Holy Mole-y!

Annnnnd, the run of bad luck continues. I just got a call from the doctor and they got the results back from Aaron's mole biopsy. There are pre-cancer cells in it, so they have to go back in and cut more out. They need to make sure they got it all out and send the new batch in for more tests. Poor little guy...He's going to freak out when I tell him. He had a horrible time with the first removal and stitches. :( But I'm so glad I took him in when I did...how scary! It's crazy that cancer cells could already be starting up in a little mole on a 4 year old!

*note* This will be the third set of stitches for the Brimhall family in less than a month. Sigh.

So, in honor of this occasion, I wanted to post this picture about moles and what to look for.

See the one second from the bottom? That's what Aaron's looked like. Along with the irregular border one. Blend the two pictures together and that was his mole. So, check your moles, and your kids moles! (Why is mole such a gross word!?! I cringe every time I type it!) The sooner you can catch it the better! The end.

Meh.

I've decided that changing up your blog is like shopping for jeans. (Or even worse...SWIMSUIT SHOPPING *gag*) You try on a million pairs...and it takes FOREVER to find a pair that is cute, fits just right, and you are willing to commit to. I swear, I've "tried on" two hundred blog backgrounds today! The background I had before was seriously starting to hurt my eyes. It was cute for the first month or so, and then it started getting really bright and obnoxious. So, now it's after 1 a.m. and I can't even tell what is cute anymore! The problem with changing your background is that then you want to change your banner. Then you have to change the color of your fonts. Then, you decide you want to change the fonts all together and spend forever going through fonts, downloading them to your computer, transferring them into your font folder, editing the HTML code to find a font that fits your blog. (Can you guys even tell that I changed the body font? It's called Traveling Typewriter from Dafont.com...) So...you guys would tell me if I had a seriously hideous background wouldn't you? Is this hideous? I'm so tired and half crazy that I can't even tell. Sigh. Maybe I'll just go to bed.

May The Force Be With You, Aaron!

Okay, I have GOT to do something to distract myself from looking at fabric online. I am literally drooling and ideas are going around in circles in my head! However, with the $600 in doctor bills we've had (IN LESS THAN ONE MONTH!!!) I won't be buying any fabric anytime soon. *sniff sniff* So, how about a post on Aaron's room?

When we first moved here he was really into Transformers. So he had a Transformers bedroom.That has died off, and now it's Star Wars. Since I know he'll probably be over that before too long I don't want to spend a lot of money on Star Wars room decorations, so all I've actually spent money on are picture frames (in which I can change out pictures as his tastes change) and a $5 poster from Walmart, a $10 lamp from Walmart and a Yoda pillow from Target (Thanks, Mom for finding it!!!). Everything else can just be spray painted or whatever to change it up inexpensively.

So, the first change I made was wall art. Remember the ones I designed? Well, I ended up doing something else instead. I can't remember what size frames these are...some random width, but I liked that they were so tall. They were only $3 each! So, I just printed out some Star Wars pictures from the internet, glued them on solid scrapbook paper and called it good. I think they turned out pretty cool, and he loves them!


The second change was to find something on the wall above his dresser. I had this shelf which was originally in the bathroom in Houston, and it was blue. So, I just spray painted it Krylon Champagne Noveau which has a nice metallic sort of finish. Then I spray painted this star black, and printed out an "A" and put that on scrapbook paper and framed it with another Dollar Tree frame that I had kicking around.

Then, I framed the poster in a poster frame from Walmart (I think it was around $10) and spray painted Aaron's name black and champagne noveau. I got the letters from Hobby Lobby when they were having one of their awesome 50% off wall decor sale, so they came out to about $6 total.

So, the total cost for Aaron's room makeover was $36! Not too bad. :)

What's my next project? Our master bedroom! I can't wait to get started!

Just For Fun

My friend blogged about a fun website where you can make your own South Park characters! So, I made our family! :) I think we turned out pretty accurate! HAHAHA!!!!

Michael

Me

Whitney

Aaron

Kate

Not that I've ever seen South Park or anything.... *cough cough*

I Heart Watermelon Pink

THESE ARE A FEW OF MY.......Just kidding. I know, I'm sick of them, too.

* * *

Wanna know what I've been up to? Spray painting and re-decorating. Lots of it. I've been itching for a change but don't want to spend a lot of money. So, on a tight budget I've re-purposed a lot of things! Wanna see some of the things I've done so far? Let's take a little tour of Whitney's room first, shall we?


The two side frames are from the Dollar Tree (love that place) and the middle one is Alco clearance. The side ones were black and the middle one was white. So, I primed them and then spray painted them Krylon Watermelon Pink and then glazed them to make the little details pop.



Then, I had this lamp kicking around for a long time. It was black, so I primed it and then used the same Watermelon Pink spray paint on it and glazed it as well. I think it turned out super cute!


And with the dresser, I added some topiaries that my mom had made for my wedding reception. Then, the big round mirror above it was one I got at Hobby Lobby for our bedroom...but I couldn't resist. Whitney's room NEEDED it. Just like peanut butter NEEDS jelly. (I don't think Michael has even noticed it's gone!) So, I primed and spray painted it Watermelon Pink as well and glued some yellow ribbon to the back to tie into a bow and hang. And, if you look closely, I stuck some vinyl yellow birds on the mirror that I bought from HERE. This is the same place I bought the tree and owl vinyl decals for Whitney's room.


Then, there is the birdhouse to go with the yellow birds on the mirror. They had these $2 birdhouses at Walmart and Whitney has wanted one for a long time. I finally broke down and we got one. I painted it yellow and glued on some buttons that we already had. Not bad, eh? It was SO easy to do!



Last but not least...see this headboard? Soon, it will be gone. I got a SUPER cute antique headboard from my parent's garage that I'm working on right now! It's going to fit in PERFECTLY with the girls' room. I can't wait to finish it! I also have the crazy idea of spray painting their dresser brown...but we'll see if I can dig up the ambition.

Well, that's enough for one day! Thanks for stopping by! I'm off to bed!. :)

SUBMITTED TO:
Blue Cricket Design
DIY by Design
Thrifty Decor Chick

These Are A Few of My Favorite Things

It has been a FREEZING cold week this week! We got snow, and every day it's been getting down to 20* below zero or more. So, this weeks favorite things list will reflect that! Enjoy!

1. My electric blanket!!!!
Our bedroom has very little insulation in it, and there is a big draft that comes in through our closet. So, on these nights of 25* below zero, I am so incredibly grateful for my electric blanket. Last year I dreaded climbing into bed because the sheets were always FREEEEZING! But this year I bought a Sunbeam electric blanket and I turn it on about a half an hour before I climb in bed. It is FABULOUS to climb into my nice, warm, super cozy bed. I turn it off before I fall asleep and usually end up turning it back on around 5 a.m. when I wake up freezing again. (I'm too scared to leave it on all night!) This blanket is so wonderful!

2. Our wood stove
I am SOOOO happy we got this installed when we did! Our boiler has gone out yet AGAIN (third time in 2 months. Grrrrr!) So we are without hot water. Since our house is heated by baseboard heaters, we would be in serious trouble! Our stove has saved our cold little tooshies more than once this winter! And I have to admit, there is something about going outside to bring in some wood, building a fire, and sitting in front of it to warm up that is empowering. It feels good to be able to take care of your family. It must be the cavewoman in me. ;) Now, to go outside and kill a mammoth for dinner....

3. Windshield De-Icer


Can I just say how much I hate going outside on Sunday before church (cutting it close as usual) and realizing I have to scape the windows on the van? In a skirt? And darling open toed high heels? This stuff is so wonderful! You just spray it on the windows and it melts the ice off instantly. I just have to run the windshield wipers a few times and we're good to go. Love it. I will never go without it again!

4. Gilden paint samplesThese really came in handy this week! I've had the painting itch. Usually I'm pretty good about looking at the paint sample cards at Walmart and being able to pick what I wanted. But now Walmart has changed paints and they have these little bottles of samples that are less than $3 each. So, I bought a pretty gray one for the master bathroom, a super cute green (like the sample in the picture) one for the kitchen and a slate blue one for our bedroom. The paint color on the little bottle looked exactly like the colors I had envisioned in my mind for our home. But, when I put them on the wall they looked HORRIBLE!!! They looked so different in the lighting of our house than the lights at Walmart! the I was so glad I didn't go ahead and buy the whole gallon things of them and start painting away like I usually do. So, from now on, I will always get one of the sample things first. It's totally worth the few dollars to not make a huge color mistake that I will have to look at every single day.

5. This gum!Since I've been trying to watch what I eat and cut down on the snacking I've been chewing a lot of gum. I've really grown fond of this stuff. I don't even know who makes it...but it's at pretty much every store I've seen. All of the flavors I've tried are good, but the minty flavors seem to help me not snack so much. Things don't taste very good when you have leftover mint flavor in your mouth. Like drinking orange juice right after brushing your teeth. YUCK. I tried Orbit gum, too...but it gets kind of hard to chew pretty fast and I have to spit it out because my jaw gets tired! But this stuff stays nice and soft for a long time and retains flavor really well. Good stuff.

Well, there you go! Have a great week, guys!

No More Monkeys Jumping On The Bed. Seriously.

Wow, what a day. This morning I was cleaning the house. I had just finished mopping and Kate was in her bedroom playing with Whitney. Then, I hear this big thud, then this blood curling scream, then Kate crying and I knew it was not going to be a pretty sight. When I ran into the bedroom Kate was lying on the floor crying and Whitney was leaning over her trying to not cry. I picked Kate up and looked on her head and I didn't see any bumps or scrapes or anything, so I was trying to figure out what just happened. Whitney said Kate was jumping on the bed and had fallen off and hit her head on the table. I was so relieved that Kate was okay! So I gave her a big hug and saw a drop of blood on the back of her neck. I was like, "What on earth!?!" And then I saw that the back of her head was covered in blood. She had a gash about an inch wide. I freaked out and called the doctor and they said to bring her right in. However, Michael had the carseats in his car, so I had to call him at work and tell him to get home as fast as he could. Luckily his work is only about ten minutes away. I took Kate to the doctor and she ended up needing 7 stitches. It was horrible! It took 4 people to hold her down and try to keep her still so they could stitch her head back together. I felt so bad for Kate...she was crying so hard I was sure she would pass herself out. It broke my heart. It took about an hour to get her stitched up. The nurses were so patient, they were wonderful. However, everyone else in the clinic was wondering what on earth they were doing to that poor child! Hahaha! After it was all over I took Kate to Alco to get some M&M's for being such a brave girl and I didn't realize I had blood all over me. Apparently I had blood smeared on my neck and the lady at the checkout counter was like, "That is the biggest hickey I have ever seen." I was like, "Nooooo! It's baby blood! Kate just had to have 7 stitches at the doctor!" It was kind of funny. And kind of embarrassing. Anyway, poor little Kate. I hope we never have any more little monkeys jumping on the bed again.