Tide with Acti-lift

I am such a laundry detergent snob. I truly love Tide. Tide now has Acti-Lift which helps to soften up tough stains that can be hard to get out. I find this very helpful with William and Dwayne's clothing since they make the most mess! I recently started using the scents with a touch of Febreze and the whole family loves the way everything smells. I wanted to share with you that the P&G brand site has $1 off coupons off almost all the Tide products. I know a lot of you love online shopping. Some of the items will even give you a bonus product at checkout. Just thought I would share since I did not realize you can purchase Tide online. Oh yeah and they take PayPal! :)

The Man Room

We recently did a little home improvement project in Dwayne’s Man Room. Yeah, I let him have a room all to himself. I say he is lucky. I would have otherwise turned it into a playroom. I really wanted to get some new bathroom furniture, a bedding set or repaint the kitchen but the Man Room project won.

So the Man Room project was to replace the old carpet with new flooring and we opted to go the frugal way by doing the work ourselves. We went with a higher end vinyl tile (self-sticking) since the base of the floor is concrete. Dwayne let William help with the rolling of the first few tiles. Don't laugh at the rolling pin, I did say we were doing things frugally!
When the boy started doing wild things like this it was time to send him upstairs to his sisters. Things started to get rather sticky (literally) It took us about 7 hours since we had to cut all the detailed edges and corners. Those were the moments I wanted to jump out the window. I could not wait to be DONE!
We were both is so much pain we could not believe it. Your boy Dwayne behaved like the usual fool and I did have to say a few (dozen) choice words. Let's just say he likes to try some really dumb things instead of doing it the proper way and I have to get on him. Thankfully we made it through and it came out really beautiful~ besides his wall art. His favorite stuffed bass. People always ask him if he caught it. He tells them "Sho nuff, caught it at an estate sale!".
I am kind of jealous now. I think this color is so nice with his custard colored walls.

Now we are thinking about the next project.... Who knows what the next Shelly & Dwayne adventure will be!

Celebrating excellence

The Ismail family went out to Red Robin for a special lunch in honor of Chardie and Brie. We wanted to celebrate their excellent report cards. They both got all A's and 1 B. Brie's one B was a 92 (an A is a 93) so she was very annoyed. Chardie was expecting to have 3 B's with how tough her college level classes are in combination with the volleyball season. She was able to pull it off and she currently ranks #4 in her sophomore class. We are so proud of both girls for being such diligent students and all around sweet girls. Now we can't leave little William out, he is doing a great job with his "school" time at home. He is making great strides daily and we are very proud of him. Here are a few photos of our lunch out...

Dwayne took this photo (the reason why he is not in it). I love these 3 sweet children!
Brie did not want to be in this picture because Daddy was being aggravating. The girls warned him before entering the restaurant- NO talking, NO foolishness, NO singing, NO drawing attention to any of us. Of course he broke at least 3 of these rules!!
We seldom go out to sit-down establishments to eat but this was a pleasant experience. William really behaved well and enjoyed his 'bottomless' fries!

If you have never had a burger from Red Robin I would recommend the Mt. Olympus Burger. It was divine!!

Flashback Friday

This was about 3 years ago when I was in early pregnancy with Will. I used to drink strawberry milk out of a wine glass to make it taste better. Have a great weekend everyone! :)

Who needs toys anyway?

Will and I were going to pick Brie up from school and he stopped and screamed out leaf! leaf! I had trimmed off the old leaves from one of my houseplants and he decided he wanted to keep it as a toy. He picked that over a truck or book. These days his favorite "toys" are leaves, grass, pine needles, flowers and stems. I guess there could be worse things he could play with!
What are some of the oddest things you have seen your kid play with?