10 Reasons to Love Fall Festival

~10 Reasons I LOVE Fall Festival~

10. Old Rusty Trucks and Silly Faces

9. Dangerous Tractor Bike Races

8. Adorable Outfits

~Because: why wouldn't I put Ella in leg warmers?~

7. Tractor Rides

~Yes, that's a child driving my children~

6. Family Photo Opportunities

5. Firetruck Kisses

4. Turkey Legs and Root Beer

~And Kettle Corn and Deep Fried Everything~

3. Produce Stacking in a Wagon

2. Giant Trampolines

1. My Pumpkins sitting on Pumpkins

{And PS. Today Ella is 5 months old....did you hear my heart break a little?}

Linking up with Miss Mommy for Tuesday Ten

What I Love About...

Here's to another Monday

And here's to what I love about...

~My 4 year old Josiah~

How he stole my heart the minute I met him and made me a first time Mommy

His adorable smiles

and sense of humor

Love for his siblings

Amazing giggle when I tickle him

His love to tell stories

His awesome dance moves

and I mean AWESOME

His imagination

That he looks just like his daddy

He's a people pleaser

That he is so compliant

His desire to help

His crazy, unmanageable hair

That he has already chosen a wife "ViVi"

That he wants to listen to "his songs" in the car

The way he talks

(even if he does have a "delay")

That he is so emotional

That he says:

"I want to go to Heaven" & "I want to see Jesus"

The thing I love the most about Josiah is:

His unwavering faith. This is the child Jesus spoke of when talking about faith like a child.

I am so proud of him!

10 Ways to Have a Chaotic Playdate

As a stay at home Mom, one of the most important parts of my life is playdates.

Mom's really need to have some sort of social contact with each other. I need to be able to talk to somebody about something other than juice and spiders

.

Each playdate is different. But some of my most favorite are the ones that are complete and total chaos.

Here's a pic of me "Embracing the Camera" with 4 out of the 6 kids invoveld in a playdate with my good friend who also has 3 kids 4 years old and under.

Look...it's actually peaceful...for about 2 seconds.

~Yes, the two partially undressed children are mine.~

And "thank you". I know I look like a movie star.

So here's my top 10 ways to add a little chaos spice to your playdates.

10. Just add markers.

9. Have only one of something.

(anything from a Batman toy to a piece of string)

They will ALL fight over it.

8. Suggest you stay indoors on a nice day.

7. Have a precious lego castle your boys have built.

(It will get torn down. Drama will ensue.)

6. Have a pantry stocked with foods you do not want them to eat.

(Because they will try)

5. Try to attempt a craft with glue.

4. Try to make it a productive playdate.

(Like mom's trying to plan something)

It is guaranteed you will get nothing done.

3. Hold the playdate in a public place. Your best bet is the library.

(You might even get kicked out. Because that sounds like fun to me.)

2. Just add sugar. Lots and lots of sugar.

1. Have at least 6 kids aged 5 and under. Always a stressful delightful time.

Linking up with Emily for Embrace the Camera

Tickle Me Tuesday Times TEN

Thought I'd participate in this, and this today.

So here's TEN of what's tickling my fancy lately...

1. Yellow striped sweaters. Even though I look terrible in yellow.

I would wear this in a heartbeat!

Pinterest

2-3. Chunky Flower Rings.

Etsy

Etsy

4. I have been dying to wear this. But at $130 it's WAY too expensive to actually buy

Etsy

5. Flower Headbands..working on my confidence to rock one of these

Etsy

6. Brown Scruncy boots. It's shallow to want more than one pair of boots...but I just LOVE brown boots!

Pinterest

7-8. Wool socks to go under my brown boots, but over my tights or leggings. ADORABLE!

Pinterest

Pinterest

9. This chocolate brown flower necklace. LOVE

Etsy

10. Feather Necklace...I'd hop on this feather bandwagon in a second!

Pinterest

~Oh the joys of worldly shallow fashion.~

What I Love About...

I thought that I needed to start out my "work week" with something positive.

I thought it would be fun to pick something that I love and blog about it each Monday.

So today I thought I'd kick it off with one of my kids.

So...

What I love about my 2 year old son

~MICAH~

He is always ready to cuddle and even begs for me to sit with him while he watches cartoons

That he says "hi" to every person he sees

That he calls all other kids "friends", even when he has no idea who they are

That he fake laughs whenever adults are laughing

His giant head that stretches out all his t-shirts

How he loves to sing

That he loves to read books

His desire to be exactly like Josiah

That he is very bright and knows his alphabet and can count to 20 (ish)

How he says "no way" instead of just "no"

His deep love for his "baby Ella"

He is all boy and usually looking busted up

His pouty face

His laugh (really amazing)

That he just told me "I like your face"

He was one of the cutest babies ever

His love for animals (despite his parents aversion to them and him being allergic)

My favorite part of Micah is...

That he marches to the beat of his own drum, is powerful, confident, and loving.

He'll be quite a mighty force for the Lord!

~Blessed to be his Mommy~

Felt Flower Clip Tutorial

I made these adorable little felt flower clips for Ella the other day, and I thought I'd share how I did it. I am not great at sewing, but these just came together so easily.

First: Cut felt into 3 different size circles. 5 sets of each size

Lay the circles on top of each other and pinch together

Sew the bottom part together with just a few quick stitches. Do this to all five sets.

String all 5 sets of petals together and sew together

Hot glue beads or buttons to the middle. Glue a clip to the backside of the flower and you're done!

~Keep it crafty~

Webcam Shenanigans

James and I recently had a great decision to make. Our old PC was on it's way out and it was time for the dreaded computer purchase.

My sister had recently bought a MAC and told us that it was amazing. At a staggering $1200 for the least expensive desktop, we had some serious considering to do. I went into the Apple Store loaded with questions, and came out dead set that I wanted to own one.

It has been SO much fun! I can't even begin to tell you all of the amazing features that it possesses, but my most favorite is the iPhoto and all of the editing I can do with it.

I have been dreaming of doing some more photo editing with all the pictures I have, and a while back I had gotten a trial version of Photoshop; only to realize there was no way I would be able to learn it all without a class.

Boo!

But the MAC makes it so easy to do some fun edits. Here's a few of my favs from editing

~Our Wedding~

~My sister's beautiful family~

~Josiah's Makeup Skills~

But the most fun aspect of it all is that it comes with a webcam. I'll be honest and admit that webcams have always freaked me out. But the boys are CRAZY about it. I'm mean really crazy about it. We've taken a million of these....

"Help Me!"

~Brotherly Love~

~Yep...Embracing the Camera for sure!~

Anyway...I think we'd make a pretty good looking alien family.

Don't you?

Linking up with Emily today!