Laundry Room

Next up, the laundry room. Since living here a month, there are a couple of things I would change if I would have built the house, and the laundry room is one of them. Granted, I am happy to have a "room" instead of a "closet" like we did at our old house, but I wish it was wider. They built the room long and narrow, and with the front load washer and dryer it is hard to get around in there when you are doing laundry! I also wish it had a sink, I don't understand why they put in counter tops with no sink. Oh well, those are just some little things. The color we used in here was originally intended for the half bath off the kitchen, but it did not go well with the yellow kitchen wall, so we used it in here. It is Sherwin Williams Cascade Green.

Kitchen

 

Above is the kitchen (probably the room I spend the most time in) the day we moved in (a little messy!). Below is after we finished painting! We chose Sherwin Williams White Raisin (yellow) and were planning on painting the whole kitchen. But once we got started, I really liked the brown wall they already painted so we kept it and just painted 2 walls instead of 3. In the first picture below, on the left hand side, you can see the pocket door to a half bath but it is too small to get a good picture of. We painted that a blue color and it stands out really well against the yellow kitchen wall.

2 months and Preston's Room

Hard to believe he is two months old already, but he is! We had his check up on Tuesday and he weighed in at 12 lbs. 10 oz. (52%tile) and was 24 1/4" (89%tile). He is bigger than Reese was at this age. I looked at her baby book and she was only 11 lbs and some ounces and was only 23" long. I am going to start "sleep training" this little guy soon, as he is a swing sleeper. You will see a nice crib in the pictures below and he will soon be sleeping in it!! It may come with days of "crying it out", but it is time to crack down and get him in the crib and out of our room. We let Reese sleep in our room WAY too long (5 months) and I am not doing that again this time. The only reason I had Preston in the swing was because of his spitting up and what I thought was reflux. I talked to the dr. and he said reflux generally makes the baby very uncomfortable when spitting up, but Preston is a"happy spitter". It just kind of rolls out of his mouth every so often, not causing him discomfort at all. So, as long as he is not in pain with the spitting, we will not treat it. He gave me medicine to try (Zantac), but said it won't reduce the amount of spit up, it just makes it less painful. Well, since he isn't in pain to begin with, I don't want to medicate him if not necessary.

Preston's Room: Before (I didn't think he would like the lace) :)

After. We used Sherwin Williams "Accessible Beige" and his room theme is "Rock and Roll" I still have to buy window treatments (the ones in the picture were left here) and I need to get things hung on the walls.

Roadtrip

This past weekend the kids and I headed up to Burnsville to visit my sister's family. I have to admit, I was a little nervous traveling with both kids by myself for 5 hours in a car, but it all turned out ok. We had to stop twice on the way up (making our trip 6 hours) and once on the way back (5 hours). Reese did phenomenal and watched movies/napped both ways. Preston also slept a lot, and only woke up/cried when he was hungry. It was an easy trip up and back, and I am glad we decided last minute to do it.
The kids all loved seeing each other. Aidan and Reese being two peas in a pod, and Aubrey being very intrigued by baby Preston. On Friday, we took the kids to the Mall of America so they could do some of the indoor ride since it was raining. They each got one ride, and did very well at waiting their turn. Saturday morning Courtney took me along to her TRX class at the YMCA while the kids went to the Y's daycare for that hour. It was a neat class, but man am I out of shape!! I used muscles I never knew I had. I am still sore today, but I am glad I did it.
We are still painting away. My dad and Kyle finished up the office and we started on the kitchen. After those are done, we have the 1/2 bath off the kitchen to do, and the main wall in the living room. Then, its complete!! I bet my Dad will be happy to see that day :)
Not much on tap this week. Preston has his 2 month appointment tomorrow (shots...boo!) and we have a wedding in downtown Chicago this weekend so both sets of grandparents will each take a kid...divide and conquer! :)

Dining Room

Here are the pictures of our formal dining room. This room is huge, and as you can tell, I do not have enough furniture to fill it up yet...that will come with time :) We have a tiered ceiling, so in the third picture you can see we painted the inside of the tier (again, when I say we, I mean my Dad) :) We chose Sherwin Williams Copen Blue. The fancy lace valances on the windows were left here, and are not what will be on them in the near future. 

Reese's Room

Little by little, I will post the before and after painting pictures on each blog. Today is Reese's room. When we moved in, all of the walls in the house were white, except for the wall with the fireplace and and accent wall in the kitchen, which were (are) a brown shade.  For her room, we chose Sherwin Williams Potentially Purple, her favorite color. It turned out great. A perfect color for a little girl. She loves it! (Mind you, we don't have her room all set up in these pictures, lots more to hang on the walls and organize!

The first picture is "before", the next 3 are "after"

Our Life in Rewind

Blog, is that you? Wow, it has been so long since we have talked! :) Yes, we finally have the internet...woo hoo!! 3 weeks is just too long when you are a stay at home mom! This blog is dedicated to a rewind of our lives the past month, because a lot sure has happened!
We closed on our new house on September 24th and moved on it. We just LOVE it. We have so much space, a huge yard, a fruit orchard (apple, apricot, pear, & peach trees-along with 3 blueberry bushes and a grape vine!), huge garden, nice big garage, and the kitchen I have always wanted. It is just perfect. Besides the fact now I think I might be expected to become Betty Crocker with all the fruit I am going to have!
We (and when I say we, I mean my Dad) has been busy painting almost all of the rooms in the new house. We had all the colors picked out and ready to go, so we have the majority of them done. I did take before and after pictures, so those will follow in a later blog. We are adjusting quite well to the "quiter" neighbohood, and Reese loves all the space she has to run and play in our backyard.
Almost 2 weeks ago my mom came up for an entire week and helped me unpack, de clutter, organize, and arrange the house to get in working order. Thank goodness I had her, otherwise we would still be unpacking. Between Reese and Preston, it is hard to get anything done for more than 10 minute increments. Somebody always needs something :)
Reese is doing very well staying at home with me. She likes being a big sister, and is so gentle with Preston. I have not seen jealousy or acting out with her yet, and hopefully she doesn't. It was like Christmas for her opening all the boxes with her toys that she hadn't seen in a month since they had been in storage. She would open a box and yell with excitement "Mom, we have this one at OUR house!!" She didn't quite get the concept that these were her toys, transported from the old house :) We are in full fleged potty training mode, and she goes on the potty, but not willingly. We are still having to take her in every few hours,  but she will get there soon.
Preston is doing much better than before. The gas drops I started giving him seem to help, and I have been avoiding tomatoes to help as well. He is still gassy and spits up, but not nearly as much and he isn't in pain from it. I have come to the conclusion that since he won't take a Nuk, he self soothes himself by crying himself to sleep. I was always able to pop the Nuk in Reese's mouth to help soothe her to go to sleep, but Preston wants nothing to do with it (which is ok so I wont have to go through the process of one day taking it away!) He is smiling all the time now, and is really developing a personality. He is an "ok" sleeper, could be better, but I'm sure could be much worse too! I have a hard time getting him to sleep lying down (I did with Reese too) and right now he likes to sleep in the swing. So we will have that habit to break soon. I can get him down for 1 or two naps in his pack n'play, but he will not sleep in there at night.
Kyle has adjusted to having a 30 minute commute to work instead of 10, and I think actually enjoys the down time on the way home to decompress before entering the "house of crazy" as I like to call it :) Reese is overjoyed when he gets home, and turns into a wild child for the remaining hours until she goes to bed. She is so much fun right now, being able to have "adult converstaions" with her, and listening to her thought process about everything. Such a fun girl!
I, also, have adjusted to being a stay at home mom right now. I am running on little sleep, which is challenging, but love being here with the kids everyday. We have already taken advantage of the programs that the library runs (storyhour, art hour, book reading, etc) and we are going to check out the Lutheran churches preschool hour this next Tuesday. I also hope to get her in swimming lessons this winter (maybe at the YMCA in Janesville-only about 15 minutes away.)
So, there ya have it, our life in rewind this past month or so. We have been busy, busy, and are now settling down and finally enjoying our time as a family again in our new house. It is nice not to have to travel all over northern Illinois to see each other :)