Whoever knew going potty was going to be such a delightful experience?

Okay, so I know there are a lot of more important things to journal about but this remodel stuff in addicting and I just have to share the completion of the hallway bathroom and then I will get back to stuff that really matters.

The same man that did our master bath did all the work in this bathroom as well (give me a call and I'll hook you up). Birch and I had plenty of finishing touches to do this weekend before calling it done.

Before:
So this bathroom didn't have any nasty issues that the master bath but it was just a bit outdated; dressed in baby blue and adorned in brass.

After:

When Birch hung the new lights and went to touch up the paint we found that this bathroom was not painted in the same hue as the rest of the house. Five minutes before the paint store closed I ran in with a swatch of my curtain material and picked out a new paint color. I am not one to make fast decisions and tend to stay with the safe taupe and white colors but "thornton sage" paint was calling my name. It took me all yesterday to decide that "yes, it was a good choice." The knobs were all bought in a lot deal from ebay.
I feel so blessed to have so many talented family and friends. All the photographs in the bathroom are by the very talented Kimberly Greenfield. Check out her website to add some awesome photography to your house. When I saw the large dogwood print I just knew that it would be the perfect addition to our new bathroom. I love the freshness of all the colors in the bathroom.
The lighting isn't great in this photo. I sewed up this little curtain for the window and found the shower curtain at TJ Max. We currently don't have any towels worthy of this bathroom; hard to hang up old swim towels when everything else is so pretty and coordinated.
New light fixtures were an awesome deal at Costco.
The tile on the floor is Montagna Belluno 12 In. x 12 In. glazed porcelain purchased at Home Depot. The accent 2 X 2 tiles in the four inch block are Montagna Cortina also from Home Depot. The grout color is light smoke.
Countertop (Wilsonart High Definition Deepstar Bronze laminate) is from the rest of the piece that we used in the master bath with a maple wood edging. I was able to purchase it from Great Floors since they beat the price of other competitors. The new faucets were purchased at Costco.

The basement bathroom is calling my name loudly but I think it will have to be put on hold for a little bit. Who knew remodeling would be so addicting (especially when it doesn't take all of your husband's precious free minutes when he is home)?

Drum roll please...

After two weeks of learning a plethora of new weird things about our house we are proud to announce the completion of the newly remodeled master bathroom. WE LOVE IT!!!

The pictures don't do it justice so you will just have to come visit us for the real effect. The main reason for remodeling the bathroom was the cracked grout and mold problems we were having; little did we know how bad it really was. Ever since we had moved in I had dreamed of getting rid of the mauveness (yes, that is a real word in MY vocabulary). This, of course, was a domino effect of pink/mauve tile, flooring, curtains, and a hue of pink on our bathroom appliances (toilet, sink, garden jacuzzi tub, and shower basin). In order to cut a chunk of the remodeling costs we opted to keep the "innocent blush" bathroom appliances but go neutral in the other things to give the appliances a more taupe tone. We're happy with the end result and I know longer feel like I am bathing in pinkness.

Before:

Just a reminder of how gross we are/were:
After:

Note the new light fixture (purchased from Lowes) and new cabinet knobs/pulls (purchased from ebay).
We used 6X6 inch (Montagna Cortina, Glazed Porcelain bought from Home Depot) on the wall and backsplash. Also a row of 2 X 4 brick tiles are accented around the backspash, under the windows, and through the shower.
I was pretty excited to find this faucet at Costco for $40.00. We were not planning on changing our faucet originally but it was hard to resist a good deal and quite the upgrade from our original faucet. The countertop is Wilsonart High Definition Deepstar Bronze laminate with maple wood edging.
We put 16 inch tiles (Montagna Cortina, Glazed Porcelain bought from Home Depot) on the floor.
I made these curtains yesterday. I am still trying to decide if I like them. It's kind of an old lady material but it wore on me the more I stared at it at the fabric store. The accent color that I did in the bathroom is kind of a seafoamy blue/green and this subtle brings that color in.
I know no one is really interested in my drawer but I have to document its orderliness. I found this great little wood organizer at Ross and it fit just perfect.
The only thing that is missing is a little somethin' somethin' on the wall to dress it up. My favorite print from the talented Kimberly Greenfield is no longer a right match in the bathroom (don't worry Kim, it will have a new home) so I'm on the lookout for something new.

This week the hallway bathroom is getting a new look. I just finished making the curtain for that bathroom and the tile will go in tomorrow. We HIGHLY recommend the gentleman doing the remodel so if you are in our area and are in need of any remodeling work he does it all. His price is right, his knowledge is incredible and his finishing work spectacular.

Squirt turns 9 months

Our little peanut has turned 9 months old. She's just the cutest little bug and we love every inch of her.

New stats:

25.5 inches tall (4% on charts)
13 pounds 9 oz. (1% on charts)
42.6 cm head circumference (15% on charts)
Two bottom teeth finally emerged this past month

Have you seen a cuter bum?

The doctor's office also ran a routine hemoglobin check and Chloe is a bit anemic. The poor girl had to go have her blood drawn following her toe poke and the lab office says that she is anemic but doesn't have low iron. Hum...I should have asked what that exactly means. They are thinking that it might be due to a nasty cold and double ear infection she currently is suffering through.

Chloe is getting around quite nicely these days. She is even finding joy in picking up small things off of the floor and taste testing them out...not always a yummy idea at our house. She's been found chewing on small lego helmets several times but so far we haven't seen any come out the other end.Eating...is it possible to be made out of Cheerios? We frequently refer to Chloe as "cheerio bum" seeing as how she usually has some stuck to her cute little bum bum. Unfortunately she seems to be getting an opinion about what she thinks is yummy. The other day she snarfed down ground up salmon, rice, and broccoli for dinner but then the next day you can't pry her little lips open to put in a bite of smooshed carrots.We were expecting a nasty face from her pickle but she ended up enjoying it.

As far as being loved...no problem there. She is smothered in love every day. She's a bit picky about who is giving her love so her span of friends hasn't grown too large. It's so cute to watch her get all spastic with excitement when Birch comes home from work. She loves her daddy! Love this girl!

Ode to Natedog

Nate just celebrated his fifth birthday! It's hard to believe that he joined our family five years ago seeing as I can't really remember life without Nate. To be honest, when we named Nathan I wasn't really keen on the name but I didn't have any others to root for. His middle name is a family name that I really like and I was happy to carry on the good lineage associated with it. When we decided to get pregnant with Nate, Alysee was still pretty little; in fact Nate and Alysee are just nineteen months apart. Alysee was a particularly good baby and we thought "Why not?"; I think I was about three months pregnant with Nate when Alysee started to get a bit feisty and throwing some darn good tantrums. So throughout Nate's pregnancy I had several moments where I wondered "What were we thinking" but as soon as Nate was born I knew just what we were thinking. Nate was meant to be apart of our family!

Nate (couple of days old) and his siblings

I made this poster about Nate for preschool this year. Nate is a really fun kid. He is super thoughtful, quite athletic, an extremely good artist, has quite a temper, loves playing with friends, and is IN LOVE with his daddy. I know he loves me but he REALLY loves his daddy. Nate loves to feel secure...this means he has a hard time in new situations being independent. Actually it's just not new situations, he really loves going to preschool, his primary class, or the "idea" of vacation bible school but once he gets there he wants me to stay with him. He frequently will say "it's just too long." That was one of the main reasons I really wanted him to go to a formal preschool so he would be forced to be with new people and have others instruct him outside of his parents. Academically he is totally ready for kindergarten (which he starts this fall) but I think it is going to be tough for him at first. I've reminded him that half of his siblings will be right with him at school so hopefully that will cushion his fear.
I had Nate write and draw this picture about what he loves this morning (his new Rollerblades):


When I asked him to draw a picture about what he did not love he said, "Hum...I think I love everything." Then I felt like a lame mommy for instilling the idea that you might possibly dislike something...dumb mommy. Anyway, he decided that he really doesn't like eating fish (which I made him try last night and he thought it was disgusting):
Here's Nate will all his birthday loot:
As I've mentioned before I am not much of a cake maker (much to my children's dismay). I did come up with this cute idea of a truck made out of an ice cream sandwich, a ding dong, and four oreos. We made several and then split them up for everyone.
Nate choose to have spaghetti, homemade bread sticks, and shrimp for dinner. It was quite tasty!
I had kind of decided last year that the era of "friends parties" had ended at our house. They often are just so crazy, lots of work, the kids get gifts I don't approve of, and then the birthday child starts getting all self fish with their new stuff. But...I guess I felt bad for Nate not ever having a friend party so I last minute decided to put one together. I did "evites" for everyone and I included the extended family members knowing they wouldn't be able to come but that it would be fun to let them know what was happening. It was so fun to receive many cute emailed wishes to Nate from his extended family members that responded to the evite.

Really just three little boys were invited locally so it was a very manageable group for me to handle. I did it in the morning on an off day of preschool. The other siblings were a little sad to miss out on the fun (Birch was sad too) but it sure made it a much smaller group.

Since Nate is such a lover of crafts and other artist things that was the theme of the party. First the kids decorated aprons that I had gotten for free from Home Depot. I sewed a blank piece of cloth on the front so the kids had a white canvas to draw their picture using fabric crayons.
Then all the boys put together car kits from Michael's Craft Store. I've mentioned these before as a favorite activity that all my kids love. They come with paint, glue, sandpaper, and all the wood pieces. The boys were all very good about following the instructions and they all went home with really cute race cars. We had some tasty little snacks and cup cake ice cream cones and then opened the gifts. I had requested they all be art related so it made it really fun to Nate then to have the afternoon to keep creating pictures with his new art supplies. It really turned out fun and was pretty relaxed.

I'm so thankful Nate is apart of our family! Love this kid!!!

What's been going on at our house...

We have lots of fun things to share but currently this is what's happening at our house...



Saying "farewell" to nasty bathroom issues...

Saying "hello" to sick little boys...
Saying "you're so cute" to increasingly-mobile Chloe...
More to come in the following days!

"The Princess That Got Married" by Alysee Ditto

About the author: Six and a half year old Alysee loves to write short stories, play with her five other siblings, catch rollie pollies, and read. She can often be found playing school or church. "The Princess That Got Married" is just one of the many books she has published at Ditto Publishing House.