Black-out drapes

Last weekend my mom and I made black-out drapes for Parker's bedroom. The sun hits that window during the day so it gets really hot in there and it is too bright in there for naps (well, long ones anyway). I wanted to tell yall how I added the black-outs to Parker's drapes. My mom and I made them when I was pregnant with Parker. I just love these drapes in Parker's room. They make such a statement because they are 12 feet tall and they are so bright, they add a ton of color to his room. It is hard to get a good picture of them because they are so tall. Below is a picture of the drapes with the blackout curtains behind them. Normally I would pull the blackout fabric back with the blue drapes so that you can see the window (it is rounded at the top). I just kept it this way so that yall could see both at the same time.
I didnt want to sew the blackout fabric directly to the drapes because they are already lined. So, I had to figure out another way to get them up. I decided to use a thick curtain rod (needs to be thick to hold so much fabric)and put it behind the very top of the drapes. I didnt want to put the rod on normal curtain rod brackets because it would stick out too far and make the drapes look funny.

You can kinda see the top of the blackout curtains in this picture. The new rod is pretty well hidden and the technique we used unexpectedly made it even darker!!

We used "C" brackets that are used on PVC pipes to hold them in place. The picture didnt turn very good, but below you can kinda see the bracket. We just cut a small hole in the fabric for the screw. It holds the curtain rod flush to the wall. This means that no light comes out the top of the drapes!

These brackets also ended up holding the heavy frabic up better than a normal curtain bracket would have.

All we had to do on these blackout curtains was sew a pocket for the rod and hem them. It was that easy!!! I was just so happy with the outcome. I have spent alot of time thinking about how I could get these curtains up without haveing to mess with the original drapes. I think it ended up working out better and I am so happy with the results!!

Look how I found Parker yesterday drinking his milk!!! What a cutie!

Memorial Weekend and a new trick

This past weekend was Memorial Day weekend. It rained the entire weekend and we pretty much did absolutely nothing. On Saturday night we did have a few friends over to eat burgers, but it rained so they girls stayed inside and talked and the boys stayed outside under the patio and talked. You would have thought we were in 6th grade!!! On Sunday it poured ALL DAY!! We didnt go to church because Parker got a cough and runny nose and we didnt want to risk it in the nursery. He is getting 4 teeth right now!
On Monday my parents came over and my mom and I made blackout drapes for Parker's room. My mom and I made drapes for Parker's room before he was born and I was cheap and didnt want to spend the money on blackout fabric. Well, it is a must in his room. During the day he will not take naps in there because the sun beats right on his window. It gets so bright in there and it gets really hot. He has been taking naps in our room in his pack and play for a couple of months now and it is really inconvenient when I am trying to do laundry and other things I TRY to do on the weekends.
Here is my mom sewing one of the panels.

Since The drapes were already beautiful and fully lined we didnt want to mess with them. (did I mention that this window is 12 feet tall!!!!!) We made 2 blackout panels with a pocket at the top for the rod. I think I will post how we put them up on tomorrow's post. We did it a little different and it makes all the difference! I will also include a picture of the pretty drapes ( I am very proud of them!)

Parker learned a new trick this week!! He learned how to lick the icecream off of the cone! He would usually just pucker his lips up and put them on the icecream. I know this is silly, but it is just one more thing that he has learned to do..he is growing up so fast!

I just had to show you a picture of how Parker likes to sit all the time now....with his ankles crossed. This is how he sits everywhere, in his highchair, carseat, everywhere.

Here are just a few pictures of Parker having fun at the office. This is his last week of being at the office full time with me!. He starts daycare on Monday.

A week of fun stuff!!

This week has been full of graduation activities. On Sunday night I went to my cousin's bacceulareate. On Monday night I went to Wes' high school graduation from Arkansas Baptist. It brought back so many memories of my graduation from AB 8 years ago!! I can't believe that it has been 8 years! It is almost time for my 10 year reunion....I cant wait for that!! I dont miss high school but I do miss being surrounded by all of my friends every day.
Here is me, Wes, Kelsey and Amy (my two sisters) after graduation.

Dennis stayed home with Parker while I went to my cousin's graduation. Tonight I am staying home while Dennis attends his nephew's, Miles, high school graduation.


Last night Kris Allen won American Idol. He is such a cutie patutie and it is even more fun that he is from Arkansas!! Everyone is so proud of him and I cant wait to see what he does! I know that he will give God all of the glory.
This is Parker watching American Idol. He gets so excited watching all the performers. Sadly he could not stay up late enough to see Kris being name the American Idol, but I filled him in this morning.




CAUTION!!!!! Questionable pictures.......





Last night Parker took his first shower, and he LOVED it!! He just played in the floor while I took a shower. We probably stayed in there for like 30 minutes. I think he would have stayed in there forever!

Just look at that little bootie!! I had some more REALLY cute pictures but they show a little too much so they will need to be photoshopped.



Today I also found out some super exciting news!!! My best friend, Diane, is 20 weeks pregnant and today she found out she is having a girl!!! I must say that I am a little jealous that she is having a girl. I will just have to live through her and buy really cute outfits for her little girl to wear!! I hope that her and Parker can be best buddies! I mean, how could a girl not love that cute little butt!!

Here is Diane and Parker last Fall. I think Parker was like 9 or 10 months in this picture.
Parker loves Diane and always get so excited when he sees her. He shows his excitement by screaming at her!!

And here is just a sweet picture of my big boy!
We enrolled Parker in daycare this week. He starts on June 1st. I will blog more about this next week but I think this is going to be so good for him. But I also think it is gonna be a little hard for me at first! He is going to go part time at first and then when I start school he might have to a little more.
I hope everyone has a great weekend!

ACCEPTED!!!

I found out last week that I was accepted into the graduate program at UAMS college of nursing. My specialty will be adult acute care nurse practitioner. Basically I will be a nurse practitioner for adults specializing in ICU patients. I will be going full time and will start in August. Going full time it will take 2 1/2 years to complete my degree. I am very excited but I am also very nervous!! I will be diagnosing and prescribing medications, just a little overwhelming! It has also been a while since I have been in school and had to study! And now I have a toddler running around that house. I have a feeling there will be alot of studying going on after bedtime!
Last week I met with my advisor at UAMS. I have to admit that walking back into that place was a little unsettling. I have many good memories from nursing school but plenty of bad ones too. I think only people who went to nursing school can understand my feelings towards that place. Being a nurse is my passion and I love it, but getting to where I am today was.....well.....interesting. (I was going to say something negative, but I need to keep this positive since I am going back to school!!!!).

I also have to start working more at the hospital. To start my second year in school I have to have a certain amount of working hours (to make sure I have enough experience). So, this next year we are going to have to start Parker in daycare, at least part time, so that I can get all the hours I need. Anways, August will begin a new chapter in my life. I am so excited to be moving my career forward and that I am gonna be doing what I always have wanted to do!

Las Vegas

Last weekend Dennis and I had a long weekend in Vegas. Dennis had meetings on Monday so I decided to go with him to Vegas. We left on Saturday at 11:30. Our flight was nonstop and we were there by 12:30! We still had the entire day to play! There was one small mishap with our luggage. We got all of our luggage from the plane, but when we got off the shuttle at our hotel it wasnt on the shuttle anymore!!! The driver was so nice and he had our luggage to us in under an hour. We were so relieved because it had all of Dennis' work clothes. I was so glad we didnt have to shop for something for Dennis to wear to his meetings. After the luggage drama we were able to relax and have fun!

This is the lobby of our hotel. We stayed at the Venetian. Our room was amazing!! We had a living room and a bedroom and an amazing bathroom!

This is the long beautiful hallway to the casino!

These are the canal shops in our hotel. You can barely see the gondala in the bottom right of the picture. You could ride in the gondalas and the driver would sing romantic songs to you really loud! Sadly, we never got around to doing this.

This is a statue in the canal shoppes that is a REAL person!! I have no idea how long they stand still like this but it is ridiculous how real they look. She only opened her eyes because I gave her a dollar (notice all of the money on the ledge) but when their eyes are closed it is hard to tell they are real.

This is outside of our hotel. This is suppose to be like Venice with the canals and gondalas. People only rode in these gondalas at night because it was really hot!

The first place we went was the Forum Shops....amazing shopping!!

That night we went for a walk down to the Bellagio to see the water show.

This is the view from the Bellagio.

This is water show from two sides of the lake. It took so long to walk around the lake that we saw the show twice!!

That night we had to stop and gamble!! We gambled in a really fun place and they put balloon hats on people! I thought it was really funny!

We gambled a little each night. One night we were up and the other we were down. I think we ended up pretty much breaking even--that's winning to me!! All that matters is that we had a great time!

This is the waterfalls outside of the Wynn, so beautiful!

On Sunday nigth we went to the MGM Grand and ate at Emeril's (SOOO YUMMY!!)

They have a lion habitat. This is a tunnel that goes through the habitat and there were two HUGE lions laying on top of it.

Here are the two lions laying on the tunnel.

Before dinner we walked over to the New York New York hotel. There is a rollercoaster on top of the casino. We didnt have time to do that, but we went and looked at it. That hotel is definitely a kid friendly place!

Dennis and I at Emeril's

After dinner we went to a hypnotist show that was really funny. When we walked in the door the hostest told us we were getting an upgrade. She took us to the front row and we got to sit on a couch!!

On Monday night we went to see Mystere, a Cirque de solei show. It was so amazing!! I want to see more of those shows!

Parker and Dennis had flowers delivered to our room on Mother's Day. Yes, I was out of town on Mother's Day. My parents kept Parker. I get to see Parker all day every day! I was sad that I didnt get to see him on Mother's Day but it is only a day!

On Monday morning Dennis and I laid out by the pool and had lunch at the poolside grill. After that Dennis had to go to his meetings at the convention center. It was a very relaxing afternoon for me. I walked around and went shopping. I relaxed in our huge comfy bed and had room service for dinner. It was nice!

And here is what Parker did while we were gone. Had tons of fun with Kelsey at Nana's.

They even got him a little car!

I dont think he missed us too much!

We had so much fun. I didnt take pictures of everything we did becaue I just forgot. and I know I didnt tell you everything we did, but we did so much in two days!! There is so much more that we want to do there. We will definitely be going back very soon!

Kris Allen Comes Home and Vegas!!

I love American Idol and I watch it every week. I am just so excited about Kris Allen being in the top three!!! He came home last night and was on the news. He is performing at the River Market at noon and has a parade and concert tonight in Conway. It is like a HUGE celebrity is in town. There is an hourly watch on Fox 16 to tell you "where is Kris Allen". They had a camera on the runway at the airport last night to watch for Kris (a little ridiculous), but I am addicted to the coverage! He is such a cutie!

It is unbelievable all the stuff Kris has planned for one day. This is all of the people that showed up to watch Kris at the River Market.

I am also excited because tomorrow Dennis and I are leaving for Las Vegas!!!! I am so excited and I jut cant hide it!! I need a break so bad. Dennis had a meeting planned for Monday so we thought I would come along and we could go a few days early and make it a long weekend. I have never been there. My mom and dad are keeping Parker. We dont really have anything planned and that makes me so excited!!! I cant wait to sleep in, go shopping, lay by the pool and just have a fun and relaxing time!! Please let me know if you have any suggestions on "must see" places!

Multiple Dr Visits

This has been a pretty busy week. On Tuesday I took Parker to the doctor for his weekly pulse ox check and I also asked the Dr to look in Parker's ears because he had been cranky and pulling at them. Well his pulse ox was 69!! and Parker has his VERY FIRST ear infection. She said it's a good thing I had her look in his ear because we caught it early and dogded a few sleepless nights! I called Cardiology as soon as I left and they wanted to me to go back in two days to recheck his pulse ox. She said it could have been related to the ear infection. Parker wasnt having any symptoms that a low pulse ox would cause so they werent that worried about it. I kinda thought that the reading wasnt that accurate because Parker would not sit still and his heart rate didnt really correlate.
On Wednesday Parker had physical therapy and when I went to pick him up he came down hall with no pants on!!! His therapist said that he started scratching and she took his pants off and he had huge sores and bumps on his legs and bottom. By the time I had gotten there the worst of it had gone away. The first think I thought was it is a reaction to the antibiotics. But I remembered seeing bumps on his feet and hands on Tuesday before we started the antibiotics. I called the Dr and they wanted to see him before they told us to give him anything. So, I made an appointment for the next day since we had to recheck his pulse ox anyway.
On Thursday we go back to the pediatrician! Since we were there with an actual appointment, I asked if we could go ahead and do his 18 month checkup (it was suppose to be in 2 weeks). They said that was fine. I checked Parker's pulse ox by myself with no one in the room. I let it sit for like 30 seconds and wathced the pulse on the monitor so that I knew it was accurate and it read 84! This is a great pulse ox--I feel so much better. I dont think I am going to go check it EVERY week anymore unless he is symptomatic. It is just making me crazy and Parker just needs to be a normal kid for a while. Dont get me wrong, I am still gonna get it checked from time to time (maybe every 2 weeks or so). I know what he looks and acts like when it is too low and that is when I need to be worried. So, the bumps ended up being foot and mouth disease. It is just a virus where bumps appear on kids hands, feet and mouth (and bottom). There is no medicine and it just has to run its coarse. He is lucky that it is not inside of his mouth, just around it. The Dr said it is only contagious before the bumps appear, oops!!! No one else seems to have it, PTL! It flares up in the heat and starts itching, but if he stays cool it doesnt seem to bother him.
Now for his 18 month stats:
weight: 20 lbs 10 oz (this is amazing, last month he barely weighed 19 lbs--I have really been trying to pack on the lbs and it seems to be working!)
Height: 29 1/2 (I kinda think he got his mom's height!)
Anyways, this has become a really long post!
All in all Parker is doing great and just being a boy!

Bouncy Fun!!!

This past weekend Stephen, Sarah and Sydney came over. It was the one day that it didnt rain in the past 2 weeks! So, we blew up the bounce house!! Parker and Sydney are finally big enough to play in it all by themselves. They had so much fun! Parker got so sweaty!

There were two slides. He would go down the little slide face first and then climb back up it all by himself!!

Daddy had to help him with the big slide.

They had so much fun crawling all over each other.

Daddy had to get in and play too!

They wore themselves out and got SOOO dirty! Every crease on Parker was black!

So, they had to take a bath and get all cleaned up! Sydney even borrowed a pair of Parker's "boy" pajamas. Sydney and Parker went to sleep and the grownups just hung out. It was a really fun evening!

The best part was that Parker slept until 11:00 the next morning!!!