We just finished our biggest project so far - the hall bathroom. It was quite a learning experience, but also very satisfying. I finally had some time to make a list of all we've completed since December.

Exterior
- changed trim from butterscotch to cream
- painted front door red
- customized some house numbers to replace old ones
- replaced entry way exterior light with more welcoming one
- pulled out tons of dead or overgrown plants, mountains of bricks and pavers, a broken water feature, a concrete crocodile and sold a broken hot tub
- replaced above items with Archer's birthday apple tree, three blueberry bushes, a raspberry bush, five strawberry plants, Quinn's wildflower garden, Quinn's birthday maple tree, my great-grandmother's hostas, Jonathan's grandmother's calla lilies, pale pink peonies from our old house, and some other little plants
- took apart 20+ year old deck and put it back together to fill in the hole where the hot tub was
- re-purposed stones from water feature into a little area for our fire pit
- repaired gutters
- de-thatched and reseeded front and back lawns
- had a tree removed and some trees pruned

Family Room
- added giant bookshelf, armoire for tv storage, large couch with hidden bed, and a matching chair
- painted fireplace brass details black

Kids Rooms
- added full closet organization system
- added curtains and art

Kitchen/Dining
- bought 1960's chandelier on Craigslist for $25 and cleaned it up, painted it, and hung it over dining table to replace one (of three) ceiling fans
- fixed refrigerator
- replaced dishwasher
- replaced kitchen faucet
- removed two sets of cabinets for more open feel and natural light
- added curtains

Sitting Room/Office
- replaced ceiling fans with drum lights
- hung a giant map on the wall and built a frame for it
- added curtains and a loveseat to sitting room
- added a used school table and school chairs, some storage, and a magnetic whiteboard easel with calendar to office
- created a chicken wire bulletin board

Mudroom
- removed old pantry cupboard
- added some cleaning supply storage and a coat rack/shelf

Garage
- took some old things down and built a new large work bench with storage on lockable wheels

Hall Bathroom
- removed everything from walls - wallpaper, shelves, lights, mirror, towel racks, base molding, 
- re-textured and painted walls
- added new vanity, toilet, mirror, molding and lights, made a towel rack, scrubbed the floor for hours, recaulked some spaces 
- all we have left is some built-in shelving to build

Master bedroom/bathroom
- added curtains and art

Throughout house
- spray painted multiple light fixtures white and replaced most outlets and light switches with clean white ones

These pictures are from Christmastime after we had made some big changes to the family room. Compare them to the listing photos from the last post.

This next photo was taken yesterday of our sitting room/office. Not the same angle, but it can be compared to the second to last photo from the last post.

And now, for some bathroom before and afters!

It has been so fun to work on all of these projects with Jonathan! Quinn has contributed her wonderful color opinions and Archer has actually helped quite a bit. He makes sure to have the same tool as Jonathan at all times. "I go get mine hammer just like mine daddy!"

Time to share the story behind our move before I forget the details.

Starting last February, we began the process of researching an addition to our old house. We were just feeling a little cramped when we'd have guests over and our master bedroom (that was originally a den) was bigger than we needed. We were wanting to add on a master bedroom and turn our room back into a den. Well, it took until September to get a real idea from contractors what would be involved and how much it would cost and we decided it would not be worth it to us. We were so sad because we had naively dreamed that our first house would be our only house.

We had been discussing priorities during the summer while we were wondering if we would be needing to move. We contacted our realtors and let them know that we would be casually looking with the goal of buying and selling in a year or two. The next day we visited three houses on a whim after church. The first one had very dreary pictures and was for sale by owner. I convinced Jonathan to check it out because one of the rooms had a large exposed beam in the vaulted ceiling and it was two doors down from a 6 acre forest park. Well, the owner was home and ushered us in with fresh made cupcakes. She told us that she had been praying for the right family to find her house and that it had been a house of love and she hoped it would stay that way. We contacted our realtors again with the update, made an offer and hurriedly put our house on the market. 

Our house went live online Thursday on Quinn's birthday and we instantly got calls to see it. Fortunately, we were going out for dinner and then ate her birthday cupcakes at the park. Friday, people were coming and going all day so we just hid at parks and coffee shops. On Saturday, we hosted her birthday party in the morning and there were showings the rest of the day. Sunday was an open house. We got a good offer after a week of craziness and were so thankful to God. 

A notable memory from the house-selling experience involved me not being warned that the inspection was going to happen. Fortunately, I was leaving with the kids for three hours for Bible study. Unfortunately, the kitchen was covered in dirty dishes, a jar of beans soaking and fermenting kombucha on the counter, and Quinn had just spilled a whole bottle of bubbles on the carpet and I pointed a fan at it before leaving. Awesome. At least they knew I wasn't hiding anything. Then we came back before the inspection was done and Quinn was being so sweet to the buyer's baby. And then she told her that Archer was born in our house. Yes, I'm serious.

October and November were so challenging, waiting and planning, timelines changing, packing with two little ones. We got our keys at the start of December and our first treat to ourselves was to have every inch of the house (except the kitchen and bathrooms, because we have plans for those down the road) professionally painted. The painters filled in a lot of holes and almost everything is SW Alabaster now. Here are some of the listing photos before we moved in:

Next time I can find a free moment, I will write about all the projects we have completed. There have been many changes.

Another two month update. I need to get back into my blogging groove. I guess I'm a little busy...

Some highlights of the past months:
- gymnastics, ballet, and swimming lessons
- continued Bible study and growth group
- getting involved in our neighborhood and city through neighborhood meetings and attending events
- attending park playdates for the homeschool community we'll be joining in the fall
- sharing meals with different families from growth group and church
- hosted an Easter egg hunt for five families in the little forest by our house with over 100 eggs
- date nights
- playdates with past neighbors
- spent time with the Changs visiting from Amsterdam
- Jonathan went to the church men's retreat
- I went to the coast with my mom and sister, so nice!!
- there's a robin's nest outside our family room window that we've been spying on, there are five chicks and they are getting so big! We are hoping we'll get to see the flying lessons.
- the kids are obsessed with Legos, rocks, and squirrels lately. Quinn requested a way to keep track of all the squirrels in our yard so I made her a Squirrel Journal. Naturally Archer wanted one too and they've been recording their discoveries.
- lots of time outside, the kids wear super hero capes to meet Jonathan when he gets off the bus
- we sold our broken hot tub, reconfigured the 20+ year old deck boards to fill the hole it left behind, got a new picnic table, planted strawberries, blueberries, and raspberries, hauled tons of bricks, pavers, and other weird stuff out of our yard, built a little fire pit patio, and reseeded and planted grass. Our backyard is really close to being just how we want it.
- Jonathan and Dennis pulled down some unnecessary cabinets in our kitchen and there is so much beautiful natural light now! I'm so overdue for a house project post with before and afters, but I will definitely be doing that soon.
- last night Quinn and I went to our church mother daughter pajama party

A "lowlight" of the past month happened during a work trip for Jonathan. I went to Eugene with the kids for a short visit and a haircut. While we were at a trampoline gym, Archer stepped down wrong and hurt his ankle. After an xray he was put in the tiniest walking boot for a fractured fibula and I extended my stay for some extra help. He was such a tough little dude through it all. When we got home he had some follow up appointments. There was concern that a growth plate was involved. Well, it turns out it was just the most xrayed sprained ankle in history. Goodness. We are just glad he's ok. 

We are in such a sweet season of life right now. Both kids make us laugh so much and they are playing so well together. We are healthy and thankful.

 Smores made with a stroopwafel from the Netherlands, thanks Amber! 

 

I'm finally emerging from the pile of boxes to say that we are in our new house and loving it. We've already entertained guests and set up Christmas decorations. It was very bittersweet leaving our little cottage though. In our last moments there, Quinn burst into tears saying she didn't want to leave it. We had a long ugly cry together. It's just hard to leave a place you love. I told Archer to say goodbye to the house and he stood in the exact spot where he was born, seriously, and waved and said in his sweet voice, "bye bye." Oh man.

We have already completed a lot of projects at our new place and there are many more to come. I'm excited to document them here. We had almost the whole interior painted before we moved in but left the bathrooms and kitchen because we intend to update those in the future. We painted the front door, built a giant bookcase, and I premade a bunch of curtains. There are many lighting updates ahead too. And we'll be preparing to get Archer's room big kid bed ready.

The past week and a half has been crazy. We started potty training Quinn on Memorial Day weekend...and that's all I'm going to say about that at this time.

Jonathan finished our fence that weekend and we've done a ton of yard work lately. Archer turned two months old (my baby is growing up too fast!) and we went to a neighborhood BBQ on Memorial Day.

We spent a ton of time outdoors last week and went to some parks for play dates. This weekend Quinn had her first smore. Some friends of ours just put in a new fire pit so we went to test it out Saturday night, so fun! Their property is amazing for kids to run wild on.

We had our first Sundae Sunday party of the summer. It was a good turnout and the homemade flavor of the month was a simple chocolate.

A highlight of last week is that Quinn and Archer are starting to really interact. He loves watching her and smiling at her and she likes helping him play and talking to him. It completely melts my heart seeing these two begin their friendship.

Since my last post, we've crossed a lot off of our to-do list. I have to brag about my awesome husband (whose birthday is today - Happy Birthday, my love!) who has been knocking out projects right and left. I'm seriously amazed by all the work he has done lately and being brave enough to try things he doesn't have prior experience with. Not to mention, having lots of quality time with Quinn so I can get things done too and go to the pool. We appreciate you hubs! And I think we can officially declare that we are ready for baby brother any day now. I'm past the 36 week mark, we have everything collected on the midwife preparation list, and we have our home visit this week. We even excavated the archaeological site of crumbs and stickers in the car so we could rearrange the car seat setup. 

All I really have left is putting the Montessori learning activity trays together for Quinn. I'm almost done reading the ebook, it has been very helpful in figuring out what materials to purchase, most of which are from the dollar store. Now I just need to get them organized for easy use and train Quinn on the activity cycle. This is my plan for keeping her entertained while I'm nursing baby brother, but I'd love any other tips people have!

Quinn's been getting ready too. Baby brother's room is pretty much set up. She helped me choose which books from her bookshelf would be good books for a baby and put them on his shelf. She's been practicing feeding her babies and burping them, giving them toys when they cry, and laying them in the crib or swing. She spends most of her time in the nursery these days pretending to be a mommy. So precious! 

I have to record some favorite quotes. Well, one is more of a tone. To add emphasis or enthusiasm to a word, she'll drop her voice an octave and open her eyes wide. For example (bold being the voice drop), Q: "I'm having a party." Me: "What kind of party?" Q: "A chocolate party!" 

She has a a little plastic sandwich from a picnic set that she insists on sleeping with. If she can't find it after we close the door, we'll hear her shout in a panicked tone, "My sandwich!!" She hoards tons of books in her bed when she goes to sleep too, so when we go in to move them after she's asleep, we'll usually see the sandwich still clutched in her tiny fist.

The other day, she started eating dinner while I was still finishing up cooking. She shouted to Jonathan and me in her best sales voice, "Come try some, I've got pear on a fork!"

We've been working on using a nice voice when asking for things and her second attempt usually sounds like, "Mommy, please, can I have ____ please, Mommy?" 

A lot of her sentences are about "I love ____" or "I don't like ____". I guess she is forming a lot of opinions right now. She and Shinobi are starting to become closer. Probably because one of her responsibilities is to feed him dinner now. Another responsibility for her is choosing pajamas and she loves to choose, "mix and match". She's really into maps and puzzles right now. She tried caribou for the first time last week when Jonathan's parents were visiting. She requested a third helping! She received a US Map puzzle from Nana and Boppa and wants me to get out the Disneyland map a lot. And we got some 16 piece jigsaw puzzles that she likes to do on repeat. 

Aside from projects, we've had some social fun and Jonathan and I have had a couple date nights. One was to a Peter Bradley Adams concert. We saw him in SF when I was about seven months pregnant with Quinn, so we had to go again. It was at a really fun, small venue so it was easy to get a photo with him. I even wore the same outfit for the joke. 

It's been a busy couple of weeks. Two weekends ago Quinn and I went to Eugene for my sister's baby shower. My mom and I had a ton of fun planning it. It was a cozy evening by the fireplace with lots of desserts and a hot chocolate bar. Quinn got to have a sleepover at Grandma and Grandpa's during the festivities. 

While we were partying, Jonathan and his buddy Heath (who has his own construction business, Valley Design Contractors) worked their hineys off building us bookshelves. Here is what the fireplace in our room looked like when we first moved in.

Over our two years here, I painted the brick, firewood doors, and wainscoting white and the top half of the walls a deep olive green and we added some art to the mini-mantel. This is how it looked with the bookshelf demoed. 

And this is how it looks today.

Pretty amazing, huh? I'm so impressed by what those two built in 24 hours. Jonathan and I spent last week doing priming, sanding, and painting marathons whenever Quinn was asleep. We are trying our hardest to wait the full two weeks to let the paint fully cure. After all that work, we don't want to do anything to jeopardize the paint job. We are looking so forward to getting the rest of our books out of the garage after all this time and also for the extra storage in the cabinets. We'll get some different lighting down the road, but our room feels so much more complete now!

And then there's this snow that we are having. I'm a bit irritated by it because my baby shower was supposed to be tomorrow, but since a number of guests are coming from Eugene and Corvallis, and it's showing no signs of letting up, we decided to postpone it. Waaah!

But there is definitely a positive side to it. Jonathan worked from home today and we got to get out and play in the snow. Even Shinobi was enjoying it. We busted out one of our bodyboards for a sled and headed to the closest hill. Here's our little daredevil sledding on her belly.

I even got my giant pregnant self on the sled. All of this was of course followed up by grilled cheese sandwiches, tomato soup, and tea. Not to mention a good long nap by the little lady.

It's been a calm couple of weeks. I'm trying to slow down my daily pace a little bit and get my priorities right. Partly because of this inspiring read, partly because Quinn's favorite phrase lately is, "Mommy play ___", and partly because I'm just more tired from being pregnant. Quinn is all about pretending and imagination right now. I'm at least 50 different people/characters a day. I love it. 

I've finally finished all the projects I wanted to do for Quinn's room, so now my attention is focused on baby brother's room - sorting hand-me-down boy clothes, sewing swaddling blankets, sewing a new changing pad cover. I've also been reading about teaching Montessori at home, going to midwife appointments, prepping for my sister's baby shower, editing Quinn's quarterly video (which I'm sending to people directly now instead of posting, let me know if you want it), making trips to the park, bookkeeping, and hosting visitors. Jonathan is working with his buddy to build bookshelves and cabinets on either side of our fireplace this weekend! I'm so excited! It's going to add some nice storage and a more balanced look to our room.

A photo from one of many trips to the park and some balancing tricks on Auntie Boo.

I've been a bit absent from this blog. It's probably because I've been sleeping a lot. And painting. And sewing. Yep, I'm pregnant. Due around March 20th. I found out on my birthday which was a pretty special treat. To add to the excitement, my sister is due a week before me and my sister-in-law is due about two weeks after me. Crazy!

It's been fun to double nest this time around. When I was pregnant with Quinn, we couldn't get to Oregon before she was born and we didn't know how long we'd be in our one bedroom apartment in California. I painted a dresser for her and had a lot of fun washing and organizing her tiny baby clothes, but that was pretty much as far as I could go. Jonathan flew to Portland for a job interview when she was one week old and we moved when she was six weeks old. She slept in a laundry room while we lived at a friend's house for a month and then a room of her own while we rented a friend's duplex for a month. When we bought our house, I pretty much left her room as is except for making her curtains out of a fabric I have adored forever. 

So before we find out the baby's gender, I'm nesting for Quinn. I just finished painting her new room a very light gray. She will be using my childhood metal bed frame and we spray painted it yellow (her favorite color). Next up is curtains and a new ceiling light. I've started working on a quilt for her using the fabric from her old curtains as a starting point because I just can't help but think of her when I see it. It's so cheery, girly, and playful. Plus, the new baby will need signature curtains of their own. 

Aside from all the nesting, we've been pretty busy. We've had some visitors, some playdates, some birthday parties, cake club, and other fun. Hopefully I'll get back in my groove of writing because Quinn is changing so much every day!

After a ton of sanding, priming, and painting, our picnic table is complete. Jonathan did a ton of work on this project. We got the table for free on Craigslist. It was handmade, very old, and very coated with thick stain. We decided to paint it the same color as our front door - a cheerful yellow.
Here it is post-sanding:

And fully finished:

We had our first dinner on it with Jonathan's sister Chelsey while she visited this weekend.

Quinn and I spent most of last week in Eugene with family because Jonathan was gone on a business trip. It was so nice to just lay around, not cook, and not have any projects hanging over me. Plus, Quinn loved all the extra grandparent attention. Lots of tea parties, stories, stair climbing, sports, and jokes. Gosh, she is such a fun age!

We went to the Multnomah Days Festival in our neighborhood over the weekend. It feels good to actually recognize people out and about that live in our area. We are pretty amazed at how God has provided for us, we just love where He has us right now.

This was a big project weekend for us. We were gone most weekends in June, and July weekends are looking packed too, so we knew we had to get a lot done this weekend.

Quite a list!
-replaced some old siding corners (sanding, caulking, priming, painting)
-started sanding the picnic table and picked out paint for it
-replaced the old clothes line
-sewed a clothes pin bag
-trimmed the giant hedge
-pulled weeds
-replaced some bathroom sink parts
-sewed some shorts for Quinn out of Jonathan's old tshirts
-sewed a skirt for Quinn

Diapers drying in the sun and our meadow in the background. It's starting to get really pretty and colorful but it's hard to see because of the shade.

We also went for a hike, had multiple park trips, Jonathan got breakfast with a dear old friend, and we had a mini Sundae Sunday (maple bacon ice cream, mmm). I harvested my first green beans, and from the looks of it we'll be eating lots of green beans for the next month or so. We had dinner at our favorite place and I can't believe what Quinn ate! They have an awesome happy hour menu that changes monthly and we usually just order a bunch of dishes. Quinn was totally loving the smoked salmon salad sandwich with cabbage, red onion, and capers (what?!) and the pasta with summer vegetables in garlic cream sauce (huh?!) And she ate her fair share of raspberry creme brulee as well.

But the highlight of the weekend had to be the Fourth of July. We went to a BBQ at some friends' house. Quinn thinks their son (who she calls Wawa) is the coolest and there were lots of families with little kids there. When it came time for fireworks, we didn't know what to expect from her. She loved it! She kept shouting, "boom!" and "pop!" In fact she fell asleep that night and woke the next morning saying, "boom!" Jonathan helped her hold a roman candle and some sparklers. Her buddy thought the fireworks were a bit too loud so he wanted to watch from his window inside. Quinn kept wanting to go in and find him. When she found him, she'd say emphatically, "Wawa, fireworks!" and point outside. She wanted him to come outside so bad! It's hilarious watching her interact with her friends these days. 

It's our one year house-iversary! That sure went by fast! We are thoroughly enjoying home ownership. The time commitment can end up feeling like a bit much at certain times of the year, but it also feels nice to work hard on projects together. We have some fun projects coming up this Spring, but today I'm pleased to share a completed project.

I've spent many a nap-time lately painting. Well, first painting sample colors, then deliberating for months, then taping, then finally painting. Here's how our room looked when we moved in:

And here it is today:

We chose a rich, olive-y sage green. I feel like it makes the white on the fireplace and the bottom half of the walls look really crisp. It's now a combination of cozy cabin and simple tidy cottage. Now we just have to add a matching bookcase to the left side of the fireplace.

On another note, I've also spent some nap-times tuning up our cloth diapers. For any bumGenius fans out there, I bought Refresher Kits for $1 each for all of our diapers. After over a year of daily wear, they are still in amazing shape. The only issue was that the velcro on six out of our 16 diapers wasn't gripping as well as I'd like. So I popped the tabs off and sewed on new ones, easy as can be. I'll save the elastic and extras for later when the other ones wear out. Definitely worth it!

I have some progress photos to share. Our bedroom started like this:

And now it looks like this:

I painted the brick and bottom half of the walls white. The firewood cabinet doors obviously need some more coats of white paint. We hope to add a matching bookshelf to the left side of the fireplace and a mantle on top at some point. A future painting project (I'm a bit burnt out at the moment) will be the upper half of the walls. It's a very pale blue that looks almost white. We are thinking something more saturated and bold would be nice, maybe a rich green? It's hard to decide. I'll share the updates when we change it though!

In the meantime, I'm glad I got that finished because someone is getting pretty good at this:

Quinn got to play with lots of other children this weekend: a nice long walk with a pal and her son, a picnic at the park with some dear friends and their little boys, and some swimming pool time with another family.

This past week I have seen some new elements of Quinn's communication start to blossom. She's always been a talker/giggler/shouter/announcer/singer.

She figured out how to clap and it makes her very happy. So now at meals I've seen her do a single clap-type motion when she wants more food which is very similar to the sign language for "more". She waves and wants us to wave back. She waves while nursing, while eating, while riding in her stroller, all the time. If I stick out my tongue she does too. She'll also stick out her tongue at me and expect me to do it back. She's started to hand me toys and then wants me to hand them back. She starts games of peekaboo non-stop. Anything can be used for peekaboo you know: books, blocks, water bottles, kale chips. She hides one eye and keeps the other eye on us to make sure we are playing. She also definitely knows the phrase "no biting" and obeys it. It's cute to watch the look on her face as she processes it.

We had a busy weekend in Eugene. It was good to see family and some old high school friends. I'm hoping to finish my painting projects in the master bedroom tonight. I'll have to post some before and afters. We've also begun scraping the paint bubbles on the outside of our house and hope to paint those this week. Otherwise, it should be a pretty mellow week with neighborhood playgroup, some friends coming over, a visit to some friends up North, and trying to keep cool.