Friday, June 5, 2009

We're Done!!!

Well, as done as we can be for now. There's still the touch up painting and decorating to do, and until the inspectors give their final okay, our house is still technically "under construction".

For those of you just dying to see the remodel, I thought I'd pleasure you with the whole process, start to finish, sans lack of sleep. That, my friends, can only truly be experienced by those of us that were here. Count your blessings, is all I can say to that. I'm still EXHAUSTED!!!

Anyway, the kiddos were treated with a bath in "Mommy's Big Bath Tub" every night. Mostly because they were in the way in the other bathroom. Nonetheless, Morgan thought she was in the lap of luxury.


After the kids went to bed that first night, the men went to the all too familiar Home Depot. Sorry the picture is blurry, but when Lauren and I saw them pulling into the driveway like this, we couldn't stop laughing! Travis rode home from "The De-pot" straddling the 2 by 4's after one fell out of the Pilot!
It's official! Once the carpet is cut and gone, there's no going back! Morgan woke up Thursday morning and said, "Oh, the carpet. Where'd the carpet go? I like my carpet!"

I thought I'd break the monotony occasionally with random pics of everyone. Here's Lauren and Kaden just hanging out.

The electrical's done Friday morning, sometime about 1 a.m. (no that's NOT a typo, though I wish it were). Don't touch these switches. I'm serious. You'll get zapped. I did. I just had someone else turn the light on the rest of the week.

Sadie had to test out the new flooring before it was installed. She saw Travis pull it out and crawled (as fast as her army crawl can go) right over to them. Pretty cute.

Morgan helped Travis pull up the old flooring. She thought it was pretty cool that she and Travis both wore matching yellow shirts. Friday happened to be "Twin Day" for Morgan and Travis at our house.

This is the amount of space the girls had to play in all day Friday. That's the coffee table boundary in the center and the couch boundary at the bottom. Complete their "cage" with the sliding door just past the TV and the half wall just behind me (I'm taking the pic). Talk about tight quarters.

Alas, the inspectors came and we passed the rough inspections on both framing and electrical. Good job Travis!

Travis pulled up all the carpeting and Sadie then changed her mind about the flooring. So, we opted to just leave it this way:

Just kidding! Here's our new flooring! We love it! Sadie especially; she can scoot across this floor twice as fast as on the carpet!!

We went to the zoo on Saturday. It was a gorgeous day to go and the kids were so good the whole time!

All the animals at the zoo just exhausted Kaden. Here he is with all things girly. A girly carseat, a pink blanket, and Sadie's cowgirl doll.

Later Saturday night, Brian installed more flooring while Travis muddded the drywall. Apparently Morgan misread the memo about work attire and felt her winter jacket and summer pajamas would be more appropriate. Well, it is only May...

Here's the hallway! Only texture, paint, flooring, and baseboards to go!
Every major construction project has to have a hiccup in it. Ours was the pleasant surprise under the vinyl flooring. Our builder stapled particle board to the subfloor and then glued the vinyl to the particle board. Oh, and the staples were about every 2 inches. Enter pry bar, hammers, strong men, and worker bees (i.e. Mackenzie and Lauren). 4-6 hours later (it was so late we lost track of time), we had the flooring up and ready for the new floors.
How am I supposed to cook dinner? No stove, no dishwasher, no refrigerator, no counter space!!! Enter takeout...

As if I didn't have enough messes to deal with already, I thought I'd give Sadie her first Oreo. I blame that mistake on the sleep deprivation. What was I thinking??? She took a baby wipe bath before I even pulled her out of the highchair. But, she loved it!!
"Mommy, can I watch 'Tars' for nap time today"
"Umm, sure, Morgan."
That lasted about 5 minutes.

Okay, the dishwasher is now in the new bedroom. How will we wash dishes???
Travis to the rescue! Not really. Paper plates to the rescue!!
I just thought Morgan's face was so stinkin' cute in this pic! And, Kaden wanted to show off his feminine side in Sadie's pj's.

Brian, exhausted, with the 3 kiddos. They truly were troopers. We all were. It was a L-O-N-G week! Oh, and it was a little cold in the basement, so Kaden borrowed Sadie's purple pajamas, too. They were pretty cute with his red hair!
The view from inside the new bedroom. On the right is the closet and you can see the fridge and the girls' bedroom door through the doorway (to help you orient yourself if you've been in our house before).

This is what the front room looked like for the majority of the week. We were all too tired to pick up toys and they were going to be out again in less than 6 hours, so I didn't bother picking them up last week.

From the kitchen, here's the new bedroom. We decided on a soft yellow color, so it can double as an office for now, and possibly a nursery in a few years.

Here's our new floor and in the top corner, you can catch our new dining room light. And yes, the paint cans are still sitting in the dining room. If I waited until all the little "odds and ends" painting touch ups were done to post pictures, it would be a long time. So, please, excuse the mess...

So, there you have it. Our first home remodel project. And, we're still alive to tell about it. Overall, it was an awful, exhausting week, but we love our floors and our new room!

Thanks, Travis, Lauren, and Kaden for coming out to help us with our project!!

Tuesday, May 26, 2009

Memorial Day Weekend

(a.k.a. Untel Tyler and Auntie Alex's visit)

Sorry for the late post...we've been on the go since the beginning of May! MUCH more to come about our home remodel and new bedroom/office!

We had a great time over Memorial Day weekend! The guys went golfing, Alex and I sewed an apron for her (it turned out super cute!), we enjoyed the Primary talent show, and suffered through a Rockies-Dodgers game (Rocks lost 16-6). Thanks Alex and Tyler for making the trip out to see us! We had a blast!
Tyler and Brian made balloon animals for Morgan; here's one of the "flops" (he thought it looked like he had a toothache):


Remember Morgan's lion costume from Halloween 2 years ago (she was about 16 months old)? Yeah. Still fits. Only this time, she's going for the capri style.
All of us at the game. Morgan was so excited to steal Tyler's Sprite again and again...
...and Daddy's hot dog.

Here's Sadie and Alex just hanging out at the game.

Morgan wanted to make sure everyone saw a picture of the game.

Ummm...what's he doing, Mom? I'm not so sure about this Tyler guy...

So, there you have it. Our Memorial Day Weekend, a good week and a half late. Maybe I'll post pics of the remodel soon...but I think we'll all be sleep-deprived for another week, so please, be patient.

Sunday, May 17, 2009

San Francisco

This past weekend, Brian and I went away for a "2nd Honeymoon", if you will. We (I) needed a vacation, sans kids. So, our friends John and Natalie took the kids for a couple of days while Brian and I went to San Francisco.
Here are some highlights from our trip:
We rode a tandem bike--very hard for a control-freak wife to NOT be in control, but we actually enjoyed the experience.
We biked from Pier 39 all the way to the Golden Gate Bridge. Here we are, so close to it, yet you still can't see it because of the fog.
We biked past Ghiradelli Square to grab a taste of the yummiest chocolate!
This is the ONLY thing at the Wax Museum I found interesting. A classic Norman Rockwell.
We went on a "Duck Tour." It's a tour through the city, followed by a float in the bay. Pretty entertaining. The tour guide asked us how long we had been married (expecting to hear a week or even a couple of days.). He was very shocked to hear our reply of "almost 6 years." He responded with, "Oh, you look like newlyweds. You're holding hands."
As part of the Duck Tour, we each received our own quacker. We'll be sure to leave them for your kids to play with next time we visit!

The Sea Lions are everyhwere in the bay! Here is one just relaxing under a HUGE navy ship! I guess if it's comfortable...

The aquarium. Not too much to see, but I thought all these bright fish were cool.

The Sea Lions at Pier 39. That's all they do. All day long.

And, I guess it's supposed to be a big deal to go under the Golden Gate Bridge. So, we went under it on our bay cruise. Very anticlimactic. In fact, the boat literally turns around at this point and goes back.


Overall, we had a great trip. Brian's already planning what he wants to do next time...

Monday, May 11, 2009

"Braska starts with N"

That's what Morgan kept telling us the whole way there. Along with "Affon (Afton) lives in Braska," "Affon moving," and "Untel Rich gwadumating (graduating)."
We took a family road trip over the weekend to Lincoln, Nebraska to celebrate Rich (my brother in-law) graduating from law school and Ben's blessing. Despite the initial hiccup that my parent's had the wonderful opportunity of spending 6 hours in the Denver airport (of course, we had already left or we would have jsut taken them to Lincoln, we had a great time. We're so proud of Rich's accomplishment.
The whole family after Ben's blessing.
Grandma and Grandpa with 5 of their grandkids (this really is the best shot, I promise).

Our happy little family.
While Logan was holding the camera, she said, "Morgan, come here!" So, she did! I thought this was a cute candid.

Courtney and Rich are moving to Utah today, so we left last night while they packed up their house some more. We got home about 12:45 a.m. As I went to get Sadie out of the car, I had to get a picture. Her face sums up how we all felt when we got home--completely exhausted. Only she'd been sleeping for 5 hours at this point! We hadn't!

We had a great, quick trip and Morgan is anxious to visit Affon and Mei Mei and Baby Ben at Grandpa Brad's (Rich's dad) in Utah! Thanks for letting us visit!

Spring has Sprung!

It's official! We have turned our sprinklers on and mowed the lawn for the first time in 2009. It was getting pretty long and needed a trim!

Our neighbors asked us why our lawn was so green and theirs wasn't (you can see the "line" where ours stops and theirs begins). I guess we just got lucky because we didn't do anything to it all winter. In fact, these pics are pre-watering!

We also experienced some warm weather last week for a couple of days, so we pulled out the pool and the girls went swimming. Here they are in their matching suits. Believe it or not, I actually had to switch their bottoms--Morgan is in the 18 mos. bottoms and Sadie in 3T! Poor Morgan kept losing her pants!


This is just a super cute shot of our sweet Sadie Bug. Couldn't pass up a chance to share it!


Enjoy your summer!

He Resorted to Duct Tape

Since people mostly commented on Brian's sunglasses, I thought I'd give you a status on how they're holding up. Two words: trash can. But, will Brian do that, of course not!

So, he fixed them again (3rd time's a charm, right?). And it wasn't just gray duct tape. My sister only had hot pink, so that's what he used.

Even Morgan is embarrassed by them. She kept covering Brian's head with her dress when she was up on his shoulders today. He claims he shouldn't spend frivolously because we're in a recession...

...so instead, we just don't walk with him in public. (Actually, we do, but I try to look past the strange glances)

Wednesday, May 6, 2009

Naptime and Other Random Things

During naptime, I'm trying to do a little of this:
Sadie is almost always up from her nap first, so, while I sew, she does this (only 23 lbs. to lift up, but she's finally getting on her knees):
And, Morgan is still doing this:
It's actually a pretty good system for us. I've worked on more projects (sewing and otherwise) these past few weeks than I think I've done in months! Now, if we could only figure out bedtime...
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Please donate to Brian's Sunglass Fund. His $5 pair of sunglasses broke a few weeks ago, so he superglued them back together. Then, Sadie reached for them the other day and here's what's left:
But, get this. Brian is still too cheap to replace his broken $5 sunglasses, so while I had the glue gun out last night, he hot glued them back together! I wish I had a picture, but I forgot to take one. But you can imagine a little pile of hot glue on the frame of his glasses. I suppose it is slightly less tacky than duct tape...