Mother's Day 2016

I love celebrating Mother's Day!!  The boys and I are so blessed that we have some incredibly strong moms in our lives, and I love any excuse to celebrate that.  We celebrated on Mother's Day at our house this year with my sister and her family and my Mom, but because of Kara's current weekend work schedule, she couldn't join us. So we were challenged to find a way to make the day special for her some other way.

Fueled by my recent DIY spirit, I channeled my inner Chip and Jo Jo and decided that we were going to try to make something for Mommy this year.  It had to be somewhat simple, because I'd have two "helpers" at home with me while it was getting built, but I wanted it to be something that Kara would like.  I stumbled on some plans to make the following center piece, and felt like it was a good option, so we were off and running.

Here was the goal, taken from the site below:
http://www.shanty-2-chic.com/2014/04/bottle-vase-centerpiece.html

The first step was to go purchase the supplies.  Off to went, to Lowes (for stain, wood, and a cheese cloth) and to Meijer (for bottles and flowers).  (As a side note, Luke thought it was absolutely hilarious that it was called a cheese cloth.  He laughed and laughed at this, all day long.

First steps first, we had to empty the bottles and soak them in water to remove the labels.  This was a trick I learned when we were planning for our wedding - we used old wine bottles for our centerpieces.  :)   Rather than just dump them out, I decided that we might as well use this opportunity to let Luke taste the sweet nectar that is Diet Coke for the first time.  (I know that giving a 3 year old soda isn't great, but hey, that's how Daddy rolls).  

Very excited about our first sip of Diet Coke

"Daddy, I even get to use the bottle opener?  I am SO EXCITED"

I'm sure I'll regret this some day, but I just couldn't help it.  So much joy.

Once we took some sips from a real, authentic, Diet Coke, we put the bottles in the sink to soak, and it was time to start reviewing our plans.  I drew them up on a piece of paper and Luke helped me do all the math for the measurements. 

Two quick notes here.  First, that was literally all Luke drank from the Diet Coke, so please don't email me about Aspartame poisoning.  Second, in a brilliant display of competence, I definitely did the math totally wrong here, and built the whole thing in a way that it was too big for the bottles we had.  So, we ended up throwing all of those bottles in the recycling and going to get new, bigger glass bottles at Meijer.  #notgreatatthis

Here's a great shot of Eli helping, and his contributions to the project, which were, of course, significant.

Now that we had the plans squared away, we were ready to start construction.  

Helping Daddy measure and cut is such hard work.  Luke was excited to see the circular saw, but then when I turned on he got really scared and grabbed Eli's hand and said "Daddy, I better take Eli in the house while you do this."

Sanding the edges.  He worked so hard on this.  

Checking to make sure that they are smooth.

More strong contributions from Eli.  (Repeatedly buckling the straps)

Luke also did not like the drill for the holes.  "DADDY! It's TOO Loud!

Luke did all the staining.  When he finished it, both of his arms were orange from elbows to finger tips.  We scrubbed for like an hour, all the while laughing about the term "cheese cloth".

Here's the finished product.  I thought it turned out pretty good, although I definitely learned some lessons for next time.  I'm still pretty new to wood working.  The main thing that I learned during this project was how much I love working on things with Luke and Eli.  I can't wait to teach both of them how to use tools and fix things and make things.  Such a great legacy that my dad taught me that I'm honored to pass along to my boys.

I know it's not exactly a pottery barn replica, but we had fun making it, and Kara seemed to like it, so I'm counting it as a success.  

We also made this banner, where Luke drew pictures of all the reasons that he is thankful for Mommy.  Here are some of the reasons that he came up with - I'll let you match them to their respective drawing.  :)

1.  She prays for us
2.  She makes us laugh
3.  She drives us places
4.  She plays basketball with us
5.  She takes us to the store
6.  She goes on trips with us and always brings fun stuff for us to do
7.  She loves us
8.  She teaches us lots of things
9.  She helps people and doctors at work


We love you Mommy!

-Daddy, Luke, and Eli