This is looking to the right from our front porch.

Looking to the left from the same spot.

And, really, would it be anything like me to go a long time without posting anything, use photos as content, and NOT use my kid? Exactly.

Usually I am not a fan of messy baby faces, he was having so much fun and we were tired of trying to get him to eat. This was before we threw our hands up for good and decided to not worry about how much he eats and instead let him decide for himself.

The weekend before Thanksgiving David decided on a whim – literally as we were walking into the house carrying groceries – that it was time to do some fall clean up! Nathan decided it was time to play with rocks.

"And I gots this here rock." For the record? That look? Totally his personality - "What can I get away with now?"

Nathan has a new trick! He likes to push his step-stool around the kitchen and climb up to the counter to “help.” It should be noted he has branched out the step-stool pushing to climb up and turn light switches on and off all day. We live in a strobe light now. Be sure to notice the sunscreen on the counter. That would be the evening we got the surprise snow.

"Helping" Grandpa Bob make corn and crab chowder.

Claire is Nathan’s lil’Mommy. Or girlfriend. I can’t figure out which is true. I do know they follow each other around and hug all the time. Alas, he only knows how to say her sister Ella’s name. He sees Claire and runs at her full steam to hug her while yelling “Ella! Ella!” It’s freaking adorable.

I am pretty sure he is telling her about the fairies that live in the Christmas mansion and I am pretty sure she isn't buying it.

"What? I KNOW I am not supposed to touch and guess what? I am NOT touching, ok?"

I really need to pull out the books and figure out how to get truer colors in low lights. You’d never know it from this shot, but the living room is a lovely shade of olive green.

An idea of what our home looks like for the holidays.

I wish I had thought to bring the real camera and not just my iPhone.

The last couple of weeks I’ve noticed that Nathan will tear head first into his playroom and then crash out on the floor.  He’ll play with his toys while lying on his belly.  It dawned on me that he is mimicking the way I read to him.  I lay out flat so our heads are nearly the same level.  This confirmed for me all those studies that say that you are your kid’s greatest role model and blah, blah blah.

So I decided we need to get outside and move more.  Now everyday we head outside and we “walk” up the parkway.  I say “walk” because, really, I don’t think we go more than 200 or 300 yards in any direction.  We spend a whole lot of time finding “treasures” like sticks and pinecones and most especially dandelions.  My kid can spot a dandelion in any thousand foot radius.  He hones in on them like they were prized truffles.  It’s a shame he can’t actually figure out how to blow on said dandelion to release the seeds.  No, that falls to mom and produces great belly laughs.  If there is a vast dandelion outbreak in the Park Hill neighborhood next spring it is entirely our fault.

Another thing Nathan does is hug trees.  Literally.  I have no idea where he learned this behavior or why he thinks trees need hugging, but his liberal parents couldn’t be happier.  He just runs up to random trees and wraps his wee little arms around them as far as they will go and squeezes.  When the hug is over we’re off looking for dandelions.

As for tonight, Nathan didn’t think too much into it – mostly “Hey!  They’re clapping!  I love clapping!  Oh!  Look!  Pudding!  I love pudding!  And clapping!  I might explode!  More pudding please!  More clapping please!”

Ps.  And not letting him watch any television until almost 15 months doesn’t make me a better mother than anyone else.  It just means we’ve never gotten back into the habit of turning on the television after Nathan was born.  We were too exhausted in the beginning and just haven’t missed it since.  We’re more apathetic, not better.

Three generations! I love how Nathan is "helping" by holding a tool of some sort.

]]> http://michelle.creativewares.com/2008/08/13/how-many/feed/ 2 http://michelle.creativewares.com/2008/08/04/house-pictures/ http://michelle.creativewares.com/2008/08/04/house-pictures/#comments Tue, 05 Aug 2008 05:35:46 +0000 shell http://knitting.creativewares.com/?p=347 Now, remember, we’re under contract. This is in no way a done deal. The inspections are set for Tuesday and Wednesday and we’ll know a lot more then. But for now…

We are going to show up at closing with a pry bar and we're prying that hideous sunroom right off! Also going are the shrubs. In place of the sunroom we'll put a canopy and a wrought iron rail. In place of the shrubs? Pretty flowers and grasses! Oh and the tv antenna? See ya!

Front entry and security door

Just to the left as you walk in is this lovely reading nook. The renter is using it as her office, but I see a big comfy chair and a low bookcase with our favorite books.

Living room fireplace. For perspective, through the furthest arch is the reading nook.

The other side of the living room.

This hallway separates the livingroom and the dining room. How much do I love the arched door? Very.

Dining room. There is actually a large archway that leads to this room. Out the french doors is the ugly sunroom that is going away. Away!!

You can enter the kitchen from the dining room or the hallway.

Off to your left? Subzero, baby!

The first bedroom you reach in the hall is going to be the playroom.

Imagine Mo Willems' pigeon and friends painted life sized on the walls.

Next bedroom is Nathan's. After we sell the current house we're going to break out the back of the about ten-feet or so. That will actually make a playroom in his bedroom, opening up the other room for endless possibilities. Oh, and goodbye orange.

Nathan's bathroom. When we bust out the back we'll redo this bath. The shower enclosure is going away and will be replaced with a clawfoot tub. The floor is coming up and wee hexagonal tiles will go over a tile heating system.

Funny little nook outside our bedroom. I see Eiffel Towers there. How about you?

Master shower. Going away!

Master sink. Away with you too! It seems that the current owners replaced the closet with a bathroom. We'll bust out the back and make a five piece bath and turn this back into the closet. Why? See below.

Master Bedroom

Why are we replacing the bathroom with a closet? Fake built-in closet!!

Headed downstairs to the basement. My future wine cellar!

My studio! Huzzah! These people really like yellow, huh?

Around the corner is the guest bathroom. Excuse the hideous picture quality.

Next is the HUGE laundry room. I cut out most of the picture because hot pink panties were drying on the rack. There is easily a kitchen's worth of cupboards down here with room for an extra refrigerator or freezer.

Family room. It'll be much nicer once we replace the wee windows with egress windows. And after we lose the awful yellow paint.

Family room fireplace.

Guest room. We're going to move the yellow wall out a couple feet into the family room so guests can sleep on a king sized bed. Also coming down is the hideous paneling.

Back up the stairs to the backyard. The door leads to the two car garage you enter through the alley. We're currently browsing tree farm websites for the perfect mature tree to transplant where the weird column of juniper now sits.

And that’s it! It isn’t perfect by any stretch, but we love it and we have big plans to take the great bones of the house and make it ours!

We got home this weekend from a week in North Carolina celebrating David’s dad’s 75th birthday. We thought Nathan would love the beach so we – and by “we” I mean “me” – convinced ourselves he would actually hate it. He started bawling when I set him down in the sand. Ha! I thought to myself, I love it when I’m right. Yeah. Turns out he was pissed that we didn’t head straight for the Atlantic Ocean. He grabbed my fingers and off he went! He got knocked on his bottom by a wave and got back up and continued heading out. David was the voice of reason, or Big Meanie – either/or – and so we all romped merrily just at the water’s edge. It was special being out there for George’s birthday this year as he was just here celebrating Nathan’s 1st birthday. They were able to share each other’s milestone birthdays!

Right before North Carolina – and by right before I mean the afternoon of our redeye flight – Nathan decided to stand up and walk across the room. Like he had been doing it his whole life! Crazy baby! Of course, now he is also sporting his first black eye having run head first into a chair while at Grandpa’s birthday party.

Before North Carolina and the walking a big chunk of time was spent in Denver house hunting. It was a fruitful trip as we found one we adore. Below our budget. In a great neighborhood. We can walk to the zoo! Pictures to follow.

Before Denver I entered a Pay It Forward contest and won!! Minnie at Thank you for not being perky sent the most excellent package! Nary a thing from the dollar bins at Target! Everything is beautiful and it was all wonderfully wrapped. Nathan immediately appropriated the frog that croaks. I have pictures of it, but they are on my laptop that is sitting in Apple’s repair depot. Thank you, Minnie!!

Less than one hour old.

364 days old.

Another change – which is possibly the world’s worst kept secret at this point – we are moving to Denver this summer. I’ve been reluctant to write about it here for fear of jinxing it, but David starts his new job on 4-August. There is so much to do that I fear my head will pop off, or my hand will die of writer’s cramp, if I start making lists.

I can hardly wait to be back in Denver. We’ve been searching for houses on the internet for several weeks now and I love looking around the town, even if it is only on Google Earth. My Jessika and her family are there. We’ll have Sunday dinner. And we can trade babysitting. And we can have family vacations. I have a hard time sleeping if I start thinking about the fun we’re going to have!

We’d like to sell the house in the Bay Area in order to have a next to nothing mortgage in Denver. If we can’t then we’ll rent it out until the market improves. With an eye towards selling, we met with a real estate agent who looked us both in the eyes and asked if we were willing to rent a storage space because about half of our stuff needs to leave the house before it goes on the market. We spent a good portion of today packing up boxes – which seems unfair since the new company is paying for our move that includes someone to come pack up our crap. Ten book boxes and six clothing boxes later the books in the master bedroom are packed up and the closet is way clearer than before I moved in. Eight trash bags of my too big clothes went to charity. We have a little more work to do in the bedroom, but we’re off to a good start. Only two more bedrooms to go! And the whole downstairs.

After packing up stuff to help our little home appear bigger we did what any American family does. We went book shopping. We thought Nathan might be getting bored with his books. He only has a few dozen board books. Now he has another dozen or so. When we got home I packed up all the “big boy” books with the real paper pages, save Mo Willems, and I’m pleased as punch that my kid probably has six or seven book boxes of books. I love that he loves books! He sits quietly, muttering syllables under his breath, turning pages and “reading” to himself.

One bright side to putting the house on the market – aside from having next to nothing in the house and it ultimately meaning we’re heading off to Denver – is that we’ll get our cleaning people every week. That idea makes me woosier – in a good way – than the mountain of chores we have.

I love him!

Ps.  The ready mix was for the earthquake kit – in case something happened to me.