Remodel - Week 6

I think it's week 6.....and moving right along. Lots of work was done while we were away and continues today even after I took these pictures.
View from the outside.

And here's the before of our bathroom and bedroom. Since moving in over 3 years ago, these are the only 2 rooms we haven't touched except for moving the washer/dryer to a laundry room in the basement (hence the extra empty space in the bathroom). As you can see from these pictures, the bathroom was in desperate need of a facelift of some sort! We never thought it would be this big of a project, but here we are...

Old "laundry room" in the master bathroom.

Master bedroom. The master bedroom itself we liked, even the paint color (well, I did anyway), but once we started talking about the renovation, we decided to take the existing closets down to make the space more furniture friendly.

The double doors is my old closet.

And to now. The girls bedroom with our toilet in the middle. Hannah and her friend Owen thought this was hilarious!
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The wall between our bathroom and the girls room is going up! Hannah wanted to put a hole in so that once finished she could still come in that way! Nice try! Our tub and heated towel rack/radiator is in! Hooray!

Our shower, can you tell? with the closet (our old bathroom) and bedroom beyond.

Bathroom from a different angle.

Bedroom with closet and bathroom beyond. The old doorframe to the bathroom has been moved over and made a little smaller. Under the boxes is our new double vanity!

Old closets. Turns out part of my old closet wall is load bearing. While on vacation, Matthew asked if we were willing to keep my closet...no so we are taking it down and getting a built-in bookcase to solve the problem.

Like I said, it's all coming along. The electrician was here today working and a few other sub-contractors were by to check out the space, all of whom just walked right in the house....apparently not realizing I was home...but it's very exciting!!! The rest of the house meanwhile is complete disarray to accomodate all of the displaced furniture, clothing, people, etc.

North Carolina

Last week, we went to Washington, North Carolina to visit Nana and Papa!

Emme's first plane trip!

Take Two! After everyone boarded the first plane and we were ready to leave, a brake error message came up and so we all got off only to reboard a different plane. Hannah made a friend with the little girl in front of her so they sat on the aisles so they could chat. Both of the girls did great! After the initial excitement of the plane, Emme and Mommy napped for most of the flight.

As promised, the first night we got there, we went in the pool. Hannah was so excited for Nana and Papa's pool and thought it was so cool to go in at nighttime.

A huge special treat....fluffernutter sandwiches. A peanut butter and marshmallow fluff sandwich...a New England thing?? I had never had one either (and probably won't again either), but Hannah and Emme loved it!

Cuckoo for fluffernutter!

Out to dinner for Father's Day! Papa and Emme!

Nana and Papa live near the boardwalk in Washington (on the Pamlico River) so we took a walk to feed the turtles! Hannah and "Mr. Clean" aka Daddy! Joe shaved his head completely on Father's Day...

Once you dropped some bread, lots of turtles came over...you can even see a really big snapping turtle.

Emme checking out the turtles.

One of the girls favorite pasttimes...playing with the cats!

Hannah's all time favorite pasttime while at Nana and Papa's was swimming in the pool. We were in the pool 2-3 times a day. She would've been in more if she could have found an adult willing to go with her...Jumping off the side to Daddy!

Emme hanging out in her floaty. She was a good sport, but only liked the pool for half hour increments.

After a couple of days, Joe had to go to Raleigh for work, but the rest of us got to stay the whole week...meaning more POOL, feeding turtles, movies, naps, fun times with Nana and Papa.

Hannah and Nana feeding the turtles.

Our little fish!

Snack time for Emme! Hannah couldn't wait to get into the pool so this was our compromise!

Sisterly love!

Hannah and Nana.

When it was time to go, we met Joe at the airport to fly home all together.

While it was blazing hot and humid in NC, we had a fun time and were sad to go....but happy to be home sweet home!

Remodel - Week 4

While there doesn't seem to be significant changes in the photos, a lot of work has been going on at our house! The construction workers are here every morning by 7am to start, much to our neighbors' delight. Most of the work being done is structural still at this point including the roof. The windows have all been cut out but are boarded up at the end of most nights. Early on in the construction, we had a huge issue with rain and water leaking through to our family room so they are sure to make it water tight when there is a chance of rain.

Hannah and Emme's room. Hannah loves to check out the progress of the work each night when Tim and Yuan are done. There is temporary support put up in the girls' room as the wall that came down was the outside wall, definitely load bearing.

The room almost doubles because of the addition.

Our new bathroom which is still just a work room for the guys right now.

Hannah thinks she has her very own jungle gym in the backyard.

They are finally headed into our old bathroom today for demolition and will start on our bedroom next week. The timing has worked out well as we will be in North Carolina visiting Joe's parents for the week. Matthew is still estimating that we will be back in our own bedroom by mid-end of August.

Adoption Day

Tuesday was the 4 year anniversary of our adoption of Hannah Alina! To celebrate, we did some fun things as a family on Sunday and then finished the celebration with dinner out on Tuesday night, Hannah's choice.

In the morning, we surprised her with a new scooter. She was very excited and has been riding it ever since. As our driveway is full of construction materials inc. a dumpster, she often rides at either of our next door neighbors' houses.

On Sunday, for a fun family activity we went bowling. Hannah wanted me to take a picture of her shoes.

Candlepin bowling with bumpers...such a great equalizer. Hannah was beating me until the very last frame where I won by 1 pin. The sad thing for me is that she will improve whereas this is it for me. : ) Hannah was so cute; when she threw the ball she would stand with her hands in the air for a few moments before moving on...great follow through!

Me and my girls in a self portrait while Joe was bowling.

All done and ready to go...

Still on part I of the celebration (Sunday), Hannah and I made a cake! We put in 4 candles that she blew out.

On to Part II, Tuesday evening...a family shot before heading out to dinner. Hannah had been riding her scooter in June's driveway when Joe rode his bike home from work, saw us, and stopped over too!

Hannah's choice for dinner out??...."the place where you take your shoes off" Also known as Amarin Thai. They have a few tables where you can take off your shoes and sit on the "floor" on cushions to eat. Hannah loves it! Yummy chicken sate!

The no high chair proved a bit more difficult with Emme but she had fun and did well for the most part. She even managed to stop moving long enough to eat some chicken, cucumbers, and rice.

And our last stop after dinner...gelato at Angelato's. Hannah can't quite take her eyes off of her ice cream long enough for a picture while Emme looks like maybe she'd like some of Hannah's now.

We are so lucky to have a such a wonderful little girl as our daughter!!!

Hannah's "moving up"

Yesterday was Hannah's last day of preschool (well, until next year) and with that was their "moving up" ceremony/program and ice cream party. All 3 of the classes came in to Gardner Hall together and performed a song and then each class individually sang a song. It was definitely not Hannah's thing. She first had to go to the bathroom so I ran her there, but got back in time for her class' rendition of "sticky, sticky bubble gum". While everyone else was standing and "singing" (ish), she sat down and then part way through got up and walked around to be by another of her friends. She is normally so outgoing and loves to sing, but apparently not in a group and not in front of a bunch of people. Fair enough!


Now onto the fun part....

Ice cream!

Hannah and her friend Jacob with Miss Lori.

Hannah was very sad that school is over for the year, but she is looking forward to being in Miss Nancy's Pre-K class next year!