Fourth of July DIY

I should be packing right now - we are moving exactly 1 week from today. But why pack when you can blog?! I was so excited about my mom's birthday present this year. Her birthday falls a few days before the Fourth, but I wanted to give her her present a little early so she could put it out as a decoration. There is the CUTEST store here in Utah called the Wood Connection. I am in love. They have lot of wood projects, from wooden letters to the flag set that I made for my mom. The idea is to go and pick out a wooden set that you like, then decorate it with scrapbook paper or paint (which they also have available at the store). I think they are pretty reasonably priced as well. I have made a few several projects from this store to decorate our apartment. I love it. I am so sad to not be able to go there any more once we move. I think Scott is elated for the sake of our bank account, haha. Luckily they also have an online store!! You all should go and check it out. So fun!! Here are the materials I bought for my mom's birthday project:

Paper and string I bought.

The wood set sold at the Wood Connection. Stackable pieces for an American flag.

This is how it looks when the blocks are stacked. The pictures definitely make it look tiny, but I would guess it's about 4"x5" when stacked.

My favorite part of this project is that it was so simple!! First I painted each of the blocks. I used modge podge that I already had to glue the wooden blocks onto the paper, then cut around the edges, and sanded off the remaining paper. I only put paper on one side of each block, so the backs and sides of each were still visible, which is why I painted first.

After I had cut around the edges but before excess paper had been sanded off.

All paper glued, sanded, and blocks stacked again.

 All that was left to do was add the star. I painted it white, then sanded the edges of the star so it had some of the wood showing through. I wrapped the twine around a couple of times, then hot glued it to the blue square (actually mom did this when she got the present - I didn't have a glue gun). That's it! I LOVE how it turned out. Might have to do one for myself next year :) Simple, easy, and SO cute!!

I'm always looking for fun projects to do for around my home. What are some of your favorites?

Hello There Blog...

Has it really been a year since I've posted? I told myself I wouldn't let that happen to this blog! Hopefully I can be better now... SO MUCH has happened since I last wrote. Scott and I moved out of Provo (a day I thought would never come, but at the same time I am sad that my college experience has officially passed), Scott got a temporary job and also got accepted into the PhD Aerospace Engineering program at CU Boulder, and we had our first baby - the cutest little boy I've ever seen!

Selfie with my cute boy.

One word to describe my life lately: BLOWOUTS. One week ago, if you would have asked me about my experiences with blowouts, I would have laughed and said I am one lucky mama and my little angel baby doesn't do blowouts. I have since been smacked in the face with parenthood reality and all it's slimy, orange colored glory. As recent college graduates and soon to be PhD students we are trying to be very money conscious since things will be tight for a few years. Great Value brand has become a good friend. Diapers are EXPENSIVE, so we thought we would try Kirkland brand. From Costco. As in 192 diapers a box. My best advice to future parents? Don't skimp on diapers!! Ever. If you have found a value brand that works for you and your babies, feel free to let me know in the comments, but Kirkland brand is basically a paper towel with straps.

First incident: we were at my great-grandma's viewing and my mom was holding baby E when she said she thought he had filled his pants. I grabbed the diaper bag and was on my way to the bathroom to change him when I felt a splat on my foot. In an attempt to not make this post super disgusting and graphic, I will just let you go ahead and guess what it was. That was when I realized his pants were literally soaked with poo, and it was dripping down his socks and onto the floor. It also went about half way up his back. This was my first blowout as a mom, and I didn't even know where to start! Luckily, little man had left a poop trail from the viewing room all the way to the bathroom, and one of the guests spotted it and let my mom know so she was able to follow me. I seriously could not have been more happy/relieved to see her. Then my dad came and we took Everett out to the car while mom cleaned up the carpet (the ladies at the funeral home were SO nice and understanding, they deserve a shout-out). I realized I forgot the changing pad at home, so we had to lay paper towels down instead. Dad worked on the baby while I worked on myself (it was everywhere - my feet, my skirt, my hands, my hair (I don't know how that happened) - everywhere).

Second incident: pretty similar to the first, only change the scene to a Chinese restaurant. My parents were still in town (phew!), and we had gone out to eat with my grandma. Everett had been so good and cute, just sucking away on his paci in the carseat while we ate, when all of a sudden he started crying. Scott and I have learned to check his diaper first thing when he fusses - he does not like sitting in dirty diapers at all (not that I would let him sit in them for a long time - I'm not an awful mom - but literally as soon as he goes he wants it off). I got him out of his carseat and was handing him over to my mom when Dad said to look at his pants. Again, soaked. We went through the same process of getting him cleaned up. This was only his second real blowout, but several other of his clothes had gotten poo on them because the diapers kept leaking, so we knew for sure that this was the result of crappy diapers (pun intended). Since we were in town we went and got a box of nice, absorbent Pampers. And now we have a box of about 179 Kirkland diapers left. They will either be refunded or sent to the dumpster.

Third incident: Today. Since we switched to Pampers I was certain that I would be able to avoid blowouts from now on. No such luck. This one wasn't as bad as the others ( I seriously give credit to the diaper for that), and at least I was at home this time, which definitely made it easier to clean. I think it was the way I was holding him - the mess had nowhere to go but all the way up his back!

I understand that blowouts come with babies, but I think three in less than a week is my limit (and Scott was at work for every single one of them!). Here's to hoping Pampers changes this pattern we have going. At least my baby is still cute! He seemed to be secretly laughing each time we were cleaning up after him. He has been so much fun, and I wouldn't trade being his mom for anything, including going back to my days of wearing shirts without spit-up stains, being able to do my hair every day, and yes, even the blowouts.

This was literally right after the blowout today. Smug little guy :)

Gone Fishin'

Historically, I've been a bad fisher. I went a few times when I was younger with my dad, but the only thing I've ever caught is a crawdad. Last summer while Scott and I were living at the lake house, we went fishing a couple of times off the dock, but never caught anything. Once I came close - I had a fish nibbling the bait and everything! Unfortunately, another, much bigger fish darted out from under the dock (right below where I was standing), and it scared me so bad I screamed. Pretty sure I scared off all the fish in the area. Obviously, I'm not the prime choice for a fishing companion.

So when Brian asked if Scott and I wanted to go fishing with him one night, I was pretty excited. Seriously, the whole goal of this fishing trip was for me to catch a fish. Brian is so awesome - he would cast out to a good spot and then give the pole to me. He just sat there the whole entire time telling me when to reel in a little bit, when to tug, and when to jerk the line. So sweet, especially because I seriously had no idea what the heck I was doing. I had a few nibbles here and there, but finally, FINALLY, I got a real bite, and the bobber went all the way under the water. I jerked and hooked my first fish!! I don't know much about fish, but Scott and Brian told me it was a pretty big one. It took forever to get it in (it put up a pretty big fight), but I was so excited. My first fish ever! To be honest, it was really gross. I never even touched the thing - Scott and Brian did that for me, ha!

Seriously this is as close as I got.

It's so big!! I didn't know this: after a fish has been out of water for a long time, you have to hold it up for a bit so it can regain its strength or else it drowns and dies!

The panorama setting in my camera has started putting black streaks like this one in pictures. Anybody know how to fix/change it? Still, what an absolutely beautiful night.

No filters added to these pictures. Utah is really amazing. I couldn't stop taking pictures the whole night!

It was such a fun night. I'm definitely excited to go again soon! Another awesome thing that happened this week: LITTLE BUBBY TURNED 12! Except for 1) he's not so little anymore, and 2) now that he's 12, I should probably stop calling him "little bubby", ha! I got to FaceTime with him and the rest of my family while they were at El Mez (seriously the best restaurant ever) for his birthday dinner. I love that guy so much - I can't believe he is growing up so fast. 

Ok seriously though, with that cute face how could you not call him Little Bubby?! :) Happy birthday Carter!! Love ya dude.

Pinsperation: Paint Swatch Calendars

I know I've said this a time or two before, but I am SO grateful for my two sisters-in-law who have become such good friends to me, and who make it so much easier to be so far away from home. We missed Whitney this time, but Nicole and I took a night to do a super fun Pinterest project. I am way excited about how it turned out. We had so much fun doing this together, and it was VERY simple to make (although a bit time consuming - if you want to do this project, I would plan about 3 or 4 hours total). Materials you will need: a poster frame (ours were 22 3/8" x 34"), paint swatches, rubber cement, and a corner rounding tool.

We used this tutorial. I even used similar colors she did, because I loved the color scheme and it added some really nice colors to our apartment. Nicole did a super cute rainbow ombre design. For more ideas, just go to Pinterest and search "paint swatch calendar" and tons of options will pop up.

The first step was choosing colors. Honestly, I think this was the hardest part. Whenever I start projects like this, I want it to turn out EXACTLY how I'm picturing it, so I was nervous choosing colors because I wanted it all to come together how I saw it in my head. I got my paint swatches at Walmart (I felt like a thief for taking so many, haha). I chose swatches that had the punch out circle at the top, because I thought they made a great place for the date. Anyway, here are the colors I chose:

Sorry for the shadow. Also, these are already trimmed and the corners rounded, I will explain how I did that next.

After I chose my colors, I trimmed each swatch down, so that there was just a little space above the punched out circle. Since the swatches were different brands, this made some of them different heights than others, but I wanted a more uniform look in the space between the circle and the top of the swatch, rather than a uniform overall height of the paint swatches. I am happy with how it turned out, but Nicole did hers the other way (so that all the paint swatches are the same height, but they are differing in space between the top of the circle and the top of the swatch) and hers looks very nice as well. I think it just comes down to personal preference. I used a ruler and scissors and cut each swatch myself, which worked fine, but if you have a paper cutter or some other tool that will do the job for you, it will save a LOT of time.Then I punched out the circles and used a corner rounder to (obviously) round each of the corners. 

This isn't absolutely necessary, I just felt like it gave it a more finished look. Again, personal preference.

In the tutorial we used, she glued fabric to the cardboard square that comes with the poster frame. However, to save a little time, money, and effort, we just flipped over the paper that comes in the frame and used the white side. The next thing I did was lay out all of the colors to try and find the pattern I liked best. After that, I measured everything off and glued them down. Nicole eye-balled hers and it turned out great. If I could do it again, I think that would be the way I would do it - you can't tell a difference between the two (hers look every bit as straight and even as mine), and she saved a lot of time. The spacing at the top and bottom of the paper, as well as between the paint swatches, is completely up to you. 

Remember the circles I punched out of each swatch? Here is where I put them to use. I glued three circles down above each column, so that they were overlapping with the middle one on top. Then I just took a pen, and wrote a lowercase, cursive letter for each day of the week. I thought this added a cute personal touch, and I love it! It might be my favorite part of the whole calendar. There are several different ways to write the day though, it's up to you! I didn't take a close up picture of my days of the week, but you can kind of see how I did it in my "finished product" picture. Anyway, after that I just flipped the paper over, clipped the cardboard back in, and wrote everything on it with a dry erase marker - voila! 

I realize there are 31 days in May! Don't worry, I fixed it :)

My finished product is on the left, Nicole's is on the right. Her's is in Polish in case you can't read it :)

Like I've stressed through this whole post, my favorite thing about this project is that it is totally "customizable!" Nicole served her mission in Poland, so she chose to write everything in Polish, and I left extra space at the bottom to write quotes or notes. The best part is, if you don't like something, erase it and start over! This is a fun and easy project to add a little organization to your life. Thanks for doing it with me Nicole!

April Overview

[WARNING: Loooong Post]

I'm so bad at blogging!! Hopefully now that things have settled down and I'm back in a routine I will get better at it.

I am now a graduated woman!! What a fantastic feeling. It was a great weekend too - my parents flew out from Indiana and we got to spend a few days together. It is such a crazy thing to graduate from college. I've spend my whole life in school, and now all of a sudden that's all over. I have to say though, I don't really mind not being in school anymore. Right now it just feels like a normal summer break, but I'm sure when Scott goes back to school in the fall, it will start to feel more like I really graduated. A few graduation pictures:

Scott was my paparazzi for the day. This picture is one of many candid shots :)

That's my diploma in there!

I am SO grateful for each of these people. They're the best. For real.

My sister Rae says I always pose with my hand on my hip... I see what she means, ha! But, I love these pictures, I love the memories I have from that day, and I especially love the three other people in the pictures. I am one lucky girl to have such a support group. After I graduated, we went to Oakley to spend some time with my grandma. Yay for spending two weekends in a row in one of my favorite places! We relaxed, got to spend some time with my both my grandma and my great-grandma, and had lots of fun. On Monday, Mom and I got pedicures, and then it was time to say goodbyes. I HATE goodbyes. And I'm not very good at them. I'm ready to move back to Indiana!! Thanks for coming out here Mom and Dad! It was so fun to see you and I can't wait to see you again! I love you!

That same day, Scott and I headed to Montana to spend some time with his mom. Neither of us got scheduled to work that week, which is a rarity, so we took full advantage. What a fun trip! We shot some guns, played lots of games, got to spend some fun time with his mom. Also, one of Scott's friends has a plane and his pilot's license, so we got to go up in that for a while. Talk about breathtaking views!!

Sorry the video isn't the best quality - it doesn't do near justice to how breath taking the view was. But, seriously a fantastic week. One great thing we did recently was go to the temple with Scott's siblings. This is one of my favorite things to do. I LOVE going to the temple, and the peace it brings to me. I can be having the worst day, and going to the temple really does make everything better. It brings a lot of perspective. I am also so grateful for the family I married into - talk about some awesome people. It has been so fun to live so close to all of them for the best year and a half. Lots of fun memories! We decided that while we live so close to so many temples in Utah, we would try and go to one new one a month. This was an adventure though! We were going to go to Oquirrh Mountain, then some plans changed, so we decided on Mount Timpanogos, which was closed. Finally, we ended up at Draper. I was still excited though - I have never been to Draper, and it didn't disappoint. So beautiful! 

Easter

Ok, so it's been a while since I've blogged. Finals have started, and I'm GRADUATING in 4 days!! Good excuses... This weekend, we went to my grandma's house in Oakley, Idaho to celebrate Easter with my family. I LOVE my family - they are all so great. It's so much fun to spend time with them. We colored eggs, had a giant Easter egg hunt, played games, threw the frisbee a little, and watched a movie. Plus, we just relaxed, which was fabulous. Some pictures:

The view from my grandma's house. Oakley is so beautiful - the picture doesn't do it justice, it seriously could be a scene right out of a painting.

This might be one of my new favorite pictures. I love it!

Minions assemble!

My grandma is SO cute!!

My cousin Ashley - I love her!

Scott and I have a fun-filled couple of weeks ahead of us. My parents are flying out this week for my graduation. I. Cannot. Wait. To. See. Them. I love my parents tons!! We are going back to my grandma's house, which will also be fun. I am just really excited to spend some time with them. The only thing that would make it better would be if Rae and Carter and Malyssa could come - but I will get to see Rae and Cart in a couple more months. Next week, both Scott and I are not scheduled to work. This seriously hasn't happened since our honeymoon! We are very excited! We decided we are going to go up to Montana to spend some time with Scott's mom. I am excited to explore Montana some more. If you haven't been there, you're missing out. More posts and pictures to come soon!!

April Fool's

(Written Wednesday, April 2)

Well, I had quite the eventful April Fool's Day. Growing up, my mom always had fun with this day. Some of my favorite pranks: being woken up in a rush, saying that we overslept and we were going to miss the bus. Only to find out - after I had rushed around for 20 minutes to get ready - that my parents had set the clocks forward an hour, and we had plenty of time. At least I got to watch some TV before school. Another one: spending the whole day wondering why my bag was so heavy, and then getting home and finding rocks hidden in very sneaky places in my back pack. Haha! Good memories. So, when I got to work yesterday and realized that it was FINALLY April Fool's Day, I was kind of SO excited. Why, you ask? Because my good friend Rachel had given me an idea for a prank about five months ago, and I have been waiting for April Fool's to come around so I could play this very prank on Scott.

THE PLAN: Create a fake KSL account, and advertise a ferret that I no longer had time to take care of, and therefore needed to sell. And of course for the contact information, I put Scott's phone number. When Rachel did this trick to one of her friends, he got tons of calls and emails asking about the little animal he was selling, so I was expecting the same to happen for Scott. Unfortunately, no such luck. However, and much to my delight, I had done the same thing to my dad, only with a chinchilla and his contact information. He had been receiving a few calls/texts, and he was kind of freaked out, so I told him what was going on and then changed the info on that ad to Scott's contact information. Then, I sat back and waited.

Finally, I got a text from Scott, asking if I knew anything about a chinchilla, and why he had a bunch of people asking if "Betsy" was still available. Maybe this is lame, but I was laughing so hard. Luckily, our conversation was over text message, or else I would have given it away as soon as he asked. Eventually though, I spilled the beans, and he tried to convince me that the police were looking around trying to find the creators of all the fraudulent ads on April Fool's Day. Ok, guys, I am not that gullible, and I really didn't believe him... Yet. But, when I got a (very legit sounding) call to my work phone from a man asking to speak to whoever was over employees in the office, because they had traced the IP address of one of the fake adds back to the Psych office, I started to get a little nervous. And by a little I mean sweaty palms, racing heart, watering eyes (although I swear I wasn't crying, my eyes really do water just as a reaction!!). Finally the fake investigator started laughing - I was pretty relieved. So that was our April Fool's.

Just so you know, the next day Scott finally had several people contact him about Gus the ferret. He told some people that we gave Gus away, and told some others that Gus had a heart attack the day before so he was no longer available :)

Happy Wednesday!