Throw pillows

Several months ago I had a friend from church give me five throw pillows.  She didn't want them anymore so I decided to take them off her hands (thanks Rachel) and re-cover them.  I know I took a before photo of the pillows, but I think I accidentally deleted it because it is no longer on my phone.  Oh well.

I decided to put the recovered pillows in our family room to add some color.  I started recovering them at the beginning of the month and I just finished the last one a few days ago.  Check them out:

FYI, the pillows that are in just one solid color I purchased a few years ago from JC Penny.  I did not make do those ones.  Just the five pillows that have multiple fabrics. :)

Toy Chest

One of my goals this year is to learn how to re-finish furniture so that I can develop a new talent, and also stock the house with "up-cycled" furniture at a reduced cost.  My sister Emily is a pro at it, so she has been guiding and helping me over the phone (thanks Emily -- I'm sure it will not be the last time I bug you about re-finishing furniture).

One of my first projects was a toy chest.  My neighbor actually gave it to me and I decided to re-paint it and put it in our family room so that I could get rid of the ugly boxes wrapped in wrapping paper (that were starting to rip and tear making them look dreadful).

Here is the before photo:

Here is the after photo (the design was actually Nathan's idea):

Farewell Little Red

Meet Little Red -- a 1994 Honda Civic CX hatchback.

It was September 1999, and I was just starting my senior year of high school when I bought my first car.  I purchased Little Red with 70,000 miles on it for $5,900.

For the last 14 years this car has been a major part of my life: high school, youth dances, 4 years of college, young single adult dances, driving to Disneyland (and all over Southern California for that matter), and dating Nathan (we even drove Little Red the night we got engaged).

Nathan and I drove Little Red from California to Iowa when we moved, and I drove the civic to and from work in California and in Iowa probably a thousand times.  The civic got driven all over the Iowa City area, and even made several other trips to St. Louis, Minneapolis, Chicago, Des Moines (multiple times), Dyersville, and Nauvoo (multiple times).

It was on a tow dolly during our move to Pennsylvania, so that doesn't technically count, but we drove it many places here in Pennsylvania such as Brookville, Huntingdon, Altoona, Phillpsburg (all of which were multiple times), and all over the State College area.

Well, on Sunday May 5th Little Red took its last drive.  Nathan had to drive it to Brookville (about 1.5 hours away) to a church meeting.  It brought him home, but the next morning when Nathan tried to take it to work the civic would not start (it was not the battery seeing that we just replaced it a few months ago.  Not to mention the lights would turn on and off).

On Tuesday we had it towed to a local auto shop where we learned it needed LOADS of repair work done (clutch problems, brakes, tires, rotary replacements, a cylinder in the engine shot, etc).  Not shocking news for a 19 year old car with 196,852 miles on it.

After some discussion and prayer, we decided not to fix Little Red, so we sold it to the mechanic for $200.  It was a bitter/sweet experience.  After all, this car represented 14 years of my life.  So now we are officially a one car family.

Farewell Little Red.  You will be greatly missed -- especially by me.

Our Mother's Day week

For our Mother's Day week all 3 of us were sick with head colds.  I think mine lasted the longest. Actually, it is still going.  Hannah seemed to shake her illness off the quickest, which is a good thing I guess.

I went to a Relief Society activity on Thursday and we did a "ice-cream and swap" social.  The idea was for everyone come to the activity with any unwanted items no longer used in their homes, and swap them out with others.  I inherited some pretty awesome treasures, but Kronk thought this one was the best.  He played with the luggage that I got, but I guess he preferred the bowl.  Weirdo.

Friday, Hannah and I picked up Nathan from work and enjoyed walking around Penn State's campus.  They have some beautiful tulips that are in bloom, and there were 3 duck families with little ducklings.  It was really cute, and Hannah enjoyed watching the ducks.  By the way -- Hannah loves polkadots right now and insisted on wearing that outfit for the day.  She has most definitely entered this independent, "do-it-self" phase.

On Saturday, Nathan took Hannah for a few hours to the local mall.  I was able to enjoy several hours of peace and quiet in the walls of my own home.  It was great!  I spent the time downstairs in the basement sanding a few furniture items that I am re-finishing (pictures of those will come, I promise.  I am close to finishing them).  After sanding and spray painting, I was able to shower and get cleaned up, and then eat some lunch all by myself.  It was a wonderful pre-Mother's Day gift!

On Mother's Day, we all slept in.  I'm not quite sure how that happened seeing that Hannah is up by 7:00 am these days, but it was fantastic and none of us complained.  We had a relaxing morning before church.  Nathan and Hannah gave me a gift card to JoAnns, as I am working on re-covering several pillows for my living room (again, pictures will come when the project is finished).  We all went to church together which was great.  It is pretty rare that we get to go all together as Nathan is usually on a high council assignment and out visiting other units in the Stake.

After church we drove and dropped off some candy to some women who were unable to attend church that day.  The country out here in the east coast is so beautiful right now because EVERYTHING is green!

We then came home, got out of our church clothes (which Hannah did not want to do as you can see by her face in the picture below), talked to my mom, and then ate some dinner.

After dinner, Hannah got ready for bed (yes...that really is what her hair looks like after we take out her hair ties).  We put Hannah down for the night, and then we got ready for bed ourselves. Nathan talked with his mom on the phone, after which it was lights out for us.  We were beat and quite exhausted from our week.  Being ill sure takes it out of ya.

That was our Mother's Day week.

My Birthday

Last week/weekend we celebrated my birthday -- woo woo!

My birthday was pretty good.  Hannah behaved well, and so did Emily (the little girl that I watch part time).  Hannah and I slept in, and while she ate breakfast I made dinner and put it in the crock pot (gott love the crock pot).

When Emily came over we loaded up in the car and went to a play group at the church.  Hannah and Emily were the only ones running around in the gym for a while and they thoroughly enjoyed it.

I couldn't help but take a picture of Hannah's hair.  It looked too cute.

After play group we came home, and the kids took naps while I talked on the phone with friends and family.  One of my favorite parts of my day was talking to my good high school friend, Janna.  We talk on our birthdays every year!  I'm so glad we keep in touch.

I later opened birthday cards and presents.  You can never go wrong with the green gift of money, in my opinion.  I think my favorite gift is the dustbuster that Nathan got me. I wanted something that I could quickly access to clean up all the crumbs kids leave on my kitchen/dinning room floors.  You know you are a mom when the first gift you ask for your birthday is a dustbuster.

Over the weekend, Nathan took me out and we did some shopping.  We ended up eating and unplanned dinner at Panera (the power was out at our house so I couldn't heat up our food).  It was nice to eat a dinner with just the two of us.

Thank you to all who gave such generous gifts, and took the time out of your day to call me.  It truly meant a lot.  All in all, it was a great birthday.

Dustbuster picture courtesy of Google images

Harrisburg

We went to Harrisburg, PA towards the end of March, and toured the State Capital.

I was watching our neighbors kids for the day (it was their spring break and both of their parents were working).  With 3 kids all by myself and being cooped up in this house for the last few months, I really wanted to do something and get out of the house, but I didn't want to do it alone.  So, Nathan took off Wednesday March 27th and came with us on our little excursion (he worked on a Saturday in March so to compensate Penn State told Nathan to take off another day instead).

Around 8:30 am the neighbor kids came over, and we all loaded up in the van and drove to Harrisburg (1.5 hours away).  It was an easy, pleasant drive.  We followed the Susquehannah River pretty much the entire time.  That is one really big river!

Unfortunately, the weather was very chilly so we did not take any pictures of us outside the Capital (I managed to snap the photo above just was I was getting in the car).  We did take a few pictures inside though.

Picture of the Rotunda

When we arrived, there was a middle school choir that sang in the Rotunda.  They sang several songs, but my favorite was the Star Spangled Banner (it was their opening number).

Harrison knows one of the Senators so we went to go see his office.  The Senator's son attends Harrison's elementary school.  Hannah also enjoyed visiting the Senator's office.

Here is a picture of the House of Representatives room.

One of the chandeliers in the House of Representatives room.  In order to change the light bulbs, workers have to build scaffolding around the chandelier, and then one person crawls inside of it and changes all of the light bulbs.  In this room alone there are over 1100 light bulbs, and they get changed once every two years.  Crazy.

The less crowded Senate chamber.

The Judicial wing of the Capital.

I thought this was pretty neat.

And here is a picture of a high school choir singing in the Rotunda.  They were PHENOMENAL!

And here we are on our way home.  Claire and Harrison watched a movie while Hannah took a little nap.

Pool results

Horrible!

Nathan -- 36.67%
Rachel -- 33.33%

Conference was hard for Nathan and I this time around.  Hannah did not take her nap on both afternoons, which made listening to conference quite challenging.

Luckily, we had great weather this weekend so we went on LOTS OF WALKS!  It got into the 60s today!  It was great.  We cracked open a few windows to let some fresh air in.  Finally, spring has come.