Room Swap!

So excited about the newest projects!! Aaron's weekend project is to help/supervise a handyman make our wood stove functional. This has been planned for a month and is perfect timing, with next week's crazy sub-zero temperatures. 

My project is to move all my craft stuff into what will be hitherto known as The Craft Room. (Pictures to come.) The Craft Room is taking the place of the room formerly known as Cole's Room. Carson's Room with hereafter been known as The Boys' Room. Happily located in the upper-most level of the house.

I think it turned out adorable! I kept the animals from Cole's room.  90% of why I did this is because I have a little bedtime ritual with Cole where we go around and say 'goodnight' to each animal and mimic it's noise - except the giraffe, which has no sound that I know of - and then we say 'Goodnight, Cole' and he makes one of the animal noises back at me.  Most of the time it's the monkey.

Another thing I added to the boys' room is a set of glow-in-the-dark stars.  It ties in perfectly with Carson's rocket ship curtains.  The girls are sufficiently jealous.

This current exchange of rooms is due in large part to my Christmas gift from Aaron's parents: a sewing table!!! (Thank you, THANK YOU, Jana and Dennis!!)  One note: I'm not sure yet what to do with Cole's changing table/dresser.  I stopped keeping Carson's dresser in his room when I realized that most of the time the drawers were empty and the clothes were all over the floor - resulting in extra laundry by not knowing what was clean.  So until further notice, the changing table remains.  When you see it the sewing table, it's pretty unassuming.

But put this key into the lock and...

My treasure!

The basement will now be known as The Master Suite. I'm thrilled! On one level I will have a comfy wood-stove-warmed room, a Craft Room, a bedroom and a bathroom.  Happy. H.A.P.P.Y.  The Craft Room will also cheerfully double as a guest room when called upon.

I've been watching the icicles along our roof grow and shrink with the warming and freezing that's been going on here.  The night I took this picture, we had left on the lights for the back porch when I noticed the scene.  I love the neat look of the back-lit icicles!

Visit From Jack Frost

This isn't so much a 'visit' from Mr. Frost as it is the constant state of our old, drafty windows.  As much as I hate being cold, I love the effect of the frost on the windows!  It's just fabulously beautiful!

Replacing the windows is on the list of things to fix on this house, to make it more efficient and safe.  A part of me will be sad, though, to see these creations and the lovely lattice lead-work go away!

More Landscaping

Yesterday I also watched the guys do tons of work. :)  Carson and Grandpa worked the loader to bring dirt from the driveway to the pool gap.  Like we previously decided, there won't be a pool there for some time, so filling it in and reducing the marsh seemed like a good idea.

Dirt-filled semi-circle.

A funny moment with Cole.  He had gotten into the cozy coupe and then slipped on the seat and got stuck.  He didn't fuss for a few minutes, so I snapped a picture.  After Aaron and I giggled at Cole's situation, he must have figured out that he couldn't get out, and started struggling.  So I helped him out.

Part of cleaning up included clearing out the garden.  The tomatoes are inside, but the cucumbers, strawberries, peppers and squash got to be razed and burned.  I'm not sure yet what to do with the soil left in the buckets.  I'm thinking about putting the garden down where all the dirt is going now, next year.  Not sure yet.  The buckets were really easy to maintain, but there were some things I wanted more of, like green beans and strawberries.  I'll think on it a couple of months.  If we don't put a garden there, we'll brick some of it up and put in a firepit.  Which also has it's draw...

Anyway, Cole helped me 'clean' out the garden.

...and watched enviously while Carson got to do the big work with the big boys.

Landscaping in Progress!

Last Friday and Saturday, Aaron's parents came and helped, working several hours each day to get our garden/lawn look better and get it low-maintenance for future years.  We also had the missionaries and our home teachers help on each day.  It was a lot, A LOT of work!  I felt bad that much of my 'work' was staying inside and keeping kids out of mischief, but I did get out some; at least to take some pictures.  Here are some 'before-and-after' pictures!

Aaron worked hard to dig a trench, bury the downspout runoff pipe, and fill it back in.  This was huge!

No pipes laying all over!  Thanks to some extra dirt, some landscaping fabric and a layer of mulch, not to mentions some grass seed, this is looking much better, with even more promises of improvement!

This west side of the house was my worst nightmare!  Thistles and spiders abounded and it took all I had to help MomB through it!

It's actually done all the way down, but when I took the pictures, it was still getting there.  But it's obvious how much better it is!

These two piles of dirt and mulch contributed much to our landscaping!  We really appreciate Mom and Dad B getting this for us so we could beautify our home!  The dirt and mulch did, however leave big footprints - the driveway was a disaster!

Three days after the piles were gone, I finally got the driveway power-washed so that we can park and walk without getting muddy and splintery.

Last year, when Aaron was spraying everything-killer over the weeds, he mistook my peonies for weeds.  Aaargh!  They rallied and have made a slight appearance this year, even if it's later and shorter.  Hoping for more pretty flowers next season!

Before/After Upstairs Bathroom

Before we began, when we first moved into this house, the upstairs bathroom looked like this:

The problems were as follow: a) the tub had a hard time draining. This was due (as we found when the floor was ripped up) to the distance from the main drain and all the elbow pipes used to get to said main.  b) the toilet was too close to c) the un-neccesary double sink.  This meant our larger bottoms put our thighs right against the cupboard and wall, the toilet paper was at an odd place, and the sink was half-useless. And d) there was an entire useless corner between the end of the tub and the sinks.

 

NOW we have this beautiful-ness! 

Bathroom Progress

Aaron was super lucky to have help both with the primer and with the paint when taking on the bathroom this weekend.  Carson was happy to get down and dirty with Daddy, then DadB lent a hand to get the lovely color - a sandy shade - painted on.

 

 

This morning, Aaron tackled the tile!  This tub is going to be absolutely beautiful!!  I told him so.  Gushed over it.  I'm so, so, SO lucky to have a husband that wants to improve our home and who does it, even if he didn't know how before he began.  Totally willing to learn to make it a beautiful happy place for us to live.

 

 

The light makes it all yellower than it really is, but I assure, it's a lovely color!

Happy Happenings

Saturday found us carving pumpkins with cousins at Grandma's house.

 

 

Aaron's been working hard on the upstairs bathroom.  He even put in a window and re-sided the area beside it!  (It's the one that's a single window instead of double.) 

Inside.  The whole room gets it!  The tub used to be on the west wall and is now on the south.  The toilet moved a foot furher north on the east wall.  The sink used to be on the south wall and will be on the west when he finishes.  At this point, Aaron's gutted the room, taken out and replaced a window, re-plumbed, re-wired electricity, put down floor and put up drywall, among other things.  He still needs to tile tub and floor, paint, and put in the sink and toilet.  It's been a month in the works and is expected to be another 3 weeks due to working on this and keeping that pesky full-time paying job. :)

 

Today I took some pictures of my nephew and snapped a couple of my sweet six month old while we waited for Baby N to drift to sleep. 

The Things Our Parents Do For Us

We have been super grateful for things that our parents have done for us the past two months.  I just realized I hadn't taken pictures to show off for them or thank them.  Without further ado, bragging begins for our parents!

One of the many things my mom did for us while she was here was make curtains for pretty much the entire house.  I didn't take pictures of all of them, but besides the two rooms shown here, she did our room, the downstairs family room, and the entire kitchen and dining room.

In Carson's room, she did a really cute rocket print on blue.

The girls' room got delicate green and pink. Here you can also see the finished puppy and kitten that Aaron's mom did.  I love that the two animals are playing with a ball of yarn!

This is the love tree Aaron's mom painted.  Another puppy, another kitten, and the pretty tree.  She made it look like we carved our initials and dates on the tree, which I thought was so cute!

We recently found out that the city looks down on half-felled trees and they advised us to remove the large tree branch from our lawn or expensive consequences would occur.  Thankfully, Aaron's dad was willing, again, to come and work on said eye-sore.  He spent a few hours just sawing the branch into managable chunks for Aaron to now hack into firewood.

We feel very lucky and blessed to have Aaron's parents nearby, and that my mom is so willing to jump in and do any and everything when she's able to make it here.  We love our amazing parents!

Bathroom Remodel Update

This is a reminder of what we started out with.

You'll have to click to enlarge these first couple of pictures if you want a good idea of what we started planning.  This was my favorite part (and about the only part I was physically involved in): scribbling on the walls general dimensions and new placements.  Surprisingly fun, knowing the whole thing was about to be gutted anyway. :)

One of the strangest things ever, when Aaron got the drywall down, was finding that the back wall had been framed and insulated sideward.  Sideward.  We have no idea why, and it helps to explain a bit of why the bathroom was never truly warm, being so terribly insulated.  The blue and white stick-on tiles you see in the picture below were our temporary fix when we tore out the carpet months ago.

I'm really sorry I don't have a better picture of this, but this is the outdoor view of the vent that Aaron wired in.  He used the space where the window used to be and put the fan there.  The window was totally ineffective anyway, being thin and badly caulked and we had it stuffed with blankets to keep the room warm, so it wasn't a light source, either. 

You have to use some amazing imagination skills here, because I was a total dunce of a wife and didn't take pictures.  Aaron rented a jackhammer and took it to the floor, so there, in the back left corner, was a good 3x3 hole.  He put in new plumbing so that both the tub and toilet could drain AND moved the toilet piping over a mere 14 inches, just so I could have this shower. :)  He put in fresh plumbing to the new shower and sink locations, rewired the electrical so I could have the light switch where I wanted it, the fan where it needed to be, and a new pretty light over the sink.  After much deliberation, we decided (yep, another part I was actually involved in) to just take out the heater and see if we need an electric one later.  Re-venting was going to be really difficult and this is a tiny room next to a larger one with a heater, so it probably won't be a big deal.  Aaron then put in the new shower base and surround, cutting holes in all the right places for a perfect shower.  I love that he got a shower base with a seat; that'll be so useful my first couple of weeks home from the hospital, not to mention relaxing later on.  He got the special mold-resistant drywall and did his best dry-walling job yet in here. 

Today, Aaron painted the room this lovely shade of gray.  The vision is with white fixtures, a darker gray tile, and a few lime-toned accents, this will be a sweet, sophisticated little washroom! 

Tomorrow Aaron will be painting the ceiling, figuring out floor tile, and hopefully laying the tile.  Wednesday will get the tile around the shower and the baseboard tile.  Thursday gets to be grout.  Friday gets all fixtures installed - toilet, sink, shower fixtures, door put back on and hopefully some pretty things.

Saturday, by all counts, should have us back in our own room, using one sweet heck-of-a bathroom!  When it's all really done, I promise to take some better pictures of 'finished product'.