When your kitchen looks like this...

At 5:00pm on a Saturday - then you know its a pizza night. 

This...also a pizza night.  

The pictures above are from the past two Saturdays.  Sadly, in terms of organization and to-do lists, I feel less prepared to sell after two weeks of hard work than I did when we started.

I thought of trying this (prepping to sell) last October but Meg wasn't walking yet and it just wouldn't have worked.  Nowadays the girls entertain each other for minutes on end.  Its HEAVEN.  They spent yesterday afternoon chillin in their new camp chairs (note to self, do not go to Christmas Tree Shops when trying to de-clutter your house!).  Meg especcially was really into enjoying the good life.

Bath

Meg. Loves. Bathtime.

Especially because she is in the tub with TESSA!

Tessa is fond of bath time as well. I mean, how could you not love the bath when you have feet that look like this?

And how could you not love Bath Time in a bathroom that looks like this...

BEFORE

AFTER.

Interior Decorating

Years ago Aaron bought me a wonderful bird cage - purely decorative, of course. It has wandered around our house, hiding in nooks and crannies until I finally had a place in the house that was going to exist only to be beautiful. Enter resident two-year old.

Not the look I was going for.

A match made in ...

A few months ago: (I don't care to know the exact date, it would just make me sigh louder) Aaron took the bathroom sink off the wall - and it hasn't worked since.

This week: He finally replaced the tiny little piece that needed to be fixed to get it working again.

An hour ago: I slipped into a nice little "baby on your chest after nursing" doze and when I woke up I was informed that Aaron got that gouge on his nose (which luckily for me was not still spilling blood down his face when I saw it) while trying to reconnect the kitchen sink sprayer and that it was broken.

"Your nose?"

"No, the sink."

"That's okay, it hasn't worked in 2 years."

"No, not just the sprayer...the whole sink doesn't work."

All of this happened in twenty minutes and less than 20 feet from where I was sleeping.

"Don't worry though, I cleared a path to the bathroom sink* so use that until I get back from H--- D----.**"

Sigh...

I grumble about the house, wishing we would just order pizza for dinner to save me the hard labor of frying up already formed hamburger patties***. But I bite the frugal bullet and decide to get everything ready to eat the minute the intrepid remodeler and his bubbly little sidekick return from the store.

Eight minutes later: The microwave beeps that the thaw cycle is done...a few reminder beeps go by and I head into the kitchen. I open the door. No hamburger. Did I take it out already? I look again. And again. And finally I find the hamburger, in a bowl, next to the window. And having never made it into the microwave at all they are of course, still frozen.

I'm really just worried about the children.

---***---

*We hadn't been using the long awaited bathroom sink because there was construction debris blocking the way, and because dirty doesn't come near describing its condition.

** I have grown to loath this particular construction supply store and would rather not mention its name in entirety.

***Edited to add: It turns out that having to use the bathroom sink while cooking makes for a pretty inefficient work triangle.

Edited once again with this update: The kitchen sink was fixed within two hours of this post. This means that I am now blessed with TWO working sinks...can you imagine?

At It Again

We're at it again... for now, here is a sneak peak at the next big project Aaron is in the middle of.

Where are you going to put another baby??

As most of you know, a little over four years ago we bought a fairly dismal one-bedroom condo. It is pretty spectaluar now. Two years ago we finished the major life-safety issues of our remodel in the nick-of-time, literally the week before Tessa came home from the hospital. This was just when the housing market started to teeter and we really liked our cute little nest. So, although that would have been a normal point in our life's journey to move we stuck around and have been quite cozy.

Now...well - I am pretty sure we could make this place work with two kids. In fact sometimes I catch myself daydreaming about what it would be like to live in this condo when we add baby #3 (in some distant future), and how maybe the discovery channel would do a special about our non-materialistic alternate lifestyle. Of course, it would be extremely boring to watch me dink around the internet all day (I will still get to do that with three kids - right? ...right?) and there would be no place for the cameras...

Needless to say, now is an even more natural place in our life's journey to sell our one bedroom and find a two (or, dare I fantasize, three!) bedroom place (don't start getting excited/upset, we are staying in MA). So we are hemming and hawing our way to "getting this place ready to sell."

This is the latest finished project. These pendants took us literally YEARS to agree on. They are made from an Ikea fixture, a Lowes shade and canopy, and a plumbing pipe.

We'll probably do it, but just today I was telling Aaron about all the cool ideas I have for fitting another person into our dwelling unit and I almost forgot my real motivation for selling...

Two flights of stairs.

I can justify staying here with many reasons. Housing crappy market being a big one. Love it here, another biggie. And my favorite, most self righteous reason has to do with materialism and not trying to keep up with the Joneses and "our pioneer ancestors raised eight kids in 850 square foot cabins."

But.

But.

Those pioneers could just open the back door and let the kids and dogs and chickens run in and out all day. AND they did not have to carry a baby carrier up two flights of windy stairs with a toddler at their heels. (Cooking over a fire-heated stew pot a babe-in-arms and a toddler at your heels...piece of cake I'm certain.)

But anyway, while we are working on the very very very last projects in this house (I promise) we have rearranged. Its not conventional, and I think it takes people by surprise. But I love it.

Of course...it is always messy so I'm not going to post and pictures of it RIGHT NOW...here are some progress pics to give you an idea...

This is our study as it appeared for approximately 10 minutes on Thanksgiving...pretty hot isn't it!


Then later that weekend we moved our bed out of the, well, bedroom giving Tessa her own room. (This is it before we moved the toys into the newly dubbed "nursery").


Then Aaron and Tessa moved reassembled the bed in the study where the Thanksgiving table sat the day before.

Sorry the pictures are so vague...this post will never get posted if I don't just work with what I've got.