A Few Words About Christmas and Our Future

Merry Christmas, Jonas; you get your own Lola!  We're thankful to Ikea for continuing to make these stuffed golden labs so that all our kids have been able to collect one over the years.

We did terrible with pictures of the kids this year, one of the main reasons I let go of sending out Christmas cards.  Next year we'll just run with it.  If Christian is covering his face, Daphne is wearing a My Little Pony crown, and Jonas is holding a wind-up radio, so be it. Set the expectations low now. 

our family Christmas on Dec 27

This is J trying to escape Christmas Eve dinner.

And this is "Daphne" enjoying "her" new microscope on Christmas Day.

I guess I did end up with one photo of all three kids on Christmas Day! 1/3 smiling, 1/3 looking at the camera, 3/3 blurry...photography magic right there. 

excuse me...I also need to be in that box

We got one little house project finished just in time for Christmas: finally figuring out what to do with our wood stove nook. We would love a mantle, but wood stove standards call for very high clearance above the stove, something like 58 inches.  So instead David made the corbels from extra spindles from the front porch, and attached Amish-made iron hooks to some matching boards for our stockings.  When we moved in this spot was just a gaping hole with light blue tiles, the old wood stove gone because it didn't meet current stove standards. Now it's cozy and cute with no blue tiles in sight. 

All the kids' stockings look very happy in their new home.

Next year's Christmas photos should be a breeze. 

Cheerful Christmas Photos

First of all, our house is looking lovely right now. Don't be dismayed at my vanity over its beauty.  (Outside beauty, at least.  On the inside...why doesn't anyone ever want to clean up after themselves?!)

colorful lights on the playhouse, too

When we started painting so many months ago I told David I was afraid we would leave the front undone for months at a time and it would be sooo embarrassing.  So yes, we still have to put shutters on upstairs, and I kind of want to put a sign on the front yard that says, "YES, WE ARE MISSING SHUTTERS. COMING SOON.  SORRY." Maybe if it would stop raining for five minutes so that hanging shutters could be safe.

This next cheerful picture is when I tried to get a nice Christmas picture of the kids.  I'm not kidding, this was the best one.

Jonas got Llama Llama Jingle Bells for his Christmas book this year.  So far I've read it 9,345 times.  I thought it would be a good idea to show Jonas that reading with Daphne is just as fun as reading with mom.  At least Daphne was happy about that plan. 

"don't take away my mama/book time!"

But carols on the trumpet with Dad is always a good time.  Jonas's favorite was singing/yelling along and sticking his hand up the bell. 

Gingerbread houses.  How do you feel?  I hate that they fall apart so easily, so for the past few years we've just flipped ice cream cones upside down and decorated those like Christmas trees.  Simple and kid friendly.  But this year Daphne had been talking about gingerbread houses and how she would really like one, and then Ikea had them for $4.99, so I guess it was time to man up and let the kids do a house.  I've heard several people say they hot glue theirs together, and ever the follower, that's what I did.

PROS: the house did not break while the kids decorated.  The roof has since collapsed, but that would be from the piles of jujubes frosted onto the roof; the seams that I glued held fast.  CONS: It was hard to glue because I had to hold the thing together for forever until the glue was totally set.  It slid apart quite a few times while I was gluing.  But since it held together so well the next day when the kids decorated, I would still hot glue if/when we do this in the future.

we did trees, too

I bought frosting for this project.  Daphne exclaimed, "the frosting is ALREADY MADE?  That is SO AMAZING!"  Oh, the wonders of the modern world.

teamwork

Nerds were one of the decorating candies.
Daphne: "Oh, Nerds! I love these! Do you, Christian?"
Christian: "I don't know, I've never eaten nerves before."

he's eaten them now and approves. on the nerds, at least

You're really good at decorating, Jonas

Also fun: Christmas trivia.  FYI: Daphne is an expert in the Christmas song category.  Out of the blue the other day she said, "You know what's an even prettier sight to see than holly on your own front door?  Smiles on people's faces."  Ha.  What a little Christmassy nerd she is.

Christian is not so good at Christmas trivia.  His answers are usually Jesus or Santa.  We would just cheer and say "Yes! The reindeer who's name starts with 'B' is definitely Jesus! And also Blitzen."

Oh, this picture is nice of all three snuggled together for a Christmas movie.  (Do not be too emotional over the sweetness in this picture.  This is the same night Christian secretly put shampoo on Daphne's toothbrush.)

Happy Advent to you.

Bye Bye Blue

We've become big fans of the Habitat for Humanity ReStore this past year.  Probably their biggest fans.

Recently we found this darling little cupboard for a mere $30. Solid wood with a cute shape, but not our choice of color and that little trim thing was unusual. 

Look at her now!

She's beautiful. 

David likes going there for lumber (new and reclaimed), paints and stains for little projects, and he got all the caulking he needed for our house exterior as he was prepping the house for new paint. 

Monday we made a visit to The Rebuilding Center.  That place is truly amazing.  If finding old things and making them pretty is your thing, you've got to make a trip up there.  We expected it to be expensive based on its location in a trendy part of town, but everything is very well priced.  Old doors, windows, cabinets, hardware, light fixtures, old toilets if you like those, lumber; so many treasures. Next time we go we will be equipped with empty car space and loads of fruit snacks to keep the kids quiet for a few minutes or maybe hours (ha).  That would be a lot of fruit snacks. 

Our current big project is getting the house painted.  David is doing most of it because I tried once when I was home with the kids, and in the first two minutes of work Christian walked on the paint can lid and left white footprints on the porch and then Jonas crawled through it and added his hand prints to the trail. 

with kids

After bedtime.  Way better. 

Our house is cute the way it is, but I really want to simplify and make it a bit more classic. My favorite look in the entire world is a white farmhouse with black shutters, so I Googled 'white Victorian house' to see if it was a look we could force on our house.  Google said yes! 

one of the 9000 inspiration pictures I have

Bonus: we found shutters at The ReBuilding Center for $1/ea!  A nicer price than $40/pair at Home Depot. 

And...one last tiny project...Our front door has never been my favorite because the inside was painted light blue and the window had a lot of pink/blue/green stained glass.  I like stained glass and all, but pink and blue combos aren't my choice of colors.  I would love an old wooden door, but for now David replaced the window and I painted the inside white.  Our living room is much brighter with the change.

it's going to be fabulous with a Christmas wreath on it

exciting new door + exciting new walking skill

Sometime in the next decade we'll paint the door knob an oil rubbed bronze and paint the exterior of the door from white to an exciting color.  Like maybe a dark grey, the most exciting color of all.

Do you think our house is mad at us for all the un-Victorian-izing we're doing?  Un-Victorian-izing might be the wrong word (and also a made up word); simplifying sounds better, maybe?  Toning down the frill?  I don't love frill.  I love our house, but all the pinks and blues were overwhelming me.  

(P.S. We put the door window in the attic in case someone wants it someday. That seemed nice of us.)

new organization of the living room, too

A Trick Question Included

Since Jonas was content in his Bumbo with a snack, and since I had just found another place to hang a boxwood wreath, it seemed imperative to use my free arms to photograph the newly-organized wall.  Nothing like wall photos as fodder for the blog.

Then I spotted Jonas through the camera lens...

And now we've graduated from Bumbo use.

I found this book at an antique store recently, and immediately memories came to mind of looking at it over and over again as a kid.  A grandma had it; maybe Grandma B?  Daphne and I are reading it so that she can learn all about Amish people.

We had a pretty successful visit to that particular antique store because we found vintage picnic baskets, too. (Stars, fyi.)  The baskets store kitchen linens and sit around looking pretty, and they are very successful at both of their jobs. 

Soon our house will be fully decorated and then what will there be left to do in life?  

(Trick question: how many pictures of Amish children are in this blog post?)

(This is a trick question on so many different levels.)

We Have a New Firepit

I went into the backyard Monday and found the big kids stomping around in the muddy garden.  I was so very close to telling them to get out, like literally had the words coming out of my mouth, when I realized this was a time to be quiet and let them be.  The only reason to make them stop was because I didn't feel like having to clean up the mess, but that's probably not always the best reason to say no.

Daph smeared mud up her legs and said to me, "Mud is really good for your skin, right?"

Sure.

lunch break at the mud spa

Another time to be quiet is when all three kids are down for rest at the same time, and you can lay in the hammock while your husband slaves away laying bricks for the new fire pit.  Did you know hammocks are amazing?  As long as you can figure out how to get in without falling back out. 

Speaking of fire pits, ours at the old house was a re-purposed wheel barrow, and we loved it.  We loved it so much we were afraid we wouldn't be able to top it. 

Oh, but top it we did.  Check it out:

We found an old woodstove at a salvage place, managed to haul the thing home (I think it weighs 9 million pounds), and now this back corner feels like a living room.  This week I got a bunch of planters put together for the area, and soon we're going to get some electricity out there so we can hang cafe lights.  David has plans for a play structure nearby.  Isn't it the cutest?

 And speaking of cute, here's Jonas rolling around on a bed.  This has nothing to do with fire pits or mud. 

The Family Room

Nine months later and our upstairs family room is finally painted.  Small victories!

This room is technically a part of the 'master suite,' but as much as I would love an extra room to set up as a sewing room, or a sitting room, or a leave-mom-alone-she's-eating-her-hair room, a family room seemed the most useable idea for the largest number of people. 

The room isn't completed yet because I still need to purchase bamboo shades for the windows and finish the curtain for the kid's closet kitchen.  (They have a closet kitchen and it's just as cool as it sounds.)  (Which may not be very cool?)

Oh! And I have this super great idea for David to build me a faux-mantle to set the TV on.  Something like this:

i have no idea the original source...i've seen this many places

Right now the TV is on a bookshelf, but I think a mantle would add some fun visual interest and help make the room feel even cozier.  And it would give us a great place to hang Christmas stockings since stocking-wise we're not quite sure yet how to utilize our funky wood stove alcove downstairs. 

jonas's opinion on mom painting

Lighting in this room is a little hard because I hatehatehate using ceiling lighting and there's not a lot of space for lamps.  Lights on the old window saved the day!  I added a boxwood wreath because my current hobby involves making more of those than I have room for.  So many wreaths, so few spaces to hang them.

In the absence of 'after' photos of the family room, here are photos of the room being used for what we consider valuable family time. 

fighting

staring blank faced at the television

lots of messes

Working Hard and Hardly Working

This is a lovely picture of us about to embark on a Spring walk.  How perfect and sweet we are!  Except both big kids were throwing fits and complaining about every little thing, until I finally told them NO TALKING unless they had something nice to say.  Daph was suspiciously quiet for the entire walk.

Otherwise, this is my most favorite Spring of all time.  This might be a strange thing to take note of, but the soil at our house is really nice.  I weeded, dug up some dead azaleas, and took out a bunch of Shasta daisies and primroses (because there were millions), and truly enjoyed the entire process.  Good soil is good stuff.  Plus it helps that David got me a cute shovel. 

jonas the tiny koala bear

a camera!  i should put my face in front of it.

The flower beds are ready for some new perennials and all our planters are artfully arranged and ready for some annuals.  We have never been so prepared for Spring.

plant me! plant me!

Speaking of prepared, I have a very detailed plant wish-list.  (I can show it to anyone who needs birthday gift ideas.)  Burning bush, snapdragons, zinnias, Lily-of-the-Valley, daphne, rosemary, more tulips, lavendar, etc., etc., etc.  Yesterday I went into the side yard and what did I find...so much Lily-of-the-Valley! (Or is it 'so many Lily-of-the-Valleys?') A big treat, for sure, especially since I get to cross that plant off my list by spending zero dollars.

 



We also hung a hammock, which has basically been a life-long dream.  Daph said, "We can make lemonade and relax here when it's summertime!"  Yes. 

We hung one of my old windows on the front porch.  Daph said, "It's not a good idea to hang things with glass because it might fall and break." 

we need a new porch light, pronto

And that's it for today's episode of Random Photos from Melissa's Yard.  Stay tuned for next time!

So Much Nesting

Now that we've gotten Fall and Christmas out of the way it's been my goal to get Daphne and Christian's room put together.  I've noticed a remarkable difference in how much more time they spend in there now that each toy has a place and there is some pretty artwork on the walls. 

They are happy in there together.

It's not perfect yet ( I really want to figure out something different for their bedding), but did I mention that they go in there, close the door, and play together?  Happily?  So I would say that's pretty close to as good as it can get. Especially when they let Jonas tag along. 

Their bedroom is a great size with pretty views out the windows.  If I didn't love my bedroom I would want theirs.  Or the guest bedroom because it has its own outside door and deck.  Or Jonas's room because it's really cozy. Yes, I want all the rooms. 

I spy Christian watching snowfall during a nap time

I started painting their bathroom a few weeks ago but haven't gotten far.  Even though it near killed me doing all that painting when we first moved in, at least Jonas's newborn status meant he slept a lot.  Painting now is not quite so easy, but I'm excited to get their bathroom done because the picture I have in my head looks real nice.

Here's to hoping that mental photo is brought to reality soon-ish!

that time Christian fell asleep with his legs inside his shirt

3 in the bed

when Christian is left in charge