Family Dinner and Playdates

This weekend was pretty low-key after the late night Harry Potter adventure that I had on Thursday. It was so nice to just be home and get a few "summer cleaning" projects out of the way. I am nesting majorly right now and can't help but clean out closets, filing drawers, our desk, or pretty much anything that is totally unseen and not really that necessary right now. Is Ty's room still a disaster / work in progress?...yes. Is Kinley's room still unfinished?...yes. But, those are not the things I have been working on for some reason.

Anyway, Sunday night was much more fun because we had a Harrison Family/Friends dinner like we haven't had in a while. We had lots of fun friends and family come over and it was nice to just swim, relax, eat and catch up.

Kinley got her cheese face back for the camera. I missed it and I am so glad to have it back.

We kept laughing at her because she wanted to eat her apples with this K-State koozie on her hand like a glove. She does march to the beat of her own drum.

Then, we started the week off with a good Katie and Annabelle Grace playdate. It is so fun that Mendy and Katie both kept Annabelle Grace this summer. I will really miss our playdates when Katie starts school in a couple weeks. Today we went to JumpZone for the girls to jump around and then since I had to stop by Joann's for some fabric (project coming soon) we also stopped in PetCo to look at the animals. The girls loved that.

I love this face of Kinley's looking at the parakeets. And look at that mullet...both are hilar. I wish I would just give her a good haircut..but, I can't seem to chop off all she has spent 2 years to grow! Maybe Ty will be born with a ton of hair. That just wouldn't be fair, right!?

We finished the day at Jason's Deli, where there were many cheese faces. Love it!

Hope your week is starting off fun too!

Harry Potter 7.2

Yesterday was such a fun day! It was my sweet brother, Matt's, birthday! He is 23 now...so crazy. He is such an amazing guy. He is adventurous and kind and loving, so funny, has such an incredible heart for God and mission work. He is an incredible uncle to Kinley. She just LOVES Matt Matt so much and is always so excited to see him even if she hasn't seen him in a while. We started the night at Joe T. Garcias for Matt's birthday dinner.

Last night was the ALSO the midnight premiere of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 2. I had bought tickets with Jen over a month ago but at the last minute we ended up having 3 extra tickets so Matt and his friends Matthew and Austin went with us as part of his birthday present. Matt loves Harry Potter as much as me (maybe more) and as soon as he found out he was going to get to go to Harry Potter they watched 4 movies within 24 hours preparing for it. He also downloaded Part 1 of the 7th movie to watch in the theatre while we waited for Part 2 to start.

This was my first midnight movie premiere to go to and I don't think it can ever be beat. All 17 theaters were showing back to back Harry Potter movies last night (some were starting at 3:30AM!). So thats 34 movies all completely sold out. We were there 2 hours early to get in line to get seats..but, even then we were already too late and they had already opened the theatre and we had to sit on the 2nd row! Such a rookie move on my part! But, we got there as soon as we could after Matt's birthday dinner.

I don't know how I walked away from the movie without a picture of Matt, Austin and Matthew....It is crazy. But, I think it had something to do with all the costumes that were there. Most of these are pics of complete strangers...but, they did love getting their picture taken too.

These cute guys voluntarily stopped and posed without request...so cute.

How cute is this family!?

And I am loving this Luna Lovegood, Beatrix Lestrange, and Professor Snape....We concluded he really could have been the real Professor Snape. He had the whole demeanor and body language down!

We did know a few people there. Compass high school students were definitely represented!

Thanks Makenzie for going with us and I love Landon's tiny lightning bolt.

I also was loving all the homemade T-shirts. This is NO WHERE NEAR the amount of T-shirts...there were hundreds.

But, of course NONE could beat the shirts Allison made Jen and I. She busted out a couple more of her Harry Potter 7.2 shirts in Gryffindor colors for us that were designed over at kojodesigns. I just LOVE them. The front is the fantastic HP 7.2 logo and the back is a list of the 7 horcruxes (non-HP lovers...can pretty much ignore this and just move on).

My first midnight movie premiere was SO much fun! Now, I just need to take a nap today.

Furniture Re-Do and Faux Metal Letters for Ty's Room

I have been SLOWLY, but surely beginning work on my kids rooms (so fun to say kids!). Right after our Cancun trip (literally the day after we got home) Kinley transitioned to a big girl bed. I am so thankful and feel so blessed that it has been super easy for her. From Day 1 she was really excited about her Big Girl Bed and runs in her room to show everyone who comes over her new bed. She naps in it and sleeps all night in it way better than she was in her crib...so, I am very grateful. I will post some pics of her new room soon once I get a few other things done (like wall decor...curtains...maybe another piece of furniture...who knows)

So, we moved the crib into Ty's room and I went about emptying out what was our guest room / storage / craft room and closet. It was a huge task to re-organize things and move closets around and put things in bins for the attic. I feel like I worked forever and have nothing really to show for it. But, at least I have a blank slate of a room now. The walls in his room are a chocolate brown. I love the color and I loved it as a guest room. I think it might be a hard sell as a nursery..but, I am working through that. My vision right now is lots of white to brighten up that room with a few pops of fun pattern and color. I also want to make it very boy-ish. Ben is definitely for that and would not be supportive of any room for Ty that could be used as a girl nursery.

I have been browsing blogs, google image, etsy, and pinterest to get some inspiration! I was wanting to get a big metal 'T' letter for his room but, could not find one that I liked very much or that was big enough to be worth the expense. I happened to stumble upon this tutorial for Faux Aged Metal Letters and thought I would give it a whirl. It was super easy to do and Kinley got to help me paint the letters so that was double fun! I love how the finish turned out...it is hard to believe that they were pretty much cardboard/paper mache letters before.

Ben thinks the finished product looks a little too much like an A&M sign..so, I might just use the T or go get a Y and do his name...or just play around with the positioning so it doesn't look so much like A&M...but, really that would be awesome too...Am I right!?!?!

Next, I tackled this old dresser that was in Kinley's room. It actually was mine once upon a time ago and I am pretty sure both my brothers used it too. I remember there being a picture of me somewhere where I had taken everything out of the bottom drawer and climbed in and stood inside of it so proud of myself. It was originally a blond wooden dresser...we painted it grey with white knobs for Kinley's room. It is the perfect height for a changing table and I love using it as a piece of furniture and a changing table.

This is the best "Before" pic I got...I had already begun taking the knobs off...

For Ty's room, I knew I wanted to paint it white...but, I also decided to distress it some with sand paper and add some rustic knobs to make it look a little more "boyish."

I love how it turned out and how it looks against the chocolate brown walls.

There are many more days of getting Kinley and Ty's rooms ready in the next couple months. Thankfully, that is usually indoor activity. It is hot out there for a preggo! Stay Tuned.

4th of July recap and some 2 year pics

We had a blast for the 4th this year. If you haven't seen the pics yet, stop on over to Lullaby Lubbock to see some fantastic pics from the weekend. Kinley had SO, SO much fun playing with all the kids. They all got along wonderfully and swam nonstop and loved seeing a few fireworks and just playing together. Definitely the most hilar thing of the weekend was when I came back with my face painted and Kinley just cried and cried. She did not like it and was a little scared. She had the sweetest sad face and kept touching my face and just wanted it taken off. I get it was not the best look for me...and my mom made some comment about that I should leave it on for her to get used to it and know that it was me in case I am ever in some accident where my face is mangled or something. Sorta traumatic to think about but so hilar at the time. Here are just a few pics of that and a group pic.

Poor Kinley...

She is breaking my heart...

Kris and Allison trying to console her...

Ella is looking like...What is the big deal Kinley?...This is really cool and I wish I had some face paint too!

Group pic

Also, a few weeks back Kinley and I had an impromptu photo session down the street at Leslie and Annabelle Grace's house. Annabelle Grace was getting her 1 year old portraits made and we swooped in during her naptime and got Kinley some 2 year pics made. I had her in regular clothes just for a bit and then she loved playing in the dress up clothes. I ended up purchasing 5 images and 4 of them are of Kinley in the dress up clothes! Stefani Marcus was the photographer and I loved working with her. She was very easy going especially with us being late additions to the day and so patient with Kinley. Now I just have to decide what sizes of these to print! If anyone wants a particular one...let me know (i.e. grandparents, aunts/uncles, etc.) I am going to send them off to be printed soon.

What a BIG 2 year old girl!

Happy 4th of July!

We are super excited about 4th of July over here! This year we get to go to Granbury and celebrate with friends and family and lots of kiddos. Kinley is so excited about getting to see some of her friends this weekend. She has been talking about it all week! Last night we had a little mommy/daughter date while daddy was fishing and we went to get some frozen yogurt and stopped by Party City to load up on goodies for some 4th of July favor bags for all the kids. Kinley had a fun time picking out the red, white, and blue toys and "pieces of flare" that she liked and is excited to give her presents today.

I hope everyone has a fabulous time celebrating our freedom and I can't wait for more pics from the weekend! Happy Fourth!