Our New House- Before and After

This post has been a long time coming…

We have loved living in our new place. A place that is finally our own is so nice. We don't even mind the three story walk with groceries… at least not too much. ;) 

We've put a lot of work and love into our new home. Micah changed out a lot of light fixtures, door knobs, and he built the bay window bench with our brother-in-law Josh. I love it!

Our house is not perfect yet. There are still plenty of things we want to get, decorate, organize, but we're finally at a point that I can say we are officially settled in. It's been fun to decorate, but wow!, this place sure has a lot of wall space. I will definitely need some more things/ideas to put on the walls.

The kitchen, dining room, and front room:

 

 

 

The front entryway:

The hallway: (We still need to replace all of the doorknobs and eventually even the hinges.)

Lila's bedroom: (I used her decorations from one of our old homes. I still need a few more things, including paint.)

Brighton's bedroom: (I still need to decorate his room.)

Our bedroom- minus the bathroom and closet: (I have no idea when I'll ever get to decorating our space, but we are getting night stands and lamps next month probably. I will also be making a headboard… eventually. ;) )

Closet, guest bathroom, laundry room, pantry: (This stuff is really hard to photograph. You can't tell the sizes of the rooms, but they're big and we're really happy with them.) 

 

I didn't take a picture of our balcony, storage space, or garage, but you get the idea.

We love our new home! For this month I can definitely say I am thankful for my home.

Halloween 2014

Halloween was really fun this year. I did a few things for the first (and some for the last) time. At school we had a challenge between some of the teachers and we had to eat crickets. I really did it. I had to include this because I never thought that I would be able to bring myself to do it. I ate six in all and no, they weren't covered in chocolate or inside candy or anything, they were just crickets. At least I know I could survive eating bugs in the apocalypse right? ;) Well, actually that's definitely a one time thing for me.

Next, I made marshmallow fondant ghosts for some cupcakes for the first time. I was really proud of my cupcakes because I had made the fondant, cupcakes, frosting, and eyes all myself. They were really simple, but I was still proud. I will definitely be working more with fondant.

Finally, we had our first Halloween at our new house. We actually decided to go trunk-or-treating with my mum's ward instead of going around our neighborhood. I just felt like it would be so much easier with small kids and they had dinner and it allowed Lila to go with some of her cousins. It was a lot of fun and I'm really glad we did it that way. Lila LOVED it. She was a beautiful Cinderella, I was a pilot, and Brighton was my copilot. We had a good time as a little family. The only sad thing was that we didn't get very many trick-or-treaters at our place. :( Apparently that was common around our whole neighborhood, though. Too bad for some kids… our neighbors were handing out full size candy bars. ;) 

I'm looking forward to the rest of the holiday season!

Haunted Half Marathon 2014

My sister Jessica and I decided to run another half marathon. Two years ago we did the Halloween half, this year we did the Haunted one. It was great and I'm really glad we did it, but I had stopped training when we decided to move so I was NOT nearly as prepared for this one as I was for the last. I had only gotten up to 8 miles before I quit training. It worked out okay though. I ended up running the first 8 then walking/running the last 5. The whole race took me about 20 minutes longer than last time. Not bad considering I hadn't run even once in about 5 weeks leading up to the race. 

Our sister Laura also participated in the fun and did the 5k. We were so proud of ourselves for completing the races. My sweet, sweet, husband met me at the end with my kiddos. I'm really happy they were there to support me. He got a video of me running across the line and Lila cheering for me. I loved it!

We dressed up as fairy godmothers because it was easy and we pretty much had all the stuff. 

Laura actually had a different medal (you can see it in the pictures) for the 5k but then a half marathoner asked her to trade so now she matches us. :) 

All of us at my mum's house after the race.

It was hard! I'm still sore... but it was GREAT!

Pinterest Party and Addie's Blessing

A few weeks ago the girls in my family had a Pinterest party. I had such a great time! We each brought a food item to share and then worked on a few different crafts together. I love the times that we get together. It's fun to just chat, eat, create, and spend time together. Thanks everyone or participating and making it so much fun!

***These pictures are not all my finished products, just pics from the day.***
So much yumminess! I tried everything and it all tasted so good. 

 

NOEL (I still haven't finished mine… maybe I should get on that)

Christmas Countdown (These turned out really cute)

Reindeer Applique (Isn't my nephew so adorable?!)
 

 

I can't wait to get a picture of all the grandkids in their reindeer shirts. 

Santa Earrings (My niece makes a beautiful model)
 

The next morning we had baby Addie's (Adelaide Mary Nelson) blessing. We are so blessed to have this beautiful little girl as a part of our family. We love you Addie!

Emma and Ethan with their baby girl. Congratulations! Too bad Micah photobombed. :)

Beautiful baby girl

Most of the family after the blessing

Quick story… Brighton is only in his diaper because right when we pulled into the church parking lot he threw up all over himself. (He gets carsick, so no, he wasn't actually sick) We hadn't remembered to bring a change of clothes so he got to spend sacrament meeting and the luncheon in his diaper. We got a few looks, but they seemed to just be amused. :)

It's official!

Last week we finalized all of the paperwork to buy our house. Hallelujah! 

Here is a picture of us signing all of it.

 Here is a picture of our family all together for the first time in our house when it really, truly belongs to us. :) 

I'll be painting tomorrow. I'm looking forward to it, but am also interested to see just how long it's going to take. There's quite a lot to paint. It'll be beautiful though!

I don't want to post pictures of the place until I can show before and after photos because I think it will be more dramatic. ;) Wish me luck that I don't ruin our brand new house!