House addition!

Some days I still can't believe this really happened!!  For years we have said that we would "one day" like to knock out the back wall to our house and build on.  Early in the year we looked at the option to buy a lot up the street and sell our house.  We looked into it a bit and just couldn't get a good feeling about it.  Then somehow we got to a point where this idea entered back into the picture.  We called Doug Wyatt and asked him to come see if it was even possible and give us a bid.  He came and said it would be a pretty straight forward addition and gave us an idea of what it would cost.  Then came the hard part...should we really do this??? Is it the right time??? Is is a good decision financially???  We had a lot to talk and pray about.  We didn't take this lightly.  We fasted together as a family and Chris and I took this decision to the temple several times.  After a month or so of pondering we decided we felt good about it and we would go ahead with it.  It was hard to believe we were really going to do it!

The addition plans came from my drawings on graph paper which then got transfered to the gym floor at the church!  We wanted to see it drawn out in real life size! Haha!! Doug was good to take my drawings and bring them to life!!  It was an exciting time, but also a very stressful time!  It took much longer than expected.  They started work the middle of July and we got our kitchen cabinets installed the middle of November.  It was a grueling 4 months!! But...we are so so happy with the results!  It gives us so much more space and we are loving it!!

We decided to do a lot of the work ourselves to save money.  Looking back, I cannot believe what we accomplished together.  Chris and I have always loved to do projects together, but this was intense!  There was a project to do every second he was off work...for months!!  I predict that it will take us until next July to be completely finished.  These are the things we did for our home together...

-installed all of the finish trim

-calked, puttied and painted all of that finish trim

-installed all 1000 square feet of laminate flooring!

-built and painted a window seat

-made cushions and pillows for the window seat

- built and painted a built in bookshelf

-installed a tile back splash

-re-painted some of our old kitchen cabinets to hang in the pantry room

-built shelves, painted and stained the counter top for the pantry room

-built a new kitchen table

-re-painted 5 of our kitchen chairs

- painted and re-painted the whole upstairs

- built and painted a side table

- painted and re-upholstered 2 chairs from the DI

Wow!  No wonder we are tired!!  

We love our new addition and know it will be a blessing for our family for years to come.  As we have built shelves and such, we have joked that they will need to be strong enough for those cute little grandchildren to climb on!  We are ready!!

Halloween!

We are down to only 2 Trick-or-treaters left in our house!  We had a 50's girl, and an Asian Princess this year.  As always, they got tons of candy and had a great time.  What's now to love about Halloween as a kid!

PS - the adults in the house weren't so festive...we layed flooring all night!

Brinley's Halloween Parade!

 Every year Foothill Elementary has a Halloween parade.  The kids get to walk around every classroom and through the halls showing off their costumes.  Parents come and line the halls to watch.  Brinley is famous for not wanting to look at me when I go to watch her!!  It's a trick to get a picture of her.  She is a funny girl.  I kinda got a half smile out of her!

Meet Luna Lovegood!!

Kylee's dentist office did "Harry Potter" for Halloween.  She became "Luna Lovegood".  She worked for weeks on gathering things for her costume. Pretty awesome!

Emilee's 17th Birthday!

Happy Birthday Em!!  Can't believe you are 17 years old!!  We had a family party at Grandma's this year because our house was in shambles.  No worries though...we were still able to make her favorite dessert for her party.  Four layer chocolate pudding dessert!!

You are one awesome and amazing girl Emilee!  

We love you lots!

Chris' Birthday!

Happy Birthday to the BEST husband and Dad out there!  Chris usually gets a lot of treats and some money to buy himself something fun!  He is hilarious as he tries to decide how to spend his money each year.  Soooo many ideas for a little bit of money.  

We sure are lucky to have this guy to call ours.  He really is the best. He is funny, such a hard worker, so kind and caring, fun to be around and the spiritual giant of our home.  

Happy Birthday Chirs!  We love you.

Conference Bowl!

Our 2nd ever Conference Bowl!  We stole this great idea from a family in our ward.  We plan and make yummy food to eat between Conference Sessions...kinda like the "Superbowl"  The kids love it because we make all kinds of "bad" food that we don't normally have!  Hopefully in addition to just having great food they remember that Conference is a special time of year for families to gather together and hear the words of our inspired leaders!  I love love love Conference weekend! 

General Women's Meeting!

We got to go with Grandma and all the girl cousins to the General Women's Meeting at the Conference Center on Temple Square.  We stopped at Pizza Pie Cafe to eat yummy pizza on the way.  It poured on us while we stood in line at the conference center waiting to get in, but that's OK.  It's all good when you are with cousins!  The meeting was awesome and we had a great night together. Thanks Grandma Barb for getting us the tickets and taking us out to dinner!

Ogden Temple Re-Dedication!

Do you know what is so awesome about this picture??  All 5 of our kids were able to get tickets to attend the re-dedication of the Ogden, Utah temple!  Our whole family was able to attend together.  I have to say that I love this stage in our lives!  I loved having my babies and little kids, but its so awesome to have amazing independent children.  The dedication was awesome.  We loved it! 

What??

For 14 days during the Months of August and September my 2 cute little blonde haired, blue eyed beauties turned into black haired Asian girls!!  These 2 cute girls were in the play "The King and I" at Heritage Theater.  They loved every minute of it!  We went through 6 bottles of black hair spray getting them looking this way! We got really good at putting their hair in high buns, doing their make-up and spraying their hair out in the front yard!

Hair!

This is what it takes to have beautiful wavy hair!  These 2 wanted braids to sleep in so that they could have waves for school the next day!  What we go through for beauty!!

Cupcakes!

Quincy and Brinley and the Forsberg girls were asked to decorate mini cupcakes for our Enrichment night.  They were in heaven.  Our house was in major construction, but we still had our bar...kind of!  They did a great job frosing and then frosted the counter top when they were finished with the cupcakes!  What a mess.  Crazy girls!

Swimming!

A fun day of swimming at the North Ogden Aquatic Center with cousins. Aunt Jenni got us free passes because it was the last day it was open for the Summer.