I hope everyone had a wonderful Easter Sunday. I know we did. Last year, Christopher and David were baptized together at Midnight mass on Saturday night, then because of the long process, our Easter Sunday was unusually low key.
This year, we had a wonderful Easter from Church to dinner. The five of us went to morning mass at the Carmel Monastery. Beautiful. Christopher was wonderful. I think he turned a few heads as he walked down the center of the church to find "papa" at the end. He had a few crackers, drank some juice, read a few books. Mommy even brought a new toy car for him to play with. However, she didn't realize he had learned the "krrrrr" (that's supposed to be a car sound) that goes with playing with cars. A little too loud and the car goes away. We were also hoping to be able to skip morning nap (as daycare sometimes does). That was unsuccesful. I think mass was a little too slow for him and he needed a little more "action". I took him outside where he walked around, looked at flowers, etc. But it was too cold and Daddy took him out early to see if he'd fall asleep on the way to brunch.
We were too successful, he was OUT. So David, took one for the team, went back to Grandma and Grandpa's where Junior continued to sleep. Mommy went with Grandma and Grandpa to brunch. Not quite what we had planned, but with a toddler (or any kid) I think any plan is 50% planning and 50% winging it.
Back at Grandma and Grandpa's post nap, we decided to do easter eggs and basket for Christopher. He LOVED this. And was wonderful at the egg hunting (with mommy pointing the way justttt a little bit).
Egg #2: "Ooooh, ball!" (I'm not kidding, this was again, his response)
Egg #3 (yes, our hiding skills need work)
Into the bag!
And so on and so on.
My handsome boy... he's growing into his hair!
On to the basket... Working with Daddy to get the eggs open...
And being very patient...
Figuring out the pig musical box...
Watching the toys in awe...
You can see his little brain working... just like his Daddy...
Ooooh, my eggs!
Yes mama?
A rare family photo...
He called them all ducks... Actually, 3 seconds later this was a "flying duck"... :)
Mommy and my little chick...
Cheese!!! (lovely, child of mine!)
How is that working?
It was under the egg!
Grandpa's new game with Christopher...
Ha! We'll have Christopher on the street by the end of the summer making the family some extra bucks with his skillz...
I love this photo. Love, love, love it. He's so happy...
Watching the Sound of Music after a long Easter Day...
Easter Videos! Egg Hunting!!!! With a little help.
The Easter Basket!
Go, Chick, Go!
We had a wonderful Easter and Christopher was a joy as usual. Grandma made an amazing dinner of lamb, mashed potatoes (Senior and Junior's favorite) and green beans. I love my family!
So today, for mine and David's work, I made Hamburgers.
See...
Don't they look yummy, and gooey with cheese? What? It's out of focus? Here, let me fix that.
So much fun to make! And eat! It was a bit of work, but I spread it out over a few evenings.
They are pretty much yellow cake cupcakes, split in half. That's a circle of brownie as the patty. After I cut them, I tried to shape them a bit. But actually, the best "patty" ended up being the last. I was one short and only had scraps left. So a put a bunch together to make a "patty". David said it was best as it looked more like a patty since it had been formed. I had to agree. But looked at all 23 patties I'd just made and decided for my first time, the cut ones would do.
Then I put the different frostings on. David and I actually had a conversation about the order. We decided cheese on the patty, then lettuce then ketchup. And then some seasame seeds on top. Both of our works loved them.
Christopher's new favorite toy is his "Big Ball!!". It comes out more like "Ball Ball" but, here see, it's his Big Ball.
He loves it. Rolls it around and around, tries to bounce it. It's very cute.
All the way down to the little balls.
They are his new obsession. Actually, Wednesday when I dropped him off at daycare he started shouting "ball, ball", which yes, in fact there was a ball nearby. He started playing with his fingers still saying "ball". Our daycare provider, Susanna, noticed, got excited and said that he was doing the sign for ball. It was nice to see her excitement that he was learning and it was a lot of fun as mommy to see him learning and progressing.
He now knows quite a few signs and his vocabulary is increasing by leaps and bounds. He now knows the word "stinky" because of diaper changes. LOL. Saturday I told him he was stinky and he repeated it. So funny what they pick up. (Could have been worse of course!)
Then he had breakfast.
I can't remember what he was having. I think it was french toast, strawberries and milk. He LOVES strawberries.
See?
He has his 18 months checkup (I can't believe he'll be 1 1/2 years old in 2 weeks) on the 15th of April. I'm really interested to find out his weight and height. We can't get the food into this kid fast enough. Because his weight so so low recently our doctor told us, he wants to eat, feed him. It get's a little tough coming up with new health things for him to eat. I'm thinking of trying to make some hummus for him. But he can't really dip things yet so I might be putting it on tortillas or something. We'll see....
Ahhh, the joy of completing a project. However with this one, we had a little help. DUH!
When David and I bought our house, the backyard was "ick!". The "lawn" had more weeds than grass and we had a constant growth of mint growing in it. Except for every time I smelled the mint I wanted a mojito, we didn't like it. Plus the fences were covered in ivy. Like 6 inches deep on the fences and about 3 feet deep on the ground. I believe a play yard set was found half buried in it when we moved in. When we bought it, we had all the ivy removed and left it at that. Last summer, we it came back. Revenge of the ivy! Argh! It was almost ALL back!
So David and I spent a few months going at it. We did some research (what wife of a geek doesn't?) and found that the leaves are so waxy, you need to cut them back and spray just to get them to start to die off.
So one weekend we went out, started chopping away. Then David went through with weed killer. It worked, a bit died off. Of course, being who I am, we found out fairly quickly that I was allergic to english ivy. Fun times people!
So a few weeks later we did another cut back and sweep with weed killer. This time however, I was in a long sleeve shirt, gloves on, and rubber bands around my wrists to avoid "slippage". Yes, the rash was that bad. The protection worked and no more rash. We did this about 3 or 4 times and the ivy was gone.
Then we roto-tilled the yard. Well, David started then we got a bit of help to finish. That brings us to the first "before" photos that I can find.
I should mention here that our AMAZING lemon tree only DOUBLED in size once we got rid of the ivy. We can't give lemons away fast enough, and they are Meyer (sp?) lemons!!
Then we had a border put in. I love it!
And then we had the mulch delivered! Yes, it was too much mulch (ha ha). A ton for $35!!!! We are going to me mulching ALL over the yard now! :)
The grass was delivered the next day!
We were so excited at this point! We knew it would be soon...
Then the fun stuff started! The mulch went in!
The sod was placed...
AND... Our new backyard!
Before the sod went down, we decided to put down sprinklers. It's such a small area that it only needed 4 sprinkler heads. But now we need to run then a lot and stay off the lawn for about 1 month. Not even mow it. We had some sod left over, so it went right outside the gate towards the front yard where the grass had just been beat down after so many years of walking there.
We are so excited about the yard. The dogs have enjoyed looking at it from inside the house. NO dogs on the new yard! :) I can't wait for our first dinner out on the patio. Just in time for warm weather and fun times outside with junior.
Almost a year and a half ago, when David and I bought our house, we knew that one of our future projects would be a complete remodel of our master bathroom. Of course, that is going to be a MAJOR and costly undertaking that will be in the future. In the meantime, we figured out a minor and inexpensive fix.
World, meet the eye sore of our master bath, the vanity.
Yeah, ewwww. Ancient cabinets, under an ancient sink/counter, attached to an ancient faucet.
Eww, eww, eww, eww.
So we started.... the project. I was so excited. I think I was just happy knowing the old sink was going to go away.
We headed over to Home Depot and found the same sink/counter top in white, on sale. Woo hoo! (this is actually where this whole thing started, we saw it and thought... hmmm, could we? yes, we could, and we did). We found a new faucet that was on sale as well, double woo hoo. We figured, this isn't final, we still want to do a major remodel eventually, we just need our sink to be a little nicer in the meantime.
Of course, when you head to Home Depot without measurments and find something on sale the wife/husband talk goes something like this.
Husband: "We don't know the measurements of our sink, we can't get it. We should go home, measure and come back." (good reasoning)
Wife: "I bet it's this size. Let's get this one." (not good reasoning)
Husband: "We should measure it. What is they say? Measure twice, buy once? Or is that cutting?" (again, good reasoning, bad memory)
Wife: "I'm pretty sure this is it. My makeup brushes fit here, our toothbrush holder here, that here... fits perfect. I'm pretty sure it's this one. Plus, if it's wrong we still have to come back." (Wonderful reasoning)
Husband: "Hmmm, you're probably right wife. You are always right, you always know best, you are so smart and beautiful too. Let's get it" (Perfect, wonderful reasoning)
Ok, so maybe he didn't say that last part but he was thinking it.
So home to the demo part. (which really just involved removing the top.)
But what to do with those ugly cabinets? Paint them of course!
With drawers out and doors off, I (with David's help) painted them. (No really, I painted all of it but one part.)
And Voila!
I was already in love at this point. We have the black trim on the tile, it worked perfect.
And yes, that is a TON of paint for this tiny project. But that was the only size they had so they gave me the gallon at the small price. Now I'm trying to figure out what else to paint black... :)
I painted the doors and drawers...
Then we replaced the what had to be 30 year old valves.
Before:
After:
Yep, I'm a home owner. I love the look of brand spanking new water valves :)
We connected everything to the sink...
Then, before we could put the sink on, we had to touch up the wall a little. David filled in gaps, I painted. (I'm telling you, we are going to create a side business here... I just need a name)
Then, we put the hardware on the doors and drawers and put them on.
Ahhh... beautiful...
And then... we put everything together...
(Sorry, ignore the weird tints. Some of these were at night and it's soft lighting in the bathroom)
I love it. So we have a new sink for little money.
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