Road Trip to Huntsville

For about six months we have been renovating the upstairs of our home. We converted a bonus room into a bedroom for George and added a closet and bathroom. Lauren took over George's old room, as it shared a bath with Grace's room. We also changed out the carpet, retiled the old bathroom and painted the entire upstairs (and downstairs, too. It's been a long process.).  

George, Lauren and Grace have been amazing with all of the chaos. Because we are living here, we have moved everything around about 100 times. It has been CRAZY. We promised them a trip to the SuperTarget of all SuperTargets once the time came to decorate. We spent a Saturday picking up some cute accessories for their room, ate lunch and even completed a work-related errand for Skip*. 

We have decided that we like the shopping/styling part of renovation the best.  

*LS/NWI

(Long story, not worth it.:)

Road Trip Organization

When we were planning a family vacation to OBX this summer, we jokingly compared pack lists to sort of check everyone's progress and to, admittedly, express some dismay over what is involved when transporting a family for an entire week. And! The younger those people are the more involved and lengthy the lists become.

As an aside, our first trip as a family was for a work trip I had at the beach for a client's convention. The event was VERY family friendly/oriented. Skip had attended a few times previously, and there was no question at all that our eight month old twin girls were expected to be splashing around in the pool in between meetings and events. (Needless to say, this was a wonderful perk of an even more wonderful client.)

Any rate. We definitely looked forward to this trip, but we also knew that first year with the girls would be much more challenging than past years. My pack list was in notebook form and took up about six pages. We jokingly wondered if we should rend a U-haul to transport everything - and I do mean everything. We survived, and we got better at it. I'm so glad we stuck with it because going to the beach with the trio has been one of our favorite things ever.

For comparison, below is an image of our car while traveling to Williamsburg and Outer Banks in 2009.  So this is a minivan, with the back row removed, and packing starts just behind the second row of seating and extends to the gate. The blankets in the bottom right? That's a changing station. Although it was no longer really needed for this trip, this was our basic set up for a couple of years, and we kept it up for any roadside situations, e.g., first aid, car sickness, etc.

2009

Also, not to leave George out, while we had packing down to a science by the time he was born, he threw us a curve ball because he would only sleep in his swing. Since he was suffering from horrible allergies (and itchy all the time), we let him! Doing so was such a small thing to try to keep him comfortable. We packed everything, but we had to have room for the swing. The SWING! We mentioned our dilemma and Skip's dad successfully got the thing folded, which was the only way it would go in the car, but it still took up some serious real estate.

That was a big packing tangent, yes?

So anyway... the packing list I use most frequently is a free printable form from MomAgenda. Since we are way out of the baby stage, I've thought about personalizing a pack list, but I ran across this updated one this week from IHeartOrganizing. I'm still leaning toward a personalized list, but these are two great options.

Although we relax our eating habits on vacation (Our kids probably burn 5,000 calories a day on vacation, and we figure they can use all the fuel they can get.), I LOVE this packing system for food/snacks during road trips. We really don't like to eat fast food when traveling, but transporting food - and especially keeping it cold - is challenging. I mean, sure, we have a bag of snacks and some fruit, but this:

Image by IHeartOrganizing

Image by IHeartOrganizing

is pro-level.  This is aspirational snack- and meal-packing.

We keep hoping to have fewer things to transport, but I don't see that happening anytime soon. Therefore, getting the system fully organized is very appealing.

Home Sweet Home

We were recently discussing vacation properties (not for purchase :), and I made an offhand comment about needing to see a property in all four seasons to really get a feel for it. That got me thinking about homes and how they match up with different seasons.

We have been in our home for over ten years, and I am the most ardent defender of this house. If Skip ever mumbles a complaint about the house (which is rare) or if someone suggests we need more room, I jump to our home's defense. I love our home and am just incredibly grateful to be here. Are there one or two things we would change about it? Sure, probably, but we looked at dozens of houses before settling on this one. This was (and is) the one. Every spring we fall in love with this house again. On those first few warmer days, before the pollen starts, we open the French doors and air out the house. We sit in the keeping room while reading, listening to the chirping birds, and looking out across the lawn. That got me thinking about how different houses' strengths shine with different seasons. In addition to spring, we have a nice fall, when all of the trees have spectacular foliage. Over breakfast yesterday, our neighbor likened their house to a vacation home, given their amazing view from their deck. We feel the same way.

Being completely objective, our home's weak spot is in the summer, because the house faces west and the front yard is not shaded. While certainly not bad, summer isn't our home's strong suit.

Skip's house in Richmond had real charm and character. Although built in the 50's (I think?), the house had been updated with an addition - a back room - featuring many windows. This house was very well suited for winter because we could sit in the "back room" and watch the snow fall. Technically, with its rich tobacco-country soil, it was fantastic for summer, too, but Skip would have preferred not having a yard in which everything grew, seemingly overnight, as if Miracle Grow had been applied. Skip would also tell you the Richmond house tended to be cold, but I simply took that as a cue to get a blanket.  My prior house is definitely a "summer" because it had an expansive yard that turned emerald green each summer.  In addition to Edenic summers, fall was pretty nice as well, with a near-perfect mix of yellow, golden and orange leaves.

Of course, now we will never be able to move because I will refer to houses by their most flattering season, as if they have had their "colors" done.  I can already hear Skip telling me to stop asking, "Is this house a winter? Because I really like winter, and I want the house to reflect that... You know, I'm a winter... a deep winter..."

That's how we will become the realtor's craziest client, but we probably had a lock on that ten+ years ago.

July 6, 7 & 8

For birthdays this year, we decided to consolidate with a larger, joint gift for all three monkeys. Our playground had served its time well, but was beginning to show its age. The duo had outgrown the swing set completely, and the upgrade was definitely necessary. There were a couple of features that were simply worn out. We started researching the project weeks ago and settled on a playset through Costco. We ordered it and coordinated delivery a month later, on July 8th.

Understandably, the installation requirements are carefully instructed in order to minimize the incident of injury, and we intended to follow those recommendations completely. (Don't ever Google incident frequencies.) Therefore, we broke down and removed the old playground, an old playhouse, chairs, etc., and we hired an excavator to level the area for the playset.  Also, we had two trees cut down and cleared.  This work occurred over the course of ten days, and crunch time really occurred on July 6th and 7th, when it looked like our delivery date of the 8th was in jeopardy.

Everything worked out in the end, and we ended up with the playset in place in time for William George's birthday.

By comparison, here (and here) is the old playground. When the girls were little, we had gotten mixed reviews on playground equipment. A full fifty percent of our friends, acquaintances and strangers we chatted up were opposed, indicating that their children never used them. In addition to that empirical evidence, we have the luxury of living a mere two miles from the park. Still, we felt that every child should have a swing set so we invested in a modest, metal swing set, figuring if they didn't use it, we had not made a major investment. Poppa put the thing together for us, and he and Gran mulched in the area. Our total investment was less than $300, and the girls loved that swing set dearly. Loved it, I tell you. We were considering an upgrade when William George was born, but held off because some of the platform-type sets can be a little challenging for toddlers. When it came time to dismantle the old playground, the trio gathered around and were very sad to see her go.

Watching the trees go down and calling out "Timber" helped the process a little.

By the way, the trees were diseased and leaning dangerously, and we did not want them falling on the house, deck or new play ground. Otherwise, we would have kept them.  After the trees, the backhoe arrived on the scene and began digging/leveling to within a 3 degree grade.  For anyone who has seen our sloping yard, you will understand what a challenge that can be.

But then the rains came, and the backhoe sat for a few days on end. We were really missing the old playground about that time. Finally, on July 7th, the area was flattened, turf was moved to build up other areas.  Importantly, we were ready for installation when the set was delivered on July 8th. We watched this poor guy work all day in the heat on the 8th and half a day on the 9th put the thing together.  Skip did not miss an opportunity to procure more mulch, and we spread mulch after the installer left on the 8th. When he wrapped up on the 9th, we tested the swing set with some inaugural swings.

The (quasi) finished product:

We still need to edge the area, install a border and put some finishing touches in place, but this is the only part the trio care about. So far, it's a big hit and definitely worth the wait. We are firmly "pro" playground and any/all outdoor play opportunities.

Obama's White House China

By way of confession, we are total White House nerds. This week has been an especially good week for nerds like us because we had the White House correspondents' dinner over the weekend and the  unveiling of the Obama State China Service Monday, although I should clarify that only the girls and I really care about the china unveiling.  To further come clean, the china patterns of past presidents has been an oft frequented rabbit hole of yours truly, and the only reason I haven't purchased one of the many books documenting the china of the White House is that I cannot decide which one to select. Plus, I would want to use the book as a coffee table book and, well, colorful, inviting books do not always fare well with William George.

Otherwise, I am fascinated with the China Room. Basically, if I were allowed into our nation's capitol, for the "good" tour, my priorities would be 1) Oval Office; 2) residence; 3) the China Room and 4) the Situation Room. For some reason, the "sit room" seems like it would be just another bad conference room, albeit with state-of-the-art technology, whereas the China Room would be lovely. Since there is no "good tour" looming on the horizon, this tour will have to suffice.

Some very lucky ladies were invited to the Obama State China unveiling. You can read Design Sponge's recap, as well as Apartment Therapy's write up.  See the full collection here. Clinton's and Woodrow Wilson's are my personal favorites.

Also, how adorable is Curator Bill Allman? He's like a modern-day Carson from Downton Abbey. 

Things We Love: Candles

I shared the above image recently on Instagram because this candle has been a winter favorite. Winter Ski Resort somehow captures the very best winter smells... and has the olfactory sensation of sitting by a warm fire*. It's woodsy and has a faint smoky smell that isn't overwhelming. At $5.00 (Wal-Mart), the candle is a steal.

*I realize March begins Sunday, and we will turn our attention toward spring. However, we had snow and ice here this week so we were channeling a ski resort vibe - sort of.)

Hand Crafted

Today the duo are headed out to their best friends' birthday party. The birthday girl and boy are twins, and they are excitedly making cards for their friends.

When my mom was in the hospital, her friends from Sunday School papered her room with cards, all of them thoughtful and many of them hand made. Had they not stamped "hand crafted" on the back of the card (where Hallmark is always stamped on my cards!), I would have never thought they could have been made by an individual. Those ladies have skills.

I love and encourage the trio to make their own cards, but am not sure I have the skill set to make an adult version. Have you attempted card making? Do you think you would want to give it a try?