Tuesday, August 21, 2012

Cam's 1st Birthday!

We celebrated Campbell's 1st Birthday last weekend! It was so much fun getting to celebrate with just us 4 as a family too. Normally we would have gone out to eat with a Grandparent or something, but this year, we did what we normally do on a Friday night. We headed to Zona and listened to the band play! We got some watermelon (Camp's fav.) and a cupcake, and just hung out, listened to the music, and enjoyed each others company. The kids ate watermelon and cupcakes and played before heading home for bed.
 Good Morning Birthday Boy
 Enjoying his birthday cupcake
 Dad feeding C his watermelon
C playing on the blanket

Friday, August 17, 2012

Happy 1st Birthday!

My most favorite little boy is turning ONE today! Happy Birthday Campbell. Mommy loves you more than you will ever know!

Sunday, August 5, 2012

Absent....but for good reason.

I feel so bad that I have not been blogging AT ALL! I have been SO busy at work and at home. Can I make it up to you by posting lots of pictures on this post?

At school, all my kids are getting ready to leave for Kindergarten and I have been trying to get all their portfolios together and notes for the parents along with just class stuff. I have always loved my job, but for some reason, I have just really been loving it and putting forth 150% there. I love all my kids, and they are so smart! And when I'm teaching them something, and they are giving me answers right off the bat, I love finding them a new challenge and teaching them something new. I know that most people see my job as just a daycare worker, but I am so much more than that. I am truly a teacher. My co-teacher and I work so hard to make sure that these kids are more than ready for Kindergarten while having fun at the same time. And honestly, I'm kinda glad that I don't work in the school districts. I don't have to worry about my job or my salary if my kids test poorly on their tests. Instead, I get to worry about what sort of fun art project we can do for the week. Last week, for example, was all about the olympics!
 We made Olympic head wreath things worn by Olympians
 Science experiment time. Bubble Snakes!
 Making Olympic torches
Doctoring up the "Olympic Athletes" in Dramatic Play

I don't see things slowing down at work either till about the end of the month. All new kids in our class and we have to "mold" them into Pre-K students and set expectations for them. This upcoming class will be the first class that I will have from beginning to end. My first year as the Pre-K teacher, I came in towards the beginning of the new class, but they had had another teacher for a month or so already. And then my next class I had to leave them early because I had Campbell. So this class coming up I will have from beginning to end, and I'm excited about that.

Home. There really isn't anything new going on at home. I know I've posted before about how time just goes at warp speed at home. Get off work, pick up Campbell, make dinner, eat dinner, showers/baths, maybe some play time, bed. That is every night. Unless we go swimming, then after we get home, it's either a super quick dinner, or Emery and I will skip dinner and just go swim for a little bit, then come home and eat and go straight to bed afterwards. Of course I don't go to bed as soon as the kids go to bed, and I wish I could say that I go downstairs and run on the treadmill, which sometimes I do (only about once a week,  I just hate the treadmill), but more nights than others, after the kids go to bed, Dave and I are up cleaning up dinner, the house, and getting things ready for tomorrow. It Sucks!

With my running, I really wish I could get back into the groove of running every other day, but that treadmill just makes me want to shove pencils in my eyeballs! So once a week has been it, and I'm fine with that. Once the weather cools down, I'll be back out hitting the pavement, 3 days a week. Promise!

In the spare time that I do have, playing with the kids is always my #1. And I wish that I could say that the pictures I'm going to post are pics of what we have been doing, but honestly, I havn't really been taking that many pics when we are just playing, because I just want to be in the moment with them. But here are some of us swimming at my Moms or my Dads.

 Grandpa and Emery after a fun swim

 Trying to get a pic of the kids together....unsuccessful
 Emery going down the slide at Grandpas pool
Emmie and Mommy at Mimi's pool
Camp enjoying his veggie dog and fruit

The weekends have been just as busy, but better. And my favorite part of the weekend....getting my Pinterest on!!! We have been doing so many Pinterest projects and they are turning out great. You saw my last post on the pallet hanging on the wall that we got from Pinterest, now here are a couple others.

My first project was to do something with all of Emery's artwork from her toddler/2's years. First, I went out and bought a canvas, doesn't matter what size, whatever size you think you'll need for however much artwork your using. I also bought some acrylic paint in a gray color.
 So, step number one is to paint your canvas with your acrylic paint. Don't forget the sides!
 While thats drying, cut up the artwork your using into "leafs".  I used 5 different art pieces for my project and cut the leafs into all different sizes.
 Next, after the paint has dried, arrange the pieces however you want them on the canvas. Then, use a hot glue gun and glue all the pieces down.
 Last step! Hang on the wall! Some people have used modge podge as a last step to kinda smooth everything out, but some people have commented that this ruins the canvas. Others have had success though. I didn't want to ruin my daughters artwork, so I opted for no modge podge, even though it kills me that the leafs are not flush to the canvas.  But it works. We hung it in the kids playroom and will hopefully have another one in a few years after Campbell has made us some beautiful art.

I bought 2 other things while at the craft store. An 8X10 picture frame that was 60% off, and some chalkboard spray paint! Here is what the frame looked like before spraying the glass with the chalk paint.
The end result of this Pinterest project is in the pictures below =)

One very fun and special thing we did just this weekend was take Campbell's 1 year old Pictures! He will be One on August 17th! I can't believe how fast the year has gone by. So, we took our new chalkboard and our handsome man out to our family's farm and took some pics. He didn't last too long though, he never does. So we took what we got, got in the car where he instantly fell asleep, and we headed to Kansas City's West Bottoms to do some antique shopping with a few new projects in mind. We found what we are looking for too! That is to come in a later post when it's all done. While we were shopping, I tried to take a few more pictures of Campbell because I LOVE the scenery down there so much more than the earthy farm. But Campbell was pretty much DONE with us trying to get him to sit still and smile. So here are a few of his 1 year pictures (the last one is the one in the West Bottoms, obviously) and the results of the chalkboard Pinterest project. Love me some Baby Campbell.

 Photography by BirchLane Photography
 Photography by BirchLane Photography
 Photography by BirchLane Photography
Photography by BirchLane Photography