Our Toy Room.

Here are a few pictures of the toy room.

I have to laugh when I look at these pictures because this room never actually looks like this. 

Because the only time this room is clean is... well, never. :)

But I love it.

I think it turned out bright, fun and organized.

It's one of the first rooms I actually decorated because I don't stress out about it and just do what I want.

And I only keep toys that I like because, like I said, I'm pretty much the only person that cleans this room. (Well, I have to say Annie is getting to be a pretty great cleaner if you can overlook the crying and whining the entire time.)

 This is their dress up corner.

This is where they get dressed up before they (Kate) sneaks out and walks 2 miles barefoot to a friends house. Kate is definitely the sneaky one...

But I have to say one of my favorite parts of this house is my basement.

It's such an awesome space to have, and it's even cool in the summer.

(Hopefully, it's warm in the winter...)

Everyday I live in the house, I love it more.

And I can't wait to show you my latest project... the Garage.

The first thing we did... Paint the House.

When we were talking about which house to buy, I would occasionally call this the Gold House...

As in Cibola- City of Gold, kind of gold.

Every inch of the house was painted gold.

Walls- gold. Ceilings- gold. Closets- gold.

So the first thing we did was paint the house- I mean have the house painted.

Brock found the greatest painter ever- who was so meticulous and so fast.

And not only did the house look so much better- it smelled like new paint and not like weird.

 So here are some after shots... with Tessa applauding.

 I loved how the color toned down the yellow in the wood floors.

And I was so excited with the office.

I wanted to paint it navy blue and the painter tried to talk me out of it.

He told me it would look black.

I told him I didn't want it to look black, but I would like it to look dark blue.

I went for it and I loved it.

And the painter even agreed it looked great.

But it's possible he could have lied to me because I was paying him.

 Brock picked out the grey in our room. 

It turned out perfect, too.

By the way, we totally lucked out on all the colors.

We didn't even test it out.

I looked at colors online and chose them.

I figured anything would look better to me than the gold.

Baby Girl has a Party.

When my cousin Katie moved to Boise, she invited a bunch of people over for Fred's first birthday.
I wanted to be brave like Katie, so we invited a few families from the ward over for a BBQ to celebrate Evie's birthday.

I can't believe how sad it made me to have to accept that Eve is one. The fact that she was a dream baby is probably why I'm having such a hard time with her getting bigger. But it was fun decorating the house for our first party.

 We decorated the deck and put all the food out there. It was SO hot! I was so stressed that it would be too hot, but then 20 minutes before the party started it cooled down. I was so relieved. And then 20 minutes after the party started it started raining- and then 20 minutes later it started POURING. Everyone told us, "Welcome to Spokane!"

 So we moved the party inside- except for the kids. They went to the front porch that's covered. Then they spent the rest of the party playing in the rain on the hill... who knew that thing would be so much fun?

 And then it was time for cake. Eve was absolutely exhausted, but thorougly enjoyed the cupcake.

 And then made it known she was ready for BED!

So in typical Eve fashion, she spent the rest of the party sleeping so I could sit down and talk to the friends... she really is a baby straight from heaven.

Happy Birthday Baby Girl!

The View

Brock was sold on this house the second he saw the view.

I was not impressed.

But that's not totally fair because while he and the agent were enjoying the view, I was still in the car trying to scrub licorice of Tessa's face, hands, arms and elbows with a wet wipe- so I'm not really sure I even saw the view, but I did see the hill-
All I saw was the hill, or cliff as I called it, and pictured my kids tumbling down it.

I told Brock let's go- I didn't even want to see the rest of the house.

He ignored me and continued the tour.

I was annoyed.

Until we got to the storage room and then I was impressed.

It's huge.

But when we got in the car Brock asked me what I thought.

I said, "No."

So for 24 hours we talked about other houses.

Picked other houses.

Changed our minds because we really didn't like any of those houses.

The morning before we left, we took the girls to the park in Liberty Lake that they had begged us to go to the day before.
While the girls sprinted off to the park I told Brock,
"This is where I want to live. I love it here. It's gorgeous."

And he looked at me (like I was crazy) and said, "Then why don't you like my house?! It's right here."

And then one of the girls started screaming and he walked over to fix it.

I sat there thinking... why don't I like his house?
I then tried to actually remember the house and as it came back to me- I realized it was the perfect floor plan.
Four bedrooms upstairs- Master on the main- Formal dining and office- walk out basement and you remember the storage room.

So I told Brock we could drive past it again.

And it was beautiful.

The morning sun was shining on it and it was like a sign from Heaven.

"This is the house."

But I wasn't done fighting yet.

We walked around to the backyard so I could make my case about the cliff.

Brock proceeded to point out the part of the hill he thought the kids would stop rolling.

But if I was being completely honest with myself the hill wasn't as steep as I remembered and the yard was bigger than I thought.

But I said, "We need a bigger yard. This yard is small"

And then Heaven said, "You don't like yard work. This yard is the perfect size."

Guess what. Heaven was totally right.

It didn't take long before I was sold.

It really was an amazing house and we all know Brock can talk anyone into anything.

So on the way home we made an offer and it was done.

^^^^^

But the thing that has surprised me the most about the house is as much as I love all the practical things, like that storage room, I really am in love with the view- especially the sky.

Sometimes it's so beautiful I swear it looks just a screen saver.

The other night there was a lightening storm that rolled in from the west. It was awesome/scary watching it come in. I'm not sure if I've ever appreciated the sky like I do now. It really is gorgeous.

^^^^^

Plus, I learned an important lesson.

When Brock and Heaven are telling you to do something...

You might as well just do it.

Because they were totally right.

This is the house- the house with a view.