Revamped Bookcases

I recently saw an article in an interior design magazine that talked about re-vamping items already found in your home to be great room accent pieces instead of purchasing new ones.  This made a lot of sense to me since because, let’s just face it I’m cheap when it comes to spending money, and we just bought our first house and I was eager to get decorating! (I’m a major nester incase you didn’t know!)  Our new house has a great corner that I wanted to use a book nook for our 9 boxes of books. (Yes that’s right I said 9 boxes of books, second only to my 11 boxes of shoes.) I decided to put our two cheap-o Walmart black bookcases in the brown painted corner which made the corner look entirely to dark.  I had seen recovered book shelves before where people replaced the back boards with a covering of wall paper or a stenciled paint job and was eager to try it.  Even though the article suggested wall paper or paint, I figured the same concept would work with wrapping paper…and I was right! I made a trip to Hobby Lobby and bought a roll of white wrapping paper with stenciled gold designs on it. (Note: You can use wrapping paper, wall paper, paint, lace, fabric, etc. Your choice really.)

To start off, all the shelves (if possible) need to be removed.  There are many ways to repaper the back of most bookshelves, but I found if the backing cannot be removed to be recovered the easiest thing to do is take exact measurements of the inside shelf area(s) and cut the paper to an exact fit.  Since I never can seem to do things the easy way this is not how I did mine. I decided to line up two of the already straight edges of my paper with the corner and two edges of the shelf, and using double sided tape, I stuck down each corner.  Then I began smoothing out the paper to the backing until I reached the opposite corner where I had already applied my double sided tape.  I then pushed the paper into the crease of the shelf to make a good fold line to cut along with my razor blade. (Make sure to get the razor or knife into the crease to cut along the fold it will help keep the straightest edge possible.)  Once the excess paper is shaved away make sure there are no bumps or edges pealing back from the backing and you are ready to put your shelves back in place.  (Note: You can also use glue or Modge Podge instead of double sided tape to hold the paper onto the backing. Tape is the easiest for removal if you ever decide to replace or remove the paper when redecorating, which I like to do a lot!) And it is a simple as that! Measure, cut, glue/tape, and reshelf and you’re done! All for the cost of one roll of wrapping paper and a bottle of glue or tape I might add. It is cheap styling made easy!

MEMO TO MOM: Paper cuts hurt worse than scissor cuts.

Bioptic Driving

This week I received an email from NOAH informing me of an upcoming webinar on Bioptic Driving.  Bioptic Driving was designed as a way to allow visually impaired individuals to drive a car when they ordinarily were unable to.  Apparently it is causing a lot of commotion right now from Google to NPR to the Conan show.  If you’d like to see what all the hype is about, or if you have a family member who would benefit from a “computerized chauffeur”, I’d urge you to follow the link and attend.  One of the first things the doctors told us when Liam was diagnosed with his eye condition was “just don’t ever expect him to be able to drive.”  I hope in 20 years Liam will be waiving at them from the drivers seat at a stoplight saying “take that doc!”

http://parents.albinism.org/

www.biopticdrivingusa.com

My "Not Such A Birthmark" Birthmark

A new discovery on our OA journey.......click HERE!!!

You Know You’re A Mom When….

You Know You’re A Mom When….

-         There are more gram crackers in your floor board than there is floor space

-         Your hair is always in pony tails

-         Milk stains are on every surface and all your clothes

-         You keep a list of places that do not have changing tables in their bathrooms

-         Your bookshelves are empty from 3 feet down

-         You forget your purse but remembered the diaper bag (only wipes won’t pay for your Starbucks)

-         You rewrite nursery rhymes in your spare time

-         You know all the theme songs to you kids TV shows

-         You have held out your hands to catch someone else’s sneeze or spit up/vomit

-         You cleaned a pacifier with your mouth

-         You used spit and your thumb as a wet wipe

-         You use a wet wipe to wipe down the table at a restaurant before sitting down to eat

-         You cut your food into little bites because you know you will have to share

-         You yell “Don’t eat that!” more times a day than you can count

Please feel free to add to my list I’m sure there are many I have forgotten!

A Place to Call Home

With our recent addition of our lovie Liam our family went from a family of two occupying three bedrooms to a family of three occupying three bedrooms….three very tiny bedrooms.  Then when we received Liam’s OA diagnosis and discovered that our tiny crammed house was very difficult for him to navigate the walls seemed to shrink in even more on us as we felt the need for a bigger space.  After months of consideration and a quick approval from a mortgage company, we decided to look just to see what we could find on the housing market and right off we found the perfect little red brick for our growing family.  It is close to the grandparents (Brian’s side anyway) and in the Greenbrier school district which we had wanted because incase Liam needs to go to ASB (Arkansas School f/t Blind) they carpool in the Greenbrier area. It also has NO stairs or steps which we were very specific about and a very open floor plan with hardwood floors (another must). The house has a fenced in backyard for Liam’s safety and it is on a quiet corner of a neighborhood where there is hardly any traffic.  Mommie required that the rooms and baseboards be painted and the light fixtures replaced but other than that the house was move-in-able.  A weeks worth of paint and we are finally moving in! Hopefully this space will fit our family of three until we become a family of five or six! (In other words for several, several years!)

MEMO TO MOM: Home is still always where your heart is.

Family

I should warn you, our family is pure chaos all the time.  From my full time working, full time student husband Brian to my independent, visually impaired infant Liam who understands more Spanish then he does English thanks to our Spanish sitter Rosa, to a mommie just trying to hold us all together and laughing at all the wrong moments, our family is just that…a family. Held together with lots of laughs and giggles, love and adoration, faith and trust, and a passion to out serve each other. If you need to know more than that or care to meet the fam click on the family tab above.

Welcome

Oh were to start…This blog will probably be a lot of things all rolled into one. A love story, lullabies, advice, requests for advice, funny tid bits about life, an all girl mommie raising an all boy baby, filled with stories of my special Lovie boy who has flipped our world upside down in less than 10 months time; my fears, beliefs and opinions to match….it’s really more of just a story…a story of life, love and all the gifts and blessings in between.