It's one of those good phases

We had an excellent weekend. It feels like we've hit one of those good phases in child rearing. This of course means that something huge will come up like next week, but for now, today, this weekend, it feels a lot more smooth.

Spencer and Genevieve are so fun these days. I had a girl's night Friday night and decided to take Genevieve along. She charmed everyone there and when we tried on all the clothes (it was a Lularoe party), she tried on her own little dresses and twirled in them and just had a delightful time. She even got to bring one home, so that was cool. Afterward she was so happy and told me, "Mommy, that was a really fun party." Just having my little girl be old enough to express that kind of thought to me makes me so happy. I foresee lots more awesome girl's nights out with her when we leave the boys to their devices. :) She is really great to have one-on-one. So well behaved, such a lover of life, interested in everything around her. It's awesome.

Spencer is also amazing one-on-one. He's in preschool now and completely flourishing. He skips his way out every day to tell me what a great time he had. He loves his teachers and he tells me about his friends, and about what he did at his stations and how they do all these cool things. I'm so, so glad we decided to put him in preschool. I knew he would love it, but seeing it play out makes it that much better.

And then we've got Aaron. I don't think I can ever even do justice to what a perfect addition he has always been to our family. He is the sunniest little guy. He is walking everywhere, exploring like crazy. He could spend all day puttering around the yard and be happy as can be. He eats like a champ. Literally, at dinner tonight we had pork chops and a cauliflower mash thing like mashed potatoes. Amazing, btw, but Aaron just dug in and ate an entire pork chop on his own. He's 14 months old. This kind of blows me away. It is so easy to make him laugh. We hardly have to do anything to get him to giggle at us and he definitely inherited Bill's ability to do something funny at just the right instant to make everyone laugh. He's already got that perfect sense of comedic timing.

We went to Stumphouse Tunnel yesterday, which is an unfinished train tunnel turned outdoor monument. All the kids, Aaron included, were so excited to walk all the way to the end of the tunnel. It is amazing to have three independent kids able to walk wherever they want. We've spent so many years carrying babies, and I'm sure we'll do more of that, but for now our three are at a perfect point and I just love it.

When a need becomes a hobby and then more

Back in the day when Bill and I were early on married and we had no furniture and were moving to an unfurnished apartment and I had time and a bit of extra money on my hands and decided to learn to build furniture because it filled the need, yeah, back then I had no idea where that would go. It became a hobby. Then it became a way of life. Now it's almost an art form and a creative outlet. I can't imagine going to a furniture store to buy anything. I might go for inspiration. I'll look around and think, I could build that and it would cost a fraction of what they're charging.

I learned how to build furniture. I learned about different kinds of screws and what works for what. I learned how to pick wood that isn't bowed or corkscrewed. I learned about saws and drills and sanders and how to finish a piece and what the best stain is, or maybe that it doesn't matter so much to me as that I like the color. I learned about finishes. I tried a bunch of different kinds and liked some and not so much others. I learned to refinish furniture. I accumulated a bunch of tools over the years.

I learned over time that some of the methods of joining furniture I had use early on didn't really last that many years. So I did more research and am still researching and it turns out there are better methods that don't even use screws or nails and are stronger. Turns out they require more tools, which is both fun, annoying when I don't have money right now to get them, and exciting because for instance, I always wanted a table saw and now I have a genuine reason to save for one. The other day I learned the difference between a planer and a jointer. Did you know you want to run wood through a jointer before a planer? Yeah, me neither, but I do now and maybe someday I'll own those tools and do something about it.

Nowadays my home is full of things I've built. There isn't a room in the house that doesn't include my work. It's really cool to see the process of learning played out in my home. It's satisfying. Some pieces are higher quality than others. All were built to fill a need, and they've all done that. Nowadays I look around and wonder what I'll build next. Right now it's a new bunk bed for the kids. Why? Because I feel like it and what I'm building will fit the need better than the current one. Plus, I like it. I like building. I like seeing it come together. I'm using different methods to join the pieces together this time and I can't wait to see how they work out. Genevieve picked the color for her bed and it's going to be hot pink and how awesome is that?! lol.

I always like personal improvement, and it turns out there is lots of room for improvement in this craft. I find myself unsatisfied with the status quo of what I've done before and looking to try new things. Back when I was in school I always enjoyed the challenge of learning new things. Turns out that process still provides me a lot of satisfaction. So onward and upward. I've got plans, dreams, future things I want to do. And who knows, maybe there will be a little bit of a business in this too. Turns out I kind of liked that the last few months as I built some pieces for others. That's it's own type of fun.

My happy moment of the day

I'm pretty sure that it takes a year to recover from moving to a new house. At least that's what it has felt like each time we moved in the last few years, and since that has been a lot of times, it feels like a good reference point.

I've been working a bit more the last month than I had the previous six, so the funds are flowing a bit more. Today I shrunk my grocery list of non food items, whatever you call that, I call it my Everything Else list, to less than ten items. It made it up into the 40s and maybe even 50 at one point when we first moved to this house in January. It might take a bit longer to knock off those last nine items, but it's surprisingly pleasing to get all those things. It's kind of funny because they're things like sheets and mattress covers and a firesafe box and canning jars and a diffuser, so by no means all that interesting of stuff, but there you have it, the things that make me happy in any given day.

Also, I think I've finally gotten to a place where I like how my working hours go. It's only taken nearly seven years to figure it out, but hey, I'm trying not to count. I used to work only in the mornings, but the kids kept getting up earlier and earlier and I just didn't get the time I needed before they were up and making it take twice as long if not longer, so now I work from 9-10PM during the week, and focus on only work so I get the maximum amount done. Then I wake up at 5:30AM and work from then until I'm done, which with that quality hour the night before means that I'm often done by 7-8AM. It had gotten to where I was taking all morning to get done and that was just unacceptable, so this is a fantastic change. Here's to the goal of someday not working at all, or at least not my current employment, but for now during these grad school years, it is a huge blessing in our lives that I have a flexible job that allows us to be more financially independent. It makes being on a grad school income not seem like such a sacrifice when we aren't piling up loans semester upon semester. And the tradeoff in stress with that is very worth it.

Three

Genevieve turned three on Friday and boy howdy, is she excited about it. We had a low key day mostly involving eating copious amounts of foods she loves. We had our classic german pancakes for breakfast. That was a hit, as always, which is why we have it for every birthday. Lunch we had Costco muffins. The kids picked chocolate and vanilla chocolate chip, so needless to say, it was not hard to get them to eat. Then for dinner Bill made homemade pizza. That worked so well and the kids didn't complain about that either. It was awesome.

I asked Genevieve what kind of cake she wanted and she was all about strawberry, but Spencer kept popping into the conversations and advocating for chocolate, so Genevieve, being the sweet girl she is, decided she wanted chocolate cake with strawberry frosting. It turned out great. She loved it. We have been snacking on it for two days.

We went to the Botanical Garden in the evening and went on a little hike. That went over well. The kids have really started to love hiking, which makes my heart happy. Aaron, our new little walker, walked half the hike. That kid is impressive. Genevieve and Spencer buzzed all over the place, loving it. They brought their scooters and used them for part of it, but Bill ended up being the pack camel for them later on. Ah well. That's not uncommon.

We're so happy to finally have our three year-old. It has felt like Genevieve is three for months. She is a smart little girl and so very sassy. She's also very sweet. She doesn't appreciate when Spencer grabs stuff from her, but if he asks nicely, she'll give him anything. She's so generous in her sharing.

Today I asked her to keep her smoothie in the kitchen while she ate it so it didn't make a mess anywhere else. This is how she dealt with that request. Basically I just shook my head and wondered what she'll be like as a teenager. Lol. She's a thinker. She always comes up with a twist on what we ask to suit her fancy. I have hope that will be a good trait as she gets older. She's definitely creative.

This girl of mine knows how to enjoy life. I've been making this quilt for her all summer. She has been so excited about it. I finished the binding last night and she discovered it this morning. She usually wakes up about 6:30AM, much before her siblings most of the time. So she gets up, finds the quilt, spreads it out on the living room floor and curls up happy as can be on it. She's in heaven.

So there you have it. Happy birthday, my little princess.

Leaps and bounds

Aaron is hitting milestones like crazy these days. Maybe a week ago he started walking and now he wanders through the house just to enjoy walking.

He's started talking. All of my kids have done that really young, and he is proving similar. He also is shockingly capable at getting his point across without words. I don't remember the older two being so capable of expressing what they did not want so very young. Basically he points until we take him somewhere, grins maniacally if he gets what he wants, or shoves stuff away from him with a horrible how-could-you-possibly-offer-that-to-me look on his face. I've gotta say, I actually appreciate it. Having opinions is cool, especially if he's willing to share them.

He eats like a boss. He has mastered using a fork in a way that I'm pretty sure the other two didn't do for at least six months.

He climbs like crazy. His favorite things to climb currently are the couch, which he gets on by climbing on our mini recliners and then climbing over the arm of the couch, and the staircase up to Spencer's bunkbed. He does both of those things on repeat all day. Surprisingly, for as much as he climbs, he doesn't fall that often either, though the staircase is still tricky. If I could keep him off it, I totally would, but no such luck.

He roughhouses with both kids all the time and holds his own surprisingly well. Plus, he has a shriek that scares them off pretty quickly if he gets tired. Or really it brings me running to see who is killing him and then to break up the brawl, lol.

He went from having none but his bottom two teeth when we came home from Utah to having all four top teeth and a bottom one or two coming in.

He learned to give real kisses. He puckers up his lips and everything. This never gets old.

They love baths, despite the looks on all three faces.

 He likes to bonk things with his head. Kind of weird, and shocking and painful when he picks my head as a target, but whatevs. We're managing. Basically, he seems less and less like a baby and more and more like a toddler and it's kind of mindblowing. Time flies.

What we've done lately in pictures

 I've been refinishing some furniture this last week and finished it all on Wednesday. I'm kind of failing on taking final pictures, which I really shouldn't since I think I want to start doing more of this, but here's a few mediocre shots of some beautiful furniture.

Footboard I refinished for a friend.

Matching headboard. This bed was in incredible condition. It's probably 75 years old and not but maybe one crack in the wood. It was so fun to refinish it. I'm totally hooked. 

This is the matching vanity. I totally forgot to take a finished picture of it, but you can see the drawers in the background and it looked amazing when I put them back in.

The mirror that fits into the middle of the vanity.

And the other refinishing project I did. Again, the quality here is incomparable. This table is I'm guessing 45 years old and in pristine condition. The stain was all chipped and peeling, but it was so easy to strip and refinish. I was bummed that I had to give it back. 

Totally engrossed in their books on the way to church. 

Aaron loves this little chair. He can climb up himself and he finds all kinds of comfy ways to chill on it. 

We've had some crazy thunderstorms this week and the kids just love them. They get all decked out in their boots and jump in the puddles until they're absolutely soaked. I just sit on the porch swing and swing away and enjoy the storm. It's awesome. 

The pigtails! She had very particular directions for how she wanted her hair done that day. It makes me smile that she's finally interested in letting me do it instead of just pulling it right out.

This kid starts preschool in three and a half weeks. I'm simultaneously so excited for him and wondering how he could be at this point already. Time is a 'flyin.

I chopped my hair off last month and I'm totally in love with it. The ease of doing it just cannot be beat. I have no plans to go back ever. :) No more headaches from ponytails, taking the time to style it every day, figuring out what to do with it when I run, or generally worrying about it all. I'm a little weirded out about how much straighter it was when I first got it cut. It's grown out a bunch already and is curling in the back again. And when I wake up in the morning I have the most amazing bedhead ever.

Refinishing furniture

I have a friend that asked on my ward Facebook page if anyone could refinish a bed and vanity for her. I've dabbled in that work in the past, but a while back I read this post and was itching to try it out, so I told her I'd be happy to refinish it for her. Excuse the terrible phone picture, but this is the only shot I have of the original pieces before I started the work. The finish was really old and fairly thick, so it was hard to see the actual grain of the wood. There were some major gouges from whatever mattress had been used. But the moment I saw it, I saw so much potential for a gorgeous piece. It has lots of history for the family and is something they really wanted to preserve and use again, so I was excited to get to work.

This is a shot of the mirror of the vanity. The finish was just old and worn and dull looking. I was really impressed with the quality of everything though. This set is probably 75 years old and there was hardly a crack in the whole thing. I'm not sure what kind of wood it is made of, but it has lasted really well.

 So I got right to work stripping all the old stain off. I'd never used these particular products before and once I got the hang of it, it's like a dream to strip. Here's a picture of the side boards after I've used Citristrip on the one on the right. The old finish just peels right off. It's amazing.

This is after I had stripped and steel wooled and prepped the boards to restain. Look at that gorgeous grain that emerged when the old stain was gone! This isn't even the same kind of wood as the original piece.

 Another shot of the mirror all buffed and ready to stain. I'm still in the middle of this one, so this is the most updated picture I have of the mirror.

And here it's stained and just needs the tung oil to finish it up.

 Behold, the finished product! It is SO gorgeous. This is hands down my favorite color of stain, so I was so glad they picked it. What a difference new stain and finish makes to a beautiful old piece.

I can't believe how much satisfaction I got out of this project. I refinished my kitchen table years ago, but it was before I knew about the stripping process I linked at the top of this post. I sanded and sanded the top of the that table and I remember it being just torturous. Five years later it's pretty beat up again. But this? This was easy. There were lots of steps, but they all went fast. I'm so pleased with the result. I barely even got out my sander for this project. I used it to deal with those gouges, but that was it. I think I've found a new side business. :)

Aaron is one

My sweet little Aaron had his first birthday while we were in Utah. We used it as an excuse to have a get together with my family. I'm not really into huge parties for one year-olds, but I'm all for a naked baby chowing down on a cupcake while we snap pictures, lol.

I don't know what it is about Aaron, but he is a special little guy. I know I enjoyed my older kids at this age too, but it feels like I just find extra delight in the things Aaron does each day. He has a million dollar smile that he regularly aims my direction. He's a bit mischievous, really into climbing, very long suffering with his older siblings' excessive gestures of affection, a total cuddle bug, and just generally good natured.

He loves to eat and just in the last couple weeks his upper teeth have finally emerged. He had just his two lower teeth past his first birthday, but we could see probably four or five teeth on the top coming in all together. That was not fun, but they are pretty well all through the gums now, so he's doing even better on chowing down on all the food the rest of us eat.

Aaron is my equalizer. The older two kids absolutely adore him and I can already tell he'll be the kid that sits in the middle between them on a car ride. He might be poking them both while he does it. I wouldn't put it past him, but he does it with such a winning grin that everyone just seems to love him anyway.

Aaron is really content with life. He's been slower to hit all his milestones than either Spencer or Genevieve. I attribute it to that personality trait. He's very happy wherever he is at. So while Spencer walked at 10 months and Genevieve at 11, Aaron is still just cruising around, happy as can be. It could still be a while before he decides walking is how he wants to move. He is such a good climber that it sometimes just makes me scratch my head that he's not walking. He seems so in control of his body movements that I expect him to run off when he climbs up and down on our couches and beds and everything else he can get up on. He regularly climbs Spencer's staircase to his bed. That gives me a total heart attack and it's prompting plans for a new bunk bed, but we can't seem to keep him off.

He's finally regularly sleeping through the night. I've been less concerned by that than with the other two, and with the weird way his teeth came in, he started doing that six or eight months ago and then stutter stopped off and on for months. He woke up every night while we were in Utah, but once we got back to South Carolina and all his familiar surroundings, he's slept through ever since. It's blissful for my nights.

One to two years old is totally my favorite phase for babies/toddler so far, so I'm just reveling in the cuteness. It's a great phase. :) Now here are some photos from our birthday party a few weeks ago.

All the babies love riding around with Grandpa in his wheelchair. Aaron sits more still doing this than anything else.

 He had no problem chomping his cupcake. There weren't even that many crumbs, all things considered.

 He kind of makes here look white, but Gracie and Aaron continue to look uncannily twinnish. Just for kicks we weighed them while I was there and they even weighed the exact same weight. It's a little trippy.

My niece Lily was a big fan of Aaron. She helped him open his presents. The feeling is mutual.