The Power of Hello

 When we were remodeling our home, a sweet woman in our ward offered me some curtains.  Simeon and I went over to check them out.  Ever since then Simeon has approached her at church every week with a "Hello Connie".  This woman's life has been hard on many levels but this simple hello from a child has touched her immensely.  She moved recently and wanted to leave Simeon something for his kindness.  She didn't have to but I thought it would be good for him to have something to remind him of his Power of Hello.

 

I don't want to tell this story to brag because goodness me, this kid can be a major stinker in the way he treats people. I want to tell it because I think there is a lesson to be learned but even more so, when Simeon reads the book that I make of this blog, I want him to remember that being nice to people is easy.

Bookmarked

I found this project on a blog I subscribe to when I was looking for a teacher appreciation gift and fell in love. I pulled out all my fabric and wanted to use every single one. I love my fabric!

Unfortunately, they took longer than I would have liked to make each one but these fabric bookmarks are awesome for my family, mother's day, teachers, Christmas, birthday. . . They are so dang cute and I have enough boy fabric so they are not "cute" but cool.

Simmy's Graduation

My kid's have adjusted really well to Boise life with new friends and teachers. I can hardly believe we are a couple weeks into summer. We are very proud of Simeon for losing his first tooth before he graduated Kindergarten. I never posted about him losing it while he was sleeping and how we never found the tooth. He thinks he swallowed it because he woke up coughing



These are the kids from his primary class and Kindergarten class. 2 of them are/have moved :(
I will spare you all the videos I took of their performance. I had two babies pulling on me while taking them. Good job Simmy

Family Room Walk Through Phase C

We have been working hard on the outside of our house and I will dedicate more to that but I will show you a little bit. I love our yard, hard work and all

Earlier

Later-
I am sure there were other flowers that were not photographed in this spot
in between these 2 pics. That's an apple tree behind the roses

I wanted this to be a post to remind you how awesome the Father of my children is. He is awesome and I am going to show you how awesome he is but really, its a post about our home and some progress we have made.

Bright and early on Memorial Day, he woke up and got to work.

Remember my post on the family room? I warned you this would take many phases to get this room set. This is phase c out of hopefully 4 phases.

Before

Next

Now

Eventually we will have a TV down there and cupboards/drawers. I would have loved to have decorated this perfectly before showing it off but who knows when that will be??

Come closer- This credenza was beyond boring and blah. I still need to decide on perfect knobs.

He built me a sewing desk so I can see the kids outside while I sew. Many of you have asked how I get my sewing done. I first laugh because I don't get 1/4 of what I want to then I explain that I sit down for 30secs to 5 min at a time in the middle of all the action. Since most of the action is outside, we have friends over a lot, and I need to have an ear and 1/2 an eye on them, this place is perfect.

This will be a window seat when I can bring myself to pay for the ridiculous price of foam


If you know our family, you know we have heirloom mushrooms. Roger has reupholstered them twice (once with his sister's help) and I invited a friend over to help me take a staple at it. The old fabric was NASTY!! Do you see the worn part vs the unexposed part.


Cute, cute cute now. It goes with the rug and was the inspiration for the credenza color.

Again, not decorated or organized but Roger built (and I painted) a desk.

Before

Now

so much to still do!!

I don't want to be done with befores and nows.

Before

Now

The trees and grass make an amazing difference.
The spring flowers are long gone though.
Do you see something else different?

Let me get a little closer

Here is reminder close up to before

Did you catch my new door? 5 coats later and it is wonderfully bright
Okay, I am done now :)

Its kinda a funny story

A few months ago I asked Roger how old his dad was turning in June and he told me 60. Ideas starting twirling in my head about a BIG party. We ran into his best friend that night and I mentioned the 60th bday and he said "Big Surprise Party at my house!" Except without the exclamation point because I have been informed that men do not use exclamation points. I promptly contacted Roger's siblings to see if they could come come out and asked Roger to get an invite list put together.

Fast forward to a month before the big day. I asked Roj to contact the host to see if things were still ago. He had too many health problems creep up so he was out. We decided to have it here. We had already been busting our tail on the outside and finally got to a point where we could plant grass seeds to host the party outside. We moved back inside for some more projects. We work really well with deadlines so this we great motivation to get some bigger projects done.

I had imagined a HUGE party with lots of friends and family. Roger started thinking otherwise and thought just family and closest of close friends would be all Grey would want. He decided to ask his dad who he wanted to invite. I don't get that but will leave it at that it was no longer BIG and no longer a suprise

Fast forward to last night. The house is just about ready. The food is bought and I have some last minute cooking to do. Roger's sister is coming from CA. His brother is here from Ut. Other family and closest friends are planning on coming. Then. . . right before I go to sleep. . .Simeon throws up. What? Maybe he ate something funny was our hope. Then. . .Michael. . .throws up.

Grey, I love you. I really wanted to throw a big special party so everyone could tell you that you are loved and we think you are awesome. Can we have the small party at your house? minus me, Simmy, Michael, and whoever we decide needs to be quarantined. Oh, and, I hope you don't have it too since we just saw you a couple days ago. Happy Birthday. I give up and can only laugh

*UPDATE- We all got sick. Every last one of us, Roger's mom, and Roger's sister and family that came for a visit. It also rained the night of the party and we were going to do it outside. True story