Misc. Christmas

Here it is the end of January and I am finally getting to putting Christmas pictures on my blog. Man, this is the slowest for me ever! The kids and Jeff and I went sledding at Grandma and Grandpa's (from the lake) house (Jeff's parents) on Christmas eve. It was very cold and we weren't out there long, but it was fun. Here is Isaac and I going down the hill together.

Isaac pulling up his sled.

Declan pulling up his sled and Juno observing. She likes to run down the hill with the sleds especially when I go down on one. She is a strange dog.

Here are the boys on Christmas morning after opening their presents.

My brother hosted my side of the family at his house. Here are Declan and Isaac with their cousins, Justin (4) and Jason (5).

Sorry forgot to turn this one the right way. Isaac with his rug burn on his forehead in a Santa hat of his cousin's. He gave himself the rug burn by rubbing his head on the carpeting. I don't know why they were doing it, but Declan showed Isaac how to do it and Isaac got the raw end of the deal.

Declan with his tractors he got from Grandpa and Grandma from the farm (my parents). They got all 4 grandboys tractors and they all loved them.

You can see my kids don't call grandparents by their last names or first names. Declan started calling them from the farm and from the lake when he started talking. It was how he knew where we were going when I would tell him we were going to Grandma and Grandpa's. The grandparents are used to this title and sign cards to the boys this way also. It is fun!

Jeff cousin (Alyssa)and family from Dallas and cousin (Tyler) and family from Madison were here over Christmas, too. We all got together at Grandma and Grandpa's from the lake. Here I am with 2 of Alyssa's kids the twins, Ashtyn and Braden. They are 4 months older than Isaac and really fun kids.

Here are all the kids. Ashtyn is holding her younger sister, Ellery who is 2, then Braden in the red sweater, Declan in the green is holding Carsten who is Tyler's 2 year old, then Isaac in red and blue pants ( he never matches) and last but not least, Soren who is 3 1/2 and Tyler's other son.

Declan and Carsten. BY this time, Declan was tired and resting in the chair. Carsten thought it looked comfortable also. Declan let him sit with him, but didn't want the picture taken. OOPS!

Isaac and Braden

Ashtyn pushing Ellery in the truck. There are 2 of these trucks and they have been used to sit in and be pushed many times. It was a popular thing to do that night.

It's been a while!

Okay all my wonderful friends and family who keep telling me I need to update my blog here are only a few pictures I have taken while we have been unpacking and preparing for Christmas. We didn't host Christmas this year so we wouldn't have to stress too much about unpacking and I am very thankful we planning it that way. We were able to enjoy the holidays and have much needed family time. I think the kids loved having all of mom and dad's attention after having us preoccupied with this whole project.

Here is the dining room with my Christmas table cloth. The buffet you see in the corner we had at the old house. Lorna (Jeff's mom) had found that for us a long time ago. It works well. We are looking for a China cabinet to put on the wall opposite of the buffet eventually.

Here is part of the living room. To the right of this picture is our front door.

The table you were looking at in the previous picture is to the right of the Christmas tree and here is the rest of the room. We have huge windows in this room and we made the smaller when we were looking at the plans. We could have gone smaller yet, but I like the bright room. The green furniture is the beat up stuff from the old house and we hope to replace some day down the road.

Here is the computer desk and the shelves behind in the office. The shelves were planned for all the stuff you need for your office. There are 4 big file drawers under the shelves and I am only using 2 of them for files. I have alot of space for stuff and it sure if nice.

The next two photos are of the library. It looks totallly different with books in it and we don't have enough books to fill it. I guess we have to find the time to start reading more so we can collect more. The library is our of our favorite rooms for its uniqueness on how it turned out.

I have Christmas stuff down now and will start unpacking some of our everyday stuff. I left it all in boxes and just set up Christmas. I will try to be better about taking pictures and posting them for all of you.

I hope everyone had a wonderful and safe Holiday season! Happy New Year!

December 2nd WE HAVE MOVED IN!

We got rid of that really ugle temproary door and have our new cool front door.

Here is our finished house. Now in the spring we will start the yard and grass.

Here are the shelves in the kitchen finished with the lights behind them.

Our mud room where we come in from the garage with the lockers to the right.

We are waiting for the hooks to hang the coats and stuff in the lockers to get things organized.

Here is the fireplace in the family room with the TV above it.

The wet bar is to the left and all the TV/stereo equipment we need to touch is in the bracket in the wall. All of the big equipment and wiring is under the stairs behind this bracket.

We bought new furniture for the family room. Everything reclines so there is no more fighting over the recliner.

Here is the craft room almost finished with all the doors and drawer fronts on. I am so excited to get this room organized and start enjoying it.

The wine sitting room with the new furniture that is the same stuff as the family room.

The game room that is behind the family room. We have a game system for the kids that they are getting for Christmas. This is all their board games in the room right now. The spent the entire evening last night playing with their games because they haven't seen them in a while.

The hockey room has already had several hours of use. They played hockey while we moved boxes and stuff into the house.

Here is the exercise room. I have owned a treadmill for a while, but never used it. I guess I have no excuse now, I have a room big enough for it.

I don't know how these pictures got out of order, but here is the other half of the wine sitting room with the new furniture.

Goalie

At the Mite level, each kid has goalie pads for a week at practice to they them out and see if they are interested in being goalie. Declan had the pads last week and loved every minute of it. We are still hoping his love for scoring beats out being a goalie.

My proud goalie, Declan.

November 20th Finishing the House

Here is my craft room still in progress.

We had the floors and walls stained of the wine cellar.

Finally we were able to take all the cardboard off the stairs because people were basically done going up and down with stuff. These stairs go from the main floor to the upper level both of which are hardwood.

We are doing shelves with these brackets around our kitchen window. We didn't want to do cabinets and close off the view and light.

The fridge panels are now on.

We ordered a bed from Beds by Design in Fargo. Our mattress has been horrible for a couple years and we are very excited to have a new one that is very comfortable.

The stacked ovens are also installed into the wall in the pantry. I have had people ask me why they are in the pantry. You can see the opening to the kitchen to the left of this picture and our cooktop is on the other side of this wall. The fridge is on the opposite side of this doorway. It just seems to work and we don't have to have the heat from the ovens make the kitchen really hot.

Here is the doorway I discussed above. The ovens are to the left of this picture. The full fridge or drink fridge and deep freeze are also in the pantry. You can see all the storage we made to the right for food and extra kitchen stuff. These go up to the ceilings and the ceilings are 9ft. Yes, I will need a step stool and I have to plan carefully what I put up there.

The storage cabinets.

To the left of the picture with the fridge and deep freeze is this doorway to our mini laundry area. The main laundry units are upstairs. I was trying to avoid carrying everything you need to wash up the stairs like hockey clothes, coats, etc.

Here is our library with the lights installed on the post. We are going to have a couple of comfy chairs on 2 sides of the post for reading and relaxing. The steel floor above looks really cool at night with these lights on. It looks like stars in the sky. I tried to take a picture of it, but it didn't work.

The beds for the kids are still in the process of being made by a friend. We bought the full size mattresses for the kids and they are using them on the floor right now. Here is Isaac.

Here is Declan. The kids were very excited because these new mattresses are way more comfortable than what they had.

I was on the upper level taking pictures of the kids beds and couldn't resist taking this one looking at the library.