Because when you stop and look around, life is pretty amazing.

 There is so much love in my heart. I get to love and be loved by these two, amazing people. I get to see their smiles, feel their hugs, and shower them with kisses. They inspire me, they make me laugh more than anyone in the world, and I love them so much, that the only ones who will ever know the immensity of my love, are them, and me. I need to live with this love and happiness, leading every movement and word of every single day. I need to be my most kind, most caring, most giving, most loving self every day. I need to do good for them, even if I may not get a thank you. I need to pick up those same socks in that same spot, and wipe up that same spill, and have it remind me of how thankful I am to have someone to forget those socks, and spill that spill. Sometimes, it's hard. Sometimes, it's really hard. But damn, it's worth it. It is so worth it...

A little Window- Er, Old House Shopping

 Today Mackynzie and I had tons of fun exploring and adventuring little things throughout our day.

After chowing down on a cheat-friday ice cream, we decided to check out a local 'stuff' shop to continue our fun. I had never been inside before, but the cozy looking outside always made me want to stop in. Boy, was I missing out! First off, this place is super unique and incredibly cozy. They bought an old (a town 'original) house and turned it into their store. They kept it in the same layout, but just made use of the space (Probably a big reason I was so in love with it.). This house was huge though. You walk through the front door, into the hallway that leads into the 'house'. There are shelves of awesome treasures, both handmade and unique everywhere, and pictures, paintings and wall hangings that hug every bit of space on every wall. It's so cool, because you walk from room to room and the place is literally packed with stuff. You even go into the door-less closets to look at displays of beautiful things. The lower part of the store is a little clothing boutique. The only changes it looks like they made to the place (apart from obvious repair and maintenance) was putting in two check out counters. We went through and snapped some (bad) pictures of lots of things I would like to add to our humble abode. You guessed it, I'm going to share them with you.

You will probably notice a lot of the photos are of beach-y things. My taste is most often very beach inspired and I can't wait until our home reflects it more.

I LOVE this, but after looking at it again (and the price tag...) this could be a fairly straight-forward and fun DIY.

I sort of  really have a thing for ceramic (white) animals. I want almost every one I see! This one doubled as a hook (under the trunk.). Fancy.

This half-hidden picture frame is really cool. It has a little chalk board around it. So cute!

I really liked this magazine basket. Perfect for a living room, den, nook, or bathroom!

Doesn't this serving platter look so soft and pleasant? It looks like a perfect morning feels.

This picture is blurry, sorry. Its a go-cup that says 'namaste'. Totally up my ally. (I felt like a creeper going around taking pictures, so I got some odd angles and bad quality haha)

They had a bunch of really fun aprons too.

I loved this pitcher and jar. I am a big fan of the soft blue playing off the fake green flower/foliage thing.

There is just something about wooden bowls, utensils, and accessories in a kitchen...

Okay, so maybe it's just a ceramic thing to an extent?

Pretty beach-y serving plate.

 I snapped this while heading down the stairs haha.

You can see how 'original' this house is. So beautiful.

We had a lot of fun in there and Mackynzie didn't want to leave. She left enthusiastically saying 'Bye!' to everything. We will definitely be back (possibly multiple times) to pick up some fun things.

A version of princess and the pea you don't hear in fairy tales...

 You know all those 'firsts' you hear about? Specifically the ones you are supposed to experience at least once when you become a mom? Some of them are sort of goofy and you just put them on the back burner (or, like me, forget about them completely and then remember vaguely right after it happened.) Today was one of those firsts. I'm sure it won't be the last, but I am hoping we may get lucky and it will be...

 Mackynzie got a pea stuck up her nose. 

 I am not kidding when I say I completely forgot that children get objects stuck up their noses. In her defense (like she needs any since she is not even two.) she did not place it there herself. She is into this new 'thing' where she takes all her food off her plate/out of her bowl, puts it on the table/floor/couch, and eats it with her face- like a dog (Resulting in a pea finding it's way up there.). Today she chose to do this with the peas she was eating for lunch. I didn't notice the pea (and maybe wouldn't have) until I was nursing her afterwards and (bare with me) cleared a booger out for her. She usually says something like 'booger' or another relevant word after, but this time she said 

"pea." 

I assumed she had to pee , so after trying to clarify she said 

"No, pea."

And pointed to the table where she had eaten. As I was looking at the table and about to ask what she meant, she said

"Pea. My nose!"

I clued in, took a look and sure enough, saw a flash of bright green. I ended up only being slightly uncomfortable with the situation, because I didn't want to end up pinning her down while some random doctor fished it out. I tried getting her to blow, but she was very upset that there was a pea in her nose, so I was not allowed to touch it. I called my dad [in law] and he told me he had had a few experiences with similar situations in his years of fatherhood. He told me to try and get her to take a deep breath, hold one nostril and help her push the air out from her belly. I hung up and tried, but I was not getting anywhere near her nose. She was telling me how she did NOT want a pea up her nose. Finally, I made a game of it by demonstrating how to blow through your nose with your lips closed tightly. I made it funny by nose-blowing on the dog (hey, whatever works.). I did this twice and then did it on my finger to show her where the air was coming from. I seemed super excited too, so when I asked her if she wanted to try to blow on my finger, she gladly accepted. She gave a weak little blow, but it only took a giggle and some encouragement for her to take a deep breath and shoot the pea across the living room. When she saw it, she was relieved and still giggling from our game. I called my dad back and told him operation pea removal was a success. She chatted and giggled about how silly it was for the rest of the afternoon.  

Ah... firsts. Can we just do the fun and silly ones please?

Finally doing stuff around the house and seeing you around

 Last weekend Cody and I got our butts in gear and finished a few things around the house. The list looked something like: Make Mackynzie's room into more of a room (worry about really decorating etc later.), get some more storage in the bathroom, mount herbs on the wall, put some sort of headboard on our bed, clean up the disaster we made doing said things.

There (of course) are still small cosmetic things to be done around here, but alas, we are close.

We needed more storage in our small-ish bathroom, so we added some shelves. They make a world of a difference.

Before:

After:

To see before's of the house (taken last month) check out my video tour.

We were playing with quite a few ideas for our bed. Originally, the plan was to make a sort of canopy bed so we would have shear curtains all the way around. I loved the idea, but then after scoping out pinterest a bit, we got some inspiration for something a little more practical for our current sleeping arrangements and went for it. It's different, but we are really happy with it. I still need to add some more art to the room which will also happen when it happens. I think it will make things look a little more balanced.

Cody also mounted my herbs to the wall for me. I was super excited (over herbs, I know.) and I love  how it looks.

Like always, please excuse my iPhone photography.

 Something I am super happy to be done with (for now.) Is Mackynzie's [play] room. (you should seriously check out what it looked like before. I say this is a big improvement.

 There are a couple things to do in her room still, like hang those purple letters on top of her kitchen, and we are brainstorming something to put around the wall of her little coloring corner. As you can see she has drawn a couple of pictures on the wall. She loves it and its so much more practical. I also have to add how big of a relief is is for me. It's so much easier to clean now.

Oh ya, we also switched sectionals from the basement and main floor two weeks ago. Huge improvement.

before: (yes, this was mid move and mid Mackynzie mess.)

 After:

Probably one of my favorite adjustments.

 We had a busy weekend! But i'm so happy to cross all those things off of our list.

 I am going to apologize now to friends and family who use this to keep updated on us. I'm going to step away from the blog a little bit to put my efforts into other things. I am still going to update as often as I can (which who knows, may not even be different to how often I update now.), but if things get a little slow around here, now you know.  I just can't predict how much time I will have to devote to everything.

See you when I see you!