Thanks for the lip gloss, Hayley

Josephine Losavio: Clown?

Tomorrow is Circus Day at Joey's school.  All of the kids will be dressing up like clowns or circus animals.  Although clowns creep me out, I figured a clown costume would be easier to DIY than an animal costume.

I picked up some supplies at Hobby Lobby:  a green t-shirt (because green is Joey's fave), pom poms, felt, and a sheet of green foam. 

I began by making a ruffled collar from the felt.  I cut the sheets lengthwise and stitched three of the pieces together, creating a long strip.

I stitched some elastic to one end of the felt, then for the length of the felt, I stitched around the elastic using a zigzag stitch.  That's a fancy trick I picked up from sewing class.

To finish the collar, I stitched the ends together.  I just hope that it doesn't choke Joey.

Next I got to work on Joey's hat.  I decided to use the foam to make a cone-shaped hat with pom poms.  I cut the foam into a round-ish triangle (sorry -- that's mommy brain for you) and then attached the edges with hot glue.  I glued a large pom pom to the top of the hat and small ones around the bottom.

I  hot glued some large pom poms to the front of the t-shirt and Voila!  A clown costume!

April

Our little family has had an incredibly busy month.  We have had lots to do nearly every weekend, and in his spare time, Paul has been prepping our house for painting.  April has brought heavy rains and tornadoes to our area, but we survived unscathed.  The May flowers should be spectacular.

Joey's Responsibilities

For Easter, Joey received the Melissa & Doug Magnetic Responsibility Chart from the Easter Bunny.  I absolutely adore Melissa & Doug.  Their company manufactures high quality and durable educational toys among other things, and their prices are reasonable.  Although battery-operated toys can be entertaining and educational, we're old-school.  We prefer toys that allow the kids to use their imaginations and have amassed quite a collection of Melissa & Doug.  Joey especially loves their Slice and Bake Cookie Set and Deluxe Easel.  I have been eying the Magnetic Responsibility Chart for years and I am thrilled that the Easter Bunny decided to bring it to Joey.

The responsibility chart has age-appropriate responsibilities for children of various ages, complete with pictures.  The responsibilities vary from personal hygiene to actual chores, so I feel like we'll be able to use this chart for many years.  The chart includes reward magnets (we call them stickers) that Joey can put on her chart when she completes a task.  Right now we're not offering any incentive for completing the responsibilities (the "sticker" is reward enough), but Joey would be thrilled with a visit to the Chikin Park or baking cookies at home.  In the future we can base Joey's allowance on the tasks she completes. 

Yesterday morning, Joey and I sat down and chose her responsibilities.  She chose:  say please and thank you, take a bath, get dressed, brush teeth, put toys away, get ready for bed, and show respect.  For Joey, showing respect means listening and not hitting.  I would have liked for her to choose "no whining," but I think that it"s important for her to "own" her responsibilities.  Yesterday she completed six of her seven -- unfortunately she was not a good listener and couldn't get a "sticker" for showing respect.

Notice how all of her "stickers" are green?  It is her favorite color.  The picture below is the bottom half of the chart with the rest of the responsibilities shown. 

The chart includes two blank dry-erase responsibility magnets to write your own.  Some of Joey's future responsibilities will probably be:  LISTEN!, do not hit, let your sister sleep, and eat your vegetables!

Busted

One of the most terrifying experiences as a parent must be when your child gets injured.

As Joey was getting into bed tonight, she hit her head on her headboard and busted her face open next to her right eye.  From the other room I heard her screaming, then Paul ran out of the room carrying her, both of them covered in blood.  There was SO much blood.  It was in her hair, on her arms, and had soaked her jammies.  I could even smell it.  I cannot even describe how terrifying the situation was.

We got the bleeding under control and assessed the gash.  We weren't sure if Joey's injury warranted a visit to the ER, so we sent the picture to one of my girlfriend who works in the emergency department at the hospital that is just a few minutes from our house.

She said that since the bleeding had stopped, it should be fine, but she offered to take a look at it.  Joey and I hopped in the car and headed to the ER, just for some peace of mind.  The gash is indeed fine and doesn't require stitches or even glue.  I'm a little concerned about scarring, but scars add character, right?

Five Minutes and Three Seconds That You Won't Get Back

...but it's worth it.

Here is a video of Joey performing a song that she made up.

Vote for Charlotte!

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House Painting

As our Christmas gift, Paul's parents gave us house painting.  The paint has been purchased and in a few short weeks the Losavio family will be coming to Tuscaloosa to paint our house!  I just hope that my mother-in-law is praying away the rain!

This is what our house looks like now.  Boring.  And in desperate need of new paint.

This is what (we hope) it will look like when it's finished.  Paul modified the above photo using Photoshop.

See how removing the shutters makes the house look larger?

We tested two colors on the back of the house.  We chose the one on the left.  The other one looked too "Smurfy."  Keep in mind that Paul had already begun prepping these windows.  It's going to look worse before it looks better!

The grayish-blue paint that we selected is Poolside by Sherwin-Williams.  The color of our porch will be a dark charcoal, Rock Bottom by Sherwin-Williams.  Our front door will be a bright yellow.

For the next few weeks, our free time will be dedicated to preparing the house for painting.  We have 20 windows that need to be scraped, sanded, and reglazed.  Our siding is asbestos (which isn't really harmful unless you grind it up and snort it) and fortunately it doesn't require much prep work.  The shrubbery at the front of the house will need to be cut back significantly, but probably not removed.

Here's Paul hard at work:

We have an awning covering our back door, which I'd like to keep.  It's currently green, which won't go with the new house color.  Have you ever painted a canvas awning?  What type of paint did you use?

Does Your Shopping Cart Look Like This?

Seriously, how do moms shop for food?  I end up packing food in the cart around the kids and on the bottom rack.  I need some creative shopping tips!

Ketchup

I haven't blogged very much over the past few months.  Although Joey has been going to school three half-days a week, and I should have more free time, having an infant takes a lot of energy.  And a lot of my spare energy has gone to finding Camrys with missing door handles (see my other blog, That Camry's Missing a Door Handle!).

So what's been going on with us?  We are preparing to paint our house at the end of April.  Paul's been prepping the house, but we haven't decided on a paint color yet.  We may post some of our favorite color combos and get your opinion.

We are also moving Joey's room in the near future.  We currently use our third bedroom as an office/guest room, but Joey's bunk beds (which I still haven't assembled) will fit much better in the smaller room.  Before we move things around, we'll need to remove the popcorn texture from the ceiling and paint the walls.  Joey's current room will become our office/guest room/play room.  As for Charlotte, we'll just put her crib wherever it will fit.

Joey is three years old.  She absolutely loves going to school.  She recites The Pledge of Allegiance, which I think is just precious.  Joey adores her baby sister.  She loves princesses:  princess books, princess movies, princess dress-up.  Her favorite color is green; she always wants "the green one."  Joey now enjoys watching Dora the Explorer, Go Diego Go, and Scooby Doo.  Her favorite book is Curious George Goes to the Hospital, but she also enjoys Pinkalicious and Fancy Nancy.

Charlotte is two and a half months old.  She weighed 9 lbs 14 oz at her last check-up.  She's already had her first illness:  a respiratory funk, cough, and an ear infection.  Luckily that cleared right up with antibiotics.  She's a very good sleeper, but still isn't sleeping straight through the night.  Charlotte is smiling and cooing, and she occasionally laughs.  She loves mirrors.  We're not on a schedule yet, but we have a routine of eating, playing, and sleeping.  Her eyes are looking blue, but it's hard to tell as they are still changing.

We've been keeping busy!