Ayres Insanity

  Roughly 12 years ago I heard a quote from my mission president's lovely wife, and it goes...   "Be pretty if you are, be witty if you can, but be cheerful if it kills you!"   I think those are good words to live by, but I have to be honest, I'm kind of struggling with that last one. Under normal circumstances I'm fairly pleasant, but during the last 7 months of my particularly difficult pregnancy I've been a bit off my game. Like today for example, when I yelled at a random neighbor. I was out watching the kids when he came strolling through the neighborhood walking his little dog, it just so happened that my neighbor's dog had escaped (which is a common occurrence with small children who open front doors), anyway, my neighbors dog naturally ran up to this guy and his dog to play and exchange a harmless butt sniff when the guy grumpily picked up his dog, threw his hand up and looked at me and told me to take care of MY dog. Well, in my pregnant s...

  School is back in full swing and I had some mixed feelings about it. I loved summer! I loved not having to wake up early (that was my favorite part), getting to play outside all day, the warm weather, and just having that leisurely unscheduled time with the kids. But I love the structure that the school year provides, the time to get the things done that I can't do while they're around, and the opportunity for them to be taught by someone other than myself.   Taevin is now in 2nd grade and from what I'm told, has one of the best teachers in the whole school, Mrs. Arnold. He likes her a lot and has made friends quickly, he is reading like a champ and says his favorite part of school is recess (go figure).   Ryler is back to preschool for his second year with Mrs. Leanne and loves it! Lucky for us, preschool is just a short walk down the street, he goes on Mondays and Wednesdays from noon until 2:30, which happens to be around Zoey's nap time, so if I'm lucky ...

  Since my little Zoey will soon be getting booted out of the crib, we decided it was time to get a "big girl" bed. Given that a new bed would have cost us around three or four hundred bucks, I decided to give the KSL classifieds a try, and after a couple days of searching, I came across this little gem.     It came with the headboard, footboard and rails and for the bargain price of $50! I liked the basic shape and look of it but it needed a paint job and those prison bars had to go.   It sat in my living room for about a month until last weekend when Russ and I decided it was time to get motivated and get this project done. I removed the bars and Russ gave it a good sanding. I searched for a while to find some sort of decorative spindle to replace the bars but with little success. Finally I found some tiny candlesticks at Hobby Lobby, glued the ends together and voila... I had spindles, we cut them to size and added some little wood appliques and after a f...