The house before

Moving. Moving is hard. And fun. And hard.
But the kids are settling in. We're slowly getting the house rehabilitated. And this is starting to feel like "home."
Most of these are before pictures. I will take some after pictures when we're a little more done with our projects.
This is the house before we cut down about 20 trees and a lot of bushes. It looks a lot better now!

This is what the family room looked like before we took down the corduroy wallpaper and painted the bookshelves white. And had the floor refinished. It looks a lot better now!

This is the pool. It's closed now. We're already excitedly anticipating opening it in the spring :)

This is the dining room. It still has the wallpaper up. It's on my to-do list!

These are the bookshelves in the living room. I liked the blue, but they didn't work with our furniture, so the back is now white. Though I'm thinking about taking everything down again and painting the back a cream-color. Hmmmm.

The stairs. We've ripped out the carpet, taken down the wallpaper, refinished the stairs and painted the walls. Looks much better.

The kitchen. Ah, the kitchen. It is gone. Yay! From the tile floor, to the wood cabinets, to the wood trim. All that remains the same is the refrigerator.

This bedroom was orange with red trim, with a mural on one wall. It is now blue with white trim. Looks much better!

This is after Matthew tore out the carpet, but before we took down the shelves and painted the room yellow. It is now Anna's room.

Another shot of the pool :)

An after picture of the family room. It is more finished now.

An in between picture of the kitchen. Also more finished now.

It's funny. I never pictured myself as the type that would like a whole-home improvement project, but I'm enjoying it more than I thought I would. Yes, I am tired of painting. And yes, I would just like it to be done, but I find I can do more than I thought I could. And I love watching a room emerge. That being said, I don't ever, EVER, want to move again. At least not for a long time :)

Fun Memorial Day, etc

I haven't blogged in a while, so there's lots to catch up on.
We had a fun time in Canada at the end of April. We stayed with Grandma Ruth and went to visit Grandpa Ted in the hospital. The kids were able to see my dad for the first time in a while. They couldn't see him at Christmas because he was in the ICU. This time, they had to put on gloves and gowns because he's carrying a superbug, but they were allowed in the room. I was a little nervous, but dad was so happy to see the kids and they were so happy to see him. I wish I had taken pictures of them together.

I do have pictures of the fun we had with cousins Kate and Alice, but somehow didn't get any pictures of my mom or sister either. I need to work on this photography thing.

We were in Thornhill for Easter. I dressed the boys up in new ties. And of course, Anna had a cute new dress that her Aunt Cynthia bought her when we were in South Carolina.

Isaac spent a lot of time holding his sweet new cousin Alice. She is very cuddly, and seemed to bond with her oldest cousin. I think Wendy appreciated having a willing Isaac around to hold the baby. 

Meanwhile, Anna had fun bonding with Kate. They had so much fun together, and mostly didn't fight. 

We also spent some time in Syracuse with Jill, Monica and Anika and their kids. We had a fun Easter egg hunt. 

I always love seeing these lovely ladies. Doesn't Jill have a cute baby bump?

Since then, we've been in sports-land. Baseball and soccer take up most of our "free time." That, and trying to keep the house clean just in case someone wants to come see it. But no one does. Big, big sigh. Oh well, moving on. 

Here's Thomas playing soccer (he's the one in blue shorts)...

So, now I get to today. Memorial Day. We had such a fun family day! Matthew and I went to the Temple this morning, which was open just for our stake. It was great. Then we went as a family to a New Hampshire Fisher Cats game. The Fisher Cats are a minor league team in Manchester. And in a fun twist of fate, they are the feeder team for the Toronto Blue Jays. Cool, right?

Thomas was in fine form. He mostly wore these around his neck, but put them on from time to time. Not sure why. 

It was a particularly fruitful day at the ballpark for our family. Joey had been begging for a hat or t-shirt, or something. We kept saying no. Then he was selected as the fan of the game! Here he is waving on the big screen. It's hard to see, but that's him in orange standing next to a Fisher Cats employee. They gave him backpack with a cup, cup holder, and a Fisher Cats hat! Very exciting. 

Then Isaac caught a fly ball. It was a high fly that went right over the net behind home plate and hit the top of the stadium wall and bounced back down toward us. I ducked and hid my head, and all of a sudden I hear this "thwack," which was the ball hitting Isaac's open glove. It was a great catch! The whole stadium clapped for him. He also, I should say, saved Thomas from getting bonked by the ball. His glove was right over Thomas' head. I have always had a small phobia of getting hit by a fly ball, which is why I ducked and covered. I know, I probably should have been protecting my children :)

It was the front part of the roof that the ball hit, above the flag, before it came back toward us. 

The most exciting part of the game was the 9th inning. The Fisher Cats were down 6-2 going into the bottom of the 9th, then they rallied and managed to win 7-6. It was very exciting... you'll have to take my word for it. The guy who hit the fly ball (Sobolewski) that Isaac caught also hit the single that won the game, so after the game Isaac went and had him sign the ball. It's a great souvenir of a fun day!

Family

My Uncle John passed away this weekend. He was an amazing man. You can read his obit here.
It's funny how things happen sometimes. My father has been in the hospital for four months now, but is still, thankfully, hanging on. My uncle was in good health, went to bed on Friday with a headache and didn't wake up. I'm grateful I know he's in a better place.

Moving... and our latest trip

So, it's official. We're moving to the Hartford, Connecticut area where Matthew will be working for Pratt and Whitney. At this point we're trying to get our house ready to sell and to figure out where we want to live when we get down there. Matthew has found temporary housing for the time he'll be there without us. He plans to travel back here on the weekends, and stay down there during the week. Hopefully we won't have to live like that for too long, but it will be at least until the kids are finished with school for the year. We're both sad and excited at the prospect of another move. The kids are handling things really well. They're mostly excited, though Isaac looks a little freaked out when he talks about starting fresh at a new middle school. The house is pretty tospy turvy right now, so that's unsettling for all of us. Once we're done painting and de-cluttering I'm hoping things will calm down a little.

Before we knew what our future held, we took a trip down to South Carolina at the end of February. We had such a great time. We spent the first few days and nights at the Disney Resort on Hilton Head Island. We loved it. Absolutely loved it. It didn't hurt that we had really nice weather.

This was the pool at the resort. We spent a lot of time there. One of the days the boys went down the slide for three hours straight, took a short break, and were back at it for another couple of hours.

There was also a pool at the beach house, which was across the street from the main resort.

The water was too cold to go in the ocean, but we enjoyed playing in the sand.

I loved how red Anna's hair looked.

We also spent a day in Savannah, Georgia, which was just an hour's drive away. It is a beautiful, old Southern city. We bought a scavenger hunt book for the kids, and after a little warming up, they enjoyed walking around the city trying to figure out the clues.
Savannah is built around a series of public squares. Each is unique. We stopped along the way for a little football tossing and ice cream eating, but mostly we marched the kids all over the city. They were (mostly) troopers.

 

 We really loved the resort. We had a two bedroom suite, and it was really nice. It was a "Disney" resort, but that really only meant they had some fun activities for families and the kids. Isaac and I went kayaking one afternoon, Thomas did a craft, and we all went to the family campfire and made smores. 

We also loved our trip to South Carolina because it meant we got to go visit Matthew's family. 

Here we are with his Grandmama Bennett, his Aunt Gaye and his Aunt Barbara. 

And here are some pictures we took of the kids with Matthew's dad, Matthew's grandpa and his Aunt Cynthia.

Whew. Now I have to go get my house ready for the move.