Strawberries!

On Monday we made our annual strawberry-picking trip to Underwood Farms with our friends Heather and Libi. It used to be our annual MOPS trip, but this year the MOPS trip was on a school day for Cora. But since Heather used to plan all our Underwood trips for MOPS, it's fitting that we went with her this year, too. Our friend Lynnette and her girls and mother also came along.
Heather is an avid - and gifted - photographer. I'm stealing all these from her, since they are so much better than mine! I love the smiles she captured from Cora. Isn't she looking grownup these days? Much less of a baby face. (Sniff!)

Here the girls are, ready and waiting for the tractor and wagon to take us out to the field. Cora thought it hilarious when Libi put her strawberry box on her head. Elyz wasn't so sure.

Everyone's doing it, Mom. All the cool kids have boxes on their heads.

Violet's so cool, she doesn't need a box.

Yum!

Look who's almost 1!

Libi, Cora and Elyz might all be four, but they're ready to get on the bus for school!

Boring, and some videos

After all the excitement and quick progress during our official Kitchen Week, the past week was very normal.
A tad boring.
Kind of like the day after Christmas (or the day after Boxing Day, I suppose!).

On the positive side, I had a friend and her little boy Ezra over for a few hours. We had a nice time catching up, and Ezra and Violet played very well. They were hospital mates, born just a day apart.

Stace and I both worked on kitchen projects during the week. I cleaned out things to get them sorted and put away, and Stace worked on the million-and-one little things that remain.

I'm happy to report that the living room is now free of boxes of kitchen gear! We are just about ready to move the old cabinetry out of the dining room and into the garage.

I also went through my shoes and the girls' shoes. See? Boring. But I thought I'd photograph it for posterity. I picked out probably six or seven pairs of my own to shed, mostly loafers and shoes I used to wear to the Valley Press in my former life. And I went through the boxes of shoes for Cora and Violet, to pull out what will now fit them and better organize the rest.

Yes, we have nearly as many pairs as Payless.

Finally, since the above is all so very boring, I leave you, my dear readers, with videos of Violet talking (she has at least a half-dozen words now) and Cora playing her favorite Nemo Finding game with her favorite orange plastic fish.

Cora is pretending she is the little girl in the movie, who is coming to get Nemo and take him to her home. She reenacts this particular scene many times per day, and is often needing a different bag, or a different twist-tie to close the bag, to keep Nemo in.

From the Garden

Though we haven't had time to work in the garden much these past few months, we are blessed to be enjoying the fruit of past labor...


Stace has redone the strawberry patch several times, and now it is taking off.

Cora collected the fruit in the bowl Friday evening.




Our grapevine is looking very healthy, with lots of little baby grape clusters forming.

Elsewhere, the spring flowers are beautiful too.



Our Pink Lady Hawthorn bushes are a burst of pink, just as they are all over SClarita. I love this time of year!



We've also had a gorgeous crop of purple and yellow irises - thanks Mom, who gave us the cuttings a couple of years ago.

Cora and Violet's new house

Despite how it must look on the blog, Stace wasn't all-work-and-no-play during our Kitchen Week.

We went out for several meals, watched two DVDs (Megamind with Cora and The Social Network last night) and enjoyed our first barbecue of the year.

Stace also turned the pantry cardboard box into this wonderful playhouse for his girls!

You can see by Cora's smile how happy she was to see it. It has kept the girls busy and happy for four days now!

The girls have played in the house individually, and together. Violet especially loves playing peekaboo with the door and all the windows.

Decorating the house became a high priority for Cora.

She first put up construction-paper curtains and purple icicles. She taped up pictures of Nemo and some flower petals.

Then, she and Ave and Johnny went to town with markers and crayons.

Cora brings inside her toys, a battery powered lantern and her blanket and pillow.

Sunday night, we got the girls dressed for bed and they had bezzert inside the house. What fun!

I absolutely love the last few photos, from their snack time together. It's these moments of seeing our girls loving each other, loving being together, that make the hard work of parenthood worthwhile.

All in and All Done...

OK, not completely all done, but we're getting there!

In only two days, Stace and his trusty assistants installed all 16 cabinets. What a transformation.
Stace with his Official Screw Passer-Outer

Hanging the last cabinet!

The cabinet fitting was completed Thursday evening. Stace spent Friday ordering the under-cabinet lights and instant hot-water dispenser, installing the knobs and pantry roll-out shelves, and finishing a few other loose ends.

Now that the big exciting things are over, Stace still has a number of little jobs to do - plumbing, molding and trim, tile backsplash, lighting... As Sue put it, a man's work is never done!

The countertop people will be out Tuesday morning to measure, and the counters will go in the following week. Since the sink is a seamless part of the counter, we will be without a sink for about two more weeks. Still, we are thrilled to see the kitchen taking shape!

And, I must add, thanks to so many of you for leaving your encouraging comments and compliments!

Wall cabinets - check!

Stace and Cora started their day with breakfast out, and a trip to Home Depot.

Their favorite kind of daddy-daughter dates! Home Depot's jelly bean machine has nothing to do with it, I'm sure!

Then, it was on to the wall cabinets. First order of business was screwing in the wooden support.

And before too long, bingo - our first cabinet was hanging proudly.

Stace ordered some necessities online from a company that produced some very helpful how-to videos - but he left it a bit late and they weren't shipped until Monday, from Florida.

Wouldn't you know it, the box arrived while he and Cora were at Home Depot! Just in time.

From the videos, he learned about these great clamps that proved very useful.

When I asked Stace what I should be sure to include in this post, he mentioned the clamps.

I don't know what else to say about them. They are orange.

But, for my three readers who understand the importance of awesome clamps, these photos are for you.






My parents were over today to help. We planned this week off around my mom's spring break from school, and my dad took the week off, as well.




Grandpa isn't by nature a do-it-yourselfer, but he was a brilliant worker and Stace really appreciated his help.


Installing the microwave was a little tricky, as was putting up the pantry. That is one huge unit.


I'm excited to start filling it!





Before his day was through, Stace installed his second base cabinet - the small one next to the pantry that will help form a little desk area.





Another tool he's found indispensable is this laser level.





The base unit in the lights-off photo is so perfectly level, it's split the 1/8 inch laser line.




And, finally, the finished product of today's work. Phew! That was a lot to get done in a day!

...and Color!

We love our paint choice.

Between the cabinets and tile backsplash, you actually won't see all that much of it.

But Stace felt strongly about painting all the walls.















Before bed, we marked the walls for where the cabinets will be installed. With a midnight finish, it was our latest night working yet.




Meanwhile, while Stace and I painted, Grandma and Grandpa took the girls to the Wildlife Learning Center.

They spoke highly of it, so we'll have to take a trip there ourselves once life gets back to normal.

Cora spent a lot of time with the reptiles, and even touched a big snake. Violet loved pointing at the animals, too - they all were "doggies."

Priming...

This is Kitchen Week. By week's end, cabinets or bust!

Stace went to work Monday, because it was priming day, and I can prime.

Mel came over to help with the girls, and she and Cora did a bit of painting, too.

By Tuesday morning, we had a fully white room.

The weekend's work

Finished copper pipes behind the sink - yes, Stace is a plumber.

All drywalled, taped, mudded (is that a word?), and ready for texture spray.

Cora helping Dad protect the floor. The compressor for the texture spray gun is in the foreground - thanks, Keith, for letting us borrow it!

Spraying the ceiling with new texture to mask where the old florescent light box was.