Archives for February 2012

It is a gloomy, rainy, tornadoey kind of day.

We are having a mid-day movie picnic.  Sometimes these days are just fun and much needed.

I chose Kung Foo Panda…Jack Black is so hilarious.

The other night I got home and saw this on our chalkboard.

I love Josh Kelley’s movie voting system…and his drawings.  Can you guess the choices?

Last night I attempted rainbow velvet cupcakes.  I made red velvet cupcakes for the first time on Valentines this year.  I used Paula Dean’s Recipe but with my Mom’s cream cheese icing recipe.  Mom’s icing recipe is like Paula’s except Mom used 2 tsp of vanilla, instead of just 1.

I always just assumed that an ingredient made red velvet cake red, but turns out it’s just food coloring, so why does Red Velvet Cake have to be red?  Well, it doesn’t.  I saw this pin on Pinterest and knew I needed to attempt it.

I made up my Red Velvet batter minus the food coloring.  It was just this puke brown kind of color…totally not appealing at all.

I wanted all the colors of the rainbow…red, orange, yellow, green, blue and purple.

I then divided out the puke brown batter into 6 different bowls.

Dyed each bowl of batter a different rainbow color.  Since the batter was the not so great brownish color, my orange, yellow and green were not as bright as I wanted, but they still worked.

I added a little bit of each batter color to my muffin cups and baked.

I iced them with the cream cheese icing, added a few sprinkles and delivered some today as a sweet encouragement.  The wee Kelleys and I are now enjoying one after our lunch.

Yes, today is definitely a rainbow cupcake kind of day.

Happy Wednesday!

Last night we had a date night.  We hit up the Nike outlet and O’Charleys.  Hot right?  Totally.  Nike was really up on their presentation of dry-fit shirts.  Love!

When we got home we noticed there were little drawings stuck all over our house with funny names.  Susan had dressed up like Cat in the Hat and read the wee Kelley’s There’s a Wocket in my Pocket.  After the book they made different monster’s and gave them names.

There was a shone on our phone, a hink on our sink, a flock on our clock, a S.V. on our T.V., a gomputer on our computer, a boilet on our toilet, a hofa on our sofa, a zarpet on our carpet, a sall on our wall, a deiling on our ceiling, a bhair on our chair and a dirror on our mirror.

Have I mentioned that Susan is grand and a 1st grade teacher…you want her don’t you?  This morning the kids were beside themselves with excitement to see if we noticed all the little monsters all over the house.  It was bliss!

Today Sol and I ran a few errands while Harper and Hud were at MDO.  We found this fabric at Walmart and pretty sure Sol about peed himself with sheer joy.  He just stared and named off every super hero the entire shopping trip.

I got to have a good long chat with our Ethiopia director today.  Those talks are always so hopeful and yet, still so hard…at the same time.  Afterwards I made this 12×12 canvas.  I have no idea what I am going to do with it, but for today, it just needed to be created.

Tonight I am going to attempt rainbow velvet cupcakes…we shall see how that turns out.  I’ll let you know if it was super success or super fail 🙂  See you tomorrow.

Monday is here and the week has begun.  The weather in Tennesse has been crazy wonderful.  We’ve spent the majority of the day outside and when the boys are done napping we will be headed out once again.  Super yah for spring…the Kelleys are so ready for you.

My sweet friend Susan asked me to go to a night service with her last night.  I agreed 🙂  I was beyond glad I went.  Ever have one of those days when you feel like the message was just for you?  That was me, last night.  It was about life not going as planned and waiting…hello…I really needed this message.  I burnt up my pen by taking lots and lots of notes.  God knew I needed to hear this.  And afterwards we ate Chuys.  YUM!  Thanks for asking me Susan!

Spring is just around the corner which means Easter goodies are everywhere.  I have my first 1/2 marathon of the year in just 2 short weeks…I’m beyond nervous.  But in the mean time, I’m running my legs off and eating these guys.  They are my arch-nemisis…I’m just too weak to fight their chocolatey, creamy goodness….MUST.HAVE.MORE.WILL.POWER.

These adorable sweat pants were at Target.  I almost, like totally almost, bought them for Harper, but they just were not quite clearanced enough for me yet.  I’ll have to keep checking back.

Harper and Huddy have been way overdue for new carseats.  They’ve out grown their other ones, but I just kept waiting until the highback boosters were on sale.  Today was our day!  Their car rides just got a little more comfortable.  Sol was a bit bummed, but he’s an itty bitty still…kid is still weighing in at a mere 27lbs…I told him he needed to be drinking some protein shakes if he wants a new seat 🙂

And want to know something else about my car?  Well okay!  My #1 car love is this beautiful trash bag.  I bought these 2-years-ago for Christmas presents and gifted myself one too.  I adore it and the quality is topnotch!  Can you adore a trash bag?  Sure you can.  And as you can see, I really do use it.  It keeps my car oh so clean and trash free.  I bought them HERE!

Harper is all about some color.  I’ve had some plain tees bought up for her for some time and she recently asked for a rainbow shirt.  Sunday she actually threw a ginormous fit because I made her wear a blue jean dress…that is adorable and my mom bought for her…because the dress “has no color.”  She cried so hard because “I love color and this dress is all blue and has no color.  You know I like color.”  She still had to wear the dress…when you throw a fit over something in our house, you do not get your way, but she was allowed to accessorize.  She added yellow and white striped leggings, purple, pink and blue striped socks and her yellow anchor shoes.  I should have taken a picture 🙂

And we’re thrilled because all 3 wee Kelleys are officially signed up for soccer.  This is the first year everyone gets to play.  They are in heaven and the boys will be rockin’ it out on the same team.  Spring is going to be good…like real good.

Hope your weekend was smashingly great.  Happy Monday!

A few things that have brought a bit of joy lately:

I cleaned our floors today.  Even though the actual cleaning itself is not so joyous, the end result is.  Our floors were quite dirty.

A jumbo watercolor set we found at TJ Maxx…who knew watercolors came in size ginormous.

Superhero kids…

and even better are soaring superhero kids.

Finding the wee Kelleys like this…just chatting in Harper’s room.

Harper’s new sunshine shirt.  This was my oh so happy project for today.  All that yellow and orange fabric and tons upon tons of stitching lifted my spirits quite a bit.  Harper digs it.

Laughter…loud ticklish laughter.  It’s just pure joy.

Thursday night date night…

to the NeedToBreathe concert at the Ryman.  The joy factor was high…let me count the ways:

1) Opening act Ben Rector = fantastic.

2) NTB had one of the coolest backdrops I’ve seen at a concert…you can never go wrong with an old, giant typewriter…way cool.

3) NeedToBreathe rocked it out.

4) I may have shed quite a few tears during the concert, good hard tears.

And last, but certainly not least…good babysitters.  Babysitters who craft with our kids and bring them cool surprises and love on them and invest in them.

  Mom was our main babysitter.  She gave us date nights almost every week.  Harper and I would join her on girls only dates.  She talked to my kids everyday & saw them almost everyday too.  She was the one person that knew our kids just as good as Josh and I do.  And she and Harper had an extra special relationship.

When she watched the kids, she really & truly enjoyed them.  She could have easily turned on the tv and zoned out, but she didn’t.  They played games and talked and danced and colored and their favorite game was hair dresser.  She always said she loved to see their imaginations work.  She cannot be replaced, but we have some dear friends who have been doing some babysitting for us and loving and investing in our kiddos, like Grammy did.  That is one thing that truly brings some joy.

Lots of things to be thankful for…lots of things to find joy in.

Have a great weekend!

Today I set about cleaning out all of the kiddos’ crafty supplies.  The amount of paper alone is just unheard of.  As I was cleaning out the drawer that houses their paper, stamps and a few other supplies, I re-discovered this picture.

It’s Harper’s interpretation of our family portrait.

And that’s Little Kelley Brother in Josh’s arms.  He’s blue with only three legs or maybe that’s not a third leg 😉

We are open to an older child, so I was very intrigued that Harper drew Little Brother as a baby.  She also said this morning on the way to school that she thought we would see his face soon.  I’m crossing my fingers that she’s prophetic.

I can hope right?

Happy Thursday!

Stay with me through my random Kelley rambles for today.

Two different sets of flowers were delivered to our house on Monday…that was nice…actually, super nice.

Thanks Ashley and Jen.

I’ve been gearing up for re-opening to orders.  I’m making some changes all around…blog, logo, pricing, etc.  It’s all coming together.  Dana at Lifelines Designs rocks…like seriously rocks.

Bunting has been made twice this week.  A shirt for Harper and some cute cards that I have happy, artful plans for 🙂

This tee made me super excited.  Thanks Ashley B…you are beyond kind.

Huddy called me over to our scrabble board and said, “Look mom.  Sol and I spelled Green Lantern.”  God love em’.

I cleaned out our treat drawer this week.  Looks like we are officially unofficial Pez dispenser collectors.

This girl is getting good at checkers.  Starting to give me a run for my money.

I really dig thank you cards…especially ones with pictures.

My Aunt Martha and Cousin Amy came to visit yesterday.  It was great to chat with them and hug their necks.  And it didn’t hurt that they brought these with them.

And I like these wee Kelleys.  Like a lot.  Like a super lot.

Happy Wednesday!

Around the Kelley house we are ready for winter to be gone and spring to arrive.  I have been pulling all our winter crafts down and wanted some new spring crafts to go up, so for our weekly craft we made butterfly glyphs.

Glyphs are super fun.  If you have never done one with your kiddos…today is the day.  A glyph is simply a new way to represent something.  They show several pieces of information all at once…they are fun is what they really are 🙂

Here are the supplies you will need:  Traced butterfly in child’s favorite color, blank body of butterfly, plain paper, scissors, glue, crayons and/or markers and glyph criteria.

Here’s the criteria we used for our glyph:

*Make the wings your favorite color.

*Color the body green if your are a boy.  Color the body purple if you are a girl.

After the kiddos cut out their butterfly and colored the butterfly body, they glued it down to their paper.

* Draw hearts on your butterfly wings if you are 4-years-old.  Draw circles on your butterfly wings if you are 3-years-old.

*Give your butterfly straight antennas if you like ice cream the best.  Give your butterfly curvy antennas if you like candy the best.

*Draw a sunshine on the right side of your page if you like reading best.  Draw a sunshine on the left side of your page if you like TV best.

* Give your butterfly a smiley face if you like to dance.  Give your butterfly a silly face if you do not like to dance.

*Write your name at the top of the page if you like winter best.  Write your name at the bottom of the page if you like summer the best.

And those are our butterfly glyphs.  Your kids will love these and you can change them up in a million different ways.

Have a great Tuesday.  Peace, Love & Glyphs.

Thank you guys so much for everyone who entered our 15 Months Waiting Art Giveaway.  I won’t lie, just about the only reason I semi enjoy these giveaways is because of all the kind and encouraging comments and all the prayers that are being prayed over our little Kelley family.  It is just so encouraging and I cannot say Thank You enough.

And the winner of this months canvas is…

#202 Gretchen.  Super congrats Gretchen and check your email for a message from me.

Today marks 3 months since my Mom passed away.  The first thing I do on the 20th of each month is pray for my brother Chris’ day and then text him to let him know I did.  My sweet friend Courtney, whose dad passed away shortly before Mom did, always, always, always remembers this day.  My phone goes off very early in the morning every 20th and that is strangely a wonderful feeling.

I know monthly anniversaries probably seem silly, but for someone who has lost a loved one and in my personal opinion,  they are far from silly.  They are important.  It seems after the funeral people tend to just forget…life goes on, people get busy, nobody really remembers the significance of that certain day, but Courtney & her family always do and I know it’s because they get grief on a really, crappy level.  I don’t know if others feel this way or not, but now that I’m right in the midst of this crazy grief, my mind still just does not comprehend how she can be gone.

Maybe this is the denial part, but I mean, I know my Mom is dead…we watched her be put into the ground and then even stayed for the entire burial.  We were the crazy family who out lasted the grounds crew at her service 🙂  Mom was fully buried and the grounds crew long gone, before we left.  It was a little odd, but that’s just how we did it.  So I don’t argue the fact that she’s actually dead.  What I keep asking myself is how someone can just cease to exist anymore.  It literally perplexes my mind.  I talked to my Mom multiple, and I do mean multiple on the heavy side of multiple, times a day and saw her almost everyday as well.  When the phone rings, even still, my first thought is that it’s her.  It is just so weird and odd and crazy.

Even before my Mom’s death our house was full of reminders of her and even more so now.  It makes me sad and glad at the same time.  I especially like these reminders of her for the wee Kelleys.  I want to make sure they DO.NOT forget her.  We talk about Grammy every single day.  I recently made a magnet board for Mom’s old Scrabble board game.

When we first moved into our house over 5 years ago, I wanted a fairly large magnet board for right outside our kitchen.  I headed to Home Depot and bought a 18×24 piece of sheet metal, found a frame and that was that.  Done and done.  It doesn’t get much easier than that.

I knew I wanted to do something similar and visual with Mom’s Scrabble tiles, but wanted it to be a bit different.  This project is fairly simple.  I started with an old frame my friend Brea didn’t want anymore and left on our back porch.  I really dig friends that do things like that 🙂  Thanks Brea!  I spray painted the frame red because red was Mom’s favorite color.

I bought a piece 18×24 sheet metal at Home Depot, traced the backing of the frame onto the sheet metal and cut it out.  Make sure you always wear gloves when cutting sheet metal.  Sheet metal cutters are very inexpensive, but they also usually come in your standard tool box, so make sure you check your tool box before you go buy some.

I wanted it to be a little different than our other magnet board, so I bought a small jar of Mod Podge and found some old wrapping paper I had purchased a while back to cover the sheet metal with.

I covered the sheet metal a section at a time from top to bottom and laid the wrapping paper over top, smoothing it out as I went.  After I had the paper all on, I trimmed any excess paper off and added an extra coat of Mod Podge to the top.

Once the sheet metal was dry I just put it into the frame and put the back to the frame back in as well.  Magnet board…done and done.

The Scrabble pieces just don’t get much easier.  I separated out all the letters and decided how many of each letter I wanted to use.

Then I just hot glued magnets onto the back of each Scrabble tile and added them to the board.  And there you have it.

The kids have SO loved this.  Harper has been a spelling machine and the boys enjoy helping her find the letters she asks for.

And now we have, yet another, sweet reminder of Mom.  It makes me super happy.  Hope you will give this project a try.

Have a great Monday.