I know I should slow down and enjoy the summer. But I must keep these little (and not to little) people engaged or I might lock myself in the closet. 

Here’s five fun things we’ve done this week:

#1 Trampoline Painting

This was serious fun! The children had a great time painting, writing their names, and having a “grand finale”. That’s code for everyone paint your feet then splash the rest of the paint everywhere! Recipe coming soon!

#2 Sticky Sculptures

Good friends of ours invited us over to create sculpture with toothpicks, marshmallows, and gumdrops. The boys used their imagination to make animals, buildings, and, of course, weapons. See the pointy death star? Tootsie made a lunch of her building materials. 

#3 Father’s Day Fun

Of course, we had to make Honey a present for Father’s Day. This was an easy one. The boys helped by drawing the trunk of the trees then we simply used painted hand prints for the leaves.

#4 Making Daddy’s Favorite Dessert

Honey has childhood memories of eating his aunt’s Chocolate Eclair. Thank goodness it’s easy to make.

Chocolate Eclair Dessert

5-Minute Homemade Chocolate Sauce *make this first*

Two packages of instant vanilla pudding

4 cups of cold milk

One container of Cool Whip

Combine milk and pudding mix (follow directions on box). Chill until set. Gently add container of cool whip to pudding. Layer graham crackers in the bottom of a large Pyrex dish. Add a layer of pudding mixture. Cover the top with chocolate sauce. Save the rest of the sauce for ice cream or chocolate milk!

Why is Little Boy always half dressed? Note to self – make that boy put a shirt on!

The chocolate sauce recipe is from Southern Food on About.com. It is amazing! I will never by bottled chocolate syrup again. Ever.

5-Minute Homemade Chocolate Sauce

• 2 1/4 cups granulated sugar
• 3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1 1/2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 1/2 cups whole milk
• 1 tablespoon vanilla

Combine first 4 ingredients. Add milk. Heat until boiling then simmer five minutes. Remove from heat and add vanilla. Cool completely before use.

Doesn’t everything look better in a Mason jar?

#5 Working at the Car Wash!

Okay. Okay. This may have not been only for the children’s enjoyment. Mama needed her big truck washed. Everyone loves getting wet and wild while doing manual labor right?

Now go make some memories with your little people!

Happy Father’s Day to my daddy!

To him I owe my shoulder shrugging, eye rolling, mischievous, laid back personality. And the cute pug nose that has been passed down to each of my 3 little greenwoods.

I will always be his little girl.

Spoonful is an online source for family fun. They provide inspiration for arts, crafts, party ideas and even recipes.

From cakes to games to decorations, Spoonful provides tons of birthday party ideas. They choose to feature my Mama-Made Pirate Cake! *squeal*

Here’s the link to the original post: Mama- Made Pirate Party. It included directions for the pirate ship cake and a homemade pinata!

After hopping over to Spoonful I just added several “Motorcross” party ideas to my Pinterest Board. Big Boy will thrilled!

Head over to Spoonful and see what you can find!

Some of you may call this a palm tree. But in my part of the south it is a palmetto tree. It is a symbol of hospitality and lazy days at the beach.

The inspiration for this piece came from Our Lake Life’s Ballard Inspired Snowbirds and Blossom’s Tutorial.  I loved the look she created with simple dots of paint. I knew could make it my own by painting a palmetto tree.

Here’s how to get started. Cover a pre-made canvas with gray paint. I made my own by mixing white and black until I achieved this medium gray.

My new favorite is Rub and Buff. “Silver Leaf” gave the gray a pretty shimmer. Love this stuff!

Next I free handed a simple outline of a palmetto tree onto the canvas.

The background of the artwork will consist of gray, bright white, and cream. Use the eraser of a new pencil and start with dark gray dots first. Dab the eraser into the paint then dot, dot, dot. Easy.

Add a bright white then cream dots.

It looks like a got tree-truck happy then jumped up to the leaves. Anyway – to give your tree leaves depth, you need to start with very dark green dots right in the middle.

After that add medium green dots then bright green dots to complete the leaves.

Wait. Are they leaves or fronds? I’m going with leaves. 

The trunk of the tree comes next. It’s just several different shades of brown layered upon each other. 

How cool does that look? I love it!

I’m partying with The Frugal Girls for the Chic and Crafty Linky Party!

and with Marty at A Stroll Thru Life: Inspire Me Tuesday

and with Crystal and Co. with The Mommy Club: Share Your Resources and Solutions 

and AttaGirlSays for Home{work} Wednesdays

and with Wow Us Wednesday at Savvy Southern Style 

You know when you get married and your stuff becomes his stuff and his becomes yours? Well, Honey came with lots of stuff. Some good – bedroom furniture for the big boy. Some not so good – tons of hunting gadgets, gizmos, and clothes.

One really good piece he brought is this coffee table.

Of course, it didn’t used to look like this. I’m pretty sure Honey has dragged this table through several cities along the way.

Just look at those legs! I’m not sure how old the piece is but I believe it came from his grandmother.

I love the carved medallion. 

After reading tons about other bloggers painting furniture with chalk paint, I decided to try it myself. Diane from In My Own Style provides a chalk paint recipe and a great tutorial for how to finish a piece.

Here’s my homemade chalk paint ingredients. The little bag is Plaster of Paris. It is used to give the paint durability as it wears. And yes – I did use the mixer to make sure the Plaster of Paris was thoroughly dissolved before I painted. 

It is really pretty simple. Just dissolve a small amount of the Plaster of Paris in water, add to the paint, then mix well. Don’t forget to go visit Diane’s blog for the recipe!

Those little rods are metal. I made sure to tape them off.

Give it a good sanding to even out the very abused table top. Told you I got some paint-slapping genes in me. 

A thin coat of Minwax Paste Wax was applied to give the table a slight sheen. 

Chalk paint allows for beautiful distressing. I think Tootsie and her princesses will take care of that all on her own.Now… what else can I paint?