Jordan's End of Summer Slumber Party

7 giggly girlies, 2 pizzas, 7 late night swimmers, 7 karaoke stars, 7 creative crafters, 7 chocolate fondue lovers, 7 pedicures, manicures, facials and FABULOUS hairdooooos By HolleeAnn, ZERO sleep, and memories to last a lifetime...way too much fun!!

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New Blogger Friends

when i first started blogging i had a secret hope that it would not only keep me connected to family and friends but that it would also connect me to new friends. i am meeting the most interesting people from my blogging adventures. and on Tuesday i am getting together with Kirsten the author of the blog AreWeThereYet . she found my blog and we not only live in the same town but we are of the same faith and that's cool!

i am finding reading about other peoples lives not only fun and often fascinating but also comforting. i can hardly explain is as i feel i live on an island most days. since moving here a year ago i have yet to really connect with anyone, with the exception my friend Debbie who has been a priceless gift to me and my family. in addition to Debbie i have people who want to be my friend and have tried reaching out but i don't feel drawn to them. i know i need to open myself up to the possibilities of friendship on a deeper level with a few people who are trying to befriend me...but i find myself on stall (for lack of a better explanation).

so i am VERY excited about my new friend Kirsten and getting to meet her on Tuesday, even though it already feels as if we have met. i think that happens when you read from another persons heart...blogs tend to be a safe place to share...and i REALLY like that! i am going to try and be more brave and share more.

Wordless Wednesday

PURE LOVE....

Jordan and Taxi ready to ride!

TONS of Bloggy Goodness

i decided to take a little time for myself today and do a little blog surfing. i stumbled upon some amaaaaaaaaaaazing blogs written by women who i can totally relate to. i wanted to share some of my favorites with all my bloggy friends...so when you have a minute read these:

all.natural.mommies read this first great-cathedrals a wonderful post for mom's who often feel invisible...soooo good and it puts it ALL in perspective. i cried reading it....

believer-in-balance that pretty much says it all...i can relate.

slurping-life a mother by birth and by adoption...she is a hero, but says her kiddos are the real heroes.

wrapped-emotions VERY cool and creative blog...makes me wanna play...so i am gonna!

check out this adorable family megans.got.47

and this one...reeeeally good stuff...inspired jen.lemen

so those are just a few of the blogs i have been reading...and from there i bounce around to the people who left comments read those blogs. it's been really REALLY good 'therapy' for me and it's my little bit of "all about me" time to break up the day and just help me feel better about life in general.

happy surfing!

wait...how many frogs do i have to kiss?

Jordan loooooves to hunt for frogs. She could do this all day long and never get tired of it. Here she demonstrates her hunting skills for Grandma and Grandpa Machado:

Step One: flood frog's home with water

Step Two: wait patiently

Step Three: when they come up and ask "what the...?" grab them FAST!

Step Four: giggle your butt off

once you have a frog...find its buddy by repeating steps one thru four....ESPECIALLY Step Four!!

ok so i know you need to kiss a lot of frogs before you find your prince, i get that *wink*...but...i have never heard about the frogs kissing each other...until now (only Jordan could come up with this silly stuff)!

Zoey the Great White Hunter

SOOOO early (5:30) this morning i let Zoey out to go potty and sit down to check email leaving the slider open for her to come in when she is done. when she comes in she starts going nuts playing with what i thought was her little stuffed Charlie Brown (she looooves Charlie Brown). but i take a closer look and i see that she has caught a frog on her potty break and invited it in the house to play...WHAT?!? frog in the house! FROG in the HOUSE! Frog IN the HOUSE! i freak out cuz i don't want the frog to hop under a couch and die or have babies or something. but mostly i am freaking out because the dog brought a FROG in MY house! so panic, panic...what do i do? get the camera of course~~

Charlie Brown meet Frog...Frog meet Charlie Brown

i managed to snap a few more pics once i composed myself, caught the frog and released the poor thing back into the yard (hoping the dog had just stunned it and not killed it, since it was a fairly easy catch). Zoey chased it around a little more before it managed to hop under the gate to safety. (ignore the poop in the pics, i haven't gotten around to picking it all up)



The other night Jordan went frog hunting, she does this now and then...we have a lot of frogs. i of course took a few pictures of her and this seems like a good place to post them...and YES she is wearing her pink double trouble shirt. this is only the second time she has worn it but this happened to be the same night i took pics of her game room too....so no its not the only article of clothing she has. funny story actually, the other day we were picking outfits for the week (she likes to do this its her OCD...lol...)and she said, "HolleeAnn i don't think i have had any repeats." not sure what she is talking about i ask her to explain and she goes on to say, "since school started, i haven't worn the same outfit twice to school yet on the weeks i am home with you guys." i think about it and she is correct...mix and match, new and old...the girl has a better wardrobe than her dad and me combined. and she also has 18 pairs of shoes...yes i know i need to be stopped..is an issue. oh well...back to the pics...

hey now no kissing for a prince yet!

The Aloha Lounge aka J's game room

As i stated in the post below (See "You asked for IT...so here IT is!) i had some fans of Dandelion Wishes (holla!) ask to see pictures of Jordan's game room and bedroom. Here are the pics of the game room. If the some of the colors and items in the room look familiar to you it's because i used a few things from my old preschool (i loved those stripes and colors and i am happy to use them in my home...ahhh memories). As you can see i painted HUGE obnoxious flowers on the back wall. trust me when i say the are huge. I don't know what got into to me but one day i just decided to change Jordan's playroom into a cooler preteen lounge. i knew i wanted bright colors and a tropical theme...so here you have the Aloha Lounge...tee hee. OH and YES those are flip flops nailed to the wall. anyway she loves this room and spends a good deal of time here entertaining friends, listening to her music, building puzzles (she is a huge puzzle fan), playing games, watching TV and movies (weekends only) and she even meets with her tutor Erynn here.

Jordan has offered many times that she would gladly give up the game room if we need it for a baby...but for now she really likes having this space that is all hers...

***YOU CAN CLICK ON ANY PICTURE FOR A LARGER VIEW***

You asked for IT...so here IT is

A couple of weeks ago i redecorated Jordan's bathroom and posted pictures of the silly and very monkey-fied (i make up words) result. After seeing those pictures my friend Kari asked me to post pictures of Jordan's bedroom and game room. Kari's sister Kati lives in Idaho and is a reader of our blog (holla!). and she wanted to see tooooooooo. So the fans have asked and here is Jordan's bedroom. AND this is the way she left her room when she left for school this morning. I never have to really ask Jordan to clean her room or make her bed, she does it and likes to keep her things in their place...i like to say she has just enough OCD to keep THIS mom happy. I hope these habits follow her into her teen years, but i am not holding my breath.

***YOU CAN CLICK ON ANY OF THESE PICTURES FOR A LARGER VIEW***

I bought some plain canvases and painted inspirational words on them...believe, aspire, dream and imagine. I added some little jewels and accents to just add a little whimsy to them. I also took an old lamp and added a feather voa to the lampshade, i think it is super cute and it gave the lamp new life.

She organizes all of her little treasures in these baskets and on these little shelves.


i bought these letters in bare wood, painted them, glued sticks to the back, and placed them in little flower pots filled with pastel colored aquarium stones. Cute huh?

Seeeeeeeee she CAN be messy...check out this wall and her closet...like i said just a little bit of OCD...lol...the perfect amount.

Happiness is having BFF Sleep Overs...

Some of my favorite memories as a preteen was when i had my friends sleep over. OH the giggles and secrets shared!! i REALLY want Jordan to have those memories too and she has a wonderful little girlfriend named Emma (who has been featured many times in this blog) to hare those times with. Emma has become part of our little family and we love having her over anytime her family will share her with us. She also takes a little pressure off of us and Jordan's constant nagging about giving her a sibling or 2 or 3...but we are still working on that too. ( i know too much information right?) ANYWAY...here are some pics from the girls latest sleep over.

they started the evening by giving each other lovely make overs...they used very little make up and actually did a nice tasteful job on each other.


THEN...came the hair...bobby pins everywhere, these hair styles were works of art. Jordan used 2 hair pieces on Emma's hairdo.



The girls enjoyed a little chocolate fondue! As you can see our dining room is coming along at a snails pace, consider this picture proof that demolition has begun, and well that's about it. Paul has promised to, at the very least, have the floor totally out so i can have my kitchen table back by Jordan's Slumber Party Sept. 21....stay tuned.





The girls had a great time feeding the ducks, behind the fruit barn, Saturday morning. What a beautiful day it was, and LOOK at those adorable matchy poo poo BFF outfits..."double trouble" is right!!

It's a big word I can't remember...

Hello everyone,
HolleeAnn has actually let me make a contribution to the blog. Rest assured she is standing over my shoulder and she has made it clear she has final creative control over the post.
Today after school Jordan was telling us about her day...
Us: "How was school today?"
J: "Cool"
Us: "What do you have for homework?"
J: "Just science."
J: "Hey HolleeAnn, I got lots of com...,comp.., compli..., people told me they really liked my hair today, even an eighth grader"
Everyone: laughing hysterically

OK so we thought it was funny. It might have been one of those "had to be there" moments, but we thought it was blog worthy.

Paul (loosely edited by HolleeAnn, because I am a guy and I am detail inept)

Monkey See, Monkey Want...Mamarazzi do, Monkey VERY Happy!

For Jordan's birthday she asked for HER bathroom to be redecorated. More specifically she asked for a "monkey bathroom". So her gift from us on her birthday was just that...a monkey bathroom. Jordan's bathroom (as well as the rest of our home) has VERY dated features including some funky 70's style lights. So before you say what I did to them is tacky let me assure you that the "before" was far worse (i should have taken pictures). This bathroom is a very small space presenting me with my biggest design challenge to date. BUT Jordan flipped over the end result and well...if she is happy then i can certainly live with a monkey bathroom in the house. What do yoooooooooooou think?

paper bag vines for the monkeys to chill on also covers the uuuuuugly chain that "hides" the cord to the lighting fixtures.

you can kind of get a glimpse of the 70's goodness in the reflection in the mirror.


awww baby monkey on a the towels...how cute!