Organization Please

Douglas is 17 months and his toy situation is almost driving me NUTS. I'd like to just put all toys in his room but he doesn't play in his room unless I'm in there. So there is a bin of toys in the living room and toys in his room. We are okay about picking up the toys in the living room at night but I don't touch his room until I need to vaccuum. So here's what I have in the way of organization: a bin in the living, a blue book shelf type thing in his room, and the bin thing in his room (see pictures). I want to know what I should do about his toy situation. Any ideas?

Denver, CO

We went to visit Travis' brother and his wife in Denver for Thanksgiving. We went to the Hammonds candy factory for a tour, the butterfly pavillion, downtown to see lights, and the temple. Itwas alot of fun and we look forward to seeing them again at Christmas.

My final 3 layouts for the Stand Up and Scrap contest are on my scrap blog now.


Check this Out

Nudity!!

I love little baby bums!! I see nothing wrong with naked baby pictures and can't even wait to tease my teenagers with their naked baby pictures. I think its humorous. Travis on the other hand would prefer that I did NOT take naked baby pictures. Well, for my credit, I haven't until now, at 10 months old. Douglas had a slight diaper rash so after his bath I was brave enough to let him roam the house naked to air dry. He seemed to enjoy the freedom! So I grabbed the camera. I downloaded some "Hillybilly" coverups for scrapbooking purposes and thought how perfect to use them now. Sorry Travis!

It says "Mom better not show THIS part to My 1st date!"

Home Improvements

Well we finally got new carpet. Anyone who saw our old carpet can testify to it's weirdness. It was a funky berber type and stained and just annoying (to me at least). After the carpet was placed we finally hung our new grandfather clock (thanks Dee) and redid our main wall in our living room. I bought a frame set that showed a design but it didn't quite work so Travis laid out this graph paper and placed the frames where we wanted, measured them, traced them and then put the graph paper on the wall and put the nails through so that it would be perfect. He did alot of work. All I had to do was keep Douglas out of the way (which was no small task).

New, normal carpet

New grandfather clock

Wall with old picture arrangement: above the loveseat (only picture I had)

New picture arrangement (we haven't developed pictures to put in these new frames yet)

And this is what Travis thought would be fun to do with the left over graph paper from the frames:

Travis & Dean's HARD work!

Travis and Dean (my step-dad) finished the pergola last weekend. It's great! It cuts down on the sun big time. We also tied a swing to it for Douglas. He's not a fan of that yet. We got a steal of a deal on the wisteria vines that are growing up the pergola though. They were originally $40 each but the nursery had them on clearance for $10!! My parents have that on their pergola and say that our vines will reach the top in the next 4 months and by next year will nearly cover the pergola. It's beautiful when it blooms in the spring! All we have left is to extend our patio to the pillars but that's just a matter of pouring the concrete, etc. Anyways here it is.

BEFORE

AFTER

Here is our watermelon taking over our garden.

Yard

We have/are making lots of changes to our back yard. You have to understand that our backyard was BARE when we moved here. It had nothing. In the last month we bought a crape myrtle tree, planted a little garden, and planted a little flower bed. Travis and Dean start building a pergola over our porch this weekend as well. We'll be extending our patio too. I'm so excited! Douglas is mesmerized by the outside so this will be so fun for him. Here's some pictures

Before any additions

After additions

My flower bed before and after my mums and day lilies bloomed. Finally, our garden. Travis isn't a big vegetable fan so we are only trying strawberries, blackberries, peas, and a watermelon.

More to come

We've been pretty busy lately but I'm waiting for pictures to show what we've done. Since the arrival of spring we've been spending money left and right on our house. We finally got a tree for our backyard, which was bare. Travis made a little planter box for our "garden" and we've begun work on a flower bed for our backyard. I can't wait until that is done. It's going to be great. Anyways, we'll get pictures up soon.

In other matters, I'll attend a "meet the doctor" night tomorrow night to see if this doctor supports my new ideas on vaccinations. I like Douglas' current doctor just fine but he's not in the same town and I don't think he'll be as supportive. Douglas has his 6 month appointment with this doctor this Friday but if I like the new doctor then I'll cancel this Friday's appt. I'm not doing anything drastic w/ Douglas' vaccinations but I defenitely have new ideas on when I want certain ones given. I'm also stopping 2 of them until he enters Kindergarten. We'll see what the doc says.

Also, some people say they can't see the new (yellow) header. So I want to make sure people can see everything. Here's what I want to know about:
1. the new yellow blog header
2. The spinning 3-d hexagon on the right side
3. The slide show below the 3-d hexagon.

If you can't see all of these then please tell me which ones you can't see. Thanks

Late House pictures

We've been in this house since August and haven't posted any pictures of it. It's a 3 bedroom, 2 bathroom. They aren't the best pictures but you get the idea. Here they are.

Wasting time

What I should be doing right now is folding clothes, dusting, cleaning my bathroom, or starting dinner. However, I'm taking these last 15 min of Douglas' nap to post some pictures.

We got a new bed set. It was very hard to find a comforter that was more red (like our wall) than burgundy. Our old one was burgundy and didn't quite go with the walls. We found this at Kohls on a major sale last week so we are very happy!

Lastly, but definitely not least, are some random pictures we took of Douglas He's doing great except for the fact that 2 days ago he decided to try the preteen look and break out everywhere. I feel so bad for him. His fore head is covered with little pimples (at least it looks like pimples) and even has a few on his eyelids, nose crease, and chin. I read they are from my hormones being in his system. I hope they go away SOON!

Mommy time

Karate practice

First full night in his crib. Mommy doesn't trust his blowouts, hence the pad underneath him.