I love watching the Sunrise on New Year's day.
I took this picture out of our bathroom window this year.
It's nice to pause and think forward with hope to all that the New Year may unfold.
We're excited for 2014.
Rob took the week of New Year's off of work at the hospital
only to be put to work at home. What a swell guy. His willingness to work so hard is one reason we love him so much. ;)
We took a whole week to work on house projects so we could start the
New Year with a more functional house of order.
It worked out wonderfully!
The first project the Saturday after Christmas was to finish the playground.
The playground has been such a blast!!
The kids play on it together every day. They all love having swings!
I love how Sterling and Brenna are becoming little buddies as she is growing up. They often sit at the bottom of the stairs in the kitchen together. Cuties.
One of the things I love about the week after Christmas is having new games, toys, movies and fun things to do together. We've had fun with our new Headbandz game. :)
On the Monday before New Year's Day our "extra hands" arrived.
Rob's Mom, Dad and brother Brian were awesome to respond to our request for help.
It's a real challenge to get anything accomplished with our five, precious kiddos in tow, so we put in a call for some back up so Rob's time off could be put to good use and we could actually get things done. It was amazing!
So, I should have taken more before pictures of how chaotic and stacked up the house had become through the daily grind in the fall so you could see what a big difference our projects made.
One of the projects of the week was the downstairs "study," "project room," "school room" you name it...if it didn't have a place it found it's way to a stash in this room/closet. We were pretty stacked up! First we took down the broken window blind and tossed it and painted over the dark red with a light gray blue.
While Rob and his Dad painted inside I painted bead-board and art boards outside on the patio.
Grandma and Ellie had a great time working on a sewing project. Thanks Grandma!
And Uncle Brian took the kids out on a bike ride with the new bikes/gear.
It was a blast!
Everyone worked so well together as we shuffled stuff around, did projects, made meals, and took care of the kids. :) We also got picked up some great Thai food one night. Yum!
New Year's Eve works out really well for us in California.
Brian changed the clocks in the kitchen (don't tell the little kids...Ellie and Ryan were on to his prank). We watched the ball drop in New York City online at 12 Midnight (9pm California time), rang in the New Year with some little horns and confetti poppers and put everyone to bed. :)
HAPPY NEW YEAR 2014!!
We did bust out the crystal glasses for some sparkling cider too,
which the kids thought was pretty awesome.
I think Scott must have had one glass too many...(I like the sequence of these pictures ;)
What a lovely hair trellis, Barbara! :)
I think Trevor must have had one too many too!
Brenna loves a party!
On New Year's Day
2 Women, 5 kids and a Mini Van
headed down to Ikea to pick up the book shelf
and to have some "kids eat free the week of New Year" lunch.
Our kids love eating at Ikea.
Their favorite meal combo is Mac and Cheese, French Fries and Rootbeer (although I had a healthy Mom moment and had them get milk or juice this time since we had overdosed on sparkling cider the night before).
They wanted to wear their Happy New Year hats out to eat. :)
So...how to get the bookshelf and all 7 of us home??
Leave it to 2 Women and a Mini Van to find a way!!
We've hauled so much furniture in this little van.
Okay in there, B?
We came home to find the boys had been hard at work putting the coat hooks and shoe benches in the garage. Yeah!
I should have taken a picture, but you'll have to use your imagination.
Picture this...One small laundry room/ mud room right when you walk in from the garage. One small walkway past the washer and dryer. 8 hooks on the wall spaced out (thanks to Grandpa Anderson!). 7 Peoples' laundry, jackets, backpacks, swim bags, purses, diaper bags, dance bags, church bags, soccer bags, scarves, all their shoes and dirty socks...wait, you can't find me in there can you? I'm behind the stack of laundry at the end, trying to fold it. Something must be done.
Wahlah! Let's move all the shoes, backpacks, jackets...out to the garage! Ah, now I have more space for all the laundry, and I found a little bit of sanity that had been lost in the pile of stuff too. That's always nice. Thanks guys!
On to another day and another project.
An awesome, new place for our family library!
And after Barbara spent a day's work on the book pile on the floor, it's now filled with organized books too!
.JPG)
.JPG)
Wow that was amazing! We brought in books from closets and shelves all over the house and now we have more space to organize everything else and we can find the books we're looking for. :) Thank you, thank you! We have loved our new reading loft.
While Barbara made sense of our books, Scott filled up 20, 5 gallon water storage containers and cleaned out the closet under the stairs so we can use it for food storage. This had been on my to do list since we moved in.
It required taking off some baseboards too. We found him dancing to his Ipod at the sink as he worked ;). Thank you, Scott!
Brian was such a blessing with the boys, they kept pulling him outside to play catch. It was Trevor's favorite part of the week, and he even had an epic dive catch he won't let anyone forget. ;) We are grateful we can play catch in our own backyard, it was a dream of ours and now it's a dream come true!
Friday the crew headed out with Barbara, Scott and Brian to the Sacramento Train Museum Downtown. They had a great time, and also got to pan for gold! She has some great pictures I'll add later.
While the were gone Rob and I made sense of the old "office" and turned it into our new "school room." We threw so much stuff away, love that feeling!
Not great pictures...but new curtain rod, curtains, paint, closet organizers, and art display wall.
We love it!
I'm not a fan of dark walls in small spaces and the lighter color opened up the room, it feels brighter and bigger. It's refreshing.
We also finished the play room and boy's Lego corner by the weekend,
which were not small projects.
We used the bonus room as a bedroom for Sterling and Trevor for the past year. It worked for a while, but we sold their car beds and bought a bunk bed in December so we could have more space for a playroom that we could all enjoy together. It works great!
It's been really wonderful to have more space to play.
We created two spaces so some kids can play Kinect or use the TV while the others have more space to play. We have fun ideas for doing art for the walls soon too.
Since we cleaned out the playroom and had more space we got out the puppet theater for the first time in Roseville. The boys have put on some pretty creative, funny puppet shows that are great for a good laugh.
We completely moved around every piece of furniture and everything else in these two rooms.
Grandpa Scott hung the new Lego Shelves in the new Lego corner and now the boys have a place to play Legos! And they sure did the week Brian was here, as the picture shows. Ryan and Brian were born under the same star,
and I'm sure the star was made out of Legos.
They also have space for other building toys like Lincoln Logs and Train Sets on the rug on the floor.
.JPG)
Sterling was a trooper as always. He plays well by himself and loves to be creative and use his imagination. I don't think I did the boys' hair the whole project week, but I'm sure they didn't mind.
Most evenings throughout the week our tired-from-projects crew curled up in front of the TV to watch football. My first attempt at making kettle corn without a kettle almost set off the smoke alarm, so we ordered a kettle online (love 2 day shipping on amazon.com) and made the real deal on Saturday night.
Raving reviews, let's make another batch, or three.
Brenna loves her Grandpa Soulier!
She took good care of him and made sure he had his fair share of Popcorn. :)
She's our little darling.
She looks more like me every day.
(Rob has a smirk for me when I say how cute she is...
and then make sure to mention that she looks like me ;).
Saturday Scott, Barbara, and Brian spent the day in San Francisco and we gave all the boys' hair cuts and finished up around the house getting ready for Sunday.
On Sunday Sterling graduated from Nursery!
We can't believe he's in Primary already!
He has loved his time in Nursery, and it was fun for him to be in with Brenna for a few weeks. They said he really watched out for her and made sure she did what she was suppose to do.
(That probably also involved carrying her around while she screamed to be put down).
He's doing a wonderful job as a new Sunbeam!
He is well adjusted and happy and enjoys being big in Primary with Trevor.
It was fun that Barbara was able to come and see him graduate too!
We had our first nice dinner on our new dishes and linens in the dining room after church. Barbara also has a picture of that I'll have to get it.
The kids had fun asking Grandpa and Brian about mission stories. They acted out Grandpa's "Meanest Dog in Australia." Ryan was a pretty viscous dog.
We also have a new curtain rod and curtain replacing another broken shade in the kitchen (see in the background above). So nice!!
Our relaxing, simple Sunday evening also included playing the "BEE" game Grandma and Grandpa had given us for Christmas. Fun times!
What an incredible boost and great way to ring in a new year!!
Our house has been more peaceful, functional, organized, and beautiful as a result of everyone's hard work.
It was also a super fun week to spend with family.
Thanks to our totally awesome, extra hands!!
Here's Brenna waving "Bye, bye" to you all.
Wishing you a Happy New Year 2014!
Brian wants
YOU
to be careful what you put in your mouth.
Make sure it's not only delicious but nutritious, alright?
