our american idol

Emily is in the choir at school and she (with 2 friends) tried out for the solo concert (not all solos, some group numbers)  They made it and got to perform Work This Out from High School Musical 2 - another favorite for Emily (please see Hannah Montana in previous post) Disney is marketing directly to my daughter.

Em did a great job!  I would have guessed that she would have been a lot more nervous but she handled herself well and had a great performance - we are very proud of her.

8's not too young

Can you see them?  Look closely...my 8 year old has tats.  A few weeks ago we went as a family to see Hannah Montana (more on that later) and Nate decided to wear these tattoo sleeves that we have in our costume box.  We got more then a few disapproving looks from passer-byes as well as a bunch of double takes with looks of complete shock.  I found it all fairly funny and watched for people to react.  You see, I am easily amused.  Nate played it up, keeping his hands in his pockets so that you couldn't see where the sleeves ended on his wrists.

Now for the Hannah Montana movie in 3-D...Luke, Nate and Derek all fell asleep and I believe Megan was close to drifting off to dreamland.  Emily enjoyed it immensely - it was right up her tweendom alley. Upon leaving the theater Derek assured me that if word got out that he went to see HM 3-D he would have to hand over his man card.  I guess that is why he stayed to dark corners as we exited the theater.

some easter fun

Derek and I found some great easter eggs last night at Target.  I have searched the internet to find a picture of them but I can't seem to find anything.

The eggs have prompted us to have a night time Easter egg hunt.  The eggs are all dark colors with a single band of reflective yellow through the center.  I believe there are 24 eggs in a pack (already full of candy) and 2 flashlights.  The kids can search the backyard in the dark for the eggs and if I can pull it together I may turn it into a Saturday night movie night in the backyard.

Target had a bunch of cool plastic eggs - some with nature designs on them like rocks, water, grass (these would be great for older kids because they would be much more difficult to find & we all know that one of our jobs as parents is to make things incredibly hard and frustrating for our kids)  They had some that looked like tree bark, other eggs that had sticky stuff or hangers so that you could hide the eggs up off the ground - there is a whole aisle of sneaky egg stuff.

calling all creative kids

I got an email for this contest today and thought I'd share with those of you that have creative little Picassos under foot.  I know my kids will think this is fun - maybe yours will too.

my mailbox is smiling

Yeah for good mail!  Kristi sent me this package full of fun ribbon - I love it!  Thanks a bunch Kristi.

luck of the irish

Bring on the green lunch it's St Patrick's Day.  Our traditional St Patty's lunch consisted of green packaged goodies and a sandwich roll-up with a spinach tortilla , meat and...

green mayo.  Nothing yummier then green mayo.

The leprechauns snuck into the house and set the table for dinner, leaving behind a wealth of chocolate coins.

We had a rainbow of fruit (yes, I did forget to buy green honeydew or kiwi)

And of course we had our favorite Irish meal - corned beef and cabbage.  The cabbage ended up a bit too mushy because dinner was planned for 6pm but we ended up not eating until about 8pm.  Derek got held up at work and the kids did not want to have St. Patty's day dinner without him (I thought that was cute of them) so we all worked through the hunger pains until Derek could get home.

Happy St. Patrick's day from the Baker's

more house jive

We spent a few days pulling out the old flooring to ready the house for the new dark wood floors that were being installed.  We ended up doing hardwood throughout the downstairs and up the stairs (I haven't taken pictures of the stairs yet)  We are really happy with how it has turned out.

Our next flooring adventure is carpeting the upstairs rooms and hallway and tiling the bathrooms.  We have to take down beds, bookshelves, etc. before we rip up the nasty carpet that we currently have.  It seems like a big project at the moment so we haven't been moving as fast as we should be but we really need to get on it.  The carpet is picked out and the company installing it is ready to move when we say go we just need to do it (I do not want workers in my house again)

some house updates

The finished entertainment center...

One of the features we love is that the tv is mounted to the back of a false wall in the unit.  The tv can be pulled put past the doors and moved around so that everyone can get a better view or so that I can watch cooking shows while in the kitchen.

a little blog catch up

My roadshow recovery program is moving along so I finally have a bit of energy and am able to download photos and update the blog.  It helps that Nathan is home from school today unable to move his leg without a bunch of pain so I am pretty much confined to home except for a trip to the doctor this afternoon.

Let the blog catch up begin...

happy birthday grandma wood

never been my strongest skill

I saw this typing test on a friend's blog so I decided to try it, knowing full well I would be horrible at it. I would be curious to know what a good score is (i'm sure it is not 42 words a minute)

42 words

Speed test

happy 38th

I have great birthday plans in my head for Derek, who is celebrating 38 years today, but they'll all have to wait due to the beast we are calling Roadshow.  My blogging birthday wishes will have to suffice for now...Happy Birthday to the most amazing person I know.  Derek is one of the most near perfect individuals I know and I am glad that he is mine, all mine.

Happy Birthday Derek!

missing in action

Road Shows... 

Derek - High Councilman over it

Denise - costumes 

Megan - in it

Emily, Nate and Luke - patiently (most of the time) dealing with it

This is why there is a serious lack of posts - life is basically revolving around road shows.  They are next Friday and Saturday and we are crossing our fingers that life at the Baker home returns to normal.

a media marvel

I love the kitchen but I am pretty dang stoked about this little beauty.  We can now finally use all the space that was in this recessed area.  

I am excited to have the tv behind closed doors. I realize that it's the thing to hang the flat screen on the wall but I have issues (surprise, surprise) about the tv being hidden - it makes me happy.

I love the four gigantic (they really are gigantic) drawers.  I love that our Guitar Hero guitar boxes, DDR mats, video games and controllers all fit in one drawer - no more video game jive everywhere (do you hear the angels singing?)  The other drawers hold blankets, board games/crafts, books, and a multitude of other goodness that a family of 6 needs while lounging in the family room.

Picture of the finished entertainment center coming soon.

granite and handles

It was fun to finally see the kitchen take shape when the granite went in and the hardware was put on.  We are loving the kitchen.  We have a ton more space (I even have empty drawers and cabinets)  We love the easy clean up of the granite, especially compared to the tile we had in the kitchen before - I really have an aversion to grout lines!  

I will put some finished project pictures up once the floor is in since these pictures are still without appliances.

I love this sink.  You can't really tell from the picture but it's huge.  Notice my cute little colander of limes?  My neighbor dropped them off to me to brighten my kitchen.

finally

We have had some major issues with being able to post to the blog - not knowing how to work our Mac adds to the equation.  Derek informed me last night that we should probably try to learn more about our computer instead of only using it to make funny videos with photo booth. Does he not know that we bought the computer just to look at it's beauty :)

Here are some kitchen update pictures.  These pictures were taken after the painting had been done.  Even though the kitchen has been done for a week or so the floor still looks the same as in these pictures.  The flooring will start going in this Monday and I can't wait.  It will finally feel like we have a new usable space.

lots of love

Happy Valentines Day.  We started the day off with a Valentines breakfast of  heart shaped doughnuts from Kripsy Kreme, strawberry milk and strawberry yogurt.  I also blessed the kids with a beautiful rendition of a made-up Valentines song while they ate - musical talent at it's finest.

I sent the kids off to school with their traditional Valentines lunches which consist of a multitude of red foods - turkey wrap in a sun dried tomato/basil tortilla, red jello, red gatorade, strawberries, frosted sugar cookie, and pringles (because they come in a red package)

The boys took Valentines to share at school.  I had started them yesterday afternoon but only got about a 1/4 of the way done before I had to put them aside to help with homework. Sometime around 12:30 this morning I remembered that they hadn't been finished. After a temporary bit of a breakdown I got to work. The whole time I kept telling myself "thank goodness that only 2 are in elementary school"  I do not miss the days of putting together 100 valentines - 40 seemed so much more reasonable this year.  I never got a picture of the Valentines (my card is full)  We took pop rocks and made a "you rock/happy valentines day" label.

Not sure what fanciness I will pull out for our Valentines Day dinner.  I am sure you will all be on the edge of your seats with wonder.  Does Kraft Mac n Cheese seem appropriate for the holiday?  With a little food coloring I think it could fit the bill.

To close...a little love shout out to Derek, Megan, Emily, Nathan and Luke - love you guys!

kitchen & entertainment center

These pictures are of the painting nearing completion.  This was about a week and a half ago (if I am remembering right)

Work gets started on the entertainment center. 

You can see our old armoire in the middle of the floor.  We have had it forever and I can't say that I am sad to see it go.  It did not hold near enough stuff and I was sick of looking at the knotty pine.  It's so nice to be able to update.
The new space will hold so much more - I can't wait to have it done.

so official

I am in love with these.  They are so fun!  I found them while checking out the How About Orange Blog.  I can't wait to start sending some.

kitchen - day creepy

So this picture totally creeps me out.

This is our kitchen all wrapped up and getting a fresh coat of paint.  This plastic beauty was up for a couple of days and all I can think about when I see it is some cheeseball, spooky movie.  I can picture a bloody hand sliding down the plastic - it has that look to me.  It's like the shower scene in Psycho - note to self...don't see creepy movies they stay with you forever.  Everytime I would walk by the plastic I had to tell myself that there was no killer or dead body on the other side -yeah, I kind of have a weird imagination, what's it to you.