DIY Army Men Lamp

Simple DIY project that takes less than an hour to complete.

Supplies:

-Plastic army men (I picked up 2 bags of green plastic army men in the dollar section in Target.)

-Simple lamp base & shade (I bought a cheap and simple lamp base and shade from Walmart.)

-Light bulb

-Blue tape

-White gloss spray paint

Once you have the supplies, creating the lamp is super simple.

Hot glue the men to the base, starting from the bottom and work your way to the top. Try to arrange them in an interesting way.

Wrap the light socket and cord with blue tape and spray paint the whole lamp. Remove tape when dry, place shade on top, and put in a bulb.

Ta-Da! Super cute army man lamp!

Nerd Alert! Fantasy Worlds Street Sign

I saw a cool road sign on Pinterest made up of fantasy world/kingdoms and knew there was no better homage to our nerdism than this project!! My husband and I hashed out which worlds/kingdoms/cites we wanted. We wanted to pick places we were BOTH fans of, so unfortunately Gallifrey did not make the cut as my hubs isn't a Whovian. *sad panda*
Honestly we could have had a sign with just the Lord of the Rings realms. It was so hard to pick just a few!!
I sanded some of the wood pieces and left some rough. (BTW the scraps of wood were a mixture of pallet wood and part of our broken fence! Score!)
I used acrylic paint and picked colors for each sign as the base. I found different fonts online that I felt best represented the world or city and outlined it onto the piece of wood. I then used a white paint pen or black sharpie for the letters. And voila! Nerd alert! All my neighbors know where the cool kids live now!!

School desk makeover

Just a short post on a recent project :)

Finally got a mom a break. I went to a few garage sales with some friends and scored this cool school desk.

I knew I wanted it to be turquoise and chevron right when I saw it. My girlfriend Toshia talked the seller down to $12 from $20 because I'm too much of a chicken to negotiate.

Let my just say that taping chevrons with no stencil kinda sucks lol!

But I think it came out great in the end :)

Entitlement, Autism, & Mary

Sometimes I feel entitled. Sometimes I feel "jipped", that bad things shouldn't happen if I have enough faith. I used to be surrounded with people who believed if you had strong faith, you could pray away anything. If you were sick, you should rebuke it and pray or fast and it would be gone. Prayer and fasting is good, but the problem with this mentality is you feel guilty and inadequate when you can't pray something away. When my daughter was diagnosed with autism, there were those who told me I needed to be praying, fasting and rebuking. All of which I did. Salem is still autistic. I was devastated. I became bitter, jaded, and angry with God. Why God? What am I doing wrong? Do I have weak faith? Are you upset with me? I became depressed because I was under that mentality that if only my faith was strong enough, I could pray away her autism.
Slowly, painfully, I have come to realize that God LETS us go through things. He let's us suffer sicknesses, infertility, unemployment, suffer the loss of loved ones, etc. The strength of our faith isn't the cause. But our faith can be strengthen when we walk through those hard times and rely on God to get us through. Which brings me to Mary.
Mary, the mother of our savior. Mary was so young when she was called to carry and birth Jesus. And she wasn't married so she couldn't hide her pregnancy behind her marriage and hope people assumed she was having Joseph's son. Nope. People would have to either believe it was immaculate or assume she was a skank. How hard was that? Why didn't God wait til she was married? Then the birth. Why did God not make sure she could deliver in a more comfortable setting. Nope. Here's a barn. Have the savior of the world next to the horse stalls, among the stench of barn animals. And then as we see Jesus in his ministry, we see Mary without Joseph. It's assumed that he passed away. So as hard as this woman's life has been, she is now a widow?!?! What's up, God? Why was Mary given hardship after hardship, all the way up to seeing her baby brutally nailed to a cross and mocked! There goes my sense of entitlement. God's love and promise was enough for her. She couldn't save herself from hardship or tragedy. But God saved her soul. He called her blessed among women. Wow. She even called herself blessed!! From an outsider's point of view, looking at her hard life, she didn't appear to be blessed. But Mary saw God's glory. She knew that somehow He was using her life to accomplish His divine plan. I'm humbled by this revelation. My life will be used by Jesus. I don't know how. I can't see the full picture, but no matter what I or my family goes through, God has a plan. His plan includes autism. And I'm OK with this now.

Hugs and Holland

The tv is on. Salem is watching her favorite show, wearing her Mickey Mouse tie and all in one pjs. I see her smiling at the tv and I just want to scoop her up and hold her close...

I love that little girl. She is a sweet sweet little flower just beginning to bloom. We all stare in awe as she makes progress in speech, becomes more aware of herself and her surroundings. Our hearts soar each time a therapist tells us how wonderful she is doing. I AM THANKFUL.

And while I am thankful for who she is and all the wonderful progress she has made, I still have my moments. Moments where I wish she would let me hug her or come snuggle with me on the couch. I long for her to say "I love you, mommy." There was a time when these longings overwhelmed and consumed me for hours, mourning the loss of the vision I had for our relationship. Like the beautiful story I once read to describe this journey, I went on a trip, destination Italy, and landed in Holland only to discover I am never going to Italy. But as I mourn at the realization I will never see wonders of the coliseum or the Trevi Fountain, I begin to notice the loveliness of Holland and admire the beautiful windmills, full of strength. All my friends are in Italy. Sometimes I wish I was too. I still want to see Rome sometimes. But that doesn't mean I haven't fallen in love with Holland or appreciate it's uniqueness. It's different. It's not what I had planned. But there is beauty here too.

Just got handed my new schedule!

I went to Salem's ABA therapy center to discuss her evaluation and our goals for her. She is behind on a lot of things. After discussing all the details of the therapy plan for her, I was handed a paper to sign. I stared blankly at the paper, pen in hand, trying to remember how to write my name. I dont know whether to cry or laugh at this. They want Say in ABA 10-20 hrs a week. After looking at her schedule, we could only fit in 17.5 hrs a week. With everything she is in already, it will be all therapies 20 hrs a week with speech and OT. And she also goes to Mother's Day Out.

My baby is going to bounce from one therapy location to the next, every day, 5 days a week. Rowyn, who's 5 months old, will be in the van for hours every day. How are we going to pull this off? Prayers please!

And though my 2 year old now very much has a full time job, I am still so thankful for so much. I am thankful for our insurance. I know people whose insurance won't cover ABA. It's such a shame. I am thankful that we have these services available in this area and I don't have to drive over 20 minutes to get to any of them. I've heard the horror stories there... We are so blessed. God is so good!

So this is going to be my own personal "wilderness", but I am believing this will be worth it all in the end. When my sweet girl is looking me in the eye, engaged in conversation, I won't look back on the hundreds of hours of therapy. I'll be too grateful for who she's become.

Please keep me and Salem (and Rowyn!) in your prayers that she will improve and progress and I will remain encouraged and patient.

My Biggest Struggle

I know I have talked mostly about Salem lately. But she demands so much of my attention that she is basically my main focus.

When a child falls down and cries, his mama's arms are comforting. When Salem falls and I try to hold her, she freaks out. I can't comfort my baby. I have cried and cried over this. It breaks my heart. She can be in pain and I don't know how to show her I am here for her.

I know it's not my fault, but it makes me feel like the world's worst parent. I miss when she was little and I could hold her close. When Chris and I want to cuddle her, we wait until she is asleep and sneak in her room and hold her in her bed. We even moved her onto a twin size mattress from her toddler bed just because it was hard for us to fit in her toddler bed- selfish, I know. Of all the struggles we have faced with Salem, this is the hardest emotionally for me.
*sigh*

Confession!!

I love seeing other children throw tantrums.... When I see a kid having a full blown meltdown in the middle of Target because Mom won't let him have a Snickers, I get the warm n' fuzzies. THANK GOD. I'm not the only one.

Salem is a beautiful child. She is vibrant, silly, and captivating. She is also really good at flipping out. I have walked out of the pediatrician's office because she would not leave another mom alone because she had on a necklace. Salem loves anything that dangles. She tries to take the pediatrician's stethoscope each visit. My husband and I have had to take turns eating at a resturant while out with friends. Salem was freaked out by being restrained by the high chair. I went in the van with her for 20 mins, then Chris took a turn in the van so I could go eat and visit with our friends... It's a blast. Really!

Today Salem wanted a boy's candy while leaving OT. She tried to take it from his hand and when she was told no, let out a high pitched shreek I thought might break that boy's glasses. The therapist tried to hold Salem to calm her down so I could finish paying. Ha ha ha!! My child will not let you HOLD her, silly person! She turned into a screaming noodle and went face down onto the floor where she continued to scream. And she doesn't talk yet, so you can just imagine all the frustration she is feeling.

I sometimes wonder if she feels trapped in her own little head. She does her best to tell me what she wants my grabbing my hand and leading me to things, but not everything can be requested this way. What if she wants me to sing to her, or cuddle with her? She can't really show me that. It really hurts to know she has some of her tantrums out of frustration. And most people, especially those with "normal" kids, totally don't get it. And people with no kids get it even less. I will probably flip out myself the next time I get dirty looks from someone when Salem starts screaming in a store. ASD doesn't announce itself when you look at a child. This is not something a person can just look at and call it out. I have had well meaning people tell me she should get a spanking... (I won't elaborate on my feelings toward those comments because they are ugly.) My daughter doesn't respond to spanking or timeout or distractions. It only makes her scream louder, kick harder, and take longer to calm down.

I'm frustrated, honestly. I thought parenting was going to be a lot easier than it is. And I have few people to talk about this to because the just don't understand. They think their kid has the same kind of tantrums. Hahaha! Ok. Whatever you say... I have met some mamas with kids on the spectrum, and they are like a breath of fresh air. "Wow! Your kid is obsessed with that too! Oh it's ok, girl, let him scream! i love it! We're going to be besties!"

So anyways, I love seeing other people's kids lose it. It's nice to feel like I'm not alone in dealing with this >>>> D,X

Super ugly, but huge Goodwill frame makeover!

I did a Pinterest project a while back.

Looked amazing for about a day then started to bubble and come unglued. How lame. I have since been trying to figure out how to frame the ginormous family picture (which btw is a cheap print on regular copy paper) without selling the kids to pay for a frame that size. I don't know if you know this, but frames with glass cost a lot. Lot's more than our shrinking budget allows.  So when I saw this fugly frame at GW, I was stoked.


My plan is to sand it down and repaint it. Not super innovative but I saved a ton of money since I already have the paint and a palm sander. And no one will ever know it was a POC frame to begin with. Unless of course, they saw this blog post. O.o

 I will report back when the makeover is complete :)

Salem

My sweet princess is making huge progress in the last 2 months. She started going to speech three times a week, occupational therapy (OT) three times a week, and we are soon to start behavioral therapy (ABA). She has been attempting to repeat more words, which is the most exciting thing since we realized she was humming songs. Watching her bloom is so beautiful and humbling. I am learning to enjoy my girls instead of constantly worrying about Salem's future... God's got this.
Currently I am attempting to convert half of my garage into a therapy area for Salem. My plans include a slide, platform swing and maybe a mini trampoline. This kid has so many areas dedicated to her. She has a play area in the living room, the back yard is all hers, she has a room, and our office is also her speech therapy room. I believe it will be worth it all when she first says "I love you too, Mommy!" :) I am waiting!!

Nerf Gun Makeover

So late on posting this, but here it is!

For Father's Day this year, I had a sneaky scheme. A month before Father's Day, I asked Chris to come with me to Walmart on a grocery trip and surprised him by telling him to pick out a Nerf gun. Of course he wanted two so I could play with him :) This is what he picked out.

The thing had an extra magazine so he can more effectively slaughter those who play with him. He even bought an extra pack of foam darts. It's the childhood he always wanted- at 23 :)

I let him have a good month to torture me and my sister with it before my fun, and the REAL Father's Day gift began.

Chris plays Warmachine and Warhammer so I had a brilliant plan to make his brightly colored Nerf gun into something that looked more like a life size weapon from his games.

First I took apart all the little attachments and used a black primer spray paint to prime the whole gun and magazine clips.

Then I used Rub N' Buff and an old artist brush to make the gun look like real metal and age it. The finished product turned out amazing!

I use gold, copper and silver Rub N Buff and different brushes for each color. I applied the Rub N Buff by dry brushing it onto the different section of the gun. I discovered that it looked better to apply a very small amount at a time and brush in different directions.

Chris was very please with his newly made-over Father's Day gift! His gaming buddies liked it too!

It's been too long!

So sorry for the long break. It's been non stop stress and fun since we closed on the house.

As of now we are completely moved in, save the few boxes in the garage that hold the miscellaneous junk that we can't seem to find a proper place for.
We are LOVING the house!! It's beautiful. I love my tray ceilings! And we have a garage! Chris and I never had garages growing up, it's so weird!
It's been so much fun decorating and organizing, I find it hard to sleep some nights. I just keep coming up with ideas.
I guess the first room that I would consider completely finished would be the kitchen.
My pretty little red kitchen.
BUT before it was a lovely red it was gold. I don't like gold. It gave me a headache.

 Now I just adore the space in my kitchen. Not a fan of the tile, but if it's clean, I can live with it until we can afford to replace it.
It took THREE coats of  the red paint to coat evenly. I thought it would never end! But it finally did and when we pulled away the tape this is what we had!!

 I love my little wine rack!

 I have fallen for tray ceilings! LOOOVE them!

 I smell a future crown molding project with that oh too industial light fixture... :)

My lovely sister, who helped me paint the kitchen and the rest of the house, gave me these super cute bar stools she scored at Goodwill a while back. Now I know this is corny, but these are the same bar stools that are on Hannah Montana and ICarly (or so I've heard...*blushes, no I don't watch either of those shows!*). I thought that was a cool fun fact :D

So that's my little red kitchen.More posts to come! Thanks for reading!

DIY Cardboard Owls

Found this adorable idea in a parenting magazine. Using an empty toilet paper or paper towel roll, make cute decorative owls. Simply push down the edges on one side making the top of its head, paint the tube, cut out the eyes, beak, and feet from construction paper and half circles for the wings from decorative paper, such as scrapbook paper. Voila! You now have adorable little owls! These will be going in Miss Salem's room.

Owls!

  I LOVE OWLS. I liked them before the owl craze that seems to be everywhere lately. I'm planning and brainstorming ideas for Salem's new room in the new house. And naturally, I want there to be owls incorporated into the decor. Chris says if I keep pushing owls on Salem, she's going to end up hating them.

Like I said, I liked them before they started popping up in Target on shirts, jewelry, and purses. My love for them began three summers ago when Chris was deployed.

As some of you know, Chris was in the Marines for 4 years. Thankfully he only deployed once, to Afghanistan. He was gone for 10 torturous months. It was the hardest thing I've ever been through. During the deployment, I decided to leave NC to return to LA to be around family with the hopes that it would ease my loneliness. I stayed with my inlaws for a few months, which surrounded me with memories of my husband and me back in high school.

The road he lives off of is a winding country road that runs along a river. It was on this scenic road one particularly lonely night, that I was driving home to my inlaws, extremely upset about God knows what. I remember being on the verge of tears, trying to pay attention to the road, when to the side of the road I saw this owl. Just a typical country owl, sitting on the side of the road, eyes glowing in my headlights. He stayed there looking at me until I passed, and the flew away. Being the sentimental-Disney-princess-loving type of girl I am, the pretty majestic owl made me cry. I had this feeling God put him there on the side of the road to cheer me up. I felt like God was saying "Here Steph, look at this beautiful creature. I sent him to make you smile."

So that's my story. I once saw an owl on the side of the road and thus began my love affair with owls.
SO, back to Salem's room...

  This is the painting I recently finished for Salem's room. I drew much inspiration from this pic I found online.

The painting is acrylic on canvas  and took probably 10 hours altogether.
(Of course that wasn't all at once, silly. It transpired over many nights while watching House with Chris after Salem was in bed.)
This is the first of many owls you will see in Salem's nature themed nursery.
So Salem, you're stuck with them in your room :)

First Post!

We close on the new house on Friday!! So excited! I will soon have so many projects to work on I will be in hog heaven :) There are several things I have all ready begun, but you'll find out later what they are.
To begin this new blog, this new undertaking, I would like to introduce my lovely daughter, Salem. She recently turned ONE.
Her birthday party was quite fun for me. I planned it all out for MONTHS ha! I spent way too much time online looking up theme ideas, cakes, etc...
I settled on "Candyland" for the theme. It was loosely based on the boardgame with more of a focus on bright colors and different types of candy in general. When it all came together, our cake table was every child's fantasy!

The "Salem" banner was made from left over scrapbooking paper :)

Cupcake tower!

Oreo Balls. MMMMMM!

Red Velvet Cookies!

The jars used were recycled jars from my G-ma :) Found the ribbon for super cheap at the dollar store, most of the decorations came from there.

A majority of the decorations were home made.

The pinata was made from tissue paper and paper mache. So much fun to do! Looking back on it now, I wish I had taken pictures of the full process.

I found a party hat print out online that I cut out and pasted over some discount party hats. Salem's hat got special treatment :)

My sister and I made pipe cleaner lolipops covered with saran wrap.

Her first party was a success!