Viva la Dior y Heather

I'm not sure where we are at here but as I scrolled through my pictures I couldn't find just the right one. I mean should I start out with this little early morning beauty where we were at our girls volleyball games?

Heather my long time BFF friend and I decided to get away this summer. I love her like a sister and she is the holder of my deepest darkest secrets, most embarrassing moments, and triumphs. She has seen me at my lowest of lows and my highest of highs. That is a true friend. I mean this girl could do some damage with all she knows, but she never would. She is true blue. 

I am not sure how these were literally the only two pictures I took while we were in Rocky Point but here they are. We stayed right on the beach, slept in every day, ate tacos, devoured books, watched movies and talked for five days. It was the best vacation ever. We pulled our beach chairs right up to the ocean and let the tide roll in until the sea covered our knees. 

When we arrived at Rocky Point we were asked if we spoke English and then invited by a toothless man to go get margarita's. We politely declined and headed to Chino's to get taco's. When Chino saw Heather he gave her a big hug, they caught up on how both families were doing and then he gave her a big smooch right on the mouth. Chino then turned to me and gave me a big hug and smooch on the mouth. Welcome to Mexico. Whenever I am with Heather this is how everyone around her reacts to her. She is so loved. Do you know why? She listens, she asks questions, she remembers their names and their wives and children's and grand children's names,  and she genuinely cares about others. The Rocky Point locals love her. 

And I love her too. 

I hope that she knows that. I hope that she knows no matter the distance between the times we see each other I will always, always love her. 

XOXO- Life is good when you have a Heather. The Sunny D

Loft Redo- A DIY project

The Loft....Before

The loft in my house has been many things. First, it was a room where I taught preschool and housed all of my teaching supplies. I then transitioned back to the classroom and the loft became a playroom/junk collecting room. There were the remnants of a preschool but mostly it was just a mess. In the garage I had a giant bookcase that held enough books for a small library and I was beginning to worry the heat of the Arizona summer was going to ruin the glue in their bindings.  The beginnings of a merge began in my minds eye. I pictured a Domino magazine type room. A room that was chic yet user friendly to my family. I was also on a VERY tight budget because who really has extra cash lying around for DIY projects? Or time for that matter......

The first thing I thought I would do was pick paint. I wanted something that would let light in and make me happy. Eventually, I scrapped all of these colors and went with the same paint color in my kitchen. It is called Dew Not Disturb from Dunn Edwards. It is very happy. 

I patched the holes in the walls something I had not done since the previous homeowners had lived here. It was so nice getting rid of those. I then began to paint and it took me FOREVER. Luckily, I had the help of a good friend. He came to the rescue and painted the rest of my room. Thank goodness for friends! I listened to books and Dr. Laura podcasts. My kids still had two weeks of school left so I got a lot of work done. 

 Must have McDonald's Diet Coke.

As I was heading to my cousins to swim I noticed that I had a smear of paint across my chest. Nice. 

Fitting everything in the Honda was a JOB. Then it was time to look around the house at what I already had. I wondered if there was anything that I could spray paint or re-use to decorate this room. I really wanted to buy this chair at target to add a pop of color. However, after seeing the price tag and realizing that it would cost the same as a month of groceries I decided against it. I searched the name of the print and found out it is a Waverly print. I ordered a yard from Joann's online May 29 and it is STILL NOT here. I am not happy about it at all. Especially since I found it at a competitors store. I have a chair that I really like and am planning to recover the seat and make some accent pillows.

Here is the chair.....just waiting on the fabric..I had a set of these three ceramic accent pieces that have been sitting in my garage for five years. I spray painted them.

Next up......organize this

Nearly there...The curtains were hemmed and I was just waiting on a sectional to arrive. In the meantime I wanted to add art. I wanted something all of us could contribute to and so we did a family abstract painting. 

Artwork almost done...

I have a few spots left on the wall to fill but the majority of these pictures are artwork I have purchased on my travels. Or pictures that I have taken myself along with family pictures. I am going to add a few more drawings that my kids do. Let's just say I am not quite a Type A personality type nor am I a Type B personality type. I'm more like an A- Type personality. What I have found works best for me when doing a gallery wall is to pin a rectangle on the wall and fill it. I don't measure, I don't use a level, I just get to work. 

After the sectional arrived I realized it would never fit the way I had set the room up. So, I had to rearrange everything. It took me a whole day. I moved the desk/bookcase to the other side of the room. I laid one of the bookcases on its side and put all the books back in. 

I just have a few more spots to fill on the gallery wall. I'm not in a rush the right pictures will come at the right time. I am so happy with the way our loft has turned out. We now have space for friends to visit, a room I can work out in, we can watch a movie in, do art projects or homework in. 

The scriptures tell us about having a house of order and that is my goal this summer. I have taken bags upon bags of donations to Goodwill. We have organized our bedrooms. Well, I have helped the kids organize their bedrooms. My room is in the process of being gutted. This was once just a house but now with a little hard work it is a part of us and we call it home. 

8 Behold, mine house is a house of order, saith the Lord God, and not a house of confusion.

XOXO- Summer Projects are satisfying. The Sunny D

Underwear in the Garage and the Weevils are A-OK

Do you ever have moments when you feel like you are a failure at everything you do, it will never be good enough?

You know, you stink as a parent. Especially at dinner when you are playing best/worst your daughter says the worst part of her day was when you yelled at her. But if she only knew that you only yelled at her after you warned her about twenty times to quit bouncing all over the couch. You were nauseous from the cologne your son sprayed all over himself at Dillard's when you were looking for jeans for him. Then he got in the car with you which was overheating as you drove it around and had to turn off the air conditioning in 110 degree weather and the only window that actually unrolls in your car is the drivers side window. You were breathing in that haze of smell from who knows what and you were so hot and agitated and there were these green gaseous cologne fingers of stink in your nostrils. That when you came home to sit on the couch and she would not sit still for five seconds you nearly sort of lost it, and thought maybe I should go to my room and be alone for a minute. Except the baked potatoes were in the oven for dinner and you still had to cook the bacon and make the green salad so you just sat there while she pretended the couch was a trampoline until you were just done. DONE. Then she proceeded to tell you that she hates green salad. In fact, your pretty sure she hates everything you make for dinner.

Or how about the diet. When you are trying your hardest and nothing seems to work. Well, maybe you aren't trying your hardest. You haven't worked out in two weeks because you have literally been gutting every nook and cranny of your neglected house and children's bedrooms that look clean...EXCEPT when you open that drawer next to your sons bed and realize there is junk in there probably two years old. In fact, you know it is two years old because there are the remnants of unloading his backpack in there after the last day of school in third grade and he just finished fifth grade. Yeah, and how about the remains of the two weevil body shells you found when you emptied everything out and you thought.....what in the world has happened to my life?

Or how about scheduling and money. When you were supposed to have your daughter at summer school at one sharp but the new dryer you just bought arrived right then and you were late and also sort of mad that you had to shell out $500 for a new dryer that is a super cheapo version of your old dryer.

Or how about when you have had the feeling that you should read your scriptures all day and you just don't want to.

And then in that moment you realize that all that chagrin is the adversary working so hard against all your efforts no matter how big or how small they are, the fact is you are trying. Not only are you trying you are doing your best at that moment.

So then you think well...
I scrubbed the bathroom
I washed Ellie's bedding
The dishes were loaded and unloaded
You wiped the counters
The floor was swept
You made lunch AND dinner
You threw away FOUR FULL bags of garbage from cleaning out Aydan and Ellie's room
You donated FIVE bags to Goodwill and actually dropped them off
You saved one bag of boy clothes for a friend to be delivered in the morning
You woke up at five thirty AM to take your son to swim team
You had your kids try on every stitch of clothing to see what fit and what did not
You taxied your baby girl to summer music camp
You took your son shopping and got him three outfits for summer and a pair of jeans for school
You used your coupon and scored seven pairs of jeans for your daughter which were also 30% off the clearance price making them about $4 each pair....and since the dress code at school next year is pants only you felt pretty awesome about that
You took your son to get an ice cream cone
You actually tried to fix your dryer yourself, had someone else come try to fix it to no avail, you went to the appliance store and picked out the best value dryer that would work for your family because let's face it you were tired of hanging your clothes to dry in the garage and it was a tad strange when you had to hang up all your underwear.....and you know that if that had happened four years ago it would have reduced you to a crying puddle sitting on your kitchen floor but now your a girl that just gets it done.
And the reasons you worry about your weight are stupid and don't really matter actually because your best is good enough.
And who cares if you have twenty run on sentences in this blog post.

So it is day in and day out there is the good, the bad, and the ugly all rolled into one. Mostly good though because you have good kids that help clean up their rooms and tidy the house. A son who planned the lesson for Family Home Evening, a daughter who really just wanted a snuggle, and you are happy with this little life. You are grateful for this little life. You are grateful you can afford to buy the dryer and that you had food to feed your kids. You are grateful that you have a body that you can work to the bone cleaning and it just keeps going. You are grateful and you are happy because you have so many blessings and you know that Heavenly Father is happy with your best efforts. I mean he doesn't care if you didn't bother to put on any make-up today because this is just how he made you and he doesn't make any mistakes. You are happy because you know there is absolutely NOTHING to feel bad about when you have worked hard all day and none of those things are true you were telling yourself earlier. That actually your pretty OK. So maybe now you will go read your scriptures.

XOXO- The Sunny D