I'm Finally a Member of the Family

Last week I got my hair colored. It's a little more blond than I like; I'm missing my brown. But, since I've been graying, that color blends in better with blond, so that's the color highlights I'm getting. My daughter has always told me that I should get my hair totally blond so that I look like everyone else in the family--my hubby and kiddos are all blond. I've always responded with how I wish at least one of my kids had been born a brunette. They do have red highlights in their hair that I love and you can really see in the summer, AND they get that from me! Anyways, as soon as I got home from the salon, the first comment from my daughter was, "Now you're part of the family!" LOL!

Goals for 2013

Yesterday, January 31, we sat down as a family and made some goals for 2013. We wrote it on our whiteboard because it's more of an impact when we can see them. Our categories were individual by name, family, spiritual, and fun. Then we took what we wrote and made a list of what required planning ahead, and made a list of chores that the kids will get paid for. (If you click on the pic you will be able to see what we wrote). I am looking forward to the year 2013. Hope you have a wonderful new year!

A Pinterest Inspired Wall Decor

I am a member of Pinterest and a little while ago repinned this image to one of my "virtual" boards:



Now, when I click on this image to go to the original site, the internet says the blog that originally showed this photo has been removed, so I don't have a source to give credit to this picture. But, anyways, I fell in love with this layout of pictures and wanted to try to do something similar with the wall above my living room couch. Here are the before and after shots:

 Now, I have no idea how tall the wall was in the original inspirational post from Pinterest, but my living room is pretty tall, so the picture frames I chose are a little higher up the wall than in the inspiration pic. Also, did you notice something similar between the sconces of the inspiration pic and my pic? They are the same--and that was not intentional! I found my sconces at Gordmans. When I went looking for sconces, I looked over several different styles, I even looked at decorative vertical metal art pieces to perhaps go where the sconces were to be, but decided that I liked these the best. I brought them home, and it wasn't until a couple of days later when I was showing Hubby how I wanted things hung and he was looking at the inspirational pic that I realized I had bought the same exact sconces!

Here are the pics that are on the wall so far:

I got this huge frame for Christmas this past year and love it! The family picture in the middle is an 8x10 so that might give you a good idea of just how large it is. The pink, purple, and white paper have 3 of my favorite Bible verses on them, but because the frame is so high on the wall now, nobody can really see them to read, so I may at some point have to switch them out for pictures.

The Family frame I have had for a really long time and have never used it until now. Most people put snapshots behind the letters, but I decided to put different kinds of scrapbook paper behind them to make it fun and more colorful. The tiny writing under the Family letters is the Bible verse that says "As for me and my house we will serve the Lord".

I have since moved the lamp that is shown by the couch, and my wall is still so large I know I need to add some more pics in the remaining empty space, but I'm still trying to figure all of that out. For now, what we put up there makes the big empty wall look nicer. A big thanks to Hubby who got out his laser level, measuring tape, and hammer and nails and put it all up for me.

Family Pics

It'd been 2 years since we had a family picture taken, so I wanted to this year. There is a young woman from our former church who has decided to do this as a job, and she kept posting all of her pics on facebook, and I thought they were fabulous! So, I contacted her to ask the detailed questions and we decided we wanted her to take our pics. She was wonderful to work with. Our family chose Sedgwick County Park for the background, and she traveled there, snapped many, many pics for us all around the park, then put them all on a disc and gave us permission to own them all! I will post some--some I really like, and some that are funny, but there were so many more. Also, it had to have been the windiest day in history, but we laughed and decided it would make our photo shoot even that much more memorable!

 In pic above, Lauren was keeping a close eye on the ducks and geese that were around!

 My big 6 year old!

 Crazy wind!

 My cool 9 year old!

Look at my hair--thank you again, KS wind!