4th of July Weekend: The One Where We Did All the Things

Hello! Did all my American friends have a good 4th of July? And did all my non-American friends have a good 4th of July minus the fireworks and the waving of American flags? ;) 

Both Jordan and I were off work Thursday and Friday, and it was the best 4-day weekend I can remember in recent history. Mostly because I can't remember the last time I had a 4-day weekend. We ate popsicles on the back deck, went to the park multiple times, went to the science museum, went to a 4th of July party, stayed up late to watch fireworks, had a friend come over, got ice cream, and I took an afternoon nap every. single. day. while J napped and R watched Daniel Tiger (she hasn't napped in over a year and a half; we've tried), and I have no regrets about any of it.

I also love that the kids get more time to be together. Since they are at daycare all day during the week in separate classes, sometimes I feel guilty and wonder if it's going to hurt their relationship at all. But they really do love each other, and there are some super sweet moments. Of course, they also can get into it pretty hard, but we always make them apologize and give hugs, and I pray they will grow up knowing they always have each other.

It's crazy hot here in Oklahoma, and I don't even care. Summer can stay forever as far as I'm concerned, minus my most hated of all things: mosquitos. I tried to sit out on my deck last night after the kids were in bed and they destroyed me. They don't care one squat about Jordan, which he claims is from all the garlic he eats constantly (seriously never met anyone who loves garlic as much as that guy does), but they have always loved me, and I do not share their feelings.

Over the weekend we discovered our bird, which we were told was a boy when we bought him a year ago, is actually a girl. Jordan came running in shouting something about Moses having laid an egg. AN EGG. I was like, what? Apparently they can lay unfertilized eggs, and the kids were very confused and excited about the sudden appearance of an egg in the cage. Jordan was like, "I had suspicious... I never could get her to sing like male birds are supposed to." I said, "What do girl birds do?" And he said, "They lay eggs." There are currently three eggs. So that's happening apparently. 

I pretty much don't watch TV these days, but my long afternoon naps the past few days have given me the ability to stay up past my usual bedtime, and I've been watching the Netflix show Dead to Me. I don't know if watching 6 episodes in 2 days is a true "binge watch," but that's certainly more TV than I've watched at one time in a very, very long time. I was a little scared because it's Netflix and rated TV-MA, and I was prepared to turn it off if it was bad, but I was surprised to find that so far, the worst of it is really just a fair amount of the F word. I don't say that lightly, of course. I don't like the F word. However, if I have to choose that over nudity and a lot of crude sexual references, I'll take some cursing. Anyone else watched it? I have a few episodes left still!

Jordan and I also watched the new Netflix movie with Adam Sandler and Jennifer Aniston Murder Mystery. We are really living up our long weekend! We never watch movies! It was ridiculous as expected but mildly entertaining, and I didn't hate it. I wouldn't watch it again, but it was amusing and not as dumb as other Adam Sandler movies I've seen (I've just never been a fan of that type of humor.)

I read Daisy Jones and The Six in about a day over the span of two days. The kids have been loving our splash pad in the backyard, and I got some good reading in on Thursday while they played for an hour or so. Here's my Goodreads review if you're interested. Basically, it is getting a ton of buzz right now, and it's legit. Super creative, unique book. I read it, but I think it would be an excellent book to listen to on audio.

On July 4th, I took engagement photos for a friend of Jordan's. Or, should I say I took photos *of* their engagement. So far in 2019 I've now taken photos of a home water birth and a live engagement. These type of events are stressful! Like, if you miss the moment it's over and done, and you can't be like, oh wait, yeah... my setting was off and the photo is blown out. Can you get down on one knee again, and can she act surprised?  Or, So, the photo of your baby coming out of you was way too dark. Can you please put him back in? I don't think so! But thankfully she said yes, and everything went well, and I think I got some good ones. Really expanding my photography portfolio this year! Not that I'm going to quit my job and be a professional photographer, but it's fun.

I'm not happy our holiday is over and it's back to the daily normal tomorrow BUT, my birthday is on Wednesday, so that's fun! The kids have swim lessons all week, so I think we will probably just wait and go to dinner to celebrate next weekend. We are going to try a new-to-us pizza place! I love doing something new for my birthday. But on the actual day, I'm thinking I'll take a half day in the afternoon, and maybe leave work and go home and take a nap before picking up the kids. Although honestly I'll probably cave and go pick them up immediately because I can't handle it ;)

Hope you had a great weekend and have a great week!

Birthday Boy!

A couple of affiliate links used in this post. Sharing a few things we've been loving this summer!

We've had such a busy week and a half since I last posted! Our sweet ginger baby turned 2! We had his party with family this weekend, and it was so fun. I went pretty low key with decorations and food, and we only invited family, but somehow it still felt like a lot to prepare. Maybe that's because I only started buying stuff two days before ;)

His favorite present was a big blue ball. He opened that first and then pretty much didn't care about any other present. I'd try to get him to come over and open something else, and he would shout "Goal!" and run around the corner. R didn't mind, because that meant she could open more of the gifts. My brother and sister-in-law got R and J a combined gift of an OKC zoo membership. I'm so excited! We have science museum passes and love it, and I can't wait to go to the zoo more. So fun.

After cake and ice cream, we turned on the splash pad in the backyard. My friend showed me one that she bought her kids, and I had never seen anything like it. I bought one the next day. We got this one, and I really like that the bottom fills up with water too, so they can play in it like a little pool. I turned our Little Tikes slide into it, and they have a blast sliding down.

(This picture is from a week or so ago, not the party. It's fun to get out for a bit after we get home from work/daycare before dinner! p.s. This is the tarp I bought for the deck. It's the 10x13 size and has been working well!)

I actually have no idea what J's 2-year stats are for height and weight because I forgot to schedule a 2-year checkup! We will be going in a week to finally get that taken care of. Only almost a month late ha!

He's super sweet but also super feisty. He's a mama's boy through and through. When everyone was singing happy birthday to him, he got bashful and hid his face in my shoulder and it was the cutest thing. We love him so much and are so thankful he's part of our family.

Now it's officially time for Jordan and Amanda birthday month! Heyyyyyyy.

A Visit to Pioneer Woman's Restaurant

RIP, my blog, am I right? Ever since we came back from England, I have not been able to get into a rhythm. I can't seem to get my crap together in basically any area of life. 

You don't even want to know the weird meals we've been eating due to my lack of meal planning. More than once the past two months, Jordan's been like, "um... these things don't really go together..." THERE'S A VEGETABLE AND A PROTEIN JUST EAT IT. Never mind that the vegetable is a bag of microwavable steamed broccoli for the fourth day in a row because my children are both aliens and love broccoli. They eat it all and ask for more. I'm not going to ask any questions.

Anyway.

What I'm here to tell you about is not the fun times of my personal cooking life but about the super fun trip I took this past weekend to the Pioneer Woman restaurant and shop in Pawhuska, Oklahoma! 

Last 5

Apparently I blog once a week now. Is anyone even here still? I mean, I'm barely here myself. August was not my favorite, and I won't lie, I've been in a terrible pity party mood lately. Don't even comment and try to encourage me because I don't deserve it. I was just being ridiculous and not joyful and I won't excuse myself, but I will say that August was packed full of VOMIT and SICKNESS and I paid a doctor copay for every single member of my family at least once, a few people twice. Because did I mention vomit? Three Sundays in a row someone in my house puked. I don't want to be one of those crazy people who blame everything on the devil, but it seemed suspicious.

Related side note: I once edited a book written by a lady who told me that the reason her book had errors is because it was correct when she emailed it to me, and the devil--I repeat THE DEVIL--intercepted it in transit (across the internet?) and changed it all. She also argued with me about commas and said she knew what was correct because she got an A in English class in the eighth grade. Oh, and her book was about a talking squirrel that lived in her backyard and was based on a true story. She insisted the cover of the book be white with a rainbow across it. Naturally.

Anyway, what I really popped in to share was the last 5 photos on my phone. I thought that might be an easy way to jump in and share a few of the goings ons in our lives lately. Of course, I'm not showing you the actual last 5 photos, which are all of clothes because recently I've gotten very obsessed with selling clothes online and have half my phone memory used up with different angles of shirts and pants. That's all I'll say about that! ha.

ANYWAY. The kind of last 5.

1. Family ice cream date

If you follow me on Instagram, you will have seen this photo already and might notice that yes, I did photoshop Jordan's shirt and the giant image of Bonhoeffer's face. As much as I love Bonhoeffer, he was ruining what is otherwise a lovely photo of the four of us. If you don't follow me on IG you have no idea what I'm talking about, so just ignore.

I told you that August was hard, but we did have some good times, including a weekend date to the local DQ for some ice cream. R got some vanilla ice cream in a cup with sprinkles, Jordan and I got blizzards, and J got bites of everything.

2. Pony rides and triple birthday parties

Forgive me if this is actually a horse, but I think it's a pony?

Near the end of August, our church group got together for a triple 3rd birthday party two friends and I hosted for our three kids, who were all born in August 2015 just a few weeks apart. We had a 1-year party, and now two years later they are all 3! We were all standing around going, didn't we just do this? Our friends have the perfect house for hosting, with a huge backyard, a trampoline, and even rides on their pony (horse). Sadly, it was just R and I because J was sick and Jordan had strep, but it was nice to just have one child to worry about, and we could stay later without them anyway ;)

3. Toe infections

Jordan and I have different ideas about when it's necessary to go to the doctor, and we argue about it all the time. I grew up basically never going, and Jordan grew up going a lot. We noticed R complaining about her big toe hurting a few weeks ago, and Jordan said we should take her in but I wanted to try soaking it and putting antibiotic cream on it and seeing what happened. So we did that for a few days, but it was clearly getting worse, so we took her to the doctor (compromise!). Turns out, she had a bad infection, and the dr put her on a strong antibiotic with instructions to take it 3x a day and soak her foot in warm/hot water 3x a day for 20 minutes. And we were supposed to do the soaking and the medicine for ten days.

Confession time: We have never gone the distance with either kid giving them the advised amount of antibiotic for any doctor visit. For like a week we start out strong, and then we forget a dose, and then another one, and we slowly just stop around day 8 or 9 and just toss the rest once we realize it's a week later and we never finished the final few.

But the doctor said that if the infection didn't get better, we would have to take her to the hospital so they could put her under and cut the infection out of her toe, and so we got majorly serious about the medicine and the soaking. Today as you are reading this (Wednesday) is day NINE, and I am very proud to say that we have not missed one dose of medicine, and we make her sit and soak before we leave for daycare, right when we get home, and right before bed. This is a breakthrough, people!

She looks less than thrilled in the above photo, but actually she asks to sit and soak her toe, and she sits the entire time, I think probably because she gets to watch Veggie Tales. We rarely let her watch TV, but this past week and a half she's gotten 20 minutes of Veggie Tales 3x a day, and she's loving every minute. She also loves to take her "pink medicine." She's always been really good about taking medicine. I don't know if that's weird or not, but I'm thankful we don't have to fight with her!

4. Wagon walks

This one doesn't so much need a giant paragraph. After work sometimes I'll load up the kids in our wagon (that I bought off Craigslist for $20) and take them for a walk. The kids love it, and the weather has not been too terrible! And by that I mean it's been in the low 90s. Perspective ;)

5. Snuggles

J continues to be the most snuggly bean there ever was. He has always favored me, but lately he seems very attached, and I don't hate it. Maybe if I stayed at home all day I'd get tired of him wanting to be held and tired of him crying whenever I leave his sight, but I don't stay home, and I don't get tired of it. 

This is probably definitely the reason he's not walking yet: because I carry him almost everywhere. I don't care. He vomited a lot in August. Like, so much vomit every couple of nights for two weeks straight. We weren't sure what was wrong and even took him to get blood drawn to make sure his liver is functioning properly. Everything came back normal, so we aren't sure if it's a food allergy or a bug or what, but it's super random and doesn't seem to be related to any particular food or situation. All that said, he hasn't been feeling 100% lately, and we've been having lots of snuggles.

This summer has absolutely flown by. When I took J to get his blood drawn, the dr asked me how old he was, and I said he just turned 1 a week ago. Then I was like, no wait, he turned 1 almost two months ago. HOW. 

So that's a quickish snapshot of life lately! There have been a lot of great moments and some moments I will not miss one bit, but overall we are happy and (mostly) healthy and trying not to wish these little years away. We are blessed and thankful indeed.

Will Sing for Money

We really don't talk about princesses a lot at our house. I'm not against them, but it's just not like we make a point to watch princess movies and buy R princess-themed pajamas and coloring books. And in fact, honestly I hate shirts with giant logos/pictures on them of any kind, so she doesn't have any clothes with princesses on them except for two dresses we got from a friend who was getting rid of a bunch of stuff. I thought maybe she'd like having a couple "dress-up" dresses around the house for fun.

I had her 3rd birthday outfit picked out for a few months before her party: the same green and pink onesie she wore for the birthday photos I took (the outfit is in the above photo in her new fort!). She wore it for opening presents, until she opened the card my parents got her, which had a built-in princess crown you could tear out to wear. She saw the girl on the crown and shouted, "I NEED MY PURPLE DRESS" and went racing off to her room, emerging seconds later with one of her dress-up dresses that had the exact same princess on the front.

My brother and sister-in-law got R a microphone and stand for her birthday. (Here's a link to a similar microphone from the same brand as hers, but I can't find the exact microphone combo she got online!) The microphone has settings for different voices and can even record a song to play back. To say she put on a show is a bit of an understatement. We got the microphone hooked up, and R put her crown on with her matching dress and sang her little heart out.

My grandparents were able to drive from Illinois just for the day to be at R's party! They had hunted all over for a pink piggy bank to get her, and then while she was singing, my mother-in-law told R to put the piggy bank next to her and she went up and dropped some change into it. A few more people pulled out some pennies and dropped them into the piggy bank while R was singing, and R kept smiling and laughing.

When I look back at the pictures taken at the party, most of them show R in a purple princess dress. If I'm being totally honest, at first I was a bit disappointed because that wasn't exactly my favorite choice for a cute birthday outfit. I don't even know if that will make sense to anyone else or just sound dumb of me to be at all concerned about something so silly even for just a minute or two. But she was so happy, and that made me happy.

I'm also so thankful that our families get along so well. Both Jordan's and my parents are married, so there isn't any awkwardness with multiple different families around, and I try not to take that for granted because I know it's not exactly what everyone else experiences all the time. Having family around is something I look forward to, and I hope it's the same for my kids as they get older.

Before R's 1st birthday, a friend gave me some really great advice that I've tried to keep in mind for all of the kid's birthday parties since then. She said that the day will be full of family and people. It will be stressful and chaotic. But make sure to take a minute--one full minute--at some point during the day and actually just stop and look around. Take in the moment, the people, the laughter.

That might sound kind of cliche, but it really has been a good reminder for me these past 3 years of being a mom. It hasn't always looked like I thought it would or been as easy as I think it should be, but there are so many great things too. Things I might miss if I didn't intentionally remind myself to stop and take it in every once in a while.

My two cents for what it's worth. I'm still new to this parenting gig ;)

Birthday Weekend + Blogging Thoughts

Over the weekend we hosted family for R's birthday! She turned 3 on Friday, and we had the party on Saturday. I took short video clips all day both days and hope to put together a 3rd birthday video collage soon. For whatever reason I think making videos is so fun and love doing it. (Here is how I make them, if you're interested!)

I haven't gone through all the pictures yet, but maybe soon I'll share a post with pics from the day. It was pretty low key with minimal decorations, and mostly everything was recycled from my "party cabinet" where I keep all the decorations I've made over the past few years along with paper goods and other Target dollar-spot finds I collect. We did a taco bar and had pink cupcakes. It was really fun!

Right before the party my brother noticed that the side fence in our backyard had fallen over in the storm the night before. The only reason it wasn't completely over was because it was being held up by our neighbor's shed. We have had a few house projects lately, and we are not the type of people who enjoy doing house projects. And by "we" I mean Jordan. I've tried to be handy and end up hanging things unevenly and putting giant holes in the wall on accident, so I leave all the handiness to him, but since he does manual labor all day at work, he doesn't so much want to do it at home. 

Anyway, we clearly need to pay to get our fence repaired (yay adulting!), but in the meantime he rigged up some rope, and the fence is at least mostly upright at the moment. We also have a broken pillar off our front porch, and our front screen door is busted so there's a piece of packing tape holding the lock down. In June we used our cash emergency fund for the very first time to pay for maintenance on my car, so we are Very Excited to pay for a new fence.

I need to sign us up for one of those home improvement shows before Jordan goes insane from the stress and pays someone to burn our house down so we can collect insurance money. (He might have mentioned doing that, but I think he was kidding.)

We are pretty stressed out at the moment, to be honest. As I mentioned in my last post, this summer has been so full of wonderful things and awesome family time, but it has been FULL nonetheless, and we are tired. We really packed it in this summer, and all four of us have a birthday within 2 months of one another so that adds a bit of extra excitement too.

But how are you? No, seriously. How are you doing? Are you feeling stressed out by anything, or are you in a relaxing season at the moment? It's so easy to get caught up in the stress of daily life, going from one thing to the next and not really paying attention to how other people are doing. If I can be an encouragement to you in any way, let me know!

Blogging is weird. You get a glimpse into someone's life that you haven't ever met (in most cases), and if you follow them for long enough you begin to feel like you know them a little bit. But you may not know this about me: I can get insecure about what I say online. I'm not really all that afraid of confrontation usually, and I often say/write what I think. Sometimes I feel like I offend people, and especially online it's hard to accurately convey tone of voice and meaning. I also hate to go back and reread old posts because I get super embarrassed by how dramatic I sound. But those were my honest thoughts at the time, so that's what I wrote! haha. Plus also if you don't know me in real life, I can be kind of dramatic ;)

Just know that I do appreciate everyone who comes and reads. I've taken a huge step back this past year in the frequency of my posts, but I still enjoy sharing in this space and hearing from you! 

I'd like to try and get some photos from R's party edited and posted, but in the meantime I wanted to let you all know about a new Facebook group I started for anyone who loves books! The group is private so you have to request to join, but I'll accept anyone as long as you love books and promise to be a nice person in the group :) It's not a book club, just a place to chat books. Join here!

Happy Monday!

A Snapshot of Summer

The problem with not blogging as often as I used to is that I get backed up on events and photos to edit and share about. And that's less annoying for you than it is for me, truly, because I actually do enjoy editing a few of the hundreds of pictures I take and making sure some of them see the light of day. Because there are so.many.pictures.

Does anyone else get overwhelmed with pictures? I find a daily struggle with trying to enjoy the moment without feeling the need to capture it while also wanting to capture it because it's so cute and hello I can't rely on my memory to hold everything in. I am 32 now, after all ;)

R is turning 3 in just about 3 weeks, and I am finally at a stage in my parenting journey where holidays and events are fun. Like, actual fun not just "let's take our 9-month-old baby to this thing they don't care about at all and pretend like they will actually remember whether or not they had a good time." 

I don't mean that to say you shouldn't take your 9-month-old baby to stuff. But what I'm saying is, whenever I see someone post on Facebook about what they should get their infant for Christmas, I want to say WHATEVER YOU WANT BECAUSE THEY DON'T CARE. I wouldn't shout, of course. But you get the idea.

Anyway, my actual point here is that R has been totally aware of and into the recent holidays and it's been awesome. Seeing life through a child's eyes and all of that. On Valentine's day, Jordan took her to the store to get groceries, and she helped him pick out some flowers for me. They came home, and she raced in holding red roses, shouted "Happy Valentine's Day!" and threw them at me. Half the flowers lost all their petals, and Jordan and I laughed about it all night.

This summer has been so fun because she is excited about everything. During the first of June, I took her to swimming lessons at our community pool. I bought her a coverup to wear, and she's been obsessed with it all summer so far. We also had such a better experience than last year. Last year was a struggle to get through the entire half-hour lesson without her waving her arms and widely signing "all done" through tears. This year she asked every day, "Are we going to swimming lessons today?" and then talked all about how she was learning to kick and blow bubbles and practiced wearing a life jacket. I didn't think she'd enjoy it that much or I would have signed her up for a second session.

I don't have a ton of days off this year because our trip to Europe this fall is taking most of them (such a rough life, I know), but I did take off a half day on J's birthday. I left R at daycare and picked him up at lunch so we could spend the afternoon together. And I know what you're thinking. I just ranted about how infants don't care about things like this, but that afternoon was 100% not for him. It was for me. We went home and I held him for a nap because I don't get to usually. When he woke up we went out on the back porch to play in the kiddie pool before going back to daycare to get R early and head home to cook dinner. It wasn't fancy, but it was special for me and I'm thankful I was able to do it.

My great-aunt and uncle live in Oklahoma City and have the best backyard I've ever seen. Last weekend we went over there to swim on Sunday afternoon. It's been so hot here lately, but that afternoon was one I didn't want to end. The wind chimes sounded like a musical, the pool was the perfect temperature, and there were popsicles and homemade banana nut cake. It was one of those days where you're just thankful to be alive, and you don't even care if that sounds cliche or not.

At this point I've given up thinking I'm ever going to write a separate blog post about my cousin's wedding we went to in June, so I'll just share some pictures. I found J an adorable pair of jeans and suspenders from H&M off someone on Kidizen, and R and J had a matching bowtie/pigtail combo. Of course, I couldn't get them to sit still for a picture together, but I've (sort of) made my peace with the fact that getting an almost 3-year-old and a 1-year-old to sit still for a picture just isn't going to happen.

There weren't a ton of small kids at the wedding, and it's not an exaggeration to say that R put on quite a show. She was dancing to the beat of her own music while the adults got drinks and took pictures, and I got a few comments like, "Well she certainly isn't shy..." My girl loves to sing and dance! We didn't plan on staying until the end, but we ended up waving the bride and groom off with glowsticks around 10:30. J was a trooper but couldn't hang and eventually passed out around 9:45. My grandma held him while we danced and chased R around and took silly pictures in the photo booth.

The next day we played all afternoon at my aunt's pool and left for home around 5:00. We were worried the timing would be terrible for the kids, arriving home in time to put them to bed again, but they were so tired from our weekend festivities that they both fell asleep within 5 minutes of being in the car, slept the entire 3 hours back to Oklahoma, transferred from the carseat to bed, and slept all night until 7 the next morning!

A couple of weekends ago, Jordan and I went to another wedding, this time for friends of ours. Jordan was a groomsman, and I wore my new StitchFix dress that randomly matched his tie perfectly. For so long I was a little skeptical of StitchFix, and while I still think it can be a bit pricy, it is really fun to do every few months. Glad I kept the dress!

Between all of that, J of course turned 1 and had his birthday party and we also celebrated my brother's birthday in Texas at a fun waterpark. Then were was 4th of July, which R was SUPER excited about. Girlfriend could not get enough of the fireworks or of waving her mini American flag. Maybe I'll post some pictures of that soon!

Basically even though I'm working, it's been such a fantastic summer for us so far, and I feel so blessed and so thankful for it all.

32!

Today is my birthday! I'm 32 and definitely settled into my 30s now... I hate to say that 32 sounded SO OLD to me at one point, but it's really not, I promise! ;)

I had J right before I turned 31 last year and spent my birthday on maternity leave at home with my babies. This year I have to work, which I avoid if I possibly can so I won't lie and tell you I'm not super bummed to spend my birthday this way. But I'm going to pick the kids up and take them to lunch with me, and then in the evening we will eat dinner and have cupcakes and sing happy birthday as a family, and really that's all I need out of life.

I love my crew and feel so blessed to spend my birthday with them! 

It's also exactly one month until R turns three! I can't even. Someone hold me. Also, please note that when I want R to take a nice photo she gives me the worst cheese face, but when we are taking a funny photo she hits us with a perfect smile. Toddlers are evil geniuses, I tell you.

Comments turned off. I'm just going to assume you are wishing me a happy birthday ;)

J's 1st Birthday Party

In the eight years I've been blogging, I don't think I've been as bad of a blog writer (or reader!) as I have been for the past month. The end of May and June so far have been absolutely nuts and so full of friends and family, and I love it.

Over the weekend we hosted family for J's first birthday party! So far I haven't gone huge on either of R's birthday parties, and we didn't for J either. Just family and no themes. Maybe I will get more into themed parties once the kids start actually caring about things, but for now I've stuck with just a color theme, which has worked really well. Although I love seeing themed parties other people do!

I wouldn't exactly say J's birthday snuck up on me... maybe more that I was in denial. We set a party date back in April, and I had invitations printed out from Shutterfly and mailed a long time ago, but that was as far as I got until a week before the party. R's first birthday was pink & gold, and for J's I went with blue as the "theme" to center my crafting around. 

Coffee Date: April

I am baking some muffins to freeze for the kids and have exactly 18 minutes to pop on here for a quick coffee date. That is not at all enough time for me to finish a blog post (editor problems), but I figured I'd try!

If we were meeting for coffee, I'd ask you how your Easter weekend went and then confess that I didn't put together Easter baskets for the kids. I'd tell you that I don't even feel bad about it except when I see so many people posting online about all the stuff they bought. Then I feel just a twinge of guilt, but mostly I'm okay with it. They get a basket from grandma, and we did an egg hunt (set up by grandma lol!). I'm not against the Easter bunny or anything, but I don't remember doing baskets as a kid and it's just not anywhere on my radar.

4 Ways to Use a Scrapbook Paper for Easy Party Decorations

Hello! Today I thought I would follow up my post from last week where I shared photos from R's birthday party and talk about some easy and cheap ways to use scrapbook paper for decoration. I don't consider myself an expert in party decor, but maybe this will spark your imagination and give you a couple of simple ideas.

I bought the above pack of paper at Hobby Lobby, but I'm sure you can find something similar at any craft store. These giant packs of quality paper are great because there are so many options for nearly any color scheme or party theme! The pack is marked at $20, but often they run 50%-off sales, or you can use the 40% Hobby Lobby coupon and get this for $12. Here are a couple of ways you can use this paper:

1. Banners

Use scrapbook paper to make paper banners of all shapes and sizes! Cut out pendants or circles, squares... whatever you want that fits your vision. Last year for R's birthday party, I cut out circles and made a vertical wall backdrop.

2. Table Centerpiece

This is so easy! Just tear out a piece of paper from the pack and use it on the table as part of the centerpiece. You can also use full sheets of paper under serving plates on the food table. The best part is that if they don't get wrinkled or spilled on, they are ready to use again for something else!

3. Guest Book Page or Place Setting Cards

I made a "guest book" page for R's party this year. I had her paint on a white sheet of paper, and then I cut an R out of it and taped it to a piece of scrapbook paper. I left pens and a note so guests could sign the paper, which I will put in her baby book! She can have a record of who was at her party with a handwritten note from everyone, and using the scrapbook paper makes it easy to match the party colors.

If you were having a party where you had place settings, you could make cards or labels out of the scrapbook paper. And speaking of labels...

4. Use as Labels around Jars and Drink Pitchers

I used the scraps of paper leftover from cutting the wall banner for wrapping around mason jars and the drink pitchers. I left a jar of "kisses" next to the party favor photos and wrapped the pink paper around it. This is a super easy way to carry the party theme around the room without having to buy anything extra!

Like I said, this isn't anything too fancy or expensive, but hopefully this gives you some ideas for easy ways to decorate without spending a ton of money or time. I love using scrapbook paper in create ways, and the best part is that you can often reuse it for lots of other things too!

What's your favorite thing to decorate with?

Have you ever considered using scrapbook paper like this?

R's Mint & Pink 2nd Birthday Party

Hello! Happy Thursday, friends. Thank you for all the messages, emails, and texts after my last post. You all are so sweet, and I'm glad some of you were encouraged by what I shared. Just trying to take it one day at a time and find a new routine!

I wanted to share with you some pictures from R's second birthday party. It was a great time! Like I mentioned in a previous post, I didn't have a theme for this party, and I really only started planning a few weeks before. One afternoon I wandered around Hobby Lobby tossing random things into my cart that I liked, and I realized that everything I was grabbing was either the color mint or pink, so I decided to center the party around those colors. And because last year I did pink and gold for R's first birthday, I was able to reuse some of the things I had bought or made for her. I love how it all turned out!

We moved our kitchen table and set up two longer tables to create a little food/dessert area. Jordan grilled hot dogs, and we had chips, homemade trail mix (peanuts, m&ms, raisins, and corn nuts), baked beans, and grapes. For dessert I made a funfetti cake, and R had her own individual cupcake. I bought a gallon of ice cream, and there were cookies and mini cupcakes from a local bakery.

The week before I took R to the park and did a photoshoot! I printed out 3 copies of each photo and hung a banner up on the wall of all the photos. The remaining copies I put on the table as "party favors." Guests could choose a photo or two to take home with them. Since this was a party with mostly family, they loved it! The grandparents especially :)

^^^ I decided to make a cupcake just for R. That way she wouldn't have a giant slice of cake and would be able to eat this herself. I also put a picture from her first birthday. I found the Happy Birthday napkins and cupcake stand at the Target dollar spot. The plates are from Big Lots. I made the "2" flag for the cupcake.

I reused the "R" I made for her first birthday, which is awesome because it took me so long to make! The tassel banner is from the Target dollar spot, and I printed off monthly chair pictures from 12 to 24 months.

She was so funny with her cupcake and ate it pretty daintily compared to last year when she went in with both fists. 

^^^ I bought a roll of pink wrapping paper and created a photo area. After opening gifts, we took family pictures in front of it! The banner is reused from last year. I swapped out a few of the pink circles for circles using scrapbook paper, and my sister wrote "Happy Birthday." The giant balloon from the park pictures the week before was still inflated, so we used it too!

Bumgarner, party of four! I thought getting pictures with a toddler was hard, but try a toddler and a newborn. It's a miracle there's one of all of us looking and with J's eyes open.

Funny story, I legitimately kept forgetting about J since there were so many family members around who wanted to hold him. I would randomly panic and realize I hadn't seen him in a while and had no idea where he was, but he was always just sleeping on someone. I am obviously still getting used to having two kids. Ha!

We had such a great time celebrating our TWO-year-old! Thanks to everyone for loving on my sweet girl so well! Maybe for her party next year I'll keep the pink theme going and do pink + another color and just rotate all my crafts again ;)

See also: R's Pink + Gold 1st Birthday Party