Five on Friday 01/10/14

First things first.  I have wronged my husband and I owe him a public apology.

I left something very important off my Year in Review post.

In 2013 we saw Fleetwood Mac in concert.

Whew!  Glad that's off my chest. 

Now we can move on to a little Five on Friday fun.

Andrew & I had a consultation with an orthodontist Wednesday morning.  It was the same guy I mentioned before.  The first visit was just having molds made and the initial prognosis.  Wednesday we sat down and talked about exactly what needed to be done and how much it would cost.  For me that means braces on top & bottom but only after I have four teeth pulled.  For Andrew that means braces on top after he has one tooth pulled.   Something about that doesn't seem fair to me.

I had a consultation with another orthodontist last week.  He didn't want to pull teeth right away but felt like it would probably have to be done before we were all finished with the process.  

It has taken me time to get to this point, but right now I'm leaning toward the first orthodontist - the one who wants to pull teeth.  I just feel like he has actually studied my mouth and cares about me individually.  The second guy feels like cookie cutter orthodontics.  I feel like he gives everyone the same treatment regardless.  

I have another consultation with a third orthodontist next week.  I'm thinking after that appointment I will make a decision.

As I was getting ready to go back to school after our orthodontist appointment Wednesday afternoon I got the phone call that they were dismissing school at 12:30 due to incoming inclement weather.  I had just backed out of my driveway when the call came so I went around the block and right back home.  Around 8:30 Wednesday  night I got the call that we would be enjoying yet another snow day Thursday.  I enjoyed getting to sleep in, but I'm going to be in school all summer.

My blog is in the process of a makeover thanks to my sweet friend Miranda.  She has been designing my blogs for quite awhile now and always does a fabulous job.  I was heart broken when she got out of the business.  Good news!  She is back!  She has just opened a new shop call Lil Birdie Design Shop.  If you are interested in starting the new year with a new look, please go check out her shop.  She does amazing work and is so easy to work with.

I think I have finally made a decision about my first decorating project for the house.  There are a lot of blank walls in our house, but there is one that drives me crazy.  Our little breakfast nook.  I snapped a picture of it a couple of weeks ago and asked friends for ideas.

The table doesn't sit centered on the wall which throws me off a little with decorating.  I received several ideas.  Most people suggested that I paint a quote on that wall or do a quote with vinyl.  Andrew isn't a fan of that idea.  Besides it would take me a sweet forever to decide what quote I would want to use.

I found a picture on Pinterest that I liked.  It is actually very similar to my original idea for this space.

I grabbed some scrapbook paper and taped it on the wall.  I need to live with it awhile before making my final decision.  Pretty sure this is what I want to do.  Now I just need to find the perfect fabric and decide what color I want to paint the canvases with words.

I went to Zumba tonight for the first time in over a year.  I've been wanting to go for a couple of weeks but haven't been able to find the motivation.  I finally just went tonight even with Andrew tempting me to skip and go eat at Brother's BBQ (where we had our anniversary date).

I am so glad I went.  It was so much fun!  I've missed it.  I had a big goofy grin on my face pretty much the entire time.  But man am I going to be sore in the morning.  I can already feel it!

A New Look for a New Year

Can you believe a new year is quickly approaching? 2011 has flown by for me. It's been a whirlwind of craziness.

I started thinking a few months ago that it was about time for a new look here on the old blog. I've even been toying around with the idea of a new blog address. I'm just not sure I want to go through that pain. Have you ever switched blog addresses? How did it go? Worth the trouble?

New address or not I'm in the market for a new look. Lucky enough, my sweet friend Miranda is hosting a giveaway for a new blog design. I'm thrilled about this giveaway. I probably shouldn't even be sharing it with you because I want to win. :)

Go on over and check out her giveaway here. She does a great job! You won't regret it.

Party Planning and a Giveaway

Hey ya'll! I had really intended to blog about Andrew's birthday party by this time, but it just hasn't happened. It's been a busy crazy week. Andrew's sister, Joy, has been in the hospital since Monday. I don't feel like it is my place to share all the details with you, but if you could be praying for her and for wisdom for the doctors, we would greatly appreciate it. It seems she is finally getting some answers and that is an answer to prayer.

Because of that and some other things, I just haven't posted this week. I haven't had time and I don't have the pictures yet. Jill was my photographer. As soon as she gets the pictures to me, I will share with you. She's been busy tending to Joy this week

But there is something from the party that I'm ready to share with you. I started the planning process back in January. Some people laughed at the fact that I started planning two and a half months before his birthday. This was the first party I've ever thrown and I knew I needed all that time.

The party was going to be a basketball party, but I didn't want to go overboard with that as a theme. After all it was for an adult. I decided to use colors as my theme instead. I chose orange, blue, and green.

I spent hours on etsy looking for the perfect invitation, but didn't find anything that was right. I found several things I liked, but none of them were exactly what I was looking for.

I decided to email Miranda. She has done my last few blog designs and I love her work. I didn't know if she did invitations, but I had to ask.

In true Miranda fashion, she emailed me back almost immediately and said she didn't have much experience, but she'd give it a try. We emailed back and forth and before the end of the night she had several digital papers for me to choose from. It wasn't long after that, she had created my invitation.

Simple. Perfect.



I absolutely love working with Miranda. She is super easy to work with and always does a fantastic job. And F-A-S-T!! She makes sure you get exactly what you want. As far as I'm concerned she will be doing all my future blog designs.

I want to show her some love as a thank you for the invitations. I'm giving one of you lucky readers the chance to win a blog makeover by Miranda. Your blog will be all ready for spring/summer with her "The Anchor's Aweigh" package. Go check out her gallery here. She seriously does an amazing job!
To enter to win this awesome giveaway all you have to do is:

1. Become a follower of my blog for one entry.
2. Become a follower of Little Sailor Design for a 2nd entry.
3. Leave a comment sharing a party planning tip for a 3rd entry.
4. Blog about a party you've planned then come back and leave a comment with a link to your blog for 4 entries.

That's a total of up to 7 entries folks!!! Let's show Miranda some love.

Please leave a separate comment for each entry. I will draw for a winner on Friday, April 15.

Sunday News

***It's snowing!! It's coming down hard. I love it! I'm pretty sure there will be no work for me tomorrow. Andrew says if it keeps coming down like this and continues to stick, he will be working from home.


NEWS UPDATE: NO SCHOOL TOMORROW!!!


***Though I haven't blogged about my goals for 2011, I have them. One of them is to get and keep our house clean and organized. Darlene over at Time-Warp Wife has a housekeeping schedule. I'm using it as my guideline. Of course I have some major cleaning to do before I can keep a maintenance schedule like this one. I made myself a calendar and I'm hoping that will help me. I hate cleaning, but I love a clean house. Since we can't afford to pay someone to do that for me right now, I'm left with no choice but to be a grown up and clean my own house. :( I had big plans to work on this Friday night and Saturday, but we ended up taking an overnight trip to Tulsa. The husband had to do so me work at the Tulsa office so I tagged along. I graded papers for the first part of the day and then went shopping the second part of the day.

***Do you remember this post about new paintings for my living room? Well, they are finished. And they are beautiful!!! AND HUGE!
This picture doesn't do them justice. I absolutely love them and can't wait for the husband to get them up on the wall. My sweet friend, Amanda, is the artist. God has truly given her a gift. She does amazing work. She even painted a baby shower gift for me on very short notice. By short notice, I mean I asked her Wednesday and the shower was Thursday afternoon. Yeah, she rocks!!! She recently started a blog so you too can have some of her artwork. She graduated in December with a degree in education and is currently jobless. She is taking advantage of this time to share her talents with you. Her blog is Splash of Design. It's brand new so I'm not sure she has pictures of her work posted yet, but keep checking back.

***Every time I decide it's time to cut all my hair off I have a good hair day and change my mind. I let it air dry on Thursday and wore it wavy. I got so many compliments. So many of my kids walked into class Thursday and told me I looked pretty. So sweet!!!

***I should have a new look here at the old blog in the next day or too. Miranda over at Little Sailor Design is in the process of creating my new design. The drafts that she has sent me look great! I'm excited about it. She did a FAB job. If you are looking for a new look, check her out. She does a great job, is easy to work with, is fast, and is affordable!! I give her two thumbs up. My new look is going to contain my very own button. It will be my first one. Be sure to grab it when you get a chance.

Bloggy Makeover

I'm ready for a new look for the old blog. I've done the past two myself and I guess they've been okay, but I'm ready for a professional job. I've been out there looking at all the different designers trying to decide what way I will go.

In the midst of that I stumbled across Little Sailor Design. She has done some really cute designs. And even better she is hosting a giveaway right now. You can enter to win a free blog makeover. Go to her blog to check it out.

I of course am hoping to win, but am leaning towards choosing her to do my makeover even if I don't win. But here's hoping. :)

Picking A Name

For the past few days, I've been playing around with some different blog design ideas. Designing my own blog has proved to be much more difficult than I thought. The hard part is the technical side of it. That - I've figured out. It's the look. Things always look better to me when they are made by someone else. Every little flaw stands out to me when it is something I've done.

One of my biggest design blocks is finding a name for my blog that I love. I've gone back and forth with this since I started blogging. I want something more exciting than just The Weavers. It's hard. I want my name to be descriptive of my blog, but my blog is dedicated to one area of my life. I also want a name that can stand the test of time. I want a blog that is good now and will be good ten years from now.

I've been searching through blog after blog looking at their names. I have gotten no ideas from this, but I have been reminded that I'm not a mom. And I'm not a newlywed anymore. It seems that every blog is either about parenthood or the life of a newlywed and the names of blogs reflect that.

Guess that means I have the Not a Mom, Not a Newlywed blog. HA!! Maybe that should be my title.

How can naming my blog be harder than naming children. I don't even have those, but I have their names all picked out.

If only there was a blog naming genie!!

Maybe I should stop trying to have a perfect blog name. What does it really matter in the end anyways? Are you going to stop reading my blog if it's name totally stinks?

Blog Design

I am venturing into blog design. I just started yesterday afternoon. I literally spent all day yesterday learning adobe photoshop. If any of you have ever used it and have any pointers, please share. I'm still a LONG way from really mastering it.

Here is the blog I put together yesterday. I loved this less than 24 hours ago. I was so proud of myself for figuring this much out. Of course, I look at it today and think it's hideous, but at least I know I can do it.