Rowan turned 5-Batman Style~

 Rowan turned 5 on January 9 at 4:05 p.m.;-)  It was a school day, so we were up and at 'em early!   We did presents before school.  That night Rowan and Alex had church, so that was the extent of our celebrating!

Happy Birthday!

We celebrated with Alex's parents and sister on Saturday!  Alex had the camera, so we have no documentation of said relatives;-)  They helped us enjoy a Taco Bell dinner (Rowan's choice) and some Orange Leaf for dessert (also Rowan's choice)!  It was fun, and he got a really cool gun and Batman figure;-)

Then we were ready for the friend party on Sunday!  We had our neighbor boys and another friend over for Batman Training Camp!  I made each child a personalized cape and mask, so we were ready for training!

Ready to be superheroes!

The neighborhood gang (minus Hayden-he ran late) plus Isla!  I could tell our house was safe the moment they all came in;-)

The prettiest superhero!

We played games then in our costumes!  The first one up was "Vaporize the Villain!"  That is code for shoot the bad guys with silly string.  This was MESSY, but the kids had fun!

How many bad guys did you hit?

 Then we started to retrieve the anti-venom from the Bat Cave to help our friends.  Alex made an obstacle course that led into a tent.  We turned off all of the lights, and they were retrieving glow sticks.  It was fun, and this kept them entertained for a long time!

 Then we were on to Bat Planes.  The kids made paper airplanes, and we launched them to see whose Bat Plane could fly the farthest!  Colin's was hands down the best.  That thing flew!

They were so eager!

 Last on the list was cake! We sang, and then the kids dug in.  Rowan had requested  an ice cream cake, so we went with it!  It was delicious and stress free;-)

A great big wish made!

Eating our cake and drinking our Power Punch!

The party was fun, and I'm confident they had a good time!  Rowan was in bed at 6:20 tonight, so I know I wore him out;-)  We had a great time celebrating the blessing of our now 5 year old!

Big Girl Bed~

Sigh.  It happened.  My sweet Isla went from this-

To this.

We took the side of her crib off this week and made her a toddler bed.  She's amazing, and it hasn't changed her sleeping habits at all.  Big girl at this house~

A Little Bit Crafty~

Over winter break, I dug out my crafty materials and accomplished a couple of projects around the house!

This is a shower curtain I bought for the kids' bathroom almost a year ago. I loved it, but I couldn't find art to put on my bathroom walls to save my life.  I finally gave up and decided I would have to paint something myself.

So here is what I came up with!  It is simply a canvas with minimal acrylic paint.  It took me a couple of hours one afternoon to paint, and I am satisfied with it.  It looks good in the bathroom now, and I can stop looking for owl paintings;-)

 Materials-
Canvas size 16x20 (2 pack for $7.99)
Acrylic Paint (I already had)
Paint Brush ($.47)

Total: $4.46 and a couple hours of time~

I also had my kitchen painted grey over the break.  I had black curtains up, so I decided they needed a makeover.  I found this fantastic yellow chevron pattern at Hobby Lobby.  Alex actually whipped up the curtains since he is the seamstress in our house;-)  I love them!  They make our kitchen look much bigger, and they are a bit funky!

I also made the EAT sign on the left!  It adds some more color to the room as well.

Curtain Materials-
2 and 1/2 yards Chevron fabric ($12.47-I had a coupon)
4 packages of curtain clips (2@$4.97 and 2@$6.47)

Total:  $35.35

Sign Materials-
3 Cardboard Letters ($2.47 each)
Acrylic Paint (I already had)
Paint Brush ($.47)

Total: $7.88

I loved the letters so much I also did them in my laundry room.  It is painted a mustard yellow, so I painted grey letters to spell WASH.  I think they really fill in the empty space I had next to our door that leads to our garage.

Sign Materials
4 Cardboard Letters ($2.47 each)
Acrylic Paint (I already had)
Paint Brush (I already had)

Total: $9.88

I'm working on curtains for my purple living room as well!  Stay tuned~

Goals, Goals, Goals...

I haven't always set goals. There were days in my life when I just went with the flow and used the mantra, "What will be, will be." You can read how our life worked on this mantra here.:-)

 Goals help focus me in a direction. They give me a challenge to aspire to meet, but there is a problem. They stress me out:-) Goals not only give me something to work towards, but they also create an expectation within myself to meet said challenge. I'm competitive in nature, and I would rather not lose at my own game;-)

Here are last year's goals Alex and I set together. The last update is from September. 

1. Get PMI taken off of our Home Loan -Done in February!

 2. Pay off Alex's small student loan ($641.00 to be exact)-Done in June!

3. Save enough money to replace Jolie's car by November 1, 2013 in cash! I was able to add to this fund in September, and we are up to 47% of our target at the moment.  If I add in the value of our car, which we will either sell or trade in, I am up to 67% of our target.  Not bad!  Accountability sure helps the results;-)  Hopefully next month I'll have good news too~ 


 We conquered the first two pretty quickly, but the third goal was boisterous to say the least.  I got frustrated with it, and I just quit on it for a while. Life happened, I threw my hands up in the air, and I believe my exact words were, "Goals are stupid!"

It is not true.  Goals are not actually stupid.  They simply place the expectation in front of me, so I am more prompted to take actions to move myself in that direction.

So here we go for 2013!  I need a challenge, I guess;-)

1. Save enough money to replace Jolie's car by August 1, 2013 in cash!
Currently, this fund is at 59%.  If you look up above, you will notice it is actually 8% lower than in September.  Yep, that's right!  I borrowed from the car fund for various car repairs on both vehicles.  Life happens.  Sad face, but it is true. Only 41% to go!  We'll be positive~

2. Go on one family vacation for at least 5 days out of the state of Kansas paid for in cash!
We didn't go on a vacation last year, and Rowan noticed.  We're going-somewhere!  Anywhere but here would be fine by me:-)  

3. Read 23 books from January 1 until December 31!  
This is very attainable, and I love to read as long as I have something good on hand;-)
 
That's it!  I'll update monthly for accountability.  That helps me know I'm being monitored;-)