Week 7 in Review

Telling me "noooo." She did not want her picture taken.

This week did not have a theme. I just ran out of ideas and we had lots to do without adding in crafts and such. I am sure most of us parents are getting ready for the up coming school year. I am busy putting together a schedule for my poor husband who will be running 4 girls around in the evening while I am at school. I am also trying to put together a 3 month menu that will allow me to prep mostly everything once a week and use my slow cooker a whole bunch.

We did our usual "not much" on Monday and clarinet practice and library on Tuesday. Appearantly we have been to the Uptown Station Starbucks so much that Charlie remembers to ask for it now.

We were playing at the playground while waiting for Kairah to finish her clarinet lessons, when Charlie came up to me and said "I thirsty." I said "do you want some water?" She said, "come on mommy." We followed her right to Starbucks where she asked for her usual milk box. 

After Starbucks, I let the kids play in the music store where Kairah was taking her lessons. Yes, I am one of those parents that lets my kids play with things in stores. To me, they put this stuff out they must want kids to play with it, especially when they leave a bucket o' sticks next to the drum set. Charlie had a blast! (It is hard to get picks of my older girls, so no nasty comments about Charlie being in most of the photos)

Kailah, Kaijah, Charlie and I went into a few stores while we were waiting. Charlie has been telling me how much she likes things in the store lately, so I decided to help her with a Christmas list. The older 3 have already given me their list, but Charlie is not able to write yet, although she does try. Last Christmas, she would ask for a piece of paper and pencil to write a letter to Santa. When she does this she mimics the characters in Charlie Brown by scribbling and then putting the pencil to her mouth as if she was in deep thought. It makes me smile just thinking about it. Any how, I started taking photos of things she told me she "loves" for a photo wish list. 

 

 Next, we headed to base to take care of some of the items for the girl's library program. They had little tasks for them to do to earn library money for prizes. Yep, I am one of those moms too. This was day two of trying to help them get as much money as they could. I helped them list the support facilities on base. That was the biggest money maker, $1 per facility for a total of $41. They washed my car for another $5. The list was long, but I am so grateful because I learned about things that were available to my family like family game night and family movie night.


Of course we had our picnic lunch at the park and two my children played in the sprinkler pad. Which brings me to this photo <----. This week I remember how much I love ruffle butts on toddlers and babies and I love pretty pink painted toddler toes. I got this cute swim suit on sale at Children's place. I love shopping out of season in Florida because you can wear your new out of season swim suit well into September.



Wednesday was the library program party. The girls bought tons of stuff with their money. Kairah bought Charlie a lot of books; what a sweet girl. They all had fun playing games outside. I have no idea why I have no pictures of the festivities. Lew came over for a little bit on his lunch hour with great news about his inspection at work. His office got 100% compliance. I am so proud of him. He was put in charge of organizing their binders and such.


On Thursday, I did not do much until I took Kailah to Pensacola for a doctor's appointment. On the way she started talking about getting her second holes done in her ears. I was in shock! Let me tell you the story of Kailah's first time getting her ears pierced.

I had the mis-fortune of marrying (two) men who believe that kids should express interest in have their ears pierced before you do it. Kailah asked when she was 3. My ex did not believe me (as he was in Korea when it happened) and got mad at me and said just do them all. Yes! I took Kailah (3), Kairah (2) and Kaijah (almost 1) to the mall that day. I was so excited. What mom does not want to pierce their daughter's ears. I had Kailah go first. She sat nice and tall in the seat. They popped her ears at the same time, she scream and jumped out of the seat and ran down the mall walkway. They almost did not get the gun un-hooked before she took off. She was mortified. The other two did just fine.

Kairah has had two holes for almost 4 years now. Kaijah got her second holes done a few years ago and let them close up. So, Kailah asking was very surprising. Lucky for me the mall is across the street from hospital. Ha! Kailah is known for blaming others for things not going her way and this was perfect timing so I did not have to hear her complain and I was curious to see how she would take it. I am so proud of her. She did really well and is very happy with her second set of holes. Now she wants her cartilage done and Charlie finally told her dad that she wants earrings. Oh yes! These are my children...lol.

I am seriously starting to appreciate all our base has to offer families. Lew has taken the girls to the Sound (beach inlet) on base to play in the water a few times and even rented equipment. We went to the Sound on Friday with the EFMP program and had a blast. We had free rentals and BBQ dinner. Although it was extremely windy, we all tried the Stand Up Paddle boards and Kayaks. (I am still sore and it is Sunday) Of course a storm came in about 30 minutes before it was over and we headed to the Landing Zone (Recreation Center) on base. Family movie night was moved from the Sound due to the storm.  It was a long night, but the girls all had fun sitting on the bean bags watching The Empire Strikes Back.

famished from all the shopping, Logan's! Yum!

Another thing I realized this week is I love spending time with just my older three girls. I am still torn with how I feel like I have two different families (Kailah, Kairah, and Kaijah & Lew and Charlie). Sometimes it makes me sad and sometimes I have a blast with each group separately. I took Kailah, Kairah, and Kaijah school clothes shopping. We found some great sales and even had lunch at Logan's. Kairah and I told each other a few times that we miss Charlie, but boy was it so much easier without her at times. 



 I did take Charlie to the zoo for a few hours when I got back. She had been asking to go on a 'fari for a few weeks; she would even bring me a hat to wear and a map. Charlie was so sad when I left in the morning. I told her I would take her somewhere when I got back. After her nap she asked where I was and told Lew that she wanted to "go right" and kept pointing down the road. We wore the hats, fed the animals, and rode the train. She loves that place. Our annual passes are one of my best investments of the year.

We are all looking forward to our vacation. I will most likely not be posting until we get back in a few weeks. I hope everyone enjoys the rest of their summer. We only have a few more weeks :D

Week 6 - Here Birdie Birdie Birdie

We love to craft! This week we painted bird houses, made bird seed feeders, and put together a bag of items for birds to make their nests out of.

I think the painting of the bird houses was the biggest hit this week. I decided to make our craft mobile since we often have time to kill while waiting to go to different things "in town." We bought the supplies at JoAnn's (with coupons and student discount) and A.C. Moore (with coupons). It was a very affordable project. We found a table at the base park and the girls sat there and painted for over an hour. Charlie had to have her own set of paints because she likes to mix them. The other girls did really well sharing. Kailah and Charlie completed their houses that day, but Kairah and Kaijah still want to work on them. Once I get them hung up I will post some more pictures.
 
Another craft we made was bird feeders. I am thinking we kind of messed these up (that is why we do not have finished project pictures). Charlie, Kairah and Kaijah had fun making them. If I can make the project work out I will post more pictures.

On Friday, we used a mesh produce bag to put together some goodies for the birds to make their nests out of. We used dryer lint (thanks to all the rain I had to use my dryer most of the week), ribbon, yarn, and embroidery floss. From what I read the birds will collect these items and use them to build their nests and it is supposed to help you see the nests easier because the items are colorful. We shall see.

Outside time is so important and I am thankful we were able to squeeze some in this week.

A little rain did not stop Kairah and Charlie from playing on the playground at Hurlburt Field Community Park. I hung out in the tunnel for a bit to try to keep dry. It makes me so happy to see that even a 12 year old can still have fun at the playground.

Charlie played at Uptown Station while waiting on Kairah to get done with her Clarinet lessons. Charlie absolutely loves that playground. She was so proud of herself for climbing the rock wall all by herself. We are still working on getting her to go down the pole by herself. She is still a little bit scared. Although, Kaijah and Kailah did not play, they still got some fresh air while drawing outside.

Another hit at Uptown Station is the pet store. What kid does not like the pet store. Kaijah and Charlie had a great time looking at the birds and fish.

I was so excited that we were able to go to the Panhandle Butterfly House on Sunday. I love to sit on the bench and watch my children explore. Kairah ran around taking pictures of butterflies with her phone and Charlie loved looking a the flowers and "baby alligator" (a toy in the pond). Kaijah enjoyed talking to the ladies that work there. I think I might take Charlie here more once school starts back for my older girls.

One of the consequences of having 4 children with activities is sometimes overload. Charlie had an overload episode this week and all I could do to keep from going crazy was to document it. It kept my mind focused on taking the pictures. It really sucks when this happens, but there really is not much you can do about it. Even older children have melt downs; you just have to sit back and watch. When it is all over then you can hug them and try to make it better. Below is a happier Charlie riding the carousel at the mall on Saturday.

Does the outfit look familiar? It's the one I just finished last week. :D

Some other highlights of the week included a wonderful LtCol allowing us to sit with him at the BX (base Walmart) food court; made soap and cookies with Kailah; Kairah, Kaijah, Charlie and Lew went to see a movie on base; and made our Christmas wish lists (yes I made one too this time, it is so fun to wish for things).

Sometimes you need to say yes to yourself...

Disclaimer: not my photo - was passed a bazillion times on Facebook so I am not sure of the origin.

 A few days ago a friend of mine posted this picture on my Facebook after we had a long PM (private message) session and phone conversation about how overwhelmed and under-appreciated I have been feeling lately.  I love doing things for other people! There is no doubt about that, but sometimes I do not get "thanks yous" or any nice gestures in return and it hurts. Or sometimes I get complete meanness and attitude and that makes me angry. I know I have been told things like this picture, in the past, but it does not hurt to be reminded of it, especial from a friend out of love.

So, the last few days I have been thinking about what I have on my plate now (4 kids at home all day, 2 summer reading programs, clarinet lessons, craft projects, house cleaning, budgeting, appointments, grocery planning and shopping, etc.) and what I have to look forward to when my kids start back in school (lets tack on 15 credit hours for me, 2 Girl Scout meetings, soccer practice and games, gymnastics practice, and entertaining a toddler all by myself). I also had to keep in mind that my husband will be tagged to help me with most of this. I had to make some big decisions about some social groups I am a part of and try to compromise on some of my kids activities. It made me feel so sad and guilty, but it also has given me some relief.

I would like to say thank you to my friend for giving me some good advice without shoving it down my throat and being there for me no matter what my decisions are.

Sewing Challenge - Day 7

 I finished my sewing project in one week! Woo Hoo! I am so excited.

One of my challenges that I have been working to overcome is casings and hems. Using a template to iron my hems has drastically helped and today I discovered this little "duh" moment. I turned my garment inside out to "measure" where it should be placed to get my stitch as close to the edge of the casing as possible. Then I turn my garment right side out and line it up and sew. Genius! I only hit a slight snag when I veered a little to the left, but it was fixable.

I also used the time honored trick my Grandma Jean showed me. She was not able to teach me how to sew due to her arthritis, but she did teach me how to run something through a casing (usually a string through some sweat pants). I use a safety pin to attach one end of the elastic to the garment at the entrance. I use another safety pin to help me slide the elastic through. Scrunching a little bit over the safety pin at a time and then pulling a little to move it along.

 I finished the shorts first. So much different than I am used to. I usually make Charlie bloomers for all her dresses. I think they turned out cute, but I am worried they will swallow her skinny legs. I have to keep in mind that this is a size 4 pattern also. We shall see when I can convince her to try these on.

Lastly I added the button holes and buttons to the dress/shirt. You can barely see the buttons because I used cute little pink circles.

I love this fabric so much. I found it on sale last Black Friday in the quilting section. I have two more sets of fabric picked out for this pattern (also found in the quilting section). When I get those done I will share them also.

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle - Week 5

This week we are working on projects to help us reduce, reuse and recycle even more than we already do.


I guess it was a real Monday in this house. No one, but me, wanted to get up and do much of anything. I did persuade Kairah to work on our craft project for the day.  She made a recycling center for items that we have not been recycling because our waste management does not take these items. She made a bin for plastic bags and a bag for batteries.

I am not sure if I told you this, but I detest plastic bags, but no matter what I do we seem to accumulate them. I keep reusable bags in both vehicles, but my husband and kids rarely use them and sometimes I forget. Sometimes I will carry my items out without a bag if I can carry them or put them in my purse (I feel like I am steeling ...lol). Either way, we still have these stupid bags. So we are going to put them in the bin and take them to our nearest store that recycles (every two weeks is our goal).


Batteries are a whole other story. I found out that I am not that smart about recycling and reducing waste because I have been tossing batteries in the trash (insert shocked sound here). So I did some research and I have only found places that charge you to recycle your batteries. I am determined to recycle them for free, so as I search for more options we are going to start putting them in our recycling bag.





Monday was also Lew's Birthday. We made him peach cobbler. It was yummy and Gluten Free. I am so proud of how my family supports mine and Kailah's food challenges. 







Tuesday was the first day for Kairah's Free Summer Clarinet Lessons at Playgroud Music. She seemed to like it and will continue to go twice a week until we go on vacation in August. I also double scheduled myself, so I am grateful that my husband was able to pick Kairah up for me and keep her until I was able to pick her up. Kailah was not feeling well today so she did not want to go to the Summer Reading program. I also got to enjoy some time with two of my favorite girl friends and their tots.  
Ahhhh...here is something exciting. I smoked my family out of the house while cooking dinner today. Lol! Other than that it was busy and boring full of running around and doing stuff like menus and grocery lists.

Wednesday is my errands day. I think my kids thought it was Monday because they did not want to get up or help with food prep or clean up. I just sucked it up and enjoyed the silence. I am so proud of myself because every thing on my list got accomplished accept for a missed sales meet up (that this person missed two times before). I even kept my cool at the school registrar when two folks annoyed the crap outta me. One lied and said he was next when he knew I had been there way before him and the other one just could not make a decision. Kailah was very helpful at the store and Charlie was well behaved. Kairah and Kaijah had fun at their Summer Reading program. Kairah was even so nice to buy me an insulated bag with her library money. I found an awesome deal at JoAnn's on fabric for Charlie's Birthday present. I only went in to check out what they had and the perfect fabric was on sale, plus I got 20% off for being a collage student.

Charlie waiting for her "new friends" to come over.

Thursday began with prepping the house for my first ever big play group. I joined a local mommies group and volunteered to hold a function at my house. I was so nervous because I only knew one of the moms that was coming. It went rather well. It seemed that all the kids had fun and the moms were as relaxed as you could be with toddlers and preschoolers running around. After the playgroup, my friend and I took our kids to lunch (she was minus one kid) at Logan's. I love eating at the place! My sewing debacle ended the night.

Kairah and Kailah's Tin Can Luminaries

Friday was rather uneventful. I pretty much took the day off. I let my kids sleep as long as they wanted and of course they complained about that too...darn middle schoolers....lol. I cleaned out my craft closet and separated MINE ONLY supplies from the shared supplies. It is so much easier to get my stuff out now. I moved the shared supplies to the linen closet in my spare bathroom that my older girls share. In the afternoon after I took a lovely nap, I let my kids make tin can luminaries. We put the cans with water in them in the freezer the night before. I made one while they watched, then I left and let them have at it. I had to save the rest of my sanity because it was in short supply this week (I am human, I have to remind myself sometimes). I ended the night with some sewing (see above link).

Sewing Challenge - Day 5

Whew! The last few days have been hectic.

Wednesday I was able to do some pinning on my fabric, but not much else.

Yesterday (Thursday), I started sewing and then I had to hit the brakes because I made a mistake with the pattern. It took me about an hour to figure out where I went wrong. I decided to try to work with it, but my toddler would not cooperate in trying on what I had so far to make sure it would due. My frustration level was extremely high due to all the running around the last few days, some middle schooler attitudes, a feisty toddler, and the heat. So, I decided to call it quits for the night.

After sleeping last night and resting most of the day today, if you call reorganizing things resting, I decided to fix the pattern and re-cut the fabric. After fixing the pattern, I found out that I did not have as much fabric as I thought. Then I was only left with using what I had. After finally convincing Charlie to try the darn thing on (found out she was scared of the pins...lol) I saw light at the end of the tunnel. 

Tonight I got loads done on the project. I am not a complete rule follower and pinking shears sure makes it easy to skip some steps sometimes. All I have left now is hemming the shorts and adding the elastic, buttons and button holes.


 




I realize the best part of sewing clothes for your child is you can adapt it to their body type. Charlie is rather long and thin which makes it hard to find pants, shorts and skirts. If I buy the size that fits her waist, then they are too short or vice-verse.

Garden Discoveries

I went out to my garden after our mini rain storm this evening to check things out. Kairah's bed is starting to get a few sprouts from her second planting of the season. All of a sudden Kairah shouts "look mom, our pineapples are growing." Sure enough, what once looked like sad little decaying pineapple tops, now look like pineapple plants. It will take at least 20 months to get pineapples, but I am just so darn excited that some of my kitchen scraps are going to good use.

I also discovered that our, late in the season, planted grape vines are finally recovering thanks to all the good rain we have been getting. I hope to have some grapes next year.


I love how well my garden is turning out. It is not perfect, but I am having so much fun learning and discovering.

Happy Gardening!

Sewing Challenge - Day 2

I have to admit, I sort of cheated on day 2. I had some free time....I know! What is that!?...last night and I worked a bit on my project.

I pinned my pattern to my fabric last night. I had a hard time reading where to put the pattern and I even had to refresh my memory on what a selvage is. The pattern showed the selvage on the top and right of the fabric, until I realized they had folded the fabric and could not label the bottom of the fabric that was folded up...whew! Then I had a hard time fitting the pattern on the way the picture showed, but I made it work.

Charlie likes to get into my sewing box(es) while I am working. Last night she decided to "measure [her] leg." It was quite comical to watch her and listen to her count.

Next, I cut out my pattern. I paid close attention to what I call the little tabby things (pictured to the right). About two years ago I invested in some really nice scissors (they were on sale) and I am so happy I did. My cuts are crisp and clean. If anyone even tries to use my sewing scissors, they get in big trouble ;)

While I was cutting, Charlie decided to help me pin the unused fabric (I always buy more than I need). She is very good at it I think. Look how she really tries hard. She is always by my side when I sew.

Anyhow, today I just marked my fabric that I cut based on the pattern. I had button holes, buttons, triangles, dots, lines etc to mark. I used a new tool that I bought and it is really light, so pictures would not have done much good. I also wrote the number of each piece with a fabric pencil.

I have used a fabric marker and pencil to mark everything before...it just takes patience and flipping the pattern up and down a bunch of times.

I do not think I will be getting much done tomorrow on this project since it is my errands day, but we will see.

Sewing Challenge - Day 1

I have challenged myself this week to complete an entire sewing project in 7 days.

Today, I spent about an hour cutting out my pattern, ironing it, tracing it, and cutting it out again. I also washed and dried my fabric. The reason I trace my pattern is because I like to use my patterns more than once and for many sizes. There are other ways of reusing patterns, this is just what works for me.
Let me explain.

 
I cut out the pattern that I bought from the sewing store. These patterns are really wrinkled, so I ironed it to make sure I do not missing anything when I trace my pattern. I made sure that my iron was on a low setting. I also ironed the tracing paper I chose to use. I think what I use is actually interfacing, but it was on sale, see through and a decent weight.

 





I then put my pattern pieces on the tracing paper, upside down. I pined them very well to make sure they did not move while I traced them. I also made sure that my pins were not close to any lines I need to trace.

Then I turned the tracing paper over and started tracing. I had plenty of light to help me see through the paper. I also looked under at the pattern to help me identify important things I needed to mark like where button holes go. I did not trace everything. Only what I needed for the size I was doing.

After I traced all of my pieces, I unpinned the original pattern and cut out the new pattern. This is how it looked when I was done.


A big thanks to my daughter Kairah for taking the pictures today. :D

Canning Chicken Soup

I have found a new love....CANNING! As if I need more things to put on my plate...I figure I can tell myself that it saves my family money and allows us to eat healthier. Yeah, that is how I justify this new obsession.

I tried my luck at canning chicken soup since my children have been asking for it forever. It is hard for us to find any soup that is without MSG and Gluten, so we have to avoided it. Not anymore!




The first night (since I have to break my projects up into pieces to be able to manage them) I made chicken stock out of a chicken, celery, onion and some seasoning....how ever you like to make stock is fine.

Tonight I made the soup. You can use whatever recipe you like, but I used the one out of the Ball Blue Book. I had to use some extra stock I had in the freezer to supplement what I made last night. I used the chicken that I had left from making the stock also. I added some celery and carrots. I did not have to add seasoning because I seasoned my stock.

After cooking the soup for 30 minutes I prepared the jars and got to canning. I filled each jar a little under half full with the goodies (meat, carrots, and celery) and then filled it up the rest of the way with the stock to 1 inch from the top of the jar. I am pressure canning the jars as I type for 1 hour and 15 minutes. I am so excited to have chicken soup at the ready that is healthy for my family.

What a difference a seam makes...

I have been teaching myself to sew off and on for about 8 years. The last 2 years I have really learned a lot. I love making my toddler the crisscross back dresses with bloomers. While surfin' pinterest.com I saw this pin about a french seam. I was curious. It looked super simple and I thought I should try it. I wanted to share this tip in case anyone else would like to try this type of seam.

Here is a pair of bloomers that I made about a year ago. This is a regular seam like the directions called for. It is frayed and looks messy.

Here is the pair I just finished tonight. There are no exposed edges to fray and it just looks beautiful to me.

I also started using a piece of cardboard to measure my hems when I was ironing them. I got the idea from this pin on pinterest. It was so much easier and the hems are all uniform and awesome looking.

Marked measurements on the cardboard with pencil

First Installment of Gardening Information "posters"

I am working on making informational posters about taking care of my yard and garden so I do not have to keep going to the web. I plan on putting these in frames and hanging them in my garage near my lawn and garden equipment. Here is the first one I have finished. It took me almost three weeks to find all of this information.

I want to make these downloadable, so if anyone can help me with that, please comment. Thanks

Summer Week 4 - Under the Sea

Another busy week for us. I planned lots, but did not get to everything and I am slowly accepting that this happens sometimes.

Monday started off pretty smooth. We did our morning routine as usual (sans Charlie's hair being brushed...it was not worth the fight that day). We read Ocean Season by Rob Hirschi and did a craft inspired by the book. This is one of my most favorite art projects to do with the kids because you can do it many times with different themes and it is great to see how creative my girls can be. We did finger print art. I whipped out my old stamp pads and my special markers and let them go to town. Charlie had fun just putting her fingers in the colors and telling me what they were. Kairah and Kaijah were very creative with their pictures. It was a blast.

Charlie, Kairah and Kaijah making their pictures, The finished results.

I really need to start taking before pictures...this is after

The rest of the day we just relaxed and watch a movie. After dinner we worked on the yard a bit. Boy was that interesting. Our yard is covered in sand right now because we had a large mess of trees and vines removed after we bought our house. Well those trees and vines will just not quit popping up, so slowly we have been cutting them away and adding things to our yard like a vegetable garden and butterfly garden. So, on Monday we worked on raking up some debris from around our beautiful oak tree, the stump next to it and the table. The stump and table area are just about cleared out, but while raking the debris from around the oak tree we disturbed a bull ant nest. Ahhhhh - I freaked. So I quickly ran inside and researched how to safely destroy get rid of them. ( I know, I know...I am supposed to love nature, but these buggies were killing my oak tree and are mean little things). We put down some corn meal and watched them take the bait. My husband came outside wondering what we were doing just looking at the tree. After I explained it to him, he just shook his head and grabbed his gloves to help us dispose of the piles we created. (Update - the bull ants seem to be gone, I guess I will find out when I rake again). After all that, we were done for the evening.

Tuesday was also pretty smooth. In the morning while watering our plant on the patio, we discovered one of our baby birds did not survive, but when we checked the nest the rest had safely flew away (another to do being added to the list - clean off umbrella it is pretty dirty after housing those baby birds). I also discovered how annoying older elementary school and middle school children can be on this fine day. Do not get me wrong, I love my children, but boy can they cause a ruckus. For about 2 hours I had to keep telling them "stop making noise" because that is all they were doing. Geesh. I soon found out after my facebook rant, that I am not the only one with this problem and we all had a good laugh about it.

Our book for the day was Fish Had a Wish by Michael Garland. After reading the book, which Charlie really loved, we made fish out of CDs. I did not buy anything special for this, although most posts I found about this craft used glitter, spangles, and the like. I just grabbed old scrapbooking stuff I had the closet, along with some paper, glue and scissors. I think our fish came out great!

Fish L->R U->D Charlie, Kaijah Kailah, Kairah, Mine

After quiet movie time I did a craft with that was meant for the older girls, but Charlie joined at the table to watch (I even gave her an old stained shirt to keep her busy). We "updated" shoes. Kailah and Kairah found a bunch of pins on pinterest about decorating shoes, so we tried a few ideas. It was really fun, so much so, they did not want to stop when it was dinner time. That is my idea of a winning craft idea.

Shoes - ribbon wrap flip flops, puffy paint & glitter chucks, puffy paint skates, puffy paint flip flops, puffy paint heely's

In the evening I enjoyed reading this article: Dominos and Donuts, the Truth About Change . Check it out!

Wednesday was the 4th of July. I hit the commissary (grocery store) and whipped right through. I only had Kairah with me and the store was practically empty. We spent the afternoon and evening at a friends for a BBQ and swimming. It was a great time.

Charlie rocked a new do

Thursday was a hectic mess. Kailah had an appointment in the morning and Kairah needed an appointment because one of her wires broke (braces). So I got that scheduled and of course it was right smack in the middle of Kailah's appointment. Luckily the two places are down the street from each other, so I made it work.

1 year with braces

Kairah's appointment took way longer than expected, but they ended up cancelling the check up we already had scheduled which was a plus. She is half way done and is very excited to be done with the creepy headgear.

While we were in Fort Walton Beach I thought I would hit up the local Goodwill. I was completely surprised at how expensive the Goodwill has become. I did not buy anything, but Kailah and Kairah bought a pair of shoes and a shirt each. Since Kohl's was on the same street and I had a coupon, we popped in there. Let me tell you, I love this store!!! We scored some great deals. After shopping, we were all tired and went home. All four of the girls napped and I fought with the BBQ grill.

Friday was an even bigger mess. Lew and I were woke up by a loud thunderstorm at around 4:30am. Next, Kaijah came and got in the bed with us, then Kairah and Champ. Kailah was up, but did not come to my door. After about an hour of wrestling around and shushing folks, I gave up and got up. Charlie did not wake up until her sisters got loud at around 6am when Kairah and Kailah started fighting about a board game (did I ever mention that no one in my house is a morning person, but me). I got tired of listening to it and ignored them and went to sleep on the couch. Lew left for work late (thank goodness they called him for late reporting, because I was so worried about him being out in the storm) and kept an eye on the kids. I woke up to a quiet house at around 9am....all the girls went back to sleep. I called my hair salon to see if my stylist had any cancellations....SCORE! she did (as usual people do not like to go out in the rain). Had a wonderful time getting my haircut and catching up with my stylist. I was so refreshed after my appointment I did a little sewing with Kailah and Kairah.

Once again, we looked at some pins on pinterest and the girls decided they wanted to "modify" T-shirts. They made market bags. We used the blog as an inspiration, but kinda did our own thing. I used another blog to inspire my "updated" shirt. I am not quite finished with mine, but I sure do love sewing.

Kairah and her crazy hair :D did a great job on her bags, I am going to add better straps to my camp shirt

After lunch, we walked to the nearest red box to pick up a movie for the girls to watch.  Apparently no one in the house cared about their appearance on this fine day. Charlie was so chipper in her mismatched outfit with crazy un-brushed hair which was left over from Thursday cool hair do. Kairah and Kaijah were also crazy haired weirdos. It cracks me up when they are like this. I guess it could be worse. I could have girls that have to take an hour to get ready just to check the mail.

During the movie I got ready for my monthly Girls Night Out. I had a blast with some friends at TGIFriday and the movies. We went to see Magic Mike. It was so funny.

Well, that was my crazy week.