It was a very Merry Christmas

We had such a great Christmas. Olive was a little under the weather that day and wasn't her normal perky self. She was interested in her presents, but kinda just moved from one thing to another. She has gotten a lot more use out of the toys in the days after Christmas when she was feeling better.

She got a whole bunch of Little People toys, puzzle books, and an adorable Christmas outfit. Other people gave her baby dolls and accessories, dress ups, bath toys, and a play purse. She is in heaven seeing as she is a total girl.

We got her this spinning toy that plays music. She can't do it herself yet, but I think she likes it.

Her favorite gift was her new slippers. She is obsessed with slippers and constantly asks to put mine on. So we got her some of her own. Unfortunately they don't stay on very well.

Here she is in her cute outfit. Isn't she sweet?



It was over way too fast, but we had a great holiday.

Merry Christmas!

If you didn't get a card from us we want to wish you a Merry Christmas!

It's quite the view

This is how Olive watches TV. For some reason her best viewing angle is to be standing and only one inch away. She had not watched hardly any TV until we started working on the house and we needed a way to distract her. She instantly fell in love. We only had a small portable TV that we would place on the floor and she got used to watching it from a very close distance. Now, even though we have furniture and space for her to watch more appropriately, she insists on being exceptionally close to the screen.

I recently rented her some Signing Time dvds from the library and they have been a big hit with her. She will bring me the box at least twice a day asking to watch. Its educational right? And at least it is bearable for me to sit through unlike some kids shows. I used to be one of those parents that said I wasn't going to let my child watch any TV during the day. Then reality set in and I realized that if I am in charge of entertaining her ALL day (especially in the winter) and want to accomplish anything else, TV time is very necessary. Don't get me wrong, ideally she only watches a show while I get ready/exercise and another while I am trying to make dinner, although there are those occasional days where the TV doesn't seem to get turned off. It used to make me feel really guilty if she was watching on and off all day especially while we were working on the house and I felt like I was ignoring her, but somethings are easier to feel guilty about than change. I try and remind myself that it is all about balance. How much TV do your kids watch?

Oh what a hallway!

Let's appreciate my new house again. So, you may think who cares about hallways? Typically I would agree that they are boring and functional. But not mine. My hallway is unique. I'm not exactly sure why I love it so much. It is one of my favorite place in our house. It might be that it is more of a little landing rather than just a dark narrow passage way. Or perhaps it is all the white on the doors and the old door frame detail that I love. Maybe it's all the symmetry.

It's possible that I love our built in drawers and cabinet the most. I have had these at multiple places we have lived and they always say "old house" to me. All these reasons could explain my love, but I haven't mentioned the best part of the hallway. That would have to be the laundry shoot in the bottom drawer that goes straight to the laundry room. Who knew I would love laundry shoots so much?

Our fabulous doors play a big part in the wonderfulness of the hallway. We don't have just any doors. They are heavy and old and have these wonderful original door knobs. And now that we made them stop squeaking we can really enjoy them.

I hope you enjoy my hallway as much as I do.

New house appreciation

The tile in our up stairs bathroom is absolutely delightful. Look at it! It makes me giddy. We have original 1920's honeycomb tile WITH a beautiful mosaic tile border to match. Yes, delightful.

The best part of this tile is its story. We had plans to tile over the ugly blue marble linoleum flooring that matched the ridiculously ugly blue marble counter top. On the Saturday of our project, after picking out our new tile and vanity, we ripped out the old cabinet to discover this glorious tile underneath. Scott called me on the phone and said " You have to come see the bathroom tile RIGHT NOW!" So I rushed over to find this marvelous miracle. Not only did we not have to do all the work of putting in new tile, the gray and white color scheme matched perfectly with everything we had just painted.

Here is a close up of the mosaic detailing on the border. Wonderful isn't it?

This is what Olive and Scott were doing while I was taking the pictures. She loves bouncing and jumping and begs to get on the bed. What a cutie.

Olive's first snow day

It snowed all night so we woke up to a nice fresh coating of snow. Olive has never really gone out to play in the snow and I thought this would be the perfect day. It took 30 minutes to put all her snow clothes on, especially since she wasn't willing to help. She only stayed outside for 15 minutes before she got cold and frustrated. It really made me wonder if I was doing it all for her or just for a picture, but whatever.

Olive didn't quite know what to do with the snow other than walk around in it. But she tried making a reverse snow angel.

A new beginning

Now that all the hair-pulling-out stress is over (mostly), I feel like I can post about all the great things about our new house. And there are SO many great things in this house that we fell in love with. I have vowed that I won't post a full house tour until everything is how I want it, sorry for the disappointment. So instead...I am stealing a cute idea from a blog that I read where she does a weekly appreciation of the cool, and cute things in her new house (except she has a cute name for her house and does everything way better). Here is our second rate "Pemberley Appreciation":

Our charming door knocker:

I think this old door knocker is so amazing. It has the family crest and name of the previous owners. This house has been in the same family since it was built so that really adds to the heirloom-ness of this knocker. We have plans to someday get our own family crest made into a knocker and put it on the door as a sort of geneology of ownership. This is why I love old houses.