The small virtues

I ran across this poster online yesterday, and the message really made me stop and think. It really sums up the fabric of our days, doesn't it? Here's to speaking graciously, working diligently, and trying fearlessly. Hope your weekend is wonderful! The first thing I'm doing is sleeping in...

Screen print sold here to raise money for charity. Their 2012 calendar got me all excited when I saw it, so now I'm going to be looking for the 2013 version to see if I'll love it just as much!

xoxo,
Tanya

The pumpkin patch without pumpkins

We make a stop at the pumpkin patch every year in October, and this year we made it there early in the month, before it got too cold, with the kids' fave cousin in tow. Plus it gets dark earlier with every passing day--it's hard to believe how much our days are shrinking!

The funny thing about all these pictures is that we got a shot of some pumpkins in only one of them, and it's grainy and dark. This place has a corn maze, a cow train, a bouncy pillow, a playground, corn pit, pig races, corn shooting, and hay rides. Plus a creepy iguana you walk through. There's a lot to do! By the time we got done doing the things we knew the kids were itching to do, it was dark and cold, and our hay ride wasn't the picture-perfect setting you see in most peoples' photos. When the sun went down, it instantly became so much chillier, and it was only downhill from there in terms of the kids' complaints. I finally had to bail early with Mila and warm up in the car because she couldn't bear to be out in the cold a few more minutes so we could run through the mini corn maze. And I brought so many layers of clothes, not to mention hats, gloves, and scarves, which you don't see in any of these pictures, but those kids were bundled up! Maybe next year we'll just come out in our snow clothes?

xoxo,
Tanya

I'm back

It's been a crazy month, for reasons I don't really want to talk about. So secretive, I know...forgive me. I've been thinking about this blog probably every single day since my last post almost a month ago, but I haven't been able to blog on even one of those days. The last thing I want is for this blog to be a chore, to become something that stresses me out (I have plenty of things in my life that stress me out as it is), so I've been going easy on myself lately--but now I think I'm ready to get back to it.

I have a few posts to share from the last month, but not too many. My camera hasen't been out too much lately, so my goal is to pull it out on an (almost) daily basis and just snap, even if not much is going on. A lot of times those kinds of pictures can be the best, right? Expressions sometimes tell more of a story than what's going on when you took the picture.

I'm easing back into this with a couple photos of a few things we've been up to around the house this month.

I got this ice cream maker from my mother-in-law, who got it as a gift and knew she'd never use it. We don't use it too often either, but when we do, the kids love it. This time we made berry ice cream, with lots of fresh strawberries and raspberries.

Baking pumpkin pie is one of my favorite things to do in the fall. It's so comforting and cozy, sitting down with a hot piece of pie on a chilly day. Technically you can bake pumpkin pie any day of the year (it's not like I make my own pumpkin filling), but I only get the urge when the weather cools down. That's why I'm glad we have all four seasons where we live--you really get to experience all the changes that come with each season.

A treat I picked up at Krispy Kreme one day. Notice the one that's missing--in my tummy already. The custard-filled ones are my favorite, but I won't refuse a plain glazed one either.

xoxo,
Tanya

Instagramming

Just wanted to put up my Instagram shots from last week, seeing as how this week is almost over now... :)

Life is good, though sometimes it sure doesn't feel like it. I am so grateful for my life, for all that I have been given, and there are moments every once in a while where I hear about someone with a terrible disease, or someone who was diagnosed with something terminal and had to face death--and my perspective does a 180. In that moment, all I can do is say a prayer in my head, thanking God for
giving me my health and everything else, and I see how good I have it. The sad part is that it's so easy to go back to making your problems larger than life in your head again, and that feeling is lost. Gratitute is such a good thing to cultivate, and I'm working on it as I speak.

1. We love our cherry tomatoes the most. They are the easiest to pop in your mouth with no mess, easy to pack in lunches, and they are the sweetest. We gobble them.
2. New project alert--painting the kitchen, and still not done.
3. A Boise house in the latest Dwell issue.
4. Riding with this little guy behind me. Didn't get a shot of the other three kids.
5. Waking up slowly with Pero in bed.
6. Hanging in my breakfast area.
7. Every Saturday we are at one field or another, usually both.
8. The weirdest tomato I've ever seen. It really wanted a nose.

xoxo,
Tanya

It's a floral cloud

No, I didn't make the sock monkey--I made the cloud pillow behind it. He just happened to be in the room, and it looked like he wanted to join the party. So I let him.

I posted a couple days ago how I was itching to make a cloud pillow, and make a cloud pillow I did! It was pretty gratifying to be able to make something fairly quickly and it was pretty foolproof, too. I am a beginner sewer and have lots to learn, but good thing I didn't have to learn anything for this one (or you could count me out). I stuffed it with bamboo stuffing to make it super natural and healthy for the kids' beds, and stitched up the hole by hand. The best part--I had everything on hand. No prep, no fuss--my kind of project.

The girls took all my scraps and thoroughly enjoyed themselves cutting it up into "mountains" as I worked (short attention spans). :) Those fabric scissors cut fabric like butter!

Don't mind the fact that my bed is unmade. And yes, that is my lovely orthopeadic pillow (how I hate it). I'm old...

I had to make the bed to get a cute shot of this pillow in all its glory. It just wouldn't have been the same without those shaggy beauties in the background, right? The cloud found a home on Mila's bed, and she now has to have it by her side as she falls asleep. So now I have to make Olivia one, and they have both requested heart pillows as well. Now I just need to think of what I can come up with for Ben's bed.

xoxo,
Tanya

Being a parent is hard sometimes

Date night

We often don't have babysitting for the weekends, so we 1) haven't been going out on dates much or 2) take the kids. Sometimes I'm tired and it's not worth the effort to arrange anything, which I figure is bad (keep your marriage alive! you need to be alone! right?), but it's been working for us lately.

This date night was actually a week and a half ago now, but I'm just getting around to posting it. We had a good time as a family, and that's what matters. I want my kids to remember a fun childhood, where their parents took them places and spent time all together, as a unit. We started off with dinner at a local pizza place (I love a good pizza), then ended up at the park, which was supposed to be a quick thing before we headed home. Well, when we were driving up to it, we noticed people everywhere, then booths, then vendors, then the park, which was completely filled with tents, and we realized some kind of fair was going on. Lots of earthy, health-conscious people. :) We played on the playground as it was getting dark, looked around, and each of us (the kids and I) got to pick a rock out to take home. I got a cool one cut in a tower--don't really know what to call it, but I like it! You should have seen me asking B to buy me a rock, and the vendor is looking on the whole time. "Please, can I have this rock? Look, it's a really cool one. I love rocks..." Ha ha! Then he started going on with some guy how wives want the weirdest things. Good thing he bought me the rock.

We ended the night with a stop for frozen yogurt (I got the tart flavor with berries and nuts on top--don't worry, no sugar!), one of our favorite things to do as a family, then off to bed. Such a good date.

xoxo,
Tanya

I've been pinning

I've been looking at beautiful spaces online lately, and here are some I've pinned. I love that there are so many different types and styles of homes out there, with all kinds of people living in them, and they are all unique because of the infinate ways you can fill a home up with things. I never get tired of it. (A little bit of philosophy for you there...)



No. 1 / No. 2 / No. 3 / No. 4 / No. 5 / No. 6 / No. 7 / No. 8 / No. 9 / No. 10 / No. 11 / No. 12 / No. 13 / No. 14

 

xoxo,

Tanya