a green artistic thumb

I've never had a green thumb.
When I was in middle school, my sister and I grew some kind of seeds in a little cup. Mine never grew, but to say it did, I switched cups with my sisters so that I could tell her mine had sprouted and hers had not.
I also have parents who LOVE plants and have all kinds of greenery around.
While I may like looking at it, and for sure wouldn't mind having some, I've always had a fear of killing the poor things so I never exercise my right to plant plants.
But this summer, a new neighbor moved into our duplex. And she brought a shitload of plants onto our front porch.
And yeah, they're pretty. Yes, it made me jealous.
For a while, I've had an empty flower pot that was hand-made in Mexico. All alone--waiting to be filled with dirt and something. Why don't I have plants? What's the matter with me?
So I went out to get some plants.
Not flowers. I don't like flowers when they wilt and die. It breaks my heart. 
And then I realized they wouldn't all fit into my 6" flower pot all together {this is how inexperienced I am folks...} So I had to go get some more pots.
Anyone that knows me, knows I'm a big cheap-o. But when I was pot-shopping, I found these beautifully Italian made pots for just $2. {By the way, I've no idea what these things are technically called, so just bare with me}
And I thought that it'd be a great project to hand paint and give them a little color.
So, like always, I got my paints out from my neatly organized art desk {that's right hubs--neatly organized!} and I got to painting. Carefully imitating my ancestral artistic native people...or just plain talavera look-alike-ness.



And like a good artist, I only managed to finish 1 before I got bored and had to tend to the boys...

Finally yesterday, I kicked laziness in the butt and grabbed Sunday by the horns...

And this is what Andrew helped me with.
He LOVES painting/crafting/drawing/etc. with me when I'm at my {neatly organized} desk.

Pretty gorgeous, huh? ;)

I enjoy the time Andrew and I paint together. While he may not know exactly what he's doing, he enjoys it and it helps me develop my abstract skills even more. 

So here's my collection of beautiful plants in beautiful pots. Enjoy!

I have them by my kitchen sink and it makes me feel good just to see them.

To know that they're not dead.

To know that they're good for me and my family and my small duplex.

And while I may not have a green thumb, I am thankful for my creativity and the time I spent with Andrew. 

Linking up to:

and

and

TATERTOTS & JELLO Weekend Wrap Up Party

and

Someday Crafts

lizzurds & 'piders!!!

I love looking through my picture folders on my computer. I mean, sometimes I spend countless minutes just staring at pictures of the boys instead of washing dishes or picking up...

But seriously, who can resist their stinkin' cute faces, right?

I did notice, however, the many pictures I have of Jonah smiling like he's in a beauty contest but none of Andrew...No pictures of Andrew smiling.

He's always looking away or turned or concentrating on whatever he's holding.

So I, like a horrible photographer, told him to sit and smile. Literally. 

I said, you can't get up until you smile and look at my camera.

And WOW was I ever so proud of him.

Not only did he cooperate for at least 5 minutes, but I have this beautiful picture of my boy SMILING at the camera---yes, at the camera.

Siempre amo ver mis fotos en la computadora. Algunas veces me la paso solo viendo fotos de los niños en vez de lavar trastes o recoger la casa... Pero dime, quien puede resistir esas caritas tan lindas? En todo el tiempo que paso mirando fotos de ellos, me eh fijado que tengo muchas fotos de Jonah sonriendo como modelo, pero ni una de Andres. Ni una foto de Andres sonriendo.

Siempre mira a otro lado, concentradose en cualquier cosa que tiene en sus manos Y asi como una mala fotografa, le dije que se sentara y que sonriera. Le dije, no te levantes hasta que mires a la camara y sonrias.Y mira lo que sucedio... No solo copero, pero ahora tengo esta hermosa foto de el SONRIENDO a la camra---siii!! A la camara!

He has the most beautiful lips and I love receiving kisses from it. 

I mean, I am just IN LOVE with him.

Tiene unos labios tan hermosos, me fascina que me den besitos--

O sea digo, como no se puede enamorarse uno de este nene?

We went outside one afternoon. Andrew stopped. It was odd--he had his gaze locked. 

Look what he saw...

Cuando fuimos afuera un dia, Andres freno. Se me hizo raro porque tenia la vista justo en frente mirando hacia abajo. 

Y mira lo que vio!

a LIZZURD!

After we talked about it and inspected it for what seemed like FOR.EVER. the lizard finally scurried away. He ran inside to tell his daddy about what he had just seen. Cutest thing ever.

After the hubs grew tired of looking at nothing {because remember, it has scurried away} Andrew quickly focused on the yellow water hose. 

Una lagartija!

Parece que examinamos y platicamos de esa criatura como por siempre, y porfin se escabullo.

Andres fue a decirle a gary lo que habia visto--muy emocionado.

Y pronto se aburrieron de NO ver la lagartija y Andres se concentro con la manguera amarilla.

Please disregard the markings this cave-child has done to himself...

Y porfis descuiden de los rayoneos este cavernicola de niño se hizo a si mismo...

And then he BEGGED for the water to be turned on. So we did.

Rogando a que le prendiera al agua...

Flip Flops. Backwards. Duh.

Las Chanclas. Alreves. Porsupuesto.

So he drank about a gallon of water and had the time of his life.

We were getting ready to go back inside, when I happened to notice a spiderweb with a miniature spider.

I pointed it out to Andrew, expecting him to get freaked out about it {like he does with all the other bugs} but he was quite fascinated by it.

Se tomo como un litro de agua y obvio que se divertio, no? :)

Estabamos a punto de ir adentro de la casa cuando me encontre con una pequeña telaraña con una arañita. Se la enseñe a Andres y estaba esperando a que se espantara {asi como a todos los otros bichos}, pero me sorprendio y empezo a hacerse el interesado. Le pico y pico, a la arañita se empezo a moverse.

Finally, we made it inside.

But I'm going to share with you a couple more pictures of our summer fun that we've had.

We have rarely been outside anymore because this heat is really starting to get on my nerves. But here's a silly face that I managed to capture with my phone camera.

Porfin, nos fuimos adentro.

Pero tambien quiero compartir estas fotos sobre lo que Andres ha hecho este verano.

Casi no quiero que salgamos de la casa por este caloron que esta haciendo--ya nos aburrio!

Pero aqui esta Andres con su cara de pingo en la alberquita azul. La tome con mi cel.

This next picture is of him with one of his many sports that he's picked up this summer: 

Bowling. He absolutely loves it.

So much in fact, he spent all of his coins and bowled a total of 4 games. 

Ultimamente le ha encantado mucho el boliche. Es lo que se la paso haciendo cuando fuimos a Gatti's {tienen jueguitos ahi} y se gasto todas sus monedas jugando boliche. A veces cuando se le va chueca la bola, se inclina pa'l lado--se ve chistosillo mi nene hermoso. 

Hope you enjoyed a summer's day with A.

But so Jonah won't get too jealous, here's his beautiful face too: 

He loves to drink from our cups...and I love his double chin

A Jonas le encanta tomar de nuestros vasos, y a mi me encanta verle su papada! 

His messy hairs in the mornings, and how he eats his cereal is precious!

Y esas greñas en las mañanas y sus manitas en el cereal--que preciosura de nene! 

See? Always smiling!

Vean: siempre sonriente!

Room Re-do

We have recently re-done our second bedroom in our small duplex. 

We didn't plan on it.

Just sorta happened.

Moomie just saw a bed that Andrew just HAD to have at a yard sale...

I mean, it's a pretty cool bed. 

What do you think?

Except when we got it, it looked like this: 

It didn't have the tent-like structure when we got it.

While not a full bunk bed, I could picture Andrew and Jonah sharing this piece of furniture. They're little boys, for goodness sakes--not teenagers {we still have a long ways for that wink,wink}

So we were pumped about this new bed and all of its possibilities.

One huge drawback was that the slide really stuck out.

Do we have enough room for it in the tiny bedroom? 

We for sure had to rearrange something.

We'll see when we get there.

Another drawback: the color.

Eww. I could just puke all that primary color!!!

Gimme modern, gimme cool, gimme BOY BOY BOY!

Oh, and yet another drawback: How do we go about this color transformation? 

We got a quote to powder coat it. Waaay out of our budget.

So we ordered paint online because three stores didn't have what I pictured in my head here in town.

Wanna know which color we {read: I} picked? 

Lime Green. Ta-da!!!

Totally screams out modern, cool, and boy. 

Well, it did in my head.

So we got to dismantling.

We got to sanding.

We got to priming.

Then we got to spray-painting.

And our backyard looked like this:

My genius husband was operating smarts that day, y'all...

He hung all the pieces from the tree and made it super easy to handle and spray.

But it looked like all kinds of hillbillies lived here--HA!

So we waited for it to dry in the non-stop-sweltering-Texas head.

We re-coated, and we waited--again.

We were so impatient, we didn't wait for the fumes to dissipate and started to assemble it on Andrew's birthday {the 7th} while he was napping away in our bedroom. 

So giddy with excitement for him to wake up and realize there was a bed in his room!!!

Although he really liked this setup: See HERE 

{but so did his brother who could torture Andrew during time-outs and naptime}

When he woke up, he found this bright thing in his bedroom!

Now, he willingly goes up to his bed because it's so fun going up a ladder {so I doubt we'll be using it as a form of punishment now}.

Umm, we still kept his Toy Story bedspread and pillow because he's like 2 1/2 feet tall...come on, he doesn't need a huge comforter. 

And did you notice? No slide {shakes head in disappointment}

Maybe when and if we move to a bigger house, we will attach it and he'll have a blast then.

It took us a while to fit the entire bedroom where we had enough walking room, and the kids had playing room.

After we bought the boys' birthday present, we really were limited in space. 

REALLY. LIMITED.

So we played with several schemes. Several times.

And finally decided this was the best one:

The iPad has an app called Photosynth Panorama stitches several pictures together to create a panoramic effect. It's quite neat!!!

From the far left wall, we have the bookshelves where toys and books are stored.

Then we have the train station table (birthday present for the boys).

On the opposite wall we have the bed and underneath the bed, we have MORE toys organized in bins and a small shelving unit. 

On the wall with the window, we had to put the changing table since stinky-magoo still takes BIG DUMPS. 

I can't imagine not having it.

And it serves as more storage for toys, diapers, and such!

Our ideal setup is NO crib in our bedroom. Both boys in the bed, that way my Art Space on the far right corner of the room can go in place of the crib (again, currently in our bedroom), leaving a lot more space in the boys room. :) 

I said ideal, meaning one day. 

In the meantime, 

A Genghis Birthday...

We have a very birth-eous summer, let me tell ya. 

My birthday is May 9th.

Jonah's birthday is July 4th.

Gary's is July 28th.

Andrew's is August 7th. 

They're almost all back to back, which is awesome in my opinion...

Moomie, my mom, always makes sure of noting birthdays, she's good like that...

...and when at her house last time, she came out with a bag that was super heavy and told Gary "happy birthday"

He got a BIG suprise!

If ya don't know Gary, he LOVES Dr. Peppers. 

So conveniently enough, my hometown is Dublin, the last town that bottles Dr. Pepper with cane sugar and has the oldest bottling shop in the world. 

There's your trivia for today...FYI.

For his ACTUAL birthday, we went out to Genghis Grill, which is new here in town.

We had come once before during lunch rush and it was really good!

Gary liked it a lot more than me because he picked Genghis Grill over his usual steak request---GASP!

Ok, I'm being very dramatic today. 

Here are the pictures:

We were seated, and behind us was the massive grill they cook all the food at.

The cooks seem to have so much fun back there, they have it open for customers to watch their food being cooked.

Our server noticed that I was snapping pictures and said to come here. 

So I came here.

And she told the guys to make the 

RING OF FIRE!!!

HAHA! It was amazing!!!

Their facilities weren't spectacular as you can see all the food on the floor, but the FIRE was...
Andrew just kept saying "FIRE, FIRE, FIRE!!"

He was quite enchanting that night as I was snapping them pictures...

Cute!

And then the REAL partying began...

...with crayons in our facial cavities, that is.

We had such a blast being goofy, the older couple beside us didn't think we were being funny though. 

They kept giving us stares...

I mean, even JONAH WAS PARTICIPATIN'!!!

Daddy did have to have his birthday Coors Light though...

So much love and goofiness...that's why I love my family

Now onto chopsticks!

It's all fun and games....

...until someone has to be "THE MOM"!!

The crayons were a hit. Wait, how old are you Gary? 9?

Finally our food came and we got to scarfin' it down.

Andrew was watching me eat with chopsticks and so, he wanted to try it too,

but of course, he needed help.

About this time, my camera died {{so sad}}...

So after our dinner, our server brought us a birthday dessert just for Daddy!

Except Daddy doesn't like brownies and ice cream, so me and Andrew took the whole advantage of it!