Beckee the gardener...

There was a hideous green bush like thing growing in our front yard (on the bottom tier of the first picture). I forgot to take a before picture of it, so you have to trust me-it was yuck. Wes bought tulips to go there instead that needed to be planted, well, now. They sat in our house for a couple weeks, and the other day I decided to do something about it. I ripped out the yucky thing and worked the soil and planted the flowers. It looks to much nicer without the bush... Here lies the remains of the bush (and some lovely leaves from our tree) in our trash...

Wow-Miracles and Hard Work!

Well, I posted the blog about the bunk bed and the fact we needed to get one for the boys. Well, since we moved here, Solace has been saying she doesn't fit on her (toddler) bed anymore and she needs a new bed. For a while she even slept down stairs on the guest bed. Well, we cannot afford to get her a bed now and kept telling her to wait for her birthday and maybe she could get a birthday/Christmas gift of a new bed. However, on Wednesday a friend in our ward said she had a bed she had just pulled apart to get rid of and wondered if we could use it. The next morning (yesterday) she came over to the house with the pulled apart bed, sheets, and bed skirt-the whole shebang. I spent a good part of yesterday sweating and laboring over putting the bed together. Thank you to the Youngs for the bed-it was a true blessing and Solace was so happy to have a bed that fits. Here is the final product (ignore the messiness):
The girls room!

Bunk Bed!

So, we were going to buy a bunk bed when we arrived here, but as it turned out had enough expenses that we were unable to (plus bunk beds are WAY more expensive than I thought once you get the mattresses and everything especially...) So, Anyway, we put it off for a while, but that means Armour has not really had a bed, he has been the floating boy, sometimes he would sleep in Sol's bed while she slept in the guest bed, or he would sleep in the crib while Kindle used the playpen, or for a while he just slept in the play pen (until he announced one morning that he wanted a bed again!). So, anyway, all this bed swapping has made our bed routine totally screwed up. SO , it was getting to the point for me with Sol starting school soon (like 11 days!) and everything that I wanted the bed routine back set in stone and solid! So, it was getting very important to solve the bed crisis of '08, but we cannot afford the $450+ that bunk beds cost. I had an inspired thought, I thought "Hey lots of my friends have raved about Craigs list-maybe I should look there." I did, and by that night I had committed to buying a bed. As I said, we had not enough money, they are $450 plus once you get the bung frame thing and the mattresses and everything. So, This one was listed at $200 obo with both mattresses (the bottom is actually a full size futon). I told them I only had $150 and wondered if they would take that, and they did! Yeah!!! So, we took all the car seats out and the next night Wes went alone in the van to pick up said bed. This is what is is supposed to look like assembled: This is what it looked like in our house all day yesterday until Wes got home and we could put it together (not something I could have done alone-especially with 4 kids in tow!)

(Yes-that is K in the Boppy in the background...)

All put together...(Sorry no putting it together pics-Sol was not there with the camera-she was banished to the basement with her brothers to watch Enchanted so we could work!) Note the looks on Wes's face in these next 2 pics at the kids arrived upstairs to look at their new bed and to "help."
"I LOVE my bed-it is so efficient!!"

(When asked by mom what efficient meant, he told me it means "comfortable")
We put the sheet on the beds, and A wanted his another way-he is quite picky-this is him trying to put them how he wanted them (which I am still not clear on what his vision was-in the end we took the top sheet off and just let him sleep on the bottom sheet with his favorite blankie...)
Still lovin' my "efficient" bed...
Just checking in... Still working on the sheets...
STILL working...
Yeah-we are cute!
A was told he couldn't climb up-we knew this wouldn't last long, but thought maybe at least like a second or two...we were wrong...here he is at the top milliseconds after we explained that he can't go to the top...

Just Chillin...

Thought I would share a few cute pics of us just hanging out...

Whoops...

In the blog about the office/guest room, I neglected to mention what Armour's role in it was. though it is probably pretty evident...Here's what I forgot to mention. When I came down and found the locked, closed door, Armour was proudly looking at it and he said, "Mom, I dood it! I yocked da door!" (I am typing in his language-that means, "Mom, I did it, I locked the door!") then he looked at me (and I am sure noticed the shock and anger I was feeling and I am sure was showing on my face) and said "I go time out now..." And walked up to time out on his own.

And that folks, is life with a 2-yr-old (OK-not quite 2, but you get the picture).

About that office/guest room...

Funny story about the room we now use as an office/guest room...

It is in the basement. It has no windows. It is the room that we had to get re-carpted when we moved is as it had grease stains from the previous owner's exercise machine that he kept in there. Now, we never met the seller/previous owner.

So, the first day we were in the house, the people came over to do our Internet. The guy in charge of the cable installation walked downstairs into that room, and came upstairs with a look of shock and amusement on his face. He asked me if I had ever met the previous owner. I said no. He told me he never forgot this house or the owner cause it struck him as so funny when he came to install the previous owners Internet that he had a huge exercise machine in there. Evidently, the previous owner was a huge, 6'6" blond cop that was obsessed with exercise...that made the fact that there are mirrors all over the house even funnier to me...

So, now, that being said, this is my son...he is almost 2, and he sure acts his age... This is my daughter, sleeping on the bed in the office/guest room. Isn't she cute? The other day she was happily sleeping there while the other kids were watching a movie, and I was trying to get things done. For some reason I thought, hmmm, maybe I should move her to her own bed and get her used to sleeping there. So, I picked her up and moved her.

This is what the room looked like when I came back down...
I know what you are thinking, so what?! The door is closed, big deal. Take note of a few things int his next picture...1-the keyed lock on the door. 2-the hinges are not on this side. 3-the screws on the doorknob are not on this side. I thought 2 thing-"Wow-good thing Kindle was not in there anymore!!" and "What the heck was this guy doing in his exercise room that he needed such security?!"
Well, I called our Realtor and asked if we could track down said seller and see if he had this key (we had already tried to get other keys from him which he did not have, so I thought this was a real long shot). It turns out I was right-he did not have a key, in fact he didn't know there was a lock on the door as he had never closed it because the exercise machine was too big and took up too much room to close the door.

So, we were down to 2 options-break it down ourselves or call a locksmith. Our Realtor, who evidently knows everyone in this city, suggested we call a place called Leapin Lizard Locksmiths. That's what we ended up doing...And look, now we have keys to that room...
And now we can all take a deep breath and a sigh of relief...

Homeowner at last....

This is our house:

This is the big tree in our front yard: When you move into your first house, after years of apartment dwelling, you quickly realize that you do not own near enough furniture to fill the house, nor do you own ANY necessary outdoor items to care for your lawn. It is confusing when the garbage people ask things like "Do you need to add yard waste to your regular trash?" and when you are confused by that question, they confuse you further with the question, "Well, is your lawn mower a mulching lawn mower or a bagged lawn mower?" Oh, you think, I need to get me one of those...So, we did...Here it is in it's place in our garage (take note that we also remembered to buy a weed eater/edger, and an extension cord for that. Also note that although it is not pictures, we also remembered to get a hose and sprinkler to water said lawn...)

Now, I'm not sure how it goes for most first time homeowners, but I do not even know enough about what I have to do yet, to know what I need to get to do it. So, back we went to the store the next day to get the fertilizer so we could get our grass green. Wes has very obsessively taken over lawn care and I am so very, very grateful! So, he wanted to get his grass greener. We very carefully read our instructions, set the little machine (see below) to let just the right amount of fertilizer out. He put the remains of the fertilizer bag in the garage, came back, and he was ready to go. started in the front and quickly realized that the fertilizer was going out much quicker than he expected...little did he know that in the 30 seconds it took him to put away the rest of the bag, our little Ender, interested in what dad was doing had changed the setting to the highest...whoops!
And here is the outcome of over-fertilization...dang!


In our move, somehow our little old TV got ruined, and as we are addicted to TV, we had to replace it. We went to Sears fully intending to buy the cheapest tube TV there, but as we were looking around, we found a GREAT TV that we couldn't pass up and now we own a plasma TV...I think that's the kind anyway...check it out... Picture courtesy or Solace...

Wesley's Birthday present/housewarming gift from my dad...(Sol took this pic too!)
It was less expensive to buy a bed then to get a hotel while visiting, so we now have a guest room/office in the basement...check it out...
BTW-all our furniture is in the basement, so when you walk into our house, it looks just empty-two big empty rooms right in the public eye when you enter...funny...but, that is a job for another day!

Funny looking, yes...but too bad, that is a job for another day!

House tag

Ok-My friend Laura tagged me because she knew I cannot pass up a tag. This is one I usually would pass up as it would be pretty sad to post my messy house, but I figure I have an excuse as I am moving, and this will let you all see a few pics of the new house. I will take more, better pics soon, for now enjoy the tag.

Here is how this works, there is only a few rules: must take picture of area as is in your house. No cheating and cleaning up before the picture.

1-Laundry 2-Closet (we are still moving in-you can see some of the boxes reflected int he mirror on the left.)
3-Toilet (I have 2-the first is the main one, the second is the one in the master bedroom)

4-Kids (I think I am probably supposed to take a pic of their area in the house, but they don't really have one yet, so here are pic of what they were doing when I read my tag...actually that's not accurate-when I got the tag, the boys were running in the sprinkler, but by the time I found the camera this is where everyone was...

Watching TV
Playing on Pbskids.org
5-Fridge-take note that it is basically full of soda and water right now-there is eggs a box of fudge and leftovers on the top shelf though and fruit in the bottom drawers.
Armour helped me take all the pictures...

6-Sink (I am ticked there are dishes in it right now-it's the first time there has been since we moved in! Dang!)

7-Favorite shoes (my new faves-pink fuzzy flip flops-awesome and totally impractical)
8-Favorite room (I took a few pics of rooms)

I love this family room we set up on the basement, nice, huh?!

This is the actual living room area upstairs-full of boxes and we have no furniture to go in it yet, but look at that great window! (there is also a great fireplace that you cannot see)
Solace took this picture-it is the kids' favorite part of our house-the backyard with the play area!!
Who do I tag?! Well, I guess I should tag Laura N cause I love reading her blog, Andrea cause she should have to do this tag too, and Carly cause I have not seen much on her blog since Hallie's injury, and I miss the blogs!! :)