Some major summer projects have been completed and they were all a lot of work!!!
Brady's big boy bedroom is now completed. I love how it turned out!
Lee and I worked as a team and we made the letters of his name. We did the letter project
last summer for both Brady and Tyler. Lee cut out the letters with his handy dandy jigsaw and I painted them into a football, soccer ball, eight ball, basketball, and baseball. Underneath Brady's name, we have professional players, Starring: Brian Urlacher, Our very own, Matt Reynolds, and Lebron James. We just bought this dresser from craigslist for $20. Lee painted it black and then we bought the baseball hardware for the knobs.
Lee also made this black shelf on the wall. I saw it in Pottery Barn and asked Lee if he could make it, as Pottery Barn's price is outrageous! In the shelf is a football player and some great football pictures of Brady himself. Above the shelf is Uppercase Living wall decals.
All of these shelves have been in the 'nursery' since Tyler was a baby, but they were white. I painted them black and bought a new cubby shelf for some toys and books.
Brady loves his new big boy room!
Another big project for me was to finish another blog book. I have now completed a blog book for the year 2009 and 2010! The reason I started a blog was so that our family could see pictures and hear stories of our family by the click of a button on the computer. I now keep up the blog so well so that I can keep all of our memories and pictures in a book. We will have these books to look back on. We will always have these stories, pictures, and memories in a book.
I love it!
First off, I want to say, I'm not a scrapbooker! When Tyler was born, I was given a box of scrapbooking material to make a scrapbook for Tyler's 1st year of life. I was not that excited, but shortly after Tyler turned one, I made a trip to Iowa City and had my mom, Rita, and Michelle all help me make Tyler's 1st year scrapbook. It was fun and we all enjoyed it. Since I made one for Tyler, I knew that I also had to make one for Brady. Like I said, Tyler's was finished shortly after he turned one. I just finished Brady's in July, one month short of him turning 2! I did this scrapbook all by myself and am thrilled how it turned out! It was a lot of work and a lot of time! I am pleased that I have a scrapbook for their 1st year of life, but that's all they're getting!
The front of the scrapbook.
A HUGE project for Lee this summer was to get the outside of our house painted. He rented this thing (which I cannot remember the name of at the moment) to paint the house. In order for him to use this on the yard, the ground had to be completely dry. We had a week with no rain, so Lee called to rent this for a Sunday. They dropped it off on a Saturday afternoon. Lee had started on the house Saturday afternoon and evening, and then actually finished up and painted the whole house on that Sunday. It ended up being an incredibly hot and humid day, but he had no choice but to paint the house since we had this 'thing' rented for only the one day. I know that he is extremely glad that this project is finished and I am so happy with how the house looks! He does still have to paint the trim white, but we are waiting until things cool down a bit, so that will probably get finished this fall.
The sand sculptures were created around children's books/movies. It was really amazing to see these sculptures and wonder how they are made. We do know that alot of time and work goes into making them! This one was for the book 'Rainbow Fish.'
This sculpture wasn't really a children's book/movie, but was made to show the Iowa Train. Herky the Hawk was blown up behind the train. Brady obviously stood at this one for awhile, since he is obsessed with trains at the moment.
After seeing all the sculptures, the boys were able to play in a sand mound for awhile. They had a blast!
After 'Sand in the City,' we headed to the Iowa Children's Museum. This was our first time going to this museum and it was great!!! We all had such a great time!
We first did some grocery shopping. Of course, after the kids fill their grocery carts, the parents have to then put all of the goodies away and back where they came from. So, this picture shows Tyler doing some grocery shopping.
Brady grocery shopping.
Grandma shopping with the boys and helping Tyler add up his goodies on his calculator.
After the grocery store, it was on to driving an Ambulance.
Then to the Dr. office to check out some X-Rays.
They could have stayed in this room all day! This room is made to be as loud as you can! Bang on drums, bells, etc. They loved it! Lee too!
Outside the "loud" room was a piano. They thought that they were pretty cool playing the big piano.
This museum is really fun for all! Here's Grandma, Lee, Tyler, and Brady all playing some music.
I would try to get a few notes in on the piano, but Tyler was creating a masterpiece!
Dress-up time! I put on some extremely small clothes and Tyler is spiderman.
Nice Family Picture! Lee in the mask, Brady as Incredible Hulk, Tyler as Spiderman, Me as, well, I don't know!
Mr. Incredible Hulk.
Brady LOVED this car race thing. He and Grandma spent some good time racing cars here.
Tyler liked this golf ball roller coaster.
Airplane Time! Tyler driving his airplane.
Both boys together in a big airplane.
Brady driving his airplane. If they pedaled, then it moved the propeler.
Lee and Tyler doing an airplane simulator.
Brady and I doing an airplane simulator.
Another very fun area was the Pizza Shop. It was very fun to watch the boys "make" us pizzas and play in the kitchen. Here's what Tyler brought us first. It was just dough. But he did want to sprinkle some parmesan cheese on top!
Brady brought us some pizza as well!
The boys getting us something to drink.
Tyler putting a pizza in the oven.
Another obsession of Brady's right now is sinks. If I let him, he would play in the sink all day. Luckily, this sink was a 'toy' sink and didn't let out any water.
After the museum, we had lunch in the food court in the mall, and then had to ride some rides. Here's the boys riding the Roller Coaster simulator together.
Tyler riding Garfield.
Brady in the dump truck.
After rides, Grandma treated them to ice cream. It was blue, tasted like fruit loops, and was quite a mess, but the boys loved it!
WOW!
Saturday evening, Katie and Taylor came over to play. Here's Grandma reading a book to Taylor and Brady.
On our way back home Saturday night. We put them into PJ's hoping that they would fall asleep on the way home and all we would have to do would be to carry them up to their beds. They did not fall asleep on the ride home, nor did they really want to go to bed when we got home! Too much fun with Grandma!
Grandma really treated us to a great Saturday! From the museum, to lunch, to rides, to ice cream, dinner, and fun! Thanks, MOM for such a great day!
