Getting It Together

Time to dust off the ole' computer (quite literally, as I'm doing drywall repair and sanding in our office) and get updated with the family happenings.  I love going back and reading about Hannah's first year because you forget so much, and I don't want to forget everything that's happened since I've last blogged.  So let's play a little catch up.  And I want to blog separately about house updates, because I have some to share soon!

We've missed several holidays on this little blog, so let's start with Halloween.  I'm sure some of you on Facebook and Instagram saw Hannah's costume.  We dressed her up as Albert Einstein.  It was Weston's genius idea, pun intended.  Hannah's hair do is identical to Einstein most days.  I try to get a bow in the front to make it cute, but usually the back is wavy and a little wild.

 

It was a pretty easy costume to put together.  I found an inexpensive toddler boy suit from Walmart, and I ordered the lab coat from Amazon.  I like that she can play with the lab coat in the future and even play doctor like Daddy.  My parents were in Texas for Halloween visiting my brother's family, but we did drive down to see Hannah's cousin Caroline.  Lindsey, my sister-in-law, sewed this costume with her Mom.  She was the cutest puppy ever.

After seeing Caroline, we went by and saw our best friends with their daughter, Avery.  She was an adorable pea in a pod.  Avery's Grandma loaded Hannah up with candy, and then we were off to our house to pass out candy!  It was crazy cold on Halloween, and Weston's parents brought in chili.  We had wanted to take Hannah to a few neighbors houses this year, but we decided to wait until next year after how cold it was.

Fall was especially fun with this girl.  She loved to rake leaves outside and jump in them!  Sweet girl.

We celebrated Thanksgiving early this year with my family at my parent's house.

 

My mom's beautiful table setting.

A couple days before Thanksgiving, our friends from Richmond, VA, were in town and stopped for a visit.  Their son, Roderick, is just a few months older than Hannah.  They were too cute together.  We're so happy for them as they just found out they're adding a girl to the family early summer.

We hosted a Thanksgiving meal on Thanksgiving day at our house with Weston's family.

Some days we wait for Daddy to get home from work right before bedtime.  She'll wait and look for his truck to pull up from her window.

Our church had a breakfast with Santa for the children of the parish.  Neither Caroline or Hannah were fond of the man in red up close this year which we were all expecting, but the girls had a blast with the crafts and being together with Grandma.

 

Weston and I dressed up before his company Christmas party, and Weston's parents babysat for us.

For my birthday, we spent a weekend at the Opryland hotel.  My parents got us tickets Friday night for the Radio City Rockette's.  The show was awesome.  It is the last year they'll be in Nashville, so I am so happy we were able to see them.  Saturday my parents brought Hannah up, and we went to see the ICE exhibit Twas the Night before Christmas.

The whole exhibit is made of ice by these Chinese ice sculptors who have been working for months on this.  The last scene was the nativity in pure, clear ice.  It was so pretty.

After the Ice and lunch, my parents left, and we explored the giant hotel with Hannah which she absolutely loved.

We ordered yummy room service that night, and we ate out on our balcony and watch the people and boats go by.  Hannah loved it.  It was definitely the right choice to do room service with her rather than fighting the crowds down at the hotel restaurants.  Plus we thought it was pretty fun!

And finally we had Christmas!  Weston and I unfortunately got the flu over Christmas.  I was really not feeling well on Christmas day, so I wasn't able to get the pictures I would have liked.  Weston did get me a video camera for my birthday, and we recorded her opening up her gifts from Santa.  I really wanted one so we could look back through the years with it.  These aren't the best pictures from my phone, but this was after Christmas eve Mass.  Hannah wore a beautiful navy, smocked corduroy dress with little pearls.

I asked her to stand next to the tree, and she very literally stood into the tree and leaned into it.

Right before bed in our matching pj's.  I hope to keep this tradition going.

After Santa visited our house!  This was the first year for us to be in our own home on Christmas since we were married 7 years ago.  So it was very special to spend it as our little family.

As you can see, Santa brought Hannah some table and chairs, a play kitchen, a baby crib, and play food!  She was a very good girl this year.

Are you still here?  If so, I'm impressed.  I'm sorry most of these pictures aren't the best quality, but I am so happy to have this documented on here.  I went to update Hannah's baby book a few days ago and realized how much I reference the blog to fill in her book.  I love to have this recorded.  Thank you for letting me share it with you!  Happy 2015!

Downstairs Progress

Hi there!  Well this has taken me way longer than I wanted to share the other rooms downstairs progress, but I found the chance today to take some pictures. Yay!  Our house was somewhat put together, and Weston was able to come home early this morning before going back in for another call shift this afternoon/tonight.  So he played with Hannah's Winnie the Pooh stuffed animals upstairs (we're big into Pooh in this house right now), and I could hear them having a tea party while I snapped some pictures.  I love hearing them play.  Daddy is the best at pretend play.

And I would just like to say here that the keyword is progress.  It's mostly for myself that I let you know that.  I have yet to get the pictures, art, pillows, side tables, lamps, and all the things that will make these rooms instantly ours and homey.  The main improvement was the painting.  Like I said in the other post, I have painted every piece of trim in the rooms we've painted.  And you can't tell in pictures how badly they needed it, but it's a huge improvement in person to me.

In the living room, I ordered online these mix of modern and traditional wing back chairs from One Kings Lane.  And the rug I ordered online as well from Joss and Main.  For a natural woven rug, it's pretty comfortable underfoot.  And Hannah loves to be on it for some reason.

The other things for the living room I'd like to do are these:

• Add more color and pattern with pillows on the couch and chairs
• Gallery of wall art with pictures and meaningful pieces to our family
• Floor lamp
• Console table for the one sidewall at the stairs
• Circular upholstered ottoman with a tray to serve as a coffee table or foot rest
• Small table or garden stool between the two winged back chairs

And finally here is the family room's progress!  We hired professional painters to tackle this room and our tall, narrow stairwell.  They knocked this out in a half day.  Something that would have atleast taken Weston and I a whole weekend.  Plus there's no risk of us breaking our necks.  It was a win/win y'all.  The color we continued with in this room and the stairwell is Benjamin Moore's Revere Pewter.

Progress

Before

So in addition to the paint, we've hung curtains and raised our new curtain rods.  Those rods that were in the before picture were left by the previous owner.  They were mismatched and too low and small scaled in my opinion.  We also found a mirror that Weston calls our "Game of Thrones" mirror from Kirklands.  I originally ordered panels for this room from JC Penney's, but they were not what I was looking for when I saw them in person.  So I found these through Country Curtains, and these are beautiful in person.  They're called a Soft Tweed fabric, and they're lined and everything.  It may be one of my favorite purchases for the house so far.  Always worth it to take something back and hold out for exactly what you want.

We have also ordered some swivel chairs to go on the other side of the coffee table from the couch.  We'll move that little slipper chair on the right upstairs to the guest room for now.  The chairs should be coming in before the holidays, and you'll never believe where we ended up ordering them from...the local baby store.  When we were looking at the furniture stores, it was difficult finding smaller scaled swivel chairs that looked good and comfortable plus not costing a fortune.  I told Weston I love our swivel, rocker in Hannah's nursery.  It was a Best brand chair, and I knew the quality and price was good.  So we headed over one morning to USA baby, and less than an hour later, we left with two chairs ordered!

The fireplace has already been nice to use several times this year!  Can't believe how quickly it's turned to winter.  The fireplace screen was ordered from Ballard Designs.

Progress

  

Before

The other items we'd like to accomplish in this room would be:

• Sofa table behind couch
• End tables
• Larger rug
• Different throw pillows for the couch and new throw pillows for the swivel chairs
• Maybe new barstools 
• New drum lampshade

And then we have the kitchen which hasn't changed much other than the paint.  It is actually a different color than the rest of the living space downstairs.  It looks very similar in certain light, but it actually a couple shades darker.  I went with Benjamin Moore's Silver Fox.  This room Weston and I painted one day.  The trim and cutting in for a kitchen was not fun in the least, but it's done.

Progress

 

Before

 

Progress

 

Before

 

Not a significant change, but we like the new color.  The tan clashed with the adjoining family room when we had it painted.  So it bumped up how quickly we painted the kitchen.  Other items down the road would be these:

• Rug for under the sink
• New rug for eat in kitchen area
• New table and chairs that aren't barstool height
• New backsplash
• Maybe update cabinets in a few years

Thanks for taking a look at what I've been working on!  It's really fun to share, and I love the feedback  and ideas you share.