vol.25

Warmer weather has me daydreaming about outdoor living spaces

I am so glad Spring finally decided to make an appearance! The warmer weather has had me really motivated to try and create somewhat of an outdoor living space on our front porch. Of course, the husband has very strong opinions, and wrinkles his nose at quite a few of my ideas, for instance drop cloths for porch curtains, and he is NOT on board for using any sort of a rug out there... since he thinks the wind would blow it all over the place. He might be right with this one (not that I would ever admit it, but the wind does funnel right down the side of the porch) but I think it would be just fine... Anyhow, he is presenting some challenges, but nothing I can't handle. ;)

Lately I am daydreaming about building a dining table for one end of the porch, so we can eat our breakfasts out there. I'm on a very limited budget so I'm trying to keep everything very affordable. I will most likely be attempting to DIY a bunch of it... and sharing those projects here on the blog. :) In fact, I need to make a running check-list of things I want to do, so I can budget everything out!

This picture (above) shows where I want to put the table... right up there in that sunny spot of the deck. The kids have been spending quite a bit of time out there coloring and petting our cats. Journey is still "learning" to play the ukulele. I have the sweetest video I took at this same time, that I really need to upload. It is sweet.

Trinity has been practicing, and she has actually gotten better. She can play bits and pieces of "happy birthday" :) I love that playing is something her and Jaydon can do together! Even though it isnt completely finished I did sort of finish the pallet sofa "bed." I prop the backdrop we made for photographing the posters behind the pallet bed and it makes it look somewhat intentional, and it is easy to grab when I need to use it inside for new posters. :) I may or may not have sprayed the back of it with home defense. ;) I'm not a spider lover.  

The string lights were my mothers day gift, and I love them! The wind chimes I made from driftwood, and I will do a separate post on those in the very near future. :) I can picture a bunch of cosmo flowers, and shasta daisies planted in the front flower bed. However, I do worry about the deer eating them. Maybe if I can get a really good deal on some, I would only be out the labor? ;) I did buy some hens and chicks yesterday while at Wal Mart. I have an aunt that lived in Coos Bay, WA and she had a million of them planted in her flower beds... good memories!

These are the ones I grabbed. :) Talon couldnt understad why I would rather take pictures of these "things" instead of pet him:

I've been researching them online this morning, and after hearing they are in fact deer resistant... AND cold hardy I think I will be adding to my collection, and scattering these all over our yard! :)

What plants have you recently rediscovered, or acquired a new appreciation for? :) Started any outdoor projects lately?

P.s. My heart goes out to all those in OK who have lost their homes. I have a BUNCH of family in Oklahoma, and a cousin living in Moore. So thankful she and her son were safe. For all those not so fortunate... they will definitely be in my prayers!

 

Happy Mother's Day

I hope you are celebrated in some small way... and are reminded of just how important (y)our job is. :) Keep right on trucking along and do the very best you can... but today carve out a little time for just you! :)

I was given my mother's day present a day early. We were planning to have company tomorrow, and they thought it would be best to give it to me now, so we could all enjoy it tomorrow. So glad they did, it was the lights and I love them!

Happy Mother's Day!

Don't forget that both sales expire tomorrow night!

DIGITAL SHOP 50% OFF Sale with code: MOM

VOL25 ETSY SHOP FREE shipping: FORMOM

 

Learning to play

Jaydon has been teaching the girls to play the ukulele... He has been spending more time with Trinity, but the other night he spent some time teaching Journey. She was catching on fairly quick, but I'm sure if you asked her today she wouldnt remember a thing of it! :)

I think it is pretty sweet when he takes the time to play with the girls. They sure enjoy their daddy time! Lately his evenings have been spent outside working on the yard. 3 acres is a lot to maintain. Fortunately we have underground sprinklers, so time is spent moving sprinklers. However he has the biggest pet peeve with dandelions, and he has been battling them for the past couple weeks. Trin earned 10.00 by halfway filling a wal-mart sack with dandelion flowers.. and he has been spraying them too. Really though, everything is probably just worse because it is Spring and the yard needs some magor attention following the winter. :) The weather has been gorgeous, and the girls were able to run through the sprinklers for the first time this year! Well, I had best get this post published I have a pile of clean clothes calling my name.

p.s. There is just a few more days to take advantage of the sales going on in both shops:

DIGITAL SHOP 50% OFF Sale with code: MOM

VOL25 ETSY SHOP FREE shipping: FORMOM

 

FREE shipping ends in 4 days!

Just a reminder, you have a few days left to grab a VOL25 print or poster with free shipping! :)

Code: FORMOM EXP: 5/13

Oh- and I have been wanting to share this random picture of Journey photo bombing my moose poster!

...it is a good thing she is cute. :) After I told her what she did her reply was, "mom you can jus delete it"

Saturday adventure

Saturday was opening day for the Methow Valley Farmers market, so we decided to head to Twisp and take a peek at what was available. It turned out to be pretty chilly. The wind had been blowing (like it has the last few saturdays!) and it wasnt a warm wind. We grabbed a sweet treat from the okanogan bakery booth:

then we stopped in at blue star coffee roasters.The girls usually get a hot chocolate or an italian soda... even though trin always begs for "some of our caffeine" as she calls it. :)

Afterwards we took the road across the river from our place and found some really great places to take pictures! It had been waay too long since I had taken any pictures with the girls so Jaydon grabbed a few for me. :)

Trinity changed a few times before we left... and I usually make her wear a longer shirt when she wears leggings, but for some reason this time it snuck past me.

She also lost another tooth last week, while eating an apple. :) They are both growing like a weed!

This one is onry as ever... and a little too smart for her own good. She also LOVES this puple sweater that used to be Trinity's. She wears it ALL the time around the house. :)

She thinks her daddy is a pretty special person... definitely a daddy's girl through and through.

Have I mentioned that I hate having my picture taken? I really needed a new profile picture taken for a couple different reasons, and so I let Jaydon take a few of me. I really need to learn to tolerate having my picture taken. My kids need to have some pictures of me. I won't be around forever, and they aren't going to care if I'm not as slim as I want to be, or if my hair isnt as thick or long as I'd like it to be... :)

The girls really enjoyed this little excursion, and Trin said we need to do it once a month. There is definitely enough places around here to explore!

Saturday was a good day, Sunday we woke up and Jaydon wasnt feeling so well... so it was a lazy day spent inside napping. This morning we woke up to snow... and I am sure you all know how I felt about that, or how I feel about the fact that it is still snowing. We were wearing flip flops, capris and t-shirts just a couple weeks ago! This morning I sent Trin off to school in snow boots. I'm so confused! Is it winter, or spring? Spring or winter? I think this winter we will invest in a nice pair of snow boots for both girls, they definitely get more use living up here! :)

 

You can now follow VOL25 on instagram

Technically I've been on instagram for over a year... but the purpose of that account was to keep my family updated with pictures of my girls... and then have those pictures printed into a book at the end of the year. Well I recently sent a science poster to a friend named Rachel from smile and wave. She posted a picture of it on instagram and I had people sending me following requests. It was then that I decided I needed to change my sceen name of that account to something a little more personal and use my VOL25 user name for a separate instagram business account. It is a pain logging in back and forth between the two accounts (would be awesome if instagram would at least remember my usernames) but it is worth it. I can finally post about happenings relating to my businesses as well as updates on life in general.

With my previous account I always felt uncomfortable posting things I've been working on for either of my shops because I don't want to be that person who constantly self promotes to family (not that there is anything wrong with that, you do what you gotta do right?) but it has been nice feeling like I can do that and you guys might actually wanna see those kind of updates! ;)

So, if you sent me a request to follow (at the beginning of the week) please go ahead and follow me here, and tag your vol25 art with the hash tags VOL25 :)

Oddly enough: I had signed up with followgram to give you guys an easy way of following me on instragram via computer, and right after doing that, I mysteriously had people added to my following list that I didnt choose to follow! Has anyone else had that happen? I know that followgram had done it, because those same people's profile pictures were showing up at the top of my followgram home screen with the message "become a power user and increase your popularity" Buy for x amount of dollars. It just makes me think those people had paid to be promoted and added to my list. Not a HUGE deal, if I am made aware that something like that will in fact happen when I sign up. Otherwise it comes down to trust issues... what else will they do without me knowing. Has anyone else had that happen? I did a google search and nothing like that came up! Maybe it is something new they are doing? I like to be intentional with who I follow you know- I'm not in for the followbacks. I want genuine ppl who care about what I do following me... even if my numbers are low.. okay super low! ha ha :)

At any rate, I went ahead and deactivated my account, I'll stick to webstagram... ;)

How is your day?! I am having one of those days where I dont feel like I am accomplishing much. Some days are just like that. I had a pretty  busy day yesterday with kindergarten registration and getting orders out yesterday morning... so today is somewhat of a lazy day! Can you believe Journey is starting kindergarten this year? I'm dreading it... but the fact that she is SO excited is helping me cope... I think. :) I had a proud mommy moment yesterday when at the screening the teacher brought up a piece of paper with letters on it Journey had wrote. She said "we have never had a kindergartner draw their letters in bubble, 3d form, I think you have a graphic designer on your hands" I just laughed a little, and said "well, that is kind of what I do." so she comes by it honestly! :) She is always trying to copy what I draw, her and Trin have always been that way.... its cute. :)

She is getting much too big. :) Did I mention she knows everything at the age of 4? She gets that from her daddy. ;)

Meet Willow

This is our new addition, Willow. She is a calico siamese mix... and she is sweet. :) Her and Talon get along puurfect, and she has really helped him transition to being outside. We adopted her from the Okanogan animal shelter. She is estimated to be a year old.

...and she is a cuddler, a definite lap cat. :)

She spends most of her time laying in one of these chairs on that blue pillow, basking in the sun and being lazy.

Honestly, I'm a bit jealous. I wish I could spend all day long out on the front porch basking in the sun... :) She has the prettiest blue eyes!

Talon caught his first mouse the other day. Jaydon seen him do it! We are so proud of him... :)

We love him and all his odd behaviours... he is a funny cat. :)

In the picture above Talon is standing on an amazon box I made into a cat house for them. It has a heated pad inside.. and Journey decorated the box and taped something special onto the outside for them. :) Talon loves his box, but I havent seen Willow use it yet. She does have a thicker fur though. :)

I hope the hawks and eagles leave these guys alone. So far we think Willow may have had a run in with a big animal, she was gone all day and came back SUPER jumpy, and she has a spot of fur that almost looks like it was shaved... which is really odd. That was over a week ago (over Easter weekend) and she seems okay now, but never ventures very far from the house! Then again, Talon doesnt either. Maybe they are smart? :)

So, how is your week going???

Excited and grateful

So, last Friday I released my science posters into my etsy shop. I had spent weeks illustrating, printing, perfecting, staining, sanding, researching, and deciding the best way to package and brand these big guys. I styled them MANY different ways, photographed them popped them onto my computer, edited all 9 posters, only to change my mind and repeat the entire process!! I was going crazy. It felt almost surreal to see them finally up in the shop. 

Over the last few days I've tried to put in a little time marketing the posters, and I was so excited to sell my first poster on Tuesday, and another on Wednesday! But, almost more exciting than that is seeing the positive response they've received on pinterest... as well as here on my blog. I had a few posters set aside for marketing purposes. I contacted a few of my favorite blogs, and everyone I e-mailed was eager to review a poster for me!! :)

Rachel from smile and wave was even kind enough to tweet the posters, and pin a couple of them following our e-mail. Shortly after that I sold my first poster!! I am always amazed at how powerful the internet can be. One person creates a drop in a pool, and from there it creates a large ripple... Another example of a drop turned ripple- Someone pinned my poppy poster from an image on my blog, and another repinned it, and this continued for awhile until it finally showed up in my own pinterest feed.. pinned by an amazingly talented Interior design stylist I follow- Holly Becker from decor8! I was pretty excited... and couldnt resist commenting on her pin even if it did make me see un-professional... I mean some things just require you to make an idiot out of yourself... and this was definitely one of them.

So, thank you for all the support, pins and kind comments I've received, I sure do appreciate it! :) I hope you have a wonderful weekend!

 

Hello Spring!

It IS the first day of spring today right? We woke up to snow!!! Boohoo... quite the practical joke I think. I'm looking forward to popsicles, and late sunsets, automatic sprinklers to run through, and a little time spent gardening. Altough my gardening will be very minimal this year. I can't really plant anything unless it is behind a deer proof fence. Considering I still need a deer proof fence built, and Jaydon seems to think we need a shop built first and foremost... and in all fairness it is a top priority. We are still paying storage rent to house a bunch of outdoor stuff... like furniture, tools, fencing material, and other "goodies".

Did you wake up to bird chirping, and sun shining? If so, I'm envious... like REALLY envious.

In other good news, my dad is coming over thursday night to help me wrap up the last of my tax stuff. It has NOT been fun. I HATE doing taxes. I'll be using a new accountant this year, one who will hopefully take the time to actually file them for me, and if for some reason he sees that we forgot to sign a form giving him permission to e-file them... lets hope he calls us! (In case you are just tuning in- our home loan was delayed an entire month because we learned our accountant hadn't filed our taxes... supposively because of the said un-signed form)

So... how are you!? :)

Meet Talon

He is our new kitty. Our last cat Rikku was ran over by a car a couple of weeks after we moved in... we were all sad. Unfortunately, Trin found her after getting off the bus. She was pretty heart broken over it. Since then we've been looking for another cat. I've been searching craigslist, and watching the classifieds. Apparently cats are in short supply in these parts.. because i was having horrible luck.

Well, last saturday we drove to Wenatchee (about an hour and a half away) to the animal shelter to adpot a cat. We weren't going to be picky... although I did not want a male, and we had hoped to find an outside cat, one that would be a good mouser/rodent catcher. Now that the snow is melting, we are finding out that we have a serious mole/vole/groundhog problem. We needed a hunter and we needed one - like yesterday.

Well, we seen this guy and I kinda fell in love with his personality. He was super sweet, curious and very affectionate... but yet he was really playful. His tag even said he would be a good mouser.

We considered adopting Lola, the long haired cat you see Jaydon peeking in on in the above picture. She was really sweet too... but lacked the hunter type personality we were wanting/desperately needing. After getting a little more information on Talon we learned he had strictly been an indoor cat, at his previous foster home. He had been delivered to the shelter with 3 brothers and a sister as a baby. So, he wasnt very old... but he was a male cat, and he wasnt an outdoor cat. We werent sure if we were making the right choice, but he just seemed to fit us so well. The shelter employees told us that if a male cat is neutered early on they may never spray... and that was the only reason I didnt want a male. So, we took our chances and adopted him. We decided to name him Talon, and he already acts like he knows it. He is smart, or we are just super proud parents. ;)

He is a red/flame point siamese and he is 8 mos old. :)

We had our address engraved on the tag while we were there... when we got home Jaydon asked me why HE picked a bone shape for the tag. We both laughed, cause I hadnt even really thought anything of it, but we were there past closing and trying to hurry a bit. I was also visiting with one of the employees when he did the choosing... so he has to take full blame for it. :) Oddly enough, it really suits him. He acts like a dog more so than a cat I think.

He likes to watch Trin play the ukulele. :)

He is fitting in really good...

We are trying to transition him to an outside cat. He spends a little bit of time outside every day. We are planning to adpot him a playmate, maybe a seasoned outdoor cat that will show him the ropes. :)

Peek a boo I see you. :)