House Tour

After a month and a half of painting and other projects plus moving in we are ready to unveil the new house to everyone.  I am so in love with this house it is amazing!  I think it is perfect for our needs.   I tell Cameron daily how much I like our house and find new things all the time that let me enjoy it more.  

This is our Living Room.  We painted the living room this green color and replaced the carpet in here and in the 3 bedrooms.  The rest of the house has pergo wood flooring that is nice.  

 Cameron build a fireplace hearth for the nice wood stove that was already installed.  Before it was sitting on the floor with a hole cut in the carpet .  We have intentions to build the rock up the wall... maybe as part of Christmas break.  

 You can see our steps going up to the upstairs and if you look closely you can see the stairwell going down to the family room.  

 This is our master bedroom.  In here we took down the wall paper only to see it was stuck right to the drywall and would not come off.  We tried to paint over the glue but it looked terrible so we had the drywall textured.  We also removed the popcorn ceilings after having it tested for asbestos.  Thank goodness it didn't have asbestos in it because it make a huge mess that we all breathed until the carpet was installed.  Thank you Mike and Sue for helping to get this bedroom painted and for the beautiful precise job that was done making the red wall look square!

 More master bedroom.

 This is the girl's room.  All 3 girls will be sharing it but we are still working on getting the other bed here.  My mom will be moving in with us in a few weeks and she bought a bed for Annika.  (If Annika was telling you this story she would tell you that the bed has a ladder, a slide, and a tent so I better tell you that too.)  That bed will go along the wall behind this bunkbed.  

 We painted the walls purple and cream and also removed the popcorn ceiling in here and replaced the carpet.  This half of the room is for the big girls.  There is a desk and not really any toys although their huge closet has some room for toys in it.  

 This half of the room is for Annika.  She has all her toys at an arm's reach and it actually works very well for her.  Ali and Ashling insisted that she have her own area so that they don't have to pick up her messes.

This is our family room.  This room is so nice for our family to have for several reasons but most importantly because our kids have a place to go with their friends.  I like that it is downstairs because while I can still hear them from my main living area they are not making so much noise as to make my ears hurt.  This room is very comfortable.   When there is a fire going it is also very cozy and we keep blankets down here to cuddle with when watching tv.  We did not remodel this room at all but may paint it sometime in the future.

 I love this shelf Cameron made when he was going to school in Utah.  It has served us for many different purposes but I think I like it best as an entertainment center.  All I need for it is some large baskets to fit under the bottom.   

 The seller agreed to leave his massive desk for us.  We double the use of the family room as an office.  I love how I can be working on something while the kids are watching tv and see everything they are doing.  

 My kitchen is perfect.  I am not sure I could ask for a better dining area.  I painted the kitchen on two walls green to match the livingroom.  The stove is heavenly.   It is a 5 burner, two oven stove with a large drawer that fits many cookie sheets, griddles and pizza stones.  I absolutely love everything about this oven and more than anything it is this that sold the house to me.  I can't wait for a big party where I can use it to its fullest advantage.  I also love the large counter for the kids to eat, do homework or color on.  They love that it is not tile and that their pictures don't get ruined by the grooves.  

 In addition to painting the kitchen Cameron had to do a remodel to the fridge area.  The fridge was too big for the area by about 3 inches.  He cut the counter and redesigned the cupboard door and drawer in order to make the fridge fit.  I am very grateful for a construction working husband who managed to do that project like it was nothing.  

Our dining room is big enough to put another table in there if needed for a big party.  What a blessing it is to have such a large room for eating.   

Disney Ditch Day

Cameron went camping and fishing with his Dad and Ashling and I kept Ali and Annika with me.  We had a lot of fun while they were gone.  On Sunday we had a girlfriend and her boys over for dinner along with Cameron's mom.  We enjoyed some good  girl talk and let the kids show us all the things they could do.  

On Monday I took Ali out of school and we went to Disneyland.  We got there when it opened and were able to meet Alice in Wonderland.  

 Our first ride was the tea cups.  Ali wanted to spin faster than I could.  I was going to let Annika go with them but they wouldn't let Annika ride with just Ali so we ended up in another tea cup that I did not spin.  Ali rode with this girl who was waiting in line and also wanted to spin really fast.

 I bought Annika some Mickey ears.  They were so cute I just couldn't resist.

 We also got to meet Rapunzel.  It was so much fun to say hi to her and see Annika's reaction to seeing her favorite princess.  She loved it.

 We rode on both Mr. Toad's wild ride and Peter Pan which usually have lines that are much too long for us to be willing to wait for them.

 Annika's favorite ride is still the Merry go round .  She loves this ride no matter how many times she rides on it.

We also we over to California Adventure and rode on Soaring over California, the silly symphony swings, the other merry go round and spent some time learning to draw Phineas and Pherb.  We also talked to Crush the turtle and had our voice stolen by ursela.  We finished the day off by watching Alladin the musical.  We loved the whole day and ate Dinner at Chili's on the way home.  It was fun to be able to spoil a couple of my kids and enjoy a fun day with them.

Making Sugar Cookies

The girls were very excited to share the new house with their friends.  Here is our friend, E, who was also very exited to come over.  We decided to make Halloween sugar cookies.  Here are some pictures of the girls.  They got to decorate their own cookies and made quite a mess.  

Trip to Washington State Day 1 and 2

AStacey called me on the phone in August and announced that for one day only we would be able to fly for half off Southwest prices.  I went on line and found I could buy plane tickets for our entire family for the same cost as the budget we had for gas to drive.  A few clicks later we had gone from a painful long car vacation to a worry free airline vacation.  We were thrilled with the difference and the kids couldn't wait to fly in an airplane.  Only Ali remembered the event.

Ontario Airport is perhaps the easiest airport to fly out of and the day of our flight was no exception.  We woke early, dressed quickly and had 3 very excited girls in the car ready to drive.  Our flight included a short stop in Sacramento and then we were in the air bound for Seattle.  

Samantha (my brother's fiance and soon to be bride) picked us up in a gas guzzling suburban that was perfect for the entire group.  We enjoyed a visit at the park and then a bite to eat before returning to the airport to pick up Mom.  We arrived home and David had beat us there from work.  (He had to work all week so Samantha spent most of her time playing tour guide to us.  She is the best bride for getting all her work done ahead of time so she could play with us!

The best part of arriving at David's house was seeing these plugged in waiting for us.  Cameron and I finally joined the smart phone craze and purchased these little guys and had them delivered to David's house to make sure we got them as soon as possible.  We spent a little of the afternoon trying to make them work but we managed it without connecting to a computer or going in the iPhone store!

Really David and Samantha's house is great.  He lives on an acre of land and has a cute house.  It had four bedrooms and so we all had a place to sleep.  They even went to the trouble of getting us a bed so we had a place to sleep.  

Later that night we met Samantha's family at a restaurant for dinner and got to know each other a little better.  It was a great restaurant and it was the one that David and Samantha had met at the very first time so it was also a little sentimental.  

The next morning we decided to drive up towards Mt. Rainier National Park and see the sites.  It helped that Mom has a "get into any National park free" card and that we could all arrive together in the big suburban.  Our first stop was to an impressive waterfall that we walked down to see.  

 Next we arrived at the visitor's center.  It was beautiful although a little smokey from some distant fires.  We ate lunch outside where we could enjoy the views.

 After lunch we went on a hike up to another view point of Mount Rainier.  It was a paved trail that was very steep.  I understood why they had to pave it because no dirt trail would last with as steep as they made it.  We enjoyed the hike anyways.

After the hike we drove back to David's house and then Cameron and I with our kids went to Dad's house and had tacos.  I love his tacos and they remind me of being a kid.... yes I did put ketchup on them in case you were wondering.