Wade's Baptism

Wade was baptized this past Sunday (or " 'tized" as our little friend Libba calls it!) and we had a great time entertaining family at our house afterwards. We have been in our house for a year now and it is finally starting to feel like us.  Did you know that in the past year we sold our first house, moved into our second, renovated it - gutted 2 bathrooms and added a third, got pregnant and had a baby. It's been a big year for us!

Here are some pictures of the baptism, the family, and a few shots of our house that my mom took while getting ready for a family brunch. It was a rare occasion that all of the toys were out of sight!

The family. Right before going to church.

One of my favorite photos of the day!  My mom caught this unsuspecting moment.  Doe Doe (my dad) was talking to McCord about how Wade was going to be baptized at church today and McCord would get to go in front of the church next to the baptismal fount and be next to him and what a special privilege that was to be the big brother.  I think he understands much more than we give him credit for.  

This is my mother-in-law, Gee Gee.  Wade is wearing the gown that she was baptized in as an infant.  Since then, Bo and his sister wore it during their baptisms as well as each of our children.  We are so thankful for Gee Gee for sharing this special tradition with our family.  In retrospect, I wish I would have gotten a picture of all of the people who have worn the gown.  It would have included: Gee Gee, Meredith (my sister in law), Bo, Emily, Kyle and Will (Meredith's kids) and McCord and Wade.  Amazing!

And here's the house.  I pulled out my collection of vintage children's prayer books and used them around the house as decorations for our brunch. 

We hope to renovate this kitchen one day - but we're slowly making peace with one another. 

The playroom - it takes a beating every day, got to love a hard working room!

And it would only be fitting to include Wade's prayer for the day, the same prayer McCord offered on his baptism.  

God in heaven, hear my prayer,

Keep me in thy loving care. 

Be my guide in all I do. 

Bless all those who love me too. 

Amen. 

McCord's Maple Comes Home! (& oh the fun with playdoh)

When McCord was born - almost 2 years ago, Bo had a great idea to plant a tree in his honor. 


The day we planted McCord's Maple at our old house.  He was just 2 weeks old.

I still remember when Bo and I went to pick out McCord's maple at the nursery.  It was one of my first times away from McCord while he slept at home under his grandmother's watch.  Bo and I really deliberated which tree would best represent our son (seems so funny now!) but we were so serious about this decision.  Then when Mc was 2 weeks old, the tree was planted at our old house on Surrey Lane.  We took Mc's picture in front of the tree each month for his first year of life to monitor his growth (and the tree). 

And then we decided we needed a bigger house.

Mc at 12 months next to his Maple.  This was the last photo we took of Mc in front of his tree before moving and leaving the tree behind. 

You can imagine how anxious I was when we sold our house in the heat of summer - I wanted to make sure the buyers would allow us to come back to get the tree in the winter when its survival rate during transplantation would be much higher.  And I am so glad to say that day has arrived. 

19-month-old Mc and his Maple - reunited.

Welcome to your new home, Maple.  We hope to be here for many years so we can enjoy your new leaves budding out in the spring and your brillant fall foliage each year.  And you'll have another tree to keep you company soon when we plant another one in May to honor Baby #2.

And - in other random news, we made this playdoh recipe today and it was so easy, I may never buy store-bought playdoh again.

This is the kind of picture you get when your toddler wants you to take a picture of him playing with the playdoh while also watching to see how the picture turns out - all at the same time. 

Oh, the fun!

Goodbye Surrey Lane

Our first house. 

You've been a place of escape for 6 great years. You sheltered, shielded and gave us a place to grow our family.  We will remember you fondly. 

We met your new owners today at closing and they are perfect in every way.  I know that you will be loved under their care.  We'll give you some time to get acquainted with them.  It may be too painful for us to drive by the neighborhood because we'll miss you, but know that we are your distant admirers.  And we'll be back in the fall to visit when we pick up McCord's Maple. 

So long, old friend.

Moving

We did it with lots of help from my parents.  And we're exhausted! 

Here are a few before photos my mother-in-law took followed by some shots of the inside after a coat of paint (but before we unloaded all the billions of boxes we brought)!

Living/Dining area



Playroom



Standing in Playroom looking at Kitchen

Master BR and sitting area

Laundry

Guest Room



McCord's Room




Sewing Room

 
After photos:



Living/Dining Room

Downstairs hall

Love this cedar closet!

Guest Room

McCord's Room



Peanut Butter Toes

Those last few months when our house was on the market were tricky.  How to keep it clean with a crawling, sticky, dirty little boy who likes to leave piles of chaos everywhere?!  I found myself constantly cleaning up and cringing when Mc would pull things out of the kitchen cabinets and leave them strewn across the downstairs (or splash in the dog bowl, or pull all of the records and CDs off of the shelf, or ..., or... or......).  And that's not the kind of mom I want to be.  Instead, I want to encourage his curiosity and let him explore, play, learn, and discover.  So a couple of weeks ago, we went outside and played with peanut butter.  Our intention was to make one of those bird feeders you probably made as a kid - you know the kind, with a pine cone, peanut butter, and bird seed - and we eventually got our mission accomplished, but it was the playing with peanut butter that McCord enjoyed so much and what made me feel like I restored my sense of motherhood.

Our birds like Peter Pan peanut butter.
We found this pine cone a couple of months ago when we vacationed at Mansfield Plantation.

Here we are getting excited about peanut butter - Rocky of course wanted to be a part of this project!

And how peanut butter ended up on his toes, I'll never know!

We hung the feeder right outside our kitchen window.

 It took our birds about 2 weeks to find it, but when they discovered it, the feeder became quite the hangout.  We learned that the little birds preferred it over the regular feeder.  We had Carolina Chickadees, Tit mouses, and Wrens.  What a joy it was to watch these birds.  McCord - as busy as this little guy is - would immediately quiet down and get real still when watching the birds.  He enjoyed watching so much, I would pull his highchair in front of the window so he could sit and watch while he ate. 

Update on our house:

We've been packing!  The official move date is IN TWO DAYS.  The washer, dryer, and fridge are coming tomorrow, and we've already had Terminix and a maid out.  Bo's been taking loads of boxes to the house every night. The painters came yesterday and did the first coat of paint on the walls, and I can't wait to show you the before and afters.  Pictures soon, promise!

Best House Ever

Today when Monkey and I were thrifting at the Habitat ReStore (aka: procrastinating packing), I found this great Richard Scarry book and had to splurge the $.50 since we'll be moving into our new house next weekend!  Thought Mc needed a new (used) book to celebrate the good news!

If you read the last post about our house hunting experience, we decided to go with Option 2 - the 1940s fixer-upper that was up for auction.  We love the age of the house and the neighborhood, but let's be honest - it needs a ton of work.  We're excited to make it what we want. 

Here's a picture I took tonight as we drove by the house for the hundredth time!

This time we were excited to see this sign in the front yard.

Here's how it all went down:

After viewing the house several times, we called our contractor (whom we trust immensely) who did some renovations for us on Surrey Lane.  He reviewed the inspection the owner had completed and reported on what needed to be fixed.  We knew the house was a fixer-upper, but wanted to make sure that it had good bones and was worth the investment.  With his report, we decided to go ahead and place a pre-auction bid knowing that both bathrooms would need to be renovated right away.  The house also lacks attic storage and a fence, so building a garage and working on the yard are both on the to-do list.  We know we'll also eventually renovate the kitchen.  Taking all of this into consideration, we placed a super-low bid (offer) on the house - not sure if anyone else was planning on placing a bid.  We'd been told that if satisfied with a bid, the owner would cancel the auction all together, and the house would go under contract instead.  Part of our offer included the request to rent the house from the owner while we are waiting on the closing of our present house - we have to move out of Surrey Lane before June 30th, so we need to find a place to live and store our possessions stat.  After a weekend of negotiating, we are so excited to say that we are under contract!  The owner has been a dream to work with - already having the house professionally cleaned and having an extra key made for us to access the house as soon as this week.  We plan to start taking boxes over daily and move in officially next Saturday.  We can't wait!



Don't forget to pack the baby!

Here's my proud husband after cleaning out the pantry - this was an amazing undertaking.  I think the pantry fought back, but in the end, my husband was the champ!



Here are a couple of sneak peek photos of the "bones."

Standing in the foyer looking upstairs into the laundry room

Downstairs bath - this will be the first bath to be renovated

Master BR - notice that you have to be super short to get into the closets.  Just kidding, there's a regular size closet in the MB, but the small nooks will be fun hideouts for Mc.

Upstairs bath - notice moisture damage on ceiling - one of many things to change in here.

Also, this is off the subject, but are any of you on Pinterest?  If you have no idea what I'm talking about, drop everything you're doing and check it out right now.  Here's a board I started a few weeks ago to stockpile design inspiration.  The rest of my boards are located here.  As you can see, Pinterest is my new favorite thing.  I think you'll like it too. 

Stay tuned in the coming months as we document our progress on the renovations. For sure, this will be a
slow work in progress.