Week in the Life- Tuesday, April 25th

 Today, I wanted to capture a little bit about our routines. Our weekly morning routines are pretty much, well routine. Evenings are often dictated by whether the boys have any activities going on. This time of year Jude is playing Cal Ripkin baseball and Ethan & Jess are umpiring in the same league on the coach pitch field. 

The first minutes of my morning are pretty much controlled by the furry children. 

Dax often wakes me up even before the alarm goes off and after he stretches he lets me know it's time to eat & then he is ready to go out for the day.

Once Dax is out I let the girls upstairs and feed them. Here lately we have been leaving them upstairs during the day while we are at work and school. They seem to like being upstairs and having more light and a bigger area to run around in.

This morning Smokey was still inside. Most mornings he likes to wake Ethan or me before dawn to go outside. He immediately wanted out, only to come in less than an hour later to hang out inside while we were gone. 

Ethan drops Jude at elementary most days and it's Jude's responsibility to close the garage door after Ethan pulls his car out. Really need to invest in a garage door opener. 

As for me, I really thrive on routine. I walk almost everyday before I eat lunch. I used to walk outside, but I prefer walking the halls these days because I don't get sweaty. After lunch today I began working on reading lists for the upcoming year. There are a lot of choices and I try to pick a wide variety of books that meet my students needs & interests.

There were no after school or evening activities today, so we got home pretty early and so there was time for Ethan to relax and once it was dinner time for Dax we let him in to eat. After a little bit of scratches & love he was happy to lay down in the living room. I got leftover supper and breakfast dishes done and started on super nachos for supper which was a request from the boys. Jess is still in DeQueen with his Dad, who remains in the hospital with pneumonia. 

Carter made a quick trip home for supper and to have me iron his clothes for the end of year athletic awards ceremony at school. 

Carter stayed long enough to eat & play a little Nintendo with the boys. Carter and Ethan told Jude all about playing the same game when they were closer to his age and laughed about the teams that Carter built that are still on the game today. The player's names are horribly misspelled, thanks to Carter. He swears he spent a tremendous amount of time building those teams.

Favorite pictures of the day: As Carter left out, he made sure to hug both of his brothers & tell them he loved them. I am incredibly proud & thankful for the relationship that the three of them have. I never take a moment when I have all three of them under the same roof for granted.

It seems only right to end today's photos with more of the animals. Smokey has a pillow on Ethan's bed right next to Ethan.  He is quite a spoiled kitty boy. Tonight Dax came in to Ethan's room to give Smokey a little love before he went to our room to lay down on the floor on my side of the bed. They do take a little more care & they drive me crazy a lot of mornings, but our home would be quite empty without our sweet pets.

 

Week in the Life- Monday, April 24th

 Ohhh, Monday.... back to work/school.  Another week of wandering aimlessly around the library while a small group of students take our state-mandated standardized test. Nineteen days to go till summer break. Sooo ready for a slowdown and a shift in our schedule.

I walked out of the bathroom to find these two on our bed semi-touching. Quite the odd occurrence considering that usually, Smokey wants nothing to do with Tines.  

Called Mom on the way to school, just to check in and see how her weekend went. Phone calls while driving are kind of my go-to right now because it easier than taking time once I get home to make or take phone calls. 

Lots of things on my list of work to-dos this week. The first couple of hours when I usually have students is now being used for standardized testing, which means that my afternoon schedule is full of students instead of quiet come as needed library time. Stack on top of our irregular, wonky schedule: the yearbook due tomorrow & still needing to read the first half of the book club book for our meeting Wednesday and I am feeling slightly overwhelmed. Instead of actually working on anything that is due, I'm procrastinating and working on book lists for next year and planning the remainder of my day.  

Maybe it is a Southern thing, maybe just a weird people thing or maybe we just have some interesting ability to see the weird and wacky, but Jude and I encounter things we consider weird and wacky nearly everyday.  Today it was a guy driving down the road with a load of re-bar not tied down and precariously bouncing along and sticking out of the back of his truck. Jude was extremely weirded out by this and kept talking about how dangerous it is to be driving around like that.

Quick stop at Walmart to pick a few essentials that we didn't get into our pick-up order Friday. Besides the sourdough bread, avocados, and big, red strawberries, none of which were on my list, I also picked up toilet paper, dog food, and detergent.

Quick trip home to drop off groceries and relax for a few minutes, then back in the car to head to the fields for Jude's 5:30 baseball game. Jude decided that the best use of his time was to play at home till we had to leave and then dress in the car on the way to the game. As he was getting dressed I heard him mutter, "I definitely did not just put my shirt on backwards!" He puts on &/or wears something

backwards at least once a week. Somedays we catch it, somedays he catches it, and somedays he makes it to school and someone else has to tell him. Good Grief!

Pulled up at the ball field and parked by this guy, who had evidently made a pit stop at Sonic before coming to the field to umpire. 

Favorite picture of the day: Jude had a solid hit to left field and it turned into a in the park homerun. So proud of him! He was due a good hit! He was very proud of himself and the run put us ahead 4-3.

Jess and Ethan hard at work umpiring on the coach pitch field. 

Quick spaghetti supper, a shower, and a little Wii play before bed.

 

I got a call from Rhonda about Randall. He had been admitted into the hospital in DeQueen because of a severe case of pneumonia. Jess talked her and packed up and headed to the hospital to be with him.  

Week in the Life 2023- Sunday, April 23rd

 This week, I am documenting a week in our daily lives. I have done this project a number of times throughout the years & I'm looking forward to another opportunity to record a week of our ordinary days. I wonder what stories this week will tell.

Early morning snuggles with Tiny. I didn't sleep well last night, so I was hoping to catch a little more rest on the couch before getting the day started. Tiny wanted to help.

The last load of laundry for the weekend. All the cleaning this weekend allowed Ethan & me to get completely caught up on all the laundry. A rarity for sure, especially considering that Ethan doesn't often do his laundry unless I remind him or he runs out of underwear.

Jude was up earlier than I expected & all he wanted for breakfast was a bowl of dry cereal. He was happily playing Fortnite with friends when I headed downstairs for a little creative time.

Back upstairs for a hot chai latte refill & heard Smokey wanting back inside. It was chilly outside, so he wanted in quicker than normal. He usually likes to lounge on the front porch or in the yard. Occasionally he ventures off into neighboring yards or even across the street, but he is happiest just hanging out in our yard and soaking up the sun. The sun was hard to find today and the spring wind was fierce.

Ethan pulled Jude away from his screen for a little while to run pass plays in the front yard. I stepped outside briefly (it was still cool)  to watch, snap a few pictures,  and check out the hostas beginning to emerge in the front flower bed.

After completely cleaning our bedroom Friday night and all day Saturday, including shampooing the carpet and wiping down all the woodwork, Sunday was all about finishing up the laundry & picking up loose clothing from our room, and putting it away.

Jude turned off his Switch and picked up the iPad to watch Star Wars. He is a serious Star Wars aficionado. 

Ethan spent his afternoon cleaning and vacuuming his room and closet. He even organized his hanging clothes and his shoe collection. 

I went in search of Georgie, who hides 90% of the time, and Ethan pointed her out to me lounging in his window behind the curtain. A much more scenic view than that of the living room chair which she usually hides under.

Carter at college (check), Dad umpiring (check), only three people who love breakfast, specifically waffles with bacon and sausage, for supper at home. Waffles it is. Ethan, Jude, & I love breakfast for supper,

Favorite shot of the day: Ethan and Jude playing on our old Nintendo Wii. Jude and I went to see the movie Friday night & really enjoyed it. Ethan brought the Wii upstairs tonight and it was a huge hit! So much fun to all sit and play a little bit and reminisce about playing it together when the big boys were Jude's age. Glad he brought it up. I see many nights of family play ahead.  

Spring Time Friendship Card

Today I'm sharing a Spring card. I love Limelight Hydrangeas and so I wanted to create something similar on this card. I die-cut a design into the card panel and added a Distress Ink background to create a shaker element. I added little sprigs of yellow for interest and to break up some of the green. I love the color scheme from this week's Color Throwdown. It is always fun to play along and create fun cards based on their weekly challenges. 

 

Coloring Tips

 This week as I began working on my card for Color Throwdown #738, I considered just using the colors given without any highlights. I started watercoloring the flower petals on the background with Mustard Seed Distress Ink. As I got the flowers done, they felt flat. Even though they are more whimsical instead of realistic, I just did not like the flat feel. 

I went back with Fossilized Amber Distress Ink and added shading on the petals and then finished the card background with Shabby Shutters and Rustic Wilderness Distress Ink. Even though they were not lifelike flowers the additional shading brought depth to the images. 

The Sentiment and the flowers were all stamped with Rustic Wilderness Distress Oxide and clear embossed. I added shading to the fussy cut sentiment with Shabby Shutters Distress Ink. I finished the card with sequins and pearls from Lucy's Cards. 

Next time you feel like your card is feeling flat, go back and add shading and highlights. This is possible with watercoloring, using colored pencils, and even by adding a darker color beneath die-cuts. Just a little bit of extra shading & depth adds so much to your  card and keeps it from falling flat.

Working for the Weekend

 As we begin to wind down the school year I get more and more excited about weekends and the possibility of summer. The card I created today celebrates two of my favorite weekend (and summer) activities: reading and plants.

I used this week's Color Throwdown color inspiration for my card. 

Today's card features stamps from Cocoa Daisy and Heidi Swapp which were watercolored with 

Distress Inks. I figured out that Rusty Hinge and Wild Honey used together made the best terra cotta color to watercolor my pots. Everything got fussy cut and popped up for emphasis & then placed on an ink-smooshed background of Tattered Rose Distress Ink. 

This one was fun and I may have a hard time parting with it!

Color Throwdown Guest Stamper

 I am honored to be the Guest Stamper for the Color Throwdown #736. For this challenge I created a birthday card using yellow, gray, and sage. 

The background uses the Simon Says Stamp Solar Burst Stencil (SSS121424) which I inked blended over with Pumice Stone Distress Ink. I also mixed Perfect Pearls with water and splattered the stenciled image before adding the flower pieces and sentiment. 

The floral pieces were created using a number of different stamp sets and embossed with white or gold embossing powder. The big floral image is an older one from Hero Arts called Stencil Flower (CG194 circa 2010). I watercolored it after embossing with Fossilized Amber and Scattered Straw Distress Ink & added Star Dust Stickles to the center of the flower. The leaf images are from the Simon Says Stamp Be Kind stamp set (SSS202099) and watercolored with Bundled Sage Distress Ink. The final floral images are the small gold embossed pieces that are from the Simon Says Stamp Thanks and Leaves stamp set (SSS101894). Before adhering the stamped floral images I splattered them with Perfect Pearls. 

To finish the card I stamped the sentiment, from the Simon Says Stamp Sending & Wishing stamp set (SSS101475) in black ink and then added a mix of sequins from my stash.