Changes!

We've been making a few changes around our house.

We moved Matt down to the basement to make a room for the baby,

Lindsay is now in a big girl bed,
 the nursery is almost ready for baby boy,

and since our room was the only one without a change,

Santa brought us some new bedding! 

Here are some of the before and afters:

Matt's old room/now the nursery:

Before:

After:

Although, I will admit, I'm a little sad we don't get to use the bedding we made for Matt's nursery:

Our bedroom before:

And after:

Lindsay's room before:

And after:

(there are still a few changes coming..like her bed frame that I'm REALLY excited about).

A few changes around the house

As I mentioned before we have been making a lot of changes around our house. Here are a few of the changes:

We painted our front door, garage, house numbers, and lanterns black, and we also added shutters and cement edging for a second flower bed. Here is our house before:


And here it is after:




Matthew is now in a big boy bed. Here is his room before:



And here is Matt's room now:



We also moved the office from the upstairs to the downstairs so we could have the kids upstairs with us. Here is the office before:



And after:





We also changed our weight room into a spare bedroom for Darin's parents. It will need some more decorating, but here is the change for now. Before:


And the weight room after:


We also got a piano this last month from my "cousin" Julie! We are so grateful to have the piano, and we have LOVED having it! (It also forced us to change the furniture around slightly.) The only problem with the piano is that the laundry, cleaning, etc. gets pushed aside for some piano time! Thanks a million Julie!!







I wish I would have taken a few more pictures before we moved in of our backyard and I wish I would have taken some during the summer! Darin has done an AMAZING job with our yard this summer. I just need to find the before and after pictures!

Oh, and we still have some work to do, but here is a little preview of the nursery! My mom has been awesome! We bought the potterybarn bedding used online and I didn't like the bedskirt that came with it so my mom has been awesome to go with me to choose fabric then make a new skirt, matching table cloth and basket covers! Thanks mama!!





I have also LOVED those vinyl trees online, but can't stand the idea of paying $90+ for one, so I bought my own vinyl and made my own!! I was pretty happy with the way it turned out!

Beginning of Quarantine

There have been lots of changes with Covid-19.

One of the biggest changes was having the kids switch to homeschool.

It wasn't always perfect, but I will admit, I LOVE having them home.

If I wasn't such a big believer in the importance of socialization, I would totally homeschool.

We transformed our basement family room into our new classroom.

Another big change was Lucy.  She used to get me all to herself, and she had a hard time with me spending so much time with the kids.  One day was particularly difficult for her, so we put everything on pause to make cookies.

Another favorite change has been "At Home Church."

I have been amazed at all the miracles that have come from a living prophet and being able to see first hand that President Nelson is a true prophet, seer, and relevator.   I marvel that a year before this pandemic hit, the church started "Home Centered-Church Supported Church" with Come Follow Me.  We had a good year to practice before we we doing it on our own.  Also, having all the boys ordained to the priesthood at the beginning of the year, instead of staggering it, then not having to worry about ordinations while everything was shut down.  I also love the change of not needed to wait a year to be sealed for those married civilly because now the temple is closed, people can still be married, but won't have to put their sealing on hold once the temples reopen. There are countless other miracles, but those are just a few that stood out to me. 

I don't LOVE doing puzzles, but it felt very "quarantine-y."

O

One of the hardest part of quarantine has been the change in funerals.

One of our neighbors died, and the bishopric organized for everyone to stand outside their homes as the family drove to the cemetery.  We loved Brother Pool and we will miss him!

 

The next day, our teachers did a teacher parade so we flipped the sign we made over to make a new sign for the teachers.

What we've been up to....

Sorry for the picture overload. We have been pretty busy the last month. Here are a few things that we have been up to.

We have taken lots of fun drives and enjoyed the beautiful fall weather. Here are a few pictures from our drive up to our cabin.








Matthew loves to mow the lawn with his dad! Or help in any way!




Darin's Garden did AMAZING this year. Here is a picture of one of his cantelopes! It was the best cantelope I have ever had!



My Young Women are doing awesome in volleyball and dress up funny every week. This was ugly dress week.

We've had some fun playdates with friends.

Matthew has moved out of the crib and into a big boy bed! And this is the last picture of him with a binki!! He is finally done with it!

And here a few (or a lot) of cute pictures of Matthew:









We also had a fun time up in Mueller Park Canyon;








We have also been busy making changes around our house. We moved the crib into the old office, the office down the the basement bedroom, the basement bedroom to Matt's room, the weight room to the storage room, and added a new bed to the weight room. Did you follow all of that? If you did, I am super impressed. We have also been doing a lot of painting. We changed our front door from white to black, our garage and our house address from brown to black, and our lanters from gold to black. (Yes, I am slightly gothic). I am also slowly working on doing our little baby girls nursery. Pictures of all the changes to come.