House Pics

Just a few pictures before the weekend of the current state of our home... I got the calls today that our lumber, doors and windows are all ordered and framing will begin tomorrow or this weekend! I am so excited to see progress on this! The weather was really starting to frustrate us because it made everything go muuuuuch slower than it should have been. BUT, we are full speed ahead again!

These pics will be a lot more interesting once you can actually see some shape of a house there!!

Okay, that's it for the week! Catch you Monday!

Just an Ordinary Night

This is what most of our evenings entail: The kiddos playing...Aidan doing his best to ward off "The Tornado" aka Elin. Now that she is cruising and crawling, nothing is safe FROM her. Notice I said FROM. She wants anything that Aidan has and wants to do anything he is doing. Aidan is one patient little soul, but lordy you can see the irritation. Is it bad that I think it's adorable?

The precious "Tornado" Just a little photographic proof that my baby is no longer a baldy. Lots of white-blonde hair that stands straight up 90% of the time, and curls up in the back: This is just a funny shot of Aidan trying to innocently play Legos with Grandma when The Tornado decided she wanted to be involved:

As destructive as The Tornado is, she is so gentle with Rico. She LOVES dogs. Any dog. Absolutely squeals when she sees them. She always approaches Rico very slowly and then pets (smacks really, but gently I swear!) him until he has enough.

These pictures are from my cell phone so they are awfully hard to see. The kids are definitely loving The Roommate Situation. It will be quite the adjustment this summer when we go.

On that note, they did pour our basement floor yesterday so let the framing begin!! This is great. Things are really going to start moving now finally. Can you tell I am excited??

Tomorrow Aidan and I are going on a little day trip. He is pumped. Should be fun!!

Have a great weekend!

Custom Wall Art

What does one do if you can't find just exactly what you are looking for to hang on your wall? Well, you make it. That is exactly what I did. I took all of this: These are cabinet doors: And made these:

Perfect for my wall and exactly what I was wanting!

What is Elin Up To These Days?

Let's do a quick update on what our little Elin is doing these days. She will be 11 months old on the 6th (CRAZY!!!?). This weekend she started waving at you when you tell her 'bye.' She crawls all over the place (she is even dropping the thugged out version of her crawl!), pulling up on anything and standing unassisted once she is up. She babbles constantly. Can't lie that one of my favorite achievements is the amount of hair she has finally sprouted on her head! Yay!! It is so long and blonde. The longness on top stands straight up :) No matter what you do! It's adorable. She is offically into everything that Aidan does, which usually drives Aidan crazy, but he is very patient with her!. It is so cute how gentle he is with her. Except when she dive bombs on top of him. Then he rolls with laughter and begs for her to attack him again. It's precious. My mom and dad's house is officially a circus. It's great.

Disney on Ice

This weekend we went to Kansas City for Disney On Ice: Toy Story 3. Aidan was so excited. All of The Roommates caravaned up there for the fun. Our little family unit left a bit early so we could swing by Cabela's so the boys in my life would be happy. Aidan was in heaven (obviously Chad was too!). He spotted this: He begged to buy the "skin." He apparently wants an animal skin rug now for his room. Bless him :) His love for hunting is adorable. I am sure that is not how Chad wants me to describe one's desire to hunt, but oh well.

Aidan loved that the bears were on the hunt for this elk. He wanted to look at animals FOREVER!

After Cabela's we met up with The Roommates and Deric, Jamey, Kyle, Cindy and Drew for Famous Dave's. Or so we thought. Apparently they are closing that location down and are only open right now because they HAVE to be, so the menu had 2 items on it and only 3 tables open. Yeah, that clearly wasn't going to happen. So we took our kids to the bar to eat. Classy folks that we are :) We went to McFadden's and had some delicious lunch and then headed over to the Sprint Center for some "ice ballet" fun.

We had great seats! We met up with Jason, Kimberly and little Charlie once we were there. Elin passed out about 2 minutes after the show started. To say Aidan loved it would be a HUGE understatement. It was really neat. I was definitely impressed. These pics are from Chad's phone in the dark, but you get the idea:

The green army men flew in on parachutes

This guy shot lasers and fireworks. All of this action in the first 10 minutes?!?!?! Aidan was sold!

Intermission came, Elin was still asleep and Aidan talked his Grandma into a spinning Buzz Lightyear toy. They make a FORTUNE off of that stuff!! The lady behind us asked the guy for a non-light up sword, 2 wands and a Buzz spinner...for $80!?!?!? Seriously. I about died.

But Aidan LOVED his light up Buzz and used it for the rest of the show. The bad guy bear (Lotso Hugs or something like that, Lotso something)

And of course, Chad's favorite guy, Ken. Ken and Barbie were hilarious. I thought Chad and my dad were going to fall out of their chairs when Ken came out. We all know that figure skating is manly as it is, but this character? Totally stole the show for those two. Hysterical.

Everyone had a blast. We headed home afterwards and everyone was spent. Sunday was low key and recovery from the big day on Saturday. I can't believe it is April this week already! The time is flying by! I don't have any fancy way of wrapping this up so have a great week!

Our House

Just to give an idea of what our house is going to resemble when it's done, here is a sketch of my original plan: The only changes that we made to this was the dormer windows. Instead of 3 smaller ones there are now 2 larger ones- I have an issue with odd numbers :) Also we will not have a railing with our pillars. We ended up liking the look without the raililng better so that is what we are thinking right now. I am hoping and praying they are out there now pouring some concrete for our basement floor because then I know we can start framing soon!!!

House Update

Today the plumber was out at the house to rough in the plumbing in the basement so Darrin can come pour some conrete for the floors! We are well on our way to maybe/hopefully/possibly seeing Leroy start framing our house soon! These pictures really aren't that fascinating to look at. I just want lots of photos of this process :)

The view from the top, looking at the front of the house essentially.

Design Style

Go to Sproost (or click on that link) and take the style/design quiz to see your design style. My results:
50% Hollywood Couture: Well this clearly explains my love of chandeliers!

50% French Eclectic: Couldn't agree more!

Pretty impressed with the site's analysis! Spot on! Have fun with it!

Hell has Apparently Frozen Over

Chad finally had his dream come true: I went hunting. Technically. Jamey and I participated in Quail Forever's Women's Hunt. We had no clue what to expect. All we knew is that we had to go get new outfits to wear hunting...we had pink and camo. I mean, who needs anything else really? Also important to note since you can't see our shirts in the first pic: mine says "Hunting Never Looked This Good" and Jamey's says "I LOVE when MY HUSBAND goes hunting and I can go shopping." We were awesome. Anyhoo, we get out to this farm and meet up with Leslie and Adrienne. They are clearly way more advanced in this than we are...I mean just look at the evidence: Once we were there we got our licenses and our snappy orange gear (aw, sorry pink hats!!):
Sexiest hunters you ever saw, huh?
All the ladies for the hunt:

First step was to figure out how in Hades to work a 20 gauge shotgun. I have a 9mm and can operate it just fine, but this? Nope, not a clue. Luckily there were some super friendly conservation agents on site to give us the 411 on how to safely operate and handle these...obviously important to our dear hubbys who were chaperoning :)

And yes, I am wearing pink boots. Are you surprised? I didn't think so.
Jamey getting schooled:

Next step was shooting skeet to warm up. Jamey and I were petrified until we saw the first few women go and miss everything that was in front of them. WHEW. They were clearly on our level. No worries.

Here I am getting prepped with the nice Quail Forever guy:

Loading my ammunition

And here I am blasting skeet...yes, I said blasting...apparently I have an untapped talent. I nailed a bunch of them (there is probably a more official word for it, but that's what I called it), AND I did a happy dance to accompany those shots, thankyouverymuch.

Jamey and I (and Adrienne and Leslie) proved to be the rockstar skeet shooters. Jamey and I were shocked at our skills. It was awesome. Then we headed out in pairs to hunt our quail.

Top Shots, baby

Favorite line of the day courtesy of Adrienne: THE SAFETY IS OFF AND THE HUNT IS ON!!
We were dorks. We know. Deric and Chad were such sports :)

We hunted with 3 Quail Forever guys and then Deric and Chad tagged along to witness this rare occasion with their wives. We got to hunt with dogs and the birds were in little launchers. It was such a cool experience. The dogs would do their things, then Jamey and I would get set up, the bird would be launched and we would shoot (usually. One time our dog got to the bird before it even got out of the thrower thing. It was pretty hilarious).

Babe on point and me ready to go!
Babe...the green thing is the launcher with the quail in it (You may already know that, but I was completely hunting ignorant and didn't know how any of this worked)

Shooting my quail!!

Me and Jamey and our quails

Notice we ARE holding them. We touched them and even carried them all the way back to the house. Of course we went straight to the bathroom to sanitize before doing anything, but we still held them!!

It was a great time. Jamey and I are pumped at our mad hunting skills. The guy helping with the skeet even called me "deadly." I am hoping he meant in reference to birds and not like, you know, people in the area. Chad was super impressed with my mature and safe gun handling. I think he had his doubts :)

We got home to a baby with allergy issues. Poor thing. We were able to get outside yesterday when it was almost 80 degrees!! WOO HOO!! Welcome spring!

I visited with an old friend forever last night and it was fantastic. Except that now I realize how old we are and also what big dorks we were. LOL, just kidding Sarah, we know we were awesome :) It so great seeing her and meeting Lexi and seeing just how darn tall Natalie is. AMAZING. All in all, great weekend!

On a Lighter Note...

Walls, people!! Walls!!

I have decided that if you are kind and patient and handle situations like a grown up, that you will be rewarded for your maturity. Chad and I were rewarded today by this sight: WALLS!

What's Your Flavor?

Since it seems that Mother Nature hates me, I thought I would talk about my loves for a living room and bedroom today. I tend to gravitate to the same style all the time. You can actually take a quiz online to see what your "home style" really is. I think this photo of my most favorite bedroom says it all right here:STUNNING ISN'T IT???? Um, no. That is my worst nightmare come true. If that is a picture of your bedroom, I am sorry. I will be happy to come over and stage an intervention for you! Since I know Chad has mini-heart attacks everytime he reads one of my home style posts, I thought I would really show what I want to do in our master bedroom: AMAZING right??? And completely rational for a normal person's home. See, Chad will see this and want to check me into a mental institution. He just doesn't understand (or maybe trust is the right word) me and that I am not a complete idiot. I love Old World style. This is MY style. LOVE it. Would LOVE an entire home of giant, heavy Old World goodness. BUT HELLO, this would look absolutely ridiculous in my home. I don't live in Versailles (the castle people, not the bustling metropolis by the Lake). I UNDERSTAND, did you see that Chaddie, I understand this doesn't work in a regular home. Okay, that is my disclaimer for all future design posts. I GET IT.

Heck, though while we are at it, this living room? INSANELY beautiful:

Must be my nerdy History degree or my love of all things loud and extravagant, but this is gorgeous to me. I would love a ceiling that high and detailed. And we all know I love a chandelier. Sigh. That is all I want to Christmas now, chandeliers. You got 'em, I want them. I will find a spot for them. I can hear Chad as he is reading this. LOVE YOU DEAR!!! If it helps, I found a deer/rustic lodge/hunting chandelier...just sayin!

Back to reality. Again, I am an Old World fan with a touch of Mediterranean. This bedroom? Look at the ceilings. Love those with the neutral room. If I had ceilings high enough, I would love to have a finish like that. But again, MUST HAVE high ceilings for this not to make your room look itty bitty.
Clearly I have a thing with ceilings. I have noticed this. I love the beams here. Rustic yet not lodgy.

Bedrooms are pretty straightforward with me. I don't like tons of color. I like neutrals with a single pop of one color or color family. Our master bedroom was black and white with the only color coming from the walls. They were yellow/gold. We have massively giant bedroom furniture (I picked them out, are we surprised?) and they are a dark dark wood. The color is called Tobacco I believe.

On to a living room...my likes? Tall ceilings. Open. I also want to feel comfy enough to sit on your couch, but want it to look a tad formal too. The thing I hate is going to someone's house where I am scared to death to fully sit on the couch in fear my butt is going to dent their fancy couch. Also? I have kids. I want to not fear bringing my kids to your house. They are angels mind you, but they also love juice. And I am sure you don't want that on your frou-frou couch. SO, my living room would have to be something a bit like this:

Chad hates a coffee table of any sort. He wants the space open. I agree with that argument when our kids are tiny. Coffee tables + wobbly toddlers = grand disasters. BUT, when the window has passed, I want a table back. That picture is just a perfect balance of formal and comfy for me. Also? I LOVE those arched doors. That is the mediterranean side of me; that living room is a great example of mediterranean style.

This fireplace is an awesome example of what I wish I could have in Mediterranean style. Clearly, CLEARLY, not for my home (well maybe when I win the lottery). It was restored in a house in Los Angeles. It is decades old. The ceiling is wood-coffered and stenciled. The floors are a black and white marble-the original floors actually. The fireplace is fully restored Moorish tile. Seriously beautiful.

This living room is more Tuscan (see the walls) and I love that finish. I did something like that in our master bedroom. It is super easy and has an instant effect of expensive paint. You can go to Lowe's and they have a whole section of faux finishes. The directions look crazy hard, but once you start, it is easy to figure out what works and doesn't. If all else fails, there are lots of YouTube videos.

This room is crazy busy to me, but if you know me, you know why I am drawn to this. Those chairs. Actually, Hobby Lobby has some zebra print bar stools that I have been eyeing everytime I am in there. They are more muted than bright black and white, so maybe I can argue my way into them? Ha, I will let you know how that goes!

If I could just relocate this room to my house, I would be in heaven. It has the beams, the chandelier, and the comfy formality that I would love to have.It is my definition of a perfect room.

This is a traditional style living room. I love how formal it is. But I also hate how formal it is. I would never make this work, but it has such pretty lines and detail. The wallpaper and trim is so delicate.

All in all, as long as my living room doesn't end up looking like this:

I will consider it a success!

Just for fun, I like to look at rooms I would have if I had extra space, and extra money. I would love to have a library. I guess you could make a really nice home office and incorporate the same stuff. This particular library strikes me as such a masculine room. I love it:

I love the detail on the ceiling. The Marilyn Monroe art is such a surprising touch.

But if I truly had my way, and was brave enough, I would totally do this to my basement:

Welcome to Morocco. I have seen a few different Moroccan rooms and they are fascinating. They are definitely not for the shy and muted. Bright colors, dangling lights, major detail. I will take it all!! Maybe if I throw a pool table in there like this photo, Chad won't notice the lanterns and stripes???

As an end note, these are my tastes. If you love your country pink living room and canopy bed, own it. Good for you. Heck, I even had a canopy bed with pink walls when I was little. But this is where I am now. If you want my opinion on homes, I wil give it to you!!

Also good to note, if you love Old World as I do, you should know that Hobby Lobby is a great resource for that stuff at an awesome price. Just wait for whatever you want to go on sale, if it isn't this week, it will be next week. I consider myself at expert at the Hobby Lobbying.