Valentine's Day & a weekend of snow

My entryway has become one of my favorite spaces to style for holidays. I don't have a ton of Valentine decor but I do have quite a bit of pink. ;)

On Valentine's Day our kids woke up to a surprise heart attack on their doors with the many things we love about them ... a new tradition that I'm excited to continue each year!

I woke up to the sweetest gift of all, this origami card bouquet of flowers from the guy who loves me the most! He was worried with my aversion to smells that I wouldn't be able to handle real flowers in our kitchen so he did this instead. Gosh it made me smile! The best part is that they carefully fold down so I can save them and put them back up to always remember this year and his unconditional ways of showing me he loves me. 

Speaking of that sweet guy of mine, he really is man of the year because he made everyone heart shaped pancakes for breakfast too! 

They opened a few fun surprises in their Valentine mailboxes and then heart gift bags from Papa and Grandma Dee in Pocatello filled with candy. 

We wanted to make the day extra special for them this year so we gave them each a new toy they had on their wish lists ... 

Liam got a Jurassic Park lego and Lyla was so giddy to finally get this Woody doll "Buddy as she likes to call him"  ...

The gift that keeps on giving was a weekend filled with SNOW! I was able to rest while the kids spent hours and hours playing in it ...

A special weekend with the people I love! <3

Friday Favorites

Happy Friday! So excited it's almost the weekend!

Here I was recapping Halloween just a few days ago and while I promise I'm in no way skipping Thanksgiving (can hardly wait for the yummy food and family time actually!), it's just not nearly as fun to decorate for as Christmas so I thought I'd share some of my favorite Christmas finds for Friday favorites!

It's no secret that I love Anthropologie and they are having a 20% off home sale this weekend so for the first time ever, I bought our family a set of beautiful stockings and I can't wait for them to come! These are the ones I picked for the girls and this one for the boys.

I got this tree skirt last year and they have a matching set of ornaments to add to the collection this year!

The perfect doormat for the season! 

The prettiest color of bottle brush trees ... they have great ones at the Target dollar spot and Hobby Lobby too!

Love these old fashioned Santa mugs to go with my favorite drinking glasses ... both are the perfect Christmas colors and have the added benefit of being the perfect festive pieces for kitchen shelves this time of year!

Cutest holiday gift wrap! Love this vintage Santa paper I found at Target too for stocking gifts.

I haven't done a whole lot of Christmas gift shopping yet (I usually wait for Black Friday online deals) but I have already ordered our Christmas cards this year after getting our family pictures back and decided to try out Chatbooks this year! I love their photo book subscription that is linked to my Instagram account ... it basically doubles as my family scrapbooks/printed memories to have in our home and they just launched a holiday card collection this year! It has so many cute designs and are really affordable so I'm excited to send those out to friends and family on December 1st. 

Man, now I'm over here holding myself back from turning on Christmas music and decorating right this minute! I might have to start sprinkling a few things around my house this weekend just because this is the most wonderful time of the year!! Hope you have the BEST weekend! XO

Deck the Halls

The Christmas season is such an incredibly magical time! Even more so with a child around our home! Last week we brought up all of our red rubber maids from the basement and decorated our house for Christmas. My favorite moment and a picture I will cherish forever from that night is this one ...

He was so proud that he got to be the one to put the star on our tree! And then there's Nic who was living his Lion King fantasy during this moment saying, "Everything the light touches, Simba!" haha That guy always knows how to get a good laugh out of me. :)

Our Christmas tree ...

My favorite ornaments are always the ones with pictures. These are two of my favorites, one from our first Christmas after we got married and the other for Liam's first Christmas only a couple months after he was born.

Inspecting it first ... ;)

One of my favorite spaces to decorate for every holiday ...

I love this picture we had taken of our family last Christmas!

A little bit of mistletoe ;)

Last year I put our nativity on a shelf overlooking our living room and I loved it so much that I did the same this year. 

Look at that sweet baby Liam in a Christmas mug. One of my favorite Christmas pictures of all time! I did it again last year but with a not so asleep baby and although that Christmas mug didn't survive the season (it got dropped), I just might have to find a new mug to carry on the tradition for this year.

We inherited this beautiful Christmas village from Nic's dad that spans our entire living room and kitchen ledge! It even has Waldo. ;) Can you spot him?!

I thought for sure half this village wouldn't survive the unboxing and putting up phase. Liam loved "helping" and things were clanging together and village trucks were being added to his toy box while we worked. It really was a Christmas miracle that none of it broke. haha Christmas with a toddler! But to be fair, he rarely ever touches the tree or any of the presents underneath so I think we are pretty lucky.

There is even a little bit of Christmas cheer in our master bedroom!

All week long I've wanted to spend all of my time in our living room around the lights of the Christmas tree. There is just nothing better and the cherry on top, we even have snow falling out our window! So much magic in the air. I know when we've said goodbye to Christmas and January comes I am going to be sad to take it all down again so I will be soaking up every last second surrounded by holiday cheer. :) 

Thanksgiving Favorites

Happy Thanksgiving Eve!! Hope you are having a festive week so far! Liam came down with a cold and I am nursing a bit of a sore throat so we are trying our best to lay low so we can enjoy the holiday with family tomorrow. I can hardly wait for a big bite of mashed potatoes and gravy. ;) Until then, a few favorite finds all about Thanksgiving ...

Thanksgiving dinners can be long for kiddos to sit through but this adorable coloring page is coming to the rescue at my house!

I am hosting a Thanksgiving brunch in the morning and am making these pumpkin chocolate chip waffles. Sounds amazing right?! Can't wait to try them.

If I wasn't trying the waffle recipe, this pumpkin french toast bake would be it.

Liam loves crafts so I think we just might have to spend part of our morning making one of these turkey, Indian, or Pilgrim crowns to wear.

Last but not least, one of my favorite quotes that could not be more true, "There is always something to be thankful for."

Hope you have a wonderful Thanksgiving with the ones you love! XO

friYAY & a few favs

I don't think there has ever been a more perfect time to use the acronym TGIF than at the end of this particular week! Between the craziness of the election, the destroyer that was daylight savings time to schedules (hello early morning wake up times from a certain little boy and some of the loooooongest days ever!), and some personal trials, I couldn't be more ready to welcome the weekend. We have been blessed with some incredible weather for this time of year so I think we'll take advantage of it and get our Christmas lights hung before it decides to take a bipolar turn toward nordic temperatures. Before I sign off for the weekend, a few favorites this week (most from around the web) ...

These copper lace lanterns I found in the T.J.Maxx clearance aisle that look like they came straight from the shelves of one of my favorite stores! Speaking of Anthropologie, everything in their Holiday section is just SO good!

THIS rug for Liam's big boy room we have in the works. Can't wait to share more soon!

A mash-up of pure talent by two of my favorite artists!

Two out of three pairs of my Toms have holes in the toes (I'm starting to think I might need to make this a trend, ya know like holes in jeans?!) but maybe these adorable sneakers hold up better?

I got our family pictures back this week that my sweet friend took and I love them! Can't wait to put together our Christmas card this year! A sneak peek of the cutest one who stole the show ;) ...

And two favorite quotes ... "In the midst of winter, I found there was, within me, an invincible summer." & "In a world where you can be anything, be kind."

Choosing to find joy in my soul and to spread kindness because love always wins. 

Happy Weekend! XO

Liam's 2nd Birthday // A Construction Party

Liam's fierce love for tractors made choosing the theme for his 2nd birthday party pretty simple. On Saturday we had a construction party for him to celebrate with his friends and he had so much fun!

When Liam's party guests arrived, they each put on a construction hat and jumped straight into their working zones. ;)

We had a wrecking ball zone where the kids got to stack different size boxes into a tower and swing the wrecking ball into their tower to knock it down! This was by far their favorite game and Nic's too!  He became best friends with all of the little kids, especially the boys, who were loving when he helped build their towers to knock down. Liam's reaction every time it would fall was the absolute best! As it would begin to sway from side to side after being stacked to its limit, he would hold his breath with an anxious look on his face and then scream and fake laugh/cough with excitement when it all fell down. Hysterical!

Another zone we had for the kids was the digging zone. It was definitely the second favorite for everyone but might win as Liam's top favorite! We filled a plastic storage bin with a couple bags of sand and had duplos, legos, wood pieces, and rocks throughout to dig up with tractors. Can you believe we had this on a mat in our KITCHEN?! I know, we're crazy! You have to improvise with October birthdays when the weather has already dipped a little too low to have games outside.

Liam naturally hogged all of the tractors in the sandbox but the other kids didn't seem to mind. It was easier to dig with their hands anyways!

We had a ring toss zone in our hallway but it ended up being kind of out of sight out of mind so it didn't get used by more than one or two kids who tried it out. Aren't those homemade rings award winning?! ;) Good job Nic! We searched allll over town (which in this town is honestly not many choices haha) and asked everyone we knew for rings to borrow for a ring toss and they could not be found. Tin foil and painters tape for the win!

After playing games for a bit, everyone was ready to eat! One of my favorite parts about designing the whole party was this digger & balloon wall! Thanks to a sweet husband who helped me hang it all just where I wanted it, it turned out better than I even imagined! For the food table we had pretzels (nails), chex mix (nuts & bolts), and grape/banana/strawberry fruit skewers (traffic lights). Liam loves candy way more than cake right now so we went with a non-traditional dessert, a build your own cup of dirt! Everyone got a cup of chocolate pudding (dirt) with gummy worms, crushed oreo (gravel), reese's pieces (rocks), and candy corns (construction cones) to choose from for their toppings! It was a favorite and so yummy!

For drinks we had a refueling station with water and lemonade!

Liam's birthday "cake"! ;)

We all sang "happy birthday" to Liam as he tried to blow out his candle (again, sorry there wasn't two!) or swipe at the flame. haha We adore you birthday boy!!!

I love Liam's face in this next picture. haha He was all about those gummy worms and stuffed them in until his little cheeks were exploding. He also didn't let go of his tractors during his entire party!

While everyone was eating I had name tag stickers, tractor stickers, washi tape, and markers on the table for them to decorate their construction hats. The table runner was also chalkboard paper so I got out chalk for them to decorate the table. Everyone loved it!!

After food and hat decorating the kids went back to playing at the zones for a while and then Liam opened his gifts. As a mom, I loved watching this part because his excitement for each and every gift he got was just so sweet! He loved all of them equally and wouldn't put anything down. He has carried all of his new tractors and fire truck in one big pile with him everywhere he has gone since that day. :)

A big thank you to all of his cute friends for coming and celebrating him with us! We are lucky to have such wonderful neighbor kids for Liam to grow up and play with! This was the best group shot I could get. It was like herding cats trying to wrangle everyone together and have them all looking at me. haha :) (His buddy Weston is missing from this picture too because he didn't want to leave mom and dad) but we loved having everyone who could come!

Before his friends left, we sent them each home with their very own tractor and some extra reese's. :)

// Party Sources //

tool belt sold out (similar: here)
tractor party favors
font used on the signs & other party decor
construction hats (similar: here)
wood round & napkins & seating tag labels (Hobby Lobby)
washi tape
name tags & plates from the dollar store