Cleansing give-away

O.K. so I have these two books, if you want them leave me your name and address in the comments and they are yours, if not they will find their way to some charitable organization.

Cleansing quote, my weeks inspiration

So this week the girls and I are cleaning our 'castle', I have been irritated lately by my messy house, in general Eric and I both dislike clutter but one way or another it begins to sneak in so I decided that this week I'd take a section of the house one day at a time and go from there. Today was my room and bathroom, can you believe these trash bags? one is recycling, one trash and the other donate. In all fairness its not all actually mine and Eric's, there is a lot of the girls junk in our room, anyway, today it became cleansed!! lets hope I can keep it that way.

For inspiration I found this great quote from Peter Walsh a noted international organizational expert (he's even been on Oprah):

Everyone deals with clutter to some degree, whether its clothes bursting out of our closets, boxes that stop us from parking in the garage, bills and paperwork that are spread over the dining room table or kids' toys that seem to cover every square foot of the home. When the stuff we own starts to own us, the message is clear: What we own is stopping us from living the life that should be ours. I'll share a secret with you: If you focus on the stuff as you attempt to get organized you will never succeed. Never!

I learned long ago that the very first step in successfully de-cluttering your home and getting organized is to ask yourself what kind of life you want to be living. What do you want from your life or your home or each room in your home? Only when you have a clear answer to those questions can you then look at what you own and ask, "Does this item move me closer to the life I want or father away from it?" "Does this item help me achieve the life I want or not?"

If it does, hold onto it. If not, what's it doing in your home?

That is my inspiration for the week, I desire to have a relaxing and clean abode that allows me to create my many 'projects', the thing is I don't like to sit down to do anything scrapbook, sew, read, blog, until all is clean and tidy, I am a little weird I don't even like to grocery shop unless I can bring my groceries home to a clean kitchen and fridge. I just can't 100% relax and so I have taken this quote and successfully de-cluttered my bedroom. The biggie for me was the big stack of Ensign's I have not been able to let go of, I feel that I should read them but today I realised they are not helping me achieve the life I want and so out with the old and I kept the most recent 2, a goal I think I can keep on top of. Wish me luck with the rest of the house, there are a few rooms and dark corners I am afraid to tackle!!

Arizona

So I completely forgot about this little trip I took, the 2nd week of July I drove my niece back out to Arizona and the girls and I stayed a couple of days before heading home. The girls were absolutely amazing on the drive there and back and I was quite impressed with myself for making the trip without Eric. We had a fun little stay at Eric's parents house, we did a little birthday celebration with family there and I got to see Nanette!! Nanette is a good friend who I used to live next door too, we still talk on the phone a lot but its nothing like just hanging out.

Kate and her cousins McKenna and Carson.

Me and Nanette - (Kate took this picture) and all the kids.

Nanette's boys showing off their tricks

Sara's little birthday shindig - she was spoiled by everyone.

It rains - even in AZ - I'm not sure my pictures capture it but it was pouring down.

Kate Lynn and Katelyn, Kate really loved hanging out with Eric's cousin Katelyn and loved it that their names were the same.

Swimming in Grandma's pool, Kate is a fish, Sara doesn't quite last as long.

Heading home it was only 86º and one great thing about AZ - gas was cheap!!

nostalgia

O.K. so forget that last post, as this is keeping me up until 1am I deem it blog worthy!! I am reliving my youthful days and trying to subject them onto my children, I have been remembering books I read and loved as a younger me and have spent the last few hours trying find the best deal on them, I can buy them used for like $1.99 but have to pay $3.99 in shipping, sucks. Anyway, books by Enid Blyton, they are the bomb and I am going to order them for Kate unless of course my dad has them stored away somewhere in his house. Also I totally remembered these books - The Magic House by Joe Austen you can read it online by clicking here. This is where ebay comes in handy!!

A show from my younger days - (I may start a series of my fave British kids shows) I'm totally subjecting my kids to this tomorrow, enlarge the screen to full size, grab your kids, sit down and watch this together. And trust me, the theme song is lengendary, I am confident in saying that almost any real Brit could sing it!! Enjoy, I love my homeland, I'm homesick again!!

help me understand the logic...

So I just don't quite get Ebay sometimes, I think its wonderful for the hard to find things, like the baby Jesus that I lost from my Fisher Price Nativity, I couldn't find the thing anywhere else but check on ebay and et voilà, there it is. Anyway, I want to be able to play music in the girls room and thought that an ipod shuffle would be perfect, I could put all their favorites into one place and download some of the new stuff they like, I love my shuffle and I thought that maybe I could find a used one on ebay for a good price. I did find some deals, there are some used ones that begin at $1, I'm not sure how much I'm wiling to pay for used, maybe a max of $20 or $25. Then I found this one and it just baffels me that someone would even put it out there:

USED Apple iPod Shuffle 1GB* MP3 Player-Blue - Buy it now $35.95 and they are charging $14.99 for shipping, that means if you but this used ipod shuffle you are spending a total of $50.94, please help me understand why someone would buy this when you can walk into the Apple Store, or even Target and buy one of these babies brand new for $49?? I find this a lot with ebay, there are some good deals out there but it seems a lot of people end up spending way to much on ebay stuff, when you add in the shipping sometimes people are paying the same price or often more than they could pick it up for in a store. I just don't get it!!

Happy Birthday Sara

Wow I can't believe it, your 2!!

You have grown up so much and so very fast, we love you so much.

Lake Mohave

Eric's parents rented a houseboat on Lake Mohave over the weekend, our little troop and his 3 brothers plus families all headed out there to enjoy. It was such a fun weekend, I had a hard time trying to pick a few pictures to capture it, I took 166 pictures overall!! The weather was hot, the lake was beautiful and clear, the girls had a great time. Kate loved the swimming and sea-doo rides. On the beach there were these little itty bitty frogs and Sara loved holding them. It was so fun to be with all of Eric's family, they really are an amazing bunch and Eric's parents have done a fabulous job raising 4 wonderful boys. The cousins all got along great and so did the adults, enjoy the pics.