Caribou

If you sign up for email offers on the Caribou website, you'll get notices of their deals.

Just in the last few months there have been 3 times where they were giving 1/2 price drinks for some reason or another. That means you can get the fancy drinks and not feel so guilty about the hefty price tag. 

Saturday and Sunday they are giving a free kids hot chocolate for every coffee purchased. 

So get on over to your nearest Caribou!

For us, it's only a few blocks away. We pretty much only go there when they are having some sort of special, but it's fun having one so close. 

Happy Friday!

Finished

It was a little traumatic at first, but she eventually liked her costume.

She has a little cape on the back too. Thankfully I already had the tights, boots that are too big for next year, and a red shirt. Perfect!

Hope your Wednesday has been SUPER!

I was going to have the kids be a little 50's couple for Halloween, but once I saw this Captain America costume at Goodwill I couldn't pass it up. 

He insisted on wearing it to Target yesterday, and it just didn't seem worth it to break his little heart by telling him no, so I let him. 

With his cowboy boots.

The boy has got some style!

And the little Miss? Wonder Woman, of course!

But this one I'll have to make. I got my supplies yesterday and think it should be pretty easy.

Hope y'all are having a great Tuesday!

Monday

It's been a fun and busy last couple of weeks, but no pictures to show for it. 

The Sufjan Stevens concert in Minneapolis was fan-tas-tic.

The kids and I went up to my parents last week for a few days and had a great time.

Henry got to ride in the combine for the first time and loved it!

I did a bathroom makeover for my mom and she made new curtains for my kitchen. 

I love how that works out!

And now it's a Monday morning trying to recover from the kids not being home a whole lot the last couple of weeks. Lots of screaming and fighting, but what's new? But even through all the noise, I am so thankful for these two little rascals.

Sorry for the boring update...

Happy Monday!

DIY

I saw a friend last weekend with a super cute cowl-type scarf. I loved it! It was handmade with a sweet vintage button on it. I immediately thought it'd be pretty easy to make something similar out of a turtle neck sweater so I gave it a shot last night and here's what I came up with:

(ignore my make up less-running clothes still on-early morning-self)

Not bad! It's not this, but for $1.29 I'm pretty happy with it. That's right, $1.29! Did you know that our local Goodwill stores have a $1.29 sale on Sundays? You just have to ask what color of tag is on sale that day and get to digging. This past Sunday I found 2 sweaters that I plan to cut up and re-stitch. I found this tutorial also that I might try next time instead.

It was absolutely lovely having an evening with nothing to do! Now for the rest of the week I'm back to the usual stay at home mommy/housewife stuff so I can get caught up on stuff.

Um...this running thing is not going well. The first week was exciting because it was fairly easy to add an extra block every day to my agenda. This week is going horribly. I love the feeling of having gotten up early to exercise so I want to definitely keep doing that.....but....I'm just saying....this running thing might not be for me after all. And I may need to hire one of you to be my body guards for the next time I see Julie after this confession. 

Hope you all have a beautiful Wednesday!!

Tuesday

I'm not sure a painting can get much busier, but I have a slight addiction to little details and don't really know when to stop.  These last couple of projects have sure been fun!

Aaaaaaand, I'm exhausted. Too many nights staying up too late painting and too many 5:30 am mornings. 

Have I told y'all how much I hate running?! 

But if I'm going to give the idea (no, I have NOT signed up yet) of "running" in some silly race an honest, good shot, 5:30 is the only time it really works for me so it's been a bit o' a challenge.

So today is catch up day. If I go one more day with my house in it's current state I am going to go crazy! Or just fall over and sleep. 

Yeah. Maybe I'll do that instead. 

Then I might be able to continue the dream I had last night that RJ got a tatoo of Ray LaMontagne on his shoulder. It was amazing-ly weird.

Tatoos are on my mind lately.

What kind of tatoo would you get???

This month is flying by...I can't believe it's almost half over. 

This weather has been so amazing, but dare I say too hot?? The forcast looks perfect once again this week so I'm looking forward to lots of time outside before the snow comes.

You know it's just around the corner!

Oh these kids. I always think it's funny when yet another older mom looks at my children and then at me and says, "it's goes so fast". Does a day pass without someone saying that? Rarely, but only because it's so true.

Henry is losing his baby face more and more and used the word "stupid" for the first time the other day. I know there is so much worse to come than that, but something about it broke my heart a little.

Earlier this summer Harper could barely push herself around on her little bike and Henry has quickly become to big for his.

It seems like just yesterday that Harper would look at me whenever I said her name and now she ever-so-sweetly ignores me all the time. (what is with that phase?!)

Just a few short months ago I could barely get her hair in a pony and now she often wears two piggies. 

It's been a good last few weeks though. Even though they are getting older and things are going quickly, I realize more and more how much I like being a mom the older they get. The baby stage is hard and tiring and frustrating. The toddler stage is all that and then some, but I feel like I can really say I love being a mom now.

And that's a great feeling.

And now onto some random-ness:

I was somehow talked into thinking about running a "race" at the end of November. It's a crazy cross country-type race that has lots of hills, climbing, mud, etc. 

Seriously, I have not run a mile since high school. 12 YEARS ago. 

So I started running a little over a week ago and it's going good. I tried to run last spring for a 5k, but my knees hurt so bad after the first few runs that I had to stop and couldn't walk normally for 3 weeks! I'm not sure what the difference is this time around, but I'm having absolutely no knee pain. And here's a shot of the shoes I wear while running:

Just some little tennies with NO support what-so-ever. Isn't that a little strange?

Anyways, I haven't signed up for this race yet and am not quite convinced I will. I've been told there are all sorts of people who run this and I will for sure not be the worst one there. I'm sure there will even be people who run it a bit intoxicated. But still. 7 MILES. And I'm about 3 months behind on training. Am I just setting myself up for an early death?

****************

I finished up a 4 seasons set for a sweet friend. I had started it and was not liking it one bit, but thankfully my husband has become a very refined art critique-er and helped me figure some things out and I ended up really liking them. 

So here they are, Angie! 

I guess this could be really awkward if you don't like them, huh? :)

 And today and tomorrow I'll be finishing up another fun and funky project:

So I guess I better get busy.

Hope you all have a great Monday!

Whatta Weekend

We had such a good family weekend.

The orchard on Friday.

2 family walks on Saturday.

Church on Sunday morning.

Then a sack lunch in the car while we went on a Farm Crawl.

We made it to 4 of the farms and sampled some yummy feta, goat cheese, root beer, and bought some pumpkins and butternut squash. My favorite farm was The Blue Gate Farm.

It was so fun! And since we were in driving around in the Southern part of the state, we decided to take a little detour to the little town RJ spent a few years of his life in, called Russell. It's fun being able to see all of his old houses!

I also lost my cell phone over the weekend.

I also found a vacuum on the side of the road and you know I picked it up. In fact, I walked it a block to my house.
Seriously. I walked a vacuum to my house. I carried it like a baby for a bit and then pushed it for a while. It's a big one.
We really needed a new vacuum and I am NOT above taking something with a sign that says
"Free or Goodwill".
thankyouverymuch

I think Henry and Harper will be a 50's "Grease" style couple for Halloween. Can't wait

to get started on those projects!

I've got a few painting orders to finish up this week and next and then I'm takin' a break and doing some things around the house again. I've been neglecting it a bit lately.

Hope you all have a lovely week!!

Puuuuumpkin Patch

This has some major photos...but this one's for me. When I'm stuck inside this winter on a snowy day, I'm gonna look back at these photos and be happy.

We went to my very favorite pumpkin patch today: Center Grove Orchard.

I've actually only been there twice now, but that's enough for me!

I felt my little miss should dress appropriately in adorable fall colors with a fancy new bow. Of course she had other ideas, but it was cute while it lasted.

Henry was very excited to dress like a cowboy. He was running around all morning SO excited and shouting things like "howdy partner!", "giddy up!".

He ran to the entrance.

Kind of tricky in boots.

First things first. The pillow-jumpy-thingy. It looked like so much fun! Harper didn't like it, but Henry loooooved it.

He also loved the amazingly fun and long slide.

AND the maze.

Seriously, he was say "come on, guys!" and running from one thing to the next.

Playing farmer.

Feeding animals.

And the absolute cutest thing I've seen in my life.

Alice in Wonderland's Tea Party!

I Harper was so excited.

Such a cute spot for a photo, but she would NOT look at me.

Seriously, look at this!!

I'm so doing this for her birthday party some year.

(or every year.)

(or for me.)

There are so many cute things to explore.

The 3 little pigs. 

Straw house:

Brick House:

Stick House:

 

It was also pretty funny when we realized Henry had locked a couple of (rather obnoxious) boys inside one of the houses.  :)

My sweet little pumpkin:

Both of my sweet little pumpkins:

It was just one of those days. One of those perfect days as a family.

The weather was absolutely beautiful. We got along. Laughed. Played.

It Was Great.

I Am Happy.