flash back friday

busy summer making memories

we have so much to do this summer that I really need to sit down with a calendar and schedule it all out so that it gets done.we have 2 locations to choose super cheap movies from. one being Carmike in Lagrange and the other being griffin cinemas,the library has story time and a family movie day,our super cheap  bowling is back again (the bowling is actually free it's just the shoe rental that costs),we have free swimming at the beach at  callaway gardens, we have tickets for 2 nights of thursday thunder and I'm sure there are other things that are currently slipping my mind. i have everything written on the calendar but now i need to make it make sense :)
oh and of course we will be throwing in some camping in this summer as well.we will take our first camping trip next weekend. my mom,the kids,mariah and a friend of hers. gonna take a nice little trip down to SkidawayIsland to get some nice little beach time on Tybee Island.
 I can't believe we are already 2.5 weeks into summer and only have 2 more months of break. Life just goes so fast it's unbelievable most days. The kids grow up so fast I'm growing up at what seems to be a lot faster pace now and I'm just a little curious if that has anything at all to do with having kids ;)

I am really blessed to be able to spend so much time with my children especially in the summer when there is so much we can do together. I just hope and pray that those of you parents that work full time or don't have the money to go on destination vacations make the most out of all the time you have with your little ones any chance you get while they are on summer break so that you both have those great memories. One day I know we are all going to stop what we are doing while we are rushing around to prepare for that first driving lesson, or that graduation day or giving that pep talk before our babies walk down the aisle and instead of wondering if you spent enough money on them,took them to enough places and made sure they had the right things in life to make them "cool", I hope we can all instead know for a fact we gave them all the time we needed to,taught them everything we could about things that really matter,have memories full of the best stories and have trained them how to walk with God and how to become people in life that will make a difference for the right reasons.

our not so little project

so i started to put these in order but they kept getting all screwy on me so i just decided the heck with it. you get the idea. LOL
we have had the base for a while. it started off as a sandbox that was Serenity's present for her 3rd birthday from Skip & I. Sadly they didn't get to use it much that year due to some personal issues. Since we got it put up though they use it pretty regularly. we added the screened in snack area which you can read how that came to be here. and now comes the fun part. the mega playhouse that is big enough and sturdy enough that skip,mariah,serenity,xavier and myself have all been in it at the same time :) 8 foot walls that i thought were crazy high but then someone questioned if we would be putting a loft in it which at that point i thought we might as well. it's not a finished project yet but it's getting there. skip, mariah and I have been working on it for a week now and it's coming along great. 

birdhouses

When we decided that an art party was going to be the theme for Serenity's 5th birthday  I knew we had to come up with something awesome for the kids to do. I thought we can paint canvases. but then i thought well they are all 5 and under and that will probably be a lot more of just random colors than an actual picture. Then Skip had the idea of birdhouses.He suggested making them and then the kids could paint them. Needless to say he went above and beyond my expectations for these little kids to just paint all over them. He made one prototype and then once we got all the measurements we went ahead and cut pieces for at least 25 houses.so the picture below is step one. a whole lot of cutting.

once we had them all cut out, and when I say we I guess I'm referring to the mouse he had in his pocket because I honestly didn't really do a whole lot to help with this project. Skip was spending many a nights out in the shop to try and get these things done. but when they were cut out he started assembling basic frames for the houses. when putting them together some of the tips of the triangle pieces were snapping off so it was becoming more of an ok people really need to RSVP so we know how many of these need to be finished so we can fix parts if needed. 

once the basic frames were put together he then measured for the sides,base & top. he drilled the holes in the front pieces then started attaching everything. and of course even including a piece of a dowel into each so a little birdie could take a breather if needed :) 

like I said, he went above and beyond with these things for the kids to just paint how ever they wanted. he made sure they had great base coats and the kids would be taking home awesome functioning birdhouses not just some junking cheap things.I'm so thankful Skip put in the effort to make such great memories for our daughters birthday :)




if you are interested at all in reading about her party then just click here and if you would like to see pictures from it then click here