Setting Foot in the New Year

It has been awhile. Mostly because I have hit the stage of pregnancy where I need to nap when A naps, also due to the writer's block and the fact that there is just so much stuff to get done, that most of my down time is occupied with something that takes priority over blogger. You know dusting window sills, replacing pictures in the frames that have hung for years, organizing closets, cleaning up all construction dust (still working on the basement stairs), simplifying the household so it is easier to keep tidy, trying to find an ounce of creativity (also left me when pregnant with A), ordering seeds, waking up early to bake and cook for foodnanny...... I think I could go on forever with what I have been up to which is nice because when I look back at my day I rarely remember that I have accomplished anything (pregnancy fog is dense these days).
The new year started with us ditching Asher with my parents. OH MY GOD, it was absolutely amazing. We had the house to ourselves nothing romantic, but the chunks of time, if you don't have kids and perhaps if your kids are old and you have forgotten, almost two year olds don't give you much time to do something. Having a block of time 2 hours with them while they nap is amazing, doesn't typically work out as you have to put them to sleep, may fall asleep yourself and then waste time trying to figure out how to best use your time (the biggest killer of time). Ben and I had uninterrupted cleaning time and we really did kick ass. We had a huge list made on the drive back from Wisconsin and I think that we have made it through most of it. The basement was the killer. It was more than a mess. Everything has a quarter inch of drywall and other kitchen construction dust on it, and as caterers with equipment we have a lot of stuff stashed down there. I packed up my stained glass studio, it was taking up a lot of space, we got more storage boxes- did you know that they don't even need to be filled to the top and you may actually find things with more ease? The difference is amazing, I was so sick of breathing in all that crap and now despite things being cold the basement isn't a bad place to hang out--well i wouldnt exactly hang out, but you know laundry isn't as bad as it once was... during those eight weeks of construction.

In the evenings I completed the work that my mom started in our craft room/office/Asher sleeping nook. I got rid of 4 garbage bags worth of yarn, fabric and other odds and ends, finished the remaining dusting and made the space a place worthy of my time and creativity. Things aren't perfect (are they ever) but we are getting there. I really need some new lighting, so hopefully before baby that will be sorted out as I have lots of things to make.

Asher's lovely bed underneath the wall of fabric.

The other half, lots of cubes removed, dust free, I think I will mosaic where the hobit door was, I am not up for the room being painted again!

Our living room got a bit of a facelift, has changed since the photo even, the butcher block table is upstairs and the empty space is refreshing. I think that everyone needs a bit of extra empty space in their life. I have new curtains arriving any day and then I will feel happy for this babe to enter our house. Although if it is like it's brother and 10+ days late, I will have to dust again!

My beloved coffee table is back in the center of things. We have been having our morning tea and first meal of the day there, cozied up by the fire... oh so lovely.

And a picture to satisfy those who would like a peak into our kitchen, some of you may have noticed that I haven't posted the final ones with counter tops installed. I was hoping to hold it over some family and friends as incentive to actually come and visit us- we aren't that far away!, oh and a visit not just to see a new baby, ben, kate and asher are important people to you know. But the bigger reason is that things aren't complete. We finally got our dishwasher, but there is no counter top on it and we are still figuring out the best layout and we have nothing on the walls, until yesterday that is when we started making headway there. So, really I don't feel as though I can post final pictures until at least all of the counter top is present. Asher above, enjoying fresh baked bread this morning on our black countertops, which are awesome for rolling out dough, we think the micro dots may actually decrease surface area enough to cause less sticking. And below, clearly demonstrating just how huge the kitchen sink is.

Now to figure out what to do with the rest of nap time...

More Light

I was so happy this week to motivate myself to dust (really a good wash) these stained glass pieces of mine. I never finished the framing, but as a pregnant woman who will be continuing to be a nursing mama for some time to come, I don't know when again I will be dealing with lead solder, so I am proud to display my beautiful pieces without being 100% done and I am loving looking at them at that perfect time of day when the sun shines in. I love stained glass pieces so much and haven't done any of it in over two years. I need to pack up the stained glass studio in the basement and give way to a new planting area. It is on the list of pre second baby projects, anyone looking for a fun an exciting get away to Urbana? Mom? We will play with sharp objects, lots of dust all in the lovely confines of my creepy, damp basement!!

Happy days to you. Enjoy the light as it dwindles! I am looking forward to celebrating and embracing its return. I think this year I haven't cared about the dwindling light so much, mostly I think it is because I don't have to work and be in an office during the suns time and get to enjoy it... oh the difference it makes.

Winter Light

While there isn't much of it. I love what little comes pouring through the windows a bit afternoon. Asher and I chase the sun around the house.

The days here seem long, but the kitchen is done and I am happy to get our family rhythm back, it has been a long time coming, and I don't really see anything really taking shape until after the holidays and then we will have a new addition to account for soon after that. I hope everyone has light brought to their dark days and look forward to the turning of the season and celebrating the solstice this coming Sunday.

What we've been waiting for...

The toe kick went in first, I think on Thursday evening, and Ben and Tim unloaded all of the cabinets then as well. I was definitely anxious for things to get done, but as always this project is trying to help me be a more patient person. Why not stay up until 2 in the morning getting things done, that is totally sane.

Today we cooked in the kitchen and moved things back into their rightful places, and some just moved from where they were sitting for the last 7 weeks into a place they will inhabit for another few days until we figure out what it the right place.

The cabinets extend up really high. I can just get things on and off that second shelf, so we will definitely need step stools. The metal edgebanding looks fabulous and the kitchen looks great. I am sorry that I ever doubted Ben's design and look, it's just that when you don't see it ever, you get a bit nervous. Asher is thrilled to be able to run around in the kitchen again, although it isn't 100% child friendly, but really with open pilots and 6 black knobs to turn will it ever be?
Our centerpiece is the sink and fractured glass red tiles. They look great and we are happy to have a wall mounted faucet, so we don't have to remember to clean all that crud that builds up on the counter level ones. There is a metal edge going along the top there as well as an overhang for the shelves and 3 puck lights.

One more hurdle, the dishwasher that we had isn't going to work in the space, so we need to find a replacement. This makes the counter top cutting a bit more guesswork than typically desired, but we will deal. We hope to have the countertops in on Wednesday or Thursday, please keep your fingers crossed.

North Carolina Vaca

We had some good family time while away. It was the most I have seen of Ben since the kitchen remodel began which was a nice change of pace. We are on the go so much that it was nice to have a bit of still, or as much still as you have with a very active now 21 month old. It did become a little sedatary, the beach was gorgeous, but there is only so much to do in late November. And then there was the pull to home and finishing the kitchen (update later) so we were eager to return home.

Here is the view of the house from our private boardwalk that went over the sand dunes to the ocean. The thing was massive. Seven bedrooms, 9 bathrooms, great porches and good views.

Asher and me building sand castles on the beach.

Our family of four, the belly is starting to get in the way. Lets just say dishes and any counter top work are quite the pain in the neck and none of my shirts stay clean long as there is no clearence from my mouth to the floor.

Enjoying turkey seconds or leftovers, Ben mesmorized by the tv- what happens when you don't watch one often and there are huge screens all over the place.Hope everyone had a great holiday.

Back in the Swing

We are back from our vacation, oh so happy. Don't get me wrong, it was great to be away, but there is so much to do and prepare at home. This baby is due in 9 weeks! That's all the time we have left as a family of three, then we become four... I still haven't quite gotten used to that idea! On vacation I had every intention on making some welcome gifts for this babe, but of course was distracted by making things for the toddler, Bubbie bought Asher some fabulous d.b. yarn and I knit up some legwarmers.

To my defense they were really needed. That part of the let is always exposed in the ergo and stroller, and even when sitting and playing outside in cold weather. Plus he was very greatful, after the first one was complete he asked for the other side and was going on about "mama make." They were easy to knit up, and with a free pattern. Done in time for a cool morning bird walk in North Carolina.

a Brand NEW FLOOR

Timmy got the sub floor layed this afternoon, the lovely orange as it is and Ben got to tile this morning... after a full day of cooking, tiling late last night- he put in a nice 17 hour day in all.

Asher got in on some of the action, helping lay the thinset and did a good job respecting the no walking on the tile rule.

And then the room was complete. A one sided picture, can't walk on it, and wasn't motivated in the cold to go to other doors for a different view. So stay tuned.

UGGGGHHH

What do you do when your whole house is covered in dust? Seriously, I dusted and swept the floor twice yesterday to no avail.
The boy is doing his typical tuesday morning lie in and I would love to take a shower, but I have no shower curtain and the bathroom is just covered, it doesn't feel clean, plus drafty and cold. I have dishes piled, but it is so hard to motivate to do them because it is such a pain in the ass.
I have piles of crap on me and seriously can't even pick a place to start. I can't wait to abandon all my troubles when we fly to philly on Thursday. I am going to take a shower every day, if not two just because I can without worry of mr. a touching the wood stove or opening the curtain and stealing all my heat.

I have been trying to ignore the mess, but it isn't working, I think I may go crazy.

And then Color Appeared

Hooray, there is actual color on the wall that will be staying with us. It will get a second coat adn be darker like the edges, but it is there. Ben did a great job picking out paint. It is wonderful to see the red with the white tile and then the tile next to the glass fractured tile.

Here is the doorway into the rest of the house. There will be shelves above the fractured glass and countertop below it with drawers. The counters will be black with stainless steel edging. It is excited to anticipate what it will all look like and hope that things all match together.

A feel for the red, look how high that ceiling is!!

Things are Going Up

We have tile on the wall. Not all of it is done but the boys got a good amount done yesterday. White subway tiles capped with black. The lines between will look pretty much as they are. We have a dark grout that we are using.

A crappily lit photo, but you can get a little feel for what the backsplash tiles are like. They are fractured glass. The paint should match them pretty well.

Today, the rest of the wall tile should be up minus 2 red sqares we were short. And paint on the walls, the boys primed yesterday. Oh and ben has aspirations for floor tile being laid tonight.

and the game goes on

Thanks to both Regan and Natalie, I have been tagged and since it was from two folks out there, I will do my best to actually list 6 random things about myself... there are just to many paths that one could wonder on random things, I generally need more direction if I am going to share things about myself but here goes. Edit this may only be a few things as pasting from word to here caused some html errors and has frustrated me for the last few days.

I hate to be hot, I think of this now as I am a little cold and while I await the wood stove fire I had thought about complaining but then remembered how much better it is than feeling so hot that you can't move. I tolerate summer and appreciate summer (for the food!) but I am a transition season girl with leanings towards winter. I also overheat easily, I was the girl at summer soccer tournaments in the first aid tent after nearly passing out people attending to me to get my internal temps down.

I love warm beverages: tea and coffee, but I go for a cider and cocoa once in awhile to satisfy that internal warm up (perhaps another reason to not like it when it is too hot out). I spent awhile in England and took right up with the tea served every hour or so... sugar and milk, not honey, but the same sweet creaminess that warms you up.

I love cheese pizza rolls. I hardly ever indulge in processed food, but these are my exception. Not that it happens often, but if I want something from the freezer section other than ice cream or juice, this is my item of choice. Ben and I used to have occassional deep fry nights, pizza rolls along with morning star buffolo wings and mini corn dogs. Now though I typically bake/broil them in the oven. Now that I think about it this splurge goes back to my college days, they deep fried pizza rolls in the AC and I would treat myself for this more expensive snack... my go to was the cheap curly fries (dipped in honey mustard).... I have been craving so much junk during this pregnancy, this all sounds incredibly good right now.

I have never lived alone really. My first college dorm was a private room- they all were, but that doesn't really count. I sometimes wonder if I missed out on something. I don't think I would have liked the idea younger, but now it sounds somewhat appealing. Perhaps that is what living without a kitchen and spare room does to you. I think I am just feeling a little crowded as of late.

Sorry not six, but this post has taken too long to begin with.
Consider yourself tagged: Sandy (the carpooling post was funny, but its time to update)
Sarah (when you get into that new house of yours in Amsterdam)
Carla- if you by chance read this
also if you blog and I don't know who you are...

Fruit Leathers, Gnocchi and a 6 Course Dinner

For my birthday this year Ben suprised me with a new dehydrator, the excaliber... very fancy stuff. So A and I have been experimenting making snacks for ourselves. I refuse to spend 59cents for six square inches of fruit leather pre packaged, even when it sounds really good, I just can't do it. So I am making my own. We have made a pear on (thanks to kara), carrot apple, banana and strawberry apple banana. They are very tasty and I look forward to making more. Oh and they are sofa king easy to make. Blend fruit, spread it, put it on saran, dry, check it, dry more, make sure its done, roll up on the saran. You do have to clean the blender, but not the dehydrator tray, very nice.

We also got a suprise this week in the form of a 6 course catering job for a lot of money. Do we have space to do this? Of course not, is it crazy to cook a 6 course meal without a kitchen when you have tons of other work? Yes, but this is us and really we wouldn't be us if we didn't take on too much at once and have incredibly stressful periods followed by calm. So we made squash gnocchi in our dinning room as a family. Ben cooked on site, I helped serve and we made up for the lost foodnanny week this month.

6 courses is lots of fun, ben made halibut gravlocs served with shitake mushrooms and micro greens, heirloom pumkin soup with something fancy, seared lamb tenderloin over the gnocchi with leeks and other fancy sauces, salad with roast beets, a cheese plate and some killer pear tarts. Things went off with only one hitch, the dude who had the party described his kithchen as "professional" great we thought as that is what we are working towards in our kitchen... it wasn't so much professional as it was- old and inefficient. (we ended up bring our camp stoves to get the job done!) He had an electric range- ick, the largest burner shot out sparks and the other took 45 minutes to boil water. The lighting was awful, I couldn't tell if I was getting the forks clean enough between courses. I could go on, but for fear of insulting those of you with an electric range (mom) I will stop and just say it really confirms that every penny we put into our kitchen is going to be worth it, which is a great things when your budget is running low and the timelime is extending.

Some Crafting

A week or so ago, Asher and I started to get into a bit of a routine where after breakfast he would play independantly, with the house in good shape, I got to do a very small simple project that pleased him and therefore bought me more time to do some more. Our friends Kara and Wren had some great eggs and as they are Asher's favorite ingrediat and he is obsessed with flipping food (actually flipping it not a clever explative cover up) I thought he would enjoy theses. For a better flip though I think they need something to give them some weight.

With white felt, yellow scraps, thread, pins, some stuffing and scissors, we set out on the morning crafting adventure. I pinned a yellow scrap onto the felt stuffed with the stuffing (what else is that stuff called?)

Drew a circle with a pencil, did a tight zig zag around it, cut off the yellow close to the stitching.

Cut out the white in fried egg shape, and repeated to have a little clutch of felt eggs.

Insulation and Dry Wall

For those of you who like visuals, here is the insulation doing its wonderful job.

And walls back up in the kitchen. The mudding and taping starts tonight. Then we will be moving on to floor and wall tiles.

Being out of your kitchen and having to use others really makes you appreciate having a kitchen that suits your needs I am super excited for this project to conclude and for us to be able to use a kitchen at our home that doesn't involve a camp stove and 14 inch hand sink for cleaning up.

Think good, happy thoughts for a smooth finish.

New Attachments

New Gutters, free of lead paint, Asher went to work this day with the men folk.

The new sink faucet, that extends out 22 inches, have we mentioned the size of the sink? It really looks like a bathtub, it is massive, which we are thrilled about. New baby and Asher will start to get sink baths.

As I now have access to pictures again- don't even get me started on the state of the office/craft room, I will try and show you the walls up. Plus we now have an insulated house. Instead of losing 12 degrees over night after cranking the wood stove, we only lost 6-HOORAY!

Besides the Kitchen...

we are getting into cold and flu season and I have to gripe. I just got back from the library where I was coughed on by some sick kids. I don't mind sniffles and a few sneezes, nor even a cough. But if your kid is hacking up a lung, has colored snot dripping out her nose don't take them to a public program for kids. If you need to run errands, or go somewhere that isn't geared towards kids I understand. I am even more okay if it is my friends coming over to my house, at least I know them. But public places where you are well aware in advance that other children will be present to infect? Come On.
I may be overreacting, but on this same visit I was also coughed on by a kid behind me, who spit chunks of noodles all over my back, forearm and leg. It was one of the more disgusting things. It is one thing if your own kids spits up on you but quite another when someone else does it. The mom was apologizing, but I didn't even know how to respond, she touched my boob to pick off a chunk of noodle. When I tried to get them off it was hard because they were partially digested and really mushy. Plus it has a little bit of stomach acid smell to it, and the children's section bathrooms were closed. The librarian did give me some antibacterial wipes to get me through the program. I would be mortified if my child coughed up his dinner on someone, but these people sat right back down next to me, I was a little afraid of getting noodle on me again, yuck, at least pick a new seat.
Then a mother is talking about how she recently had the most god awful cold in the world which layed her on her back for Monday and Tuesday-it is only Wednesday and she was over there coughing. At least pretend, don't announce to the whole world that you are sick.
Fortunately we have been very lucky with Asher, he has only had one cold. I do hold breastfeeding accountable for a lot of this fortune, plus the fact that he eats dirt and chews on sticks. We don't keep him in a vaccuum, and most of the time I am not nervous about illnesses and maybe this stems from the fact that we are weening a bit as I have only colostrum, Asher still nurses but not nearly as much as he was a year ago. Being sick sucks, and if it happens often to your kid, I can see still wanting to stay active, heck, go to the library at an off time even, the noon hour is typically dead there... better yet go for a walk, fresh air is best and tires kids out so sicky will go to sleep and get over being sick. Kids don't catch colds from being outside.
It's been awhile since a venting post, feels kinda good, am going to publish without rereading.