Kelley’s Place

Tuesday night was the last craft night until fall. It was carnival themed and I was having major De-ja-vou because I faintly remembered the past two years having a carnival themed night as well. They had fun making crafts, playing games, wearing their clown noses and hats, and eating animal cookies. We even won the door prize again! That kind of stuff never happens to us! Haha I took some pictures with my phone (because I once again forgot my camera) and I noticed how big the kids looked.
It really sunk in how big they were when I came home and looked at the post I wrote in 2010 about the carnival craft night. No Maddie, no Josh, and just a teeny tiny Sophie!

Over the next three months we have our busiest, most jam-packed schedule of the whole year.

Mid-May through Mid-August includes both Jason and my birthdays, both Sophia and Maddie’s birthdays, Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, and our wedding anniversary. It also it the most popular time to be invited to weddings, BBQ’s, and other outdoor parties.

Throw swim lessons, soccer practice, gymnastics (new this summer for not for just Sophia but now Josh too), children’s museum activities, library shows, concerts at the park, the pool, the zoo, etc..

Plus all the once a year things like National Night Out, outdoor movie theater specials, bike races, etc.

I look at our calender and there is hardly a day off in site!

That’s how we like it though, while the weather is nice we cram in as much as we can.

I am looking forward to seeing how the kids like their classes and activities. I hope I can keep up!

Can I just say, I love Mother’s Day!

When did my little boy turn into my big boy?

My girls (yes, I can already see it in Madelynn) are so independent and don’t often slow down much. They are full of talking and (in Maddie’s case) squawking. Sophia (and I predict Maddie too) is full of plans for the future and questions about life, always.

I love that so much about my girls but there is something about Josh that is such a nice change sometimes.

After a day full of climbing, sword fights, dirt-digging, and growling he is more than happy to curl up next to me in bed and snuggle quietly. He will fall quickly to sleep without a sound.

And for these few minutes I purposely wait to carry him to his own bed because it’s during these moments that I can watch him and still see my little boy. I somehow know that even long after I am able to carry him to his bed at night, I will still see him in this way.

What a blessing to have a son.

On the way home from our trip to Indiana this past weekend, we made a stop to visit my brother and sister-in-law and their family. I had been really wanting to meet their newest little addition, Ashley (who is just as sweet and adorable as I imagined!)!
We had a wonderful time catching up!

I made some little matching outfits for the kids to wear to the rehearsal dinner we went to this past weekend. They actually wore them all day since we had bible study in the morning and then the dinner. It thankfully made it really easy to spot my kids in the crowd because they were wildly playing with other kids and running around like they had eaten sugar all day (oh wait, they pretty much had). haha

I had quite a few people come up and say something to me about how they noticed that they all matched. I even heard the waitresses whispering about it at the restaurant. One lady came up and told me she wanted to now go home and buy a sewing machine just so she could make matching outfits for her kids. lol I know I am going to pay for this matchy craze I am in when my kids get older and have to look back at these pictures! Poor kids! Ha!

Anyways, I was happy with how much I was able to make out of one yard of fabric (since this was a little bit more pricy fabric than I would normally buy and I wanted to make the most of it). I made a skirt for both Maddie and Sophie, a tie for Josh, and a hair-bow and headband.

I had just a little handful of scraps left over after everything was done.

We headed down to Indiana this weekend for a family wedding. Joshua was the little ring bearer so we had a great time watching all his antics!

We made it up there Friday evening where we headed to the bride’s house for dinner. The next night was the rehearsal dinner and then Sunday afternoon was the actual wedding.

Joshua was so cute walking down the isle with the little three year old flower girl. They did so good getting up there it was just a little too much for them to stand still through-out the ceremony. Josh had everyone cracking up as he slouched lower and lower until he was resting on the ground using the ring bearer pillow as a real pillow. Then he did a ginormous sneeze that blew snot down his nose and someone has to toss him a hankie. Then he saw an ant on the ground and proceeded to lay down on his belly and follow it across the floor and then the flower girl saw it from her side and the met in the middle on their bellies!

Thankfully, the bride and groom couldn’t see this happening and no one seemed upset with the little “show” going on!

We love cheese-it’s around here! So when I found a recipe on how to make your own cheese-it like crackers I had to give it a try. I think I like them even more than the goldfish cracker recipe I tried a while back. Of course, how can you go wrong when more of your ingredients are just butter and cheese, right!?

They are softer than cheese it crackers but are good (in my love-cheese-and-salt-oppinion) nonetheless. At least I got Maddie’s approval!

Homemade Cheese-Its

8 oz cheddar cheese (shredded)
half a stick of butter (cold and chopped in small pieces)
1/2t salt
2T cold water (I ended up needed 4T to make it doughy enough)
1 cup flour

Mix together and refrigerate for an hour. Roll out and use a pizza cutter to quickly make small squares. Bake 350* for 12 minutes. Eat your calorie and fat allotment for the day in 5 minutes flat!

I recently found some cute fabric scraps at a thrift store. I thought the fabric could have lots of uses for kid’s stuff because it was in all small amounts (most 3/4-1 yard each). But for 25 cents each I thought they were worth it!

So I made this little farm playmat for Madelynn (and really I think Josh will play with it during church as well).

I used some farm themed fabric on one side and some green polar fleece on the other. Added a pocket to house all the little pillow farm animals I made out of one of the other farm fabric I got at the same time.

I made it so it would fold up, velcro shut, and with some little handles so it would be easy to carry around.

I have realized that Saturday afternoons are is the time where the house gets most destroyed! The kids have spent all morning sitting still in church services, and sitting for the 40 minute car ride there and back, and often sitting more while we go out to eat with friends, and by the time we finally get home they are ready to be let loose!

Saturdays their nap times are pretty much thrown out the window as well so this makes them even more wild and rowdy (while it makes Jason and I more and more tired, funny how that works)!

These pictures pretty much depict how they spend there afternoon after we get home from church (while both Jason and I take turns napping ourselves, heehee)…

*The first couple pictures are of Josh and Maddie inside a cushion fort.

*Also, strangely enough Sophia actually fell asleep for a little bit so she wasn’t in the pictures from yesterday- this is very unusual and more often she is right there organizing the craziness with the other kids!