Fall little things and big things

Lots and lots going on this fall! Above: a bike ride Neil and I took a couple weeks ago when the leaves were really at their peak.

Some pics of Abigail getting ready for homecoming--she looked (and looks!) so beautiful! No pics with her date by her request, since they broke up a couple weeks ago. 



While Abigail was at homecoming, we hosted a big party for Juliet's friends at our house (which then expanded to Isaac's friends too). It was a fun night--lots of bonfire time and backyard night games. Of course, the only pics I got were Luke setting up...

...and Isaac cleaning up (burning the last of the firewood. It's a thing). 

I'm not even going to try to keep these in order since the process of transferring photos from my phone jumbles everything! 

Launching rockets with the Activity Days kids (Neil was in charge of this one and it was so fun!). 

One of our friends turned 60 and designed his own party, which was seriously SO fun! He invited whole families instead of just couples and we had a 5k color run, sumo wrestling, tons of backyard games and yummy food, and wound up with everyone throwing pies at him. A very unique party and one that we all really enjoyed (we have some extremely competitive adults when it comes to duck duck goose and Dizzy Izzy). 

This is the time of year when I have to limit myself to only taking one picture per run because it's just SO gorgeous. One Friday the weather was particularly gorgeous so I ran a half-marathon after I dropped Matty off at preschool and the clouds were so good while I was waiting at the roundabout that I had to take an extra photo!

And then my other allotted photo. I made myself wait 8 miles to get this one because I knew it would be so good! I totally plan my routes this time of year based on leaves. 



Case in point: 

Then I make everyone go back with me on Sunday walks. 

Oh gosh I just love fall running.



This is the time of year when I always get a home improvement itch! This year it was our exterior siding...

PS notice the moss on the sunroom roof? In a classic case of project creep, we just signed the paperwork today for a new roof. Sometimes I get started on a project and I'm like WELL THIS WHOLE PLACE IS JUST FALLING APART ISN'T IT?! Kind of like when you start cleaning something and realize how gross everything is and how you thought your house was clean but you're actually living in squalor with hand smudges on your walls and dusty baseboards. (Note: my walls are smudged and my baseboards are dusty.) 



We paused to take our kids to the ward trunk or treat and then looked at the forecast when we got home and were like, oh dang, we better finish the last 45 minutes worth of painting. 

I'm realizing I uploaded the photos that still have ladder marks in them, so please rest assured that we did go back and paint those spots. ;-) And we have bedraggled fake spiderwebs everywhere since it was the day before Halloween when I took these. 

Love this color!! The wood siding is Hale Navy by Benjamin Moore (same color as our kitchen island) and the stone is Avorio White limewash by Romabio. We added the raised beds last year and I limewashed the stone the year before that. Next year's project is converting the sunroom--hopefully!



Another quick little project--stripping out all the caulk in our main floor shower and hanging new doors. Relatively easy update and it makes such a difference! (I took a photo of the process but apparently nothing of the finished version...)

Lots of morning tea around here (Matthew is partial to Trader Joe's harvest blend and I love Celestial Seasonings Bengal Spice) and this is my favorite cup yet. 

The little boys and I waited for four hours for their first round of Covid vaccines--we got them the day after they were approved!! Such a relief. 

Cute Matty in some of cousin Caleb's clothes that they passed on to us!! Such a fun box to open. 

Juliet had her end of season banquet for cross-country!

And started getting in some good cross-training days...

Lukey working on our Halloween week calendar

Cheering on some cute friends in the school musical (Isaac was home with a fever, poor kid, so Nathan happily took his ticket). 



Lots and lots of walks with Matty. 

And hitting the playground with friends every time we had good weather and could squeeze in an hour! 

Matty's hair is a whole thing right now. Sometimes he rubs it up in his hands to make it super crazy...

...and then sometimes he asks for us to style it "like that mean boy in Harry Potter" (Draco Malfoy). He is currently really into the Draco hairstyle and wants his hair like this for every Sunday. 

Not sure why I took this but it is a pretty typical thing--I usually try to fit in some strength work in the mornings while Matty is home because he is really into the various Peloton instructors (if I do a class with Andy, you know that Matthew picked the class that day). Matthew will often do the class with me or just sit here and comment things like "Mom, you're getting pretty strong, but you're supposed to be going faster." 

"Hey Mom, do I look like a really cool guy?" 

And to take us out, here is Neil rocking a fever and "helping" to put away groceries. I came in from the car to find this and started laughing so hard as I realized that if Neil were to ever get drunk, he would probably do exactly this. Haha! Kind of sad though because this is the one that took us all down the week of Thanksgiving and you can see that I was SET on butter for that butterific holiday. (Good sale, gotta stock up.) 

 

Two years!

We moved into our blue house two years ago today! Honestly it is crazy to me that it has only been two years--it feels like we have lived here forever.

I feel like we are in a wonderful place in our lives right now--all of our kids are absolutely thriving and have wonderful friends. We just ended the first 9 weeks of the school year and everyone had stellar grades. The boys don't get letter grades, but it was so fun reading the comments from their teachers (my absolute favorite comment ever from Luke's teacher: "Luke, I can tell the time that your brother threw up on his bed was a big ordeal! You used many details and strong verbs in your essay.") Nathan has the most wonderful teacher for first grade and his class is absolutely packed with friends; Luke is in the same class as his best friend for the third time (and I actually got a note from his teacher about Luke being chatty/passing notes in class which almost made me cry with joy because Luke just totally sucked into his shell for the first 18 months that we lived here and I was so dang happy to hear that he was comfortable enough in his class this year to be a little naughty!) and Isaac is yet again not in the same class with his best pal, but they sit together at lunch and exchange notes in code. Isaac's big thing these days is that he was offered a spot on the school's robotics team and he is totally blowing his teachers away with his awesome robotics skills (he gets to go in early for solo work before the rest of the team gets there & takes parts home to work on here that other team members didn't quite finish up).

The girls are doing so so well and both got straight A's this 9 weeks. Last year had some pretty rocky spots and I am so proud of them for how hard they have worked to overcome the stressors and just really used those trials as character-building experiences that are now helping them thrive. They are both taking really intense schedules (and Abigail is in her first year of high school!) and are just totally rocking it. Juliet is in orchestra French club and ran cross-country again this year...she just ran her little heart out and saw huge improvements over the season! Abigail is taking a crazy schedule of honors classes, goes to seminary every morning at 6:10 AM, is totally blowing away her engineering teacher, joined the international club with her friends (they always have the best snacks!), and is gearing up to take some intensive swimming classes this winter to prep for lifeguard certification after she turns 15 in April...and gets her learner's permit! Holy cow.

And our little Matthew started preschool a few weeks ago just after he turned 3! I was feeling SO hesitant about this (none of our other kids have done preschool until the last year before they went to school; because Matthew has a late birthday he won't start kindergarten until he is six), but this summer I realized how lonely he gets during the day without the other kids home. So now he goes to preschool every day for two hours and he loves it SO MUCH. While he's at school I either go on a long run or do a project around the house or grade like crazy, so it's been really pretty amazing for me to have two very productive hours in the morning when I'm feeling the most energetic...then I go pick up Matty and we either come home and read stories for an hour or we go to a playground or Conner Prairie or something like that. Once a week we go pick up one of the older kids and take them to lunch and Matthew loooooves those days (he misses his older siblings like crazy! He and Nate are really becoming such good friends and it's so fun to see).

Anyway, I was thinking I should do some fun little celebration for our family to mark our two-year anniversary here (I think last year we ordered Chinese takeout from the same place that we bought it our first night here?) but we went to our ward fall party last night, then today was the Primary program and I was pretty darn invested in that (my calling involves writing the program so it's a big build-up for me!) and we had meetings before/after church, so by the time I finally got home the kids were playing outside in the gorgeous leaves and I took a long nap, then woke up to a delicious dinner made by Neil (homemade pizza and sweet kale salad) and then we just kind of puttered around tonight. The kids traded candy from the trunk or treat, I played the piano for an hour or so and then did some planning for the week, and Neil went through all their allowances with the older kids...just a nice lovely normal evening.

Home tour: Kitchen and family room “final” versions

Et voila! I love these rooms so much. Still a few things to finish up, but we have come such a long way and this is totally the vision of loveliness that I had when we initially toured this home.

The cabinets are Benjamin Moore's Chantilly Lace; the island is Benjamin Moore Hale Navy.

The sofa is from Interior Define and I love it SO much. I would buy it again in a heartbeat--loved that we could completely customize it for our space. We have the Oliver reversible sectional in mushroom cross weave with tapered natural oak legs (106 inches). I ordered on October 29th and it was delivered the first week of January. (why yes, I totally did order swatches before we moved and then taped out the dimensions the second night we were here!)

The quality isn't the best on some of these phone pics, but hey, you get what you get! And just feast your eyes on that cute lil' Matthew if the light balance is bothering you. ;-)

I love my little office space SO much. So so so much. I'm teaching four classes this semester (and four next semester) and it's so good to have a dedicated zone where I can really work and feel inspired by beauty around me. (Our kids' computer lives against the wall just opposite the couch.) 

Note the lovely green square of drywall which means there's renovation underway upstairs!

I love these oven so so so much and I hope I will always have double ovens because these are my babies.

Remember my last post where I talked about standing at the island and being able to visualize what the house could look like? This is what I saw. Makes me so so so so happy.

And one last shot of where that appliance garage used to be. Sawzall for the win!

Sources:

Pendant lights from Amazon (I realized that I totally forgot these in my recap yesterday, but we love them!)

Bin cup pulls and trash drawer pull; round knobs purchased locally

Paint: cabinets are Benjamin Moore Advance in Chantilly Lace; island is also Benjamin Moore Advance in Hale Navy

Floors are white oak with a custom stain mix of Minwax Simply White (approx. 75%) and Classic Gray (approx 25%)

Artwork: I drew the line drawing of mother & baby & the illustration of Frances & Gloria playing ball; the children created everything else. Frames are a mixture of thrifted, Amazon, and IKEA

House plants: pothos, corn plant, majesty palm, monstera deliciousa, fiddle leaf fig

Appliances: JennAir professional gas cooktop with center griddle, Whirlpool fingerprint-resistant stainless steel double ovens, (fridge and dishwasher from the same line, but I bought those at Lowe's so I don't want to link to one that I'm not 100% positive is the one I have and can recommend!) and range hood.

Kitchen faucet, similar 

Bar stools in silver; 24" counter height

Family room rug: Vintage Kellum in slate blue, 9 x 12

Kitchen runner in navy/ivory 

Sofa: Interior Define; Oliver 106" in mushroom cross weave with natural oak tapered legs

Yellow throw from West Elm, buffalo check throw from Amazon; throw pillows from HomeGoods, Hobby Lobby, and World Market

Wallpaper behind desk (I needed 2 rolls)

White desk: 3 IKEA Billy bookcases (2 on each side and 1 on top custom-fit)

whew I think that's everything! If I missed something that you're curious about, please let me know! I realized after a flurry of emails earlier this week that I need to go back and put a bunch of this info on the living room & bathroom posts!