december

December has been such a fun and busy month. Pretty much every day has been spent at the gym. We've baby proofed everything, put a tv in the office, taken a bunch of toys down there, and turned it into a safe place for Zion to run around while I work in the office and Zac trains. Zion LOVES playing at the gym.


This new set up is perfect because it gets me and Zion out of the house for a few hours every day, we get to spend more time with Zac, I feel like I'm contributing to the business again, and it takes some of the pressure off of Zac because I can help a lot more with marketing, finance, etc. The best part... if me and Zion decided we don't want to go in, we don't have too. We have no set schedule and can work however much or little we want. This month we've worked a lot, though.

Our days have been filled with work, and our evenings and weekends have been just as busy. Between weddings, Christmas party's, my birthday, BUNCO, a weekend in Salt Lake, and Christmas shopping, this month has seriously flown by! Here are pics from a few of those events.

We had our company Christmas party at Tucanos. We seriously have the best trainers. Thanks Cody, Matt, Isaiah and Nicole for being so easy to work with.


I turned 25 and had a fun birthday weekend. My actual birthday was on a Monday so we kind of celebrated all weekend. We shopped a lot, went out to eat a couple times, had Sunday breakfast with my family, and Sunday dinner with Zac's family. On Monday Zac only worked until noon and then came home with these in hand...


He also bought me some fabulous boots, a coat and this watch I have been obsessing over...


And then he cooked me a delicious meal of king crab legs and asparagus for dinner. I have always hated my birthday because it is so close to Christmas, so this year Zac wanted to spoil me and make it feel extra special. It worked. Thanks Zac! You're the best!

I went to an ugly christmas sweater themed BUNCO and it was a blast! Thanks for hosting Candice, and thanks for inviting me to join the group Jewels! I can't wait for next month!



We spent a weekend in Salt Lake with my whole family minus Heather. We've made it a tradition to go see the lights and take coats to the homeless shelter. This year we ended up staying overnight and getting a bunch of Christmas shopping done, too. I love that Cyd is home from school for a couple of weeks and was able to go with us.


Did I mention we have shopped a lot this month? Zion has gotten really good at taking naps in his stroller (a full 3 hour nap while we were at Fashion Place last weekend) and carseat, but I can't wait for this month to be over so we can be back to our normal schedule.





Don't worry though, we have had plenty of downtime this month. I somehow convinced Zac to watch The Vampire Diaries with me starting from the beginning of the first season. It's my guilty pleasure. I've already seen all of them, but I wanted to watch them again. I'll admit, we've watched about 55 episodes this month. Hahaha! Seriously, though, check out these peeps... How could you not want to watch a show with such gorgeous people in it?


That pretty much wraps up December thus far. Now bring on the rest of the Christmas festivities! And Happy Christmas Eve!!

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ps...

ps... I guess I did take one picture on Thanksgiving. Proof of my sick boys that night. Sad, but cute.


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thanksgiving

Wow... I'm so far behind. I can't believe I haven't blogged since Halloween. We've had a lot going on but I'll skip most of it and go straight to Thanksgiving. Have I mentioned how much I love that mine and Zac's parents are such good friends? It makes holidays so much easier. This year dinner was at Gary and Leesa's house with all of the Price/Ewell gang and my family. I loved not having to juggle two families in the same day and just spending the whole day with everyone. Poor Zion had a rough Thanksgiving day, though. He was cutting all 4 of his canine teeth and had a horrible cold that turned to croup that night. I felt so bad for him. He could barely breath, had no voice, his cough was the saddest little bark that hurt him so much he would cry every time he did it, and he had a fever. I kept rotating ibuprofen and Tylenol, hot steam in the bathroom, and cold air outside, and he was still miserable. Thankfully my sister-in-law's kids had just gotten over croup and she had a nebulizer we were able to borrow that helped a ton. Zac also ended up sicker than a dog Thanksgiving night. He fevered for a couple days and had horrible body aches. Between the two of them, I'm not sure who the bigger baby was. Needless to say, Thanksgiving night as I was thinking of all the things I have to be thankful for, good health was at the top of my list. I'm grateful I didn't catch their bug and that I was able to take care of them all weekend. Health is one of those things that is so easy to take for granted. It's so easy to not appreciate it until you or someone you love losses it. Thankfully Zac and Zion's was just a very temporary loss of health and they both were as good as new a few days later. I didn't take any pictures on Thanksgiving but I do have a few of the Price/ Ewell family photos we had taken the end of October that I need to post, so here they are.











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halloween

Halloween was a blast this year. I had so much fun making mine and Zion's costumes. I don't think I have mentioned it yet on this blog, but Zion is obsessed with Toy Story. OBSESSED! We have tried getting him to watch several other movies, but they only hold his interest for about 2 minutes and then he's climbing on our laps with either an iPhone or iPad in hand waiting for us to start Toy Story instead. He will literally sit on the couch and hold still for the entire movie, and he looks this adorable the whole time.


Obviously being Woody was the only option we had for Zion's Halloween costume this year. Zac and all of the trainers decided to dress up as 80's workout instructors, so I decided to match Zion and be Jessie. Like I said, I had so much fun putting our costumes together. I pretty much found everything at the DI and Walmart and then spray painted it.... Both of our boots, hats, and belts were originally different colors. His yellow shirt was a cheap white shirt that I found and dyed yellow, and I made my 5 strand braided bracelet out of some left over white fabric that I dyed yellow along with it. I made his vest and my chaps out of some cute cow print fabric I found at JoAnns for 40% off. I think our costumes turned out pretty cute and were really inexpensive.





On Sunday we went to Gary and Leesa's for a big Halloween party with all of the Price family. Leesa's homemade doughnuts were delicious! Monday morning Zac went to work looking like this.


Yes, that's a real and very nasty mustache. And this is him and the trainers that were working that morning.


Monday evening we stopped by my granny and grampa Houtz's house for chili and to visit with them and my parents for a little bit. Then we were off to another Halloween party with our friends. Brett and Juliann hosted the best party! Everyone brought tons of yummy soups and fall treats and we played a way fun game. I don't know what it was called but it was a blast. Here's our little family at the party.


Everyone dressed up in such fun costumes. Here are the girls-



And here are the boys-



Brett and Jewels, thanks again for such a fun party! We had such a great time!

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october?

It does not feel like the end of October, and I'm not complaining. I have LOVED the warm Fall we've been having. I always feel a little cooped up and depressed when it gets chilly outside. I am so thankful for the nice weather right now. It's what I need. Nothing makes me happier than being able to play outside with my family. Last night while Zac was at work me and Zion went for a walk and played at the park. Zion loves climbing on the playground, swinging, and throwing wood chips everywhere. I love seeing him so happy... It makes me feel like everything is going to be ok.





I cannot believe how big he looks climbing the ladder. Luckily he didn't get any slivers in his toes, because he did not want to keep his shoes on.








I tried to get a picture of us swinging but wiggly boy + in motion + iPhone self portrait do not = success, so this is as good as it gets.


Right now we are driving to St George for the Houtz Family Reunion. I am so excited to enjoy a weekend of 80 degree weather, relaxation, family, and for Zion to be able to swim and play with his cousins non-stop. I think it's just what the doctor ordered.

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another month, another loss

I lost another baby this week. We were absolutely shocked when we found out we were pregnant again exactly 4 weeks after I miscarried. Usually it takes 1-3 months to get your cycle back after a miscarriage, so we were totally shocked. We felt like it was really meant to be this time, because despite all odds we were pregnant again. We went to the doctor to confirm that it was in fact a new pregnancy and not just left over tissue that my body hadn't "shed" on it's own causing a false positive. Sure enough it was a new pregnancy. Being "high risk" the doctor wanted to monitor me closely. I had to have my blood drawn and hcg level checked every other day. The first few days it was doubling exactly the way it was supposed to. We we ecstatic! Then it started to slow until it was increasing by less than 30%. The doctor told us he was 90% sure this was going to be another miscarriage. That feeling of helplessness I felt last month when I started bleeding, times that by about a million and that's how I felt as I was sent home and told to wait for it to start again. It took five very long days for the bleeding to start. Five days of trying to hope that everything would be ok, but being terrified of having too much hope and end up being heart broken again. Last month I was able to deal with the loss pretty well knowing that these things just happen sometimes. But two losses exactly 6 weeks apart. It just feels like a mean joke.


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laundry basket dresser

I have to say, I am more proud of this little project than any other project to date. I have never built anything from scratch so this little guy was quite an accomplishment. When I came across this image on Pinterest, I knew I had to build it. The actual tutorial came from Ana White's website.








I love this laundry basket dresser to sort dirty clothes. I decided to use Ana White's idea but had to modify all of the dimensions because I wanted to use square laundry baskets so it would take up less space. It was kind of a pain in the butt figuring out all of the dimensions on my own, and I made a few mistakes along the way, but in the end I am so glad that I did. The original tutorial makes a triple stack of baskets 26" wide and 3' tall and mine ended up being 19" wide (yay I saved 7" of floor space) and 4' tall. After I followed the steps in Ana White's tutorial I decided it looked a little unfinished. I wanted it to look a little more furniture grade rather than boxy so I added some 1/4" x 1.5" trim around all the edges to give it some decorative panels. I painted it Crystal Aqua by Valspar (my new favorite color) and added a little glazing over the top. Here is what my finished product looks like...












































I love it so much and am proud of my first build. Although I can't say I did it all on my own because my dad cut all of the wood after I figured out the dimensions and Zac helped me hold everything square while I assembled it. I think this is the first of many more building projects to come!

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shelf re-fashion

Remember these little shelves from Zion's bedroom?


Well, I'm making some changes in his bedroom and these shelves aren't going to work anymore. I thought about sending them to the DI but then I realized I might be able to make them work for an entryway organizer for the hallway leading to the half bath just in from the garage door. The problem... They are each 3' and we only have about a 5.5' wall to put them on. I had my dad cut the overhang ledge off of the right side of one, and the overhang ledge and left corbel off of the other, and then while he was at it I decided to have him cut all of the pegs off, too, and they ended up being a little under 5' when side by side. I hung these two little shelves right next to each other and used wood filler to cover up the tiny gap between them. Then I sanded them down, touched up the paint, added some cute hooks I found at Hobby Lobby and some little baskets I found at Lowes, and... finished! (actually I still need to make labels for the baskets but who knows when I'll get to that) You would never guess that they are two separate shelves.





Now we have a place to hang our jackets, diaper bag, purses, etc and the baskets are great storage for sunglasses, wallets, phone chargers, camera, camcorder, scarfs, mittens, and whatever else we need to have handy. The best part about it is we can now clean out our good sized coat closet and use it for something else. Maybe food storage? I am loving finding ways to make our little house more functional!

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kitchen table redo & some more fall decorations

I would say the key to living successfully in a small townhouse is finding ways to maximize floor space and storage. We found a kitchen table a few years ago that did just that, but once again it's black and I'm trying to lighten things up so I decide a fresh coat of white paint would be nice. We moved it out to the garage so I could start working on it and then I remembered to get a before picture.








I had already taken the drawer pulls off of the front, but you get the picture. And yes that is what our garage floor looks like.... Oops. I love that this table is really long and narrow because our dinning area is tiny. And before we had Zion I liked the little wine rack to store sparkling cider and the rack to hang our fancy glasses on, but with a hands on and curious baby it is just wasted space. While I was tearing the table apart to start sanding, I realized it could all be easily removed so that's what I did. I even got Zac to help with the sanding.








After a lot of time was spent sanding, priming, white painting, sanding the edges again, and then glazing the edges with a dark stain and glaze combo... I should have put a coat of poly on top to keep it protected from little hands but I was too excited to get it back in the house... This is what I ended up with...








As soon as Zion became mobile I started keeping the table tucked up against the wall to amplify floor space, and use it more as a way to decorate. When we have guests over we pull it out and use it like normal people, but the rest of the time we just eat up to it bar style. I love how it turned out and that I can fit a couple baskets under it to store stuff.








I made a couple more little decorations to keep on the table. Remember how I still had a bunch of burlap, hemp and silk leaves left over? I used them to wrap and embellish one of Zion's little sand buckets to hold our "Thankful Tree". You've probably seen a billion different versions of "Thankful Trees" but I'll tell you our version because it's a little different. We decided it would be a fun tradition to each be given enough paper leaves as there are days in the month of November leading up to Thanksgiving day. When it's time to pull out the fall decorations we will spend a night writing down different things we are thankful for on each leaf and then hot glue them to the tree. That way it's a fun decoration to enjoy during the fall season but will also bring a spirit of gratitude into our home for the whole fall season and lead right into The Holidays. Starting the first day of November we will each pull one of our leaves off at dinner time and talk about what we are grateful for. Then by Thanksgiving day all of the leaves will have "fallen" and we can start decorating for Christmas.








The other little fall decoration I made are "faux apothecary candy jars". I used some candle stick I already had, emptied and cleaned a couple jalapeño jars and filled them with candy, and then glued a little knob to the top of the lid and painted them black. Cute and easy and the candy can be switched out for any Holiday or season.








All I had to buy for these couple of decorations were the little knobs for $1.99. Everything else I already had, which brings all of my fall decorations to a whopping $42. I think that is pretty dang good for everything I've made! I feel like I should now say something like.... Stay tuned for the next episode of "What a crazy, housewife, mommy, insomniac, does in the night ". But that would be weird so I won't.

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rainbow rice

I've officially been a stay at home mom for almost two months now. It took a little getting used to at first and I missed all of my friends at the gym, but now I'm used to it and absolutely loving all of the free time I have to play with Zion and then craft and work on projects while he's sleeping. While he was napping yesterday I made some rainbow rice. Easy peasy... Just pour raw rice in a few ziplock bags, add a couple drops of food coloring and a squirt or two of Purel hand sanitizer or rubbing alcohol (this sets the color and helps it dry out), shake it around until the color is incorporated and then pour it onto a cookie sheet or tray to dry. This is what mine looked like when it was ready.







Zion loves to stir things so I poured it in a bowl and let him go to town. He seriously stirred and played with the rice for over an hour. I would hide little toys in it and he would dig through and get so excited when he found them and then throw rice everywhere. Wouldn't it be fun to fill a little sandbox full and let him go crazy... And then just pour all the rice in a large storage tote to be reused? I think I'm going to do it! I love Zion's concentration face in this picture!













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feeling like fall

It's starting to feel like Fall and I am loving it! I love everything about Fall.... The crisp air, the changing leaves, the layered fashion, pumpkin everything, chai lattes, the beauty of Maple Mountain, fun decorations, the spirit of gratitude, the oncoming holiday season..... And the list goes on. Well, I can think of one thing I don't love about the Fall... Football. I don't mind it but it's not something I look forward to. What I do love about it, though, is that while Zac and Zion do their boy thing and watch the games, I have plenty of time to work on projects. This morning I've been baking pumpkin chocolate chip cookies, heavy on the chocolate chips, for my baby sisters birthday party later today. Happy Birthday Heather. I cannot believe the baby of the family is 20 years old! We are all grown up now. I love you so much and hope that this coming year can be one of healing and recovery and that you can find great joy in living. You have fought a hard battle the past few years and I hope that you keep fighting and conquer. Love you always!!










Not only is it feeling like Fall outside, our house is becoming a little bit festive, too. I pulled out all of our Fall scents to burn in our Scentsy, and I've started making a few Fall decorations. First off... I've seen a ton of different cute Fall wreaths so I decided to come up with one of my own. I went to Joanns and their grape vine wreaths were buy one get the second 50% off, and the kind of moss I wanted to use came in a package with enough to make 2 wreaths so here's what I came up with. The first one will be staying on my front door.



















And the second one will be hanging inside my house on the antique window I showed you in my last post.



















These wreaths were fun to make. I used an 18" grapevine wreath and then hot glued moss around the front. I found moss at Joanns I had never seen before. It came on a roll that was 6" wide and 36" long. I cut it length wise so it was only 3" wide and then cut it into 6-8" pieces. This made it way easier to curve the moss around the wreath. You could use the bagged stuff to save a couple dollars, but it would be a lot messier and harder to glue down. And then I just stuck a bunch of fall stems in the bottom to create a fun little arrangement and hung it with a 4" wide strip of burlap. I found the fall stems at Hobby Lobby and the were all 50% off. I like that the fall embellishments have a stem that I was able to just stick into the grapevine without having to hot glue down, because I think the moss wreath will be cute for other seasons, too. For spring I think I will replace the fall stems with a few flowers and mini bird nests. Anyway, here is a really bad image of what a couple of the stems look like when they aren't hooked onto the wreath in case you want to find them at a craft store and make this yourself.










Did you notice the candles in the background of the cookie picture? I threw those together really quick this weekend, too. They were way easy. I just wrapped and hot glued the ends of some hemp rope around one of the candles and then hot glued a silk leaf onto each of them. Turned out kinda cute.










The last little fall project I made was a little fall bunting banner. I cut 9" triangles out of burlap and hot glued a silk leaf onto each one, and then hot glued hemp rope to the back to hang it by. I decided to hang it across a mirror that hangs above my kitchen table, but my kitchen table is currently MIA. Actually it's in the garage and Zac is sanding it down so that we can continue on with our black to white trend. I will post some before and after pictures when it's finished.










All of these little fall projects have cost me less than $40 and I still have a bunch of silk leaves, hemp rope and burlap left over. I think that's a pretty good deal. Have you ever looked at the price of wreaths? I found one at Hobby Lobby that I liked, but it was $70. No thank you. I would rather make my own and pocket the savings for something I want more, like the new gorgeous espresso colored Michael Kors 'Blair' watch. Did I mention I also love fall fashion?

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