Home Renovations

Finally, some pictures of the work we did on the house before we moved in! This house is in great shape and didn't really need anything to be done, but there were 2 rooms we wanted to change. The first one was the family room and a wall by the mud room:


Yes, it's the same color and I'm sure the people we bought the house from loved it, but it just had too much purple in it for us. Ben and Timothy called it the "lipstick walls". So now.....


this is one of my favorite rooms. You should see it with our slate blue couch in front of it! It's almost a cantaloupe color, or Sunny Delight if you ask Ben! But I LOVE IT!!

I don't have any before pictures from Kassie's room, but all we added was the pink stripes. The tan on top and dark brown on the bottom was already there (it was a nursery for their baby boy), but now it's fit for the "princess":

Video Game Fun

Timothy has DEFINITELY inherited his dad's and uncles' obsession with video games. He can figure them out in no time and will spend as much time as I will let him practicing (which has been quite a bit lately as I try to unpack). It's fun to watch him get so excited, and he comes up with some interesting names for them. So here's a quick quiz to see if you can name his most recent favorite. I will post the answer sometime next week. Good luck!

Timothy: "In this game, you're a corn eater. You have to eat the corn, but not run into the bad ghosts. If you run into the bad ghosts, you disappear."

We're Moved In!

So we are FINALLY moved into our new house! We will be sending out an email privately with our new address and phone number, but here is a link if you want to see a virtual tour of the house. We love it and are so happy to own our own home at last!

In the pictures, you will see 2 red walls in the family room, they are now pale orange. And one of the upstairs bedrooms is 2 tone brown, it's now brown and pink striped on the bottom. The "Princess Room". We left Timothy's tan and dark blue.

We hit a true milestone today. I was cleaning up the kitchen and Timothy wanted to go outside and play in the back yard. I started to say "When I get done", but then realized that they can go out by themselves! It's a completely fenced yard with locked gates on both sides! So they went out and I could watch them from the kitchen window. It was a glorious moment.

We are anxious to show off our new place to any of you that want to come visit, boxes and all at the moment!

Here's the link: http://www.circlepix.com/tour.htm?id=699155&mls_tour=1

Let us know what you think!

Help!

Ok, I am enlisting the help of those of you who read our blog. As you all know, kids say the cutest things and I really want to record those great one liners to show them later. One friend of mine marks those posts as "(name of child)-ism". I'm looking for a clever way like that to use in my blog. I'm relying on your creativity, since I can't come up with anything on my own! Thanks!!

Best of Friends, really!

This picture is from last spring, but it kind of wraps up their relationship. They are usually the best of friends, but also know how to push each others buttons as only siblings can. It started out with Timothy being the one to pick on Kassie until she screamed. For example, Ben tried to teach Timothy about the expression "getting someone's goat", mainly because he was telling him to stop trying to get Kassie's! A little while later Timothy comes back and says "Daddy, I knock over Kassie's goat!" His version has since become a family favorite!

BUT, times have changed and little sister has now learned how to fight back. Her main point of attack? Timothy's love (and need for) order and logic. Here's their conversation on the way to pick up Ben from the bus the other night.

T: It's dark outside.
K: No, it's light.
T: (with immense patience) Kassie, do you see the stars?
K: Yes
T: That means it's DARK.
K: No, it's sun-shiney.
T: Mama, is it dark?
M: Yes.
T: TELL Kassie!
M: Kassie, it's dark.
K: No, it's sun-shiney.

No matter how hard I tried to explain to Timothy that the more he argued with her, the worse it would get, he insisted on trying to set her straight. And of course she'll disagree with him just to be the pesky little sister and he rises to the bait every time. Interestingly, I remember having these same kind of battles with my younger brother and we are really close now. Maybe there's hope for my two after all!

Holders?!

I am constantly reminding Kassie to take smaller bites. Mostly so she won't choke, but also because she makes a huge mess when she takes big bites. So today as she was eating Spaghetti-O's:

K: Watch this big bite, Mama!
M: Wow, what a big bite! Make sure you chew that really well.
K: (around her mouthful of food) Don't worry Mama, I put some in my holders.
M: In your what?
K: My holders, see?

She then proceeds to show me that she has tucked spaghetti-o's into each cheek. Useful and adorable!
Her "holders" were about all you could see of her when we bundled up to go play in the snow!

It really happened!!

Things that I have done before owning a house:
-been married for 8 1/2 years
-had 2 children
-graduated from college
-taught school for 3 years
-moved 6 times in my adult life
-lived with my in-laws....twice....for a total of 10 months
-watched my husband graduate....twice.....with a total of 2 undergrad majors and 1 minor, 1 law degree and an MBA


BUT it is all over now!! We are under contract for our first home and if all goes well will be closing on it on the 25th of February! Yay!!!!