WE HAVE THE COOLEST GRANNY!

The Jeppson girls would like to thank their granny for the hard work, love, and style she put into making them... THE COOLEST APRONS EVER! Take a look... you gotta agree...

The cutest is, every apron matches my girlies personalities! It is so good they have a granny to sew them cute things since their mom has absolutely no sewing skills!

I had to make them stop being a divas so I could get a good shot of the aprons.... sooo cute!!! Lettie calls her's "My Pizza Making Apron"! She loves to help make pizza and we discovered she likes to stash extra pepperonis in the pockets for after-dinner snacks.

That's My Girl!

I went to Williamsburg with the kiddos to see family and to have a little vacation! We stayed for a week and it was GREAT! We could fish when we wanted, swim when we wanted, ride the ferry, go to parks, pick blueberried, visit family... good times!

One of our favorite things to do was go to my Grandparent's dock and the kids would swim while 2 would take turns fishing! I was really suprised who my most dedicated fisher was...

JOVIE!

From a young age I have always loved to fish, was never scared to hold a fish, and would play with the worms...

turns out... Jovie is a chip off the old block!

Everytime she would catch a fish she would talk to it and then inform me it told her that it did not want to go back to the water, but rather, it wanted to stay with her. Then I would haveto inform her that because she cares so much for this fish she knows it needs water and it's mommy and daddy to live. She needed to explain to the fish what was best... so she would get close to the fish, explain the situation, and then lovingly throw it back to go home!
We caught A LOT of catfish. I was one busy (and slimy) mommy trying to keep up with the unhooking and baiting. Big and small. As soon as we threw out, we would hook one. I had to take a picture of Jovie with every fish she caught. Since she could not hold the catfish, I would hold it for her!

And when it was too big for me to hold it and the camera, I would put it on the dock and she would get beside it and wiggle back and forth in her best fish out of water impression.

And sometimes, she would hold the string! She was very brave!

And when she was not fishing she would play with the worms and if someone did not take their turn she happily took it for them! When did she get so big? I love my fisher girl!

Happy Birthday Mom/ Grandma!

WE GOT YOU A PRESENT!

It is a Saucer Magnolia!

(We hope we got it right)

Hopefully me and my "black thumb" can keep it alive until we go to the mountains!

We will do our best to take care of it and water it and hopefully keep it alive until we see you again!

We love you!!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

Bloomin' in My Garden!

My sister-in-law Katie loves to grow flowers! She does a very good job! My little girls love that Katie does a very good job! They also love that Katie sometimes lets them pick some of her flowers (or sometimes just has them picked whether she wants them picked or not).

On the sidebar of her blog she always has a collection of pictures entitled "Bloomin' in my Garden". They are full of beautiful pictures of beautiful flowers.

As I was grilling burgers last night on the patio I looked around my back yard and took note of all the flowers I had successfully grown and were "Bloomin' in my Garden" and decided to take some pictures of them and post them here on my blog in honor of Katie!

Without further ado... I present:

BLOOMIN' IN AUDRA'S GARDEN:

Dandelion: Taraxacum officinale

I am quite proud of these! I have not only succeeded in growing an abundant amount of these strikingly beautiful yellow flowers. But I have also succeeded in keeping them exceedingly healthy until they reached their mature/ seeding state!

Wild Strawberry: Fragaria virginiana

My strawberries have been quite abundant this year! They have produced many pure white flowers and deep crimson fruit.

Thistle: Cirsium vulgare

I suppose I can not take full credit for the hardiness of my thistles this year. Basically, my thistle patch resides next to my air conditioning unit hidden on the side of my house and sometimes they are forgotten. But miracles of miracles, here they are this year, healthy and strong, with stems the size of your wrist. Eeyore would be proud! They are flanked by an impressive array of waist high brown grasses.

Azalea: Rhododendron periclymenoides

The azaleas are in full bloom and what could be prettier? My beautiful Azalea is doing well among it's well-maintained bed of displaced mulch, broken fence pieces, and firewood.

The Hillside Flower Bed

All I can say is variety, variety, variety. I have beautiful flowering Vinca Ivy inter-dispersed with large-woody plants with dainty soft pom-poms on the end. As well as strong hearty briers (the guardians of the Flowers) that tower over their dainty yellow sun-colored wards.

The Backyard Wildlife

Of course every back yard garden has its share of wild visitors! Especially the ever-so-helpful caterpillar.

Pansy:Viola wittrockiana

My pansies have reached a point where they are now delicately dropping over the side of their pots. A cascade of purple, green, and brown.

Thanks for visiting my garden! Did you like it?

Thanks Granny!!!

When Levi and I went to Florida... I forgot to do Lettie's Gingerbread Man project with her!

Bad Mom!

Lettie was to take a paper cut-out of a gingerbread person and make it into anything she wanted. She wanted to do a ballerina, and I had no clue how I was going to pull it off. Luckily, I left Lettie in the very capable hands of her Granny!

When we got back, Lettie was gushing over the beautiful ballerina she got to make with Granny! Then she brought it home... and behold...

A sewn pink tutu, ballet slippers, curly hair, and a bow!!! How perfect! This was the highest quality paper gingerbread person I have ever seem! And Lettie was so proud! Granny truly has amazing sewing and crafting skills! I would have NEVER been able to pull this one off in a million years!

THANKS GRANNY!

As Lettie would say, this ballerina is "right up her alley"!

Tape + Toilet Paper Rolls = One Weird Kid!

Silas was walking around the house with 2 toilet paper rolls asking for tape. I figured he was making some binoculars. Which he did... he just too it a step further...

and made them HANDS-FREE binoculars!

I love my crazy Silas!!!

Why I Have Not Been Blogging Lately #1

I like to keep my blog updated... but I have been SO DARN BUSY lately!

Seriously Busy!

You know how sometimes people say "I have been busy" and you know they really have not been THAT busy?
(I am guilty of using "busy" to liberally... sometimes it means "I did not feel like it" or "I forgot" or "leave me alone for Pete's sake").

But I have been the real kind of busy! I have a list of things I have been up to to prove it. So, when I have time, I will tackle telling you about them one at a time! So I have a moment now... actually, I am putting off something else I need to do... so I will tell you about one:

So, reason for not blogging lately #1:

Started Selling Ukuleles at Aloha Snow!This sort of fell into my lap. But is a good thing for a variety of reasons. Some of which are:

-Ukes do not spoil or go bad, if I do not sell them right away, whatever. No biggie. My goal is 1 a month. I sold 3 the first month. I am 2 months ahead.

-They are like a functional decoration. Like the artwork or antiques on the wall of restaurants that you can buy. They look great, fit the theme, and you can take one home if you feel like it.

-It makes the shop even cooler than it already is!

-This is a lot of fun for me to do! I got to make a new Uke order yesterday and was absolutely giddy!

-I get to spread some Uke love to Charlotte!

-It brings in a little extra income! Fun stuff!

It took some doing to get everything rolling. It is not as simple as ordering ukuleles and hanging them on the wall. I had to hand make those Ukulele hangers (which look rad if I do say so myself. The design is a Mim original. But at the same time they are a pain in the butt to make). They look linear and industrial, and awesome! Then I had to hang them, which I did single-handedly and that is not easy and even caused me to get aggravated at those who said it could not be done. They replaced my shirts (which I need to figure out somethign else for) so that left some touch-up to be done on the wall. I needed to touch up the rest of the shop anyway. So I touched up the rest of the shop too. Then... I needed to make a web-site for my Uke stock. So I created and designed:

mimsukes.com

Which, again, I think looks awesome if I do say so myself! I use the cheapest program known to man. It is kind of like using paint for photos instead of photoshop. So, all things considered, I love the site!

I still need to set up an ebay store or ebay listings. Still working on that one and that is perhaps one of the aforementioned things I am putting off at the moment (I am SUPER tired, I was up till 1:30 last night painting and Callie slept very restless last night and yes, she ended up in our bed. I can't think strait).

So, now I sell Eleukes and Ohanas! Great Ukes!!! If ya want one, let me know, I will get ya a deal!!! Oh, and if you have any other musical needs, I am a Chesbro dealer now. So anything in their catalougue I can get for you if they have it in stock. I can even get it shipped directly to you if you want!

Tomorrow is IKEA day! HOORAY! There will be a blog post about that too because my upstairs in unrecognizable right now! Lets just say it looks flippin' awesome! Awww... yeah!

Our Own Little Oscar Night!

We had our own "Oscar Night"!

We watched all the video submissions for Kangatheroo7's Disney Ukulele Contest and then I let Nolan read the post that announced the winner!!!

Here ya go:

The kids are so excited! But now they thing we can hop in the car and go immediately to Disney because we have 2 tickets... haha!

I read the results last night and was so excited... but I figured I would save the announcement for the kids until we had our own "Oscar Night"! So tonight we sat down as a family and watched all the Disney Uke videos complete with brownies and then I let Nolan (your ghost host) read the results!!!

If you have not yet checked out our video... here it is! Extrememly corney, but Epic in a Windows Movie Maker kind-of way!

Callie's Birthday: Part 2

After Chuck E. Cheese we went to Build-a-Bear! Callie made a bear the week before for Carrie, she wanted a bear for herself as well, but never wavered that she was making a bear for Carrie and not herself. When I asked her if she wanted to build a bear for her birthday she just kept saying, "I make another bear for Carrie". When I finally explained that she could make a bear for herself as well, she was really excited.

So... when we got to the mall... she and Jovie ran for the door. You can see the excitement in their run!

When we got to Build-a-bear Callie stopped in front of the bear to pose for a picture because that is what we did the week before. She is such a creature of habit. She even made her favorite funny face.

Callie knew what she wanted... a panda. Jovie wanted a panda too, but she did not even look down the row of bears. Then. She saw it... The PERFECT bear! I mean... LOVE... at first sight! So here she is with her bear.

Jovie getting her bear stuffed. The lady was SO nice! She was great with the kiddos!

Jovie still did not trust her... haha! She just is shy. So when they lady asked her to rub the heart and kiss it and make a wish, she just glared at her!

Callie then got her panda stuffed. Here she is giving it a test-squeeze after it being stuffed. It was just right! And seriously, this lady was the best! Every time I went in previously I had to beg the workers not to stuff the bears too much where they were hard! She had them perfectly squishy!

Callie is a great sport! She gave the heart a really good warming with her hands.

I love this picture. When Callie is unsure she cocks her head to the side like this.

Giving the heart a kiss before putting it in her panda!

While Callie was doing her thing, I looked down at Jovie. She was lovingly looking at her bear. Then she would hug it. Pull it away from her, and then lovingly look at it again. Then she gently put her bear to her face and rubbed noses with it! It was so sweet, loving, and gentle. Then when I said, "Oh! You love you bear!" She got embarrassed and then scowled at me. She does not like to show her mushy side. But it was a sweet moment! Here she is giving a loving look at her bear.

The girls giving their bears a "bath".

I am not into buying a ton of clothes for the build-a-bears. The kids don't leave them dressed anyway. But they each picked out Hello Kitty panties for their bears. Then we went to the computer and named them. Callie named her panda... well, "Panda". Jovie named her bear "My Sweetheart"! Now just "sweetheart" "MY Sweetheart". Which was really sweet for me because the week before she said she would not be my sweetheart when I asked her until I explained to her what it meant to be my sweetheart and then she insisted she was in fact my sweetheart. She kept saying, "Mom! You're my sweetheart!" So for her to name her bear Sweetheart is... well... sweet!

And since she made her, Sweetheart is never far away. She is always sleeping next to Jovie, at the breakfast table, and even at the Blue and Gold Banquet.

Silly Callie being goofy with her Panda. She loves her Panda too. But not at the same intensity as Jovie. Callie is more of a baby doll girl.

All boxed up and ready to go home!

A video of them giving their new friends a "bath". Callie cracks me up! At the end she is saying, "It's for Carrie!" She was still wanting to buy bear accessories for Carrie. We had a really good time together.

Callie's Bithday: Part 1

My Baby is 3!

It is bitter-sweet because she is my baby. My last little-one.

But she is growing up and becoming such a fun and sweet big girl!

She is full of personality and always keeps us laughing!

For her birthday, I decided to do her favorite things with her for the day. So the first thing we did was go to Chuck E. Cheese. It was just her and Jovie, so she got a lot of special attention. Our Chuck E. Cheese opens at 9, and often when we go they have not even turned on the music yet. People think it opens at 10. It is great to have the place to ourselves. So we had a good time. I have a game I like called Raptor's Revenge. I hit 200 tickets twice, so we had a lot of tickets by the end too! So she got to be spoiled some. It was a fun outing with my girlies!

Her favorite thing to do is ride the carosel! If there are more people there she usually parks herself on there and lets other people pay the tokens and she hitch-hikes.
Jovie's favorite is the horsie-ride. She rode this one 3 times in a row!

She is the queen of goofy faces!
We took a picture. It turned out really cute! I love the Chuck E. Cheese pictures! Only 1 token and you have a keepsake!
While waiting for your picture to print they always play this song, so the tradition is to dance to the music while we wait for the picture to print out!
See... Momma's gots Raptor's Revenge Skills!
Our loot! Last year at Chuck E. Cheese Callie won 200 tokens on the Big Win wheel. This time she won a coupon for Cotton Candy (which is equivalent of 150 tickets). And we ALWAYS get cotton candy first, so that freed up a lot of tickets. I can never get anything like that, even when I try. One token and she randomly pushes the button and wins.

That girl has really good luck!

More later...