Bubble Fun

Last week during my OB appointment (I was 38w5d in these photos) my mom rode to the office with me and took William to a park right around the corner. There is a pond full of geese and a sidewalk that goes around it. Also some shady area with picnic tables. So, a toy lawnmower, bubbles and a ball provided 2+ hours of entertainment! Here are some sweet photos she took of us playing together since we will soon have a brother or sister in the mix.

I have been making an honest effort to pay less distracted time with William. The weather has been beautiful and we spend hours at a time outside. My phone is inside. Everything else can wait (unless my husband is away on travel for work). I realize that our lives will soon change and I want him to have my full attention as long as possible. It has also left me with mixed emotions about asking his grandmothers for help even though I may need it. I feel bad "passing him off" even though he has a wonderful time with them.

I LOVE his sheer joy in this photo!

Another fun shot except my eyes are closed so darn tight...

Sharing bubbles with the baby

Closet Facelift

On the same day that the carpet installers were at the house, I decided a little closet facelift was in order. All of the closets at our "old house" had white wire shelves. That is not the case here. This is the closet in the master bathroom upstairs. It is an obscenely large bathroom (no photo to share now) in need of several updates, but with a smaller size closet. There is also a similar size closet downstairs adjacent to the full bathroom on the main floor which I am grateful floor. Right now, that houses everything child related since it is near their bedrooms and extra towels that are not under the sink. Note: without locking bathroom cabinets, the only thing safely stored in them are towels! Back to the closet...

The closet shelves were in need of new paint. As you can imagine hair products, lotions, etc sitting there over the years. Well, I didn't want to paint because that would mean sanding, cleaning up dust, etc and we will probably paint the closet when we paint the bathroom down the road. 

So, I used the next best thing, a material I am very familiar with…Vinyl! I purchased two large containers of this distressed chevron vinyl at JO-Ann's back in the summer for $2.97. The rolls were huge. Time to use them!

I simply measured the shelves, cut the vinyl and adhered it to the shelves. WaLa!

Now the shelves look updated, clean and it was a much quicker process than painting.

Progress - Flooring

While I haven't posted, we have certainly made progress on the house. I am going to break it up into all different posts so I have updates to share as I choose :).

Lessons Learned in Reno Progressively: You get more work done when you don't live at the house. For us this rings true because we have a toddler in bed by 7:30pm which restricts what improvement projects we can do because of noise. And we had family in town for William's birthday party/real birthday/Easter so we enjoyed three days with them instead of working.

So let's talk flooring since I did a whole post on it earlier. The carpet installers from Lowe's spent 7.5 hours installing carpet in 6 bedrooms of our house. We used two types of carpet: one for the four bedrooms and another for the two "bedrooms" in the basement.

Basement guest room

New carpet pad down

New carpet installed!

Removing the old and installing new carpet breathed a fresh breath of life into our house. It smelled fresh, it looked fresh and it looked updated and was what we wanted. We are glad we decided to go ahead and install all of the carpet at one time because the original carpet was old, discolored and stinky. Plus, since we spend alot of time playing on the floor, it probably wouldn't have been the best healthwise for young children.

Now Brad also finished our beautiful Pergo floor in the living room (large area, about 28x17). He did a great job and we are working on putting up new floor trim. Everyone compliments our floor and we are so happy with the color and material selection we made.

How did I contribute to the flooring process? Well, besides painting the floor trim in the bedrooms once the old carpet was removed, prior to the new carpet being installed, I also decided to pry up the flooring in the entryway (shown below). You don't need to remind me I was 34 weeks pregnant, my husband did that. I just sat on the floor and pulled up the pieces with a small crowbar, it wasn't too difficult. This area is going to have the same Pergo floor once we get the time to make noise for a couple hours to get it installed.

Two Years: Unforgettable

Two years ago, sweet William Michael entered our lives.

His first moments brought so much joy into our hearts, our lives and our relationship. I don't think we thought it could ever get better. But it has. As he has grown and developed, I think we have both fallen in love with him more than when we first met him at 8:18pm on Thursday, March 31, 2011.

He still looks like this newborn boy to me…when he is asleep at least. I know he has changed by leaps and bounds but the resemblance he bears to these first photos always makes me smile.

Happy birthday my son. May you have a wonderful second birthday (and Easter) with our family.

Happening this Week

The whole idea of waking up early because I am finally sleeping better has its benefits. By 7:15am today I packed two boxes (one was 95% of our spice cabinet) and put the ingredients in the bread maker for some fresh bread (traditional white bread…added Rosemary). Today the carpet installers come to lay new carpet in the four bedrooms and two rooms in the basement…pictures to come!

I have grandparent assistance again so William doesn't have to wait around with me for the installers. Once the carpet goes in and tack strips with nails aren't all over the place, the house will be a much safer place for him to be. It also means I can bring a box of toys so he can be there with us without us being so worried about his safety.

Hopefully I can unload a few kitchen related boxes while I am there by myself. There is much more cabinet space in our new home which is exciting but also a little daunting. We do not have an official pantry, but there is a long refrigerator height door with pull out shelves and plenty of additional cabinets for food if needed. I would rather limit our food to the refrigerator and "pantry" as I do now, because as a family of three it is enough and prevents food from going to waste if hidden in the back of a cabinet. Also, in our current home, I have a linen closet in the dining room. Our new house does not have a formal dining room, so there is not a linen closet either. So, I will be storing tablecloths, napkins, servingware, etc in kitchen cabinets as well as the buffet that was in our kitchen.

Also while at the house I hope to assemble William's birthday banner since his party is next weekend! Also want to cut the food tent cards and maybe put some new white paint in the bathroom closets. We will see…I have been told to take it easy and my feet, hands and knees are also asking me to lighten up!

Also happening this week: DirecTV, satellite internet installation and hopefully some slow unpacking/transfer of items from once house to the other since we just live up the road.

Lessons Learned in Reno: 1st Weekend

On Friday we started working on our new house! My husband picked up the flooring at Lowe's and we spent some time that afternoon enjoying the place we will call home (or "my farm" if you are my two year old).

Lesson 1: Main living areas look better WITHOUT carpet.

Living room on Saturday morning

Living room on Saturday evening

Lesson 2: Old mauve carpet looks best thrown out on the front lawn!

Photo of the carpet and pads from the two upstairs bedrooms

Lesson 3: Paint trim white! On Sunday we went and picked up a new gallon of Valspar White semi-gloss paint to start painting the trim throughout the house, mainly the bedrooms. New carpet will be installed on Tuesday so painting trim before carpet is installed is much easier and allows us (or me) to not have to be super exact.

Lesson 4: This house is going to be where we live for many, many years and raise our children. It is a wonderful feeling. It is so relaxing to walk outside and not see neighbors, only our land. I so like people, but it just seems so "zen."

Lesson 5: (No photo). We are lucky to have grandparents nearby to keep William while we work on the house. He spent both days this weekend with my mom and had a wonderful time. We missed him lots, but couldn't have gotten as much done as we did without her help.

Weekend 1 achievements:

- removed all carpet (about 1900 sq ft worth) and brought to the local "beauty spot" to dispose of it

- laid our beautiful new floor in the living room

- removed all of the window grates and cleaned the inside of the windows

- painted all the floor trim in the master bedroom and started the other large upstairs bedroom
- removed the floor in the entryway in preparation for our new floor
- in the laundry room, we removed a handful of boards with nails hanging out (as hooks), a large MDF bookcase once used to stack shoes to the ceiling and a broken wire rack

We Bought a Farm!

Believe it or not…we bought a farm! We just closed on the property eight hours ago after making our initial offer in September. Surprised we are moving again? Some of you may have been with me since 2009 when I started writing about building our current home. But yes, we are moving again. Only 2.5 miles up the road, but technically it is a new town (same school cluster) and 13 more acres of land. Eek! 

So this will mean one of two things for this blog. 1) I will be sharing lots of DIY and home improvement projects because we have a new place to start and make our own. 2) I will not share as frequently because I have an almost two-year old, am 33 weeks pregnant, moving and trying to make the house "ours" somewhat before baby arrives.

I am not going to share any pictures of the house itself yet, but for now, enjoy the view :)