The rooms

I have been saying I would put up some pictures of the finished girls rooms. 

Abi's still has one big thing to go in it on her birthday but for now this is what it looks like now when looking in from her door.

Looking toward the foot of her bed you see the lego table and the pet shop area...

back toward the door from the bed...

And Maddy's from the door....

the dollhouse area looking toward the door...

the 'store' and the fisher price toys

the housekeeping area...

from the closet/vanity area looking toward the new kitchen...

from the store area looking toward the other wall we see her little bed...

I have since had to throw away that tree on the wall because it was no good. It kept coming off and when it did the color would come off of it. It is nothing like the other one in Abi's room. 

Maddy is doing great in the toddler bed and loves being in her room much more since this transition.

Buckets

Doug kicked me out of the office... (just kidding, but he did ask me to move my craft room into our bedroom) and I ended up using the shelves in Abi's bathroom in our closet for my stamps. I needed a new way to hold her stuff that would be cute and I found these buckets in the dollar section at Target the other day. I hung them with some ribbons and stuck her things in them. I love it!

New bed stuff

I had been keeping an eye out for toddler bed sets that weren't character ones since we got Abi's bed at Christmas but haven't been able to find any except online where they were pretty expensive (posh tots and pottery barn enjoy mocking me) but the other day we went into Target down by Doug's work and were amazed to find that Target is not the same every where as I had first imagined. Well, it was pretty much the same but had a lot more stuff! We found this complete set for really cheap and Abi loves it.
Today she is actually taking a nap and I checked on her a minute ago to find this.... I guess hippo was tired too.

Can you guess what I did this afternoon?

Yet again Doug came home to a part of the house re-arranged. This time it was the kitchen again. I have all sorts of weird quirks and one of them is that I like Abi's toys to stay in the play 'area'. It is practically impossible to keep her toys in the family room (although easier than it was when the playroom was the front room) and for some reason it just irritates me when she takes stuff in the kitchen. I decided that instead of continuing to let this bother me I had to adapt. So, I shrunk down our kitchen table to the way I used to have it against one wall in the dining area....
(by the way, that big champagne glass looking thing I have Valentines Candy in I got at Good Will for $2 and I'm loving it!)

and I undid the 'mud area', brought Abi's kitchen toy up from the basement, and made a kitchen for Abi inside the kitchen. I even decorated the blackboard for the occasion...

I don't know why I didn't think of this before. She loved it. It functions well. It was played in for a long time. We are loving it. I let Abi take the camera for awhile when I was cooking dinner and she took some 'artsy' photos of her view of her new play area...
and I got a few of her playing.
Someday maybe my house will stop being re-arranged so much... but I doubt it.

What did we do this week?

It seemed like a really busy week but we also had a lot of down time which was so much fun!
These are some of the things we have done over the past week...
Abi showed off some of her new bows and learned that it is hard to run in an ankle length denim skirt. (But she still had fun doing it!)

We found out we had voles again when I noticed one of the holes from last year looked open again and then saw a little one come running out and start eating the grass the day after the snow melted. Doug put out some poison before going to work while I watched with mixed emotions feeling like a villain.

Abi learned about Taoism as it relates to the Winnie the Pooh gang.... (not really, she just liked looking at the pictures while I read through it)

Abi was thrilled that she finally could wear the yellow overalls that Mckenna and Courtney handed down to her. She loves the little hammer holder thing on the side.. it's the perfect size to hold the teddy bear the doctor gave her when she had pink eye.

There were a few meltdowns in her room when her dolls wouldn't cooperate during tea time... that darn Kirsten just wanted to stand on her head. Where are her manners?

We celebrated New Years Day and Eve:
Abi started the day watching the Barbie Nutcracker. She was mostly playing and making a mess while I watched it (I really like it) but toward the end when the Prince and Clara are dancing she stopped everything and watched, occasionally lifting up an arm and a leg like they were doing.

We were very excited for New Years decked out in our polka dots for good luck!

We had tacos and chips and homemade cheese salsa for dinner along with soda and other kinds of junk food.. and we each got to pick a movie to watch. Abi's pick: Horton hears a Who. She had fun building a fort while watching.

We rang in the New Year (the first time) at 6:00 when Abi's movie was over. We all sat on the floor and had a glass of sparkling apple juice, broke open a Christmas cracker and Abi put on the crown, and we made a toast to 2009 and yelled Happy New Year!

Then we did a little dancing of course!

Then it was off to bed for Abi and Mommy and Daddy celebrated the rest of the night by watching Mommy's pick 'The Spiderwick Chronicles" and Daddy's "Wanted". These were both intense movies so they kept us up easily until midnight. We paused Wanted in time to watch the ball drop at midnight and toast each other with some more sparkling cider and then finished watching it. We both liked both movies a lot although I had to cover my eyes a few times during Wanted so I wouldn't see the blood. (Here's Abi looking soooo much like her Aunt Wendy I did a double take)

We gathered all the Christmas stuff into the front room and packed it away..

Then moved everything into the middle of the room and painted! (This was Friday and Saturday)

So now we finally have a room in the house painted that people actually see..

The red curtains won't be staying in here. They just have to stay until I get the new ones sewn. I bought the fabric two years ago when we first were moving into our home but hadn't made them yet because it is nice fabric and I didn't want them hanging in the preschool room. These are the fabrics they are going to be made out of.

and I read A LOT of books. It was awesome.

Thursdays Thirteen: My 13 favorite things in the last week

1) Re-reading Dracula by Bram Stoker in honor of Halloween- I started it again last night to cap off the perfect day we had yesterday.

2) Reading The Tale of Despereax to Abi last night. After bath and scriptures we went into her room and she got in bed and I read the first three chapters of this book to her. It is not a picture book. She laughed at all the right places and sat still for the entire time. It was such a joyful moment.

3)Re-decorating our downstairs and adding the playroom to our family room. We also put our movies back in there like they used to be. It's more crowded now but I really like the change.

4. Having a sitting room again... here's the old playroom. Since this picture we have hung a painting over the couch and added a few things. It is so peaceful to sit in there.

5. Put out all the halloween and fall decorations. This is a new one I made. I was not thrilled with the way it turned out but I think it's cute enough to put out.


6. Started working on our Family Home Evening board. I have always wanted one so I purchased the wood quite a while ago when Hobby Lobby had a sale and I got our sister in law to make the lettering for me. I spent the last two days painting it and then last night I put the lettering on. I didn't notice until I was done that activity is missing a t but I don't really think it's too big of a deal. Now all I have to do is wait for Doug to drill holes in the little name squares so I can paint them and put on the names to hang from the posts with ribbon.

7. Yesterday when Abi and I went to McDonalds to cash in our free small yogurt parfait coupon we got while on our vacation. Abi loved it. I got a drink and worked on pencil puzzles for an hour while Abi played. It was so nice.

8. I finally finished my cake platter I made at the Girls retreat. I had finished the painting in Utah but now it has ribbon around it!

9. Ate dinner at the table set with Halloween and Fall decor... I am such a geek but I love this time of year.

10. Finally found Halloween colored m&ms. We looked at four stores before we found them. I knew they would look so cute in my pumpkin bowl.. unfortunately a bag of M&M's seems like a lot but it didn't quite fill up the entire pumpkin.

11. Played at the park last night with Doug and Abi.
12. Made an appointment for brunch at the American Girl Cafe in a few weeks when my mom is here. I can't wait to go there again and Abi is so excited!
13. Watched a cheesy Halloween movie while sharing hot chocolate and caramel apples with Abi. This is something my mom and I have done the last two years so this year I did it with Abi. I love creating and keeping traditions.

Wednesday night at our house... random thoughts

Does anyone on Earth re-arrange their house as much as I do? Seriously. Doug and I are trying to de-stress and simplify some things. We talked about the state of our house. I don't feel relaxed when it isn't tidy and yet picking up after a 2 year old and 31 year old constantly (not to mention myself) has me frazzled- so, after some great advice from his mom the other night we have chosen certain areas of the house that are the most important to have perfectly clean all the time and the rest can be done when there is time or on my strict schedule (meaning that since my schedule has Tuesday as the day to clean the upstairs bathroom it doesn't get done until then even if it needs it unless I have some time when I FEEL like cleaning it... I don't think that will ever happen.) Also, this means not picking up the toys throughout the downstairs and Abi's room every 15 minutes or so because I want it clean. I will let her play to her hearts content and before nap and bedtime we will clean. This led me to some other ideas because of how massive our toy problem can get because of having the preschool in our front room.
We used to have a 'sitting room' in that area. It was a nice, quiet, relaxing spot to visit with people and to sit as a family or read. I decided that since my preschool is very small that we will downsize it. Most of the toys and things will go to the basement to be swapped every few weeks to keep them interesting. This way what we keep up here at one time will fit into the 'family room' off the kitchen. The front room will be transformed over the next few days back into a 'sitting room'. This is also so that it feels more relaxing when we come in through that door.
That said, I re-arrange all the time. I know Doug thinks its funny how he can come home and have everything changed without his knowing it was even going to happen. I was talking to my mom about this today and I told her that I blame her and my dad!! It's that Navy Brat blood in me that keeps me from being able to settle. I have to constantly be changing my surroundings and if that isn't moving into a new state/city/house than it must be done by the re-assigning of where the bed is or the way the tv faces. I realized that come next summer when we will have been in this house 2 1/2 years (assuming we will still be here then) it will be the longest I've ever lived anywhere. Yes, it's true. I have NEVER lived anywhere longer than 2 1/2 years. In My Life. The funny thing is that most places were much less than that. It was fun though. I enjoyed the adventure so I will embrace now the adventure of furniture 'moving'.
While I have been doing this I have been watching the final debate of McCain and Obama. It was crazy. I didn't think McCain came off as eloquent as I have seen him in other debates/interviews but I think that has a lot to do with how everyone told him that he needed to take the gloves off with Obama. I don't think he was comfortable doing that... just my opinion. I still prefer him though. Watching them I just know that I agree with so much more of McCains platforms than Obama's. I do think it is important though to keep an open mind when watching these kinds of things so I did that- and I'm still for McCain. I kept thinking that if I was somebody who owned an insurance company I would really be sweating right now. I know a lot of them are probably pretty corrupt but not all of them and I have a feeling they are out of business if Obama wins.... the good along with the bad. AND I have to say that although we make nowhere near that quarter of a million dollars a year- I don't think that people that are successful should be punished for it. Why should you have to pay more just because you make more?
How is that fair? I will always believe that it should be an across the board percentage. Like tithing. If you are making 10,000 a year or 500,000 a year and you are paying the same percentage of tax the rich person is still paying more but it makes it fair. Anyway, that's what's going on around here.
Oh and a bit of news... in case you didn't know Doug's mom was called to our church's General Young Women's Board recently. I think that is really cool. She will be great at it and a huge asset to that program.

Abigail's New Room

I was going to paint Abi's room blue with clouds and a sunshine and a castle but Doug finally admitted to me that he didn't like that idea so we decided on stripes. We had no idea what a project we were taking on. We wanted pink and green and spent a lot of time trying to find the perfect colors that would look okay with her quilt but also with some of her old "baby" room stuff. This was hard. We finally used the dress she was wearing at the time as inspiration and got two colors that matched the pink and green on the dress. Doug spent hours yesterday drawing the lines all over the room and then taping. We painted the pink first and then had to remove all the tape and Doug re-taped while I tried to get Abi to sleep downstairs. She was crying and so sad. She wanted to go to sleep in "mine own bed!" We had moved her mattress downstairs and we all had a slumber party in the family room. So, then we painted the green. Doug did an amazing job of drawing and taping so the lines are as close to perfect as I think you can get the first time you paint anything. This is the first time I have ever lived in a house with painted walls. I was very nervous last night. We were up until 1:30 am finishing up but we are pretty pleased with the results. The colors are a lot brighter than I was expecting but I think they are still fun and Abi loves it. I plan on adding some flowers painted onto the bottom green section over the next few weeks some time as well as some kind of something over her bed... not sure what yet. So, it is a work in progress, but here are some pictures of it now.