Thursday, June 24, 2010

Kiddy Pool …Doggy Pool !!!

I have a very large still some what overweight chocolate lab. She suffers from a condition which causes her to slough off a much higher than normal amount of skin cells. Thus more shedding and dander. I also have 3 boys who suffer from skin allergies and one is a 6 month old baby who LOVES playing on the floor. Unfortunately this means Ginger must spend a lot of time outside. I live in mid Georgia and it is extremely hot and there is pretty much zero shade in our yard. All these things combined  (plus the fact that she started digging a 2 foot deep hole next to our house foundation to lay in and stay cool) got me searching for a way to keep her cool. At the beginning of the summer I purchased this for my big boys (we’ll use their nicknames too)  Bubba (7) and Rew (4).  Monkey’s not interested in getting in yet at all…

pool1 

It is another project in progress. I need to trim down the tarp, mulch around the pool , ring that with stones and add stepping stones from back patio to poolside. But enough on that, back to Ginger beating the heat…  Buying the big pool left me with this from last summer…

So I cleaned all the winter debris off my back patio dragged the Kiddy Doggy Pool out of the shed and scrubbed it clean. I had planned on turning it into a raised garden bed for a little bit of lettuce but Ginger’s health seemed more important. The day I kicked this project into gear she had collapsed on my porch on the verge of heat exhaustion.  I still bring her in and let her sleep in the coolness of my master bathroom from noon to 3 during the peak of the day but she LOVES her pool !! We also feed her popsicles and float them and ice cubes (mostly ice cubes they’re better for her) in the pool and she “bobs for ice cubes”.   It is one of her favorite games. She will stick her whole face or head under the water if necessary ! It is so funny to watch. I also float sponges in the pool she loves to chew on them since they’re dripping with cool water !! On the day I went to take these pics my boys were at Gram’s so the Diva came out to feed Ginger popsicles for me

popsicle bobbing

In this pic you can see she’s almost got the popsicle !

head dunk

I wasn’t kidding about submersing her head

win

When she finally gets a hold of the popsicle she jumps out to eat it.

jump

In this pic she just jumped into the pool… you can see the water is all churned up. And this pic leads me to the only modification I had to do to turn it into the doggy pool. I bought some heavy duty clear non skid stickies (like for bathtubs). They had to be clear cause if she thinks there is something on the bottom of the pool she will NOT get in !! I took the non skid stickies and trimmed them into small pieces the same shapes as the raised bumps on the bottom of the pool. Then I coated the bottom of them with pool repair kit adhesive to give them extra strong stickability  LOL ! I stuck them on and when she does her super dog flying leaps into the water she doesn’t slip and go down. So far they are holding up well !! Ginger is cool and being a Lab is ecstatic to have her own pool and my boys are entertained watching her antics.

I am linking this up in the Garden Party over at Keen Inspirations that I mentioned the other day. Stop in, check out everyone’s  outdoor and summery projects and enter all the giveaways. There are several and they are all great !!

Peace

Steph

Wednesday, June 23, 2010

Garden Party and Giveaways !!

I know some of you know that Sharon over at Keen Inspirations is my mom. If you don’t know or haven’t been to her blog drop by !! It is awesome ! She blogs about everything from crafting and repurposing to couponing  and even some recipes. You can find her here

                         BUT WAIT !!!!

This week she is having a “Garden Party”  !! There are giveaways and “door prizes” and so many people are linking up great outdoorsy projects !!! So this is the best time to check her blog out !

Here is your invite  :o)

SO be sure you drop by and enter some of the fun giveaways !!

Also I have been absent cause I am BUSY working on a HUGE project blog posts and pics coming soon !!

Peace,

Steph

Monday, June 14, 2010

A Canvas I Painted for Monkey’s Nursery

Halfway through my latest pregnancy my husband lost his job and after losing our baby girl at 36 weeks pregnant making a beautiful nursery this time was really important to me . I was determined to do so even while working on my VERY LIMITED budget.

I went with a jungle /safari animal theme and made most of the stuff myself. Here is the Large canvas I painted for one of my taller walls.  I started with a blank 16x20 inch canvas that was already primed white. Sorry no pic cause I was not aware I’d be blogging at the time. LOL

Then I drew my Giraffe in pencil where I wanted him on the canvas.  I put a G in the lower left corner to make it match a set of 4 smaller canvases I had done for another wall. (I’ll blog those another time) and it still needed something so I added tree limbs in the upper right corner.  This is what I ended up with

gircanv

Sorry it’s hard to see but it is pencil… So finished with my drawing I started painting. My wonderful hubby picked the most fabulous yellow for me. It was perfect “giraffe yellow” LOL !!  The blues and greens were left over nursery paint any other colors or shades I mixed myself. As I finished I realized it needed something more if it was going to blend with the other canvas set I made. My nursery “designs” were stripes and polka dots. I went with polka dots on this canvas to off set the length of the giraffes neck.  So now the finished product is this…

fingiraffe

I am very happy with it finished  and am proud to show it off.  Start to finish this only took me 2 hours including dry times !!  Now I am sharing this at   DillyDally and Flitter for Just Something I Whipped up Monday !!

The Girl Creative

Check out all the neat stuff everyone is whipping up and share the comment love. You know deep down we’re ALL comment junkies. I for sure am. I LOVE getting feedback !

Peace

Steph

Saturday, June 12, 2010

An AWESOME GIVEAWAY !!!

Well I did not get to do anything on my list the Monster was in rare form today.  LOL  But I did get Monkey’s clothes sorted and packed up what he has outgrown so far :o( makes me kinda  sad.  Then cause I couldn’t do much of anything but be at Monsters beck and call I started blog surfing and through "The Mommy Times" I found a fantastic giveaway over at One Savvy Mom !!  The give away is for an Apple iPad   ! YAY!!! I am so excited, I could really use one of these. Then again so could my Hubby. His job has him out on the road all but 3 days a month.  He was out of work almost a year so when he got this job 9 weeks ago we could not afford a laptop or anything. But if I could win the iPad it would be a great father’s day gift and we could SKYPE !!  Which would be great cause he could see the boys and talk to them too !! Especially Monkey since at this age they change sooo much every day. Anyway…The giveaway ends June 25th so head over and enter if you’re interested but no offense I hope I win… LOL!

Once again I want to thank  One Savvy Mom for such a great giveaway and to thank "The Mommy Times" for passing it on !!! Good luck to all!

Peace

Steph

I have to work on Saturday UGH !

This is not new. I always have to work on Saturday. The girl  I sit for is a store manager at a retail outlet. Saturday is their biggest day so she has to be there. My only days off are Sunday and Wednesday. This makes it hard to take weekend trips to my moms which I was looking forward to when my husbands job took him out on the road. If you follow her blog you can see why it would be so much fun to weekend  there !!

So I have a lot I want to accomplish today but I’m not sure how much will get crossed off the list since I’ll be working around “the Diva” and “the Monster” . 

The Diva is 5 going on 21 and is very bossy in an oldest child type  way. I have to constantly remind her I’m the boss and I know what I’m doing LOL  But she also LOVES to clean an organize so YAY !!! Now I just have to convince her to do it MY way !!

The Monster is almost 7 months old. He is 3 weeks older than my Monkey and twice his size. He was born early (34weeks) but is HUGE ! He is wearing 12 months clothes and weighs well over 20 pounds. He is very high maintenance but pretty mellow as long as things go his way.  If they don’t go his way though … OMG thats the other reason I  have dubbed him Monster. 1 his size and 2 his howling !!

My plan for today is clean up last nights dinner mess. (I was exhausted when they went home at 10:30 last night and just went to bed )  and  then finish moving my boys into their new room and do a temporary organization in there.  If I am successful I will blog about it this evening … wish me luck !

Thursday, June 10, 2010

Saved Some Money, Got a Deal !!!

I LOVE to save money, I LOVE getting deals !!!  LOVE, LOVE, LOVE it !! I get this from my mom too so I know she’ll be thrilled for me when she sees this post.

My youngest is 6 months old today. In our family we call this a “halfy birthday “.  His nickname is Monkey so that’s how I’ll introduce him to all of you. Well I have noticed that he is out growing almost all his clothes.  I had TONS of clothes from newborn up to 3-6 months but I have NOTHING from there til 18 months. In the summer as long as we’re at home my babies wear those little onseies, the ones that you can put under things in the winter. They are cool and comfortable. Well last night I had a hard time finding one that would snap between his legs. By the time I tried them all on I was left with only 7 that fit. That meant a shopping trip today and I happened to get an email from Carters this morning saying they were having a HUGE sale !! Carters is a major vice of mine. I love their baby clothes. They are so soft and cute. I usually buy the Walmart brand of Carters (child of mine) but there really is a difference. Carters from their store is softer higher quality fabric.

I didn’t find what I needed on the 70% racks but the 5 packs of onesies were on the 60% off racks !! SCORE !!  But on the way to the register I saw the cutest little one piece outfit. It had a monkey on it. Then I realized it was two outfits sold together on the same hanger. Also 60% off. And the second one had the cutest monkey face on it. Actually the monkey face kinda looked my baby Monkey. OK now it is a MUST HAVE !!!   Here is a pic of him in it so you can see what I mean

coltmonk

I think its the ears  LOL !!  Anyway… heres the break down

Walmart

5 pack of Child of mine onesies  = 11.00

2   1 piece outfits 7.50  each   = 15.00

Plus tax my total would have been  27.82

Carters

5 pack onesies  = 8.00

2   1 piece outfits =  8.80  for both

plus tax my total was   17.97

I am sooooo thrilled with my savings! And I got some really cute things !!  So I had to brag   share about my deals !!

Peace

Steph

Wednesday, June 9, 2010

A FAIL !!!!

Well today was a nothing day… very boring and uneventful.  But the way my life goes I will take the very few days like this that I get happily !!!

So since it was so uneventful  I decided to blog a past project from a few weeks ago…

I was very tired of my very ugly  white dining light fixture. The white was ALWAYS dirty, seriously it had to be cleaned every other day. It showed every little speck of anything. There was nothing I could do about the ugly but I knew I could fix the white since I inherited the spray paint gene from my mom Sharon. You can find her over at Keen Inspirations.

I don’t have any before pics since at the time I didn’t know I’d be blogging. I headed to Walmart and bought a pretty brown hammered finish spray paint by Rustoleum. Then I took down the light and headed out to my back patio to spray. My husband thought I was crazy cause there was a short in one of the “candles” but I was tired of looking at and cleaning the white and didn’t want to spend money on a new light til I could get the expensive one I really wanted. SO I sprayed several coats over the next several hours and ended up with this…

light light2

Over all I WAS  (remember that was) pretty happy with how it turned out. The color was gorgeous and matched my home, the finish turned out beautiful even on such skinny surfaces and it was so much better than the white. Still ugly but not as bad.  Now I say WAS pretty happy because when I re-hung the fixture the short in the one candle spread to another and over the next 12 hours kept spreading and finally they all shorted out. So my wonderful hubby who knew how proud I was of what I’d done and how disappointed I was that it broke went to Home Depot and bought me my light !!

newlight

Its from the same set as my living room fixture and things that blend/match but are not exactly the same are my favorites !!  I am very happy to have my new light and I love my understanding Hubby !! Also I guess this was not a total fail as I discovered I LOVE that spray paint. I’m going to use it on my kitchen cabinet door/drawer pulls. Oh yeah, I’m redoing my kitchen cabinets but that’s a HUGE project for another day!

Peace

Steph

Tuesday, June 8, 2010

My list habit collides with my obsession to organize …

I am a list maker.  I make lists and I make “sub-lists” .  I get made fun of often by my husband, by my friend. But I also have my friendly supportive fellow lister  (you know who you are )  Well I have so much going on right now on a daily basis and so much I want to accomplish both long term and short term that I am afraid I will forget something.  This has me making many many lists. Now I have stacks of paper. Uh oh ! This has kicked in the organizer in me. She is buried much of the time under mess and stress but she tries !  So  I decided I had to get some organization of my lists or regardless of everything being “listed” things would still fall through the cracks. I went to my jumble of project stuff and found a binder and my scrapbook supplies.  This is the end result          

 

binder

So far I only have 2 categories

clean

and

projects

But I am sure I can come up with more as life goes on !  Now I have my lists in one place all neat and organized . I have now really opened myself up to the teasing since I have so many lists I need a binder for them. However my fellow lister  understands the need for it, loves it and wants one.  I just may have to make her one !

 Peace,

 Steph