A friendly (weightloss) competition

My husband and I are in a battle. We are battling to see who can reach their own weight loss goal in three months. There's money on the line, people!

I will admit, having three kids in 4 1/2 years and using excuses because of busy life, schedules, etc hasn't helped me one bit, but I will be 30 next year and really want to get into shape and feel good about myself before a new set of numbers begin!

I started yesterday and wasn't pleased at the options I saw on the menu at Red Robin (where he chose for Father's day), so I am scouting out new choices, recipes, etc.

I am also drinking tons more water and began exercising as well. The exercise part is lacking big time, and I am already finding myself using the 100+ temps outside as an excuse. I am starting small though, alternating yoga and bike riding.


So in my quest to find things to try to keep this fun and exciting, I stumbled upon this book yesterday and plan on ordering it. Anyone have this?

And let me know if you have any tips and tricks for me! I am pretty open to hear anything and would love to hear your own thoughts! I know its a process and I want to do it the right way, but I have GOT to beat him! 

Didn't disappear!

Hey guys!

I haven't disappeared! I had blogged a lot of entries ahead of time before we went out of town and then did a few more while we were out of town. We were gone for two and a half weeks, including some time with zero internet or cell phone service (gasp!)

Now that we are home, I am getting ready to do a yard sale here soon, and I was busy doing laundry and unpacking and getting back into our normal routine. Also...I LOVE summer! I love having all three kids home with me at once! I am treasuring every minute and having so much fun with them. They grow way too fast!

I have been working on some projects too!

Talk to you soon and enjoy those men in your life this weekend. They deserve it!

Duct Tape Roses Tutorial

My grandma has discovered the world of duct tape crafts.

So, she taught me how to do duct tape roses.

Here's what you do:

Get about 4 inches of wire to tape the petals to.  She uses this old lap board to do all of her taping and measuring with.

Then start cutting 3 inch long strips for petals. You will need to cut 24. 

Now fold over like this:

and then over again like this: 

Wrap the petal around your wire.

Keep wrapping petals around as you make them:

After you have done all 24, it should look like this:

Now let's work on the petals. 

Cut a 6 inch strip of green and 4 pieces of 3 inches apiece of wire, 

Place the four pieces of wire on the sticky part of the tape, then cover with another piece of tape.

Cut leaf shapes out:

Twist the four leafs together

Then wrap the whole stem with the rose and leaves together with another piece of green

Complete!

Petal Pillow (antique)

Growing up, I always played and adored my mom's petal pillows that she inherited from her grandmother. They were so much fun to look at all the fabric colors and designs when I was supposed to be taking a nap.

I mentioned the pillow to my grandma and off she went to find hers. And then...she gave it to me!! This is something that I will forever treasure!

Check out the back of the pillow. Isn't it neat?

Apparently, she made at least 7 of these pillows (different shapes and varieties) possibly more. Can you imagine the patience?

I googled it, and found an owl pattern that I bought to try. Christmas presents for the kids! It will be a great stash buster for all those scraps, and something that maybe they will enjoy as much as I did.

DIY Car DVD Player Holder

If you don't have a built in DVD player in your car but need something for roadtrips, check out this handy dandy system my husband did for us!

He took a scrap piece of wood and drilled holes in it for the headrests to go through, and we keep it in the middle of the car for all of the kids to see.  Also, cut off the corners so that there's no sharp edges if there's an accident.

Then he added two more holes for the cords to go through. We have a power inverter for the plug and we have a stereo cord for the sound to play through the speakers in the car.

That is also an industrial strength piece of velcro. We put one on the board and one on the dvd player to hold it in place. 

Please excuse our messy real view. All seats in the back are able to watch it! Makes a 25 hour car trip totally possible!

Got Ski? (soda)

Recently my husband was reading an article about a bottling company that he thought was in St Louis (where we are visiting some of my family), but as he read it, he learned that it is actually  in a very small town that some of my family is from.

If you read the article, you will see that the bottles have been in use since the 60's! It's so neat because you can go to the Excel Bottling Company and pick up a case for yourself at the side of the building in any combination of flavors that they sell for 18.00. You get 24 bottles and if you bring the bottles back, you get 10.00 back, or you can refill them for 8.00

We went and picked up a case. Some of the dates on the bottles read '68 and '69. They were sold out of root beer (their most popular flavor) but we got a whole assortment of other kinds, including Ski.

I thought the case was the best part.

Just a really cool story of reusing materials. 

Fancy up that Grill!

My husband really enjoys smoking meat and bbqing. He always talks about one day opening up his own little restaurant, so together, we "upscaled" his new smoker.

What we used:

• Rust-oleum high heat ultra in aged copper
• clear contact paper
• cutting machine

It's not perfect, and it could be a bit more centered, but I like that his smoker is now custom!

mason jars

I adore mason jars. There's just so many different uses for them besides canning!

If you do a search on Pinterest, you can see all sorts of different ideas! Here's two that I made from ideas I saw on pinterest using what I already had here at home:

Soap Dispenser (how-to at the link)

Match Stick Holder

Road Trip Fun Idea!

I saw this idea over at The Mother Huddle and it screamed out to me, "TRY ME!" I think I even heard the word "please" when it screamed out at me, so I knew I must do this for our own road trip.

I didn't buy any new dvds for the trip, so I didn't add them to the bags but I did do some of the same ideas as what I saw. So excited to put a twist on entertaining the kids in the car for 24 hours!

Hopefully I am going in prepared and we will have lots of fun! Movies, music, coloring, new pillows and new little toys, plus lots of snacks. The snacks are a big deal because they are never allowed to eat in the car.  Mean parents, aren't we?