My big girl

Ruth is becoming such a big girl and she has done some really cute stuff over the last few months, so I have a handful of photos I wanted to share.

First of all, she has really gotten into hats. She loves taking them off and putting them on all by herself. This is one of my new favorite photos of her:




Notice how this hat actually goes with her outfit. Luckily for Ruth, her love of hats is being encouraged by her Grandma Christensen, who bought her two new ones during their shopping trip to Target last weekend.

Secondly, as is evident from this photo (hair style by Tony), her hair is getting REALLY long.

She had a trim back in November, but I think I'm going to take her in for another one during the next couple of weeks. I'm trying to let her bangs grow out so we don't have to deal with cutting bangs all the time.

Thirdly, Ruth LOVES coloring. Her self-appointed job during our move was the "box decorator" :


The girl would spend hours coloring boxes. She came up with this idea herself, and she was actually very good about not coloring on walls. When she's really into her picture she gets this very focused look on her face, and she makes really little scribbles. I think she's actually starting to understand the concept of coloring within the lines, although she's not good at it yet.

Thirdly, the girl is a little ahead of herself with her interest in women's undergarments. She thinks her mommy's bras are quite peculiar, and whenever she can get her hands on one, she likes to see if she can try it on herself.


In this situation, she was "helping" me fold clothes and found one she wanted to try on herself.

I don't have a photo relating to this, but she has also taken a very sudden interest in butterflies. She loves going through books to see if they have pictures of butterflies and pointing out all the butterflies. I think I'm going to buy some vinyl butterfly wall stickers for her room.

Anyhow, that's what's up with Ruth! More updates tomorrow!

New House!

I'm sorry for the long delay in posting! The last two weeks have been very busy and exhausting. But we moved and we love our new house! We are so glad to be done with renting (hopefully) forever. Our mortgage payment is slightly higher than our rent payment, so it's incredibly affordable for us. And this house has so much potential! I took some pictures of it before we moved in all of our stuff.


This is looking into the living room from the dining room. The front entryway is on the right side. There is a lot of old wallpaper in this room and the dining room that we will be taking down. We are going to put slipcovers on our furniture that will be a darker sage green. Not sure what color to paint the living room.


This is the dining room. There's a nice window seat (I will be making a big cushion or two), and it's a fairly big room. It also has a bar, so we're going to get some bar stools. I think we're going to take down the wood paneling because I generally don't like wood paneling, and I don't really want to paint over it. We'll see, though. What do you think about the paneling?


This is a corner of Ruth's room. Her wallpaper border has unicorns on it. She loves her room and has an awesome closet. We're going to paint this room a very light sky blue color.


This is the other bedroom on the main floor. Tony and I are currently using this as our bedroom, but it will eventually be a spare bedroom/office. It's got this really cool old, glass light fixture that I need to take a picture of. We're going to clean it up and keep it. The wall color in this room is currently a very light pink. Not sure what color we will paint this room.



This is our one and only bathroom. It is currently covered in some very old wallpaper. We will be painting this room a nice light sage/celery color. It's also going to be one of our first big projects. We're going to replace the molding and base boards, vanity, and possibly the medicine cabinets.

This is the entryway to go upstairs, and you may not be able to tell this, but the stairs are very narrow and steep.




The loft spans the entire length of the house is divided into two very good sized rooms.



We've decided not to put anything upstairs yet so we can make it the first area of the house we paint. I don't know what color we will paint it, though!


This is the master bedroom. This picture doesn't do justice to how large it is.

And finally, this is our kitchen, which is ENORMOUS compared to our old kitchen:


The walls were painted using some kind of faux finish that doesn't look so hot. It also has giant florescent lights in it. Ick! My dream is to paint the walls, sand and paint the cabinets, get new flooring, and replace the florescent lights with some cool track lighting. It will probably be the last thing we get to, though.

We also have a huge unfinished basement that will be Tony's mancave and a big backyard that will probably take a couple of hours to mow. We love it!

I've already picked out the colors I want to paint a few rooms, but I'm having a lot of trouble picking out paint colors for the main living spaces. Tony is leaning more towards greys and blues for the main living spaces, while I am trying to decide if I'm brave enough to paint the living room something bold like cranberry. I think if we did that, it would probably only be an accent wall. But I don't know that I'm actually brave enough this time around! I don't have a particular style yet, although I like things to feel warm and homey. This house turned 100 years old this year, and I really want to honor the old charm of the house with our decorating. If you have any color/decorating ideas, let me know!

I have a lot more to blog about, but I'm limited on time this morning. I have some fun pictures of Ruth I've taken recently that I want to post. I also want to take some pictures of the handyman projects Tony has already completed. He's such a good handyman! My house is a total mess right now as we try to unpack, but I'll take some pictures as we get everything picked up. I'll try to blog more later today or tomorrow! Let me know what you think and if you have any ideas!

Busy, busy

Hello, hello. We've been busy the last couple of weeks. Tony's always working hard with full-time school and work, and during his days off we've been trying to have fun family time. Last week we went on a spontaneous trip to the zoo, which ended up being great because there was hardly anyone there. It was chilly out, but we just did the indoor exhibits, and Ruth had a fun time. She's become much more aware of the animals since last time we went to the zoo in the fall, and I think she's getting more out of it. Yesterday we went to the Nebraska Furniture Mart to look at furniture and appliances, and we have our new washer and dryer and dishwasher picked out.

Everything is still good for us to close on our house on Feb. 19th! So last Saturday I took the list of things that needed to get done before we could start packing and divided them up among all the days this week. (Cleaning out dressers, closets and under-the-bed boxes, etc.) And I haven't done ANY of them yet! I need to get on the ball! I don't feel too bad, though, because I've been much, much busier this week than I expected. I was able to do a little shopping for homeowner's insurance and then pick a provider and get all that squared away. That took more time than I thought it would. We also got our taxes filed, which, again, took longer than expected. I've worked out every day this week so far except for Sunday and I'm feeling good. But I'm getting stressed about all the de-cluttering that needs to get done, so I suppose I should quit blogging and get to it!

I'm leaving you with a video of Ruth. She's recently discovered Tony's book light and likes to wear it as a necklace. I was trying to get some video of her wearing her "necklace" and playing "basketball" (thanks for the suggestion, Jenn), but she stopped playing when I started shooting video. Listen for her new favorite word, "silly," at the end. :)