Delightful

Since I frequently pin inspiring quotes on Pinterest, I decided to print a stack of them as 4x6 photos to hang on our fridge. But then I got this idea to put super strong magnets on the back of a cheap picture frame so it would stick to the fridge over the quote. This was a super easy project (I used Gorilla glue to stick the magnets to the frame) and makes me happy every time I see it.

**Do you pin lots of quotes?

Do you have stuff on your fridge?

Ever tried these super strong magnets?**

A Home Improvement

A couple Saturdays ago (12 on the 12th to be exact) I posted my 12 on the 12th year in review and ended up ordering all of last year's grids in an 8x10 size. I also used an Amazon gift card my parents had given me for Christmas to order a set of 12 clip frames, woohoo.

The frames arrived in the mail last Tuesday and I had high hopes that Randy would do the all the work framing and hanging the prints on Saturday. When I mentioned it he said, "Do I want to do hang the pictures? No, but I will." Yeeha!

This is the lovely sight I see on the way to our bedroom and when coming out of the bathroom; I study the photos while drying my hair in the morning too. I love how these grids capture the minutia of our lives and are such a great year-in-review for us.

The Gift That Keeps on Giving

For Christmas this year I gave my mom a card that said "Gift of Service", then inside I explained that I would help her organize all her photos and put them into albums.


I spent 6 hours at her house last Tuesday labeling the backs of photos with dates and names and then sorting all the photos by year. This took us all day!


When I went to her house today we were able to take all the outdated photos from her picture frames, wash the glass, then put recent photos in the frames. I had ordered a bunch of 5x7s for the frames and gotten prints of several photos we could use for other frames, plus I've emailed Robyn and Amy about getting 5x7s of their families made as well. This was no small task!


Andrew was home from "work" (he folds towels for .36 cents an hour) with a cold. The poor guys hates going to "work" but gets bored if he stays home all the time, plus my mom is tethered to the house if he's home constantly. He loves it when he gets a cold and can stay home and watch Funniest Home Videos or movies from his Disney collection. Poor guy.


My mom made us a really fantastic lunch of French dip sandwiches and salad; oh how I love having someone else make lunch for me!


I remembered to take a self-portrait this week (I can't believe I forgot to last week) and am disturbed by how red and white my skin is, what's up with that?


I had about 10 minutes to spend with Amie after leaving my mom's house (this is the view from Amie's front porch, you can see my parents' house in the distance) before Landon and I (I let him skip school to play with James today because James didn't have school) had to head back to pick Whitney up from school.

It was a productive day, but the time flew by. Next week we should be able to move on to sorting the photos by month and maybe, just maybe start putting them in albums.

**Did you give any gifts of service this Christmas?
How do you organize your photos?
How often to you change the photos in your frames?**

Comment Window Tidbit: I think we're going to have breakfast for dinner. It's 7:00pm so I guess somebody should do something about dinner. Aargh!

To-Do, To-Do, To-Done!

This post is a follow-up to this morning's "Too Optimistic" post. I actually felt like a bit of a slacker after reading some of the comments because it reminded me how gloriously uninterrupted my days are since my kids are at school. (I appreciate this fact most of the time, but still forget how crazy it is to have endless demands from little kids.)


My to-do list is to-done! Why is it so satisfying to check things off like this? Perhaps it's a way of giving myself a little pat on the back since no one else knows what I do all day. I know the kids (and probably Randy too) think I sit at the computer and blog all day, but that's not true.

Today I...


--Scoured the shower and tub, cleaned both bathroom sinks, toilets, floors and washed the bathmats and towels.


--Cleaned out the kids' closet and made a pile of clothes for Lucas, a pile for Adam and Amy's girls, and a pile for D.I. and dropped off the bag there too.


--Finished a 2 page primary newsletter and think it's looks fabulous.
--Sent two good mail packages today.


--Did 2 new listings on Etsy.


--Posted 2 auctions on Ebay.
--Went to Walmart for some groceries and to pick up my photos and drop off plastic bags for recycling.


--Bought a bag of ice from Sonic.


--Raided the house for items to go on top of the armoire AND came up with an arrangement that I think looks decent.


--Helped Whitney with her homework and dropped her off at a friend's house.


--MADE DINNER!! (I do this so rarely that it really deserves all caps.)
--Posted on my blog twice!


Listened to the book Bel Canto the whole time! (I read this book years ago, so it's a treat to listen to it now.)

Not too shabby eh?

**How was your day?
Have you ever documented a day like this?
How did I do with the armoire toppings?**

Too Optimistic?

I have gotten out of the habit of making to-do lists and having meetings with myself and I can really tell a difference in my productivity level and sense of well-being. Most of the time I do the main things that need to be done, but there are always bigger projects piling up in the back of my mind that aren't usually addressed unless I start to get mad about them.


Like when the house starts to feel like it's full of booby traps (i.e., open the hall closet and get hit by a bar of soap, go to set something in the garage and find there are no empty spaces to be found, go to hang up clothes in the kids' closet only to find there's no room yet they have nothing to wear). When I trigger one too many booby traps (don't you just love that term?) I get fed up enough to take care of them, and that day is today.

{Amie's photo}

But what I should do is have a long-term to-do list going to remind myself of the bigger projects I intend to do, so hopefully I can take care of them before they make me insane. Amie recently posted her list of big projects for the year and even made a space on her sidebar where she will be updating things as she does them (brilliant!).

I think sharing these projects on our blogs helps make us more likely to do them, helps inspire each other, documents a lot of the behind-the-scenes women do, and is just plain satisfying to see.

**Do you had long-term to-do lists?
Are you inspired by others' productivity?
Is my list for today too optimistic?**