I need your help...:)

I've had this idea in the back of my head for several months now, but am ashamed to say I haven't followed up on it. It keeps coming to me again and again that this could really bless our family, but then I get busy and forget :) Well, no more! Only problem is, I need some of your fantastic ideas.

I have decided I would like to have a family service project that Paul, I and the kids do every month. We will use the first family home evening of the month to kick this off, sometimes we will be able to accomplish it that night, other times it will just be a starting point. My problem has been in coming up with service projects that will not only bless the lives of others, but that my children, even as young as they are, can participate actively in. I have thought of a few that would have special meaning for our family (taking things to families that have babies in the NICU, etc) but I need many more! Please leave me comments with your ideas, I am lucky to know so many amazing people that are such great examples to me! Thanks!

Tummy Time!

Tummy time at our house has always been a much-hated thing! ALL of my kids have screamed and screamed on their tummies, and Britton (up until this week) has been no different. So I decided we would have family tummy time every day and do some pilates moves I remembered from doing it years ago. It is cute to see how much fun the kids have and how Britton is slowly learning to not hate it so much, doesn't hurt that he can now roll over any time he wants to be on his back again :)

I need some FUN!!

Do you ever have one of those weeks (or months!) where you get so caught up with everything that NEEDS to be done, that you forget to have fun?! That has been me lately. I have been trying so hard to accomplish all these different tasks that I haven't done anything fun with my kids for weeks, and that is not like me :) If you have ever taken that color code personality test, I am ALL yellow, fun, fun, fun!! So yesterday I snapped out of my funk and we had an awesome afternoon together. Here are some things I came up with that were super fun and easy, and most importantly, FREE!!

Skylar had been looking forward to Monsters vs Aliens coming out on video so I thought I would go rent it from Redbox. I always have a bunch of free codes, and even though its only a dollar, who doesn't love free? While Skylar was at preschool I thought it would be fun to use my cricut and cut out different shapes that we could use to make monster faces. I already had all the paper so this was free and only took a few minutes to do.



Then I tried to think of some kind of snack I could make for us to eat while we watched the movie. It had to be something I had on hand and something that would go with my monsters theme. So I give you....(imagine I had blue jello:)

BOB JIGGLERS!!!



I just made jigglers and then cut them by hand (obviously, they are not too great, but Skylar loved them!) Then I used white and blue frosting to make the eyes and mouth.



Today was a good lesson for me. I am a huge planner, and I like that. But it was good to realize just because I didn't have this huge elaborate well thought out plan didn't mean I couldn't still be creative and have fun with my kiddos!

A fun, simple, CHEAP craft :)

You have probably seen these a million times, but I think they are a really cute, inexpensive gift or craft to do with your kids. All you do is get the .50 composition notebooks from Walmart and cover them with scrapbook paper. Then I cut out some words with my Cricut and finished it off by tying with a ribbon and sticking a pen in! These are a few I made for a girls weekend a few weeks ago.

What have the Johnson's been up to?

I am glad you asked! :)

This is just too cute (if I do say so myself!:)

Last week I got together with one of my most favorite people, "Aunt Lisa"! I love her to pieces, and its actually funny, while she really is my aunt, we are only a little over a year apart in age. She feels much more like a sister to me :)

She is one of the craftiest people I know, and she did it again, and invited me to come over and make one of her newest crafts. You may have seen these around, they are advent calendars made out of 24 ct muffin tins! I absolutely love the idea of these! You cover the tins with individual square magnets that you decorate with scrapbook paper and embellishements and of course the numbers to represent the different days. The thing I love most about this is that I can just make magnest for all the different holidays and keep it up all year round. I still have to do the numbers, but I couldn't wait to post this in case anyone else wants to make one :)

Without any further ado...



Now I need to start making some for all of the other holidays...:)

Happy Birthday Kendall!!

I can't believe it, 2 years old already!! Kendall is such a fun part of our family, she is the quirkiest little girl I know. The littlest things can make her SO happy, like having a lipgloss or taking a nap with her shoes on, but man, if you make her angry WATCH OUT! It has been so fun to see her personality really start to come out this year. I have always hoped she wouldn't be in Skylar's shadow, since Skylar loves attention and is quite the little performer :) I am not worried about that anymore :) Even though its in a very different way, Kendall makes sure she gets the love and attention she needs, and every day is better because we have her! And of course, gotta love squeezing those chubby cheeks :)



For her birthday this year we decided to have a little Elmo party and our friends came over to join us! I had so much fun doing all this, sometimes I think I enjoy it more than the kids :)

We had fun Elmo cupcakes and little treat bags for the kids.





All in all it was a pretty laidback party, but still such a fun way to celebrate our precious Kendall. Love you sweetie!!