I’m sorry I was AWOL last week – I promise I wasn’t abandoning you for binge-watching Grace & Frankie (although I did do that) – last week was a bit crazy with “stuff to do”.

We went to Florida for March Break, so last week was all about ‘catch-up’ – the worst part of coming from vacation.

Swimming pool, Floridian 5 star, Florida

Yes, given that this was my vacay-view, I certainly won’t complain about a little catch-up.

Papa let the girls do their annual “add dish soap to the hot tub and bubble up the pool” game:

Swimming pool, Floridian 5 star, Florida

They LOVE this, but I’m just waiting until we get the call that the pool filter has exploded or something.

Swimming pool, Floridian 5 star, Florida

I started off by tackling income taxes on Monday, and let me tell you – don’t leave your receipts all year-long and then expect to get taxes done in an hour or so.

Holy ass-balls! (yes, the profanity is as painful sounding as I found income taxes to be). I spent ALL of Monday entering receipts and printing off invoices. WOW – Did that suck! Luckily my friend told me about invoice templates reviewed and I found some templates which made my job a lot easier. Making invoices can be such a pain if you’re not using a template.

My build for the week was working on turning an old dresser mirror into a garden mirror – which has been a giant fail twice now – so I’ll only show you the before:

I want it to have muntin bars and look like a garden mirror and not a dresser mirror – but do you see my dilemma? Yup, the mirror is sitting on top of the frame and not framed within it, which means I have to border the entire thing before I can add bars to it. Now notice the shape; framing it is not as easy as I’d hoped. More on this if ever I get it finished.

I worked with a couple of sponsors last week, one of which you’ll see soon and the other I’m ESPECIALLY excited to share – so hang on for that.

I put down another 20 servings of my Mom’s famous Cream of Tomato soup. I think we’ve eaten 10 servings already, so that may be a chore I’ll have to re-do this week.

Miss Madison has an 11th birthday coming up (soon) so she asked for purple hair for her birthday gift.

I know that dyeing hair (professionally) is a luxury not generally given to soon-to-be-11-year-olds, but at the moment her hair is short… which means growing the colour out – should she not like it – is much easier now than as she grows her hair longer.

Melanie did an AMAZING job, but I admit – I panicked at this point:

That’s after stripping all the brunette out – YIKES!

But 3 hours later (4 in total) and look at the finished product! Dark roots then blue fading into a purple – it’s just stunning!

Blue hair, purple hair, blue short hair, purple short hair, coloured hair, tween hairstyle

My soon-to-be-11-year-old seems pretty pleased. Click here for Melanie’s IG photo (with movement so you can see the layers).Blue hair, purple hair, blue short hair, purple short hair, coloured hair, tween hairstyle

My God I love that kid! She’s even more beautiful on the inside (most of the time).

Hubby and I (mostly I) have been on the fence about getting new patio furniture this year. Ours is in great shape, but it’s just a 4-seater set and we wanted to be able to seat more people. After hunting online for a month or so, we (I) decided that we’re going to keep our existing set and maybe just update the accessories a bit – so I had a fun shopping morning with Amazing Amy and my bestie “Trish from HomeSense”.

A few pillows, some matching dishes and some planter pots and I’m ready for Spring! We’re still in frost-season in SW Ontario, so plants will have to wait another month – but I’m LOVING that flamingo pillow! Extra guests may have to sit on the grass, but they can admire the new accessories. lol

My baby girl, Miss Chloë, was sick last week too. She doesn’t often get sick, but when something hits, it hits her hard – so Friday was “couch day” – and my opportunity to watch season 3 of Grace & Frankie on Netflix. (SO good!)

I’m back now and planning all kinds of neat stuff – so hang in there and don’t give up on me yet!

Have a great one!