How We Kicked Off December

When we first looked at our house we LOVED it. It felt like the perfect place for us.  We were not even planning on buying yet.  The house found us. 

We loved so many things about it.  One of the things we loved was that there were not a lot of things we had to do...but lots of things we could do.

We decided we would take one room at a time and give our selves 1-2 months to work on it.  We started with the living room.  I would say it is 90 percent done now (It's still missing a couple pieces of furniture and pictures on the walls).

Here is the picture from the listing.  It was a nice living room when we bought it.  It had been freshly painted white, it had a fireplace, wood floors....

 We knew it had potential to be so much more!  My Brother was so kind to help us paint.

 He is awesome (for more reasons then just his painting abilities).  I know of no one that can cut a line like he can.  He uses no tape and somehow it comes out perfect.  I can't even imagine how long the painting would have taken without him.  Thank you Dan for all of your help!

 Tyler and my Dad (who is the master carpenter) built me the most beautiful shelves around the windows.  I LOVE them.  They exceed my expectations in ever way!!!  My Dad gave a lot of his time to us.  He glued boards and even found me boards that would go up around the windows, which was really important to me.  Thanks!

Tyler worked every night on them.  He put a lot of sweat equity into them and it was so worth it. The pictures do not do it justice. (scroll back up to the original so you can see the difference).

Every time I walk in the room I sigh and smile.  It's not even 100% done and it just feels so warm and cozy.  I think it feels that way for a couple of reasons. For one- it is a warm and cozy room.  Another reason is because we put a lot of our time into it and each time we look at it we feel a sense of accomplishment.  And for me I feel a lot of love in this room.  It is a reminder of the people I am surrounded by that love me.  My Dad for helping us build the shelves.  My brother for giving his time to paint. My husband for working so hard because it was important to me.  I love it!  It was a fun way to kick off December (even if I did complain about how late we are getting our tree this year- we couldn't really have one around while the room was being worked on). 

It makes me very excited to keep working on the rest of the house. It's fun making it our own and putting our mark on it!

Enough about my living room (is anyone still reading?).  Here are a few things the kids have been doing lately...

School Projects for Garret

 Getting anxious for Christmas and worrying because we don't have a tree yet.

Playing dress-ups.

 One day the boys begged and begged me to let them go play "Indians" outside.  I finally let them (it was cold).  I looked out and they had their shirts off and were running in 45 degree weather like this.  I figured it couldn't last long and they were having so much fun I hated to yell at them to put their shirts on.  They played for over an hour this way.

 Titus (affectionately known as TyTy) is a sweetheart. He smiles and giggles and sleeps and is adored by everyone.

Now that the living room is not taking up all our time we are going to get going on Christmas.  I love Christmas and am so excited!