What Ana Does

A funny thing happens when you walk into Jo-Ann Fabrics with my kids. They go completely insane. It mid as well be Toys R Us. It's actually worse, because I get a little overly-excited, too. I see and touch cute patterns and my mind starts churning on potential projects. You can probably see my eyes rolling around and smoke coming out of my ears from the amount of creative ideas that are formulating. So let's just say all three of us get a little kid-in-a-candy-store dazzled. Needless to say, we came home with a load of fabric and a Sunday full of sewing plans. Just a Sample of Our Fabric Finds

Guess what we did today... Kindergarten, Here We Come! And because my school district is the size of a small European country, there were eight tables to visit with forms (I filled out the night before!) and more information to gather. It was annoyingly bureaucratic. Plus, I have to do it all again in August! Also, if we had stayed in New Jersey, Alice would be a Kindergartener TODAY! Their cut-off is in October. Rather than Sept 1 here -- a mere 12 days before her birthday. So she's super-duper ready to rock Kindergarten. (This annoyance has lead me to recommend NOT to have kids in the Fall, it's too messy.) And, with any luck, Dual Language Kindergarten -- which would make all this annoyance worth it.

This is the friggin BEST! On Fridays I work from home, thus allowing Leah to take the bus home just that one day a week. And I absolutely love love love it. I'm giddy watching the clock starting at noon. I count down the minutes during the afternoon meetings until it's not "too early" to start standing at the bus stop. My heart soars watching her jump off the bus with her trademark happy-go-lucky stride. My Leah! Although, Leah has started to ban me from coming to the bus stop. "No other parents are waiting." It's starting already!!!??! So last week I took "Benny for a walk" at the same time as the bus -- coincidence! She didn't mind. Benny Says Hi After the School Day Wouldn't it be just PERFECTION if she could take the bus everyday?! Sigh. 

Can you believe I already have to consider this? We're sitting in a sub-zero polar vortex and I have to register for summer camps. Last year I was conceiving the idea of my two week stay-cation at this time . Coming up with a plan to take two weeks out of the summer for family time -- putting the girls in more interesting classes/activities and taking advantage of fun summer activities. (And, it worked and was totally awesome!) Now that I have a full time job that I really like, I can't be so cavalier in my summer planning. Though, I have spotted a week with a soccer camp I want both ladies to attend. Could I negotiate to work from home for the week? Let's hope so.  This year I'm also stepping away from the day care summer programming and putting both girls into the township's Parks and Rec camp. We didn't think they had such a great time in the day care program last year -- not enough activities or outdoors time. Particularly Alice, who didn't g...

Oh my. Alice talked us in to buying challah bread at the grocery store this weekend. And I was feeling all "cool, I can stay away from it." Sure. And then, here it is. On my counter. Taunting me. Challah Bread in Plastic It's not like I can't eat any of it. I can have a little piece, right? But, it's challah bread. And when I start, how can I stop!?! So delicious! Dave thoughtfully offered to lick the bread so I'd be so grossed-out I wouldn't eat it. But let's be honest.... 

I've been having a hard time taking photos of the entryway -- being tall and narrow. So, here's what I've come up with so far. In this angle, yes, you'll see the gold pendants I made for Christmas falling down. Classy! But you'll also see that piece of molding under the second floor railing. See it? OK now imagine if I continued it into the entryway -- all the way around ... thus dividing the tall space into two. That's good, right? The top half would be painted the glorious white that I'd like to paint all the awful beige walls. The bottom half, well, that's the fun part. It can be just about anything! I thought about adding some built ins or bold wallpaper. I have a Pinterest board that is slowly getting filled with inspiration. BUT, maybe I'm getting ahead of myself. Let's start at the beginning... What are my goals for my entryway? 1. Hooks! This space isn't a daily dropzone, but I have lots of neighbors and playdates who ...

The Sad Entry Way ... Months Ago What are your thoughts on wallpaper? I'm thinking about my entryway again because I recently imposed a deadline of end of April to come up with my master plan -- and the ideas are starting to flow in. And when I think about the big "POW! Huge Impact!" statement I want to make the minute you walk into our house, you can't get bigger impact than a massively COOL wallpaper. And, as I'm shopping around, it's about the same cost as a bucket of paint. (Unless, I get some amazingly fab hand-drawn design (not likely) -- that stuff is crazy PRICEY!) I'll try to stick to the navy, green and/or yellow color scheme I've been working with. And I'm a fan of the geometric patterns or organic patterns. I'm also considering using the wallpaper in a section of the wall -- because, remember, this entryway has walls that are 2-stories high. So with some clever use of moldings to break up the massive area, I can pick and c...