Overwhelmed...

That is how I'm feeling about Operation Room Redo right now. My house is in disarray because I have bits and pieces of different rooms every where. Do you ever just feel like you have started a project that just keeps spiraling out of control and continues to get bigger and bigger. That is how I'm feeling right now. I am making progress, but it is creating a bigger mess the more I get done. How does that happen?

We are having the boys closets done tomorrow by a local closet company. Chris and I did ours last summer and it gave us so much more space than just that one rod and shelf we had. So we decided to go ahead and do the rest of the bedrooms this year. So now I'm cleaning out closets. Which is adding to the piles of stuff I have around here. I know that after we get the closets done tomorrow it will help with the piles.

And I 'm still working on the finishing touches for Spencer's room. This is one of the canvases I painting. That green paint is a pain to work with because it takes so many coats of it to get the right color. And you have to let it dry in between coats of paint. So once again it is taking a long time to get something (I thought would be quick) done.
I finally picked out a color to paint my new scrap room. You would not believe how long and how many trips to the store it took me to pick out a color. I seriously agonized over this choice for much longer than I should have. Yesterday I was in Home Depot looking at paint chips for the gazillionth time, when I finally told myself to just pick a color! So I went with this. I don't know why I have such a hard time picking out paint color. I do this every time I'm going to paint a room.

On a completely different subject, yesterday Connor had to go and get the rest of his shots so he can start Kindergarten. I couldn't actually get a picture of him getting the shot because I had to hold him while they were doing it. So this is of him getting ready for them. And why he is still smiling. Actually he was very brave and didn't cry at all. He got to pick out a football from the prize basket because he was so brave!!!
Thanks again for visiting me!!!

And now I have to go back to cleaning out closets. :(

Our Holiday Weekend

Over the Memorial Day weekend we went to Ohio. We got to visit with family and friends, see a couple of movies and do a little shopping. Well actually we (that really should say me) did a lot of shopping! I thought I would share a few of my pictures that I took for my Project 365.

Here is my picture for Friday. Chris took this for me as we were entering Ohio.

This nest is in Chris' parents backyard. I had to take a lot of pictures before I finally got one of the mama bird and her babies. Every time I got the camera out, she would fly away.
Here I am after our big Ikea shopping trip. Can I just say that I love Ikea. I really, really love that place. I wish there was one closer. I got two of the Expedit shelves they had on sale for the Holiday weekend for my new scrap room. I also got Spencer a new desk chair and a long table to put in the basement for the boys to use for their drawing and coloring. I got a small chair for my scrap room and some curtains. This was on Sunday. After we got home that evening, I was wishing that I had got the cover that went with the chair. So on our way out of town Monday, we drove back to Ikea with the boys. We ate breakfast there and I got the chair cover. The boys loved it! Spencer said he thinks Ikea is his new favorite store. :-D
After our full day of Ikea shopping on Sunday, our friends Denise and Joey came over to Chris' parents house and had dinner with us. This is Joey, Spencer, Karen (Chris' sister) and Connor playing a game of washers in the backyard.
And this is of my picture of the day for yesterday. Driving back into Missouri.
We had a great weekend and now I have to get all of the things I bought at Ikea put together. Spencer's room is very close to being done. I have a few canvases left to paint and hang and then I think his room will be ready. His room is really coming together great! I can't wait to show it off. I'm hoping by the end of the week to have it done so I can take some pictures to post.

Thanks again for visiting me!

If you are a fan of Lost...

or Desperate Housewives I think you will enjoy this. I thought it was great!

Tuesday's Picture of the Day

I'm still going strong with my picture of the day. Now I haven't got them all printed out yet and in my album, but I am taking them. Actually I think I'm about two months behind on my printing. I need to get that caught up!

Today's picture has a little story behind it. A couple of months ago Connor planted some seeds in a cup during Sunday school. We brought it home and kept watering them and to our surprise we actually grew a plant! On Mother's Day, we transplanted it to a pot outside and this morning I happened to notice that we had flowers on it. Very pretty purple flowers. Now I just have to keep it alive during our hot St. Louis summers, which I admit I'm not very good at. I tend to forget to water them. I'm going to try and be better about keeping this one alive. Wish me Luck!


Thanks again for visiting me!

Operation Room Redo: Making Progress

I am almost through with Phase One of the Operation Room Redo. Today I spent painting Spencer's new bathroom (the blue paint shown below). We also moved over his bed and dresser today. I have a few finishing touches to make before I can show the complete room. That probably won't be until after Memorial Day weekend. I want to look for a couple of more things to finish it off. And we are going to Ohio to visit Chris' family on Memorial Day weekend and there just happens to be an Ikea close by. And a Pottery Barn outlet. :-D So I am hoping that I can find him a cheap desk for his room. He has been wanting one for a long time, but I just haven't found what we want.

I did get his new headboard finished. Yea! Because it was a major pain to paint. It took forever! But I must say I am very happy with how it turned out. I got it on clearance and this is what it originally looked like in the pictures below. (Sorry, but I forgot to take my own pictures of it before I painted it, so I had to get these off of the web.)

It was a headboard made for holding scrapbook pages. How cool is that? I thought it was really neat, but of course it won't work like this for Spencer's room. So I transformed it into.....

This!

I really, really like how it came out. Like I stated earlier, it was a complete pain to paint and took forever to get done. I hope to get it up into his room tomorrow and finish painting the bathroom. And then once I get his new room done, I can start on my new scraproom. Yippee!!!


I thought I would add a few pictures of Spencer's first baseball game of the year. This was last Thursday evening. This was suppose to be his third game, but the first two got postponed because of rain.
And I know this picture isn't completely in focus, but I love the look he gave me while he was playing catcher.
And I have to include a picture of Joe Cool here. Did you notice the blue lips? He got those from the lollipop he had during the game.
Thanks again for visiting me!!!

Eeek!

That was pretty much what I kept saying last Saturday afternoon. The boys were invited to our neighbor's 7th birthday party and it had all kinds of creepy, crawly, yucky things. Well, they are all yucky in my opinion! All of the kids thought they were pretty cool!

Yes you are seeing that correctly. Connor has a scorpion on his head!!!!

And here is Spencer meeting a tarantula.
Are you feeling the creepy crawlies yet???

Here is Mr. Alligator. I think it is an alligator.
The reptile man was explaining the difference between an alligator and a crocodile, but I don't think I was listening very well because my child was holding one!

And now for the drum roll.......The big star of the show, and I mean BIG, was an Anaconda!!!

The boys had a wonderful time and I was just glad that I didn't have those creepy, crawly things in my house! Angie, I don't know how you slept that night!! :-D

Thanks again for visiting! I'm still deciding on the blog name change. (Actually I just haven't had the time to do anything yet!)

My Mother's Day

I hope that everyone enjoyed their Mother's Day. I had a great day. Connor drew me a picture of a sunflower and Spencer had watercolor painted a vase full of flowers at school for me. They are both gorgeous pictures and I love them!

I also received this cute, clay flower pot that says Mom on it. This was all Spencer's idea. His school was selling these pots. So both he and Connor used their own money to buy me one. And they kept it a secret all week long!

I also got an Archiver's gift card, and Chris made me breakfast.

We decided to go out to dinner at one of my favorite local Mexican restaurants. But before we went, I wanted a picture of the boys and me for my picture of the day.

And of course, I got quite a few of these:

And these:

And then I finally got a picture or two that I love. Of course, I told them that we couldn't leave for the restaurant until I got a decent picture. That definitely speeded the process up!

Thanks again for visiting!

Changing my blog name....maybe

I'm thinking about changing my blog's name. My current one is okay, but it is rather long and I have had a few people tell me that it kind of sounds, well, I'm not sure how to put this, but kind of risque. And that was not what I was going for at all.

I've done some checking and I think I can move all of this content over to a new blog title. I'm not 100% sure about this and if anyone has any advice regarding this, please tell me!

So I checked the following titles and as of right now, they are available. So if you could please leave me a comment and tell me which you like best. Or if you have any other suggestions, I would welcome those as well! Please!

So here is what I have come up with so far.

just-christie
christie was here
christie loves pictures
christies tidbits
christie-is-here
christies-world
christie ellis blog

Thanks again for visiting me and helping me pick a new name.

Living with boys

So this morning I hear Spencer up. That is not unusual because he is an early bird and is usually up before me. My alarm clock is typically the sound of the tv being turned on by him to the Disney channel. I get up and come down stairs to get him breakfast and I see this.

This little speck is on my ceiling in the family room. I can't begin to tell you how many times I have told him not to throw things in this room. I have found things on my window ledges many times (remember this post), but this is the first time something has been on the ceiling though. Can you tell what it is? Any guesses?

Any idea?

Any at all?

How about a sticky frog?

That little frog stayed up there all day. I was beginning to think that gravity wasn't going to get him at all. But about 15 minutes ago, he fell back down to earth. I'm sure it left a mark on my ceiling, but thankfully the ceiling is high so I can't see anything.

I will say that Spencer has a good arm because he lobbed him up there and got him to stick the right way. It did look like I had a frog on my ceiling for most of the day.

And both of these are going to my picture of the day. Thanks again for visiting me!

Happy Cinco de Mayo!

I hope everyone gets to enjoy a little Mexican cuisine today. And maybe a Margarita. :-D
I, however, will not be able to fully enjoy this holiday because Connor has a T-ball game tonight. Plus we were informed at 8am this morning that we also have concession stand duty tonight right after his game. So I'm seeing a full evening of baseball tonight and not chips and salsa.

Our Operation Room Redo is going great. I have got Spencer's new room all painted. I started painting his new headboard too. It needs another coat of paint though. We also got the room emptied and let's just say moving that Queen bed down to the basement was an adventure. I'm not sure how we are going to get it back up if we ever need to.

Here is Chris installing the new ceiling fans in Connor's and Spencer's rooms.



And finally after weeks of bad weather and illness, the boys got to go to a golf lesson together last night. They really enjoyed it even though they both got blisters after the first 15 mins.