Chalk Board Paint

I’ve always wanted to do a chalkboard wall for Spike; I finally decided to do it. Chalkboard paint is somewhat expensive and has limited colors. So I went to the internet to find a DIY option for chalkboard paint, one that was both easy and less expensive than buying ready-made chalkboard paint. The number of tutorials you can find online for doing chalkboard paint is daunting.  I ended up combining multiple tutorials to reach my finished product.

 You will need:

1.       Unsanded grout

2.       Flat paint

3.       Water

4.       bucket

5.       Paint stirring drill attachment (optional but so much faster and more efficient than a stick)

6.     Paint brush and/or paint roller

Ratio 1 tablespoon unsanded grout to ½ cup of paint

 

I did a quart of paint at a time.

I started with 8 tablespoons of unsanded grout in a bucket. Here is where the instructions are a little fuzzy. I found nowhere that told you how much water to add to the grout. I added a little bit at a time until it was the consistency of pancake batter, I should have taken pictures of all the steps.

After it was well mixed I added the paint and used the stirring attachment to blend it well.

I only did a quart at a time. This was enough to do two coats on one wall. I did have to wait in between the two coats of paint. After I finished the first coat I poured the remainder back into quart can. Before starting the 2^nd coat of paint I mixed the paint again just to be on the safe side, I didn’t want to risk the grout separating and settling in the paint can.

I had no problems applying the paint. I used a brush to “cut in” around the door and moldings, and used a standard roller for the major parts of the wall.

After the paint is dry, I waited 4 hours and “slated” the wall. This is an important step, and the bigger the chalk board the longer it is going to take. To slate the area you take a piece of chalk (or in my case many pieces of chalk) and turn it on its side and rub it on the wall. You then erase it in a circular motion, either with a dry rag or a felt eraser.  After you have that done you can draw on the wall however you like and it will erase easily.  Some tutorials say to let the paint cure for longer. The longest I have seen is 3 days, before slating.  I might try this next time.  So far the wall is doing great, it’s been just over a week and it’s been used almost every day.

 

 

**** DO NOT USE SIDE WALK CHALK ON A CHALKBOARD WALL, SIDE WALK CHALK HAS OILS AND WAXES THAT MAKE IT DIFFICULT IMPOSSIBLE TO ERASE ****

 

blogging failure.. and big news

Clearly I really do suck at blogging. I might try to get better. I make no promises. Since my last post in July of 2012 so much has gone on. The biggest being that our family is growing again. Spike is going to be a big brother. To a little sister we are calling Katie, that might change. I mean really with siblings called: Boy, Goozie, Bug and Spike you can't just be called Katie. She will make her grand arrival hopefully in May. We had a 3d ultrasound done last week. and she looks just like Spike did as a newborn.

Maybe we can call her Spike Jr. 

Being pregnant with a girl is totally different from being pregnant with a boy. Or maybe it just falls under the "all pregnancies are different" tag line. Since we found out that she is a girl we I am trying to come to grips with having a girl that I'm supposed to teach how to be a girl. The big girls have their mom to depend on for girly things so I never really felt the pressure of teaching them how to do hair, or how to dress or wear make up. All of those things I try not to worry with ever. But the closer it gets to my due date the more I am feeling scared out of my mind comfortable with having a daughter. 

31day blog challenge... what an epic failure

YEP... I totally failed at the 31 day challenge... I suck at blogging sometimes.

Day 3: Your first love

First love is complicated subject. I think that what most people think of as their first “love” is not “love” at all. This may not be true…. But it is my experience.

                In my mind my first love was my husband. Maybe was isn’t the right word. He IS my first love. He is an amazing man. He goes above and beyond to treat me like a princess. He isn’t perfect, I’m not perfect but I honestly believe that are imperfections are what make us so perfect for each other. 

Day 2: Meaning behind your blog name

My blog's name is pretty self explanatory, if you have been reading my blog since I started it (wait do people read my blog??) you would know that it started out just being about Spiky! Since then it has evolved to a bunch of random chatter.

31 Day Blog Challenge Day 1: Introduce, recent picture of yourself, 15 interesting facts

I warned you I was probably going to suck at this challenge. So here we are on March 2, and I am just now doing Day 1 of the challenge, which means I have to go and do two days worth of Challenges in one day!
To introduce myself... I am Spike's Mom... I am the stepmom to The Boy, The Gooze and The Bug. and yes that is what we call them 85% of the time. I work in a city located in the north-central region of the Gulf of Mexico doing police dispatch, 12 hour shifts over night.

15. Interesting facts 

1. I have very few close friends; I always expect them to leave so I don't get close to anyone anymore. 

2. I changed my degree from Graphic Design, to Psychology, spent two years in Psych and decided to drop out of college all together. This is one of the best decisions I have ever made. 

3. I dread the day that the kids decide they want to go to Disney, I do not fare well in the happiest place on earth. 

4. I am the oldest of 5 (7 if you count my stepbrothers)

5. I am slightly misanthropic

6. I have worked with the same people for almost 7 years. I know very little personal information about most of them. 

7. I vividly remember the worst calls I have ever had at work, and still have nightmares about them. 

8. I can't play a single musical instrument (I'm trying to learn guitar) but I can see most songs if they are in the key of A. 

9. My youngest sibling is 6 weeks younger than my son. 

10. Sometimes I am completely overwhelmed being a wife and mother. 

11. I like to take pictures... 

12. I tend to distance myself from people.

13. I lost most of my friends from High School when I started working for a police department. 

14. I am married to my best friend 

15. I was the babysitter. 

31day blog challenge...

if you are one of my facebook friends you would know that I just completed a photo a day challenge for February. Thankfully it was only 29 days because it is harder than I thought to be creative for 29 days! Since I did make that commitment for February I think for March I am going to do a post a day challenge. Unfortunately I can't find a 31 day blog challenge. So I'll be doing a 30 day blog challenge. and hopefully Ill come up with something cool for the 31st day. Here is the list of blog topics for the 30 days... I may alter some, I may skip one here or there and do something different. But I will do my best to do a post a day.
Day 0: The 30 Day Challenge Explanation and Description
Day 1: Introduce, recent picture of yourself, 15 interesting facts
Day 2: Meaning behind your blog name
Day 3: Your first love
Day 4: Your parents
Day 5: A song to match your mood
Day 6: A picture of something that makes you happy
Day 7: Favorite movies
Day 8: A place you've traveled to
Day 9: A favorite picture of your best friend
Day 10: Something you're afraid of
Day 11: Favorite tv shows
Day 12: Something you don't leave the house without
Day 13: Goals
Day 14: A picture of you last year - how have you changed?
Day 15: Bible verse
Day 16: Dream house
Day 17: Something you're looking forward to
Day 18: Favorite Place to Eat
Day 19: Something you miss
Day 20: Nicknames
Day 21: Favorite Picture of yourself ALL TIME Why?
Day 22: What's in your purse?
Day 23: Favorite Movie
Day 24: Something you've learned
Day 25: Put your iPod on shuffle, first 10 songs
Day 26: Your Dream Wedding
Day 27: Original Photo of the city you live in
Day 28: Something that stresses you out
Day 29: 3 Wishes
Day 30: a picture of yourself this day and 5 good things that happened since you started the challenge
Day 31: I'm not sure yet but maybe something cool :)

I am...

I am by no means a famous blogger. I am not pithy or overly humorous. I am who I am. I am Spike’s mom, I am a stepmother to 3 wonderful children, I am a wife to a wonderful man who goes above and beyond to make me feel like a princess, I am a woman with PCOS, and I am a {insert occupation here}. While these things influence who I am they are not who I am. I am far more than all of that.

For starters I used to be a college student, I was working on a BA in Psychology, and then I found out that Psychology is not what I thought it was going to be and I dropped out, yep I am a college drop out. I really thought that I would regret this decision, but I don’t. Not at all, not one little bit. Its only been two months and already I feel relieved. No longer do I have to “neglect” the Spike in order to get school work done. No more do I have to stress about deadlines, due dates and what my next paper topic is going to be. The only down side is that I LOVE writing. Like absolutely love it, I don’t really like the research part of writing but the actual putting thoughts on paper (or word) is very satisfying. I know that one day I will find more things to write about and more time to write, but as of now I am really enjoying just working and being Spike’s mom.

By the way, at some point in the last month Spike decided to turn 2, and apparently turning 2 means that he is drawing on himself with pens that I cannot find before or after the new Spike tattoo is drawn, he is also climbing on top of furniture, like book cases, boxes, you name it he climbs on it. 

What makes a house a home?

It is time for a vocabulary lesson oh great and you know that its going to be torture fun!

Word one: house noun: a building for human habitation, esp. one that is lived in by a family or small group of people

Word two: home noun: the place where one live permanently, esp. as a member of a family or household

Most people think that these words are interchangeable. Clearly as clear as mud they are not. In my mind a house is just somewhere you eat, sleep, watch tv etc. A home is where you raise your family. 

We have lived in our current house since August of 2008, for starters I don't like it, I've never liked it but it was a place to live. In all this time I have yet to decorate, the walls are the same color as they were when we moved in. There are 4 pictures on the wall, and that has just been in the last year. When we first moved in I decorated the children's bathrooms, there is no theme for bedrooms, our bedroom has curtains that my mom made and those were also put up when we moved in. 

Well a series of unfortunate events has made it so that we are moving. and we are not just moving... We are moving to a HOME! 

In the next few weeks we are moving from our current house to a new home! on one level I feel a little overwhelmed; but on every other level I am totally excited! 

I do feel like we are starting over but in a good way. I actually want to paint and decorate and save the money for a tree house and whatever else. I finally feel like we are going to be somewhere permanent and it is a major relief

those secret hidden blessings....

you know those little things in life you find to be utterly annoying... like you have a flat tire so you have to find somewhere to air it up and you don't have any quarters but then a nice person walks over and gives you quarters to you can air up your tires, or, you spend your teenage years being all pure and what not because you know the first time you have sex you'll get pregnant; only to find out at 24 that you have PCOS and require months of fertility treatments to get pregnant, or you start a business think you are doing really well only to do your taxes and find out that you actually lost over $500 this year... yeah me either...
So Friday I get ready for work, go out to my car, check my tires (yes I really do that before I get in my car EVERYDAY) and realize that my rear passenger tire is flat, like way omg flat. Luckily there is a gas station a block from my house, so I go in the house find some quarters drive to the gas station put my quarters in the machine and of course the machine is out of order. Its Friday afternoon after 5 the store is super busy so I decide to push my luck and drive 5 1/2 miles to the next store, at the red light old guy and grandson (?) pull up next to me and tell me that my tire is flat. Well duh big red truck... I nodded , thanked them and went on my merry way. Thankfully I made it to the next gas station but I had no more quarters, I refuse to ask people for money because, well idk why, maybe pride or embarrassment, who knows. But while I was frantically searching my car for enough change to make a dollar to go in the store and get changed a nice person stopped and asked if I was ok and gave me quarters to put air in my tires. See there's the hidden blessing.

Tonight I was doing the schedule c part of my taxes. I had really thought that b & b designs had done good this year but I was apparently wrong once I added it all up. However I can honestly say that I gave it my best shot, and that sense of accomplishment is yet again another blessing....
and then we have the Spike, the product of the years of infertility he's not so much a hidden blessing and more an in your face "hi I'm red headed and crazy" blessing.
So don't look for the negatives, look at what the negatives turn into positives and remember that the next time you face a negative head on :)

Crave Photography

Crave photography is having a 25,000 fan give away! If you are into photography you should go check out (and like) their facebook page and also go check out their blog. Crave always posts very helpful hints and some awesome shots. Its totally worth checking out!

Where to begin???

In November  I mentioned that we are working on making a new Spike. Not really a "NEW" Spike but an additional Spike, or Spikette. December was the first month with Follistim; unfortunately it was unsuccessful. The  news of it being unsuccessful was not devastating and not entirely that surprising. I'm not going to lie; it is NOT fun being on fertility meds, multiple appointments to have blood drawn, daily shots of fsh for 2 weeks, a shot of hcg and then 2 weeks of progesterone supplements, and I am not even ready to talk about the delivery of the progesterone supplements. But after all of that for several months I still got the Spike and it made the months of frustration, and drs appointments (and then months of morning sickness) totally worth it.
Well adding injury to the insult of the negative pregnancy test on December 27th I go in today (December 29) for baseline blood work and ultrasound and find out that I have a 22mm cyst on my right ovary which means I have to take the month off from fertility meds, and I have to go on aygestin to shrink the cyst. One of the worst parts about the cyst is that I didn't even know I had it until she started the ultrasound and was measuring my uterus and that little bit of pressure was enough to anger the cyst and I have been in some level of discomfort ever since. I am scheduled for another baseline on Jan 23. So here's hoping in February we make another October baby!

Almond pound cake

Since I had surgery the day before thanksgiving I made my dessert For thanksgiving on Tuesday. I made an almond pound cake. It was the first time I made one that wasn't plain. I think it turned out pretty well. If you want to make this pound cake it is:

2 1/4c all purpose flour

2 1/4c sugar

3 sticks of butter 

7 jumbo eggs

1 capful almond extract

1 capful vanilla extract 

Preheat oven to 325

sift together flour and sugar

add the butter, almond extract and vanilla extract to the mixing bowl. Alternate adding flour/sugar and eggs until all ingredients combined. mix on high for 2 minutes after all ingredients are in the bowl.

Spray bundt pan and add mixture

bake for 1 hr 5 min

the "drizzle" for lack of a better term is in all reality fruit dip.

it is

1 standard package of cream cheese

1 small container of marshmallow cream

1 capful of vanilla.

Whip together, put in a piping bag and drizzle over the cake

This cake I put toasted almonds on top since my grandmother wanted an almond pound cake, generally I don't put any almond flavoring and put mini chocolate chips on top.

November

November has been a busy and emotional month. I really don't even know how to begin to describe how busy and emotional.

My grandfather died on November 14^th. He was diagnosed with bladder cancer earlier this year, so his death was not a surprise but even with it not being a surprise it has still been difficult to deal with. My grandfather was one of the most important men in my life. He taught me how important it was to always be on time for anything, no matter how unimportant the event seemed. He would do anything for anyone weather he knew them or not. Even with his faults the world was a better place with him in it. Spike and I (and most of the rest of my immediate family) were at his house when he died, we sang to him as he took his last breath. It was a very touching moment.

The night of my grandfather's funeral November 17th my father's sister died. I was not close with my aunt, but her passing was still sad.

November 23^rd I had a hysteroscopic D&C with polypectomy. The surgery went as expected and the outlook is good for an additional child in our future. The only odd thing that happened was my iv infiltrated, which made my arm swell, and I have a lovely bruise.

In Spike news he is slowly learning his abc's and since he is only 13 ½ months old I think any abc learning is pretty cool. I have a video on my phone but I don't know if I can upload it from my phone. I'm sure there is an app for that.

My son the musician

For his 1st birthdy Spike recieved a drum (because I am the coolest mom ever!!) and he loves it!


Little did I know I could have gotten him a broom for his birthday just so he could play some sweet air guitar, complete with power slide.

I see a sound proof instrument room in my future!

First Hair Cut!!

Spike had his first haircut a little more than a week ago. He did such a good job!

Save Araya Sunshine | MicroGiving.com

Save Araya Sunshine | MicroGiving.com

About this Project

We need help to save a family friend. My friend and her family are loosing their dog Araya to distemper. She received all of her vaccinations and booster shots later but has still caught the disease. The problem started when her husband brought a puppy in that he had found. At that time the puppy was healthy. One day the puppy got out of the fence and was later found at the pound. She was brought home and was thought to have kennel cough which turned out to be distemper after being exposed to their other two dogs, Araya and Jade. We have now found out that the human society admits to keeping ill dogs with healthy dogs and that there is an outbreak of distemper in the city they live in. Jade was the first of the two to come down with the disease. She was a micro chihuahua and it was not long before she was too far gone. They used their mortgage to try to save her but she did not make it and once she passed they had her cremated. Their daughter was greatly affected by her death. Now Araya has come down with the disease and may not make it without treatment. They need to take her to a clinic several hours away to receive the newcastle disease vaccine treatment that would be given through her spine but they do not have the money. Araya has been a major part of the family. She was a gift to my friend from her husband because of the many fertility problems they were having. She has saved my friend from a robber and is always on alert to protect the family. She has been a loving dog and a great protector. We now want to return the favor but can not afford to do so. We do not have much time and we could use any help that could be given to say her life. You can add my friend on facebook as a friend, Brandy Sutton, http://www.facebook.com/marleekingston. She really needs any help that can be given.

I am

almost the mother of a 1 year old! Where has this year gone!?!?! Spike has grown and changed so much in the last year. It is truly a blessing to watch him grow and learn. Even though it has only been a year I can't imagine what my life would be like without him. This weekend is a busy one his birthday party is this weekend. Hopefully his first hair cut will be today. I am so tired of people telling me I have a beautiful daughter. I know traditionally you don't get a baby's hair cut until after their first birthday but I'm a rebel!

Welcome to October!

In 8 short days Spiky will turn 1! Where has this year gone? He has changed so much! Is every year going to be this way? I don't know what I expected his first year to be like, but it has been totally amazing. We need to build something to make time slow down!

The bracelets have found a new home!

If you find yourself at Adventures with Spiky looking for paracord bracelets they have been relocated. You can now find them at http://bandbdesign.blogspot.com/ Along with the move they can now be purchased straight from that page without having to be redirected to Etsy. The prices have bee updated to reflect the current sale where they are $10 instead of $12. Thanks to everyone for their past and continuing support!