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Amy Madden Olivas

 

 

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From: Amy Madden Olivas

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from: Amy Madden Olivas

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Another favorite thing...

If you know me well, you know that I'm a Pinterest junkie. Pinning items to my virtual board is how I fall asleep, how I wake every morning, and how I spend every second of free time I have. ('every second of free time I have'....haha.....now that's funny.)

Another well-known Amy-ism is my overwhelming desire to decorate for each and EVERY holiday I can. It's safe to say that finding pinterest has made my holiday-decorating addiction downright dangerous.

One of my all-time holiday favorites was the 'thankful tree' we made in the weeks leading up to Thanksgiving.  During Christmastime, I found this way to display cards (on pinterest) and I loved the way it looked on the large mirror by our front door.   For Valentine's Day, my kiddos found their mailbox inspiration on pinterest (yes, I've introduced my male offspring to pinterest.), and we've also made some wicked leprechaun traps....with a little help (of course) from pinterest.

With Easter (one of my FAVORITE holidays) vastly approaching, I've been eager to break out the decor.  Easter is always a tricky holiday to decorate for.  Being so close to St. Patrick's day, I never know when to put the green away, and bring the bunnies and chicks out.  I've contemplated keeping them both out at the same time, but that just doesn't seem fair to either holiday, and it messes with my OCD brain.

Just talking about the logistics involved with decorating for two holidays at once is enough to make me feel the need to breathe into a paper bag.

As I slowly pull my chicks and bunnies out of storage (so as not to piss off St. Patrick), I'm realizing that chicks and bunnies are no longer cutting it for me.  Now that the boys are getting older, I want to make sure they understand that Easter is so much more than Cadbury eggs and Peeps.

SO.  MUCH.  MORE.

In times of despair such as these, I turn to pinterest for advice.  I was feeling the same lackluster feeling last year, and came across this and this, but never had the free time to make either of them.

Oh free time.  We have such a love/hate relationship.


This year, however, I am off to a running start.  Have a look at what I made today-

 

 

You like?  Thanks!  It's our crown of thorns, and it will sit on our kitchen table until Easter.  I'm hoping it will help the boys be mindful of the choices they make, and (in some form) remind them of the true meaning of Easter. 

Here's how it works:  each child has an 'assigned' color of thorns.  Red for Evan, green for Luke, blue for Jack, yellow for Logan, and orange for Wes (unless they fight over their assigned color, in which case, there will be some color switching.)  Every time we (the parents) take note of a boy going out of his way to do something nice for someone else (a true sacrifice!), we will allow the good deed do-er to remove one of his thorns from the crown.  Obviously, the goal is to have a thorn-free crown by Easter.

The crown was super easy to make.  (The hardest part was sorting and counting 150 toothpicks.)  I used a grapevine wreath from Michael's and wrapped it in burlap to help hold the toothpicks into place.  Then I stuck all 150 of those bad boys in and my true Easter decoration was ready in less than 15 minutes.  Easy peasy.

I've seen something similar to this on pinterest, but nothing this fabulous....right?

Here's to traditional Easter decor, sprinkled with a bit of sacrificium. 
 

Favorite things...

Today is Presidents' Day, which means my boys are home from school. ANY day that my boys are home with me, is my favorite day. Today is also my brother's birthday. Not just ANY brother, but my favorite brother. 

This brother-


 

His skinny jeans always make me jealous.  They fit him like a glove and he never gets that 'saggy butt' look.  How he does it, I'll never know.  Happy 35th, Dec! 

SO, in honor of my favorite brother, and in honor of my favorite day (a day when my boys are home), I wanted to share one of my recent favorite things finds.

Behold, the Lunadoll.

I came across this wonderful site when instagram snooping a few months ago.  It was love at first Lunadoll sight.  I really like this one-

But I'm also madly in love with this one-

 

 

And also this little Luna-

There's just something about their imperfectness that makes them perfect in every way. They each have their own personality, which would make it fun to match Luna-to-Boy.  I showed the Luna's to the boys and like me, it was instant Luna love.  It took me awhile, but I figured out how to convert the site to English (click on the British flag) and also tried my hand at converting the price to USD.  Luna's hail from Sweden and are made by their creator, Malin. (I stalk Malin on instagram just to be the first to see when a new Luna is born.)  Unless my conversion from Swedish Krona to USD is way off, Lunadolls average around $55.00 each, making them out of our budget. Boy #2 has a birthday coming up and has his favorite Lunadoll on his birthday wish list. 

(I think I want it a tad more than he does.) 

 

I foresee a Luna heading home to Colorado in the near future. 

 

(I was in no way compensated for the Luna shout out today.  I just wanted to share their awesomeness with you.  I did, however, get permission from Malin to link to the Luna site and for use of the pictures.  Thanks, Malin!) 

 

Tomorrow, a new favorite.