Ladybugs

I need something to make me smile today.  2 years ago I posted Doodlebug shoes in honor of KAH's birthday.  Of course, it's his birthday again today, which makes me smile.  Although I can't believe he's 24.  He was born when I was 18, so for this year we're inverse ages.  I posted this picture on Facebook this morning:

This is from when I used to do daycare for him and his sister, and this is how I tend to think of him (although I DO realize he is a grown man with a job and a life, of whom I am incredibly proud).  I have a small obsession with small children in overalls, so dressed him in them as often as possible.  

So that's my doodlebug.  I already did a doodlebug post, though, and there weren't a lot of options, but doodlebug led me to ladybug, which makes me think of The Bean, which also makes me smile.  So today's post will be ladybug shoes, of which there are lots.

 

These are very sweet.  I might even wear them if they came in my size.

I would totally wear these in my size, but only if there was a small child (or several) who had matching pairs and we used them for puddle jumping!

 

So cute.  But dang those are some big eyes.

I'm thinking my mama could totally make these in a variety of sizes.

Ribbon laces!  You know I'm a sucker for ribbon laces.  In fact, I wore my coral canvas shoes with the ribbon laces just yesterday. 

I love all the colors on this.

See?  I should post more often as this one has given me several things to smile about.

Yikes

Yesterday The Bean tagged me on Facebook, showing me this video:

It's an exhibition happening in New York right now, you can read more about it here if you want.  You should watch the video because there are some crazy shoes in there.  Here are a few stills I found:

The colors are really cool.  That's the only good thing I can say about these.

This is both hilarious and absolutely ridiculous to me.  Makes me laugh AND roll my eyes.

Huh.  Interesting shape, but can you actually walk in them?  I'm guessing I would slide and fall on my patootie.

 

This might be the most normal one of the group.

I don't think these have heels.  I still need to find a pair like this and try them on because I can't wrap my brain around how these are physically possible.

The Bean thought we should go to New York and see the exhibit.  That would be awesome.  I just need to win the lottery and collect my winnings before the 17th when the exhibit ends!

Whew!

Today was a VERY busy day.  Double A, The Bean, The VH, Flower, Pippi, Tink, and Laughter were all here for Holidays!  Holidays is the tradition we started when DJ was 4 (she's 19 now), and try to do at least once a year, where we celebrate a bunch of holidays in one day because I'm usually not home for most of them.  So today we did:

Easter.  Each kid gets to dye 6 eggs, then we send them off on an errand and I hide the eggs (obviously it's too cold for the bunny to come do it).

 

Thanksgiving.  We eat Thanksgiving dinner, but very pared down.

We celebrate birthdays.  Each person gets a cupcake.  We've started doing only 1 candle for each, because between 7 kids and 4 adults, it would have been something like 304 candles.  11 are easier to light and blow out...

 

4th of July.  We got outside and do sparklers and smoke bombs.  There isn't always snow like this year, so this time we got to toss the smoke bombs in the snow and watch the results. 

Halloween.  We do face paint and the kids trick-or-treat around the house.

St. Patrick's Day.  We do a treasure hunt with clues to follow to find the Leprechaun's lost gold (gold wrapped chocolate).

Are you exhausted reading about it?  Because it's exhausting doing it!

 

We then all wore our matching owl pjs to the movie.  Because I am a dorky aunt who makes her nieces do stuff like that.

 

The movie was Moana, and it was a lot of fun.

Finally, today is Shoetopia's 4th blogiversary!  I think this shoe is hilarious and adorable.

Everyone is supposed to be spending the night, but sadly Pippi had a horrible headache all day and decided she wanted to go home after the movie, and Tink decided to go with her.  The VH has family stuff tomorrow so she couldn't say over.  I still have 4 kiddos sleeping over, though.

Speaking of kiddos, all of my nieces are amazing, but can I take a minute to brag on Double A and The Bean?  They still love to do Holidays, but they are also great with helping with the younger kids.  They're great with kids in general, and love hanging out with their cousins.  They are patient and kind and loving, and it makes my heart happy to watch them.  But now my happy heart and I are going to bed.

Deer

There is a group of deer that wanders in and around the parents' yard:

This is from the front porch.  Yes, the neighbors have a caboose.

This is the back porch.

And this is the backyard.  Aren't they sweet?  I don't have to live here, so I love seeing them and watching them.  Mom and Dad do have to live here, so they are less enamored with the deer pooping in the yard and eating everything.

Obviously tonight's shoes shall be deer themed:

 

Why does this shoe have a hood ornament?

These are actually pretty sweet, but I would have to have a very specific occasion for which to wear them.

 

Awwww.  I love these.  Still can't think of where I would wear them, though.

But wherever it is, the PB could also go.

Yay, deer AND Christmas!  Or not, but they kind of look Christmas-y to me.

What is even happening here?  These make the hood ornament shoe look sane.  I...like the color...?

Much better.  I couldn't leave you with the insanity above.

Today was awesome.  The auntie, seester, Double A, Bean, Flower, and Laughter came over for a crafternoon.  The seester and I crocheted, Double A painted rocks, and everyone else kind of rotated around through various crafts.  It was a lot of fun.  The auntie and seester went home before it got dark, but Double A and the Bean just left and Laughter and Flower are having a sleepover.  Not a bad way to spend the 5th Day of Christmas, if I do say so myself.

Adventures in Hair Dye

Double A helped The Bean and me dye our hair with blue kool-aid tonight.  The Bean did the ends of her hair, and I did a little bit of the underside of mine.  Mom took a picture of us lying on the dining room floor with our hair in cups to send to the hubby, who was understandably confused.  So I now have sort-of blue hair.  I tried to take a picture of it but you can't really see the color.  Maybe tomorrow if the sun comes out I can go outside and get a better picture.  Anyhoo, I was trying to decide what to do for tonight's post.  I've already done kool-aid shoes, and you're probably sick of me posting blue shoes, and the other variations I tried didn't produce anything.  I did look up blue shoes yet again and came across this:

I like them.  They're different and interesting.  These led to the following pair:

These are Badgely Mischka, so we're not going to talk about how much they probably cost, but they come in a bunch of different colors:

I think I've probably posted the blue version already, but hey, they match my hair!  Sort of.

So far we're going in reverse rainbow order.

I couldn't find yellow or orange so had to skip straight to red.  But, now I have Christmas colors next to each other!

 

And back to turquoise.  This might be closer to the color of my hair.  How do I know, it's on the back of my head.

I've slowed down on the sugar shock, but I'm still going.  I only made one thing yesterday and today.  Yesterday Mom and I made up a recipe using some of the ingredients leftover from other things, and today I made peanut butter cups that are quite yummy.  So that's 8 kinds of cookies/candy/whatever so far.  I might need a 12 step program.

Christmas Programs

Christmas Programs are the theme of this week.  Flower's was last night and she looked beautiful and did an awesome job.  She played her clarinet and sang in the choir, and even had a speaking part!  (Pippi's and Tink's was also last night but sadly I haven't learned to be in 2 places at once)  The Bean's was tonight and she also looked beautiful and did an awesome job.  At least I'm almost positive she did, but I couldn't actually see her, which sucked.  She was smack behind the director, and even when the director moved all I could see of her was about 2 inches of her forehead.  That's what happens when you're short and play tenor sax so you're in the third row.  Oh well, it was still fun to listen.  (Flower and The Bean both had cute shoes for their programs, but did I take pictures?  No, I did not.  I'm a terrible auntie)  Laughter's is tomorrow at 1:00 and hopefully the weather holds so we can go.  Then Pippi and Tink's church program is tomorrow at 5:30, so hopefully the weather holds so the trip home isn't too terrible.  It's a busy week full of my favorite little people!  In honor of all of these programs tonight's shoes are a random assortment of Christmas shoes:

These wouldn't actually have to be Christmas shoes, but red plaid is rather festive.

 

I love these.  So cute!

Awww...the PB needs these for the imaginary baby closet.

And these!  Also, can I have some?

This appears to be two different kids, otherwise it's someone with very strange feet, but I would totally wear one green and one red shoe as a pair.

Well, I'm off to bed so I can get up and go to more programs tomorrow.

Frosty

The Brother works late on Tuesday, which means that Double A and The Bean stay until 9:00.  After dinner the parents and Double A watched NCIS while The Bean and I snuggled up in bed and watched Netflix on my kindle. (Oh, Double A also made cookies.  Yummy chocolate cookies.  Cookies we call Cow Patties because they look like a cow flew over.  She's awesome, as her name implies.)  We ended up watching The Legend of Frosty the Snowman, which is a Frosty movie from 2005 that neither of us had ever seen.  It was weird.  It had some cute moments, but it was really odd.  We both prefer the earlier Frostier movies.  But the snuggling and hanging out time was awesome, so I will not complain.  Tonight's shoes are Frosty-inspired:

I wasn't searching specifically for Zazzle, but these are all Zazzle, and are the first 3 pairs I found.  I like them. 

That snowman is just so happy!

I love these.  I know you are shocked.

Hypothetical question:  Would it be wrong to leave a spouse to stay in Montana and snuggle with nieces?  Asking for a friend... 😁😋

Theatre Shoes

Pippi and Tink came over after school today.  They, Double A, and The Bean went over to the theater to help me, Dad, and the brother decorate the Christmas tree, which was a lot of fun, even if the girls were all total goofballs.  Actually, the goofballyness of them was why it was fun, because they all crack me up, which I totally needed after today.

Didn't they do a nice job?  For tonight's post I looked up "Llano shoes," because that is the name of the parents' theater.  Llano is the Spanish word for Plains.  Except for the 2nd pair, I couldn't tell you what the connection is, but I just picked some that I liked from the results.

 

I think I would like these better without the gold accents (which are the Gucci symbol, so they're not going away), but otherwise I think these are adorable. 

The nieces need these for work!

Adorable.  Love the colors.

I actually like these, although I don't think I could pull them off.

I'm not sure what's going on with the pattern on the bow, but otherwise this is cute.

Also adorable.  Also love the colors.

So there you have.  Llano Theatre shoes.  Who knew?