Hair-Do

I would like a little girl next so I can do what this mom does here.
Seriously. Can't Wait!

Blog Envy

So, I have a new theory about blogging. . .maybe not too profound, but I seriously believe it. I always look at other people's pictures and think to myself, "wow, they did something so cool," or "they have such a cute living room," or "their life seems so exciting." So then I get a comment on my blog from a friend who basically says that something we did seems really cool, and all the while I am thinking, "oh, but honey, it really wasn't all that! It's just what we were doing."

My theory is that maybe blogs are like the infamous "Christmas letters," a.k.a "Brag Letters." You pretty much write all the cool stuff you do, because it is the most interesting, and in the meantime you don't mention that you really need to mop your floor, or do the dishes, or that you haven't washed your car in like a year, or anything that is less than glamorous. I completley don't believe in Brag Letters, but I love the good old blog. So, to help the envy come to an end, let's all (or maybe just me, if I'm the only that has ever experienced this) remember that the person who took a really cool trip to some exotic location also has dirty clothes at home, waiting for them to wash and that their babies smear oatmeal from breakfast in their hair, too. And really, that's what makes life exciting!

End of Summer

This has been the summer of exercise, gardening, dry-walling, mudding and trips. I went to Youth Conference and all of Young Women girl's camp, Phil went up to King's Peak with some friends and climbed the whole thing in like 14 hours (a time he is determined to beat this weekend), and I flew to SanDiego with some very fun friends for just a day of lying on the beach and eating mexican food! FUN!!!

We ran a lot of races (okay, four) from May to September (Bryce Canyon was one of them; definitely a favorite) and we have only two coats of mud to go before we paint our upstairs and get carpet! Wahoo! The picture above was taken at the Greek Festival 5K/10K race that we ran a week ago, where Benson was a real trooper, although his Mommy had to take a break in the middle of the race at a Chevron to use the restroom. Oops! Daddy had pushed him in the last race, so I did this one. The double stroller adds a ton of weight, but it is awesome to be able to run with the whole fam, whether there are babies or not. (Don't make fun of the double. When baby #2 arrives, it will have been worth pushing around an empty seat for 2 years! Seriously!)

I planted my very first garden this year. Everything died, except the tomatoes, and up until this weekend I thought my peppers had died, but low and behold, there actually are like three baby green peppers growing! Who would have guessed. A good friend helped me learn how to grow from the plant above, to the jars below! What a satisfying event to eat your own produce!

Although he looks a bit sly here, onesie boy not only learned how to crawl this summer, he also has learned to pull himself up to standing and cruise around on furniture, or even push chairs. He is also a big fan of stairs, where he has learned to go both up and down. His O.T. came two weeks ago to do his 18 month review, and he is at age level for all areas of development (fine motor, social/emotional, language, etc.) except for gross motor, where he came in at a roaring 11 months developmental age. That, I tell you, is amazing! He has progressed so much from six months, and we are so grateful. As our Occupational Therapist says, when he walks into Kindergarten, no one will know the difference!

Crawling!

This was taken at the end of July. Benson opens up our lovely drawers, and reaches in and grabs whatever he can find. In this case it was a half-used bag of pasta. . .who knew it would be so much fun to play with!

Hello Camera!

Crawling! (He started in June at 16 months! Way to go buddy!)

Summer

Summer Top Ten:

When i wasn't blogging (oh, that was never!) I was:

10. staying cool-ish in the house
9. helping little boy learn to crawl!
8. cooking healthy food/ having family visit
7. running early in the morning
6. eating treats after the healthy food
5. painting walls/ helping family move
4. conferencing and camping with the young women
3. auditioning for American Idol
2. cleaning, dishes-doing, gardening, weeding etc.
1. Enjoying summer

Wow! We really needed an update. A meager attempt, one way or the other!

Update Alert

6 new posts. I've gotten behind, but here it all is. Too much to take in at one glance, but have fun!

WAY Befores and Afters

Just thought you might be interested to see the before pictures back from when we bought our house nearly three years ago. Our construction is taking a long time because we are doing it ourselves in random spare time, but looking at these pictures makes me remember that it is seriously worth it! AND, we are nearing the end for the upstairs to be actually completed! So. . .

Original gross, brown, yellow nasty bathroom. We used it for a year, and then in 2006 we remodeled to. . .

This! I love our bathroom. It is about 6 inches longer because Phil moved a wall next to the tub, and our cabinetry makes the space there is much more usable. Oh. Plus it doesn't drip random yellow moisture from the ceiling like the old bathroom. That is always a plus.


Hello the Brown kitchen. Brown floor, brown cabinets, brown walls, and brassy brown light fixtures. It actually did have kind of a cozy, homey feeling, but I was not in love with it, by any means.

New, clean, modern (very modern on style, so for all you traditionalists out there, you may prefer the brown look).

Mostly Done Kitchen

New Wilsonart HD Bella Noche Countertop installed! I chose the dark color to tie in the floor, black appliances and silver hardware, and I think it works. You can see some of the details of the kitchen that still need to be finished, like the back of the bar and some doors, but it is fully functional, and I can COOK again! Hurray!


My very favorite IKEA thing is having mostly DRAWERS as our base cabinets. This is not a very traditional idea- go to any Home Depot Kitchen and notice all the regular doors, not drawers- but the drawers are awesome! We don't have a pantry in our kitchen, and so we needed lots of usable space to hold food, and its the details about IKEA design that I love.
The drawers are VERY deep, and hold every ounce of food we have, and because they are drawers, you can see it all, and don't have to rearrange everything to get the one item you need out. I can't quite tell you how convenient this makes it to cook!

The drawers are also deep enough to hold all my appliances, which once were stuffed in one tiny cabinet, where, if I wanted to use the crock pot, for instance, I would have to unload everything to get to it. Now I just lift the appliance out of the drawer, and Bam! Breadmaking in the Bosch in an instant! (Yes, I am a little obsessed, but I seriously love it!) This also makes unloading the dishwasher happen at lightning speed!

Ikea Cabinet Slide Show

Finishing Walls

Learning to mud. . .but Phil did most of it!

The mudded seams and screws

Primed walls! Hurray! It's starting to look like a room!

PAINT! By far my favorite part of remodeling. This color is Sherwin Williams Trusty Tan in Satin finish! Sherwin Williams has extraordinary paint!

PAINT FINISHED, and floor reinstalled. This picture was taken at 3:47 in the morning after we had spent all day reinstalling our floor. The purple patch was trying out a color idea for the backsplash, which I didn't end up liking.

Walls

This is the Kitchen sink/dishwasherwall with all new plumbing and electricity.. .

and this is the same wall with insulation (It backs the bathroom, so any insulation for sound is helpful, if you know what I mean).

Drywall beginnings

Drywall finished!

Kitchen Remodel "Before" Part 2

If you haven't checked out the previous post, look there first.

Here is the plaster. Oh how we will miss the plaster, and the metal, and the dust. The dust that is still settling on my piano. Phil hates plaster, so he took it all out! Our whole house was made of plaster, and now the only plaster left in the entire house is two walls and a ceiling in the living room, and the stairwell. Everything else is drywall.
We took up the laminate floor, which is the only thing we also kept for our new kitchen. Underneath was interesting tiles that had a red tinge underneath the black coat. Hmm. Maybe we should have used that. . .
OOOH! This was a good day. No plaster, all new wiring and electrical boxes, a brand new ceiling, and beautiful can lights. It is lighter with those 5 lights than it ever was before!
Just didn't want to leave this detail out. Underneath the corner cabinet was a tiny remnant of the original 50's flooring. I'm secretly sad that we can't keep it, but you know, we all have to sacrifice.

Look for more posts about the NEW kitchen, which is turning out beautifully thanks to IKEA, Wilsonart laminate countertops and flooring, and Sherwin Williams Paint.

Kitchen Remodel "Before" Part 1

So. 6 weeks later, I am finally posting about what we have been doing. Phil started remodeling our lovely, "80's updated" kitchen on my birthday, which, as you can tell from this before picture, wasn't exactly the beginning of the remodel. The large beam on the ceiling is from Phil taking out a huge wall separating the kitchen from the dining room, the wood panneling on the right hand side HAD to go, and the wall strait forward was leftover electrical work access.

The pure wood theme of our kitchen was one of the things we both didn't love about our kitchen, not only for the "oh my heck the whole kitchen is brown" issue, but also because it was very dark. So, we took everything out!

Going. . .

going. . .

Gone!

One Year Picture

It's small, but cute!

Haircut!

Check out the hair before the haircut- long locks of craziness!

Then. . .voila! The Saturday after Benson's birthday, I laid him on the floor on his changing pad, gave him a grahama cracker, and cut his hair. It isn't perfect, but I figured out of his eyes is better than totally even. And, he looked darn handsome, if I do say so myself! Of course, we saved a lock in a baggie for his scrapbook. I guess it's just what you do!

Birthday

Happy Birthday to the sweetest boy in the world who has completely changed my life and expanded my ability to love unselfishly and thoroughly! I love giggling with him, reading to him, throwing balls with him, singing finger-play songs, pointing at things with him, making him laugh, him making me laugh, watching him learn how to fold his arms, clap, wave, scoot, and a million other little things that he does! Motherhood is wonderful, and I am priveleged to have such an amazing boy for a son! Love you, buddy!

Holidays

Here are the highlights from the Holidays which, until now, have been nonexistent on our blog:

Phil and Benson downtown at the lights.

Cold, happy family

Christmas Morning- Benson got a bath toy from Santa. . .

but really it's the paper that he loved the most!

Christmas at Grandma Nielson's house. These are some of his favorite toys- stacking cups and blocks from IKEA, and classic Fisher Price stacking rings. Learning how to put the rings on the stacker taught him all sorts of great fine motor skills! Thanks Grandma!

What a fun first Christmas for Benson!