Week 9

I just love when babies stuff their whole hand in their mouth with that look of determination.

Go Cameron!

Ceiling is finally finished! This was my off the wall idea we weren't really 100% that it would work out. The contractor was wholly against the recessed ceiling in the kitchen referring to it as a grave.  He was convinced we needed to cover it. He wanted to put in fluorescent lights and cover it with a diffuser...much like you see in an office building or at a school.

I was wholly against making any room in my house feel like an office.

So I stared up at the ceiling for a long long time and finally decided it needed to just look like we welcomed the recess not that it was just...there. 

So that's what I did.

Framed in tin ceiling tiles and we were set. Keith and I both ended up loving it, even the kids like it. 

Yuliya told me the other day that she didn't want us to make anymore rooms in the house new for a long long time. I guess she's tired of the disturbances too.

Today marks the end of week 8, now onto week 9.

Just a wednesday

Tomorrow I will be taking Yuliya to get a haircut. She has been begging all week for a haircut. On Monday she had a talk with me about mine.
"Momma you have had Rapunzel hair for a long time, I don't want you to have Rapunzel hair anymore, I want you to have mommy hair now."
I think what it boils down to is she wants us to have matching hair cuts....I am open to it, a long bob maybe like so...what do you think?

maybe

In other news:

More progress has been made on the kitchen :) Maybe only day away from ending now.. I will post pictures shortly.

Last night we saw Arctic Monkey and The Black Keys in concert, Heather, Keith and myself. It was nice, nice to sit on the hill with a cool breeze and get an up close view on the screens around the stage. Pleasant that it was a Tuesday during the school year, so there weren't many teenagers. No offense teens, but you will relate in a few years. Nice to sleep in a little today and wander into work. Tomorrow I get to have lunch with my sister and wonderfully sweet niece in this beautiful weather. A hot march had my hopes down for beautiful weather this year, but April has more than made up for it. 

tin tin

And we finally have ceiling tile!

It still needs to be framed in and of course about a million other little details around the kitchen. But we are getting there, now I actually believe it will be done this week. 

Keith and I spent a wonderful weekend in San Antonio with his parents and brother. Driving home from work on Friday in hail and zero visibility in the driving rain, I was taken by surprise by the perfect weather we had this weekend. Not a cloud in the sky, perfect temperatures and nice walks. Great food as always. 

I love big baby smiles with no teeth. Cameron(nephew) was so cute and cuddly, never a tear or whine from this one. Him and his brother play so sweetly. 

Wonder where all of the pictures went? While I am still putting the kitchen together I have yet to find the charger for my camera which used to live in the kitchen drawer with pens and paper.  I will find it soon though!

Week 7

 Above you see the color the room used to be, two shades of brown. Which went well at the time, but now that the kitchen is such a "dark" color I needed a less cave like feeling in the playroom. So I went for something super bright. 

And here it is...now two shades of yellow, this room is supremely bright and cheery. I love it! How bright and happy it is now it reminds me of a sunflower. However I am used to calm cool colors so it does take a little adjusting. 

Did you notice in the picture above...We have hardware! 

Small victories

I'll take them

Enjoy it

There are a few moments in a day when I really feel like a Momma, my favorite times that I can just sit back and enjoy it. 

One of them is when I creep into my little tots bedroom early in the morning before school and I get the joy of seeing them so peacefully sleeping. It always reminds me of when they were tiny babies and would fall asleep in my arms. I am not a huge fan of Cash jumping into bed with me at 3am with his school bus and zooming it all over the bed for an hour until he can get back to sleep. But even that makes me laugh a little when I wake up,soak in my environment before sliding out of bed for work and I get to see Cash cuddling his Momma and his school bus.

I am also thoroughly delighted when the kids enthusiastically ask to go in the backyard to find any peas or blueberries they can eat off the bush. We can't seem to grow either food fast enough for their eager little appetites. 

Update on the kitchen:
Remember this wall we made a hole in to have a breakfast bar?

Well now that the kitchen is a darker color as well as the living room... I decided to brighten up the playroom/formal dining. They painted it yesterday, it is super bright now and I love it! Pictures to follow

As for the kitchen, the contractor did a walk through last night and announced that we have about a days worth of work left (fingers crossed) We are waiting on the tiles for the ceiling they should be in today or tomorrow!

Side note:

Keith and I decided to make bucket lists....What would you put on yours? I am going to ask all the kids the same questions. Answers to follow soon enough.

Charleston-Angel Oak

On Sunday we celebrated Jack's birthday, but because there wasn't enough time the day before we did the the 2nd of two things I wished for for my birthday. 

1. Frozen Yogurt

2. See the Angel Oak.

Remember I told you we took a ton of pictures?

Well here they are

I thought this knot looked like a dragons eye

Singing under the tree. 

I am still blown away by the girth of the tree.

There were little green caterpillars everywhere

After a while we started bringing them leaves to eat or picking them up and putting them on leaves, here we were watching one eat. I know it sounds about as exciting as watching paint peel but it really was pretty neat to see how fast they can chomp away at a leaf.

Eventually we left the tree and had our shrimp and grits followed by many many rounds of bananagrams and Chinese checkers.

We celebrated the rest of our birthdays with brownies and bowling for Jack(I am so glad they had bumpers...for my sake) and mini golf and frozen yogurt for Sam. 

I'd say it was a delightful 5 day weekend.

The end

Finally a Charleston post

The last weekend of March we took to the skies to see Jack and Sam. We woke early stopped in at the Chiropractor for a pre flight adjustment, grabbed a bag full of kolaches for Lynsae and Nathan...being a Texan you must miss kolaches when out of state! We flew all day, we took off at 1pm to arrive in Miami for a  layover. In Miami we were able to stop in for a great Cuban meal and then make our way out to the far end of the airport where we boarded our teeny tiny plane that then hopped us over to South Carolina.

Taking in Charleston as we landed.

When we arrived we were greeted by Nathan who was determined to feed us well. It was a nice way to end a busy day, with everything he whipped up for us and Lynsae and Nathan finally getting their hands on a few kolaches. 

We promptly fell asleep during a movie.

Which was okay because early in the morning we woke to go see Mr Jackson play soccer, he did really well. 

We were all impressed.

Except Sam...because...well..that's his brother, how impressive can your sibling be.

So we kicked our shoes off and kicked the ball between the four of us ----> see the kid behind me..he kicked too...made 4 while Jack was supporting his team. The cool damp grass felt refreshing under our feet with the warm sun baking the tops of them.

I think they look like Koala's here, what do you think?

Sam isn't so great at convincing me he's having a bad time.

We also had a chance to hit up the Flowertown festival with Lynsae, Nathan and Cody. We stopped in for Greek and then made our way through the festival. It was fun...until it started raining.  And because it was my birthday I decided I wanted frozen yogurt...... before dinner! 

So....that's what we did 

More on the rest of our trip coming soon!

But I'm not getting any shots right?

Does she look worried?

No shots this year little miss.

 Yuliya has now jumped from close to 10th percentile to height and weight to 50th for height and 35th for weight. Way to go growth spurt, she is still projected to be a pretty tiny lady.

Still have not uploaded pictures from Charleston, apologies. It has been busy around these parts. Here is a video I took of the Angel Oak in South Carolina said to be between 500 and 1500 years old. It was pretty magnificent, I am still in awe. Taking video was sort of a last minute thought had I planned this out it might have been better. Not to worry I have a ton of pictures of it coming soon.

This weekend was spent driving out to the city of Bastrop, which is  wonderfully charming. I absolutely loved their historical district and river walk. We were able to drive around the hill country and just sight see and I didn't get car sick once. (major accomplishment for me)

We spent the remainder of our weekend washing as many dishes as we could. I don't generally use the dish washer, but I was prepared to this weekend since every dish in the house is now either covered in dry wall dust or paint. This weekend however the power outlet that supplies the dishwasher decided to go out...so I had to wash them by hand anyway. Keith and I had a nice wash and dry assembly line between the two of us occasionally taking breaks to work on the garden and run errands. 

 

Here is the latest on our butterfly/herb garden(remember when we created it?) about half of the flowers are blooming at the moment and all of our herbs are booming. I am excited to see the entire bed in full bloom. We were also able to munch on a few fresh homegrown blueberries while we pulled weeds from our veggie beds. We are having luck with potatoes, cucumber, tomatillos, peppers, alliums, peas, beans, pumpkin, okra, and even the broccoli is still hanging on....but our tomatoes? Nothin'...I don't think they have even grown an inch since being put in the ground. It has me a little puzzled, in previous years tomatoes seemed to be the stars of the garden

And maybe the best moment of the weekend...

We were able to cook! A little disabled until all of the cooking utensils have been washed and put in their places, but use the stove we did!

Over the bar lights put in on Friday, they look better in person.

The tiles have been grouted and the new sink hardware installed.  The new faucet kind of works like a joystick, right to turn on forward for cold, and back for hot, it has been an interesting adjustment.

We are officially in the home stretch! I have my fingers crossed that it will be complete this week!

Games

No post yesterday, on top of the killer migraine I was privileged enough to sit at the vital statistics center for around an hour and a half to obtain copies of the children's birth certificates, then mosey on down to the elementary and enroll Yuliya into Kindergarten. I went ahead and grabbed Cash's BC b/c let's face it, who wants to sit in that building and in that line more than necessary?

Yuliya asks me every day "not the day after tomorrow, but the day after that I am going to kindergarten right?" So yesterday I was able to tell her she is enrolled and we are now on a 4 month count down.  Kindergarten has been a VERY hot topic in our house lately, so much so that now any new place we go Cash automatically dubs "kindergarten" Yesterday I took them to Chase bank for the first time and he confidently declared that we were in kindergarten.

Not quite kiddo.

Charleston:

 I am hoping to have our Spring Charleston pictures uploaded this weekend. But here are a few I took with my phone.

The boys prefer staying in and playing games over going out any day, so that is what we did. We stayed in and played Chinese checkers, bananagrams(a game I have never played and now love!), checkers and find its. Jack and Sam brought along a Find It book that we poured over, all four of us working together to find the hidden objects on the page. Sam started out next to us and then decided to switch spots to look at the book upside down, I am amazed at how well he's able to find objects upside down.



Jack and my bananagram



We even went bowling



Last time we went to Charleston I tried the famous Shrimp and grits everyone insists on having while you are there. Originally I had it with brown gravy and cheddar cheese which was fantastic(and I don't typically like shrimp) This time I tried with Alfredo and Parmesan.....not so good. Next time it's back to brown gravy.



Ginger beer, non alcoholic and so so yummy, we thought it would be great to drink with sushi.

And....last but not least!

The Kitchen:

Here it is as of right now, all of the tiles for the back splash are in place, waiting on the grout between them. As you can see we still have quite a few things to do but the major issues have been addressed :) Last night I was able to put about 2/3 of the pantry back together. Hoping tonight the stove will be functional...I am so ready to cook. This weekend Keith and I were fantasizing about all of the things we are going to cook as soon as we have a functional kitchen again, nerdy huh?

Counter tops!

Last night we left Charleston, scheduled to land in Dallas and connect to Houston arriving at 10pm. Due to the weather in Dallas we were able to catch a direct flight to Houston and make it home 3 hours earlier. Three hours earlier meant we were able to survey the kitchen, water the plants, and go grocery shopping. Three extra hours did not however prevent me from being a little sleepy today. 

  Keith standing at the new breakfast bar. Still no water, stove or oven. But I expect it to all be back shortly. Still need back splash, hardware, cabinet in the pantry, ceiling tiles, lights, and floor tiles.

Back from Charleston but left most of the pictures on Keith's camera. So for now you get to see the fantastic Cuban meal we had during our lay over in Miami on Friday, how happy that made me. Now if I could manage the same exact meal for lunch today...