Retaining wall of death

Ugh. This retaining wall project is taking FOREVER!! I have to say we had some wonderful burly men come over to our house last Thursday and help tear down the old wall :) I can't thank them enough for helping us do something in a few hours as opposed to days if it would have been just us!

The deteriorating retaining wall before.......

 It was literally falling into our neighbors yard...

We had about 8 guys working to rip the old out. Some of those posts were buried so far under I thought we'd never get them out!

These pics were taken on Thursday....... all these guys had worked 8 hours at their regular jobs... and then another 3 working their butts off hauling these old railroad ties into trucks (or in our driveway... we still have a nice pile that needs to go to the dump! Keep in mind those things weight about 80 lbs when they're not rotted out.... so some of them were a little bit lighter :)

Friday JDub and his dad emptied their trucks at the dump and made some more runs to Menards for supplies...

Half moon FALL manicure

So I saw this on Pinterest... surprise surprise.... Here's a link to the how to...half moon manicure

Here's mine!

I kinda went with a fall/candycorn/halloween feel here. I usually don't paint my fingernails... I'm always chipping and breaking them it seems... but I saw it online and wanted to try it out! They're kinda fun.

They are already messed up though... JDub has been putting me to work moving rock and brick... we have to put up a new retaining wall in the back...... Here's what it looks like now..

 Wouldn't you just LOVE to be my neighbors and have to stare at that all the time?! Yikes... it's been a long time coming for this thing... So here are all our new bricks for the new wall.

Spent last night in the rain re-stacking them and taking them off the pallets... I'm already a little sore too! Wish us luck.. this could be the longest project of our lives...... Our mini-walls look nice though right?!

LBD take 2

Hello Friday night!!! Whoo hoo.. this is what I'm doing this evening... yep blogging... I like blogging and all... but the extra nice part is I have this to enjoy as well!!!

I tried to make the  picture look all fancy and yet you can see pampers points sitting on top of that wine box... go figure!!!

My last LBD (Little Black Dress) proved to be a bit of a challenge! It turned out quite fancy! I am still planning on wearing it to a wedding coming up in a few weeks! I'll have to add some black hose and a cardigan or wrap though! It's chilly these days!

I acquired this other black dress through my sis down in TN, thanks FF! It's a size Large, from Old Navy. It has a drawstring waste, but its a bit too big.... The sleeves went well over my hands.

So I had planned on taking a few photos along the way for this lil project... and then I realized the camera was in Bubba's room on the top bunk... and he was taking a nap... so yea I was NOT gonna wake him up just to take some pictures... So I'll just describe what I did! I found some black lace in the scrap bin at Hancock fabrics and thought I might be able to jazz it up a little bit more! Since the sleeves were a big long anyway... I thought I'd take it down to a 3/4 length. I seam ripped the arms off the piece... cut some strips of fabric off to make room for the lace...(lace is very in right now... ok maybe not right now.. but it was earlier this summer!) used some elastic on the ends... and whaa laa :)

Got Milk?

Well it is official!! No I'm not pregnant! haha... but I AM done nursing!! Whooo Hooo! On the down-side that means I can clean the litter box again.... Yes as a perk of breastfeeding/ being pregnant I got out of having to clean the litter box for almost 3 years.... I know you can clean the litter box when you are pregnant or nursing... but eh, why take the risk? After all us women do all the hard work, JDub can clean up after the cat right? Well I can help now....

I guess I don't really know what amount of time has to pass before it becomes official... but its been over a week now :) It was rough... but I did it. After trying for a few days on my own... I researched a little bit online for some tricks of the trade. While I know most of you out there reading are not pregnant or breastfeeding... I still thought some of you might find it interesting to know how I weaned Ceej. Boys should probably stop reading now... it gets a little graphic......

Ceej is 16 months old. First thing you have to do is GRADUALLY decrease the amount of times you are nursing. I had it down to 2-4 times a day for a while there... He usually wanted to in the morning just when he woke up... then at nap times (he use to nap twice) and then at night...
I tried to just cut it down from 4 times to 1 time... but I would get engorged and be in pain. I did not want to have to get the breast pump back out... so I would nurse him just to ease my pain (which he didn't mind obviously!)

Finally I figured out I needed to be more gradual. I went down to nursing only 1 nap time a day for a day or so. Then the next 2 days I didn't nurse at either nap times. I found it really important to replace those times I would nurse with something fun instead! Either reading books... or a little snack. He would usually pull and yank on my shirt, throw a fit and whine, and finding other distractions like singing a song or patty-cake would take his mind off of it. I would also have a drink on hand to offer him instead.

One really interesting thing I read online mentioned NOT having "easy access"  to nurse. Since I had been nursing for over a year you would usually find me in a tank top, or low cut shirt that was easy to nurse in. Being home all day and having Ceej rarely take a bottle I was nursing alot and it was just easier to have "breastfeeding friendly" attire on. I didn't even think to stop wearing these types of clothes once I was trying to wean! It really did help too. When he would yank and pull on my low cut shirts he would get even more agitated seeing "the goods"! But once I switched to t-shirts and other restricting clothing he would usually give up and move on to something else.

I found it helped me to have JDub put Ceej to bed at night to help stop that night-time feeding. He knew he wouldn't get any milk from Daddy... and it helped ease my stress in seeing poor Ceej in distress. I know some moms out there are extreme... and they might think I'm a terrible mother for denying my child milk... but you have to stop breastfeeding sometime right?! You can't spoil your kids all their life... well you could but I don't like bratty kids... I mean hey whatever floats your boat really... but I was ready to be done.

Then finally I had it down to nursing once a day. Only in the morning when he just woke up. It was hard to stop this time. Ceej usually wakes up before Bubba's clock turns green in the morning... and I would usually pull him into bed with me and just relax and let him nurse. I am NOT a morning person so this extra "quiet time" was so nice... but I knew I wanted to stop nursing... so I had to get up and get going. I got him his own special cup of milk and spent that time playing and reading to him. I went one day w/o nursing... and nursed him the next day... and then finally stopped.

He still yanks on my shirt sometimes... and it was really hard with him being sick in the middle of it all... but we made it. :) He's still a happy lil guy! Sorry if I bored you to death...

Rough week...

It has been a rough week around this household.... Poor lil Ceej came down with a cold Monday...... you would not believe the amount of snot coming out of this kid... it is nasty... Not the way I wanted to start my week off... but eh? What can you do? For the most part he was in good spirits... had a fever on and off which I gave him tylenol for when he started to get lethargic.....

On Thursday that cold then turned into an ear infection....... Shortly after making this yummy afternoon "snack" for myself.........


Heeeey Home-made Iced Coffee!!!

Ceej awoke from his nap not a happy camper. JDub had gotten home a lil early from work so I could go mow the lawn. (Yes you heard right!! This Momma mows the lawn! Mainly b/c I enjoy time away from the kiddos... and JDub doesn't think I do a terrible job :) I'll leave the snow-blowing to him this winter though!) When I came back in he said Ceej was not doing well.... and he wasn't!! He was bawling uncontrollably and tuggin on his ear... After a trip to Urgent Care (Where Ceej proceeding to cry like a banshee the entire time the doctor was checking him out....... this might have been to my advantage though b/c he prescribed him some pain drops to put in his ear directly! He said most doctors won't prescribe them, but seeing as he was witnessing my child cry in pain an grabbing his ear he was being nice and wanted me to get some sleep :) and then another trip to get meds we were back home. Those drops were AMAZING... he was like a little zombie not moving an inch for 20 minutes and then those kicked in and he was running around like his crazy self. Funny how all you want your kids to do is be quiet and still until they are sick. Then all you want is for them to get better and run around again!

And now JDub is sick......... and Bubba has been sneezing... While Ceej slept pretty good Thursday night... he was up  ALL night last night... and even made it back into our bed to sleep b/c Mommy was out if it.... He then proceeding to kick me in the face all night b/c heaven forbid that he sleep with his head at the top of the bed... no it had to be in the middle! Oh my goodness...

The Cyclones beat the Hawkeyes today! whoo buddy :) I'm a Panther (UNI) at heart b/c that's my alma mater... but ISU is 2nd b/c I spent many a weekend there as well :) I'm not going to say anything about Ceej's sleeping right now b/c I don't want to jinx it!! But here's hoping we all get well and next week is better!

As for my home-made iced coffee.......... here's what I do!

It's coffee, sugar, and  whole milk (its what the boys drink and skim just doesn't cut it for me). I also add whip creme and drizzle caramel on top!!!

I keep some cold coffee in the fridge most of the time during the summer for when an iced coffee feels right. I like my coffee strong, and I think that really works best for iced coffees b/c when you add ice to it, it melts and can get too watery tasting otherwise. Before the coffee cools I add the sugar so it dissolves quickly, (I like mine sweet!!) depending on how much coffee is in there... I usually use around 1/4 a cup of sugar for under a half a pot of coffee. I then put that in a container in the fridge for later! Once that's cooled I fill a glass with ice, pour the coffee/sugar combo in, around 2/3, add the whole milk, and leave room for the whip creme and drizzle caramel! It's soo yummy :) I use to make it just the coffee, sugar, and milk....... but its soo much better with the added goodies on top!

Pillow talk

Ok now that I have your attention..... Let's talk pillows. So my first pillow has some issues... I was just starting out and didn't really know what I was doing... I was looking at a site for inspiration and of course the lady is all "just make your standard pillow... you all know how to make a standard pillow right?!" And here I am thinking no... no I DON'T know how to make a standard pillow.... so that's why I went with the snap route! I couldn't figure out how to close the pillow up without hand stitching everything and I did not want to do that!


my first attempt at a pillow

Then I came across this wonderful site Ruffles and Stuff . Ok first off... this lady is great?! She has so many fabulous tutorials that are VERY easy to follow along with. Her pictures are stunning as well. I know "thou shall not covet" but man I am jealous of all her photography. I know I keep saying it but I wish I had a nice camera/had the knowledge to take some decent photos.... The link above is just for the pillow tutorial. But I encourage you to browse her site cause it is amazing!!

First I found this old shirt I had... I had stashed it away in our storage room b/c apparently I felt it was "too cool" to give away to goodwill!

Haha Yea I thought I was pretty cool in high school and even wore this shirt for my 11th grade school photo! What a dork....

Shirring again on a shirt this time!

I've been meaning to work on this shirt for sometime.... its kind of funny I'm working on it on the hottest day of this week though!! Initially I thought I would get a piece of elastic and kind of "cinch" the waistline in a bit. The shirt is very cute. Its hard to see but the buttons are acutally pearl buttons so they shimmer a little when the light hits them just right. I just wanted to make the shirt fit a little tighter and make it look like a have a little more of an hourglass figure... not just a boxy shape :)

After I've been shirring so many things

I figured I could use shirring for this shirt as well! I'll spare you the details and setting you should put your sewing machine on. You can click HERE if you want to look back at my past blogs to see how to get set up :)

And here is the finished product!!

It's a pretty subtle change... but I like it!!! I'm looking forward to wearing it on the upcoming cooler fall days :) And yes... that is JDub's paused Halo game... haha.. at least he'll pause to take photos for me!