Tucker's 3rd Birthday

A few days late, but HE'S THREE :) [click to read about his first and second birthdays]

And yes, I'm still going to be that crazy mom who will blog about her dog's birthday even when she has a human child over her own...

He's our first (fur) child, and he brings so much love and fun to our little family! This year has been a busy year for Tucker - from getting a little brother to a new house! The bond that he and Bennett share melts my heart - they truly are obsessed with one another and love each other so much. If they're not together, they're always looking for where the other one is. He's so gentle with Bennett - Bennett literally hangs off of him, pulls his hair, rips toys out of his mouth - and Tucker just lays there and allows the craziness to happen. It's so sweet to see them interact.

As with my previous Tucker birthday posts:

Age Three Favorites:

• His brother! (This one definitely takes the #1 spot this year - he's obsessed)
• His new backyard and no longer needing to be on a leash. Having the ability to run wild has been so funny to see (until he gets distracted by sounds from the farm, trees, leaves, animals.... you name it - he gets side tracked)
• Along with the new back yard, comes his love relationship with squirrels... (thankfully, the few times that he was able to catch up with one - he'd attempt to play with it, like it were a dog, instead of trying to eat it) :) He still doesn't understand why they won't stay to play with him.
• The swing set in our new back yard - Haha his walker, Nicole (who he loves too!), taught him how to go up and down the slide - he likes to show off from time to time.
• His pup cousins and friends and having them over to play in the back yard.
• Pig ear treats (gross, i know - but what you can do?)
• Bell peppers - especially the red, yellow and orange ones! He loves to get scraps and leftovers when mom makes veggie trays!
• Pop's house - (Technically Meme's too - but he just doesn't jump and sprint to the door like he does when you say "We're going to Meme's house" like he does when you say "We're going to Pop's house")
• Playing ball with Bennett - He'll roll his favorite nasty dog ball to Bennett, Bennett will pick it up and throw it back to Tucker, and the cycle continues!
• Laying in the Bathroom supervising while Bennett plays in the bathtub
• Morning nap time with Bennett and Dad

Age Three Facts:

• Weight - 76 pounds (still apparently overweight according to the vet)
• Eats - Still twice a day (morning/evening) but grazes. He'll never fully eat everything in his bowl at one time (unless there's extremely yummy people food mixed in). 
• Still sleeps with Mom & Dad, and tries to sleep in Bennett's room when we leave the door open. He's also taken over the guest bedroom and sometimes moves there to sleep when Dad gets home from work and hogs the bed.

We're looking forward to another fun-filled year with our boys! :) Photos to follow in no particular order!

Leading us on a walk

Always checking him out

Snuggled up on the couch

Taking his guard dog duties very seriously

Obsessed with the snow

Fall photos!

Road trips 

"Let me get a closer look at you bro"

Enjoying the back yard this summer

4 weeks before Bennett arrived!

Meeting Bennett for the first time

Meme & Pop's Back Yard

Enjoying his birthday ice cream - 

Of course, little brother wants to try to steal some too

The morning mommy went to deliver that 

bowling ball that she was carrying around!

Prepping the nursery - he assumed the little chair was for him

Packed and ready for Meme and Pop's House!

Roasted Brussel Sprouts with Balsamic Glaze

With only a handful of ingredients, this side was so easy to make! I love brussel sprouts and just recently started trying to make dishes with balsamic glaze. This one was so good - we served it as a side with steak! I pulled this recipe from Skinny Taste - an awesome website with tons of healthy recipes and it also breaks down each recipe with its nutritional information. This recipe is gluten free, low carb, paleo and whole 30 approved! Enjoy :)

Ingredients:

- 1 lb brussel sprouts

- 2 tbsp olive oil

- Salt

- Pepper

- Balsamic Glaze

Place the brussel sprouts on skewers. Place a sheet of tinfoil on top of your grill and top it with your skewers.

Lightly brush the skewers with olive oil, adding salt and pepper.

Grill for approximately 30 minutes, turning the skewers every 5 minutes to keep from burning.

When you're done grilling, drizzle the skewers with balsamic glaze and enjoy! :)

Giving Your Furiture a Facelift - Easy Steps to Reupholstering Chairs

It has been a gloomy, rainy weekend so I took advantage of the extra "inside" time and decided to do something that I've been wanting to do for a few years - reupholster our kitchen chairs! I had never reupholstered anything before so I was a little nervous with how they'd turn out. I was surprised with how easy (and fast) it was and am thrilled with how they turned out :)




Materials
- Fabric
- Staple Gun
- Staples
- Screw driver
- Scissors





First thing to do is to remove your chair cushions. Mine were screwed on to the base of the chair, so it was as easy as laying the chair down to unscrew the screws on the bottom. My cushions were in great shape, so I decided not to remove the old fabric. If you need to remove the old fabric on yours, you'll want to do that before the next step. 

Lay your fabric face down and place one of your cushions on the fabric. I was lucky enough to get pieces big enough for 2 chairs, with each strip! Once you've determined how much fabric you'll need, cut the square of fabric that you'll be using. Lay the cushion upside down on the fabric, and you're ready to start stapling!

You'll want to start by stapling the fabric on one side of your cushion. I placed my staples closer together so that the fabric would be nice and tight.

Do the opposite side next, pulling the fabric tight with each staple. 

Now you're ready to do the sides and the corners! Just remember to keep pulling the fabric tight so that it looks nice. I folded my corners like I would when wrapping a present.

When you have all 4 sides and corners done, you're ready to cut the excess fabric from the bottom (I had to trim mine a little so that the screw holes weren't covered).

Place the freshly recovered cushion back on your chair base, and screw it back on.

That's it! I was surprised with how easy (and fast) it was and am in love with how they turned out!

Before & After

Finished Product for the Breakfast Nook :)

Playroom Twine & Clothespin Banner

Having a playroom in our new house has been a dream! It keeps all of Bennett's toys organized [without cluttering his bedroom and our living room like they did in our old house], but also provides a great, safe place for him to play. One of the things I wanted to do in his playroom to give it a more playroom feel is to create and hang a banner to be able to clip little flashcards with the alphabet, numbers, colors, animals - and then to one day have a space to hang little projects and artwork that he'll create. There are huge empty walls in the playroom, so I loved creating something so cute while also functional to dress up one of the walls with. I had the twine and clothes pins already and scored these alphabet cards from the dollar section of Target a few months ago. It took about 5 minutes to throw together (thank you Mom for your help!) and I love the way it looks in his playroom. 

Materials you'll need:

- Twine

- Wood clothes pins

- 4 thumb tacks 

- Scissors

- Things to hang our your pins :)

We cut our two large pieces of twine and thumb tacked them to the wall. I knew that I wanted to hang flashcards first, so I actually laid out the flash cards on the floor, in front of the shelf that I wanted to hang the banners above, to make sure that I was cutting my pieces long enough.

Once they were on the wall, I made bows (as you can see in the close up picture) to tie on the ends to hide the thumb tacks on the wall. 

That's it! So for a project that literally cost a few dollars, if you're counting all of the supplies that I already had, it was a quick and easy project to do to spruce up a boring wall in the playroom and to soon start using to teach Bennett his letters, numbers, colors and animals!

PS - Can you tell that I was two pins short? Haha, until I can steal two from my mom's clothesline at home, two chip clips will do it for now! :)