ideas to fight summer boredom

We are right in the thick of summer.  
We've kept pretty busy so far.  
We've had girls camp, scout camp, day camps and a dance recital along with birthdays, 
meetings and appointments.  

Even with all of our summer activities, I've heard the dreaded, "I'm bored" many, MANY times.  

And while I agree with this article (seriously, go read it) that it's not my job to entertain my kids all day, every day, I thought it would be nice to have a list of things my kids can do.


So if they just can't find a way to entertain themselves, I'm prepared.  


When this cute little guy comes up to me to explain how there is nothing in our house for
 him to do, I can give him one of these tasks.


  There are some fun activities on there, but there are also some chore type things 
that always need to be done.  


I cut the tasks up into small strips and put them into a mason jar.  
Hopefully we'll have less, "I'm bored's", but if not, then at least my house will be cleaner!  :) 




4th of July burlap wreath

Today I'm sharing how I updated my burlap wreath


to reflect the 4th of July!


I started with my spring wreath.
I removed all of the butterflies and the S.
Since I used hot glue to attach the felt butterflies to the clothespins, I was able
to pull the felt off to reuse the clothespins.


I picked up some glittery stars at Hobby Lobby.

(all July 4 items were 40% off)



Then I just hot glued the glittery Styrofoam stars onto clothes pins,
and clipped them onto the burlap wreath.




I tied a few ribbons onto a star from my stash.
(I think I picked the star up at Home Goods a couple of years back)



Then I tied some burlap ribbon around the top to hang the wreath.



Happy 4th of July!
Linking up to: Tatertots and Jello


House Tour before and after 10 years later

I found this old scrapbook album the other day.



I put it together shortly after we moved into our house 10 years ago.  
It was really interesting to go through it and see how different our house looks now 
compared to how it looked then.  
There are so many things I want to do with this house that sometimes I get discouraged.  But after looking at and comparing these photos, I feel much better!!


This is what the outside of our house looked like the day we bought it.  


We have put up a fence, planted many plants and a tree.  


Oh the living room.  Wow.  It was so dark and cave like.  


This is the in progress photo.  We had painted, put up board and batten and bought some new furniture.  


This is now.  We how have hardwood floors, a rug and updated furnishings.  So much lighter!
More on the living room here.  


Oh the dining room.  What do you think my favorite color is?  
I'm kind of embarrassed by this photo.  


Now we have new flooring, new paint, new table, new curtains and new furnishings.  


On the other side, I painted over that red and filled up the wall with a large shelf that I decorate seasonally.  
SO MUCH BETTER!!


Here is the office when we were moving in.  
Up until about 6 months ago, this was my husband's office/library.  


Now it's my office!  
I'm still putting some finishing touches on it and will do a post soon.


Our kids bathroom before.  Excuse the photo of a photo.  


Here is what our kids bathroom looks like now.


Here is the master bathroom before.


Master Bath now.  


This is my boys' room before.  This was before our youngest was even born.


Here is the boys room now.  


This is my daughter's room before.  


This is my (almost) teen girl's room now.  
We've updated since that blog post and moved a bunk over futon bed in here. 


Playroom before.  This is when our kids were small and had lots of toys everywhere.


Now our kids are bigger and need room for board games, video games and hang out space. 
I also have a blog post planned about this room.  It's gone from playroom, my office/craft space to the current bonus room.  


Here is what our family looked like 10 years ago when we moved into this house.  


This is our most current family photo.  


linking up to:  Craft Frenzy Friday

Girls Camp treat handouts for Young Women with Free Printables

Make cute and thoughtful handouts for the Young Women at camp with these Girls Camp Handout Ideas with free printables.  



Girls Camp Handout Ideas with free printables