Hot Tub Time!

Our new house came with a hot tub (score!).  The cover was really ratty so we held off on using it till we had a chance to buy a new cover, drain/sanitize and clean the whole thing.  That took about 5 months….  But now we get to enjoy it.  The kids love it, we usually have it at about 99 degrees so its a safe temp for the kids.  It feels like a warm bath.  D loves being able to submerge in it- when you're 6'3", you don't get tat opportunity in a bath tub.

What to do with Instagram photos?

Put them up on the wall!

Finally something above the piano.  I had a lot of our instagram photos printed out from Printstagram
The quality is pretty good, some of the photos were really grainy but we figured out those we ones that we sent from D's phone and then put in instagram- so basically the quality was lowered by texting it over to my phone.  We used small nails and some gray sewing thread I had laying around.  To attach the photos I used mini clothes pins.  They were left over in my craft box from our wedding, purchased them from paper source.  I like that it was an affordable solution to such a large space. I had most of the stuff on hand, but even if I didn't thread, nails, and those pins would be less then $10.  I can also change out the pictures whenever I feel like, which is nice since I like to re-evaluate things around the house.

Here is a non instagram photo of it, less grainy…

Grout!

We finally got around to grouting our kitchen backsplash!  We went with the subways tiles from Lowe's (22 cents a tile), and the grout they sell in "Silver".  The grout is exactly the color we were hoping for.  It could have been a disaster since we decide to go purchase the grout with both kids….and the dog!  And of course as we enter the tile aisle, they shut it down to pull some heavy things off the shelves.  So yeah, waiting with two young kids and a dog isn't fun.  The kids were great, we survived, but once in the aisle our dog puked!  We immediately cleaned it up- no thanks to the lows employee!  Worst attitude by an employee ever- she was heavily sighing as we asked for some paper towels and stating we were sorry and would immediately clean it up.  She said she couldn't get paper towels, she was a bit busy.  D ran to the bathroom and grabbed some.  But yeah, so we just grabbed a gray grout and left ASAP- it was a good choice.

I'm not sure if we will seal the grout- anyone have thoughts?  It will change the gray to be darker, which could be ok.  If it will save the grout from stains and help it hold up I am open to it.  D and I have come a long way with our DIY skills- practice makes perfect, so all the previous tile jobs set us up to do this one pretty quick.  Now I'm longing to do our kitchen floor- oh and both bathrooms.

I love what my kitchen can become

I somehow forgot that renovations are hard, stressful, time consuming, and expensive.  We had huge success with removing the badly built in giant microwave and cabinet that we decided to do a huge remodel to the kitchen.  We are house poor so it had to be within he budget, which meant no ikea kitchen cabinets (yes they would have only cost about $4000, which is nothing when you think of a full remodel, but that was not even close to what we could manage).  So we decided to reuse the ones we had, paint them, reconfigure, and purchase a couple new ones to match (as closely as possible).  

How about some crappy iPhone pictures to start the story.

See what happened there?  We beautifully removed the microwave cabinet, painted the wall.  It took a couple hours at most, we even had a play date in the middle of completing it.  Basically this didn't disrupt our lives at all and we got cocky! Oh- we can TOTALLY redo the whole kitchen because they went smoothly…..HA!

So then we went on.  There are not many pictures of the demo.  It was more complicated, messier, and longer then we anticipated.  But all the cabinets were moved, all the backsplash and counters, sick, etc. The floor remained, but will be replaced eventually (boy the floor looks hideous now!).

Well look at that, not too bad right?  Far from complete, but we were happy to have some sort of working kitchen again.  As you can see all the cabinets on the left were from the original kitchen, reused and reconfigured.  The ones on the right were purchased from lows, unfinished.  They are not a perfect match, but due to time and money constraints we went with it and hoped the painting would make it work- I feel like it did.  That cardboard on the floor?  The cabinets used to come out there- yes we doubled the size of our kitchen with the changes.  The counters are maple butcher block from lumbar liquidators.  They were int he budget, in the design esthetic, and once we added the tung oil (I will make a post about this because it was a big decision), they looks beautiful.

If we had a legit budget, cabinets would have been ikea (the quality is awesome, they have the look I like), the counters probably a combination of butcher block and quartz (on the left side because of the sink).  The ceiling would be leveled out, the bay window replaced with something more insulated, the wall opened to the dinning room.  See?  Lots of things did not happen, but thats ok.  So far we are looking at under $2000 for the kitchen (sink, counters, new cabinets, paint, subway tile, new range hood).  Not too shabby.  I have a lot of pride in this update since it's been all D and I doing the work, coming up with budget friendly unique solutions. 

And this is where we are now.  A lot of trim and finishes touches left to do, some paint touch ups, grouting, maybe more tiling.  But loving it.  

Mornings

Sometimes I get a morning to myself- it's rare, it's often very early, but I really do love them.  Especially this morning because we have finally started to get some rain in California.  While most of the country has been struggling with extreme weather conditions, California's winter has been more like a cold spring, things are blooming here and it's barely into February.

Today I woke up as D was leaving, the dog didn't want to let me sleep, and I'm glad.  It's been about 30 min so far that I have had completely to me, sipping coffee, listening to the rain.  Hey, the blog even gets a few pictures because of this morning.

 This is what is happening in our living room, vintage sofa and chair from my mom, but originally from her aunt.  Her story is an immigrants story for sure- came to New York, worked as a live in housekeeper all her life for a wealthy older woman who had no heirs, and who then left all her money and belongings to my great Aunt.  The couch and wing chairs have been recovered (and will be again when the kids are a bit older) but still hold their antique charm.  The rest of the room is stuff we have had, the infamous fauxdenza sits under the TV and gallery wall- I will have to do a post on how that has turned out since I never followed up with that after we built it.

I love this picture, makes the living room look darling, and L is perched how he usually is in the morning watching some cartoons.  We have a lot of natural light that comes into the living room.





















Meals as of late- eggplant fries with walnut oil based aioli (with some sriracha because it was the Super Bowl), and then eggs with bok choy (one of my fav greens to have for breakfast), almonds, and pomegranate seeds.  I think eating real food and eliminating grains has made the food we eat more colorful and beautiful to look at.

E loves to eat, here she is enjoying some goat cheese- those blue eyes mesmerize me every time.  We still do full fat yogurts and occasional organic cheeses with the kids.  D and I rarely partake because both of us seem to have negative consequences when we do- for him it's lactose intolerance- for me, I get a headache, stuffy sinuses, and it makes me moody.  Strange I know, but it's amazing what you notice after you eliminate something then slowly add it back to your diet.

Today on the docket is taking a shower (this will be a challenge with both the kids and just me), delivering some business cards to a doctors office- it's wonderful having consistent referral sources, returning library books, just hanging out with the kids- oh and if I can manage, bathing the dog- she stinky and like a third child.

Where have I been?

We've been busy, very busy.

We almost moved back to our old house.

But then...

We bought a house up here.

And...

We are in contract selling our old house.

It's been crazy, emotional, fun, exciting, and almost too good to be true.

We are currently doing a few things to the new house before we move in, before Thanksgiving!

Painting, floors, cleaning...

We are so excited to welcome the kids to the new space.

Our Little Girl's Nursery

It's a small space, but we managed to most fit everything we had from L plus a few extras.  The closet is devoted mostly to non baby stuff (most of our closets are not for the clothing of the person/people in that room, we have a teeny tiny linen closet and THATS IT, so all closets are filled to the brim with all sorts of stuff).  Don't under estimate going from 1700 sq. ft. to 1100 sq. ft. and adding a new baby....

Big Boy Room

L's big boy room is done- well as done as a room can be to me.

Happenings

Of course it's been forever since I made a blog post...

It feels like so many things have happened, yet not much to write about, or nothing that I want to write about.  We have been trying to get the house more "ready" for our little girl arriving in the next 7-9 weeks (if she's on L's schedule she will arrive before the due date, but I have to at least be aware that I could go after my due date, boy will that be difficult to handle).

We are finally making some real progress on the nursery.  after L was born I really felt like his room was a waste.  He never slept in there and I spent all this time making it so cute.  When I first got pregnant this time, I toyed with not even having a nursery and just keeping the 3rd bedroom as an office/playroom.  Well I couldn't stand it, and I started to think about how the baby would need a space her own, off limits to L for naps.  I figured he would have a harder time staying out f our room then the "baby's" room.  We also moved L into the bigger room and I am so glad we did.

Since my last post, L has not once been walked down to sleep- YAY!  That does not mean bedtimes are easy, but it's progress.  L now enjoys his night time routine of teeth brushing and stories, but he still fights sleep.  This shows up in different ways depending on the night.  He will ask for food/drinks oevr and over, he will want to have a certain toy in bed and then be distracted by it, or he will want to read certain books that engage him way too much.  Books with pop ups, texture, flaps to be lifted, etc are off limits at bed time.  We also realize that we need to change books out often or he gets bored.  So we decided to go to the library to get a bunch of books every few weeks.  My favorite bed time book for him is Bedtime for Francis- the way it is written works well with a fairly monotone voice and usually gets him to bed.  But L is so smart that when he wants to fight bed, he fights the books that are great at putting him to sleep.  L is also pretty much day time potty trained.  He has an occasional accident, and still has some some anxiety about pooping, but I am so happy we can put on underwear, bring our potty in the back of the car and just go.  Night time we use pull ups and L seems to avoid pooping during the day on the potty by pooping when he wakes up in a pull up.  I am fine with this for now.

We are having a lot of struggles with Ls behavior with other kids at preschool/playgrounds.  L hits/pushes if they simply approach him.  He really believes they are going to take his toy or get in his space.  It's embarrassing to have the kid that causes the other kids to cry....but thats a post for another time.

Here are a few pictures to make this post less of an essay...

Starting at the top: L playing with "colored" water- sort of our version of a little montessori activity.  The next two are nursery progress, got a great deal on a room and board glider off craigslist, make some cheap curtains out of clearance sheets, bought fabric for the skirt and pillows on the crib, and repurposed most of L's nursery stuff (light, birds, etc).  Bottom left pic is L coloring eggs at school- he looks so old here, no more puffy diaper paints!  Last is me at 27 weeks.  I am much larger now but have to yet to take another pic.

Big Boy

I really thought I would be blogging more during this pregnancy- it always seemed like something I wanted to do.  And then here I am blogging the least I have ever...and there is so much going on.

L is making some major progress in the potty training, and sleeping department.  Tonight will hopefully mark the SEVENTH night in a ROW that he has fallen asleep with a story (not a book, but just being told a story in bed).  This is HUGE.  L has probably done this 2 times in his life prior to the last seven days.  It's like he is finally ready to let go of his hate for night time and relax.  The potty training was also a huge breakthrough- I started offering him semi sweet chocolate chips to go pee- since he was holding it for hours without his diapers.  He started going regularly and now doesn't need a reward to constantly go.  He hasn't mastered pulling his pants/underwear down so sometimes he goes on the potty through them. He also sometimes tries to stand/squat over the potty backwards- this made for a hilarious poop that was dropped on the floor in front of the potty.  Thankfully we have hard floors and he missed the few carpeted spaces.  He we isn't ready to go out of the house without a diaper.  But yeah, these things are amazing and so nice to see happen before the next baby comes.

We moved L into the other room. It's a larger room and close the the kitchen so he can play in there while I do stuff and still watch him.  He likes it a lot better and I credit his better sleeping in part to the room change.

We upholstered his headboard to make it safer and better looking using Daniel's tutorial.  We only did the headboard so it would still be easy to take apart, and we do plan on painting the wood gray.  We made a wall shelf of books using the Ikea Ribba ledges.  I really love how they turned out.  We also got a chew nightstand on craigslist.  There is so much more to do but it's finally coming together.  Here's some shots of it now- far from finished.

I am excited to get started on the babies room.  So far we have L's nursery furniture out, but nothing decorated on it's it's permanent spot.  I also really want to find a glider I like thats not $1000.  I look on craigslist and in the stores but nothing has really popped out at me yet.

L has found his love for legos again- constantly masking "sail boats, "robots", "monster trucks"- have I mentioned how "boy" this kid is?  So boy.  I got him a doll for Christmas and he frowned and said it belonged to his cousin, who is a girl...oh well.  Below L is building towers with D, and then I had to include this sweet sleeping picture.

Rental Rescue: Mini House Tour

We have done quite a bit to our little rental house- and the reality is it will never be 100% what we love, but it's getting more and more comfortable.  Here are a few shots of our home- being used and lived in- having a toddler means never really having a tour quality looking home.