Making A House a Home...

Every so often I get bitten by the #DECLUTTERALLTHETHINGS bug and I'll get on a roll making my house not only livable but pleasing to the eye.  It usually dies off pretty quickly, but I am left feeling somewhat accomplished.  Until it all builds up again.  Endless cycle of getting rid of stuff, bringing in stuff, moving stuff around, etc.

The other day I was lamenting how our tiny bread box was just silly at this point, because it couldn't hold the amount of bread items we regularly have, and it spilled over looking cluttery.  A friend of mine posted a cute wire basket she had just purchased to use for her bread and I was like DANGIT, I want something like that.  I hit up Pinterest for ideas, searched some shopping sites, but just didn't really see what I was looking for.  In the midst of all that, I decided I needed a shelving system to use as a pantry in my kitchen, too.  My cabinets have built in shelves that are incredibly short, so things like cereal boxes, syrup, tall bottles only fit in the ONE cabinet that IS tall enough... over the stove.  This leads to my kids climbing up on the cabinet and over the stove to get their cereal.  Not cool.  Also, the other day I may have expressed envy of my friend's pantry and my husband decided he would "get me a pantry!" Whatever that means.  So, I measured and researched and figured out that for $15 I could get the perfect sized shelf system for our little nook behind the backdoor.  Off to IKEA!

We got our shelves and a plain wooden crate to serve as a bread box, plus had dinner and coffee, too.  I love my new-to-me kitchen and am working to declutter it to have some actual counter space. I also plan to paint the ceiling and walls in the very near future.  Cannot wait to have that project over with!  All this time with the yellow, we are overdue a change!

Anyway, I ended up decluttering the hall cabinet that houses things like medicines, extra towels and random stuff of all kinds, too.  Now I feel the closet in the Littles' room calling me.  Oh, dear.  That's a big job that I've undertaken many times and it finds it's way into a mess so very quickly!  Michael also got inspired to work a little more organization into his tool closet.  So, we'll see where that goes.

We have lived in this house for 4.5 years, and sometimes I wonder why we haven't done certain things sooner.  Time, effort, money, or simply just not even thinking of it!

Starting School, 2018-2019...

All done with 3rd Grade, age 8

Finished 7th Grade, age 12

Preston and Callen successfully wrapped up their 7th and 3rd grade years in the middle of May.  After just a couple of weeks off, on June 1st, we were right back at it, starting up their 8th and 4th grade years.  Hard to believe, but yep... my big guys are growing quickly!  Since Preston started First Grade, we have used My Father's World as our core curriculum.  It worked well for both boys, we all liked it a lot.  But... this year, because my hands are full chasing two littles, I need the boys to be able to do their work more independently.  We are trying out the free online Christian-based curriculum called Easy Peasy All in One Homeschool.  We are about 10 days in, and so far, so good.  The boys seem to like it, and while there has been a small learning curve (them figuring out how to follow instructions I'm not reading to them, lol), they seem to be doing well.  Did I mention it was free?  Yeah, that's awesome!  Here are a few pix from our first day...

Ready to start a new chapter

Of course, Josie wants in on the action.

Brennan's Half Birthday

My sweet #4 is six months old already! He is such a good, easy-going fella and I am trying to soak up every minute of his baby-ness because it's fading quickly.  He is rolling, scooting, sitting up and even starting to pull up already.  He has two bottom teeth.  Babbles and raspberries with the best of them.  He's still exclusively breastfed, but has had some mashed banana here and there - he's a fan.  His siblings still adore him to pieces.  And he loves them right back.  He gets majorly excited when Daddy enters the room, or he'll be sound asleep and hear Daddy's voice and bolt right up!  My little chunker is less and less a baby every day, and it's bittersweet.

Edited to add: At his 6-month check up on June 19th, he weighed 19lbs and was 27 3/4" tall!