InstaFriday

Pictures from the last week two weeks via Instagram

{Levi and Caroline playing at dinner}

{My first 5k Trail Run - very hard!}

{My cousin's family shower}

{Mexican Monday @ our house}

{He always wants to play with my hair}

{In the nursery at church}

{Caroline's 2nd birthday party}

{Caroline's 2nd birthday party}

{After a hard day of partying and playing, he just couldn't stay awake for dinner}

{After-dinner walking}

{Our new favorite summer spot}

Project Post 23: Removing a "Pop of Color"

You hear people talk a lot about adding a "pop of color" to this or that, but in my case lately, I've been doing the opposite. I'm sort of on a neutral kick because I have a fear of having too much color. Our living room, dining room, and kitchen is all one large room, which is exactly what I wanted and I love it. However, it is sometimes a challenge to keep it from looking cluttered, especially in the last year with the addition of eleventy billion toddler toys (my brother-in-law created that number and I use it any time I need to exaggerate).
With that being said, I'm not a huge fan of counter clutter in the kitchen, whether the clutter is functional or decorative. I absolutely hate a toaster permanently left on the counter (this is pretty controversial, so to anyone's toes I've stepped on, sorry). We do keep our coffee pot out, because it's used daily and there simply isn't a place to hide it. In our next house I'm rooting for an appliance pantry.

One of the things I do keep on the counter is a set of large glass jars that hold my bulk flour and sugar. Chances are, if you've gotten married in the last 5 years and invited myself and/or my mom, you've received a pair of these jars stuffed with kitchen gadgets/accessories. We love to share a good idea. Several places have carried these same jars over the years, including Target, Hobby Lobby, Bed Bath & Beyond, and Wal-mart recently started carrying them. When Target first came out with them, they had 4 or 5 great finishes for the lids - lately I have only been able to find stainless or black lids. When I bought mine several years ago, I bought jars with red lids. I don't really have a lot of red displayed in my kitchen, although almost everything I have stored in the drawers/cabinets is red. The pop of red on those jars has been annoying me lately, and my clutter radar has been going a little wild. So I decided to paint the lids to look like the stainless finish, and give my counters more of a streamlined/blending in look.

I could have sworn I've seen a spray paint color called "Stainless Steel," but when I went shopping for it, all I could find was metallic silver so that is what I came home with to try. After several coats and a good cleaning/disinfecting, I achieved exactly what I had hoped to. It looks great and my clutter radar has calmed down a little (until I look over in the living room at the giant toy box called The Floor ;)).

{Don't mind all the dust, they got a good cleaning}

{It took 3 or 4 coats to get good coverage}

One of Last Week's Little Projects

I emptied out several of my pots around the house/yard/porch that were in need of replanting for Spring. I've still got lots to do in the front beds and pots, but getting this done was quite a little accomplishment. This was really a week-long job when you consider I only worked on it during naps and a few brief moments while Levi ate lunch and watched a tv show. I will be so happy when we get the backyard fenced (soon! it's up next...) and Levi can roam and play out there while I work on stuff like this, but until then it just isn't safe for him to roam. I have to follow him around and watch like a hawk, which means nothing else can get done during that time :)

Tyler came home early Friday with a present for Levi that kept him safely occupied for about 3 hours (see pictures), which is when I finished this all up.

Wild Man

Last night after we got home from church, Levi was pretty wound up. After his bath we coaxed him into running out all of that energy before bed time with the help of the bubble gun and playing "chase dad." Tyler probably ran the length of our house 100 times with Levi running, chasing, flailing his arms, and laughing after him. The pictures are all blurry because no one ever stopped moving. We might need to make this a nightly ritual because it makes for sound sleeping :)