Living out Passions & Beating the Winter Blues

As I've posted recently, we've been getting a lot of snow lately. Along with the snow, we have had extremely low temperatures. Think single digits. And sometimes even below zero, especially when you factor in the wind chill. We are in New England, so the cold is to be expected, but this is an abnormally snowy & cold winter.

I'm a New England girl, born and raised here, but I'm not really a fan of all of this snow and cold. I love summer, I often long for the warm weather. When it is warm, and by warm I mean in the 40's or higher, we are outside. Every day. I love being outside and so do my kids. We spend so much time out of the house when it's warm. It's good for all if us and makes all of us happy. This winter, we're not really getting much of that. We're getting a lot of inside time.

Lately I've realized that rather be sad and upset by the weather, I need to just embrace this time and make the most of it. I need to do the things inside that make me happy. That is, when I'm given the time to do them! Darling Daddy (thankfully!) finished painting the basement last weekend, which means that after about 6 months of working in the basement on the weekends, he's free to help out and spend time with the kids! I took that as my invitation to go a little Pinterest crazy with projects. 

I'm a Type-A girl at heart. Love organization, excellent multi-tasker, very driven & motivated to get things done and achieve goals and also a little bit impatient. Though Darling Daddy would argue to say that I'm very impatient. With that being said, I was getting an itch to get some things done around the house and in the basement. Things that would not only make me happy during this long winter season, but also make me happy just to be doing them and creating things. I like to create things, it's who God made me to be. So, I feel happy when I'm able to follow my passions and use the talents God blessed me with.

I was inspired to share this after reading my online devotional this morning. You can read it here: 

http://us2.campaign-archive1.com/?u=f63562b3be485ea0ae33acf18&id=e0394b0105&e=6e468428c4

The first thing I wanted to do was create a space for me in the living room. I needed a grown up area where I can sit each morning and have my coffee and quiet time before the kids get up. I read, I pray, I plan here. I wanted it to be a place that I feel comfortable and like a grown up. 

I stained the wood block and K on the wall and used a stencil to paint the bird on the burlap. The flower vase is a recycled spice bottle and the wood is a basement scrap. The chair was (finally!!!!) on sale on Target.com a couple weeks ago, so I splurged. My happy corner :) I can't show you the rest of the living room, at least not until all of the toys disappear into the soon-to-be basement playroom!

My dad lent us his saw and the yellow guide thing. Thank goodness! Otherwise, these projects may not have happened!

I have been wanting to make one of these for years! Since we had some scrap wood from the basement project, I figured now was the time. Not to mention that Curly Girl and Ginger Boy are now four and two. We need to record their heights while they're still young! And you'll also notice that the ruler goes up to 7 feet. We have high hopes. Literally. Just kidding. I upcycled wood the best I could.

This chair was a free find at a take-it-or-leave-it shed years ago when Curly Girl was just a few months old. We originally painted it pink, but I'd been wanting to make it more gender neutral for a while. The sign is one of my favorites! Another piece of scrap plywood painted with black chalkboard paint bought years ago for another project and the photo letters were bought with a Groupon a while back. Probably paid more than I should for them (Because I accidentally let the actual Groupon expire... Did I forget to tell you that Darling Daddy? Oh well. Water under the bridge...)

These blocks are painted with chalkboard paint so the kids can draw their own windows and doors on them. More basement wood scraps of course! 

I still have a few more planned projects, but this was enough to satisfy me at this time. 

Snow, more snow, sickness, and more snow

It's been snowing a lot here. Most of you know this, but just in case you didn't, now you do. We've been confined to our home quite a bit lately because of the massive amounts of snow that keep falling, the bitter cold temperatures, and catching the flu. How we managed to get the flu when we had been so confined to home is still something I'm trying to figure out! Here is what life as looked like for us over the past few weeks.

Practicing the letter F in as many ways that we can think of. These Dollar Tree foam shapes stick to the window when they area little wet.

Reading the Bible story about Jesus feeding 5,000 people with five loaves and two fish. Then we made our own baskets and cut out fish and loaves. Great lacing and cutting practice for Curly Girl.

Playing with paper towel and toilet paper rolls and Pom poms. Gravity at its finest :)

Turning the water play table into a bean play table. I'm still finding beans everywhere! 

Reading time together on the couch. It will be so fun when she can actually read to him!

Play dough play and mixing. The mixing drives me absolutely crazy, but I've given up on trying to stop it. That only makes me crazier!

Coloring time. Lots and lots of coloring time.

Indoor snow play. There's enough of it outside, so why not bring it in too?

Trying to bring down the fever on my poor, sick girl :(

Watching Tangled, while dressed up as Rapunzel with her prince.

Cornstarch & water slimy goo play. Messy, but so fun! 

Some apple math, including some basic addition! 

A trip to Target with some special treats for good behavior. Getting out of the house felt good!

Helping Darling Daddy with a little work project.

A Valentine's Day game that included some Lego building. 

Darling Daddy FINISHED PAINTING THE BASEMENT!!! Now we just need heat & carpet and then it can be our playroom! Hooray! 

A visit to the indoor zoo. Also known as Pet Smart ;)

Free birthday treats from the Barnes & Noble cafe for some special birthdays last week.

Made my first batch of natural hand lotion. It was super easy and so far seems to be working great on our extremely dry & chapped winter skin.

Flowers from my mom when we were sick have been brightening the kitchen, as well as the tulips that I couldn't pass up on our last trip to Market Basket.

The view out on our walk-out back patio. The fence is probably about 7 feet tall. And that's our table & chairs somewhere under there too. I wonder if we'll be able to use it by Memorial Day? 

We went outside to play in the bitter, freezing temperatures. The snow piles are gigantic! The light Poe that I'm level with is about 12 feet tall! 

The target.com shipment box that has provided lots of fun and will continue to bring hours of fun :)

Our first ever meal at Moe's! Did you know that kids eat free all day on Tuesdays? Daddy was working late, so this was a win for all of us! 

So there you go! These are just some of the things we've been up to over the past few weeks!