Our New Addition

*WARNING* This post contains TOO MANY pictures and captions, only shown for those truly interested.

So....we have a new room in our place!! Tom worked SO HARD and did such a GREAT JOB and we are EXTREMELY GRATEFUL for the new "west wing" of our home :)

Here's the background: We took the 2 car garage of our condo and converted most of it into a master bedroom. Tom put up a new wall to divide the room from the garage and cut a door leading into the current bathroom to provide an alternate entrance/bathroom access for the room.

Here we go: one of the first things he did was cut out the door.

The kids had fun with this one! Their one chance to hammer holes into the wall!!

He framed in the area with the water heater and set up a venting system to the outside through the garage area.

This is our future closet.

Many friends helped us out with this project! Here is Dave G. spraying on the wall texture.

Both sets of our parents helped to paint when they were here for Gideon's blessing in April. It was a fun, productive day!




Tom was great to let the kids help!

Here it is, the night before the carpet was installed. You can see the landing Tom built.

And, here it is! It's pretty void of much decoration so far (any suggestions would be helpful!)...


Our closet doors have been ordered for Tom to install, so soon all our clothes will be hidden.

The back nook is yet to be organized, but I'm excited for it: it will be a place for me to work on my projects (to be determined), as well as a place for Tom to play his trumpet!

We love our new room; it has really added a lot of space to our home! The kids love being in our old, large room and ruling the upstairs! One thing about this space is that without a window, it is very dark and quiet at night! The first morning we woke up in there we had slept in until quite late (the kids were upstairs having a party in their new room). One must-have is a monitor to hear Gideon in his room! THANK YOU TO TOM FOR MAKING A BEAUTIFUL SPACE FOR US!! :)

PS Thought I'd add this in as an afterthought. Many people wanted to know how this ties in with the garage area. This was taken from the kitchen door, which has always led out to the garage, with a view of the bedroom door. The garage door still functions and is just to the right of this picture. This currently highly unorganized area :) gives us enough space for some food storage, tool bench, etc. It's actually been pretty fun to have a quick passageway to the kitchen from the bedroom, too.

Four months & growing FAST!

An update on Gideon at 4 1/2 months: he's sleeping through the night now and that makes me as happy as can be!! (And he's much cuter in person!!)

Celebrating the 4th!

As you can see, we had a fun 4th at the beach! We learned that if you go to the beach EARLY on a holiday, you beat the crowds and the blazing heat! Allison finally discovered the fun she can have in the water, even when waves pulled her down. All she wanted to do was walk and jump in the water, holding onto one of our hands. Jacob ran his traditional circles in and out of the water with the waves chasing him.

We started out the day bright and early at the Channel Islands Harbor 5K Run, where I played the role of 'runner' while Tom & the kids cheered me on. It was a fun run through some beach neighborhoods with a view of the beach at the end. It was good for me to train and then actually do it--I felt so great at the end! I reached my goal of running the whole thing (no walking allowed!), but came a bit short of my goal of running under 30 minutes, finishing in 32. Next time I'll be faster...

We did see fireworks on the 3rd and gathered with friends for a BBQ after the race and beach on the 4th. I loved watching Jacob enjoy the fireworks, exclaiming with each one that it was "AWESOME!" Allison lost interest after a few minutes, but at least she wasn't scared. Gideon ate his blanket in his car seat. Good times!!