Beaumont Parade!

A new family tradition? Definitely!
Saturday Morning we took our little boys to the Beaumont Parade(Farmer's Day Parade)...Who knew right? Not me. Thankfully Aunt Amy called and invited us out to Beaumont or we would have missed all of the fun!A few days ago Hudson was watching Dora, and he started asking about going to a parade(he fondly remembers a parade we went to last summer). When Amy told me about the upcoming parade, I knew Hudson would be thrilled! The whole way to Beaumont he could barely stand himself. The weather was perfect, we had great company, and best of all they handed out free candy, shorts, t-shirts, and even air fresheners for your car! It was a perfect way to spend a Saturday! Thanks Joel and Amy!

Shutterfly Book

For a long time I have been wanting to make a baby book for Hudson, especially since now I need to get cracking on one for  Cooper. I started a traditional scrapbook, but I honestly found it hard to take everything out, clean it up, and get started day after day. I decided to do a digital book because there is no mess and I love the idea of being able to print out multiple books for gifts or whatever.

I was going to wait to do a post on Hudson's book until I had it in my hands, but since right now there is a sale on at Shutterfly I figured I would do a post and share what I did to get an even better deal in case anyone out there wants to save a few bucks.

*Warning*...Doing these photo books CAN take a lot of time depending on how detailed you want it.

Right now(and often) Shutterfly has great sales on their books. I started mine a few months ago but just got around to printing it. Since I had added so many pages to my book it was going to cost me around 60 bucks plus shipping(?70 bucks).
The book that I wanted went on sale 30 percent off, so with shipping it was going to cost me around 50 bucks.
Then(here is where it gets awesome) I found an online coupon for 20 dollars off here.  (there are a couple other great coupons there too).The coupon for 20 dollars off cost 2 dollars and doesn't expire until the end of the year. I was not sure if it would work, but it did, making my book(approx 50 pages) with shipping under 30 dollars. I figured with all of the customization and hard cover ect. that that was a great deal. It was a lot of fun to do. I wanted an 8.5x11 book, but for only a couple dollars more you could can get a 12x12(as they are 50% off). Just printing off the photos (almost 200 pictures)and buying an album for them all to fit in would cost more than one of these books(and not be as fun).

Now all I have to do is sit back and wait for it to get here! I am sooo excited to see it in person.

If you are interested in seeing the book click here

Summer.......

Have I mentioned how much I love summer lately? Cuz, I LOVE SUMMER.
The past few days have been spent doing the following:

1. Playing outside
2. Picking Dandelions(H pulls his wagon around and collects them for me-so cute)
3. Going to the Park
4. Going to Garage Sales
5. Eating Popsicles
6. Watering the grass
7. Planting Flowers and trees
8. Going on bike rides
9. Mowing the grass(Hudson loves to "mow" with a stroller while we cut the grass, and it is his "chore" to help bag the grass)
10. Playing with pals in the back yard
11. Playing Badminton in the yard and
12. Jumping on the trampoline

We have been enjoying the great weather and the few bugs as of late! It has been so much fun!
As is always the case, here are a few shots of us the past little while.

 

Our new trees and flowers*now let's hope that we can keep Hudson from uprooting them all:)

 We bought our duplex because we hoped we would enjoy our yard in the future, but It really is THE BEST feature of our home. We live outside in the summer!

This cutie LOVES to crawl around in the grass, he is so easy to please.

A definite favorite activity around here! Anything with wheels down the hill!

Tonight I offered Hudson a piece of gum if he would let me take some pics of him and Cooper.(He was desperate for some sugar, because today he was a terror at church so I cut him off-hahaha)

                    
 Cooper has cut ANOTHER tooth-so of course he has his hands in his mouth.

                       (Do you like how ghetto we are-we do impromptu photoshoots with our three year old in only his ginch-bahaha)       

Are you ready for some serious cuteness?

This is just a quick post with some of the photos I received of Cooper today. Images are courtesy of Talia Audenart Photography. I LOVE the way Talia takes studio pictures of kids. I am so lucky to know her and live so close to her. She is so talented and captured my boy EXACTLY how I wished! LOVE them all!

I just love his two little chompers here.

The Perfect Shot!

                 Don't you just LOVE him! Sorry to post SO many pictures, but I couldn't stop.

Poor man's necklace?

Not too sure what I should call this next little project, but it did result from me being too cheap to order it from etsy, so I guess it can be called my poor man's necklace. I am posting this for a friend, but also as an FYI for anyone in young womens as it would be an easy and cheap activity. (we are planning on doing it in a couple weeks)

I like jewelry( as evidenced by my old part time job at the Plaid Giraffe, right?....ahhh that was fun). I peruse jewelry on etsy all of the time. Sometimes I try to replicate things, but finding the appropriate supplies can be tricky, especially in Edmonton.  I saw this cute necklace, then went off to Michaels to see if I could find some decent beads(which I could not).

I was not too sure what to do next, but then I remembered in grade 8 I used to make beads out of Fimo(they were really ugly, I promise) and I remembered I had a lot of fimo sitting being wasted in my basement.(*we bought the fimo when Shane decided he liked to make figurines out of it-we bought a lot, as per my Hoarders syndrome, and he used it once-haha). Fimo is actually pretty awesome, you can make anything out of it(it is like a harder play dough) then you bake it and it becomes rock hard.All of the baking instructions are on the package.

I make some beads similar to the yellow ones, just by rolling balls and poking a toothpick through them. I ripped an old t-shirt for the string, just like the picture, and here is what I came up with.
(I know, hers is way nicer, but for about 2.50$ I am okay with mine:)
I only had a small package of yellow fimo, so instead of doing 7 beads on the bottom and 5 on the top, I did 5, and 3. I just tied knots in between each bead.
NOTE: one package as seen above is what I used for one necklace
I added a lobster clasp to the end of mine just by tying knots(as per the "shabby chick" aka sloppy and easy style I love).

The best parts of this project is in total it takes 45 minutes-ish. It is Super easy. It costs about 2 or 3 bucks for a pack of Fimo. You can make many different variations of it. You can find Fimo anywhere, and you feel like a rockstar when you make your own stuff!

Our Long Weekend

I loooooove long weekends. If I had it my way I would have Shane working 10 hour days and have a long weekend every week! It is just so much fun to spend some extra time as a family(these guys really are my best friends). Until a few months ago Shane worked part time (every Sat.) and now that he doesn't I am addicted to our weekends!

This past weekend happened to be a long weekend. On Monday we had our cousins come over for a little BBQ and it was so fun. Hudson is obsessed with his cousins, and it was great to see baby Jade.
We were blessed with great weather and the kids just ran and played. It was so much fun!!!

Some pictures of our long weekend festivities, including an awesome bike ride with Dad, and getting to play "throw the cat" with Uncle Joel!

Hudson and Lincoln

Now onto some updates, Mr. Machy is now 7 months old and fully mobile. Tonight he even managed to make his way down the stairs(*meaning I left the door open and he tumbled down the wood stairs-oops). I can't believe what a little mover this guy is. He will NOT sit still to let us change his diaper and I had to take him out of sacrament meeting at church already because he won't sit. What happened to my little baby? Poor little Mach has had a bad cold, for what seems like forever, and has a terrible diaper rash(because I am pretty sure he is getting his front teeth). The past couple weeks have been hard for our poor guy.

Poor sick baby Machy, getting some extra snuggles from Dad.

Hudson has just realized he loves to paint. It has been a bit rainy the past couple days, and H will just sit at the table and paint for a long time(which is a bit of a miracle). It is cute to see his art. He also loves to glue pompoms and craft supplies to paper. He enjoys his "art "time a lot. He is also interacting more and more with his little brother. Tonight when Huds and I realized Cooper went down the stairs, Hudson started bawling. He was hysterical. Later he came and sat beside me and told me that he loved Cooper and didn't want him to fall down the stairs again and go to heaven. I just want them to be pals so bad so it make me so happy to hear that, especially since most of the time Hudson is complaining that Cooper is in his ears(translation-his crying is annoying Hudson).

Hudson "loving" his brother-What's not to love about a brother THIS easy going?

Now onto me. It has been one month since I started my new diet with Lisa Parker(trainer/dietician). I have got to say I am amazed! I am amazed first at how bad I ate, and that I have actually really enjoyed doing this diet with her. How the program works, is she weighs and measures you then figures out your BMI and fat composition. Then she gives you a diet according to your goal weight based on protein, carbs and fats. Essentially you eat 6 meals/day and you balance your meals. The first two weeks were REALLY hard. I felt like I was eating soooo much, and I was sooooo tired. Now I am feeling more energized and I am really enjoying my 30 minutes of exercise(when I get it in...). I am so proud that in the last month I have already lost 8 lbs. I am so glad that I am seeing results, or it would be very hard to keep motivated.

Lastly, I finished my new headboard. I will take pictures of my entire room when the piles of clothes are put away-heehee(cuz, really it was hard enough to get my bed made for the pictures-ha). I found this King sized headboard on Kijij for 80 bucks. The thing is a monster and is solid wood. It had been painted black, so I just refinished it in white to go with our room. I feel like my room is more grown-up now that we have a headboard-haha. I was planning on building one off of Anna White's Knock Off Wood website, but I am not even sure I could make one for this cheap. The only real trouble we had with it is our bed is a Cal King, and the headboard is a King(4 inches wider). We had to move our whole room around to make it work, but I am getting more used to the new layout. *our master is teeeeeeeeeeeny and now our bed pretty much takes up the ENTIRE ROOM!*

Tada

So here is our Headboard(let's hope it gives me the motivation to make my bed-:) Speaking of bed, Goodnight!

A post about Motherhood!(Belated Mother's Day Post)

This morning I went to get some pictures done of the boys! I have a friend who is incredibly talented and she takes the most lovely pictures. The photo shoot was primarily for Cooper, but I wanted to attempt to get ONE picture of the guys together(see collage below- to understand that I fully recognized we had our work cut out for us-haha). Me and Hudson practiced smiling and "listening" in the morning and I had some pretty sweet bribes lined up, but he had his mind made up and was having none of it when it came down to actually having the pictures taken. He proceeded to act out while my patient friend did the pictures of Cooper, doing things like raiding her pantry, throwing silly puddy down her stairs and being rambunctious. When we were leaving, Hudson "wasn't ready" to leave and I had to carry him out to the car kicking and screaming.

I don't share this story because I am mad and can't believe how my son was acting, but on the contrary, because this little guy who can be such a bull-headed stinker has me completely wrapped around his little finger. He did have to suffer the consequences of not behaving, but what I realized driving home was that I would take all of the moments like this morning any day over not experiencing Motherhood. (I guess this is my Mother's Day post-heehee)
Hudson is becoming such an individual with opinions and thoughts and feelings of his own, and like any other stage of child rearing with a first born this stage is new to me. In some ways I feel for him because parenting really is all trial and error.

For example (NO JUDGING PLEASE) the other day Cooper was crying all day(and I really mean hours on end-due to teething). Hudson was being such a champ dealing with his incessant cries, which made me so proud, cause let's be honest, even being an adult with a little bit of self control I was finding it hard to listen to. Hudson requested some Kraft Dinner for lunch, so I made it for him and as a reward for good behavior I told him that he could eat it in his playroom. I had a towel on his lap in case any spilled and warned him not to make a mess, then went to Cooper's room and rocked the poor baby to sleep.  A minute later Hudson came into the nursery and informed me with a giant smile that he made a big mess. Already frustrated, I went to go assess the scene and let me tell you, there was a huge mess.  Hudson being in his underwear only made it opportunistic for me to wail him on the butt, and wail I did. I spanked him hard 3 times, and yelled at him to clean up the mess.(*here is the no judging part-We are not the spanking type- but I say parent as you wish! Some kids respond to a little spank, Hudson really doesn't so we usually try other methods) He was obviously upset and sobbed as he picked up the macaroni. He was having a hard time as the macaroni kept sticking to his little fingers. When I finally gave him the chance to he informed me that he was just trying to move and the towel I placed on his lap got stuck and the macaroni went flying. He tried to clean it up but realized he needed help, so he came to get me. I just assumed he was being rude and threw his macaroni all over the room and he came to get me to gloat( this has happened in the past-oi).
I totally wrongfully judged my son, who just came to me for some help. I immediately started crying, and apologized. He forgave me so quickly and was just super concerned that I was crying. He hugged me and even told me to take a deep breath, when I was still crying he asked me if I need a little drink of water. I was so overwhelmed with his love and forgiveness and the biblical prompts to become like a child. I thought about me, today, if I had gone to say my own Mother, or Shane or a close friend, and needed help, and they treated me as bad as I treated Hudson, I would be furious and I mean MAD. I can tell you too, that I would not be forgiving them that next moment, and completely forget about my hurt feelings and be so concerned for theirs!!! Kids truly are amazing. They have such resilient spirits, and they have so much to teach us about being good human beings!

When I was 19 I went away for Mother's Day and did not call my Mom from where I was at. I figured I'd call her when I got home. She was livid! I didn't think it was a big deal. I am learning why it was such a big deal everyday. Motherhood deserves to be celebrated! It really is amazing and divine. We do need to teach our children to respect it, and now I think-what an idiot I was for not calling my Mom.(A few years later while traveling in Crete I made a concerted effort to call my Mom on Mother's Day! Seriously there were sketchy Grecians on mopeds creeping me out as I called-hopefully that made up a bit for that missed call:)

One teeny silver lining to the black clouds of last years forest fire, was having my Mom live down the street from me for 6 whole months. I loved having her so close and getting to see her everyday. I loved having her come to church each week with our family and her getting to know my ward family. I loved having someone to run errand and make memories with all of the time. It was fantastic and I was so sad to see her leave.  I am so thankful for that special time as I have lived far from my Mom for many years, and I will likely never live in close proximity to her again in my life. I have a wonderful Mother and I am so thankful for her ENDLESS and INFINITE sacrifices on my behalf!

      Happy Mother's Day to all, and Thank God for Mothers!!!!!

                        a few shots of failed attempts of brother pictures:)-notice who makes it difficult   
                                                                       EVERY TIME?