Repurposed Xylophone

Ever had something you didn't want to part with, but you couldn't justify keeping it? That doesn't happen to me VERY often because it's generally easier for me to get rid of things and live minimally than it is for me to keep things and feel cluttered. There are, from time to time, those sweet little items that I just hate to part with though. One of those was this xylophone.

Sweet TINY KK playing the xylophone at only 4 months old. She's a musical genius.

Manly's grandparents originally found it at a garage sale, I think, but they gave it to Olivia when she was about 2 years old, and each of our children has LOVED playing on it. It has a great old fashioned sound, and is so pretty! I love all the colors.
Well, you can imagine after six kids and 7 years a toy gets a little tired. Manly had repaired it several times, but a few weeks back it broke for good, and we decided we had to take it out of the playroom. I was so sad that I couldn't throw it away. Manly had the AMAZING idea of repurposing it into a wind chime. I of course loved this idea. We try to do family activities on Sunday afternoons, and yesterday we finally had a chance to work on it.

Everyone was really excited and Manly gave everyone a job. Brubbs is obviously VERY interested in what Manly has to say. Ha! And yes, everyone is in PJs cause that's how we roll on Sunday afternoons.

 

Manly found this big hoop to use for our project. I have no idea where it came from, so if your lamp is missing a hoop, it was my man! Ha!

 

We first had to take the xylophone apart, which wasn't too tough since it was already pretty broken. Afterwards, Manly gave our arguing children new jobs with different partners so that we could work in peace. Ha! We tried using fishing line to attach the chimes, but it was too fine. Lulu had some rainbow yarn, so we used that. Not nuts about it, but it did add to the charm of it in the end!

Here is Manly tying on the chimes the kids got ready for him.

 

Once we got the chimes all hung on it was just a matter of spacing. The girls held onto the hoop while Manly got it just right then we hung it. I'm loving the color on my porch, and it sounds SO pretty!

 

KK helping dad.

 

The Middles helping to hold it just right.

 

The finished product. We just hung it with a hook onto our porch siding.

The Truth Is...

I keep getting on my blog to update the world with what's been going on with us, but the truth is every time I do I feel overwhelmed with how far behind I am on here. It's been WAY too long, and I've missed a LOT. Another truth is that I bought a new computer, and while I love a lot of what it does I HATE sorting through photos on it, and it makes trying to post photos on here nearly impossible. I'm thankful for the provision of a computer, but I should really take the time to try and figure this thing out because I'm limited to what I can actually do on the silly thing! Ehh, at least it has a touch screen...
Also, the truth is that we aren't doing so great. While I always try to be real on my blog, there are only so many times that you can write that it's been a tough year. We've had financial struggles due to the yo-yoing of private practice, heartache, loneliness, sadness, sick kids, kids going to public school, kids getting their heart broken, kids with attitude problems, the list goes on and on. I am fully aware that our trials are minuscule in relation to the trials of others, and I am in no way trying to get anyone to feel sorry for me, only stating that it's been tough, and sharing our nutso life with the world isn't really high on my list of things to do. I want to be honest, but honestly, there are some things I really don't want to have lingering over my head on the Internet for the rest of time.  I've struggled with how to say what I'd like to say for a long time. Honestly, there are a lot of things I'd like to share, but proper words just won't come to me, so I take that as the Lord being my filter of sorts. Ha!
I haven't really done a whole lot of blogging since Christmas, so I think I'll just highlight a few things that have happened since then.

• In January we put the three big girls in public school. It hasn't been what I wanted it to be, and honestly, I'm not really all that pleased with how things are going. The girls are all doing fine, and have really liked a lot about school, but I'm still feeling sad about not being their teacher. I miss them terribly, and feel like it's still not quite right. There are a lot of things I do like about it though, and one of those is that they are having a fun time and they are shining their light for all the school to see.
  

Here they are on storybook character day. Addi is Cinderella, KK is Alice, and Olivia is Josefina(the American Girl).

 

KK won the character award in February. Makes a momma proud!

The kids had a superhero night at school. Here they are sporting their looks. Yes, Eli is wearing a shirt although you can't tell! Ha! Check out the creeper behind Livi. Poor Mia was a little shy.

 

Another pic of the kids. Seriously hysterical!

 

My Lulu at her first choir concert. She's the first one on row three on the left.

• Brubbs turned FOUR! I can not believe he's already four! He's such a sweet sensitive little boy. I love his sense of adventure, and love for all things manly. He and his Daddy went to the monster truck jam for his birthday. He got a Red Rider BB gun from his Pop which he loves. All he asked for was cake and his Nana and Pop to eat lunch with us.

Here he is at his restaurant of choice with his monster truck cake.

 

With his pop shooting his gun for the first time! He is SO proud of that gun!

• Manly and I made rain gutter bookshelves. I got the idea to do them a long time ago, but never had the time or effort available to do them. Recently we've been making some simple home improvements, so I added doing this to my list and we knocked it out in an afternoon. They look BEAUTIFUL and the kids love them, and they are quite sturdy if I do say so myself. We used this tutorial, although since ours were almost nine feet long we added several more brackets than they say are required.

I added little baskets for the really heavy massive story books we have. They're just too big for any shelf really.

•  I also decided to have my hand at some of my own DIY projects I've been putting off. I'm really happy with the end results, although I don't have pics of those. Ooops!

I used my leftover lactation tea to dye my curtains. They turned out the right color and everything. Too bad tossing them into the dryer for 10 minutes to dry shrunk them up!

This poor front porch rocking chair was looking quite rough! After a few coats of red spray paint she was looking as good(better) than new! LOVE the new color and it matches my front door.

I also turned several things in my house teal. LOVE the pops of color!

 

•  I helped the girls(with Manly) make some killer Valentine's boxes! Judge if you want, but it was fun and the girls were DELIGHTED! I'd do it again in a heartbeat. Although I did make these reusable, so I stuck them into the attic at first chance so I can use them again next year!! Ha!

Addi wanted a castle, so castle she got! It looked super girly and sparkly.

KK wanted a pirate ship. Her box took us about 20 minutes. REALLY simple and FUN!

Livi did most of the work on her doggie box. It was the cutest thing! I loved her idea of using multi-color brown yarn to give it added dimension. The little pink bows on the ears just really top it off. SO cute!!! Pretty easy too! Just a box with tape and yarn.

•   Isaiah is still receiving vision therapy in Fort Smith, and we are pleased with his progress. I will say we HATE going to Fort Smith every other week. It's a total hassle, but at this point still worth it to me. I wish his Dr. would move to Conway though!!

Isaiah working through his therapy with red/green glasses. He does a lot of work with these so that it will force him to use both eyes at the same time. 

• I got a nose ring for Valentine's Day. Well, I guess it wasn't really FOR Valentine's Day, but I did get it the day after Valentine's Day. So far I like the way it looks, but it does bug me a little. I think it's mostly because I touch my nose too much! Ha! It's funny how the way some people viewed me changed. Ha! Honestly, it's something I've wanted to do for a REALLY long time. I just finally got the guts to do it! There are a lot of things like that on my list of things to do that you might see pop up. Too bad the next thing on my list is fit into a dress that I've always kept. I may NEVER get to anything else on my list. Haha! No, seriously. I like my nose ring and you should too!



• Eli is a MESS. No, like he's really a stinker! He's basically been sick since he started refusing to nurse at 4 months. Yeah, he's basically a poster child for the benefits of nursing. He's currently on a month long dose of antibiotics in hopes of flushing this nastiness out for good, but if this doesn't work, we'll be checking for immunity and allergy issues. To say the least, it's been a long several months of having a sick baby. I know it could be much worse, and I'm very thankful it's not. I am praying for healing and answers though. In the mean time he's just been as sweet as can be! In between making messes that is!

 

After he got his oatmeal bowl and basically got it EVERYWHERE!

• Mia Jane is really coming out of her shell since the girls have been in school. She has had severe shyness, but in the past three months has really bloomed. She's also REALLY smart and able to do things that blow me away. She can add, subtract, knows most of her letters and numbers, and has amazing control over her writing. This girl got her smarts from her daddy. I can't wait to see her continue to blossom this year.

My sweet girl wanted to write her name. She said, "Show me how, momma." So, I did. This is what she did afterward. Love her little Disneylike "I."

 

She reminds me so much of my sweet Livi at this age.



• Manly won the outstanding young alumnus award at our college. I am SO proud of him! He's really done well in the last few months at work. I can't wait to see what lies ahead for him. I know he'll go on to do great things. He's such a hard worker, and really great at everything he puts his hands to.

My man with his award. Looking quite cute, I might add. 

• After YEARS of waiting I finally got my Big Red!! I'm SO SO EXCITED. I jump at any chance to get to use her! She's such a bute, and so good at what she does. I'm so thankful to Manly for getting her for me!

Here she is in action making homemade butter cream icing.

 

• Manly and I will soon get to take a break and visit Dallas sans kids.
• I met a random stranger who knew who I was because she read my blog. Hi!
• Manly got a new truck! Poor guy has been driving tiny cars suitable for much smaller people than himself, so he was delighted to get to buy a big Ford Explorer. Best part is it's completely paid for. Best advice we ever took was to buy cash cars!

OK, so up next, Eli's party! Now I feel like I'm caught up enough that I can share about his party without feeling like I've skipped EVERYTHING else that happened over the last few months! Thanks for being a part of our life and for hanging in there with me while I needed a break!

 

Princesses, Spiders, and Pigs! OH MY!

You all know that I usually go all our with themed family costumes each year for Halloween. This year I'm really trying to be a little easier on myself. It's been a really rough couple of months, and I'm trying to get rid of any stress that isn't completely necessary. That mostly means we do everything on a much smaller scale. Honestly, it's pretty hard for me on the front end, but proving to be TOTALLY worth it in the end! Like, seriously, go easy on yourself, friends.
SO, this year, when the dreaded "fall festivals" started to creep up on us I kept trying to think of how we could pull it off in the most simple way. Saturday we got up and I just kept kind of putting it off until after snack when I finally decided we were going to just do a little "what's inside momma's costume box game." I jumped up in the attic(actually I climbed the ladder, but it's always pretty quick because secretly I'm a little worried that one day it's going to fold up with me.) and got the costume box down. This is the box that holds all of the costumes of the past. I really built it up with the kids, so when I brought the box in they were all jumping around excited about what might be inside.
After going through everything the kids each decided what they wanted to be and we went to the not so quick work of getting everyone ready to go.
Here's what they chose.

Smittle Family Halloween 2013.

Eli and I are Charlotte's Web. KK is Wilber.

Flash Back to 2008.

Oh, my hair...Please, look away. Draw your attention to the first Charlotte, Addison, and KK as Wilber for the first time. So you know, Lulu is Fern and Manly is Homer Zuckerman.

My web was a white flat sheet that we painted with puff paint. The spider is just stuffed socks pinned to the carrier.

My Mia Jane as Dorothy. She's just recently realized who Dorothy is and that she had the costume. Now she wears the shoes just about every day. She rocked the ruby slippers.

Brubbs was the, as he says, "scare a crow." These two make such a CUTE team!

 

Flash ALL the way back to 2007. The background, the sweet cheeks, the brown nose. I just love it! We used all the same scarecrow pieces on Brubbs as we did on Manly. Even the same brown paint.

These two had already made up their minds before hand, but even after seeing all the costumes they stayed with their first choice. Lulu was Wendy and Addi was Cinderella.

 

Here's Olivia in 2011 the first time she went as Wendy(Isaiah was Captain Hook).

 

 

Other pics from the fall festival.

The best thing about this season is FREE FOOD! Ha! I seriously make my menu around free food activities whenever possible. Ha! Isaiah ate THREE hotdogs that his sisters decided they didn't want.

Brubbs on his horse ride.

This was Mia's first time on a horse! She loved it. She's gotten so much more outgoing since she's started being a big girl. A few weeks ago she wouldn't have dreamed of doing it!

LOVE this one of all three big girls. You can tell Lulu and KK were giving each other a hard time about each others horses. Such a cute moment captured.

 

Happy Halloween!!

And THEN, Isaiah Threw Up!

 



 

So, we were finally on the homestretch. We had everyone sleeping for what would be our last night away from home. We were snoozing away in our plush sleep number bed when all the sudden we heard it. That sound you hear when someone is THROWING UP!! I jumped up and blindly slapped at Manly who was also already up and moving to figure out who it was. We both made it over to the bed at the same time and found the culprit.
Isaiah was laying there asleep, but covered in puke. He had shared the love with Addison who was also still sleeping away. We decided to get him up and put him in the shower. The poor boy was so limp and sleepy that he couldn't stand, so I got in the shower with my pjs on and helped get him cleaned up. Bless his little heart he hardly even woke up. Once we got him out we dried him off and put him on a makeshift bed made out of the couch cushions we had removed for the pull-out bed for Olivia and Mia. Because he was still so sleepy he hardly noticed where he was sleeping and quickly went back to sleep.
In the meantime we also had to get Addi up, strip her, wash her hair out, and find her a place to sleep. Because we had no extra bed linens, and because we now had a bed mostly covered in puke we had to put her in bed with us. Lucky KK got the best deal. She ended up on the non-puke-covered end of the bed all by herself because she had her own blankets and was on the other side of Addi when the "event" took place. She and the other kids never woke up at all.
We finally laid back down after just throwing ALL the puke stuff in the shower for the night(well, that this point it was 3:45am). We soon found out that Addison is part ninja!! That girl has some fierce kicking feet. She's also a blanket hog! Ha! She should have been an only child, bless her heart!

My sweet girl making herself at home in MY bed!

 

Poor sick baby boy who never got sick again, which was a blessing!

 

Sleep did finally come though. We slept in until Eli woke us up raring to go at 7:45am.
We cleaned all of our things up, packed the car up, and headed home. 5 stops and 16 hours later we were HOME!
Now, as I look back at the trip I'm able to enjoy the great moments we had. I never stopped being thankful that we were even able to go, but honestly, it was a TOUGH trip! The longer we go, the more we can pick out the good moments instead of the bad ones, so that's good. Looking back, the things that stand out to me the most are being thankful for our safety plan the moment they brought my baby boy back to me, having a blast with Addi at the Bippity Boppity Boutique, and eating with the fish at the Coral Reef.
Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to go start planning my next trip in March. This one is going to be a LOT more relaxing. See, it includes me, Manly, and a big big beach. Sorry kids, but mommy needs a vacation from vacation!