Matchy Matchy

As I have read various people's blog it has made me kinda think about what I want my blog to be like. The blogs that I especially love seem to have some direction or congruency versus the rather random postings I have been doing. So I have decided to create schedule for my blog to help me remember what things I care about posting and take some of the "thrown together"-ness out of my blog. I have already started to feel out my schedule with some of my postings but I want to try to be more regular about it. The schedule could very likely change, or I might hate it all together (although I highly doubt that because almost everything in my life has a routine or schedule. I already live by a weekly schedule (which I don't tell many people about because they look at me funny ( it is kinda hilarious that I am now telling the whole world via my blog)), so I imagine adding in a blog schedule seems normal (p.s. how many stinkin' times have I already said schedule?!))

I am thinking that Monday will be Olive Loves Day. She is rather quirky and hilarious so I thought that would be a fun way to highlight it. Wednesday will be something I Love Day, which will probably include things about my house which you might be sick of but ehh. Friday will be something I have Created Day. I work on all kinda of different projects and sometimes I want to show them off not because I want praise or admiration but to justify me spending so much time on them.

Seeing as it is Friday I thought I would start out with a project I recently finished. I am not a fantastic seamstress although I can kinda get by with what I know. My mom, who is an amazing seamstress but has no time to do it, always tried to get me into sewing when I was a teenager. The pressing and the tediousness really turned me off then. I wish I had stuck with it more because I feel like I am just learning as I go now. I figure, the more I do it, the less "homemade" things will look. So here is my creation:

I love fabric stores. I could spend hours there if I didn't have a baby with me pulling everything off of every shelf. On a recent trip to the fabric store I found this cute bird patterned fabric. I decided it would be perfect for a skirt I had been wanting to make. And although I know it is very cheesy I was estatic when I saw there was enough left over fabric to make Olive a matching dress.

Here is a better shot of her dress. I found this cute free pattern online.


I included this shot just because I like it.

A friend of mine came over for a late night bow making party and she helped me create this matching clip. I am kinda in love with it.

This is Olive telling us "NO NO NO" because she was done taking pictures.

Olive Loves....

Shoes! Olive is all girl. We got her these new shoes last week and she is obsessed with them. She holds her foot up to admire them when she is in the stroller. She asks for them first thing in the morning. She says "bye bye shoes" at nap time. Seriously obsessed. How could you not be though? I mean those are adorable right?

Olive is not just obsessed with her new shoes.


This is how I found Olive this morning. Anytime our closet gets accidentally left open it is inevitable that I will find her in there.

She tries on every single pair. The taller the heel the better. She likes to look at them. And point to the different parts on them. And just hold them. And talk about them. And talk to them. And love them. We might have a major addict on our hands.

I love when she takes them out to walk around in. They are usually on the wrong feet or sometimes backwards but that doesn't phase her at all. Often she can only walk around with one shoe on and one barefoot to keep her balance. I get to hear CLOMP CLOMP CLOMP all day. The only time to put them away is nap time otherwise I am afraid I will lose an arm. She must be distracted by something else, otherwise it is a major tantrum to clean all the shoes up.

I don't mind though because, well, look at her!


How stinkin' cute is she?!

Our Back Yard Version 2

When we first went into our back yard we did not want to leave. We would go sneak back there and hang out even before we actually owned the house. For all of the weird things in the back yard, it is actually pretty magical (yes, I think it is magical) and serene. be prepared to feel like you are at Disneyland!

Here is the entrance to our back yard. You have to pass through these two bushes to enter. It feels very Secret Garden to me. Check 1 for magical!

This is what you see when you are entering our secret passageway. I just stuck these old chairs under this tree and I really like them there. I think it is charming to have a little sitting area under a tree.

I feel like our yard looks like a park. It has lots of old trees that are really big and they provide excellent shade. Even in the middle of the afternoon most of the yard is shaded. I think it is perfect. Now that our trees are blooming it looks extra beautiful, although it is pretty horrible for Scott's allergies.

Our yard is kinda narrow and then goes wider. This is one half. (notice our close line and mystery box hanging out in the corner)

Here is the other half. Doesn't it look just like a park?

Here is the opposite angle to give you a full 360 view.

This is what I looked at as I sat and read, surrounded by chirping birds and the smell of blooming flowers. It was so relaxing and serene. Adorable right? I could hang out there all day, and usually we do.

This is our cute bench and probably the number one reason I feel like it is a park back there. The only problem is that the bush in the middle attracts bees, so we might have to replace it sometime.

See I told you we had big awesome trees.

Another magical spot is this little bench that is tucked in the corner. I love it. I can envision many a family/birthday/ Easter/whatever picture out on this little bench. It is one of Olive's favorite spots in the yard also.

This is our monstrosity planting bed all cleaned up. Doesn't it look great? Finally the tulips have come in and I can't wait to go to the nursery to fill it up with not poisonous plants.

Other cool features of our back yard are that it is isolated from all our neighbors. We don't have any houses really close to us so we can be as loud as we want. Also, our neighbor directly behind us has a full tennis court with lights that she said we can us any time. I was kinda bummed because there didn't seem to be a great place for a garden in our yard, but our tennis neighbor also has tons of planting beds and she said we can use them.

I thought I would include this photo of our side yard. You can't see it very well but it has a great mountain view. I am not sure why but this is one of my favorite views or our yard. These trees are our view outside of our windows. It is like having a beautifully framed picture as our window.

The awesomeness of our yard just might be my favorite part of our house! I hope you basked in the magicalness.

Olive loves Mac and Cheese

A lot!

Our Yard

We were so excited about moving into a house because that meant a yard. No more lugging strollers up and down 3 flights of stairs to go to the park. Or stepping in dog poop on the common grass. Or scraped knees because the side walk was the only place to play. Nope, now we can conveniently walk a few step and play all day. BUT....we were buying a very old house that had a very old lady living in it and have discovered some unusual, puzzling, or down right crappy things about our yard.
For example, here you see our lovely beach themed planting decoration. These plants are as pokey as they look. It was once filled with shells and rocks that were probably gathered from all over the world and have now been scattered across our yard. I kinda really hate this little piece of paradise.

Here is a planter box that housed some fake flowers and an odd dog statue.

I personally find this statue to be very very creepy. What is wrong with it?

I feel like now I can't get rid of either of these things because Olive has become quite attached to them. She loves to dig in the planter box and I tell myself it is kinda like a sand box but less scary. That is normal right?

We do have a clothes line. This is kinda good and bad. The good is that I love the thought of it, and might use it because it is actually in great shape. The bad is, and I am probably crazy for thinking about this but, do I want a place for my kids to hang from? Is that a danger? What could really happen and if nothing could then why does it scare me? Still undecided I guess.

Then there is this square stone mystery box. It is full of mush and mud and possibly a dead animal and we are quite clueless to its function or purpose. Was it really just an oversized planting box?

I so wish it was a cute and charming original well like our neighbors have. Unfortunately, ours stone square box is nothing.

Then there's this monstrosity. It is over grown and dying and just a big mess. I think it will probably be more difficult to clean up than I am expecting.

But I am nervous to replant anything real in it because Olive thinks it is a great place to play.

However, I found out the it is filled with this highly skin irritating, non-native weed that takes over all the other plants. My poor niece was playing with it and got the liquid on her skin. She had a horrible reaction and it looked so scary and painful. So now I have been super paranoid about Olive playing in there. It is my goal this weekend to get it all pulled out so that I am not a nervous wreck.

The thing I am most dreading to tackle it the ivy ground cover. It is everywhere. Seriously. It is old and very established. It killed two trees. I hear it is a real bugger to get rid of and grows back every year. I hate it . This is the down and out crap part of our yard.

Oh, but I can't forget these gems.

And our weird rock/bucket area. Is it a rock garden? Is it a planting garden? Why?

One of the big problems with our yard is that this is what our fence looks like. Sad. It does nothing to keep the children in and does even less to keep the dogs out. I hate picking up dog poop when we don't even have a dog. Maybe this is the most crap part of our yard.

However, I saved the best for last. Yes, indeed. This is a headstone. Nobody knows why it is there. Nobody know if it is real. Nobody knows what to do with it. I personally am guessing that poor Ms. Janet White is not buried in our back yard. But what if she is? The kinda really creepy part is that she died on my actual birthday. The exact same day. Odd no? Creepsville? YES!

A Trip to the Farm

Scott has been so busy with work that we decided to have a family weekend and spend some time together. We live close to an adorable farm and in the spring they usually have baby animals so we decided this would be the perfect relaxing place. I love taking Olive here now that she is obsessed with animals. As we were walking over to the animals (past the farm house) she kept saying "Amimals. Amimals. Where?"

Olive was a little unsure about the cows but mostly because they smelled horrible. She was yelling "MOOO MOOO" at them.

Checking out the horses.

They had lots of goats and some really tiny babies. Olive knows what goats are but finds it confusing to say a sound for them.

I love that you can get so close to the animals and some are friendly enough to pet. Another little girl was petting this pig. Olive's expression says to me "What is wrong with you girl? There's no way I'm going to touch that. That thing is way bigger than me!"

The turkeys made her quite nervous actually because they kept puffing up their feathers and gobbling at us. They were not being very friendly. She did however like flapping her arms and walking around the chickens.

The tractor is always fun to play on.


They have a ton of ducks which made Olive very excited.



Some nice people shared their bread with us so we could feed the ducks but Olive thought it was more important to feed herself.

She didn't understand why we were trying to throw her food away.

We got some treats and took a break at the cute little country store. Olive had so much fun and it was nice to go together, usually it is just Olive and me and sometimes friends. It was a great day. I am so in love with spring!