Taking Care of Momma Mondays

Taking Care of Momma Mondays

A dear friend called a few days ago and asked if I might have her kiddos over while she tended to a few things in her life that needed her attention sans littles. You bet I jumped at the chance to have friends over for my troops! It is a win, win situation for the both of us moms!

However, being such a dear friend and sometimes knowing better what I need for myself, than I do, she insisted she have all 4 of my kiddos over for a few hours on Sunday.

I hid the kidless few hours secret from my husband thinking that a date would be a ultra cool surprise. I cannot tell you the last time my hubby and I have had a "real" date. To my dismay he quickly caught onto my sly ways and found out the "Kidless, Real Date secret. Alas, I still went ahead with my plans and had him on board to keep the kidlets at bay, while I prettied myself up.

A date and a flawless face go hand in hand! You know on dates you get pretty up close and personal. Ok, so not so much anymore, but I really love masks and definitely do not apply them often enough, because the last time I did was here.

From my head down to my tosies, I had full intention of looking as good as I felt about a few hours around town with my man.

We began at The Taj, a local Indian Cuisine that I had high hopes of eating at sooner than later. Such an awesome guy, my man is he obliged even though it was not what his palette was craving. (He even spent hours thrifting with me!!!)

Love him!!!

To his surprise and not so much mine, it was fantastic food! We will definitely be heading there, maybe even with the kids. It was that good!

We finished off at Dargan's with a Bloody Mary for him, Coffee for me, a Mudd Pie for us, and a whole lot of good conversation throughout.

Thank you friend for pushing me to take sometime for my hubby and I and thank you Twig and Toadstool for pushing me to take care of me.

It really is the little things that make me feel better!

This Moment & Gratefulness

{This Moment} Inspired By~ Amanda Soule

A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.

If you're inspired to do the same, leave a link to your 'moment' in the comments for all to find and see.

In this moment I am grateful for: (Inspired by- Waldorf Mama)

-The sunshine we have had all week

-My husband's unconditional love and understanding of my roller coaster emotions

-My children's ability to flow with what life is presenting us with right now

-Dinner and a much needed nice long chat with a beautiful friend

-The excitement of "Sunday"

Sunshine & Fresh Air = Warmer Hearts

My little ones and I are having no trouble working the wonders of warm weather into our daily rhythm. Too many times I had heard myself murmuring, "but it is still winter!". Winter or not, we have sun and with sun comes many hours of soaking up the warmth.

I was enjoying the cool weather so much, that I had forgotten just how wonderful warm weather can be too.

Mother Nature seems to know better than I do what I need, as I definitely needed this warm weather to liven up what has been a few weeks of dreariness in our lives.

Watching all of these little feet hard at play, listening to the laughing & giggling, and even joining in the fun here and there allows me to escape the realities of what life is presenting us with right now.

I am ever so grateful at this turn in weather allowing the tune to change a bit around here, which was needed much to my obliviousness.

We are looking forward to many more warm days spent together outside together in the fresh air and sunshine.

Rain, Rain Go Away

Come Again Another Day

Sun, Sun Come and Play

Won't You Stay Another Day

Hoping that this warm weather is feeling much like a fresh breath of air like it is to us right now!

Starring Lillitha Hill

Momma had a camera with intentions of capturing a few moments of sibling fun.

Lillitha had a modeling shoot on her mind.

She is a cute one!

The catwalk is getting a taste of Lillitha.

And than she let loose.

And we bring you the many faces of Lillitha Scarlette Piper Hill:

I love this gal of mine, she is definitely a keeper and a crack up!

This Moment

{This Moment}

A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember. If you're inspired to do the same, leave a link to your 'moment' in the comments for all to find and see.

Inspired By- Amanda Soule

Wishing you a lovely weekend!

Look What I Stumbled Upon Today

My girl sewing.

I smiled and began doing the Happy Jig when I walked into out dining room and found her diligently sewing at her own machine with a tremendous intensity.

Look at that beautiful face of concentration.

We picked up this fabric at a Sofa Recovering store near my parents in Redondo Beach a while ago. Coral wanted to make a patchwork quilt for her bed, but received a comforter as a birthday present before she was able to sew the quilt. I received a purse for the Holidays that Coral is in love with. My friend was kind enough to share the secret to her pattern...

And voila, you give a girl her own sewing machine and a new pattern and the girl makes herself a new purse.

She was totally proud of herself!!!

The purse is awesome!!! What I love most about the design is the boxie bottom just like a grocery bag or present sack.
(This is just what she used as her pattern)

She has been sewing for a while but unfortunately not as often as she would prefer.

After she fell asleep tonight I snuck in a took a closer look at her work.

She did an awesome job. In just a few projects her skills have improved by leaps and bounds.

I have been doing my best to keep my ideas to myself and allow my children to explore their interests alone without my noise. I believe that this is exactly why I am still smiling ear to ear tonight over my daughter sewing a purse. It may not be moving boulders, but she has self taught herself sewing, one of my fave things to do. I am totally looking forward to having a late night sewing partner in the near future.

Blogging the Good and the Bad

When I began this blog I had a really hard time figuring out what I was going to make it. After reading a handful of blogs day in and day out for over a few years, I became weary of all of the glory. I know, I know who the hell wants to let the skeletons out of the closet?

It was not that I wanted negativity for these amazing woman, I just wanted to be reminded once in awhile that they were real woman, leading real lives, where things did not always seem so "perfect".

I was inspired by this perfection that I saw, so inspired that I wanted to do it all, and that is plain ridiculous. I had lost site that these women are all doing only what they are sharing, there was not one woman doing it all. The blogging world is a collaborative effect of people sharing wonderfulness!!!

When I began blogging I felt this need to make it something special, to find a specific focus per say. But, what I realized is that my blog needed to be what it was going to be, there was not going to be any making it one thing or another, there was not going to be just one focus.

I wanted it to be a blank canvas that I colored each night with whatever flowed from fingertips to the keyboard.

Recently, I realized that it paints a very pretty picture of our lives. Blogging has brought more positives into our lives than I could of ever imagined and I no longer question why there is not a lot of skeletons being shared.

It is so much more fun to share goodness and joy and way better to place our own focus and energy on all that loveliness!!!

I get it, I finally get it. All those blogging woman are indeed real people choosing to share and focus on the positives :)

But, at the same time I want you to know that we are real people, with real feelings, and very real lives that have many ups and downs. I will not be afraid to share the goods and the bad, life is what it is.

With that said, today I am terribly annoyed that I needed to spend another $13.50 on this very skein of yarn to finish the last 2 rows on,

this beanie. Dude, the last 2 rows!!!!

We finished all of the serious stuff that needed to get done early today, so I motivated myself to begin making a purse I have been dreaming up for well over a week now. The kids had a whole other plan to save me from killing myself with numbers while trying to draw out the perfect pattern. We found ourselves reading, reading, and reading some more.

This is the perfect example of the blogging dilemma! I absolutely loved snuggling up on the couch reading to my kiddies. Indeed, I was mourning the purse I have dreamt about adding to my collection, but in the end I would not go back and give up that time on the couch for the purse.

It is all in how you look at it I guess.
Because in the moment I was rather frustrated to be giving up the time I wanted to be working on constructing my purse.

On the other hand I did find time to begin making these cuffs I had hopes to have had done over the Holiday vacation.


In the grand scheme of life, it seems utterly ridiculous for me to complain about a skein of yarn, or a day gone a wry, or whatever small stumbling blocks we are encountering. Because there are days like today where we experience a death in our family. That is the big stuff that is worth grieving and spending energy on. For the small stumbling blocks there are at least 2 times that in goodness for me to share with you and that is so much more fun!!!

And there will be lots and lots more goodness to come.

Ahem, maybe after I finally get to the basket of knits waiting to be stitched up and worn.

I Was a Tad Mistaken

A few posts ago...

We were spending a lot of time indoors.

Learning the art of making friendship bracelets.

Beading jewelry

Working towards making these one day.
These are way cooler than when I first made a friendship bracelet.

I plan on making a few for myself.

Giving basket weaving a try.

It looks like a lot of fun, but is definitely very difficult.

We were having a lot of fun making messes all around our home keeping us more than content.

Please fast forward with us to today...

The weather has been beautiful the past few days, so we have been outside a lot.

The beach has been calling my name and talking to me in my dreams. I needed the beach.The beach is why I talked to my husband for 5 years everyday about moving.

One should not allow months to go by without digging their toes into the damp sand or smelling the sea salted air.

I go to the beach for me...the kids reap Mother Nature's rewards while I bask in all of her glory.

Spring is indeed on the horizon and saying good bye to Winter is looking to be easier than I thought just a mere week or so ago.

Feeling the balance between these two seasons chattering amongst themselves is the perfect place to enjoy the harmony between indoor and outdoor activities for awhile.

Mother Nature truly is amazing and if we pay attention closely it seems that she knows just when we have had enough of one season or another.

A Very Simple but Superb Weekend

The weekend began with dinner out celebrating my husband's 35th birthday.

We love Taqueria Tepatitlan-

-it is a mere 2 1/2 block walk

-we always leave satisfied

-the kids are easily entertained with the 25 cent machines

We love you dear Coral even if you are feeling like we are the most strict parents in the world right now!

Love her, but is she not so 12?!?!

And this would be so 2!!!

My wonderful hubby calling me an a** for embarrassing him!

But what he heck is a birthday without the ta do???

We love this man and we wanted to celebrate him!!!

Lillitha missed out on the fun, as she was a sleepyhead.

Zari was concerned she would be sad, so she was trying to wake her to let her in on the fun.

The weekend drew to close with the most beautiful day.

We could not resist staying outside ALL day!

The skateboards were hauled out of the dusty hall closet.

Tricky gal she is.

Momma was a bit worried about no helmet.

First outing this week will be purchasing one that fits!

Figuring out to make it go.

Taking it seriously.

Santa showed up with one heck of a gift!

She is seriously contemplating "riding" the skateboard.

Nishan is working hard to ollie.

I can still glide slowly down the street.

And daddy can still ollie.

Zari settled for a bit of fun with momma.

She thought it was the coolest.

And than night fell and we began to slow down,

while watching the beautiful sunset.

But, I could not resist one last short ride down the block on my new ride.

Hoping you had a most wonderful weekend too!