Downstairs Bathroom

BEFORE:

AFTER:

The Girls' Room

We have a room to show you... Here is a "before" picture.

One more "before."
Evi and Zoe's room is finished (for the most part). I'm not sure we'll ever be able to say we are completely finished with a room. There still is trim to do, curtains to put up, pictures to hang and a reading nook to paint but other than that... Here is the "after" picture. They have an awesome closet but there were no closet doors so I used the same idea as Gracie's crib skirt (ribbon-trimmed tulle layered over another piece of fabric) to improvise. Evi picked out the glittery pink flowers that hold back the curtains (not knowing what they were for). And that is indeed a turquoise awning outside the window (on our list, don't worry).
Another view of the closet. The reading nook is up on top of the closet.
View of the other side of the room.
And another view, toward the door. The girls have not been allowed up in their room because I wanted to get it all set up and ready for them to sort of surprise them. They had seen me painting pink but had not seen it set up with the bling and flowers.
Here are the "diamonds." I bought some rhinestones at Michael's and put them on this stripe.
Here's a closer view. The girls have been really into flowers lately. Both of them say they want to be florists when they grow up (along with a lot of other things). Whenever we go to a store and they see fake flowers they really want to buy them. So I wanted to make the room very girly with diamonds and flowers.
Here is Zoe pointing out her favorite part of the room. She said the closet curtains and the flowers.
Evi couldn't decide what her favorite is, but she posed by the two bouquets on their bedside table. Notice the intercom system behind her. Nice.
They were excited to play with the doll house again since it had been in the garage for so long.
I'm so thankful to cross some things off my very long list!!

Halloween 2009

We had a very fun Halloween. We had our singles' monthly dinner/bible study that night. Before we went to the singles' reformation party we went trick-or-treating with our friends the Johnsons, Maxwells and Fillemans. Here are most of the kids before trick-or-treating.

Emet was a sailor. My mom made this costume for my brother one Halloween. If only he had a hat he would have looked like the boy on the Cracker Jack box. Zoe was a cute little cheerleader and Evi was Belle this year.
Any guesses on Smedly? If you guessed Shai Linne, you're right.
I was a pregnant lady from the 60's. This is a dress of my mom's that I found in a trunk and her boots.

Halloween Cookies

It was down to the wire but we fit in our tradition of making and decorating Halloween cookies. Here are the kids ready to rock and roll with the frosting and sprinkles. I couldn't find all my food coloring so we had sort of strange colors....no orange but no one seemed to mind.

Two down; about seven more to go.
Look at that concentration. The creative juices were flowing.
Caught in the act!


Happy Halloween!!!

Famous Person Day

Today at Evi's school the kids could dress up as a famous person. Evi was Laura Ingalls Wilder. We have been reading the books together and recently rented a few dvd's of the television show from the library. My mom made this dress for me and I wore it when I was 3 and 4 or 4 and 5 (I can't remember exactly) but I know she lengthened it with the ruffle on the bottom so that I could keep wearing it. I loved it. It was so fun to see Evi wearing it and the bonnet that goes with it.

Sibling shot before school. It's cold here (61 degrees right now) so Emet's been wearing his robe and Zoe is wearing the warmest clothes we have unpacked.

After school today I had to stop by the grocery store with all three kids and Evi got so many comments from all the older women who passed us. They LOVED her dress. One lady asked me, "Do you dress her like this all the time?" I felt bad disappointing her by answering, "no."

House Pictures!

This is the day we received the keys to the house. After dinner we went over to check everything out. Emet's holding the key; a proud home owner.

Our house...

I won't show you all the rooms (at least in this post). Below is the guest bedroom, where the kids are all staying right now.

Another angle of the guest room...

Here it is in progress thanks to Angela, Reese and Jamie.

This is the master bedroom. Yes, the carpet is a nice shade of rose pink.

(Below) The master as it is today; a shop (without carpet). Smedly has been working hard on the floors upstairs. You can't tell from this picture but about a third of the master has the wood floor put down.

This is a lovely fish-eye view of Emet and Grace's room at move-in.

Look at that nook for Emet's bed and lots of wall space to hang up all the boards for our favorite sports (that will someday be his favorites, too, we hope).

OK, so this is a sneak peak at the girls' bedroom but notice the floors. That's what they look like when Smed puts them in. They're unfinished and they look pretty cool but they get super dirty, quickly.

Emet and Grace's room is the only room that is finished in terms of paint, floors (stained and varnished) and trim. Here are the floors finished. Below is obviously Gracie's side of the room.

This is Emet's side (brown and orange). The brown looks light in this picture but the next one shows what the split looks like and the color of the brown better.

The room is split exactly in half by the paint. Now we can start moving furniture into that room!!! More pictures to come...

More Random Photos

Zoe got a guitar tangled up in her hair at our last singles event. Something like that happens to one of us (except Smedly) every day.

Look at that pumpkin!

Emet's "baby" Elmo. Traveling without "huge" Elmo will be a lot easier.