The Bethke Bunch

{off to school}

Here is our first day.  In the collage you can see how nervous Sadie Grace & Cami got~but no tears!  That is huge for us!  Oh and I love the one of cami dancing to the garage door with her fingers pointed up.  So cute!

Sadie Grace was so excited to carry her "purse!"

 

 

Cambry was just plain excited!  Can you tell?

 

Purely for our memories.  Thought I would share our pretty much unedited collage.  I just love them!  OH we did have a minor catastorphie this morning.  Sadie Grace's chubby feet wouldn't fit into her shoes we bought for school.  So Garrett raced upstairs to our hand me down closet and found a pair of pumas for SG.  Whew thank goodness.  It was so sad, we tried to cram, but no dice.  Nike is not made for my baby.

{clips, bows & bands}

Well this is one of my organizational obsessions!  I love to organize.  I have found the perfect bow & headband storage that works for me!  Here is a little thingie.  My friend emailed me today asking if I had a genius headband storage idea.  I have been meaning to post this for a bit and she gave lit the fire under me!  So here is how we do it at the Bethke household.  {Remember to click to see it full size or you can go to the Organizational section for a PDF download.}

 

{cookin' up something good}

Yeah!  I started a meal swap with some friends.  There are 3 of us to keep it small.  Every month we will swap a freezer friendly meal.  This month I chose to do Chicken & Sausage Jambalaya.  It isn't spicy at all and you can make it a bit healthy with some simple swaps like turkey sausage instead of beef sausage.  Easy right?  So I whip up 2 pots, let it cool and spoon it into my food saver vacuum packs.  Then I seal it up, label it and pop it in my deep freeze.  When I freeze all my sauces, etc. I lay them flat when they are freezing.  When our vitals are finally frozen I have flat dinners literally ready to file away.  Sounds silly I know, but it helps me keep my freezer tidy so a brick of spaghetti sauce doesn't crash down onto my foot!  I am finally starting my recipes section of my blog sure to delight.  I will post my faves.  Please do share yours too!  I made my template very simple so I just copy my recipe from my Cookn' recipe software and plop it into this template and save it.  I don't want to get in over my head which I do have a tendency to do.  So we will keep it simple.  Oh and I have made it without the green peppers and it is still delicious.  A download-able PDF is in the Recipes section on the sidebar! 

{inside scoop}

I am super excited!  I am working on getting my "client site" together.  It will be full of all kinds of important information to make portraits a snap for you and me!  It will be a password protected blog.  The Inside Scoop will have stuff like client forms, styling tips, links to my favorite stores, my pricing, etc.  It is a work in progress, I am so excited to get this done!  Yipee for me! 

I may take some pics later of my girls.  We shall see!  These last few days of summer are KILLING me!  I am not kidding~I am spent.  Thank goodness it is cooled down so we can go outside a bit more without melting and turing red from heat stroke.  I actually went outside yesterday and didn't come back in exhausted and crabby.  My girls are so sweet and I love them to pieces, but I am over summer!  Bring on FALL {and school}!

{clippity clip clip!}

I love to make fancy hair accessories.  I have moved on from bows to a much wider variety of materials.  I have used silk flowers, but I am done with that.  Now I love to use felt.  So fun.  It doesn't matter what I do I always use a lined alligator clip as my base.  The lining  part is super easy so I decided to do a silly little tutorial.  Once you line it you can glue a bow and wrap the center knot to the underside of the clip, glue a cool doo-dad, whatever really!  Some of these clips are just like this but wrapped in a cute ribbon.  Anyway: click to make it bigger and the PDF file is in the {crafty downloads} section.  

{Oh Elfa, how do I love thee}

Let me count the ways!  We were having major hall closet drama so I redesigned my coat closet just in time for school.  Elfa is an amazing product Container Store does right.  They have a fantastic computer program that gets your closet together in a jiffy.  Not to mention it can be reworked at anytime with grace and ease.  We discovered our love for Elfa when we moved into our current home about 2 years ago.  In the early fall {now} they have a 25% off shelving sale.  In January they have a 20% off everything Elfa sale that is well worth the wait.  We like to tell people we Elfa-ized our house.  Check out our newest venture.  We went and picked up a few new shelves today and it was done in a jiffy, about 30 minutes to be exact.  Problem solved!  Let me know what you think, or if you have any other ideas how to simplify the closet.  {Click to make it bigger and a PDF download is in the Organizational Downloads section of my blogdom!}

Oh my, I feel like I just showed you my dirty laundry!

  

Ahhhhh, I feel better now!

{well today I am 30}

That is right today is my 30th!  Yeah!  I am no longer in my 20's I suppose.  No biggie, who really cares.  So since it is my birthday I have a present for y'all.  A tutorial on making Woodland Fairy Princess Crowns.  There are several people who makes these on etsy.com.  They are so cute and you can do so many things with them.  Not to mention the are a total snap to whip up!  {Click to see it all, it will be in the crafty downloads section}

{madame alexander}

Growing up my sisters and I collected Madame Alexander Dolls.  They are so stinkin' cute.  This year for the girls birthdays Darcie {their Godmother} decided to give my girls a doll for each birthday until they are 18.  On the bottom she typed up a sweet note with her favorite memories from the year.  They are so cute and I know my girls will always cherish them.  Finally today I got around to taking some rather lame picture of them and collaging for their "digital" scrapbooks.  {I am not a scrapper, in fact I hate it.}  Anyway with out further chatter here are my girls new dollies!  {Click on the pic to zoom in to see it all and read what my sweet sister wrote.}

{Cambry got Sleeping Beauty and her Fairy Godmothers.}

{Sadie Grace got Little Red and the Big Bad Wolf.}

{my niece}

Well here she is.  My little 10 oz. niece.  We are so excited!  Now we are hoping for red hair like her daddy!  She will be here around January 10th!  HOORAY!

{perry is having a girl}

Yeah we found out today my little sister Perry is having a girl!  Wahoooo!  That means...

1. I have 2 sisters and 2 daughters

2. Now my sister is having a girl, so I will have a niece

3. That means all the grand kids are currently girls {The husbands and Darcie's Boyfriend were not surprised by still being completely outnumbered, which we love!}

So a girl is fitting and will blend perfectly!  As one of my friends said we are taking over the world!  What I think is most fun about this is that my girls will have a cousin close in age that is a girl too.  What fun as they get older to become friends as well as cousins.  I love that.  It will be so fun in Galveston when they are into the same things boys, sassing, etc.  Darcie {my other little sister} and I showered them with random Target girl purchases as soon as we found out!  Cambry and Sadie Grace gave Auntie Perry hair bows, a barbie, a Cinderella doll {Cinderella is Perry's favorite Princess}, girlie pacis, and sweet itty bitty Newborn Pampers Swaddlers!  We had fun!  I finally will be an Auntie!