new school, new hair, same Julia.

(*disclaimer: we are not against public school but for our family it was not the best road*)

tomorrow is a big day 

The Julia is starting a new school!

the old school was going in a direction that we didn't want our children being exposed to.

The system was not teaching her values and qualities we wanted to instill. 

Julia is extremely smart and loves school but we saw a decline in her grades and interest in learning and felt like we were not getting any support from her teachers to help her grow.

 And multiple other issues with other children didn't sit well with us.

We prayed and prayed every night to have God guide us to make the best decision for our children's future.

The financial commitment is huge and we were very worried we wouldn't be able to do it. 

BUT 

when it's the right thing, some how, some way God makes it possible!

It's not going to be easy but it's absolutely worth every extra hour at work or cutting back on dinners out, vacations and buying new things.

Her new school is a catholic school and we are so excited about her learning more about our faith and having more emphasis on her education

 We want the best for our kids and we feel 100% this is it.

~

I recently was asked if Julia was nervous 

that made me laugh 

because I don't think there was ever a time The Julia has been nervous.

She's extremely outgoing and so confident in herself.

She's so excited running around tonight getting her lunch made, uniform laid out, alarm clock set and just dancing around signing songs and hugging me over and over again.

this has been a HUGE 180 from the last month or so.

things have been very rough with her for other more personal reasons.

She has been so full of anger and has had a lot of violent outburst

so this excitement tonight made me even more confident on our decision.

 my cup was over flowing with love for her all over again.

I couldn't help be remember the first time I saw her.

only 3 weeks old sitting in her car seat smiling and staring at me.

or a year later when she first called me "mommy" for the first time

 and then fast forward to her first day of Kindergarten.

 

then in a blink of an eye she's 9 and going into the 4th grade!

 o yeah and one more BIG change for her:

 for months now she has begged me to cut her hair.

I talked her into waiting until the end of summer.

today we searched for haircuts she would like and she kept picking out the "Pixie" cuts!
I was doing everything I could to talk her out of it 

But

if you know THE JULIA you know there is NO talking her out of anything she wants.

so she sat in the hair dresser's chair and was asked 3 times if she was sure. 

Julia said yes with the biggest smile

the scissors closed on her pony tail!

Miss Belle and Lil Stella sat and watched her hair fall to the floor.

Stella kept saying "it's all gone!" 

and my tears were flowing. 

It fits her

Sweet, Sassy and simple

she's growing so fast 

 Thank you Jesus for the last 9 years all the ups and downs, the struggles and fun, the sleepless nights of worrying and times that I squeezed her a little too tight. Thank you for giving me the best gift in being her mom. I am the lucky one that gets to watch this miracle person beat the odds and show the world she's got more to give.

I love her and guarantee I will cry harder tomorrow than any birthday or first day of school before.

It's going to be a big day!

She's ready!

A 4th letter to Belle

Dear Belle,

4 years ago I gave birth for the first time.

We didn't find out the sex until that big day.

They held you up and said "It's a GIRL!"

 and the first thing that came to my mind was now Julia will always have a best friend.

We named you Belle Elizabeth Taylor

Belle was always my favorite Disney character because she was smart, strong, stood up for the mistreated ones, she sacrificed herself to protect her father, and ultimately fell in love with a person because of his personality not because of superficial looks or stature.

I felt like all of these qualities I wanted my daughter to have.

 I am beyond proud to say you do possess these things and much more!

You are smart, funny, creative, loving, caring, and always happy.

I smile when you do or say something that reminds me of myself but I admit you are a mini me but better! your imagination is so fascinating! and as much as I want to keep you bottled up in this age forever I can not wait to see what amazing things you do with all your talents.

 your a tender hearted soft soul with the sweetest little voice most people can't hear because you talk so quietly and shyly. You are scared of the dark and hate being alone.your favorite cartoon to watch is Spiderman and friends.(1970's version only) You pretend to be Fire-star and you fly around shooting fire balls at "bad guys" (typically Stella or Jerky). I feel like a psychologist would say this is your coping mechanism to help you feel safer. It's just another piece of your puzzle that I am completely in love with.

 I often think back on this day 4 years ago and think about how much my life has changed since you came into our world. I wouldn't change a thing about you and I hope you never question just how special you are.

Happy 4th Birthday 

Miss Belle!

Love, 

Mommy

Week 2

As I started working this project I was really thinking why am I doing this in the first place?

I am very happy with life and honestly would change much at all.

but I feel like I have so much more to learn and do better in all aspects of my life to keep being happy.

everything is work. life is work, marriage is work, motherhood is work, work is work, and keeping up with all these job titles but still be yourself and be happy is work!

so what do I have to loose by taking a little challenge every week to really focus myself on improving.

for week 2 I am assigned to make a vision board of what I want my ideal life to look like.

I had recently through out all our magazines so making a physical board was going to be difficult unless I cut up some of Belle's coloring books and since my ideal life is not being a princess (that would be nice but I am trying to be realistic) 

I thought I would grab a few pins from pinterest. 

these don't have links to them......

a big no-no when blogging and using pinterest but I am tiered and pregnant and if you really want to find the correct links you do the work!! :P

I just like the message in each one so I copied and paste I do not claim to own anything that has to do with these. just borrowing for my own inspiration.

The first and I feel most important relationship aside for with God is with my husband.

The man I promised God I would spend my life with. I don't ever want to stop working on being a better wife...

 Then of course the one I feel needs the most help because if I don't work hard at being the best mom for my girls who else will? These gifts from God have been the hardest most stressful thing I have ever been given BUT They give me so much love, hope, laughter and joy that being a better mom is absolutely a top priority!

 Being a better me. I still have a lot of work to do on myself and my insecurities.

The second part of my assignment for the week was to take a picture of your ideal life board and post it somewhere you will see everyday. I choose my favorite bible versus and set it as my phone background. 

are you fallowing along with the life organizing challenge? it's more deep than I was thinking but I like it and am excited to grow.

How I decorated a nursery with no money!

Stella is very excited about the baby but not too excited about all the changes that means for her.

she is being evicted from the nursery

watch that adorable video here

did you notice all the decor? she had a twinkle twinkle little star theme with purple and pink colors.

This time around I wanted something totally different!

My sister doesn't approve of the middle name for this new one and says it reminds her of an Iguana.

as a joke I said we should decorate her room in Iguanas! 

then I started thinking more about it and was so excited to get started!!!

The budget for this room was 0$!

seriously

this is our 4th kid and the hubby says decorating does not trump food or house payments.......

darn :P

I used left over paint from another room and lots of little crafts we had on hand to make.

 The mobile was made from an embrodery hoop and felt flowers and leafs

That Iguana painting was done by all three of her sisters. We used fabric paint and painted Iguana's with bows on a pink crib sheet.

 We are just reusing the crib, dresser and changing table from the older girls.

That adorable little yellow dress is going to be worn when the baby comes home! I get so excited when I see it!!

 I did the H out of cardboard and yarn

Julia and Belle painted over old canvases

That frame was a messed up order I made a long time ago and never did anything with it.

the embroidery hoop says "I Guana Kiss You"

 I sewed little color coordinating scrapbook paper circles together and draped them along nails above the bed.

 a few other things from around the house that I thought would look good. the rug is made from lots of white scrap fabric I had.

there are little imperfections here and there but right now it's my favorite room in the house!!! I can not wait to meet this little girl and show her the room!

now just to get Stella to move out. she just loves sleeping in the crib and isn't ready to leave yet. hoping when we redecorate the big girls room next it will help her feel more comfortable.

Organize your life challenge!

I think this has a lot to do with growing our family again

and being the middle of summer

but I am feeling like I want to make things simpler and easier.

I feel like there is so much clutter 

in every aspect of my life.

I need to just let go of what I don't need and concentrate on what I do in order to live the life I want.

So I came across this book 

Organize now! you can purchase it here

It's full of great motivations and suggestions on how to organize everything!

There are weekly challenges and I decided I wanted to share with you all my journey as I am going through it.

The first week talks about priorities.

what's important to you 

what do you want to put more effort in 

towards being a better person.

I though well no brainer

until I had to actually list them

she ask for 10 most important priorities

so I listed the first 3 or 4 and then had to really think

and think

and think

it took me all week!

good thing that was the only challenge for the week...

not!

you also have to make an effort toward 5 of these items.

so instead of watching Netflix at night I turned everything off and had long conversations with my husband. I included my children in weeding the garden or cooking so we could have more time together. I photographed things just because. I called an old friend that I hadn't talked to in a while, and I listened to a catholic radio station talk show. 

I am excited about this book and everything it will teach me and push me to do that I might not otherwise think to do.

What are your top ten Priorities?