Week 29: What'd You Want Me To Do? Dress In Drag And Do The Hula?

Oh the Lion King. Hayden has become OBSESSED. It started about a week and a half ago, and he hasn't let up. I'm pretty impressed that without having seen it for years, I can still recite most of the movie by heart. This impresses Hayden to no end. I'm suddenly the coolest mom ever. I'm pretty sure he thinks I created/wrote/produced the Lion King. Clearly, theres no explanation. He came home from school every day and asked to watch it. It's like me and Mary Poppins all over again.

The only real fun thing we got to do this week, was a trip to IKEA and Home Depot on Saturday to get some things for the house, and a trip to the Florida State Fair on Monday. Yes, we have our state fair in February. It's really not that awesome though. When I think fair I think lots of animals to pet, incredibly amateur flower arrangements (sans those kids who have their moms do them), dish pan towns, random teddy bear collections, lego wanna-be models, 4-H Milkshakes, and the 'Beef it's what's for dinner' tent with $1.25 lemon shake ups. This fair has none of that. It's mostly rides and food, but we always skip the rides, because it's ridiculously expensive- something like $30 for an all you can ride wrist band. So, we have food and a couple of random animals. We went the last day of the fair- because I was still sick this weekend- and because it was free admission after 4. The downside was that things were really winding down, and most of the animals were already on their way home.

We did get to go in the tent that has a sampling of all kinds of different animals- and some nice people on their way out handed us a cup of free food. By day 16 of the fair though, the goats, sheep and chickens are about as fat and happy as they can be. We could only get one or two goats not to turn their noses up at the food. We skipped most the food, but Asa couldn't resist the bacon dipped in chocolate, and we all got an order of fried cookie dough and split it. Hayden spent a little birthday money and got a balloon, and we bought a slice of fudge to bring home. Overall, it was a fun trip to the fair.

The boys were off school Monday- thanks to Presidents Day, and the younger two are in dire need of new tennis shoes- so we headed off to Kohls. I'm not sure about the Kohls here though, they hardly ever have anything in the boys sizes. Yet, theres like 18 rows of girls shoes. I get it, little girls like shoe shopping- but you gotta give me something! This time there were zero shoes in Haydens size, and only 1 in Peyton's, and he didn't like the bright orange (and I didn't blame him), so were still on the hunt- maybe hitting the outlet mall this weekend. I did notice though, all the inventory slips taped to the aisles, and all I could think about was how happy I didn't have to do that crap anymore. Ugh, retail.

Wednesday Asa had the day off- he switched out a regular work day for a work from home day on Saturday. He got up and let me sleep and took the boys to school. After lunch we went thrift store shopping. I have never had so much fun. We went to the Salvation Army looking for a dresser, and possibly some bar stools. We didn't find any, but clothing was half off so we headed over to the polo shirt section and discovered people turn in the funniest shirts. Asa decided he was going to get random logos, wear them to work and make up stories about where they came from.

Heres the rundown: (as contributed by Asa)

Spark: Yea, I worked here for a couple of months. After the first year of Baker but before Corinne and I were a 'thing'. They make mostly transistors that are outside the standard specifications that any major manufacturers use for CPU and on-die motherboard development. Not sure why the name 'Spark' but it's a general electronic term, plus to be fair - there was a lot of sparks in the factory. Both in the physical manufacturing and between this dude Rick and a chick in the front office, turns out they had like EVERYTHING in common, pretty sure they're still together. Beat the odds, Rick.

Intel: Had a summer internship here just after my first year of college. They had a little party at the end of the summer, around the time everybody's summer contracts were ending. One of the bosses made really good chili and they had all this Intel swag, I used to have a coffee mug and water bottle with the logos on it too.

Balboa Yacht Club of Panama: I actually worked here for a couple months, the summer before my one at Cedar Point because I couldn't afford to live at college after my first year there. It's like how Cedar Point has a bunch of foreign people come work there for the summer, except I'm in Panama so I'm playing the role of a culturally uneducated young woman from Yugoslavia. Anyways, you're basically a waiter on the deck of a boat. Pros: plenty of sunshine, tips, and scenery when you have a minute to look around. Cons: you're somehow less respected than your standard foreign Cedar Point employee.

U.S Space and Rocket Center: The summer before I moved down to Florida, before Corinne and I were together, I ended up getting a job here. Nothing fancy or professional, just running a gift shop, I didn't even have a degree yet with only 1 year of college under my belt. Occasionally someone would walk through surrounded by dudes in suits, and I was also pretty sure that 'someone' was an astronaut. Always kept a lookout for Men in Black, fairly certain I saw them multiple times but always got my memory flashed immediately afterwords.

He relayed all these stories to me in the aisles of the Salvation Army. I nearly peed my pants from laughter.

On the way home we stopped by a local thrift store and had better luck. We picked up a dresser for $11. It's currently white with purple drawers, and missing knobs. Plus it has some dragon flies glued to it. When Calib got home from school, we told him we got him a new dresser. He didn't want to look ungrateful, so he just told me thanks- before I even told him I had big makeover plans for it. I'm hoping to get it done this week and show you the before and after pictures in the next blog- so stay tuned!

Other than that, this week was just more unpacking, and more unpacking, and even more unpacking. Later, we unpacked some things. When we were done with that we started unpacking, and followed up with some unpacking. Then, we finished all that up with some unpacking. Yes, I know. But, I felt that was best to get my point across.

In an effort to tell you about the rest of the time I've spent this week, I took some pictures. I got a lot of these ideas from pinterest, some from reddit, and some I just adapted with stuff I had around the house.

So, this is my very cute laundry room. If this wasn't a quick stop rental house I would have probably wall papered either the back wall, or the ceiling something awesome. Instead, it's staying white. But, here we have the kids backpacks, hanging off of some IKEA S hooks (awesome and SUPER cheap at 99 cents for 10), I also got the blue top case for all the nails, screws, hooks, and random wrenches, and the other little tubs you see that house things like batteries. I took an old pot and put all our screwdrivers and hammers in it, and found the adorable little whale guy on clearance from target at a whopping $3.25. I guess he's somehow Valentines related- so I got him 75% off. He eats all the change I find in the laundry. I used an old lysol wipes container for plastic bags (although I'm going to eventually cover it in some cute paper), and and old jar to collect pocket finds. The basket up top holds the old towels and cloths and such for washing the dogs, or cleaning up messes.

\\

This is the wall next to the washer- those bars are $1.99 at Ikea, though I already had those on hand- along with the 'cups' that hang off of them. I do have a lot of spray bottles that contain my homemade concoctions- FYI, a combination of vinegar, baking soda, hydrogen peroxide and a tiny bit of dishsoap cleans ANYTHING. Plus, these nifty little bars are great for hanging scrub brushes, lint brushes- or anything else you need to store without taking up precious drawer space. (Oh, and I have since tackled that giant pile of laundry you see at the bottom)

So, here's part of my kitchen. We got the chair pads at Ikea for $3 a piece. I had the paint, but in order to make it a chalk board wall I had to get some unsanded tile grout. You can only get that in rather large doses though, and you only need one tablespoon per cup of paint, so I have quite a bit left. It is relatively inexpensive though, $4 a tub or so. I then took another one of those VERY handing Ikea bars and cups for chalk, and hanging a bottle of water and a towel for cleaning off the wall. Hayden LOVES this wall, he draws on it every day, fills up the whole thing and tells me about the 'story' he drew. The only problem is we're currently using sidewalk chalk because normal old chalk is way harder to find now than back in the olden days when I was a kid.

We also made this neat little wall hangings to hang up the boys good grades and art work. I had chalkboard paint left over, so I quickly rolled some on to these fence boards we picked up at home depot for around $1 a piece. I already had the clothespins to glue to them, so this project also cost next to nothing. I like that it's chalk board paint too- so we can write on those as well. I also hung one vertically in the laundry room for cards and reminders and things- I try to keep things off the fridge, as they tend to just end up on the floor with something spilled on them. I live with a lot of messy boys, you know.

And finally, here we have the playroom. We previously had ALMOST everything you see here. The blue and red shelves on the angle were separated in the boys rooms- but since they matched the buckets we had so well, I pulled them out. The big bucket of Dinosaurs in the corner we also had, but I spruced it up with a bit of the remaining chalk board paint. I purchased the basket on top of the shelf for video games and controllers at Walmart on the clearance rack for $2.50. Also purchased were the gutters. Yes, gutters- that is what the books are displayed on. Gutters are SO inexpensive- about $6 each. We bought two 10 foot long sections (they don't come any shorter so be prepared to cut them in the parking lot or get creative on the way home- Asa chose the latter) The fourth section is in the kitchen, above the cabinets with my cookbooks in it.

This is our office area. It's technically a diningroom, but we have our only table in the kitchen- so we thought this would make a good space for our desktop, and Asa's work from home computer. The ikea cups at the bottom hold pencils, pens, markers, and crayons, with some cute little reminder clothespins clipped to the bar. The next shelf up has a basket full of electronic chargers, our Hershey's bucket with glue and scissors, mason jars full of my sewing buttons from my grandma, and a mason jar full of my thread (I even got so OCD I spray painted the lids black to match everything), plus all our paper, and the boys school stuff sorted in the magazine holders. The next shelf up has random office items like rubber bands, erasers, thumb tacks separated into glass votives I had from the wedding, and some cute decorative items. The last self finishes up with our wedding date picture frame, the fraggles, and my framed mini gold pro certificate. I even made one of those 'I love you because.." dry erase frames and hung it up. And, if your wondering where all the cords are- I put them all up neatly in this cute little $3 wire rack from Ikea and some screw hooks from target. Keeps them off the floor- no more dogs laying on the power strip turning off the computers- yay!

Also worth noting: Asa set a mozzarella cheese bag on fire while making us salads for dinner. And yes, you read that correctly.

I have all kinds of other projects in the works, so I'll share those with you next week.

Up Next: More crafty/organization/unpacking to do- and more excitingly, USF vs. Cincinnati men's basketball game!