Picture Happy

Now that my kids, and I  are back to "normal",  I decided to get the camera out and take some pics today.  Yes, I got a little picture happy, so sorry if this bores you.   It is so nice to feel like a human being again :)!

 Above was my attempt at making a human shaped "A", it didn't work to good did it? 

*Note the overalls Amelia is wearing were Aaron's when he was a baby.*

Dear Sleep

Dear Sleep,

I am writing to you to tell you how much I miss you.  It's not that I don't want to be with you, but for some reason for the last week and a half my 3 little ones have wanted to keep me apart from you.  I am beginning to get a little resentful towards them for it.  I mean really, why can't they take care of themselves when they are sick ;)?  I feel like they have gotten together as a  team and came up with this plan:  "I'll get up an hour after mommy goes to sleep, then you get up 2 hours after that, and then baby Amelia will get up 2 hours after that, and we'll continue doing that every 2 hours until it's morning time, and then we can be whiny, and crabby for her all day long.  That's a good plan to make her go crazy, don't you think?"  

AGH!!  I am just not the same without you sleep.  I can't function very well, and I become very whiny, and crabby also.  Oh, how I need you again!   I long to feel all the good things that come from being with you.  I know we will meet again, I just hope it is soon!  But, until then, know that I miss you dearly!!

Yours truly,
Sarah

Before and After: The kid's bedrooms

This will be my last before and after post for a while.  We still need to finish "fixing-up" a few more rooms like our bedroom, and the dining room before we are done with the first 2 levels of our house.  The next big project after that will be re-finishing the basement, but who knows when that will be.  

As anxious as I get to want to get everything done on the house NOW, I have to remember "Just one thing at a time."  Thanks for letting me share all the before and after pics of the house thus far.  I am now done with the photo book that I made for the contractor and painter, and I hope they will be able to get some extra business from it. 

I'm ending with the before/After pics of the kid's bedrooms.

Avery's room:

Amelia's room before (I was so happy to get rid of those shutters too!):

 

Amelia's room after:

*Bonus pics*

Notice the little doors in Avery and Deacon's room above.  Those little doors lead into attic space.  My parents (who are the best) finished them off and made them into little playrooms for the kid's birthdays this last year.  The kids absolutely love their little "hide-outs", and spend many hours playing in them. Thank you, thank you, thank you mom and dad!

Before and After: The great room

Recently we have done a little work on the great room.

I finally decorated the mantle (with the help of my friend Stacey), and we updated the brassy doors on the fireplace by spray painting them with black heat resistant paint (something I saw on HGTV).

See the doorway leading out to the deck?  The door was all rotted out, and pointless, because it was never used.  So, this last week we tore the door out and made it into a wall (well, we had our contractor do it).  Now, we have a place to hang our tv, and I was able to get rid of those nasty shutters, those things have bugged me for the last 2 1/2 years!

Before

After

Valentine Inspiration

There is this good friend of mine that is such an inspiration to me.  She works full time, is a mother of two, and is always making the cutest darn things!  I don't know how she has the time to do it all, she just never ceases to amaze me.

So, after seeing her love is in the air post, I got inspired to try my hand at making something creative for the kids valentine's this year.  I cut out 6" strips of fleece, and cut fringes on the ends to make scarves, and then embroidered each kids initials on them.

I know, I know, it's not much, and I don't even know if it's that cute, but I tried, and I felt good for doing so.  Thank you Tammy for inspiring me, Love you! 

Hannah, and Avery modeling their scarves.  Of course they had to have matching ones.

And here is Deacon with his monster truck scarf.  Don't you love that little hat of his?  My friend Stacey's mother-in-law makes those.

Before and After: The Bathrooms

The kitchen and bathrooms were the first things we renovated.  I wish I would've been able to get better before pics, it just doesn't do it justice.   And again I wish you could have smelt and felt the filth in these rooms.  We are talking layers, and layers of nicotine.   

 Here are pics of our Master Bathroom.  
Before:
(Look at the mirror behind the tub, who would want to watch themselves in the bathtub? Ew!!)

After

Avery and Amelia's bathroom before

After

Half bath before

After

Deacon's bath before

After

Before and After: The Kitchen

Two and a half years ago we bought a 25 year-old fixer upper house.   It reaked of smoke and filthiness, and was definitely in need of some TLC, but sat on 3 acres in a quiet subdivision close to town.  It was the house for us, we just knew it.  Our friends thought we we were crazy when we decided to buy it, but we saw the potential the house had, and are slowly transforming it into the house we invisioned. 

This last week we had our contractor and painter come back to do a small project in our house.  They were the 2 main people that have helped transform the house thus far.  I know this is a little late, but as a thank you to them, I am working on a before and after photo book for them.  I thought they could have it to show potential clients all the work they did on the house, and hopefully get more business out of it.  I am starting with the kitchen, and have included some of the pics to post on my blog.

I wish you all would have been able to smell the inside of the house when we first moved in.  It would've made you sick to your stomach!



Here are some before pics of the kitchen

Here are the after pics of the kitchen

and here is the big overall pic of the kitchen

Nursery time

I hate to admit this, but I am just now starting to get Amelia's nursery done.   It's so funny how things change by the time the 3rd child comes along.  I had Avery's room completely put together, and organized a month before she came along, and here Amelia is over 3 months old, and doesn't have her room complete.  I am only giving sneak peaks of things, because I still have a lot to do to the room.

 

These are 2 of my favorite things in the room.  My good friend Tammy over at 703 made the pillow, and picture.  Is she good or what?  She is another one of those people that makes me sick.  I think she needs to open up her own store, don't you?

The quilt on the back of the rocking chair was made by my 90 year-old grandma and is a very special keepsake.  Aaron's mom recovered the rocking chair, and that cute little piggy bank was given to Amelia from my brother, and sister-in-law Jill.

I think she likes her new bed.

Found

A few weeks ago I was playing on my favorite toy: my mac.

 
I was messing with some of the pictures I had taken, when I saw some funny little looking graphics.  So I started deleting all those funny looking graphics, and then all of a sudden I lost all of my iphoto pics.  Agh!  I was frantic, and panicked.  Those had all of my kids baby pictures on them, and all of our precious memories on them, what was I going to do?  I called the apple hot line, and he told me they were probably all gone, and I wouldn't be able to retrieve them.  What!!?  I was dumb, and hadn't backed up any of my pics since September of 09, and that meant I didn't have any of Amelia's birth pictures.  I was sick to my stomach, and couldn't sleep that night.  After going through the entire grieving process, I accepted the fact that Amelia would probably just think she was adopted.

Well, my good friend Ryan has a friend Dale that works on macs daily, and he said he would be willing to try to find my pics.  So, on Tuesday I went over to her house to meet Dale.  I was pretty sure my pics were gone for good, but I figured it was worth a try to have him look for them.   And to my utter amazement he found them within less than a minute!   Can you believe that?  He is a miracle worker, and my new favorite person.  Thank God for Dale, I will be eternally grateful to him, and I am sure Amelia will be also.  Now she will know that she was not adopted.   And yes, I backed up all my pics the very next day.  I am encouraging you all to do so also, you never know when they could be gone.

From This to This

This weekend was a very fun, and productive weekend.  My longtime girlfriends came up, and that is always a wonderful time filled with stories, and laughter.  I was blessed to be able to have my good friend Stacey stay a couple of extra days with me, and for those of you who don't know Stacey I'll tell you a little about her.  She is one of those persons who could make anything look cute, and she has so much talent and ability with decorating, and creating things, it would just make you sick (or at least it makes me sick).  So I asked her to help me with decorating this mantle below.  Remember it?

 We decided to stay with the rustic look, since that is the feel of the house.  Why fight it?  I love all the bright and fun colors, but I don't think that is the style of the house.  She helped me figure out what would look good, so off we went shopping.  We found some good buys, and shut down 3 stores while doing so.  She then arranged all of the things below

To get the overall look of this:

And I just love it!  It makes the room feel warm, and cozy don't you think?  I could never have pulled it off without her.  Thank you so much Stacey, I owe you one!  I think she needs to start a blog, don't you?