bathtime and a random

My cutie-pants in the bath tonight. 

This video is only from February.  She seems so much littler!

And a random:  We were at the lake one day this week and I was getting her ready for her nap.  She disappears for a few minutes while I'm cleaning some stuff up.  My mom says "you better go check on her what if she found some pills or something and is being naughty..."  I walk into the bedroom to see what she is doing....

 This child is an angel.  Seriously...how did I get her?

she's not tired, she's happy

Oh, Sweet Elise. 

She says new words every day - it's so adorable.  She thinks the word happy means she is awake.  So if she's not sleeping she's happy.  Which is basically true.

Me:  Elise you look so tired...are you sleepy?

Elise:  Nooooo!  I happy...happy happy!

Big news around here -- We are using the potty!  Not all the time - but we've had success with #1 and #2 (once - and she cried -- not quite sure what was going on there...).  She gets M&Ms when she goes potty - she loooves her some "em-ems".   Today we were in the kitchen, Elise was in the playroom, and she walks to the living room where we keep the diapers - grabbed one, says "poopy" and brings it back where she tries to put it on her baby.  I think we're ready to get serious about this.  Oy.  Please comment and leave any and all advice you have about potty training........  

These pictures are from a little "Run 4 Reading" 5k that West Side Christian put on at Millennium Park this week.  It was a beautiful night - and they have the best playground.  I should say that for us it was a leisurely walk for reading (we literally came in last)...what can I say - I did it for the kids. 

the time we wore matching leopard print skinny jeans

Yep. This happened.  It was awesome.  Auntie "Wo-wo" Lauren picked out Elise's outfit today to match mine.   She is staying our house for a couple nights so we can paint our office/playroom.  It looks like pumpkin pie and it's so cute!   I'll post some pictures when it's all finished.  

 [By the way - I have no idea how people have style blogs.  This was beyond awkward for me to stand here so Lauren could take a picture of my outfit. Weird....]

She LOVES Lauren.  She wants only Lauren to put her to bed, push her stroller or shopping cart, she'll take bites of food from Lauren but not me.  She stalks Lauren while she's in the shower and watches her get ready.  It's really funny because she says "boobies" now.  It's okay I totally get it.  I love my Aunties too.  :-)

My sister Aubrey brought over some cupcakes on my birthday.  I'm 28 now.  That's like a real grown-up.  Elise was really excited and pretty much ate frosting for dinner. 

tid bits

Not much new going on around here.  A few things:

This week I took Elise to DSW.  She thought it was awesome. 

 Elise found a grasshopper and a frog by our house in the same day.  She thought it was awesome -- especially since we have "Daisy's Grasshopper" practically on repeat around here.  She kept saying "hop hop hop!"

I think something was wrong with this frog.  It did not look right and couldn't hop out of this container.  I sorta let it go in a puddle hoping it was just dehydrated...poor little buddy.

We listen to Barney in the car now.  I put it in one day to keep her awake on the way home and she loves it.  After each song she says "more please". 

Almond milk is my new favorite thing.  It's pretty low calorie and I use it in cereal, as my coffee creamer...it's so good.    Sometimes I just drink it plain it's so delicious.  

Lauren is coming on Sunday and we're going to paint our office/playroom orange.  I promise it's not a weird orange...although Nick is a little nervous.  

My mom and surgery on her foot and is being forced to relax.  Elise and I are bringing her lunch today and we'll probably have to pull the tiny weeds she can see from her window that she has diagrammed with detailed instructions.   Just kidding - she's doing really good and I think she's kind of enjoying herself.  :-)

playing with papa

My mom was out of town this weekend so my dad came over for lunch today.  And then a little trip to Hager Park.  Elise had so much fun. 

She went on the big girl swing for the first time today.

She thought she was very fancy.   Thanks for playing today Dad!

the sewing room & childhood memories

It's been a few months since the sewing room has been finished - but I've just recently gotten some things on the wall.  And now I can't find the 'before' pictures - so just picture a room with absolutely nothing on the walls, mismatched furniture, and a neutral walls.  So here's the 'after'. 

Lauren and I did it in one weekend.  I love it! We painted the walls and some of the furniture.  I had a lot of miss-matched IKEA stuff so we just painted it orange.  The curtains are actually paint dropcloths from Lowes that we taped off and painted stripes on.  

 All the furniture we had - so this whole project only cost as much as two cans of paint, three dropcloths, and a curtain rod/clips.  Even the shelves, baskets, giant safety pin, lamps, and wall art I made from things I already had.  The TV we got as a wedding gift.  You know I can't sew without the Kardashians.  BTW - I think Kanye is a total a-hole.  Anyone else??

I also recovered my ironing board with some fabric leftover from some pillows my mom made.  I am thrifty.  Although Nick would probably suggest otherwise. 

Aaaannnnd I got a new sewing machine.  I've had the super basic model for the past 4 years, and it's been making some super weird clunking sounds and breaking needles and just ticking me off.  I brought it into get fixed and they said it would cost a HUNDRED dollars.  Insane -- that's how much it cost four years ago.  So Nick said since it's almost my birthday and because I'm so pretty *sarcasm* that I could upgrade.  

Hello Beautiful.  

And then I made this bubble skirt during naptime.  

I'm also going to start tackling those sewing projects on my Pinterest board.  I'll keep you posted on those. 

Tonight for dinner I re-created a childhood memory:  jell-o with fruit in it.  In this case I used a can of pears with strawberry jell-o because it was all I had, but I distinctly remember one of our favorites being green jell-o with pineapple.

Yum?

grand haven

I realized it's the end of the summer and we had not once been out to Grand Haven this year.  It's the cutest little town a little north from us on Lake Michigan.  Last night we headed out with some Subway and met Nick's mom and dad for some ice cream and a walk on the pier.  

Papa is so funny...

There's a bell that you can ring by the Coast Guard memorials.  It's really loud and scared her a little but she thought it was so fun.