Catching up

Well, once again I am behind on updates. We've been busy. Mary started preschool a couple weeks ago. She is doing great! I've been told by the teacher that Mary is "independent" which is not a word I would never use to describe Mary. I've also been told that she is very polite and is very mature for her age. I am so glad it's going well. I was worried about her since we've never left her except with her various grandparents. She didn't cry at all the first day and now runs into the room to go play with her friends while I hang her coat and backpack up on her hook in the hallway. I am so proud of her. The pictures of her in the purple shirt (in the previous post) were taken on the first day of school.

Ellie had a birthday! Yippie! I can't believe my little one isn't a baby anymore. I guess I shouldn't be surprised. She's been walking and climbing for over a month. We had a party on Saturday with almost 20 people here. We started singing Happy Birthday to Ellie, and she loved it. She was smiling the entire time. She doesn't get to see my parents and grandparents very often, but she did great and let them hold her, etc. It was a great day. The weather was perfect for playing out in the yard after lunch so everyone sat out there and talked while the girls and their cousins played on the slide, swing, and sandbox.

Singing to Ellie

Normally I would hate this picture because I'm eating, but I think it's super funny!


We're still working on the basement. John went out of town a couple weekends ago, and when he came home he was sick. Now Mary and I are too. I keep thinking we are getting better, but we just can't seem to kick it. Ellie's fine of course. How funny that there can be three people in the house with a cold all coughing and sneezing like crazy and Miss Ellie is healthy as ever. Thank goodness for breastfeeding!


All primed and ready for paint:



John actually took a long lunch today and got some painting done. We need to get the area behind and around the washer and dryer done ASAP because we'll need to wash diapers in a couple days. After John gets off work, I am going down there to give that area a second coat of paint. I'm hoping we'll be done painting by Friday and we can start on the floor (which has several steps that need to be done before we can paint). I'm so excited!

For Amelia

a bit of progress

The basement is slowly coming along. On Friday, after a long day with the girls, John said I could start priming even though we technically weren't ready for it. It actually worked out pretty well, because that was a time that I could work and he could watch the girls. Plus I love to paint, and he doesn't. So I'll probably be priming then painting between his projects.


Go, Mary, Go!!! I was just doing the edging, but Mary started on the wall. I think she did great! Plus, it's just the primer and will be behind the shelves.


All the work made Ellie tired. She toddled over to the paint cans and sat right down.


John got that white door in the pic above hung up Saturday. Now he's working on the ceiling. He got it mostly insulated, took down some of the ceiling panels/tiles where the shelves will be so he could reuse them where they would be seen, and covered the ceiling over where the shelves will be with plywood. Oh, and hung new wood strips up for the ceiling tiles. The camera ended up being full after this pic. He actually got a bit further before ge ran out of insulation.


Remember, he just wanted to build some shelves........

Basement: before

Alternately titled: Oh my Lord, I cannot believe that our basement was this messy AND that I'm posting the pics on the internet.

Seriously, this is bad. Bad, bad, bad.

looking in from the doorway into the room:


The huge pile of tubs. That we didn't pile up after the last time we dug in to them.

Standing right next to the sliding glass door, looking back to the door into the room.


Okay, seriously, I debated posting these. ugh. But, it is what it is. Piles of stuff. I'm noticing there's a lot of baby junk. It's all too big to store IN anything. So it's just down there. We either need to keep if we are ever going to have another kid, or we need to have a yard sale or something. Or burn it all. But then we wouldn't need the shelves.

Last night we got the last of the junk moved out of there, and washed the walls down. After the girls went to bed, John went down and measured how much trim (for the top of the paneling) and baseboards needed to be replaced. There's a bunch missing. Where did it go? Why did it get taken down? Well, who knows. But we might as well do this right and replace it.

The shelves will be built in, on the outside wall. They'll start in the corner where the pile o' tubs is, and go down to the sliding glass doors. That's twelve feet. We're going to put a piece of paneling on the end (right next to the door), and paint it. Then we'll trim out the top to match the rest of the ceiling trim, and put a baseboard on the paneling too. The front of the shelves will be covered with fabric/curtains. I'm thinking if I can find some cheap 84 inch shower curtains, I'll use them. That way they will be washable and already made. I haven't put too much thought into that yet. I'm thinking something plain white or off white.

John's going to inventory our primer and paintbrushes/rollers at lunch, and tell me what we need. After lunch, the girls and I are going to go get what we need for painting. I'll have to pick out the wall paint and get it mixed. I'm really hoping to start priming Sunday. Dang it's a huge room. Mary loves to paint too. I am going to let her help. She wanted to do it last night. That's my girl:).

DIY :Our basement

Bless my dear, sweet, good looking husband John. Saturday I asked him to find some stuff for me that was in storage. Our current storage set up is just a huge mountain of plastic totes sitting in the corner of the basement. Every time I/we want something, it's ALWAYS on the bottom. So John said, "you know, I think I'll build some storage shelves down there." I heard "honey, let's remodel the basement." I was so happy and excited. I immediately had a list of 10 things I wanted done. Then I got more ideas! Then even more! Woot! How fun. John said "wow. This is a lot of work just to get some shelves."

Our basement is two HUGE rooms. One is John's office/our basement gym. The other is largely unused. The washer and dryer sit at one end. Our junk sits in the other corner. The furnace is in there. We don't have a furnace room/closet because until we moved here, this house did not have central heat/air. The ceiling is a drop ceiling which was partially torn down to put in the duct work. We/John were going to fix that ceiling right up when we moved in. And now, it's 2 years later. We never really go down into the basement (except John, for work) so I guess it just isn't a priority. The walls are covered in dark paneling. There's a big sliding glass door, but it's still like a cave in there.

John said shelves. But first:

1. replace old toilet in the creepy bathroom down there. We had our master bathroom redone before we moved in. We kept that toilet. First it sat in the garage for a year, then the basement. On Sunday, after 2 trips to the hardware store, a day with the water to the house turned off after John broke the pipe, and several hours of John's hard labor, we have a working toilet! Woot!

2. Clean out all the junk. John's working on this now. Well, not now. Now he's at work.

3. Repair ceiling, repair/replace missing molding/trim from paneling. Get a new door for the crawl space (currently shut off by a huge piece of ply wood on the bottom, and a baby gate across the top). Remove strange 1970's attached to the wall space heater thingy. Clean the floor and walls.

4. prime and paint! woot! something I can't wait to do. I love painting! The walls will go from a dull dark brown to an off white color. We're painting everything. Walls, trim, doors.

5. repair the floor. There's at least one small crack and a couple holes in the floor where a creepy partition was nailed down. Seal the floor with water proofing stuff (or the paint won't stick as well). Paint. Woot! I think it will be tan or light brown.

6. Build shelves! John will either be really happy at this point or be ready to kill himself. Install shelves. Paint shelves to match walls (I want them to have a built in look).

We've given ourselves a month to do this. I suspect it will take longer, but that's okay. At least we'll be able to find our junk without having to dig through all the boxes.

Last night, John reminded me that this was a lot of work just to get some shelves. I told him that raising two kids was a lot of work just so that he'd have someone to give his stuff too when he died. He agreed and went to the basement to work some more:).

Pics to come. I have before pics on the camera, but need to download them. Hopefully we'll at least be priming by Sunday so I'll get pics of that too.

Stay tuned:).

How long has it been?

We went on vacation in June and it seems I'm still trying to catch up on life.

Ellie's walking! She was about 10.5 months when she took her first steps. She still crawls more than walks. And she's a climber too. Ugh. I think she wants me to have a heart attack.

I thought the piano was bad, until I saw this:


I mean seriously, what 11 month does this kind of stuff? Apparently Ellie. Other current obsessions are her sippy cup--"gink," the cats "kiiiiiiii" and books "boo." She's also very into pointing.

Mary's 3.5 going on 16. Ugh. Pre-school starts in 19 days. Not that I'm counting. She's on my last nerve. I cut her hair this morning due to excessive tangles. Maybe I'll try to get a picture of her soon. Here's something she wrote recently:


She had it all done by herself except Ellie which she needed me to spell for her. She's really into writing notes these days. When she's not throwing a fit.

I've been busy knitting as usual. I think I'd go insane without it. I just finished this sweater for Mary:

Of course she's already told me she doesn't like it and won't wear it. Thanks, sweetie!

I'm also in the middle of making my Mom's b-day gift. She's coming here at the end of August and hope to have it done by then. I really hope she likes it. All I can say is that it's something felted:).

And I'm making 4 Christmas stockings for my friend Lisa. We're doing a trade. She's making some longies for Ellie.


I can't wait to see a picture of them in her bright green living room. I have three done. I need to get going on the last one as I think we are going to meet up at the Wool Gathering in September and trade.

Ellie's napping and Mary's resting. I have dinner in the oven already. I think I might rest too. I'm hoping once pre-school starts I'll have more time to blog regularly.

Completed projects

I have two projects that I just finished up.

First, some play food for my friend Karen's (KWAB's) little girl Freya.


There are two crocheted sandwich cookies, two knit strawberries, three knit sushi rolls, five baby carrots and a lettuce leaf. I hope Freya likes them!

Next up, stockings for the girls. Mary's is the red and pink. Ellie's is the red and green.


And now, I don't know what I'll do next. I can't stand that. There's nothing I'm itching to make. I want to make myself some fingerless gloves. I want to make Mary a sweater. I want to make some Christmas stuff. Or maybe I could just take a break from crafting and actually clean my house. Just kidding!