Annah's Fall Portraits

How blessed am I to be the mother of this amazing, wonderful, beautiful, sweet girl?  It's almost more than my heart can bear!

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Birthday Presents

Caeden and Annah received birthday gifts this evening from Krampa and Gram and Uncle Travis and Aunt Erin, Tessa, Bryce and Grayson.

Caeden is very excited about the Lego Advent calendar from Uncle Travis and family.  In fact, he is so tempted by it, that he decided to leave it at Krampa and Gram's house until Thanksgiving so he won't be tempted to open it and play with it before December 1st!  What a cool gift!!

Tessa had lots of fun with the tissue paper from the presents!

We had such a nice evening together.  Thank you for the gifts for the kids, Mom and Dad, Travis and Erin and kids!

Great Grandma's Violin

Before my Grandma Mc passed away, she told my dad she wanted Annah to have her violin when she was old enough.  

(Photo: 4 days after Annah's first violin lesson--July 2006.)

Sylvia began playing violin too, and the very last time the girls visited with Grandma (June 2009), they both played for her.  I remember her tears.

For a while, we worried about letting Annah have Grandma's violin, since Sylvia played too.  But, since Sylvia decided to stick with cello, and Annah was ready for a nicer, full-size instrument, we recently decided it was time.  

Mom and Dad had the violin repaired and appraised, and this evening they asked her to play it to see how it sounded.  They've had her test it out before, so she didn't think anything of it, even though we were all gathered in the living room watching, listening, and recording her.

Annah was very surprised when Krampa told her that her Great Grandma wanted her to have the violin, and Gram said, "It's yours, Annah."  There were lots of tears.

It was a precious moment.  What a beautiful gift, and a beautiful giving.  

"Music is enough for a lifetime, but a lifetime is not enough for music." - Sergei Rachmaninoff

Dr. R's Recital

Thursday evening...we spent in town, as usual, but a little different eve than usual.  Caeden was the only one with a music lesson today.  Annah and Sylvia and I perused the music shop while he was in class.  Annah needed some new clarinet reeds, and we ogled over the violins, french horns and clarinets for sale.  

After Caeden's lesson, we went to Subway, where Jeremy met us for a quick super.  And also, this girl was there. 

The girls and I went to ISU to hear a recital of music from Latin America and Spain, given by Sylvia's teacher, Dr. Ransom and pianist Dr. Nemko.  It was held in Kemp Hall at ISU.  

The girls made me turn my phone off completely, since that was the instruction in the program.  So I didn't get a photo of the performance.  It was spectacular though.  The girls jaws were on the floor and their eyes were huge.  They could barely believe the caliber of the performance.  It took me back to my college days, when I attended several recitals a week and was in awe of the amazing musicians I was surrounded with at Capital.  I'm incredibly grateful that Dr. Ransom is willing to teach Sylvia!  She is learning from the best cellist in central Illinois.  

A coat of paint

When we moved here from Ohio, the first room in our house that I did anything to change was the downstairs bathroom.  It had a huge hanging cupboard that was oddly placed, barn wood "shelves" dilapidating along the entire wall behind the toilet, and it just needed something immediately.  I painted it off-white with navy blue accents and an Americana theme, including stamping all around the top of the walls. 

It has been looking really yucky for the past few years.  I often walk into the bathroom and wish I could rip it completely apart--I mean gut it!!--with my own bare hands. We wish we could do a major renovation to the bathroom and kitchen, but that won't be happening for at least a couple years--or decades.  :)

I decided a little over a week ago that I would just paint the bathroom to give it a little lift.  It's nice to have it looking a little fresher.

I didn't take any 'before' pictures, but these are the old switch plate covers I had decoupaged with fabric.  I had made a matching shower curtain, and it's so faded there is barely any color left to it now.

Here are a few 'after' photos of the bathroom after this project.  Annah and Sylvia went with me between church and youth group a couple Sundays ago to choose colors and towels and rugs.  We had a good time together with that process!

I had a shower curtain picked out online, but when we saw this one, we liked it and decided to go with this color scheme.  I love the scripture on it--some of my favorite verses.  

Serve - "as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord." - Joshua 24:15 

Believe -"If you have faith as a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move; and nothing will be impossible for you." - Matthew 17:20

Praise - "Shout joyfully to the Lord, all the earth;

Break forth in song, rejoice, and sing praises." - Psalm 98:4

Trust - "Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding." - Prov. 3:5

I like that we now have those great reminders in the place where we do much of our preparation for each day and night.

The paint tan/grey color we chose for the walls is called Wild Bramble.  

The doors on the built-in cupboard are from an antique Hoosier cupboard, so I'm glad to keep them.  I painted the dark brown parts with $.88 craft paint to cover the navy I had painted them before.  

 I really like this new rug.  It, and most of the things I bought, came from WalMart.  Basically the only thing I bought anywhere else was the big brown bath rug, and it came from Meijer.

 For this curtain, I bought another shower curtain, cut it the length I needed it and hemmed it.  (It is basically to cover the fact that the window is unfinished.) 

 The biggest expense of the project was new towels.  Our 13-year-old towels have been raveling and shredding over the past year, so it was a good time to move them to gym towels and get new ones for the bathroom.  

I had received a wonderful appreciation gift card from our church in August, and chose to use it to fund part of this project.  I wanted to keep the total expenses down below $200, and I was really close.  I actually kept track for the first time, and I spent $239.00 total:

Paint - $15.97

Painter’s Tape - $6.27

Outlet covers - $1.88

Rugs - $11.97, $16.99 = $28.96

Shower curtain $16.96

Curtain - $16.96

Curtain rod - $2.97

Bath Towels 8@ $5.88 = $47.04

Hand towels - 6@ $4.88 = $29.28

Washcloths 10@$3.88 = $38.80

stacking organizing baskets inside cabinet - 10 @ $2.99 = $29.90

helper shelf for under sink- $3.99

And actually, the organizing items were kind of free, because of mPerks rewards I used at Meijer.  (If you shop and Meijer and aren't using mPerks, I highly recommend starting.  I have saved over $110 in the first week of October using mPerks. And I am not a crazy coupon-er!  mPerks are just that awesome!)

So anyway, it's not a fancy HGTV bathroom, but it's a nice freshening up for now.

School pictures

The kids and I are hoping we will get some pretty fall colors around here so I can take some nice portraits of them this year.  (I didn't get it done last year.)  I'm wondering, though, if it hasn't been warm enough this year for leaves to turn colors...?  Hope not.

Also, I didn't order any of the kids' school portraits.  You just never know how they're going to look, and we just enjoy outside pictures better.

Here are tiny versions of the kids' school pictures.

Caeden - 4th grade

Sylvia - 6th grade

Annah - 8th grade

10 minute punishment hug

These two do not always get along.  They are often after each other, picking, insulting, complaining, pestering, annoying, and generally driving each other nuts.  I don't like it when they get hurtful towards each other, which they did tonight.  When we got home and inside, even though Annah had homework and it was late, I made them sit in the recliner together and hug for 10 minutes.  They were not allowed to speak unless they said something nice about the other, and they were to think about how they were truly thankful for each other.  Funny, it worked. They liked each other a lot more at the end of the 10 minutes.  Then I made them give each other a kiss on the cheek and say I love you.  

I want them to know that siblings should treasure and trust each other and be lifelong friends and supporters. 

"Let brotherly love continue."

-Hebrews 13:1a

A sweet Saturday

Sylvia's friend Isabella C. recently moved back to the USA from China, but now lives in Tennessee.  She and her family were in the area for a few days on their Fall break this weekend.  Isabella spent the night with the girls' friend Calli, and both Calli and Isabella came over this afternoon to hang out with Sylvia for a while.  They watched Muppets Most Wanted, played Mousetrap and Uno Attack, and we had homemade chicken noodle soup (per Isabella's request, since she hadn't had it for 2 years because they don't have it in China) and apple crisp for supper.

It was fun to have these 3 together for a bit!

This morning and this evening, we cleaned house.  In the girls' room, we moved some furniture around to allow heat to come up through the grate in the floor during the cooler weather.  

We made the tough decision to take down the canopy from Annah's bed. She wanted to keep it up a little longer because she loves it, but we like that the room looks much bigger without it.

Jeremy drilled bigger holes where the extended posts had been in order to fit the knobs in place.  

Jabba's Palace

Caeden and Sylvia have been creating Jabba's palace out of the Lego "Jabba's Sail Barge" set.  Sylvia took a few pictures on her iPod of their work in Caeden's room.  They're not great pictures, but I love that the two of them still play together.  I know it means a lot to Caeden that Sylvia will play with him.  She misses Annah playing Barbies with her and is at a point where she wants play to hang on a while longer.   I'm glad there are at least some times where the kids are friends.