FAVORITE FASHION FIND FRIDAY

It's time for my favorite fashion find again! I can't believe that tomorrow is August 1st. Wow it is hard to believe that fall is just around the corner and school will be starting soon. Jace's 1st day of preschool isn't until September 8th so he has a little while longer. We went to the mall yesterday and shopped for a few school clothes for him. Gap, Old Navy, and Banana Republic all have 30% off right now with a coupon so you can't beat that. Usually it's 15% on sale and 30% on full price, well everything is 30% right now so you can't go wrong using that on sale prices right now.

So I got these shoes and am so excited about them! Right now on gap.com they were $39.50 and are on sale online for $18.99. I found them at the store for $6.99 on sale and then got 30% off making them $4.89!!! How could I resist that? I also got another pair similar that are not listed on the website but they are tan and white stripes with a huge tan bow! They are $9.99 and I got them for $6.99 with the coupon!

You have got to LOVE the clearance racks! If you look you can ALWAYS find something! Or at least I can :) Well I hope you all gave a great weekend. It's so nice out today and I think that is supposed to continue into the weekend. My brother and his wife and my niece Emme are coming home tomorrow so I'm excited to see her!

DOUBLE TROUBLE...

If they could always be as sweet as this picture, they look innocent right?

Wow since Grady started walking I feel like all I do is yell at my kids! I'm telling you, what one doesn't do, the other one does. Double trouble is the perfect name for the two of them. They fight, they both want the same toy, they follow each other around and get into things they are not supposed to and one is always crying about something.

Today it was like Jace woke up on the wrong side of the bed. He was grumpy, whiny, being mean to his brother, not listening to a word I said. When they say terrible two's they are WRONG. I think it is terrible three's!

Just like the pictures above, fighting over toys and then this is always what Grady looks like when Jace steals things from him!! LOL

Before we ever left the house today he had so many tantrums. He shut his brothers fingers in a door. He threw a fit when he had to brush his teeth. So I told him that I was going to do it for him and OH MY!!! He cried and bit the toothbrush and spit all over. It's like seriously? At one point he threw himself on the ground and was yelling "it's a bad day, it's a bad day." He wanted this little bowl for his scrambled eggs, so I gave him the bowl and put Grady's in a different bowl. Then Jace threw another fit because he wanted Grady's bowl and he wasn't eating his egg's until he got it. So after Grady was done with his I gave it to him. Sometimes I feel like I just give in, so he quits throwing a fit - I know that's terrible but sometimes you just can't take it! That in return makes him worse in the long run I know!

This picture sums it all up! I'm not listening mom, sticking out his tongue like ha ha ha!

Tonight we went to the mall. He kept escaping from the stroller. We went to Old Navy and he wanted this Superman shirt and then he saw a Batman one and I was getting him two already, well then he saw a different one and was trying to climb up on the shelf and pull one off. Then we went to the Gap and he saw another similar tee-shirt and I told him that he just got two and he wasn't getting this one, and that was it! He started bawling and screaming and throwing another fit. I was so embarrassed. He is usually pretty good when we shop, but for some reason today he was just OUT OF CONTROL!!! People were starring at us because he was so loud!!! What do you do when they do this? He has never thrown a fit this bad before. Any advice? All of you mommy's out there, I would love to hear what you do in this situation!!!

Grumpy face - imagine that! Not Jace, he's always an angel, to bad he's to cute to stay mad at!

Grady is becoming so ornery too! He is into everything. He takes remotes, telephones, the dogs bowl. He is starting to climb up on things, and behind things. He is almost running now. He does this thing where he scrunches his shoulders up to his head when he knows your coming after him. He dumps the dogs water and eats the dog food. When you go to get it out of his mouth he bites you so hard! He's CRAZY just like his brother! When his brother threw himself on the floor and started banging his legs down on the floor today, Grady came and sat down right beside him and started banging his legs too. DOUBLE TROUBLE and it's just beginning!

Then to top off the day, we went to Panera Bread for supper. I love Panera Bread and decided to try the Turkey Bacon Bravo sandwich. It looked so good, bread, bacon, turkey, cheese, tomato's and lettuce. Well I took a bite and thought this is kind of hard to bite off. So I took another bite and it was still so hard to bite off. So I thought it was the bacon. Sometimes if you order bacon on a sandwich like that, they just warm it up and it's chewy. Well after several more bites I thought this is ridiculous..and thought I will just take the sandwich apart and take the bacon off and just eat the turkey by itself. Well when i took it apart, I realized that the paper that the turkey either comes separated in or what they pick the turkey up with was in between the turkey and when I pulled the paper out I had actually eaten three bites of the PAPER!!! My mom wanted to complain but I was so embarrassed and grossed out that I actually just ate that and was so dumb to not even realize that I ate it! How could I not know that I was eating paper? Because I never would have thought there would be paper in my sandwich and thought the cause was the bacon! CRAZY to me! Can you imagine if I would have went and showed the workers...what would I say um... I just ate paper that you left on my sandwich? I bet they would have thought yeah right! So I didn't tell them :(

Give Grady awhile longer, I think he's going to be bigger than Jace the way he's built and will give his brother a run for his money!

Well enough for tonight. My day has been long enough and I just hope that tomorrow my kids are "back in order" as you might say! I LOVE my boys and I know they are really not that bad, it just seems that way lately ha ha! I wouldn't trade them for the world, because they are my world :) and they they act like their dad so they get it honestly and I woudn't trade him either!!!

A LITTLE SECRET...

Well I am going to let you in on a little secret. My family has been signing up for contests on Marlboro.com for a few years now. We do not smoke, but we sign up and click the "we are smokers" button so that we can participate in these contests. How many times do you hear if you sign up for something you could win and NEVER do? Well let me tell you - when Marlboro sends us a contest we all get excited and sign up as soon as it starts.

My brother and his wife were the 1st to win something. A few years ago they won an all expense paid trip out to the Marlboro Crazy Mountain Ranch in Montana. When they got there they received all kinds of little goodies. They got a Stetson Cowboy hat, sunglasses, Columbia coats, snow boots, gloves, a camera, thermal clothing, duffel bags and several other things. They got to go dog sledding, snowmobiling and I can't think what else...but they had the best trip. The pictures of where they stayed and just of the mountains in Montana were picture perfect.


A few years ago I opened my front door and there was a huge box from Marlboro. I had no idea that I had won anything and thought, what in the world could this be? I opened it up and I had won a Coleman 6-8 person tent! It is huge and Jace loves to set in it and "pretend" to be camping (since we don't really camp).

My grandma last year won a two cup on the go coffee maker from Cuisinart. It makes just two portable cups to take with you in the morning!

My mom a few months ago won a portable The Singing Machine karaoke machine. We have jammed to it a few times lol... you would not want to hear us though! She also won a $25 amazon gift card recently.

My husband and I both received a notification in the mail not long ago that we won tickets to the Indy 500 this year. We could each bring a guest so we both brought our dads. None of us had actually been to the speedway for the Indy 500 so it was definitely an experience. The seats we had were pretty good, we received binoculars, disposable cameras, a Marlboro backpack, towel, hat and earplugs. It was a really hot but fun day!

This summer we recieved a contest in the mail. It's called 100 days of flavor. Every day for 100 days you sign in to Marlboro and they give away gifts for each day. My brother, my parents, my grandma and my husband and I have been competeing to win! So far we have won a few things that aren't worth all the much but so fun just to win something. We all won the wall mounted bottle opener as they gave away I think 500,000 of them. My brother and grandma won a canteen. My mom and brother both got a cow hide money clip. I won an ashtray. Then I just found out that I won a pair of Maui Jim Akoni sunglasses. I had never heard of them but they only gave away 500 so I went to check them out at Mauijim.com and found out they are $259.00 shades! How exciting is that? To bad they are men's aviator sunglasses and my husband will get to use them..or maybe I'll try and pull them off - I'm not sure I want him to have them, we have been teasing him that he will either lose them or break them ha!

Also Marlboro sends you coupons which we obviously don't use (except for my grandma), they send you a little gift on your birthday like an ashtray, dice, a deck of cards etc... How fun!

Well I just thought that I would let you in on this little secret...I shouldn't tell you this information because now my chances will be lessened if you all sign up ha ha! Why did I tell you though? Because I am JUST THAT NICE :)

Hope you all sign up soon and win big!!! We have about 40 days left of the 100 days of flavor and I'm hoping to win another big prize, a car would be nice!!!

LAKE FESTIVAL

What a great day it turned out to be yesterday for the Lake Festival. The weather was perfect, making it a great day to be out by the lake. We wanted to be there for the annual Amphicar "swim in" which was more of a "splash in" for some of the car's! What fun it must be to be able to drive a car into the lake and it instantly becomes a boat. It just doesn't look right. You look out into the water and see all of these car's floating around. It's just a really neat event! Jace was amazed. He especially loved the Batmobile!




While walking around we ran into 3 of my old girlfriends from high school. I was a little overwhelmed at who to talk to as I don't get to see these girls very often and there is a lot of catching up to do with each of them. Let me tell you - 10 years out of high school these girls looked so great! They are all happily married and doing so well for themselves!


At 10 o'clock the fireworks were going to start, so we made our way out onto the pier that the city just cemented. It is so nice. It was the perfect spot to watch the fireworks at. We ran into my mom's sister Dawn and her husband Jeff so the boy's were so excited to watch the fireworks with them.


The fireworks this year were great as they lasted quite a long time and were really big! They also blared music to them and that just made it even better. People were dancing and really enjoying them. It doesn't matter how old I am, I still love a great fireworks display and I still ooohhh and ahhhh at them!!!



When they were over there was a live band playing at the festival. Whenever there is a band playing Craig's parents are always there. They park their chairs right in front of the stage and enjoy the music. Craig's mom was dancing with her friends and Jace joined in on the fun. They were getting a kick out of watching him move and groove! He LOVES to dance, it's so funny to watch him..boy does he have the moves! He definitely doesn't get those from me...must be from daddy! Grady loved the loud music and was just kicking his legs in the stroller as well.

Well today is supposed to be the Grand Parade, but as I sit here with my windows open and type this blog I can hear it P-O-U-R-I-N-G down rain :( That is never good for the festivities as there is so much "supposed" to be going on today! Hopefully it will clear out by this evening and they will still have it. We will just have to wait it out and see! If you come through our town the streets are lined with chairs and have been since Monday. People like to "stake out" their spots and I'm sure all of the chairs are soaked by this point!

FAVORITE FASHION FIND FRIDAY

I thought I would try this. I saw on someones blog that every Friday they put their favorite fashion find. I thought this would be a great idea to do on Friday's. So here we go...

I received this purse as a gift from my mom. They went to Florida on vacation a few weeks ago and I watched over their house and watched her 4 cat's and she brought me this back. She definitely did not have to get me a thing for doing that for her, but I was so excited when she did! Many of you know that my favorite color is PINK, so this Coach purse is perfect for me. I LOVE it! I love handbags and this one is one of my favorites by far. It's so girly and fun. What I love most about it is that it is like a shiny coated material. It will never get dirty like most cloth bags. It has a long strap that is convenient for shopping, but it also detaches so you can carry it over the shoulder. It is puckered in the front with a huge pocket and the back has a huge magnetic pocket. It is definitely roomy...and I have realized with 2 kids I need a big purse. You never know what you'll find it there, ha ha! I'm not sure how much this purse was, but we are bargain shoppers and she got this on sale at the Coach Outlet. If you ever want a Coach purse and don't want to pay a huge price, then you have to go to an outlet store around a holiday! They have HUGE sales and you can get like a $300-400 purse for like $100!

Well we have a huge weekend ahead of us. It is our big Lake Festival weekend and Friday night is the fireworks and the amphicar swim in.If you've never heard of an amphicar, it's a car that you can drive right into the water and it becomes a boat. There are only so many of these around, as there were only so many made. It is an annual event here, and they do the swim in on Friday night and then they all drive through the parade on Saturday. I think the boys are going to love the parade this year and I know they will think it's so cool to see these cars drive into the lake. Some of them drive pretty fast into it, and make a huge splash! Jace keeps talking about it already! Our niece is a freshman in the band this year so she will be marching with the band in the parade. We just might have to yell and embarass her :) I hope the weather stays nice for these events. I will have lots to blog about and many pictures to share over the weekend!

Thanks to all of you who are continuing to follow my blog :)

WHERE IS OUR SUMMER...

Wow, what a drastic change in weather from yesterday to today! Yesterday it was so nice outside around 82 I think and today the high was 69. July today feels like fall and I'm not a bit excited about it. Summer only lasts so long and winter feels like it lasts forever, so why can't it just be hot for a few months.

I'm so glad that I took the boys to the pool and enjoyed working on my tan yesterday. Jace has been loving the pool this summer. He is getting so brave and confident in the water. We have really been teaching him about pool safety this year. With my parents having an in ground pool it scares us to death and we really want them to feel confident around the water. Jace uses this thing called a Puddle Jumper made by Stearns. It is the best thing E-V-E-R!!! It is made out of life vest material and is coast guard approved. Unlike a life vest this just goes across the front of him and has 2 things like floaties that go on his arms and then it just hooks in the back. It doesn't prohibit him from doing anything, it doesn't get in his face at all and he has full mobility of his arms and everything with it on. He knows that before he ever can get into the pool he ALWAYS has to wear his "frog" as he calls it. They make all sorts of funny faced ones, animal ones etc... His is the frog and he loves it! I would recommend this to anyone. He feels confident enough to swim out into the deep end by himself, and is jumping in almost all by himself with it on too. Another thing that has been a life savor at my parents house is an alarm on the door that goes out to the pool. If one of the boys even opens the door the alarm goes off within seconds and it is LOUD. There is a button high on the wall that we can press so it doesn't go off if we go out, but the second they open it, it goes off.

Jace always has to pee on grandpa Kevin's fence. I could not resist this picture!! At least he knows not to pee in the pool though! He will love me for this one someday too hehehe...

Grady fell asleep while we were out by the pool and Jace decided to play in the little bit of sand that will have paving blocks covering it. He played in that sand for so long. I am telling you, give that kid sand or dirt and he is so happy! I was happy to because I got to work on my tan and read my new Self magazine that I got in the mail. We all enjoyed ourselves!

When my mom got off of work she decided to get in the pool too. She will love me for this picture of her :) Love you mom ha ha!!!

Today it was so cold compared to yesterday and my husband had the day off. We are always so glad when daddy is off for the day. The company that he works for always has a big baseball tournament to raise money for Children's Miracle Network in the summer. So next Tuesday is the big game and the guys on his team decided to practice today. So the boys and I went along. I should have taken some pictures but it was rainy and not very nice and I was just trying to keep the boys occupied. Jace was having so much fun when the guys would hit a ball out of the fence he would chase them and try to throw them back over the fence. He thought he was really helping out. He got a few over the high fence but it wasn't easy! I had to help him a few times, but he sure did try his best.

After practice we were in the town that Uncle Josh (my brother) works in. He is the general manager at a hotel so we stopped by to visit him. Jace was so excited. He had to go up the huge flight of stairs and there was a lady cleaning the suite so he got to check that out. Then he had to check out the pool and hot tub. Next the breakfast area. He knew all about the hotel since we stayed in so many on vacation. He wanted to know if there was an elevator. Well I'll tell you what happened on vacation in the elevator. We were in Branson, MO and it was our final day there. We had just went down and ate breakfast and got on the elevator to go get our things so we could check out. Jace was ALWAYS the first one out of the elevator...well not this time. As Craig, Grady, my grandma and I were talking and out, I look back to see where Jace was and he was still on the elevator and the doors were going shut! I tried stopping them and it was to late. My husband and I freak out as our 3 year old is on the elevator by himself! Craig takes off to the stairs as I am yelling into the elevator hoping Jace can hear me. I am telling him to STAY ON THE ELEVATOR! I can hear him from afar. The worst is going through my head. Oh no what if he gets off, what if someone takes him, what are we going to do! Luckily the hotel only had about 5 floors and luckily 3 of the nicest women got on and could hear me screaming and stayed with him until they reached our floor. As my husband is frantically running from floor to floor and seeing if he can catch the elevator, the elevator comes back to me and I have my 3 year old back! Thank goodness for those women and my yelling!!! My husband on the other hand did not know that I had him, so I stayed on the elevator until we found him on the lobby floor! He was sweating as he just got the biggest workout of his life running up and down 5 levels trying to get our son! It did not phase our child at all, he wasn't scared a bit. I actually think he thought it was cool. He even told the ladies that we came from he lobby and were going to the second floor! They thought he was pretty cute, and told me that they didn't think he looked like he should be in that elevator by himself!!! We definitely learned our lesson and now know that in just a split second how fast something terrible can happen. That must be why I'm such an over protective parent! I love my kids and would never want anything to happen to them, so if that's what it takes, I'll continue to be that over protective parent and that worry wart that I am no matter what anyone thinks!

Well I have kind of been slacking on this blogging thing. I never realized how much time it actually took to do this! I am enjoying it though and I hope that you will continue to read it! I will try harder to blog every day or at least every other! So that's it for now, have a great night everyone and please keep the comments coming!!! :) I love to hear what you all think!!!

THE BACHELORETTE...

I don't know why sometimes, but I LOVE watching the bachelor and the bachelorette. Every year I say I am not going to watch this show and some how I always get addicted to it! This year is no different. My husband knows on Mondays at 8:00 for two hours that I am going to be in front of the t.v. I know, two hours I devote myself to watch a stupid show that the people hardly ever stay together in the end but I love it anyways! I don't watch t.v. much at all, so he can't complain to much :)

I love the bachelorette this season - Jillian Harris. She is so cute and I love her style! I love her hair and her clothes, and she has such a fun personality! She always wears big earrings and I can totally relate to that. I love big earrings and big rings. I feel like since my hair is long that I need big earrings so you can see them! I also love big gaudy rings right now. They are so fun for summer and there are so many cute ones out right now! Here are a few of my favorites...

The ones pictured above are from Forever 21 and they are only around $3.80 a piece! Love that!!! That is one of my favorite stores for jewelry and shirts. It might not be the highest quality, but they have the cutest things for the cheapest price.

So next week is the season finale of the bachelorette and I can't wait! Who will Jillian pick, will it be Kiptyn (love that name) the 31 year old Business Developer from CA

or Ed the 29 year old Technology Consultant from MI?

I have no idea who she will pick this year, usually I like one or the other, but this year I think they both seem like really great guys! I'm just so glad that she got rid of Wes!!! If you never watched the show he was a musician from TX. She fell for him hard and he was totally playing her. He was there to promote his record and he supposedly had a girlfriend. Kiptyn and Ed both seem really well rounded, mature and are both pretty good looking!!! Looks like she's going to have a hard choice ha ha! Can you seriously imagine going on this show and having 25 guys to pick from? I don't think I could be in that situation on either side, it just doesn't seem right lol!

Well today it actually feels like summer again. Looks like we will go to the pool and enjoy summer some more. Jace is so excited and I'm excited to work on my tan hehe :)