Happy New Year!

Happy New Year! I appreciate the new year because it's always a time when I reflect on the past. The last year, previous years and the future yet to come. I can't get over how big the boys are, or how much Ellena is growing. I swear that girl says a new word or phrase daily. Today I was looking for the remote control and had her look underneath the sofa with me; we both spied it at the same time and when I pulled it out from it's hiding place, she exclaimed, "Got it!". It stopped me dead in my tracks. All I could do was sit there on my knees in awe at the wonder of her. Her other favorite phrase right now is, "I don't know." Where she'll shrug her shoulders and put her arms up in a questioning manner. I can't get over how cute she is.Michael began high school last year; although my husband Denniss and I have enjoyed watching him grow into this new season of his life we're also totally freaked out. I've always loved and embraced each new stage in my children's development, but honestly, these teen years are sort of freaking me out. I have never questioned whether I'm doing things right so much before. Meanwhile, Evan is in the last year of elementary school. This Fall he'll start middle school and just like that he'll be in a new stage of his childhood. Sometimes I feel as though my head is spinning because I constantly have to switch up my parenting method with each child, and sometimes, the switch doesn't happen as smoothly as I'd like. We'll get there and I'm sure once I feel like I have a handle on this parenting gig, something will change and I'll find myself right back to here. It isn't so much that I doubt my ability to effectively parent, or that I'm somehow totally screwing up my kids, it's more about making sure each child is getting what they need to thrive. Sometimes I feel like, I'm missing that mark; which is something I definitely want to work on this year.Most of all, I want my family to do more together. We fell out of the habit of having "family game nights" and the activities the boys used to love to do, they no longer have the same enthusiasm for. My goal this year is to tap into what they're growing personalities and interests enjoy and get involved. Find things they're interested in and turn them into family adventures. It's important we take full advantage of the time we've got with all five us here under one roof, because my husband could deploy at any moment really and I don't want to feel like we've wasted our time with the boys and Ellena.

Our Christmas

It's hard to believe another Christmas has come and gone. We had a lovely Christmas at home, and it was wonderful. We all felt so blessed to be able to spend it together, unlike last year, where my husband had to FaceTime with us since he was stationed overseas. We've been such homebodies this entire Christmas break. My mom even came up from Florida with her two poodles and we barely left our house. It's been great!We went to Mass on Christmas Eve and then came home and had a great dinner, my husband cooked the entire thing! He is awesome!Then we hung out by the Christmas tree and called his parents in the Dominican Republic. I miss them so much and I wish I could snap my fingers and have them here with us. I'm sure they miss us even more. They've not seen my husband in over five years since when they visited last summer he was on tour. Hopefully, in the new year, we'll all manage a way to spend some time together God willing. It's always fun hearing our kids who don't speak Spanish (shame on us) try to communicate with their grandparents who speak very little English.Michael is especially hilarious. I snapped this photo while he was trying to say "Feliz Navidad" and just couldn't get the pronunciation right. His facial expressions are so funny, I wish I'd had it in my mind to try to get it on camera.He has grown to be such an amazing kid. He's so patient with his little sister and he loves her and his little brother (though he doesn't show it quite as much).Sharing Christmas with Ellena this year has been such a blessing. I've so enjoyed watching her learn and LOVE all things Christmas... except for maybe, Santa. We'll give him another try next year. Ellena and I have some-what matching hats. Aren't we cute? These beanies are by Carhartt. You can find Ellena's beanie here and mine here.

His face. I just love him so much.

All in all, we had a wonderful, quiet, uneventful Christmas. You really can't ask for much more. Finally here are my mother's beautiful Standard Poodles. Mother and Daughter, Chole and Lilly. They are so sweet and smart.  

Making Military Housing a Home: Holiday Edition Part 2

I'm back to share a bit more of my home - Ok.. actually I'm here to share a re-do. I moved my tree. Yes. I moved a fully decorated tree. It's much easier than it sounds. I simply slid it over a few feet no biggie. Especially since I've been known to do this before. The first year we were in Italy I moved my tree three times, I couldn't figure out where I wanted it, and seeing it in the spot was the best option for me. I also do this with furniture. I can visualize until I'm cross-eyed, but seeing the furniture in the room in the space is what I prefer. When you move as much as we do, sometimes furniture doesn't work exactly the way you thought it would, it's all part and parcel with making  military housing a home.

Anyway, in my last post I know I mentioned I wasn't exactly in lov with it being in the corner. So I moved it today. I like it much better centered in our living room, like an anchor or something. Plus, it gives my daughter even more tree to explore. So far she's broken 5 bulbs and I've had to redo the garland on the lower half at least as many times. It's cool. She likes Christmas and I am fully encouraging her to LOVE Christmas. As I type this she is currently napping on the floor by the tree. 

Seriously is there anything more magical than sleeping beneath a Christmas tree? I can't really think of anything. 

Here is my dining room table. I'd like to add some evergreen branches in the jug along side the cotton stems. These lanterns are pretty much on my table all year except for during the fall when they get changed out, but I like that they can be used for various seasons and holidays. 

This little tree is a fun tree. The colors I use in the dining area are shades of green, red and turqoise or blue. It all blends in nicely and looks cohesive. 

This is our advent wreath. It's super simple. It's not the traditional advent wreath you'll see in many Catholic homes who do a wreath. I don't have colored candles and there is no evergreen in it, but I like it and it works. It also stays out all winter long to help remind my family of Christ's light.  

As you enter my home this is directly in front of the front door. I really wish we had a bit more room as we don't have a mud room so things like coats and boots get stored beneath the table and behind the door on a hook.

When we go out for walks, my husband and boys will give me pine cones. These ones have were collected in Florida and Italy. 

This blue dresser is an antique I bought when we lived in Italy. I spruced it up and really have become attached to it. We recently moved it to the landing on our stairs, so I could place the tree in the corner. I may have moved the tree, but this dresser is staying where it is. I like it in this little nook. 

I have been on the hunt for several weeks for stockings that were simple and white. I had envisioned having each of our names embroidered on them. I couldn't really find anything I liked that didn't cost about $25 a piece. I happened upon these in Target and was immediately drawn to them because of their simplicity, and a sort of vintage feel to them. At $3 a piece, they were also a steal. I'm going to make some dough tags with either initials or everyone's name to hang by each stocking. I'll be sure to post a tutorial on what I end up making. 

That's it for now. Be on the look out in a few days where I'll share the holiday trees in our bedrooms. 

Making Military Housing a Home: Holiday Edition Part 1

I love Christmas! I LOVE decorating for Christmas. When you're in the military and move every so many years, making each new home yours can be a challenge. One I happily accept. I love to put our personal touches on each of the homes we live in; even if those touches need to be temporary. When it comes to holiday decorating I usually keep it minimal. I REALLY don't like moving this sort of stuff around - because honestly, we never know where we'll end up. Will the house be smaller, larger, have a garage? We can't say. Next we need to factor in damage. A lot of our belongings inevitably disappear between the packing up of our stuff and the unpacking, or are damaged with each move. It's frustrating, but we deal.

Over the years, I've learned I need to limit how much holiday decor I allow myself to have. What this means is decor for holidays other than Christmas get relegated to no more than two bins and Christmas gets four. That's it. The bulk of the ornaments on the trees were collected over the years at our various duty stations or can easily be replaced if I need to purge excess items in preparation for a big move.

The Friday after Thanksgiving I began decorating our home. My boys have never showed much interest in the tree. Even as babies or toddlers they left it alone. I can not say the same for Ellena. She has been all over this tree and took a keen interest in watching me decorate it. I can't tell you how many times I've caught her touching or pulling bulbs off. I love her curiosity, and the challenge she's given me to keep the lower half of our tree to the shatterproof decorations and bulbs. I think I may have FINALLY gotten my Christmas decorating partner. I'm looking forward to future Christmases where she and I will really decorate our home together.

I still want to tweak a few things but here are a few photos of what I've done in my living room so far. I love the small wreathes between each of the windows (we've four in our living room). This prooves decorating for the holidays needn't be over the top. Sometimes the simplest of touches, have the greatest impact. 

I picked up this countdown garland from Target this past weekend. My advent calendar got ruined in our last move, so last year I used store bought ones for my kids. When I spied this one I sort of fell in love. Apart from the candy, which my boys love to look for each day, my husband and I are writing little notes to our boys. These sort of traditions are so wonderful and I hope when they are older they'll want to continue them with their own families. 

I love these reindeer pillows. I bought them in Italy, but you can find similiar ones in many stores. I also love this one from Joss & Main. The black and white pillows I also added this week. I've wanted a black and white check or plaid pillows for these sofas since we moved into this home a year and a half ago, but I didn't want to spend a small fortune on them. I found these four pillows at Kirkland's and they were very affordable. Here is a comparable pillow from Walmart! 

Check back tomorrow, I'll share a bit more of my holiday decorating and how I make military housing a home. 

Boho Themed Baptism

Ellena was baptized into the Catholic Church on a lovely Sunday morning, on the feast day of the Nativity of Saint John the Baptist, at our little military chapel.  The day blossomed into a perfect warm summer day, full of sunshine and blue skies. After we came home for a boho themed baptism luncheon.

Scroll down to the bottom of this post, for links and things...

After her baptism, we came home for a lovely and simple bohemian themed lunch. You know I love a theme, so I decorated our dining area with dream catchers I made using doilies and ribbon.All the ladies wore flower crowns I made and after lunch, we dined on a delicious homemade (from scratch) vanilla bean cake "naked" cake I made. I'm so not a baker, but I do try.The cake recipe I used can be found here: Vanilla Naked Cake. Do add the fresh raspberries... it's sooo good. I decorated the cake with fresh roses and peonies.Directions on how to make a flower crown can be found here, or you can always buy a flower crown. This is a cake stand similar to my rustic live edge serving platter I really like these dream catchers. Had I seen these prior to making my own, I totally would've bought these instead. This one has gold dipped feathers just like the ones I made. These come in a four pack! Seriously! I could've saved some cash! I purchased this rustic cake topper from the Etsy shop, Seaside Sass. These glitter ones are cool too and they come in a bunch of different colors!

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Ellena's Simple First Birthday Celebration

My baby girl is a year old! I decided on a simple first birthday celebration for Ellena because she’ll be baptized this summer and we’ll have family and her daddy here to really celebrate in a much bigger way. Pope Francis says we should celebrate the day we're baptized like our birthdays and I love this idea and have begun to mark the days we were baptized in my own family. Though this celebration was a small and sweet much like our little girl; the simplicity of this first birthday celebration in no way mirrors the vast amount of joy and blessings we’ve felt since she’s joined our lives. In many ways I feel like I’ve blinked. With her father overseas this last year it’s also felt very long. It’s funny how time can feel that way isn’t it? She’s brought so much happiness into our lives, my only wish is that he would’ve been able to share in the many wonderful moment’s we’ve had with her in person. As hard as this year has been for all of us, I know it’s been doubly hard for him to have been away.  Thankfully, with God’s grace, he’ll be home soon making many wonderful memories.Yesterday Ellena and I spent a few hours visiting local bakeries in search of the perfect birthday cupcake. We brought home several for her brothers to sample and vote on the best. I placed them all on a pink cake stand to create her birthday "cake".Ellena's cupcake was a strawberry cake with strawberry buttercream. It was delicious! I'm glad I bought two in that flavor (just in case!).Though she didn't gobble it up as I expected her to. She sampled the frosting and kept making a few (oh so cute) faces. I think it was actually too sweet for her little taste buds. She hasn't had many overly sugary foods yet besides a taste of some ice cream and chocolate.I kept the decorations minimal for this simple first birthday celebration. The happy birthday banner, gifts, "one" cake sign, and her homemade party hat were it. So easy. Keeping the focus on how blessed we feel to have her here with us.Isn't this picture sweet. Ellena has some amazing big brothers. She's one lucky girl! They shower her with so much attention and affection, and often remark, how having a baby sister is so great. This really fills my heart with joy to know they love her so much.We all made wishes for her when we blew out her birthday candle. My biggest wish is that she grows up to be brave and kind. Brave because I hope she's unafraid to go after her dreams and the challenges that life will throw at her. Kind to always remember to treat everyone she encounters with respect, and dignity. To have humility and compassion for all.I still pinch myself sometimes. I never really felt like I was through having children, but we'd waited so long (nearly 9 years) before she came along, that I honestly thought this season of our lives was over. I'd already been blessed with two amazing and beautiful boys. To think that I now have a teenager, and pre-teen and a toddler still blows my mind, but it really is rather splendid. I'd have another if I could.You can see how I made Ellena's cute First Birthday Party Hat here.

Back to School Photos

It's hard to believe, we're at the inception of another school year. My eldest son Michael is in eighth grade and younger son is in fourth. They're both such beautiful bright boys. I'm sure this year will be met with many challenges for them both, but with each one they successfully get through, I know their confidence will build and they'll get better and better and overcoming any obstacle they may face.