first day of school

This girl is in 1st grade. Craziness.

Katie was a little nervous in the beginning - change does not come easily for this apple who landed right at the bottom of the tree - but then she spotted a buddy from her Kindergarten class, and things improved.  At least for her.  I was a mess.  I think Kindergarten is easier for ME because it's only half day.  Sending Katie of for a whole day just has turned me into jelly.  Somehow between back-to-school night and the first day of school the headphones are already lost, so we're off to a great start!  :)

This handsome fellow started school the following day.  When did he turn into a BOY?  He is definitely not a little guy any more.

Mr. Friendly had no trouble starting school.  He popped instantly into line waiting to go in - he has the same teacher and room Katie had, and he's always the first kid to go up and introduce himself to the others at the park, so he was right in his element.  I'm room mom again for Kindergarten, which should be a little easier now that I have some clue as to how things go.

Green Hawaii starts school this week.  (These outfits from Oma were our official uniforms for summer.  I tried to enforce a 'twice a week only' rule, but by the end of the summer that was out the window.  It did make doing laundry pretty easy.) Every day he asks if he gets to go to school yet.  Naturally the nerd in me delights that all my kids love school so much, but I do miss having everybody home during the day.  Although I naturally have a list of projects to try and distract me and keep me busy . . .

last hurrah

Tuesday before school started we decided we needed one more adventure while we could still go with everyone.  By 'we' I probably mean the 'royal we' - a way for MOM to put off thinking about everyone heading off for school and growing up too fast!

Mag was up for the adventure so off to the zoo we went.

Winner of best outfit of the day.

Train riders.

Train lover.

I was really hoping that the Icee was going to splat him in the kisser, but it was too frozen.

Proof that I was actually there - and can you stand how cute Violet is in sunglasses?!

  Ice cream lovers.

Everyone pooped out by the end of the +90 degree day.

Katie is 6!

This crazy kid is 6 already!  Well, now she's been 6 for a whole month and a half.  This was going to be the year of just having a family party, but somehow we ended up having a 'princess tea party' with just a 'few' friends. It only takes a few 6 year olds to turn any small gathering into banana land.

We had cookies and snacks and made bracelets.  A good time was had by all, and I survived.

After the kid party we had a big kid party with Aunt Mag and Opa. Katie loves the latest addition to her princess dress collection courtesy of Oma.  It's amazing how a fancy dress can turn any outing into something special.

Katie's current favorite cereal is 'Fruity Pebbles.'  I don't know how that happened!
Her favorite vegetable is still broccoli. She will at least try almost everything placed in front of her - I'm hoping she rubs off on her younger housemates.
Her favorite season is summer, because 'we don't have to freeze our heads off.'
Katie's favorite time of the day is the evening, 'because then I get to hang out with my family.'
She is still enamored of princesses, and loves to sing all the time - she's singing with a children's choir this year - mainly because someone else does all the driving - and LOVES it.
She loves doing craft projects, and asks daily about the progress on 'her craft room.'
Her current heroes are her parents - here's hoping we continue to live up to that expectation!
Her favorite books are 'Put Me in the Zoo' - thank you Aunt Pam - and her green book of Beginner's Books, favorite being 'Would you Rather Be a Bullfrog? - thanks Aunt Julie.
She loves to make up stories with all her little figurines - her brothers provide moving van services when they need to move houses.
Her career goal currently is 'kindergarten teacher at Twin Peaks.'
Katie is so loving and so very loved.  Alex has a hard time being separated from her, and for half a year talked Katie into sleeping on the floor in the boys' room so she would be near him. When she slept over one night at Oma's house for her 'make up birthday' (Oma had the nerve to go visit her children back East in February), Alex couldn't believe she was going to be gone for SO LONG. We have since negotiated that down to one night a week (Tuesdays if you're wondering).
Katie is such a happy, genuinely nice girl.  We love her to pieces!

Katie's self portrait in beans.

While not birthday related, this picture just had to be included. I cannot stand how cute this guys is!

phases 2 and 3

Thank you Amy for kicking me back into action.  We've been a little extra busy around here, and the lack of perceived progress on the basement made me hesitant to post the next phase.  In my brain it wasn't done.    But actually, phase 2 IS done, and wallboard gets to be it's own phase.  I'm glad I finally downloaded some pictures - forward progress is being made, despite lame renters!  The extra time has actually been good, allowing us to really think about what we want and add things we didn't initially plan on - things that are a lot easier to change now BEFORE wallboard is up and taped!

Roger rented a framing nail gun for most of the framing, but it had to be returned before everything got framed.  This allowed our handy helpers to all be a part of the framing.  Alex puts on his 'Mouse-ka-zoomer' to get those screws in, while Roger provides a little bit of extra muscle.

Dad/Opa helped a TON with the wiring.  Of course, now there are plenty of outlets and plugs to be wired if anyone is interested in a trip to sunny CO!  We wired the area next to the stairs for a future kitchen.  I think Roger is most excited about the 12,000 channel sound system he wired down there
.

The kids are now more of a fan of the Pink Panther than I am!  Luckily my contractor reminded me of the importance of long sleeves, so the itching from all the insulation didn't last too long.  The kids made good runners, and Alex had fun standing on the board I used as a straight edge.  It's amazing what a difference the insulation makes.  Even though it's still open to the garage, the basement is a ton warmer - it's only heated by the boiler room, which is plenty. 

Here's a peek at the back bedrooms.  The top pictures are of Katie's - and my - new craft room.  We moved the doorway so now you enter the room straight off the hall, and flipped the closet over to the wall next to the boiler room.  It's deeper than usual, and there's now a linen closet on the left side that will be accessed from the hall.  The bottom pictures are of the guest room.  I had to get in a picture of one of the few things that didn't get changed.  One wall that doesn't have to be taped! 

Putting up the wallboard got put on hold thanks to some awesome tenants.  We finally got them out Feb 7.  My favorite comment from our SECOND visit to court, when they were asking for more time to move out, and I noted that they knew for at least a month that I wanted to evict them was 'We thought you'd change your mind.'  Oddly enough, continuing to not pay rent did not help me change my mind.

Another favorite:  2 days after they finally were out (just 5 days after they said they would be) the calls about when they would get their deposit back started.  Somehow they were under the impression that although they still owed us some rent and they left more pet damaged carpet than I've even seen, I would be returning their deposit to them.  People are awesome!  When I get totally frustrated by their shenanigans, I go sit in 'mom's blue truck' and calm back down again.  I'm SOO glad I remembered to put that in the stipulations from court visit #1!

So, instead of working on our basement we spent Feb putting Humpty Dumpty back together again. We finished cleaning and rehanging all the doors on Monday.  To celebrate, we started work on phase 3:

I forgot to take a before picture of the kitchen.  Where there once was a wall between the kitchen and the stairwell (on the side of the dishwasher; right where Roger is standing in the picture on the right) and between the garage and the kitchen, there is now a big hole. Fortunately, plastic sheeting is actually not a bad insulator.  Last night we put on part of the subfloor and moved the washing machine into its new home.  The laundry area is now on the outer wall - allowing the dryer to finally vent correctly to the outside.  The area where the washer used to be (where the electrical panel is) will be a little mud room.  HOORAY for more space!!

phase 1

So,  before I go back to last summer and write down what we did before it gets lost forever in the abyss of my mind, I thought I'd do a marking for posterity of the first project that Roger and I are actually working on FOR OURSELVES!  Here is what the front of our house looked like BEFORE the magic started to happen.

We took out the brick wall in front of the house with a minimum of effort.  A little air hammer and some elbow grease and the bricks popped right off.  Taking apart brick work doesn't seem so hard after all . . .
We found some pretty huge wasp nests tucked away in there.

Here is what the basement looked like right after the tenants moved out.  Please enjoy that mammoth stone non-functional fireplace while you can, because it's not going to be around much longer!  Please notice the kitchen sink in the middle of the island.  In case you've assumed that it drained directly below, you'd be wrong.  Nastiest drainage pipe with more 90 degree bends EVER.

Christmas came early for Alex.  Hello excavator, good bye tiny windows.

And hello mud.

Best work crew ever. Just think of what they'll be able to accomplish when I don't have to watch them all the time to make sure they're not going to hit each other in the head with their hammers!  They're all great at taking the nails out of the walls, and Max is a pro at removing screws with the cordless drill.  They don't each have their own tools yet . . . but they're earning them quickly!

activities

Here are some of our favorite activities this month, excluding all the excavating and demolition, which of course are in a class unto themselves.

Opa's Christmas concert with the Colorado Mormon Chorale 12/2 got us off to a great start this year.  They actually performed up in Longmont this year, so we didn't even have to drive far, making it much easier for us to be on time and not miss anything!  The choir did a great job, and the Stake Center was so pretty.

Go see The Velveteen Rabbit at BDT.  Really cute show.  Even cuter baby afterwards at Red Robbing for lunch.

Cutting out snowflakes -from paper and doilies - was such a big hit we revisited it multiple times.

Christmas glitter nails - Katie went for alternating red and white on her fingers, and white and gold on her toes.  Max went for green toes, and Alex declined, as he was too busy driving the train.

Train show in Longmont - not as big as the one in Denver, but still really good this year.  Added bonus was setting up the Circus Train (electric O-gauge model steam train) and decorating it immediately with various nativity sets.  When Roger's old train set arrived from Grandmother and Granddad, various nativity figures quickly made it to the flat bed cars for immediate transport.

Gingerbread houses!  Alex made . . . a steam train, Katie made the station, and Max went for a regular house.  The writing on the roof of Katie's is 'Cris' and 'Mis.'

The kids all had cute holiday programs at school.  It's fun to see how much the classes change as you go up just one year in age.

 Note to Roger: Max is not the shortest kid in his class, even though he is the youngest.

 Note to Kat: please learn how to take pictures in focus!

Katie's class decorated mini-gingerbread houses after the singing program. This was my first experience with  glue-gun-on-milk-carton graham cracker gingerbread houses.  I'm still a bigger fan of the original, but there was no way I was going to make 30 'real' gingerbread houses.  Another note to Kat: need more graham crackers and frosting for 30 houses!

Making beaded snowflake ornaments - and whatever else we come up with.

Movie night - always a hit with everyone. This one also got a repeat or two throughout the month.

Sleep over at Oma's house - this became plural after the main breaker blew.  Original fears of a new panel were put to rest when Roger figured out how to fix our antique main circuit breaker.  He then discovered that only half of the panel worked - the CITY gets to come and fix their part of the adventure now, as we only have power coming IN to half of the panel.  (Playing electrician was NOT on Roger's list of fun activities, but he was doing cartwheels when he figured out the problems!)

Hot chocolate party. The kids cut out the extra marshmallows from candy making into fun shapes.

Decorate sugar cookies

Make candy - FINALLY Katie is messier than me (her entire jaw bone was covered with chocolate).

Make Christmas cards - I'm so happy my kids like to play with paper and coloring!

Make deliveries -we're still trying to get to our best friends and to the fire station.

Camp out in the basement - this will require more sweeping

Zoo lights will be happening after Christmas - it just got too cold!

Hammond's Candy factory tour:  TOTALLY great this year!  The factory was in full production mode, so we could see them making lots of different kinds of candy, and all the packaging and other equipment going at full speed.  And more exciting, KATIE LOST HER FIRST TOOTH WHILE WE WERE THERE!  She pulled it out all by herself. I am trying to not freak out at the continual growth of my 'babies.'

Today (12/22) we woke up to THIS, so 'Have a white Christmas' will make the list after all!  MERRY CHRISTMAS!

decorations

This year we finally graduated to a full-sized tree. It's fake, but it is taller than 3 ft. I'm glad we went with the shatter-proof ornaments - I'll save the glass for a less exciting year.  The activity advent has moved to a home of it's own home. Highlights of some of our activities coming next . . .














The kids have really gotten into decorating their own rooms.  The boys opted for snowflakes and ornaments on their window - they had a little help with the tree - and peppermint lights.  The giant penguin snow globe complete with motion-detector-triggered music is a huge hit - thanks Oma.  Katie made each of the kids' rooms a Christmas countdown sheet, so they can cross of the days until Christmas.  She is also very particular about the other decorations in her room - she designed the 'HO HO HO' on her door, and has blue snowflake lighst and a miniature lighted Christmas tree in her room.

Also, she (well, I might have had some input there) decided that every door needed a wreath, so everybody picked out their ribbon and bows.  I may need a tutorial from a more accomplished bow maker, but these worked for the under 5 crowd this year.