Before Dan left

The night before Dan left, I made him his favorite meal.......Basil Garlic Pesto Chicken with orzo, green beans, and salad!

 The boys really love it when I make this meal.

 The morning of Dan's flight. Dan flew out on a Sunday morning. So we woke the boys up, had bath time, and got them dressed for church. Then as I was getting ready, Zach and Dan took a quick snoozer before we drove Dan to the airport. (Dan and the boys really love my pregnancy pillow!)

Dan left to Washington for a few weeks for some job training. He took a week off of work before leaving. I was grateful for his help in getting the house ready and prepared for him to be gone. We just moved in to our new home just over a month ago. And up until a week and a half before he left I was on bed rest. So, I was extremely grateful for Dan's help before he left.

- He organized the garage (aka: the man cave), so that I could park the car in the garage while he was gone.

- He helped me create and complete our combined idea of making Benjamin's bed a comic book with modge podge.

- He helped me get lots of sleep so that I could recuperate and be well enough to take care of the boys.

- He cleaned carpets with the carpet shampoo machine.

- He helped empty boxes left from the move.

- He checked off many things off our "project/to do" list. Which included........
* Completed and made the Lei box.
* Super glued about 20 things that needed fixing.
* Backyard clean up

He is so amazing. I am still convinced he is Superman.

The Lei box
How it was made:
* My step dad gave me this shadow box to be used to hold our Lei's from Hawaii that we had saved. He is really talented with wood working. He had the glass cut and made at a glass shop. He and my Mom gave this present to me two years ago for my birthday. We just got around to completing the final project!
*I knew I wanted a photo in the Lei box. So, I first chose a picture of our last day in our Hawaii ward. They gave us the beautiful Lei's in the picture after singing Aloha Oe to us at the end of a sacrament meeting. (The Lei's in the box were collected over the 3 years we were in Hawaii.)
*I took that photo and edited it on the Picnik.com website. I did a color tint on a black and white base. (I rarely use this site. Though it is free, using the site has junked up our computer with nasty viruses.)
*Dan hung the Lei's we had collected from Hawaii with fishing twine from the back board. (Dan the smart cookie totally thought of this on his own!)
*The back board is covered with a Hawaiian print fabric. The fabric was hot glued to the back board.
*That back board was then put into the wooden shadow box.
                                                         
 The final product hanging on our wall!! It is so beautiful and goes perfect with our Living Room theme of "Around the World".

   

Benjamin's comic book bed

(These pictures were taken with my cell phone so they are a little blurry. But I wanted to show off the final product!)

This bed comes from Ikea. We bought it back in 2008 for Benjamin's first big boy bed. It can flip over to make a bunk bed. However, Zachary kept climbing up and trying to jump off. Also, the fun tent cover could not work with the bunk bed style. So we kept it a twin bed with tent. And Ben loves it. The top cover is a blue tent with white stars. We figured this goes with the super hero theme since Superman flies around in the sky. :)

The completion of the comic book bed brings us one step closer to finishing the boys super hero themed room! All we need is bedding, curtains, and the vintage metal signs for the wall.