Christmas Fun

We have had a very busy few weeks around here, just like everyone else I'm sure.  One thing I didn't do too much of this year though was baking.  I just wasn't into making the batches and batches of cookies like I usually do.  Here I am with the boys making my one and only batch of eggnog sugar cookies for the year.



My cookie decorator decided to help himself to a few while he was supposed to be working.



It was fun this year because Rex finally understood the whole Santa thing.  Even better was that we could now use that as a way to get him to behave a little better for a few weeks anyhow.  I only got a few photos of the boys in their matching pajamas on Christmas morning because as soon as Rex saw his new Curious George shirt in his stocking, he took off to put that on and the cute Christmas jammies were over.

Opening stockings and playing with one of the many new Handy Manny toys-


Playing with the new train table from Santa-


More Handy Manny toys (that is Felipe in Wyatt's hand)-


Modeling the new Curious George shirt I mentioned and his brother's new Cars sunglasses-


Opening more presents-


Almost done-

It took forever to get all the presents opened.  Every birthday and Christmas I think, "Okay- now is the time they are finally going to just tear into all the presents and it will just be a present frenzy."  Still hasn't happened.  My boys like to open something and then play with it.  And then after a while, maybe they'll open something else.  Maybe not.  It is tiring and takes so long.  So you will probably notice the still unopened packages on the shelf behind the couch which sat there for quite a while.  They did manage to get everything opened by lunchtime I think but I stopped photographing at this point because I was over it.  We cooked a beef tenderloin for dinner which was fantastic and just had a fun and low-key day at the house by ourselves.  Although we did miss our families a lot, we got to Skype with quite a few people which helps.

One strange thing about our Christmas was not having any snow on the ground.  Our winter has been so bizarre here.  I think it has snowed just twice and both times it was very little and melted quickly.  We have lots of highs in the 40s and lows in the 20s.  It has even been in the 50s this week.  I ran out to get the trash can at the curb today with no shoes or jacket on and I was totally fine.  Normally I think my feet would have frozen to the driveway if I tried that at the end of December.  I imagine our good fortune here with the weather will run out eventually but we are enjoying it as long as we can get it!

The Penultimate Family Room Project Update

So, here it is.  Finally.  After nearly 6 months.  The almost done family room.







Ta da!  We still need to stain and paint some trimwork and cover the spot where the air conditioning unit will go and put wood covers over the metal shelving.  But that's it!  We have been enjoying the new space a lot.  In fact, Rex keeps asking to go play in the basement and I just don't ever want to go down there because I love being in the family room so much.  We incorporated toy storage behind the couch as you can see in the last picture so he has things to play with- don't feel too bad for him.  I realize it's not as much fun for him as the basement but for now, I just want to be in the new space that we've worked so hard on for so long.

We moved a lot of the furniture from the living room out there so now the living room looks kind of empty.



It's hard to really get a feel for just how sparse it is from the picture but let me tell you, with only two chairs and an end table (we have moved that old record player out now too) in a room that is about 24 by 14 feet, it feels mighty empty in there.  This morning we moved everything else out and did the super-clean on the floors.  Now Rob got distracted watching The Polar Express with Rex so we will start working on it again in a little while.  We put some new lighting up last night and now we need to bring the dining table and chairs and the loveseat back upstairs.  They had been banished to the basement for storage because there wasn't enough room for everything before the family room was finished.  Once we get that all done, I will put up some pictures of how our new living and dining area turns out.

And before I wrap this up, I would like to follow up on a few things from my last post.  The Disney Store is sending out the Mickey Mouse that I ordered (yay!) though it is questionable if it will be here in time for Christmas (boo!).  They also told me to keep the wall border and donate it to my favorite charity.  Since there are toy donation things all over the place, I plan on dropping it off at one of those.  My disappointing fresh garland continues to disappoint.  A week after putting it up, it is all dried out and droopy and nasty.  We took it all down this morning because it was so bad.  I guess my comment on fresh garland would be this: Only use it outdoors.  Maybe, maybe, if you live somewhere you don't have to use a heater much you could have it indoors.  I learned my lesson though and I will be picking up some fake stuff at the after-Christmas sales.

And here is a funny picture I took of my boys this week in their awesome big and little brother t-shirts just because.

Do you see the problem here?

I have begun my Christmas shopping and would like to get it all done by the end of this weekend.  We'll see.  I'm not doing too good so far though with it- check this out.



So instead of the crocheted Mickey Mouse I ordered for Wyatt, I got peel and stick Fantastic 4 wall borders.  Or maybe it's all the Marvel Heroes, I guess.  It doesn't really matter though because it is not appropriate for my almost 19 month old son.  Someday, it would be awesome.  But not right now.  Now I get to fix Christmas gift orders in addition to trying to finish my shopping.  Geez.

Things around here are really good besides that.  Rob spent the weekend hooking up all the electronic stuff in the family room.



We have the tv and all related equipment out there now as well as our couch, chair and some other furniture.  I need to take more pictures of the family room and what's going on with the living room too but that will have to be for the next posting.  We put up an artificial tree in the family room with some cheap little decorations and hopefully it will all be little boy proof because they were all over it as soon as it went up.



The decorations and tree are holding up pretty good so far.  It is really nice not having to worry about them spilling water out of the tree stand so that right there makes the artificial tree worth it.  Generally, I despise them but for now, it works much better for our family.  I got some fresh garland and put it up around the house hoping that would bring in that wonderful Christmas tree smell but as it turns out, not so much.  It looks good though even if it doesn't have that wonderful tree smell I was wanting.

It snowed the other day a little bit and Rex couldn't wait to get out in it.  He tried to catch it in his mouth and even make snow angels.





I didn't tell him to do either of those things either.  He just went for it.  I laughed so hard when he tried to do the snow angels.  I told him he was going to need a little more snow on the ground for that to work.  We still haven't had too much at this point but I'm sure he will get the chance to do snow angels before too long.

Since I am always the photographer, I rarely manage to get in the pictures but here are some I got lately with my boys.

In the snow with Rex-


Hanging out with Wyatt-


Well, I think I will go contact Disney customer service now and see about getting a Mickey Mouse doll instead of the Marvel Heroes' wall border.  Wish me luck!

Let's Eat Turkey From My Big Brown Shoe

When I went out to pick up the pumpkin pie Wednesday evening, I overheard a kid (probably about 10-12 years old) tell his dad, "They don't have any Thanksgiving songs."  I missed everything else in the conversation so I'm not sure what brought that statement up but I wanted to tell him, "Oh sweetheart, you are too young to know but there is a totally awesome Thanksgiving song out there."  I blame the parents for not raising the boy right.  Then again, he may have been a bit young to hear that song just yet.  My title for this posting is a line from the song, just in case you thought I actually ate Thanksgiving dinner from a brown shoe.

Rob smoked a whole turkey in our smoker and it came out good.  I made most everything else to go with it, except the pie.  I never make the pie.  I have so much else to do and I know I can buy one that will be much better than what I can make so I just do that.  Here's the bird.



It looks different when it comes out of a smoker compared to oven so if you might be thinking it looks burnt, it is not.  It was perfect.  Here are the guys all having a drink and waiting for me to stop taking pictures and sit down so they can start eating.



And the aftermath.



Everything is cleaned up pretty good by now but man, what a mess!  It was a wonderful day- I think it was supposed to be 68 degrees!  I don't think it maybe got that warm but it was definitely in the 60's which is strange (it set the record for a high) and awesome.  So we had a very nice Thanksgiving here at our house.

I have been looking forward to today so that I can start my Christmas decorating for probably a month now.  And now that the day is here, I haven't done hardly any decorating.  My big issue is that I hate to put anything up now when everything is going to change so much in the next week.  Our tv mount gets here on Wednesday and that should be the day we move everything into the new family room.  AND I'm trying to convince Rob to paint the living room after we move the furniture out so I can't really decorate in either of those rooms.  I did manage to finish up the wreath I was making and I hung it on our front door today.

Hopefully I will be putting up some new pictures next week with everything in our new room and then later after it gets decorated too!

Move In Ready... Almost

This weekend, it was finally time to remove the door between the new family room and the rest of the house.  Rob and I removed the door then Rob knocked the frame out but left the final blow for his number one assistant.



Rex thought it was all his doing that got the frame out which he just loved.  We did that Friday night and then Saturday and Sunday Rob put up all the new trim around the door and finished the step (it was just the bare 2 x 4's up until then).  The room is pretty much move-in ready now.







I say "pretty much" move-in ready because we do still have the electrician coming to finish up the electrical work so we can get the tv and related tv/audio equipment installed.  The big hole to the right of the fireplace is for the air conditioning unit but we will just be covering it up with some artwork until next spring when we are ready to purchase the unit.  All the oak trim at the doorway and around the fireplace still needs to be stained and we have to figure out what we are doing for shelves for the cable box, dvd player and audio equipment.  So there are a few minor things to take care of but I am hopeful that we will be able to be sitting out there and watching tv by this time next week.  We've been having fun playing soccer and just running around in the big empty room though too.

I have been getting ready for Christmas as much as I can.  I love to decorate for the holidays but I have never been even close to satisfied with my decorations in this house.  They always seem so sparse and I have been working on projects and coming up with ideas to make it the space I want it to be.  We picked up a lot of decorations at our neighbors' garage sale this summer when they moved out.  We even scored a 7' artificial tree which will go in the family room while we have a real one in the living room.  I have picked a new color scheme of silver, white and bright green to go in most of the house.  The family room will probably be a color overload though mostly because I still want to use some old things that don't fit the color scheme and because that steal of a tree we got included multi-color lights on the tree.  Anyhow, I spied some fun artwork I wanted to try using paint and stickers on canvas (paint over stickers to reveal the silhouettes) so I gave it a go.  Turns out I am not very good at painting even when I cheat and use stickers.



The one on the left may be salvageable but I think the one on the right is a complete FAIL.  The paint got under the stickers and basically glued them down so now I can't peel them off.  Oops.  Well, on to other things I suppose.  I have a wreath wrapped in white yarn that has been sitting there for weeks just waiting to be finished.  Considering I need to put it up this weekend, I'd say the time has come to complete that project.

Our Thanksgiving plans are simple- without any family around or a dining room table to accommodate more than our family, it is just going to be us.  Rob is going to cook the turkey in our smoker and I will make the usuals to go with it.  I have been so busy thinking about Christmas that I confess Thanksgiving hasn't gotten much attention.  I am so happy for Rob to have some time off though and I am sure we will have a wonderful time.  I hope you do too!

Craigslist Love

Thank goodness for craigslist.  We have gotten some really good bargains for our family room project, especially the electric fireplace and our carpet tiles.  Rob installed the carpet tiles this weekend as well as some vinyl hardwood planks by the exterior door.

First Rob put the adhesive down-



Then he put the carpet tiles in-



And here it is after the vinyl planks went in too-





The tiles are a little wild but once we get our very neutral and boring couches in, it should tone it down some.  I like it and for $100 worth of carpet tiles, it is hard to beat that.

I mentioned recently that I have been looking on craigslist for an old entertainment center to turn into a kids' play workbench.  I kept looking through ads then finally posted my own wanted ad when I couldn't find any for free.  It was just a few days before a lovely lady contacted me and told me she had one in her garage that I could have.  Yay!  I looked at it last Thursday and it is perfect.  Tomorrow night we are going to go pick it up then I can start that project.

We had a garage sale a few weeks ago (that I posted on craigslist) and two of our items were some wall cabinets out of our bathroom and the former bike shop (now our beautiful family room).  Now, they aren't lovely but I thought someone could use them for their garage or something since they are in excellent shape.  Rob thought I was nuts for trying to sell them.  I guess he was right; no one was interested.  I put them out by the curb and put an ad on craigslist in the free section.  Still no came for them.  I was really surprised now.  I waited a while and finally reposted them last night and this morning I had FOUR emails from people wanting them!  The guy who emailed me first came over at 9:00 this morning- he couldn't get them fast enough.  I love that I get stuff out of my way and he was very happy to have them to use at his house.

Craigslist seems to come through for me a lot.  I love you craigslist.

Basement Play and Let the Potty Training Begin!

I thought we were doing such a good job on making the basement more appealing for wintertime play- until I saw this photo I took yesterday.

There are a few things working against me- I was taking it with my camera phone and the lighting down there is great but not the best for photos.  Anyhow, I'm trying to get their play area fixed up to give us more options for the winter months and it is coming along good.  I took the playhouse apart and washed it all down on Sunday (when it was warm and sunny) then brought it downstairs and reassembled it.  I also washed up their bbq and set it up so they have a whole little house and yard thing going on with their new picnic table.  Even though they aren't playing with it in this photo, they do spend a lot of time playing in the house and Rex likes to cook up things on the grill and then serve it to me and Wyatt while we sit at the table.  I still have to move some things around down there (like the fireplace surround with the area rug thrown on top of it) but it is almost how I want it.  And good news with the crappy camera situation- I took my camera apart this weekend, by myself thankyouverymuch, and got it working again.  Go me.

Time for the family room project update- all the window and door trim and baseboards have been painted and we are ready for carpet tile install.  Yay!!!  Rob asked me to help him on Saturday while the boys were napping and I agreed.  As it turned out, he wanted me to spackle all the nail holes on the baseboard. There were a lot- I think someone got a little carried away with their new nail gun maybe...  Anyhow, as I was working my way around the room, something on dawned on me.  I asked Rob, "Am I doing this because it's a really crappy job and you just don't want to do it?  Tell me the truth."  He replied, "Yes,  That is it 100%"  Since he had done the spackling on the window trim, I couldn't be too upset that he had gotten me to do the baseboard.  The trim is all painted white (Swiss Coffee to be exact) and looks pretty much the same in pictures as before so I didn't bother to take any more photos.

This morning we went out and did a big grocery shopping trip because we are supposed to get our first snow tonight.  The National Weather Service is predicting 2-4 inches but since it is still pretty warm, I am not expecting much of it to stick around.  But you never know so I figured I would get us all set up for a few days so we don't have to go out.  It also is a great chance to finally get Rex through the 3 day potty training bonanza.  I am kind of dreading it but when I think about not changing his diapers anymore and not having to spend all the money on diapers for him, it doesn't seem so bad anymore.  He is definitely old enough, he understands that he should be doing it, he has used the toilet several times in the past; we just have to make it the daily routine now.  I feel pretty confident that it will work and we will be successful, we just have to make it though the next three very long days.

Family Room Update and Basemp Picnic

As usual, there has been a lot of home improvement going on around our house.  Last weekend Rob got the fireplace in its spot.  Sorry for the crappy photos- my camera is still stuck on movie mode so all I have to work with for now is my phone on my camera.



There was a little hiccup with the fireplace installation because it turned out the opening was just a tad too small.  When Rob measured the fireplace insert, he didn't include the little bun feet that it sits on.  Oops.  It was a quick fix though so that was lucky.  We've run the fireplace out there a few times and it is amazing how well it heats up that space.  I am pretty impressed with it.  He also got the windows all trimmed out.  I only got a picture of the one but the other one looks just the same as this.



We were both impressed at how good the windows look at all finished up.  We took three in-stock windows off the shelf at Menards and just made them fit our space.  Rob did such an awesome job with it- both the framing of it and the trim.  I don't know how he got everything to fit the space so good when nothing was custom made or ordered and it had to fit the existing openings.  I think he is done with all the baseboard and trim nail-hole-filling and caulking and it is ready for paint now.  I can't wait for that to be done so I can get started on laying out the carpet tiles.  I am really anxious to see how they will look.

Rob took a short break to mow the lawns this weekend.  Rex must have known that Daddy needed to get back to his other projects so he decided to lend a hand.



The boys and I were out on a little shopping excursion yesterday morning and ended up at K-Mart where we found a little kids' picnic table on clearance.  I thought it would be fun in the basement (or basemp as Rex calls it) for the winter and, of course, in the backyard for the summer.  I'm trying to get the basement a little more fun for the winter so they can play down there more.  I'm going to put their playhouse down there and I could just see it all set up with the playhouse, the Little Tikes BBQ and the picnic table all set up.  Rex and I tested out the table yesterday at lunchtime.

It was pretty fun but the cable guy came to FINALLY replace our crappy cable box so picnic time got cut a little short.  I have one more project idea for playtime in the basement that I am going to get working on pretty soon here.  I have seen a lot of kids' play kitchens that are repurposed from old entertainment centers and I think it is so neat and such a good idea.  I didn't really want to build the boys a play kitchen though (even though boys can be chefs- Rex cooks and bakes with me all the time) and then yesterday I came up with the idea to turn one of those old entertainment centers into a workbench play area.  They love tools and I think this would be a lot more fun for them than a kitchen.  Everyone is getting new tv's that require a different style entertainment center so I am hopeful that I can get one of the old ones for free.  I keep looking on craigslist and people want anywhere from $20 to $150 for them.  People are so crazy with their prices on craigslist sometimes- do you really think someone is going to give you $150 for your ancient entertainment center that only fits an ancient tv?  Please.  Anyhow, I'll keep looking and I know I may have to break down and give someone a few bucks for one.  I'll be sure to post the project on here when I get to it.

Our Favorite Holiday

Rob and I both love Halloween so much.  I just love to see the boys dressed up in their costumes- it is the cutest thing ever.  Rob is on trick-or-treating duty which he thinks is great.  He always comes back and tells me what a great time they all had.  I am pretty sure it is Rex's favorite holiday too.  He loves to ring doorbells and he gets candy for doing it instead of getting in trouble like he usually does.  Two words-  Awe.  Some.





Wyatt ended up in the stroller after two houses but he had a good time too.  I stayed home and made a jack-o-lantern pizza and handed out candy.  Rob said Rex opened a few people's door when they took too long to answer after he rang the doorbell.  Oh dear.  We will have to work on our Halloween etiquette for next year I suppose.  Last year, he went into people's houses, this year he opened their doors so maybe next year he will get it finally.  We had two little boys (I would guess they were about 2 years old) that were twins come to our door dressed as Mario and Luigi and they get my vote for best costume- they were adorable.  Besides my two boys of course.

The Pumpkin Patch

Our trip to the pumpkin patch falls into the "Better Late Than Never" category. I've been trying to go for the last three weekends with our whole family and it just never has worked out. Today is a beautiful day and I decided to just take the boys by myself. I loaded them up and took them to the farm of one of my favorites from our local farmers' market which turned out to be a great choice. For one thing, the lady could be mother-in-law's twin and I always get a kick out of seeing her. Anyhow, the boys had so much fun on their trip out to the farm to get pumpkins.









So they had a good time with the pumpkins, but they actually spent a majority of the time playing with the rocks in the driveway and with the cat (you can't see the cat in the second picture but it is in the tarp).





It turned out to be a lot of work, taking the two of them there by myself so we didn't stay all that long. It was just off a busy road and every time Wyatt heard or saw a big truck go by, he would take off towards the road so he could see it. Umm, I don't think so Wyatt. We got a nice big pumpkin, perfect for carving, as well as some smaller pumpkins and gourds and even some pumpkin butter (soooo yummy). Trips out to the country always make me want to live there and this time was even worse with the boys running around and loving it. We will stay put for now but I am sure it will always be something we are thinking about.

Cheating and Stealing

Our theme this past weekend seemed to be cheating and stealing. Not that we were actually doing that, it just felt like we were. We decided to get up early and go to Des Moines Saturday morning so that we could go out to breakfast, go to the Habitat for Humanity ReStore and Sears. Breakfast was great put the next two stops were awesome. The ReStore had an ad on craigslist for some carpet tile that we were interested in for the family room. I called and it turned out that they had a lot more carpet tile than just what was shown in the ad. When we got there, we discovered they had HUGE piles of new carpet tile for 37 cents/sq ft. SCORE. But there were two small problems- they were all different colors and styles (a few multiples of some but lots of singles) and they were commercial style, not residential (hard and dense versus soft and plush). We figured we could get enough tiles in similar colors to do the room so problem one was solved- hopefully it will look something like this.



Then Rob pointed out that Hot Wheels go a lot better on this type of carpet then something thicker so it made me feel better about that. We bought enough tiles to do the room plus about 10 extras for when some need replacing in the future- and with my two boys, that is a when and not an if. So it ended up only costing us a little over 100 bucks to carpet the room, plus spares. Feels like stealing but it is not. In fact, we are helping Habitat for Humanity so that makes even more awesome. I also picked up some banquet table legs (for only $7!) that I have been looking all over for to make this large piece of wood we have (I think it's an old door) into an extra table. I think I was more excited about that than the carpet tiles! Anyhow, then it was on to Sears. My dad bought Rob a cordless circular saw for his birthday that was really nice, but we ended up exchanging it for this air compressor/nail gun combo. Rob got the baseboard and some door trim up this weekend and he said it was so easy, it felt like he was cheating thanks to the nail gun.



Rob also finally busted out my birthday gift to him, a compound miter saw, to do the baseboard and build a step going from the house out into the family room.





I help a little, but mostly I just try to keep an eye on the boys. They need it. Here's what they do when you turn your back for a second.





Actually, I helped Rex into the monkey costume. It is from last year and we were checking to make sure it still fit. It does- yay! And then I was making a cake with Rex and watching Wyatt as he climbed onto the table. I don't think Rex ever tried that. Rex does some crazy things but I think Wyatt is even more of a daredevil. Oh dear. In related news, I colored my hair this week to cover up all the gray. Not that I have that much, but it certainly does seem to be coming in more and more over the past 3 years. Thanks boys.