Internet Troubles

I've been absent for my blog for a while now because our internet connection has been rather sporadic.  We have wireless internet with a local company because we live a bit out of range for the usual cable high-speed internet and that has been serving us fairly well for a little over a year.  Unfortunately, our live oak trees, of which we have many, are growing too high and blocking our reception from the internet tower closest to us.  Trimming the trees isn't a very feasible option as they are quite high and very numerous.  Satellite internet is another option we could consider, but the downloading limits are very restrictive; watching TV shows or movies with our Amazon Prime account would all but be a thing of the past.  I had thought recently that AT&T had extended their lines out further and were on my street, but it turns out that they haven't come quite far enough - boo!  So, until we find a better solution, I will do my best to keep up with blogging as I am able and "save" my posts often so as not to lose all my typing and pictures.  Living out away from it all is definitely worth it, but also has its challenges.  Hope you all have a very blessed day!

Room Make Over: A Fashion Fairytale

When we moved to this house a little over a year ago, we had to decide where the girls' room/s would be.  This house is a little bigger square-footage-wise than our last place, but instead of 4 bedrooms, we now have 3.  One of the 3 is downstairs and with younger children, inevitably they wake up in the middle of the night, need help, sleepwalk, get sick at night, etc.; so we didn't want to put any of them downstairs for now.  Upstairs has 2 bedrooms and 1 of the bathrooms and one of the bedrooms is double the size of the other.  We decided to make the larger room the girls' dorm and put them all in it and give ourselves the smaller room.  This has worked out really well and the girls enjoy having each other around and hanging out together.  This did give me a challenge when decorating, though.  I didn't want it to be decorated as a nursery (eventhough our youngest just turned 2) because the older girls have already outgrown the "babyish" themes, as they would say.  I also wanted whatever we chose to appeal to the younger girls (5, 3, 2 years old) as well as the older girls (7 and 8).  Then, I got an idea.

On Dakota's birthday, I gave her a Barbie movie because she likes all of her sisters' Barbie movies so much.  The movie she received is called, "Barbie: A Fashion Fairytale", and in it Barbie goes to Paris to visit her aunt whose fashion house is beginning to fail and the story is about the restoration of her business.  Then, I was on Amazon looking for vinyl decals for the girls' walls and found several that either had to do with Paris and/or fashion from different merchants.  So, I ordered them and got to work putting them up.  This is an easy way to decorate that isn't very expensive, looks nice, and can be removed and changed later on.  Here are our results; see what you think!

Wordless Wednesday 4-18-12

A Color Infusion

While my hubby was away last week on a missions trip to Thailand with a group from his school, the girls and I tackled their bedroom (all 5 of them are in the same room).  We pulled out furniture, swept up piles of dust, through away garbage and random items, reorganized drawers, and washed the walls with warm, soapy water (the fun part of the cleaning :-).  With only a day and a half left until Papi (their Daddy) got home, we gave their room a mini color infusion by painting a bright pink on 2 sections of wall - enough to not make the whole room dark, but a nice change nonetheless.  Here is the finished paint job.  Stay tuned for the rest of the room make-over. 

I was pretty pleased with the results considering the fact that I couldn't find the painting tape and did the trim work with a brush, sponge brush, and a wet rag for clean-up.  I really liked the Glidden 2-in-1 paint that has the primer right in it; it sure made it a quicker paint job.

Gift Bow Making

Since #5's birthday was just this week, I thought I would include a fun bow making idea shown to me by a friend that likes to craft.  Here are the links to the "howaboutorange" blog from which this idea comes.  It is an easy way to recycle magazine pages, or you can use wrapping paper/scrapbooking paper, as well. 

http://howaboutorange.blogspot.com/2009/10/make-gift-bow-from-magazine-page.html
http://www.howaboutorange.blogspot.com/search/label/recycled

Here is an example of how I made a gift bow with two contrasting wrapping papers.

Happy 2nd Birthday, Little D!

Our first glimpse at her darling face.

The day our sweet Dakota was born.

Pensive

Sweet

You just want to cuddle her right up!

One of the perfect newborn poses.

My goofy, little giggle-box (at 9 months).

15 months and she was, finally, fully in walking mode.

My little Christmas beauty.

Almost 2 here.

"Gotta keep up with those sisters!"

Wonderful, darling Dakota,  Happy Birthday!  Our lives were all blessed and made that much richer when you came into the world as part of our family.  We thank God for you every day and your sisters always say that they can't imagine our family without their littlest sister.  You are so special to us and we can't wait to watch you each step of the way as you grow up.  We love you!
Your family