Dino-ROAR!

We decided that it was time for Lucas to upgrade to a big boy room... so here's a little preview! We chose the Dino Roar theme because he already had a great deal of primary colored organizer bins in his room to begin with. Plus...the boy loves dinos!


The new bedding is full of his favorite dinos! He now has a twin size bed with three drawers down below and a head board for his toys/books! We kept the safety rail for familiarity, but I'm sure he's ready to take it down.

I couldn't find any artwork or wall decorations that went well with this set, so I made my own! I found a $5 wooden dinosaur puzzle at Michaels and decided to make each into piece into its own frame. I found scrapbook paper that matched the bedding precisely and went from there!

I hung the frames along the long wall in his room and later want to make a wall decoration of his name to go next to his bed.

I then topped the room off with this cute Dino toy box! This was given to us a while back and it's been kept in the yard for the outdoor toys. I honestly didn't even think to add it to the room until I had the bedding in hand. It was a perfect fit if I do say so!

Lucas absolutely loves his new room...and especially his new bed! He has been doing fantastic at night and has only woken up screaming a small number of times since the transformation. He's even disappeared a few times and I find him already tucked away under his blankies! Nap time and bedtime are a piece of cake...he LOVES sleeping in his new room!

Fall Harvest Festival

We went to the Fall Harvest Festival yesterday on Pyrah's Pioneer Farm in Palmer and had an absolute blast! Everything fall related that you could think of...they had! The kids played in a huge pile of leaves, played basketball with pumpkins, took a tractor ride, had a mini potatoe race, saw farm animals, and more! And best of all...we spend the day with his adorable cousins Elyah and Valencia!






These are just a few of my favorites pics!

World Beach Project

In my Art Appreciation class we were asked to join in on the World Beach Project that is being hosted by the V&A Museum in London. I had such a fun time completing this assignment alongside my amazing boys and wanted to share our creation!


McHugh Creek is just one of the many stunning creeks flowing through Anchorage, Alaska. The waterfall is not only beautiful to look at, but its soothing sounds allow you to feel in tune with the surrounding nature.



The rocks were fairly uniform in color and I was immediately inspired by the waterfall to help me with my creation. I decided to give the rocks a bit of contrast using one of nature’s most powerful elements; water.


The variation in color seen between the wet and the dry rocks was exactly what I was looking for! The color change reminded me of the differences of day and night. Although they did not change physical shape, the visual alteration was strikingly noticeable. Going off of this wet/dry concept, I used the rocks to reconstruct the images of a sun and a moon; the images most often thought of when speaking in terms of night/day or light/dark. Because they are opposites, I constructed the sun with a dry center and expanding wet “rays”, while giving the moon a dry outline and darker body.


My project was accepted and placed onto their website's gallery for the world to view! I highly encourage everyone to join in. The gallery has some beautiful projects from around the globe. Yours could be next!

Saltwater art at its finest!

This post is dedicated to my husband's new hobby...or should I say OBSESSION! Lately, everything out of this man's mouth is aquarium related, and he has even gotten to the point where he dreams about tanks. This sure is one expensive hobby, but hey, it could be worse. At least he's at home and I get to admire his artwork!

My underwater camera is out of commission at the moment being repaired by the good 'ol Geek Squad guys at Best Buy. These are all pics from my iPhone, but they turned out much better than I expected!

He built this beautiful custom light hood to match the stand!
Next, we added nearly 150lbs more live rock
The next challenge was to aqua scape it and make it look beautiful!
We since have added another big rock to fill in the top
Our first coral was in with the rocks we purchased and we brought it back to life. Meet our Zoanthids.(Nothing fancy, but they were free!)
Now to MY coral! This is my bouquet of Daisy Polyps! Thank you hubby!
Our brittle star. Cool, yet creepy.
Frogspawn coral! This will be a hit with our future clown fish for Lucas!
Green Star Polyps. Looks like grass and it adds so much color to the tank!
Pom Pom Zenia! It was hard to capture a good picture, but they pulsate and look like flowers!
This is Shrek, our sea hare!
He is by far the craziest little creature I've ever seen!
Our first fish! We got three of these little Chromis
Montipora cap! Excited to see this thing grow!
ANEMONE!! We custom ordered this guy. Has a beautiful red foot and vibrant blue tentacles!
Isn't this amazing?! What's even crazier is to see this thing eat...and poop. It still weirds me out that it's alive!
Camel Shrimp-really neat guys! They went crazy when we added in the anemone and fought over the poop.
Red Legged Hermit Crab! (Found him in the rocks too)
Can't forget the little guys...our little pyramid snail!
Ninja Star Snail
Sea Shell Snail

And our big guy covered in hair algae!

We also have a pair of peppermint shrimp, but they are nearly always in hiding. It's so amazing to check the tank every morning and see what's grown! I swear, we rarely watch T.V. anymore because we're always watching the tank...such a nice way to wind down the day. He's almost convinced me to convert our Cichlid tank to a saltwater as well, but we'll see. We may possibly start a small frag tank and grow some corals!

Lucas is so interested in this adventure as well! Any time we get into the car he asks to go to the fishie store, and when we're there, he runs around pointing everything out. I'm amazed at how much he knows and that he can actually distinguish specific fish, coral, or inverts. He's going to be a Saltwater Pro before he turns 2! A few nights ago, Levi was drawing Lucas pictures on his little doodle toy. He did the basic run down of animals and then started in with the fish, snails, starfish, etc. Then he drew this...

Lucas immediately yelled out "ANEMONE!"

Yep, Levi is one proud daddy!

Bare Minerals

I am officially in L-O-V-E! I'm disappointed that it's taken me this long to try the bare minerals makeup line because I have truly been missing out on an amazing product. I have heard many good reviews, so I finally got around to ordering myself a starter kit. I don't wear much makeup to begin with, but this makes me feel like I have nothing on at all...but look great at the same time! I'm secretly craving for a reason to get dressed up now! Our next date night better come soon =)

Monsters & Nightmares

By now I've nearly lost count of the nights that Lucas refuses to sleep in his room...I think we're on night 14 or 15. He's been fussing quite a bit when we put him down, but what's been even stranger is that we wake to find him sleeping on the couch...EVERY MORNING! Although he doesn't feel the need to wake us up, he brings his blankets and pillow out to the living room and makes himself a nice cozy spot on the couch. This has also blended into his nap time routine where he will sleep for an hour, wake up screaming, come out to the living room, and instantly fall back to sleep. I was finally able to get him to open up to me yesterday and you would never believe what he said...MONSTERS! How on earth does my 22mo old child know about monsters??

Unsure if I had heard him correctly, I asked, "Monster?" He immediately shouted "Yeah, in there. I see it. Room. BIG ONE!" At this point I was completely speechless as my son was pointing into his bedroom and yelling "I SEE IT...IN THERE." How horrible is this? Daddy took him to his room and asked him to show him where, and Lucas was yelling monster repeatedly while pointing to the closet. We did a walk through and showed him that there are no monsters hiding in his room, but he still insists that there are.

There have even been occasions that we've found him on the floor. I was hoping this was just a phase, but it appears that something is really bothering him. Looks like we are going to need to dramatize a monster extraction and cross our fingers that it works. I think the next step is going to be to clear out his room of everything that he doesn't use/play with anymore. Hopefully a change in scenery will help...plus it's an excuse to redecorate (which I've been begging Levi to let me do for months!) Big boy room, here we come!

Daycare Days

My mini break only lasted for a little over a month, but I'm happy to say that I'm back in the daycare business! I thoroughly enjoyed my one-on-one time with my little man, but having other toddlers over really keeps the days interesting! Our first week back in the business was tons of fun and lucky for us the weather was actually nice. I was thrilled to get one of my favorite little boys back, and the new girl is only 10 days younger than Lucas...so sweet!


Kiddos playing Mr. Mouth!

Color time!

I have 3 amazing laundry helpers!