Club Initiation

Tyler was initiated into a club last night... or should I say this morning since it was about 2:30 in the morning to be exact. He is now a proud (well, probable not so proud) card holding member of the stomach flu club. That's right, up until last night he had never thrown up (except for spitting up as a baby). He's 6 and a half- how does a kid get away with not puking for 6 years? Let's just say that it was a long long night and we are both really really tired today. Let's also say that I've been sanitizing the house like crazy this morning. One puker is enough for me.


Poor kid. It's the "sick eyes" that get to me- they break my heart! While we're on the subject of Tyler... here's some pictures of his from 2 weeks ago that I meant to post about.










He's our bloody nose kid. He get's one about once a week. Usually they're not too bad but this one didn't want to stop. That's why he's holding an ice pack on his nose. One of these days I'll get around to taking him to to doctor to see what can be done to help. But until then we'll just keep shoving rolled-up tissues up his nose. I also pulled out the humidifier to use at night to see if it helps.

It's that time of year again

Time to do a little canning. I love taking a few boxes of these...


And turning them into this...

I love making jam most of all. We now have enough peach jam to last a long time!

I've also started working on our long term food storage. Boy is that a chore! We really don't have that much storage space, but we'll make it work somehow. I just couldn't pass up Macey's 50lb bags of flour for $10. I think I'll work on 3 months at a time. Once we have 3 months of all the necessities I'll start building it up to 6 months. Slow and steady right?!?

I like how...

When I asked Kate to clean up these (cause they were all over the floor)...
They ended up here (in the trash can- if you can't tell)...I didn't know I needed to be so specific with a 2 year old.

I wonder what other things she's thrown away that I don't know of?!?! I'm sure that's where some of our spoons have gone. And yes, I did dig them out and wash them off. I guess I should have just cleaned them up myself to begin with.

Out with some of the old...

And in with some new. This post has 2 different stories that will tie into each other in the end.

Story #1:
There is one part of August that I really truly dislike. August is the month that our power and gas bills are adjusted. We are on the "budget" plans, which don't save you any money but do make it easier to plan your bill paying because you pay the same every month. In August they figure out if you over paid or under paid. Well folks, we under paid big time! I guessing it's because this is the first year we've had a finished basement. So we are now paying $7 more to Questar and $12 more to Rocky mountain power every month. That adds up to $228 a year! (I like math by the way)

Story #2:
I was walking around Costco the other day and saw an amazing deal on their compact fluorescent light bulbs in all shapes and sizes. I wasn't planning on buying new light bulbs that trip, but I just couldn't pass it up. I like to think that I'm a little "green" and this is just a super easy way to do it. I mean really, how hard is it to unscrew one bulb and screw another one in. I got enough for the 6 can lights in our basement playroom and for three of our bathrooms (our bathroom has a window so we really don't use the lights that often, the other 3 don't).

So now to blend the 2...
Now that I'm spending over $200 on energy that I don't want to be spending, it's time to make some changes. I hope the new bulbs live up to their claim of lasting longer and so forth. We also turned the temp up on our air conditioner so now it doesn't come on until 80 (I really wish the weather would hurry up and cool down!!). And will probably do the same with the heat for the winter (but down I guess). I've also tried to make a better effort at getting the kids (and myself) to turn lights off as they leave a room. I guess we'll see this time next year if all my hard energy saving work pays off. If anyone has any other thoughts or ideas let me know, I could use all the help I can get with this one!

Once upon a time...

there was a crib. This crib entered our lives when Ellie was born (10 years ago). When Kate started potty training (which is another post for another day!) I started counting down the days until I could finally get rid of the crib. We all know that Kate is the last, and why store a crib that I will no longer need, so it was going to take a nice little trip over to Sweet Pea (a store close by that takes used kid/baby stuff). Maybe I was a little too excited to be done with the crib, or maybe it had hurt feeling at being let go so easily and jinxed me, I really don't know. But the day I called to see if they had room for another crib they nicely let me know that they no longer take cribs. WHAT?!?
Once upon a time there was a crib re-call. Well great! I guess there was a recall on many many many cribs that have drop down sides. So Sweet Pea is no longer taking any crib just to play it safe. The crib I so desperately wanted to be done with is digging in it's heals and refusing to go.
What to do now... Well I guess I could try to sell it, but let's face it- who wants a 10 year old crib. It could go to DI and find a new home that way. Or it could get a make over!
And that's exactly what happened. I turned the old crib into a toddler bed for Kate. I searched and searched for a "before" picture but this is as close as I got...
Tyler in the upper left, Ellie in the lower right, and Kate in the big pictures. There's some rails and bars but no whole crib. And here is the after...Don't pay any attention to the white walls. Sure we've been in our house for 5 years, and you would think that we would have painted by now, but no- white walls it is. Bryan has color picking issues. I know it looks like the foot board is taller than the head board but it really isn't. I think it was just how I took the picture. They really are the same height. So, just in case you're wanting to cut apart your crib and make a bed, I'll tell you how I did it.

First: I sawed off all the legs. See how the foot (and the head) board rest right on the floor. I guess you could leave some of the leg if you want it a little taller. I also filled in most of the screw holes from before and painted it white.





Second: I took a trip to Home Depot and bought some wood. With this wood I made the supports for the mattress. They run between the head and foot boards. I actually used 2 pieces of wood, the one you see in the picture and another one that is screwed onto the bottom half of the back side (so it make a ledge- if that makes any sense).

And Third: I screwed the mattress support from the crib onto the wooded frame.



That's it- you have a little bed! (which, by the way, Sweet Pea will take!)