Please save me from myself

My office/scrapbook room is hopeless. It's one of those rooms you just never get a handle on. I guess that's why it's such a great room since I can actually walk away and leave it. I practically live in it. All my seminary prep is done in there, I pay the bills there, I wrap presents there, I craft/scrapbook/bead/knit there, my kids do homework and projects there, the computer is there so I shop there and surf there, I sew there, I download and manipulate photos there...it's just the multi purpose junk room. I visualize cabinets and countertops and even maybe a sink. But I should just be happy that there is a room for it all. But, it will never be all the way clean. I'm already starting to pile Christmas projects around the borders of the room. Every morning I come down and this is what I see...piles of projects. It's ridiculous. I've even cut way back on everything and this is what I have. Does someone with great organization skills want to come help save me?

Go Northmen!

Yesterday afternoon I thought I ought to go watch Hunter cheer at the last freshman football game for the season. This game had been rained out a couple of weeks ago and was rescheduled. It ended up being a beautiful, cool, autumn day...perfect for football. Although, I still think the game is too long. Hunter has such a great spirit when she cheers. She's very sincere and animated. Does that make sense? It sometimes seems like the girls aren't very excited to be there and don't care but I really felt that Hunter genuinely likes cheering the team on. She doesn't particularly get along well with the other girls and it's constant friction. But what cheer squad doesn't have those issues right? She's always telling me she wants to quit but then she cheers at games and loves it. She starts soccer conditioning today and swimming in a couple of weeks. I wonder if she'll be able to keep up with it all. Oh, and by the way, Oak Park won 42-34. Go Northmen!

New Tradition?

What makes a tradition a tradition? Is it the amount of times you do it? If so, how many? I guess it's safe to say it's a tradition for us to carve pumpkins with the Litsters since we've done it two years in a row. It's always fun and crazy!

3D

There are very few movies that I can quote almost all the way through. I'm not one of those people who leave the theater regurgitating everything I've just seen. I have to see movies over and over again to do that. So, I'm pretty picky about the movies I see over and over. Some of those are: Gone with the Wind, Pee-Wee's Big Adventure, Dumb & Dumber, Ace Ventura Pet Detective, Napoleon Dynamite, Nacho Libre, Corpse Bride. As you can tell, I have impeccable taste. One of the biggest is though is Nightmare Before Christmas. For some reason, ever since that first came out in theaters over 10 years ago, I've been hooked. We've worn out the VHS copy from watching it so many times. So, as you can imagine I was pretty excited when I found out it would be released for a limited time in 3D! It opened last friday and much to my dismay, my schedule didn't allow me to see it until last night. What a great FHE, in my opinion! So, I donned my NBC t-shirt and dragged the girls (minus one who stayed home and barfed). I don't think I could be more proud then I was sitting next to my girls who knew, like me, the whole movie...verbatim. The 3D effects are digital and very effective. The movie itself doesn't have much in the way of coming at you but it is very clear and there are many details that couldn't be seen before. So how can I devote an entire blog entry to this event? Easy...I justify it with a picture. It is only playing in theaters for another week and a half. I hope I can see it again before it goes. The other best part of the night? I got to take home these stylish, high quality 3D glasses. They look even better on...

One down...one to go...

Or I should say...one up and one to go. The entry way light is back up and now I'm waiting for Boyd to have an hour to put up the living room light.
Here is the entry way...

Here is the living room medallion...

Here is the light...on the scaffold...waiting to be put on...

In the mean time...

So...while my house is completely torn apart and trashed with ladders and scaffolding and everything from off of the walls...we still have to live. Yesterday we spent some time working on Andrew Mack's Eagle Scout Project and chaperoned and photographed Megan Kitchen's 16th birthday party. I especially thought my nephews who have come out here for scout camp would enjoy these pictures. Some of the boys they went to camp with are in these photos from Megan's party. So, yesterday was another day spent with the youth of our ward while my house stays in chaos. It's all good though..


Dress standard for the party: semiformal/formal...here are Andrew and Ben with Chloe.





The invitation requested that everyone wear black and white. Not everyone could do that but as you can see Kaleb did. He wore a black shirt with white painter's overalls. It was awesome! He called them his "formal bibs".

This was classic Andrew all night. He was either jumping in every photo or calling, "Sister K, take my picture!". For more photos, see my Facebook.

more progress...

The ceiling is actually done, it just needs to be reassembled. I need Boyd to go up to the top of that rickety scaffolding to hang the medallion and chandelier though. But here is the paint process...

First, they painted two layers of black. They let it dry and came back the next day and painted a layer of metallics.

During this time Boyd and I painted the walls a dirty gold color. Then yesterday they came back and stained the hole thing with black. They also brought over the medallion for us to hang up and put back together. I love it! When you come in the front door now, you're eyes are drawn up to that space. I can't wait to see it all put together. I'm not sure when it's going to happen...tomorrow is saturday but we have an Eagle Scout project, a baptism and then Boyd and I are chaperoning and taking photos at a sweet 16 party! Let's hope we get it done before I have to give the scaffolding back!

Work in Progress

I've been wanting to have some faux finishing done in my house for quite awhile now. I can tackle some basic finishes and low heights but I really wanted something very professional. I knew of a lady here, Jennifer Allwood, who's practically famous for her painting techniques and I've always wanted to have her do something in my home. She faux finished the homes made by Extreme Home Makeover here in KC. My friend Shauna happens to know her and told me I really need to give her an opportunity to come and give me some ideas and estimates. I'm so glad I did! We're starting on this relatively small project for now. I say small because it's only a space of about 10' by 6' but it happens to be 22' in the air! She brought over some scaffolding and began yesterday. A great friend of ours, Tom Allison came by first off and took down the chandelier hanging in the entry. He made me so nervous wobbling around on the scaffolding that I nearly vomited. Yesterday they came in and painted two layers of black paint. Today they painted the first layer of bronze/silver/gold metallics. It's all very exciting! Last night I even convinced Boyd to take advantage of the opportunity to use the scaffolding and paint the walls in the entry. They look awesome! I'm so glad he was willing to climb up there. Now I just have to figure out how to do the rest of the high walls! I'm posting pictures of Tom taking down the light. You can see the color of the entry is cream in these photos. Tomorrow I'll post more so you can see the change. Fun stuff!

And then there were 8

So, remember the memory block I received as a birthday present a couple of weeks ago? Well, I knew it would be an addiction for me. I'm up to 8 of them now. I need to lay low for awhile from Ebay...they love me there. We had this discussion in seminary the other day about worshipping idols. I asked the kids of there was anything they wanted or had that consumed their thoughts? Do they feel like they HAVE to have it or would be miserable without it? Do they think it about it all the time? Is it in a prominent place in their lives and heart? Do they spend their time, talents and money trying to maintain or earn this item? If so, perhaps they should consider whether or not they are "worshipping" a false idol. One of the kids brought up collections. Instantly I thought about this new passion of mine. I have to admit that for a few days it pretty much consumed my thoughts. Kind of like when the girls were little and they were obsessed with collecting all the Lion King toys from the Happy Meals from McDonalds. The toys were only released one a week, so in order to get them all you had to get Happy Meals for many weeks in a row. Every week the girls would get all excited and beg me to take them to McDonalds. And we did because we HAD to collect all the animals. How can you play Lion King without all the animals??? Well I kind of figure...how can I display these if I only have a couple?? Besides, I'm not ever going to be able to collect them all and I have set myself a limit on how much I will spend on a single tile (I've seen some of them go for $1,200 a piece!). Anyway, my Mom always had this saying she would say to me from a famous rock song..."you can justify it till the end". Till the "end" I'll keep thinking about how I can justify my obsession. For now, I tell myself that if I lost them all tomorrow...all would be alright...and it would.

Ho Hum Day

There's no school today...it's a teacher training day or some other made up day to get out of school. I really wanted to take the girls to our annual pumpkin patch to get their pumpkins but the weather stinks. So we went any way. I don't know if it's because I've been down for the last few days or because they are bored and too old, or if it's the weather, but no one was too excited. Bridger roamed around a bit and checked out the animals while I focused on the pumpkins. The other girls could have cared less! But we have our pumpkins and we made the annual pilgrimage so we can call it good. We have got to get out of this funk....

Here are the girls with the cornstalk trojan horse...

Pay Day!

I call these days Pay Day because after weeks of paying for costumes, altering, shuttling to and from practices and wardrobe malfunctions...a day like today is a pay day. It was the first choir concert of the year. Hunter sings in the Treble choir which is an all girls choir she had to try out for while she was in 8th grade. They only took 5 freshman this year. Chloe sings in the show choir...Oak Street. They dance and sing and perform all over town as well as in competitions throughout the country. She also sings in the Acapella concert choir. To be in these two choirs she spent two weeks last year in tryouts. The drama of that time is more then made up for when I watch her sing. Both of the girls have great stage presence and are very confident. I wouldn't have even DARED to try out for these choirs when I was their age. They must get that from their Dad.
So...yesterday was definately a pay day. I love pay days...


Chloe in Acapella





Hunter in Treble Choir




Chloe in Oak Street

Thanks Mom!

Last friday I was thinking that I needed a new puzzle to work on. I even browsed a bit on the internet. I mentioned to Kiera that I would love to start a puzzle swap website. She said she was going to pretend that she didn't hear me say that. What?? Is it because I don't need one more project or because I'm a puzzle nerd??? Anyway, back to wanting a puzzle, I go outside to the mailbox and there's a package in it for me with a puzzle in it! Mom sent me a puzzle from the Grand Canyon. She must have read my mind. I started on it and almost decided to quit...it's almost one color. I didn't think I would complete it. But I did today...Thanks Mom!

Happy Homecoming....again?

Tonight Chloe went to another Homecoming dance. This time she was asked by a boy in our ward that goes to Smithville High. We actually have 4 high schools in our ward! Luckily we picked up another dress while we were in Utah this summer. We also had her silver Tiffany jewelry that she got for her birthday this year. She and her date, Brent Smith, doubled with another couple of kids from our ward, Sonja Litster and Caleb Baker. So, curfew is in effect for tonight and it's almost 11:00 pm as I write this so we'll see if she gets home on time! I know they went to eat at the "drugstore" in Smithville. The food there is incredible. I can't wait to hear how the evening goes! I may have to wait up for this!