My new little treasures

One of my favorite stores EVER is The Container Store. It's this organizational heaven that has any and every type of jar, bucket, bowl, bin, drawer, jug, shelf, or any other type of storage container you can imagine...hence, the name. The also have random things sometimes too.

I visited one of these stores before in Columbus, Ohio. It was an escape into a dream world for me where you could easily spend hours without even realizing it. My dream job would probably be a professional organizer. My house doesn't always reflect this but for me organizing someone else's world is even more satisfying.

We don't have a Container Store close to us but I often visit their website when I'm looking for an organizational solution. I wanted to show you my recent finds because I get excited like a little kid.

This is our new toothbrush holder. How cute is that? Our bathroom is green and white and our old toothbrush holder was getting yucky no matter how much I cleaned it.


This is a pet hair lifter I ordered. Classification: random stuff. Like I said sometimes they have random things but it works pretty good. I'm always interested in new and different ways to keep the pet hair off of things.
AND.....my most treasured purchase lately is....shoe boxes. I have always liked keeping my shoes in their original boxes because they stack in the closet nicely and I thought easier to find until I saw these above. How much easier to find your shoes when you can see exactly which shoe is in a box. They stack so neatly because they are all the same size. So after salivating over them for a really long time I finally talked Andy into letting me get them. We were so busy for a while I didn't even get to take them out of the box. When I did find the time it was so much fun to put them together and organize my shoes. I was so proud of my beautiful closet that I had to take a picture of it to show someone because how oftern to people come in our bedroom. So here it is...my pride and joy...my closet.

Isn't it beautiful?! I am so pleased with it. You can't see all of the boxes because some of them are below, too.

These boxes aren't only for shoes...they show this other image on the website for an additional view so you can see that they can be used for many, many things. Doesn't that just look like a masterpiece? I know what you are thinking...I can't believe you spent your money on boxes. Boxes. They are only $1.79 each although if you buy their case of 20 the are $6 cheaper. It was worth it to me.

Cinderella

Yesterday we went to Party in the Park, South Ridge Church's community party at 5th Street park. Drea and Charlotte had such a blast. Playing with their friends, getting their face painted, bouncy houses, prizes and who can forget...cookies.

After turning in our prize tickets, we noticed the "bookshelf" with FREE books on it for each child. This was the best prize my kids could have won. They love books! (Thank you Debbie Burgett for your giving heart.)

Drea picked out a Cinderella chapter book. Tonight we read this book at bedtime and it was very trying for my little munchkin. The title page on the inside said, "Cinderella. Retold by Susanna Davidson." After reading that I thought, uh-oh I better prepare her for this.

Drea is regimented. She likes things to stay the same. When we read to her, she will know if we changed a word, skipped a page or in any way veered from how she knows its supposed to go. So I knew this book could be a challenge for her. I prepped her by explaining that "retold" may mean it's different from the way she knows the story to go.

She was very put off by this but still wanted to continue. The book started off normally until we realized that Cinderella's dad is alive throughout the whole book. And the stepsisters have different names, Griselda and Grimella. That's where she stopped.

I tried to be excited about it. "Honey, they have new names in this book."

She said, "Mommy, you need to say their names are Drisella and Anastasia."

I said, "We should read the book the way this author intended us to read it. Let's just give it a try and you can see if you like it."

There were many other differences as the story continued. This may have been one of the hardest things for her. But she made it through the book and soaked in the differences. The book challenged her normalcies and I liked that. It was interesting to watch her reaction. We'll whether she asks to read it again tomorrow. She probably will. It will probably become her favorite. She doesn't like change but then she embraces it after she makes it through it. Probably just like many of us adults, huh?

California Love

From August 4 - 10 the Niessner family headed to California to visit my sister Laura and her family. Our trip didn't start out as planned, but we had a great time anyway. We were scheduled to fly out of Pittsburgh at 1:30 pm, however, Delta had other plans. After being delayed, for an hour, we landed in Atlanta at 4:00 pm with 20 minutes to reach our connecting flight. We ran though the airport like Noel Devine running down the football field. Giving it our best effort and running with a car seat and 4 year old, we missed our flight by 5 minutes. This started our long day in the Atlanta airport. We were on stand by for the 7:15 flight, which we didn't get on, then our 9:50pm flight was delayed until 10:30 pm. We did not land in California until midnight west coast time. We then had to drive 2 1/2 hrs to Laura's house. On the bright side we did manage to get our luggage and the rest of our trip was wonderful. Here are the pictures from our trip.

Here is the reason for our trip to CA, our new nephew Luke David

Getting ready to go though security

The girls' first plane ride

Mommy and Charlotte on the plane

On the other side of this sand dune is Mexico

Those dots are Leo and Drea

Luke and I swimming in the Colorado River in Yuma, AZ



Drea running in the river

These next two pictures are my favorites from our trip, I promise she only looks sweet.

This is at a park that was right around the corner from Laura and Leo's house, we must of rode by it 15 to 20 times and no one was ever playing at it. I guess that was because it was 112 degrees outside. We managed to go at 10am one morning it was only 95!

Drea enjoying the Pacific Ocean

Family Photo

Drea buried up to her neck, this was fun, until it was time to clean the sand off of her.

Pictured from left to right: Melissa (Leo daughter), Leo (Laura's boyfriend), Luke (in Leo's arms), Laura, Stacey, Drea, Andy, and Charlotte

Couple teaser pictures....

Since we haven't had much time to catch up and put pictures up from our vacation, I thought I would give you a couple quickly until we have a chance to put up more. This was our last day in California at Mission Beach in San Diego.

Trip to Cali

We are taking a trip to visit Aunt Laura, Leo and baby Luke today! Flying clear across the country is pretty exciting. We will be back next Tuesday (pretty late) but watch for pictures of our trip when we get back. This is both of the girls first time on an airplane! Pretty exciting day!

facebook statuses

Seems like a silly post but one of the things I love about blogging is having a record of things I will have for my kids one day to look back on. Recently I was thinking about how sometimes I post things on my facebook status that I should be blogging about. Facebook statuses will disappear but hopefully my blogs won't especially since I'm going to be making them into books for the kids. (You can do that on www.blurb.com, in case you wanted to know.)

So below are some of my recent facebook status posts that I want to add to my bank of memories here on our blog.

July 27 - I shouldn't have commented on Charlotte's slow teething process. The doctor said she has 6 teeth coming in at the same time. Four of them are her 1 yr molars. :(

July 26 - is it sad that I'm starting to ask my 4 year old fashion advice? Which shoe looks better...this one or this one?

It gets really difficult when she says "I like the one on the left." because she's really excited that she knows her right and left now. But the problem is she knows HER right and left, she can't turn it around. So I usually just know that she means her left when she says "I like the one on the left." :)

July 20 - bike ride tonight on the rail trail would have been great until I wrecked in the tunnel because there were NO LIGHTS!

July 19 - I just heard Andy singing a song to the girls to the tune of Gloria Estefan's "Rhythm is Gonna Get You". He, he, he!

July 13 - I used to think I was special because Charlotte says "momma" all the time. Not special anymore after noticing she calls Andy "momma", too.

July 12 - Stacey Niessner has been working in the garden for two straight hours. I feel like I have bugs crawling all over me.

July 7 - Yes, I set up the yogurts and drinks in my fridge like I'm on MTV Cribs. It makes me happy.

July 6 - Stacey Niessner was so glad to get home early enough last night to do laundry and unpack suitcases! I rested peacefully knowing it was all finished. I know, I'm such a dweeb.

July 2 - Charlotte stepped on a bee last night and he gladly gave her her first bee sting. ouch! it was such a sad little cry.

June 29 - I have to say that many days I have to just trust that God knows what he's doing and be satisfied.

June 23 - Charlotte gets two teeth every five months. Seriously, 2 at 5 months, 2 at 10 months and now she's getting her next 2 at 15 months. This could be a long process.

That's as far back as I'm going. I always love doing random lists. So I guess this is mine today.

Ice Cream in a Bag

One of the things that I like to do every summer at my summer job is to make ice cream in a bag. It usually turns out, but for some reason this year it was really good. Not Dairy Creme Corner good, but good all the same. Anyway, we decided to make it with the girls. Here are some pictures from the event.

Drea with her strawberry ice cream


Charlotte with chocolate

I made vanilla and Stacey made strawberry, too. We all shared each favor and had a lot of fun making the ice cream here is the recipe to try it on your own. The key is ice and salt, make sure you use enough. You need:

1 gallon ziploc bag

1 quart ziploc bag

4 cups of ice

1/4 cup of salt

1 cup of whole milk

1 teaspoon of vanilla extract

2 tablespoons of sugar

Procedure:

1. Pour the milk, vanilla extract, and sugar into the small ziploc bag. Squeeze as much air out as possible and seal the bag carefully.

2. Place the small ziploc bag down into the large bag. Cover with the ice and salt. Seal the large bag tightly.

3. Shake, toss, and flip the ice cream machine for 5- 10 minutes. Don't open the large bag to check ice cream because it may not seal properly afterwards. Don't worry if the bag leaks, it will.

4. Take small bag out of larger bag and enjoy!

**To make chocolate or strawberry omit the vanilla and DECREASE the sugar to 1 Tbsp. Add strawberry or chocolate syrup.