And in the sleeping chamber

I'll add one more room to my house tour for now.  I still have the other 2 bedrooms to add later--and my scrapbook nook, but those will have to wait.

Like some of the rest of the rooms, this one still has some unfinished things that need done.  If I waited on everything that needs done then, well there probably would be no pictures of the house!  Some things I (can) do, some things I can't, (or won't) ha!

One of those things is painting, which I'm perfectly capable of doing.  However my husband is a pro at it, and what would take him 2 hours would take me 8.  Why would I want to waste that kind of time?

Besides, I like to make him feel useful and needed.

On the other hand sometimes a bug bites and I do crazy things that I really should probably wait for him to help on.  For instance the day that I decided I was tired of the way the furniture was arranged in our bedroom, and so I managed to move the big heavy dresser and bed around in our small room all by myself.  I'd never put the wallpaper boarder up, and If I was going to move furniture I knew I might as well get that done at  the same time.

I know he dosen't understand why I can move the furniture around by myself and yet I would prefer that he get the gas in the vehicles for me.

Don't ask me, I have no explanation for that weird quirk.

 Left side of room

Right side of room

 Looking towards doorway from the right.

There you have it.  Yes, it's quite a contrast to our other house where our room was at least 2x this size.  We used the same colors when we re-painted this room as what we had in our house in town.  We really hadn't had them all that long, we chose the colors to match our spread and we weren't tired of them.  Not only that, I had bought the boarder to match and had never put it up in the other house.

Coming up next--
Our family "Thanksgiving" day and a surprise.

Upstairs-Downstairs-

In My Ladies chamber.

That will be tomorrow.

Yesterday I created a sewing room in my upstairs bathroom.

Today I sorted, de-cluttered and cleaned my downstairs bathroom/laundry room.

Our house is 100 years old.  When it was built I'm pretty sure there were no bathrooms inside.  Sometime later these rooms were re-modeled into bathrooms.  We're guessing that the upstairs one was probably originally a bedroom, and the downstairs one was either a sitting room of some sort, or a bedroom.  I'm pretty sure this is why these bathrooms are both so large. There was a door from
the living room into the bathroom, in addition to the door by the kitchen and stairway.

From the doorway--
The large white cupboard was originally in the kitchen. The door into the living room was in the area of the sink.  These were both changed after my sister bought the house.

And yes, this room also holds my huge collection of photo albums. (Just photos) not my scrapbooks.  At least for the time being.

What??  You don't store your picture albums in your bathroom????  Hmmm.  Do you have a better idea where I should keep them?

From  the other side of the room facing the doorway.

 I moved this dresser down from the upstairs bathroom & changed places with the sewing stand.
Plenty of paint projects still need to be done...the wall--the dresser--

I LOVE this saying.  Such a good reminder.  We can be so thankful for "normal" days!

It's a bath...no it's a sewing...

No, lets just call it a multi-purpose room!!

It's been quite a while since I posted some pictures of rooms and I've been really busy lately trying to get some more cleaning out and organizing done.  Unfortunately I seem to make a huge mess in the process, and it causes more dis-organization & work needing to be done in another room.  Sometimes a room that I've already got pretty much gone thru.  Seems to be the story of my life tho.  After all, I'm *only* a stay at home mom, what else would I do, right?  RIGHT.

One of the biggest problems joys in my life is that I love creating and have way too many hobbies and things I want to do. (When I hear people say they are bored, I just grit my teeth & roll my eyes.  smile politely and wonder what they do with their time.)  There is just not enough time in my life to do all the things I want to do, and NO time to be bored!  Oh yeah, blogging comes under creating in case you were wondering!

Back to my house.  Remember-- we moved last spring.  Remember-- we moved FROM a huge house, TO a small house. Remember-- I have stuff.  Alot of stuff.  I don't mind going thru my stuff, but I hate getting rid of my stuff.  So I keep it, store it--but sooner or later something has to be done with it, or....

#1 it will get filthy from barn dirt,
#2 it will get broken or torn, or messed up from people digging around looking for other STUFF
#3 it will get wet
#5 it will get ruined by mice, dogs or cats.
#6 if nothing else, it's likely to get thrown away if my husband or kids get too tired of having it in their way.
#7 And help us all if my daughter comes home at Christmas time and decides SHE needs to help me go thru it!

I worked lately on my scrapbooking nook & supplies and got them the space under control, but didn't get around to taking a picture of it.  Now I've messed it up a bit because....  (there's always SOME excuse ya know)

Anyway I've been sewing again lately!  I use to sew.  Loved it and made lots of clothes and other things over the years.  For many years I had a quilting machine and did custom quilting.  I've made a lot of friendship quilts for friends, but for the last 10 years there's been very little sewing.  Now the bug has hit again, and I had no space to work except my dining room, and that's a bit inconvenient a lot of the time.

After racking my brain on where I could make myself a sewing spot.  After crossing off the barn (too cold, dirty & unfinished) and the basement ,(too damp and dark) I came up with basically 2 choices.  My downstairs bathroom, or my upstairs bathroom.

Now I know that probably sounds really strange, but
#1. I'm desperate here.
#2.  I have 2 really big bathrooms
#3.  I believe in utilizing space
#4.  If you don't have something and you want something, figure it out, and make it work!

(I'm really in to #4.  I grew up this way--blame it on my mother. Or being poor.  Or something.)

I didn't take before photos, not much was changed except a dresser where the sewing machine now is.
And, I still have a couple boxes on the shelf of non-sewing STUFF that has to be gone thru.  But, I have my space and I'm quite happy.

We didn't do anything to this room when we moved in except put the two white cabinets on the wall for storage. The colors matched my bathroom decor anyway, so we left it the way it was for now.

 The sewing room from the doorway

 Sewing room from the bathroom

 The bathroom/tub

 The bathroom sink/stool

Looking out the door to the hallway.

There you go.  Mission accomplished.
Oh, you wondered why I didn't put it in my downstairs bathroom?
My Laundry room is in there.  :)

Thanksgiving day

I love Fall.  I love the colors, the feel of the season & the beautiful autumn decor that abounds.  It's why I started decorating my house for the seasons because I started collecting all those "feel-good" colors of oranges, yellows, reds & browns.  It warms me & gives me a comfort feeling.

Thanksgiving has always been our familys special holiday to get together on.  This holiday goes right along with the warm fuzzy feel-good feelings! Family, friends, food & fun along with all those great colors even if the weather has already turned cold and looks like winter.

  A first holiday in a "new" house is always special too.  Special gatherings, holidays, company for meals seem to cement the "making the house a home" feeling.

Because all my side of the family had other plans this year and my married girls were with their husband's familys, we invited a few others to be with us and our two older boys.  It worked out for some of Leon's family to be with us this year too. 

 There was alot of this going on--

 The waiting Living room was full of people.

 The baby was happy (and cute!)

Our company was delightful (Too bad I didn't get Duane in this one too!)

 The food was plentiful!

 The baby  was kissable.  (Did I mention  so cute?!)

 We had 6 kids between the ages of 3 and 6!

 The tables were full

 And desserts were waiting.

 I do believe this is the first time in over 30 years we've shared Thanksgiving with you Lori!  The only other time I remember is the year before Leon and I were married.  So glad your family got to come--and join us!

On the other hand, as many great pictures as my kids get just PLAYING with my camera--WHY when I deliberately give them the camera and permission to take lots of pictures do I generally only get goofy-unfocused ones?

Moments to love

A couple weeks ago when we were in Sidney for a long weekend with our kids I decided to surprise Kyrie and pick her up from school.  It was a beautiful day, so Kara and I walked--and I handed off my camera to Kara.

Let them be little

-- Let them sleep in the middle  

And somehow she does end up in the middle even tho there was only 2 of us!

She's so still my "baby" even tho she's 9, and tries very hard to keep up with the rest of the kids.  Last night everyone else had plans & she was feeling very tired & a bit left out, and so when she asked me with big sad puppy eyes if she could sleep with me, and it was a Friday night too. How could I resist!

After all--

I can remember when you fit in the palm of my hand
Felt so good in it, no bigger than a minute
How it amazes me, you're changing with every blink
Faster than a flower blooms they grow up all too soon

So let them be little 'cause they're only that way for a while
Give them hope, give them praise, give them love every day
Let them cry, let them giggle, let them sleep in the middle
Oh just let them be little

I've never felt so much in one little tender touch
I live for those kisses, prayers and your wishes
Now that you're teaching me things only a child can see
Every night while we're on our knees all I ask is please

Let them be little 'cause they're only that way for a while
Give them hope, give them praise, give them love every day
Let them cry, let them giggle, let them sleep in the middle
Oh just let them be little

So innocent, a precious soul, you turn around
It's time to let them go

So let them be little 'cause they're only that way for a while
Give them hope, give them praise, give them love every day
Let them cry, let them giggle, let them sleep in the middle
Oh just let them be little

Let them be little

She's 16-

She's Beautiful-

and she's mine.  (well, ours-on loan anyway)

Meshayla turned 16 back in September.  Sixteenth birthdays seem like quite a milestone, and it's always fun to do something special.
Our convention is in September, and also I was leaving on my trip in September and Morgen and Meshayla were both going to stay with their older sister  in Sidney while I was gone and somehow we needed to squeeze a birthday celebration into the month too.  When I found out that all the kids were going to be able to come to York this year along with the advantage of it being a holiday on Monday after, we started making plans for a surprise party for Meshayla on Sunday night.
I might add that it's very hard to pull a surprise off in this family--too many people, SOMETHING or SOMEONE always slips up.

Well, this is true except when you intend for everyone to know something and assume that they do, then SOMEONE DIDN'T find out when they were suppose to.  (Note--don't ever assume)

Anyway, amazingly no one let it slip, and we pulled off the surprise party.  Amazing.  As was the cake that Lynisha made and brought with her, leaving it here at the house on their way to York.

Meshayla and her "twin-cousin" Rebecca have celebrated their birthdays together since they were 3 years old.  This year Rebecca is living in AZ, and so she wasn't here on their birthdays.
When she came back on her school break the girls got to spend some time together, and took a whole bunch of pictures of the two of them (with help from Morgen.)

Here's a few of my favorites they took.

To celebrate their birthday together, my sis and I took the girls on a girls day out to shop & eat before Rebecca went back to AZ

Happy happy 16th year to both of you!

  ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥