Home again

Back to life! We had such an amazing weekend! Todd was going to a worship conference, so we all tagged along. It was a great getaway. In the evenings we got the privilege of attending The Fathers House worship conference- Brian and Jenn Johnson led worship... It was so good! I felt like I was home again, quiet and loud in God's almost tangible presence. While Todd attended the day sessions, the girls and I stayed in our *really nice* hotel- we enjoyed our 3 room suite and indoor pool. It was so relaxing and fun. We were staying about halfway between Napa and Vacaville, so it was hot! :) We ate our lunch in the courtyard and had sweet naps in the afternoon. And then we toured the JellyBelly factory!

And on Saturday we headed over to San Francisco where we hit the awesome IKEA. The little girls played in the play place for a bit ( till we heard- to our fear over the speakers, "Will Todd Moore please come to the childcare area" ... Uhhhhhh!! But they just missed us!) and we all had fun buying home accessories (well, mostly me ;) )

We drove over the bay bridge... Drove along Fishermans Wharf, headed toward the Golden Gate bridge- which Bella was excited to see because her teacher had just been teaching about it. We then headed to Chinatown and saw the dragon gate and walked and shopped. The girls had a blast.



....of course the Golden Gate...


....And the Dragon Gate...


....Cute Chinatown :)


....And the Bay Bridge! A fun and great adventurous day :)

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love IS a superpower.

Abigail has this thing where she dreams she is a superhero. How cute is that?! It has happened since she was about 3 or as long as she was able to communicate to tell me about her dreams.

Last night she told me she had another one. This time, her superpower was love and her friend's was rainbows. They fought the bad guys and then rode home on a rainbow. Doesn't that sound fun?

I told her it was the sweetest thing I'd ever heard. I wish my dreams were that sweet!

New-ness

We've taken a break from STOP for a while... Tho now it is desperately needed! Man. But! We did some fun new stuff in our living room. Thanks to my friend Lalena and her great ideas, I am really starting to love the living room- even with it's blue carpet and yellow walls. Well, minus one now :)



Yep, red to match the dining room. It looks totally good. And then we printed out the super cool pic of the girls running from the waves from Costco. Fun new shelf thingy to put stuff on :) ... (And Todd on his iPhone! )


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More learning....

True, true, true. I really like that I can take a pic of a quote instead of typing the whole thing out. ....is that lazy?! Eh, I say efficient!





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It takes a village

You know that saying? It takes a village to raise a child? Who was it who said that? Like Hillary or something? Or was she just quoting someone else? Anyways, it doesn't matter, I guess! Just saying... That phrase came to me today as I was thinking about this unorganized house!! It takes a whole village to clean this house!! Lol. No, but really. One project does lead to another, right?!

Today's projects consisted of painting a wall, sanding a table, washing the couch covers, steam cleaning, vacuuming and fluffing the cushions... Washing the windows and hanging different curtains. Sheesh.

And in the meantime, the girls are dreaming of new and fresh ideas for their room. Bella has these crazy ideas for painting and rearranging. Since we can't quite get to all that now, I thought I'd give them their own little project- so after school they went to it. Painting an old bookshelf purple to put in their room. They worked together and for about an hour and a half on it, but still will need to do more tomorrow. I was pretty proud of myself for allowing this could-be-a-disaster... I even didn't try and go back over their paint strokes or constantly tell them to do it this way. But that was also partially because they were doing so great, so I'm proud of them, too. :). I have created monsters!!

On the list for tomorrow... Grocery shopping, picture hanging... More painting... And maybe organizing a little more in the living room. I might try to tackle the toy/book situation. It makes me tired to even think about it!!!! Yikes! I am sure you are all enjoying reading about my cleaning process every day! But hey, it's life ...from here. :)




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My add.

Today I did finish the entertainment area. But it was very distracting/ADD!! It was less like STOP and more like S.... Oh but I need to clean the patio and pull out that honeysuckle vine..... T..... Oh but I must finish that painting for my friend and also take it to her.... O... And I need to go to the bank and the post office.... P... And the laundry room needs a few labels posted on before I forget, along with a couple loads of laundry.

Somewhere between all of that, picking the girls up and so on... The entertainment center was complete.

The thing about organizing is that I want it DONE!! But it is a journey, and I am reminding myself that continually.

By the way, I have relayed the STOP sessions in the wrong way- it is Sort, Toss, Organize, Put Away. The Sort step is the one where you decide whether to store, donate, toss or keep. Small details which I just thought I'd correct :)

And, just for fun, I thought I'd show you what cleaning looks like at my house. Why does it always get worse before it gets better?!! Lol.


And just for fun again maybe you'd like to see my finished painting (except for that one little spot I missed) for my dear Hoyos friend.





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first STOP.

My STOP session lasted longer than 20 minutes, but I still had to end the session before the project was finished. Which is actually good because I can come back to it tomorrow with energy to get it completely done. Just like the book says!! So smart!

Before:


And so far:



It might not look that different, but believe me it will cut down on tons of clutter. I got rid of all of the CDs- we never use them! They were just taking up space since all of our music is on mp3 now. I moved all of the old board games to the closet, we don't use them that much, so some will go to goodwill and others will be stowed safely in the closet top until needed. All the Wii accessories now have a spot for functional use and the games and DVDs are also stored so that the ones we use the most are the easiest to reach (hot zone)... And stuff that we don't use all that much ( like home movies or old DVDs I don't want to get rid of) are more in the back (aka 'cold zone').

So I only got half done. And it took like 2 hours. BUT, I did stop! Which is a huge plus- bc ordinarily I just want to start and finish a projet on one afternoon. But now I can get to other things.... and my family might get dinner tonight. Plus I have a project waiting for me tomorrow. A project to finish!

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