent award!!!

later that afternoon, when everyone got back on the ship, the guys and some of the older kids decided to forgo the spin class and go for a 5 mile run and then swim to the buoy i had mentioned above.

they ran and then got to the beach. all but roger went into the water.
a local walked over and asked him what they were doing.
to which he replied, "swimming out to the buoy"
"you aren't from here are you?" he said.
"nah, we are on the cruise"

here it comes...

he says, "this water is infested with sharks, they need to get out"
roger, not sure, starts to worry.
another guy comes up as this conversation is going on and tells roger that
he has lived here 7 years and will not go into this water.

now roger is flagging the guys down, yelling for them to come back to shore!

they do.

they all survived, no sharks attacked them. we hear the story when they get back. and everyone googles it.
yep. sure enough, it's like number 4 in shark attacks.
google it.

now the next day, we decide to NOT go back to the beach. we did some shopping and came back to the boat for lunch. while on the boat we can see the beach.
um yeah, and about 5 SHARKS!!!

gavin and his cousin freak out. he is not happy that i encouraged a father-son bonding swim.
he could have been bit by a shark for crying out loud!

hahahahaha...

he wasn't and it makes for a good story!

Bound for Hawaii!!!

this summer we joined shawn's family
and headed for hawaii!!!

ALOHA!

 

the flight was great. didn't have to drug give sleepy medicine to any of the children!
evyn rose slept for three hours! it was fabulous but i didn't get a lick of stitching done.

i love the picture of chels coloring! gavin sat in the back with nana & pa and was a tad bored...
(we changed it up for the flight home)

we all arrived safely in honolulu.
all ready to board the norwegian for a fun filled cruise with all 25 isas.

stayed tuned!

Treading Water...

so for a while now i've been contemplating the blog.
do i keep it? why? does anyone read it? and why?
am i inspiring (which was its purpose) and am i inspired?

so many thoughts running thru my mind.

then the other day i ran into a friend and we talked about blogging & pinning.
she shared her thoughts about how she feels it does more harm than good for young wives and young mothers. while i love blogs and pinterest i found what she said to be very true.

it's hard. really hard to try to keep up with other moms. i remember being a realllyyy young mom and feeling the pressure, then something clicked and i didn't feel pressure as much as i felt a desire to want to be a better wife and mother. but with all the posts and pins and facebook statuses it's hard to feel adequate and it's easy to compare ourselves to others.

i think sometimes people think i'm an "other". i've had people ask me questions like how do i get so much done or how do i do it all with shawn gone all the time and the truth is, most of the time i'm treading water just as hard and as much as the next guy but i've been doing it for soooo long it just seems easy to those who are looking in from the outside.

the truth is, i am far from perfect. FAR! i'm doin' my best and trying my hardest to make life all that i think it should be and really, i think i make myself crazier.

i could go on and on but i won't.

i've decided to take the blog on a slightly different path. kinda makes me want to cry and i don't even know why. i hope that it helps the new mom or the "old" mom like me that is tired and needing some reassurance that you are normal. i hope i can let you in to my private craziness and make you feel better about yourself.

really that's all we want, to feel normal. to feel like we are ok and to know that other people are treading water too!

so here goes. my attempt to make you feel good about yourself. if it does, share the post with someone else. and have a laugh on me!

MY WEEK IN REVIEW

laundry. i HATE it! shawn left sunday so saturday (yes 6 days ago) we did laundry.
i threw it all over the couch in the living room.
and there it sat. all. week!
if you came to my house this week and saw the living room doors shut, it's because of the laundry.

now mind you. this is how it currently looks after spending 45 minutes putting away laundry.
you can only imagine...

now, if you follow me on facebook you will already know that on wednesday
jethro tore poor wilson's bed to smitherings!
and yes, this is what it still looks like.
i might get to cleaning it up on sunday after church.
wait. it's suppose to rain sunday. shoot i'm in trouble...

and here's an ecard story.
do you ever NOT want to unload the dishes from the dishwasher so instead you
hand wash the curent dirty dishes and put them in the clean dishwasher to dry
so that you can have a clean kitchen without really having to do all the work.
yeah! that' me...

and on a final note.
this is what my bedroom looks like when shawn is out of town...
you can't see the dog beds in this picture but they are there.

yes all of us, except gavin, sleep in my room.
every night.

and this week we have fallen asleep watching re-runs
of duck dynasty!
LOVE that show!!!



p.s. i will still post my quilts and all the fun stuff. it's who i am.
enjoy!

The First Day of School!!!

ohhh, the summer just flew by
and not one of us was ready for school to start.

masyn started 5th grade
her last year in elementary

 

nolan started kindergarten
he's a little "later gator"

 

praying for a wonderful school year!

A Bridal Shower

last weekend my friend kim hosted a bridal shower
for a mutual family friend at our house.
she did an awesome job!!!

 

 

congratulations micaela!!!

A Dive-IN for Ten

hi. i'm alive!
i have been without a computer fo the last couple months working solely from my phone.
YIKES!!!

so much has gone on this summer.
masyn turned TEN! holy moly!

she planned her birthday this year and she wanted to have a dive-in.


the movie of choice was soul surfer
she wanted a concession stand
(it was too warm to put the candy out in the beginning)

 

we borrowed a friends popcorn maker.
so cute!

 

of course, cupcakes are a must!

cute fishies found on pinterest!
love pinterest!

and cute pink buckets to hold the refreshments

 

the girls had a shaving cream fight.
it was a must.

 

all cleaned up and ready for the show to start

we got tubes and fun net like chairs for the pool
but the girls were too cold and decided to watch the movie in comfort.

it was a great time and masyn did a great job planning fun stuff for everyone to do.
Hope to be back soon with more summer fun!