Designing a Purple Themed Girl's Room-- At Last!!

When my husband and I had our first baby nearly 7 years ago we decided to be surprised when it came time to finding out the gender. We ended up having our first boy who was closely followed by our daughter who was followed by another little boy. I was always glad we went with a gender neutral theme and would reccomend doing that even if you do know the gender of your first as you never can tell the gender of the next baby... or the next. We had this sweet Pottery Barn lambie theme and it was just so sweet that all three shared the same nursery.

However, since our third was a boy for about 3 years our older two shared yet another gender neutral room this time courtesy of Ikea. I still in 5 years of having a little girl had never gotton to do a girls room. So, it was with much tears but also anticipation that we transformed the nursery into a girl's room. Oh, I'm sorry, a BIG girl's room.

My daughter seems at times like a mini teenager and then a minute later like my sweet little baby and then again 5. She is unique, spunky, sweet, sassy, snuggly, and the only girl in the middle of two boys. I wanted to pick something that reflected her, celebrated her uniqueness, and wasn't too brassy of a theme that it wouldn't pay some sort of homage to an older house.





I got the quilt and bedding at T.J. maxx and her bed online at Wal-mart. This bed is adorable, but if your daughter thinks she is a ballerina-gymnast, she will be swinging from the bars. The adorable little end cabinet is from Ikea and was actually from their bathroom line, but I loved the door and inside the top is an adorable little mirror with some secret storage. her dresser was from a local Thrift store and I painted it and then bought the hardware at Lowe's. The curtain rod is also from lowe's, but was on clearance. We "made" the shelf-- it was a pinterest inspired project mixed with over zealous insanity. Just buy a shelf at Michaels and the effect will be the same. Her little wicker chair is from Ikea too and makes a compfy nook for reading. If you look on the light there is a little clay bird which is a gift from a Highschool friend, Katie. The DREAM decal is from UpperCase Living and I got it in plum.




She loves her room and thats the most important thing. I love her having her own girl space, although I have found her brothers in there using her bed to read or jump on and they all settle on the rug to play games and read more books.

So, there you have it. A labor of crazy love for our crazy girl :)

{a mother's love}

Before I had my own kids, if I had been asked to define a mother's love, I would have said, well, I really don't know as now it means so much more then those three little words.

Its more then loving them when they smell so good after a bath you could hold them forever and just breathe in their scent.

It's more then loving them when they give you that first toothless grin or belly laugh for the very first time.



It's loving them when you have been up all night. for. an. entire. week.

It's loving them when they spill milk-- not just on a clean floor, but for the 87th time that week.

It's loving them when they go through more outfits in one day then a celebrity-- and you know that means you'll be washing every single piece.

It's loving them so much because you are the only one who knows how to kiss their boo-boo, chase away the monsters, and soothe their tummy aches.

It's loving them when they say something cringeworthy in public-- and loving them enough to take them back out in public again.




It's loving them when they hurt you, dissapoint you, throw tantrums, and insist their life would be much better if you were the maid and if you were the nicest mom ever like so and so's mom.

That's what a mother's love is-- loving them when you want to go in a closet and let out a good scream, when you know you can't save them from the world or shelter them from all it's evil, loving them so much it hurts so bad. Because they are yours. Andyou are their mother. And you will love them forever.

Dance Fever!!

I would like to take the time to let the reader know that I love to dance.

Loving to dance and being able to dance are not the same thing, but thats a minor detail and there's really no point in splitting hairs.

I love to dance and have felt it essential to pass along this love to my children. We car dance, we living room runway dance, we disco, we do the bop, we twist, and occassionally my husband will intervene and put something from the 80's on.

That is why when we were at the Pittsburgh children's museum and they announced a DJ dance party, we literally spent more then 25% of our time at the museum dancing. i also like math, but that's another post entirely.



I was the only mama dancing, but that's okay-- as the DJ reminded us every 3 songs, dancing is good excercise and we should dance (he might have said excercise here, but again, lets not get all detailed) 30 minutes a day.


My kids made me proud too-- they new the YMCA, Happy and you know it (it was a kids museum), selena gomez, the twist, and Justin Bieber-- yeah, you know it!! I know it's against kid museum policy but I don't think a little Lady G would have killed anybody, but we did dance for ever! It was great-- the disco ball, the bubble machine all the things I imagine are in our living room. Perfect!

However, I did out dance my little guy. He said "No dance mommeee!" and then procedded to flip al the theater chairs up so noone could sit down. Then he proceeded to reflip them as he was pooped.



Then he was literally so tired, he couldn't bring himself to get all the way onto the chair.





It was at this moment when I, ahem, actually had no clue and kept dancing with the older two and then they two bailed on me and I had to finally do the decent mommy thing and leave the dancing for another day and snuggle all my tired little dancers.

More on pitts trip to follow....

Greek and Salsa Pizza

Yum, Yum, Yummy-- that's how we feel about these two pizzas-- both similar but different and bith equally yummy! I promise your kids will love their veggies-- first the word pizza is in the title and second, both are served on crescent rolls which are pure yumminess in themselves. Moms will love this since it's minimal work and cleanup, easy to make, and super healthy!


Salsa Pizza
Take two packages of crescent rolls and arrange like a pizza. Mix 1 tbs of garlic with 2tbs. of oil and lightly brush over rolls and then insert to bake following package directions.

While they are baking, dice two small tomatoes or one large, 1/4 of a red onion, 1 avocado, 1 green pepper, and some cilantro (my hubby doesn't like this, so must sneak it in small portions) place in bowl. Stir. If your kids can take the heat, add a diced fresh jalapeno.

When pizza crust is done baking, remove from oven and spread on one package of reduced fat cream cheese. Spread diced veggies on top and then sprinkle with taco cheese. Warning-- eating this can get messy, but you'll be licking the crumbs of veggies up, so it's all good!



Greek Pizza
Arrange crescent rolls and bake as above. Do not place garlic oil mix on top.

While thats baking, dice up two tomatoes, green pepper, 1/4 red onion, a handful of fresh spinach leaves, a cucumber, and then add one container of feta cheese. Stir it up.





When crust is done baking, spread garlic hummus all over and then spread veggie and feta mixture on top. Slice it up and enjoy-- would like to add, if you have olive lovers, please apply them to the top of your pizza.

Okay-- see, easy, yummy, and really, really healthy :) I must admit, these are both begetarian and my husband absolutely adores them both-- okay, off to eat some Greek Pizza :)

** Disclaimer, the original recipes can be found on pampered chef, but I tweaked them a bit and upgraded to two packages of crescent rolls :)

Places to Play in Pa: The Please Touch Museum

Hey all!! We're back!! Well, we really didn't leave on purpose, but the reality of the past few months have taken us all over both emotionally and physically. But I did miss doing this so much, so thought I'd start with something current and work our way backwards.....


The Please Touch Museum is in Philly and very very easy to get to-- you dont have to go into Center Coty from the PA side at all-- its right in/near Fairmount park in a gorgeous old building. Honesty, we went years ago in their old location and it was a little skinny thing right in the heart of the city with city parking- ugh! But this is much better location wise esp. with little kids, which I would hope you would have with you as its a kids museum ;)


The grand entrance is grand and the kids ran right to the automobile/mechanic section and began tinkering away. Now, online it says they dont sell lunches, but they totally do-- simple stuff, but you dont have to pack a lunch unless you want to. We packed and their cafeteria was nice, although I would imagine it getting crowded on a weekend.


The kids liked the water play area and the grocery store too-- very cute.

But, I am gonna be honest here, as far as kid's museums go (and this is our 4th), this one gets a C in my book. Here's why it didnt score big-- bad use of space!! This is my biggest complaint as other museums with their size (port discovery in baltimore and The childrens museum in pitts) have floor to ceiling settings for you to use. Floor to CEILING!! Lots of climbing, moving, exploring, etc. PTM just had wasted space everywhere above maybe 20 feet. Also, in the basement, there was tons of empty space. I also felt the museum had way too many 3 and under areas-- way too many! I have a 3 and under and older kids and I paid the same price for both. I felt the whole museum was geared more to this age group in general rather then 2-8 who would like to imagine and explore too. There water area was nice, but not awesome. Baltimore and Pitts' water rooms were memorable-- our kids could have stayed for hours and hours.


So, here is my concensus, and disclaimer-- this is my two cents and the first time I felt somewhere deserved an actual grade--- take a car ride down to Baltimore's port Discovery or stay simple and go to Lancaster's Hands on House and pay half the price.

Places to Play in PA: Intercourse Factories

We love going to the Intercourse Canning Company-- the Kitchen kettle Village across the road gets a lot of the traffic and hype, but the products are much better here in our opinion. Their Blueberry applesauce and jams are some of the kids favorites! I like the salsas and peanut butters and Matt is a pickle and pepper relish guy--- they have something for everyone, plus you can watch them can on certain days of the week. They people who work there are so incredibly friendly. Now, I must confess, we tend to do a bit of grazing here and lots of snacking-- so if you can stay in Lancaster for the day, it's nice to get here at noonish and then hit a yummy smorgasborg in the area for an early dinner. http://www.intercoursecanning.com/




This was our first trip to the Intercourse Pretzel Factory tour, but everyone was so friendly and the kids had lots of fun making their own "pretend" pretzels. It was neat to hear how PA turns out so many pretzels for the country :) I do reccommend going on a cooler day as the factory doesnt have AC plus the heat from the ovens-- it can get a little toasty. We went on a nice 80 degree day and we're a little toasty-- a very nice fall or winter field trip.

Where we've been...

Hello friends-- I apologize for the long delay in logging-- but we lots our computer for a month and then it took us about a month to catch up one everything :)

We have officially begun school this year-- hello kindergaren and 2nd grade :) We're trying a new math curriculum-- Horizons and I really like it for my daughter, but am wondering if I should have kept my son with singapore-- hmmm... we shall see. He is adjusting to doing two jampacked pages wiht lots of various tasks-- I've found it helps for him to do some jumping jacks or grammar in the middle which is difficult for me as I like to do one task at a time and complete it and then do something else-- ahh, the world of various learning styles.

We have still been hopping around to various PA places and I look forward to telling y'all about some of our new and old finds that we love.

I have also been engaged with being an Independant Consultant with 31 and loving it-- they are such a great company to work for and most importantly, it has allowed Matt and I to give more abundantly to missions and that has been a huge blessing to us!

We are also on the verge or our birthday-two-month-extravaganza: in the span of about 2 months we have four birthdays amongst us and all these milestones make me wish we could freeze time and bottle it up. How can our baby be turning two and our oldest 6? It seems like we just bought home these two little bundles of boy and now one is off to toddler hood and the other to kid-domhood.

So, friends, thanks for your patience and I'll be back with more ;)