A bump in the road...

Here's how we beat the heat on Saturday

This weekend the purpose was to drill the kitchen floor to add electrical to the island and get it ready for granite.  Then we were going to tackle removing the laminate from the stairs to get it ready for carpet....well with all of our adventures with this house, things don't always go as planned.  The concrete was really hard to cut through, so that took more time than the guys wanted, but they got that part done.

Then they started on the stairs.  Our carpet people told us to remove the laminate from the stairs so the carpet could go in.  Peter started to work on this only to find out after 1 1/2 hours of work he barely had one stair clear.  The laminate was glued on quite well.  The guys-Paul and Frank worked on the stairs only to find out that the only way to get the laminate off was to completely tear apart the stairs and rebuild.  We came home from church today to find the bottom portion of the stairs completely removed.  I'm sure my eyes told it all as they kept telling me they were going to fix the problem.  This first picture shows the open heart surgery of the upper level of stairs.  The lower picture is the bottom portion fixed up.  They ran out of plywood and had to call it a day.

Now Peter is contemplating the idea of putting wood on the staircase instead of carpet.  Carpet is definitely cheaper and I like the idea of carpet more than wood while we have small children.  But we have also discussed making it wood in roughly 6-10 years.  So do we bite the bullet and make it wood now or do we wait?  Did I mention we are also on a time crunch?  We need to have carpet and baseboards in before we move furniture into the upstairs rooms and I'd like that done before the baby arrives in approximately 7 weeks (though I measured a week early at my last appointment and Connor arrived a week early as well).  Frank would like all of the inside house mess done before the baby arrives as well.  Which would include laying the tile that we have yet to pick out for the entry, dining and kitchen area.  I just don't think there's enough time to get it all done, so I'm leaning heavily on the side of just put carpet on the stairs and get it over with.  We can change it out later when we can afford something nicer and aren't too worried about small children falling down the stairs.

What we've been up to...

Well Monday I started to potty train Connor...do you think I have enough underwear for him?  I have two six packs of white undies for him as well.  I bribed him to sit on the potty...every time he sits he gets two gummy bears.  If he pees he gets five gummy bears.  Well Monday came and went and he got a lot of gummy bears for sitting, but he never peed in the potty.  Twice he came out of the potty and promptly peed-I'm talking less than a minute after sitting for 5-10 minutes.  While on the potty we read stories.  On Tuesday I was hoping for better luck...but we didn't have any.  Tuesday night I ran to the library and picked up some potty books and a DVD.

Wednesday rolled around and my perky little guy had a decent morning, but then nap time rolled around.  When he woke early from his nap super crabby I knew something just wasn't right.  He was snuggly and only happy when held....and he was hot.  The poor guy had a fever of 102.   Potty training was put on hold and we enjoyed the comfort of diapers while we rocked in the rocking chair.  I stripped him down to just the diaper, put a fan on us, grabbed a light blanket and his teddy and we sat in the rocking chair until we both fell asleep.  He was out for at least an hour.

After waking up he was in a better mood, but still clearly groggy so we took it easy.

That brings us to today.  He's much perkier, happier and the fever seems to be gone.  He still has a cough and a runny nose, but he's managing that pretty well.

We played with Playdoh most of the morning.

We're making big steps towards talking now.  A month ago he could say a few animal sounds and a few words.  Now he says probably 10 times as much.  Some things he says:
Just about every animal sound-pig, cow, dog, horse, bird, bee, snake, sheep, cat, frog, monkey, etc.
Colors-red, yellow, green, blue, pink, brown, black, white and we're working on orange and purple.  He'll tell you the name of some animals-pig, dog, cat, bird, bee
Random words: big, ball, bed, book, milk, no, diaper, potty, mommy, daddy, apple, banana, bread, baby, and I'm sure many more. 

He got a hold of the camera and took a picture of me...here's the bump at 32 weeks.

After our short nap...poor guy couldn't stop coughing.  We watched old videos of him.  He loved it!  We also turned on the potty DVD and watched it 3 times.

Progress

A lot of progress has taken place over the past couple of weeks.  I anticipate much more progress to come in the near future as well.  The bedrooms upstairs are almost ready for carpet, which is really exciting!

Here are a couple shots of the nursery.  There will be a cute Winnie the Pooh border separating the green and blue paint.  There will also be butterflies on the wall.

 

Here's Connor's room-we are going for mountains with tufts of grass.

 Here's our new room.  Each room got a new ceiling fan.  The original fan in this room was missing a few blades.  The fan at the top of the stairs only works with a remote and guess what??  The owners didn't leave that behind...go figure.  So we have one more fan to purchase.  For now the fourth bedroom upstairs will not be getting a ceiling fan.  That room hasn't been worked on yet, but it will be the office/craft room.

This weekend this wonderful floor was put in.  We don't hear any creaking while walking down the hallway.  Once the fourth bedroom is done and painted, we'll have carpet installed here.

Back downstairs this is what our front room windows look like.  But they won't look like that for long, on Saturday my shipment of window covering arrived.

Also on Saturday we organized the garage.  Before it was a bit of a maze.  Boxes containing our island were in here and a big shelf.  We mounted the big shelf on the left wall, which is currently covered by a big drywall plank.  We also took the island cabinets inside and started playing with them.

With them roughly in the right place we realized we made a big calculation mistake.  We wanted an 8 foot island and ordered cabinets to be 8 feet long.  We didn't take into consideration the fact that we were building a pony wall for extra seating.  The three cabinets together were just too long.  So after a few options were thrown out we decided the island would consist of these two cabinets.

And this cabinet will be over here in the corner and will store the garbage and recycling cans.  We were going to put a breakfast nook over here, but I can live without that.  It looks like we'll have more than enough seating.  Not to mention we did just buy a 6 foot folding table with 8 chairs so we have enough seating for the big family dinners that we often throw.  The island will also have enough seating for at least 4 as well.

With the pony wall the island will be about 7 feet long and will have two heights.  The higher height will be for eating, the lower will be for preparing.

A few weeks back work on the stucco began again.  This is the window by the front door.  It looks so much better.  Once all the work inside is done, the last layer of stucco will be added.

And last but not least...here is how the garden is doing.  We plucked our first zucchini today.  We have been enjoying strawberries and a couple varieties of cherry tomatoes as well as a purple pepper.  Our carrots, green onion and radishes in another part of the yard have been doing wonderfully well.

I'm walking on sunshine...

I'm walking on sunshine , wooah
I'm walking on sunshine, woooah
I'm walking on sunshine, woooah
and don't it feel good!!

I had a doctor's appointment today...she said I passed the gestational diabetes test again!   Then she said, "Looks like you're in the clear this time."   I asked if I had to be tested again and she said no.   The test came back negative, my urine tests have all been good and I'm gaining a healthy amount of weight.   She said as long as there's no dramatic weight gain, there's no need to test me again.

I'm walking on sunshine , wooah
I'm walking on sunshine, woooah
I'm walking on sunshine, woooah
and don't it feel good!!

Now what do I do with all the sugar free stuff I stocked up on several months ago?   I have pudding, jello, peanut butter, jelly and instant oatmeal.   Luckily all of it tastes relatively good, so I doubt it'll go to waste.

Butterflies

Rewind a little to April:
During my spring break, Connor, my dad and I went to the Safari Park for their annual butterfly exhibit.  I've had these pictures for awhile...but they slipped my mind until yesterday when my dad asked about his flash drive.  So here are a few of the fun pictures he captured.

1 butterfly

 3 butterflies

 3 butterflies and 1 excited child

At the end of the week Peter went with my dad and met some of his family there as well.  Connor had a butterfly land on his head, but he was a bit sleepy and didn't notice his new friend.

 We love visiting the butterflies when they are in town.