Saturday, October 22, 2011

Mark these off the to-do list

I have found that owning a house and making it your home creates what seems to be, at least for me, a never-ending and ever-growing to-do list. I am a list maker, I make lists for everything: groceries, what to do today, what to do this weekend, what to clean, what to fix, books to read...you get the idea. I was very happy to see some of the items on my perpetual to-do list finally get marked off in the last month or so.

Here is my list of what I accomplished (in no particular order):
1. Clean and re-stain the deck - This was what I thought was going to be a weekend project, not so much. With the help of my mom (Thanks Mom!!) I think we got this completely accomplished in 2 weeks. There is only so much that you can do when you have to work around work, the weather, kids and the fact that it was getting dark not long after 6pm. But, now that it is done I will say the deck looks fabulous!



2. Get the tile floor fixed in the kitchen and dining room - This has been a headache since we moved into our house. The builder did not do a very good job laying the floor and we had him correct the middle section of the floor not log after we moved in. We had on-going issues getting him to come back and finish the job right, so we ending up having someone else come in to fix it. Huge Thank You goes out to Justin's Flooring for fixing us up and doing a great job (let me know if you need to have any flooring work done, we recommend him and will pass along his information if you want it).

  




3. Reorganize the dining room craft area - We like to keep a supply of craft/art/play-doh items in the dining room for the boys. This gives them easy access and it is easy to keep an eye on them while they are creating their masterpieces. We had been using only the pie safe, storage in the benches and clear tubs under the benches around the table, but I was growing tired of the tubs and we needed better storage options. So off to Target I went and found 2 desk top shelving organizers, bins to go inside and basket for the top. Now the crayons, markers, stickers, glue, scissors, etc. all have their own bins, the (obscene amount of) play-doh is now neatly stored in the pie safe. Plastic flower pots from the Target clearance section now hold all of the play-doh molds and cutters. And learning and activity books are conveniently kept on the bottom shelf. A supply of paper is, not so neatly, stored in a fabric tote, we haven't found a completely neat and easily accessible way to store the boys paper supply.


 

  
We also finally got a new laptop, the old one was probably 8 or 9 years old, we were due for an upgrade! I think that had been on the list for quite a while and we finally did it. That's all for now, I have to get back to making my lists and hopefully marking some more off!


Thursday, October 13, 2011

Punkin' Patch

On our way


Last weekend we made it out to Schaake's Pumpkin Patch for our annual pumpkin pick with friends. The weather was AMAZING, temperatures in the upper 70's in October, we can't complain. We were on the hunt for a single big family pumpkin, Grandma and Grandpa had their own pumpkin patch and the boys had already choosen their carving pumpkins.








We checked the boys height like we do every year, played on the play equipment, and also looked at the animals that were out and about. One of those animals was a baby calf that was only a couple of weeks old. Then we boarded the trailer and let the tractor take us out to the patch. The field was very dry, I think it had been almost 20 days with no rain, so the kids were all a dirty mess by the time we were done.

Overall it was a great time with great friends and we look forward to it every year. Happy Fall Everyone!!

Finding the family pumpkin
We couldn't get just one after all

Tuesday, October 11, 2011

Take us out to the ball game

Back at the beginning of September we took the boys to their very first professional baseball game. We went and watched the Kansas City Royals play the Cleveland Indians (it did not end well for the Royals, but that is the story of their season) and boy did we do it in style. Kevin's company rented a suite for the game, so boys definitely got spoiled for their first experience out at the ball park.