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 :)