Lets Head Downstairs...

So we are back at the entryway, heading downstairs. I LOVE these pictures of the boys. My original thought was to hang these in our bedroom but once I got them in their frames I knew they had to go here. They just fit so well and helps out this HUGE wall.

So this is standing on the bottom step looking straight ahead. When we rented out the basement we put a door that went from the left side of the laundry room door to the right side of the stairs. When we did laundry, we had to go into the renters space. Thankfully she worked pretty regular hours so I got pretty good at staying on top of the laundry so that I didn't have to disturb her. The bathroom back there is the one that the boys claim. They are also the lucky ones who get to clean it. It doesn't get perfectly clean but I don't have to deal with the mess that gets created by three young boys. Ha!

We found this sign while getting our Christmas tree a couple of years ago. I thought it was cute so Dean bought it for me and it now hangs in the laundry room. Last year for Mother's Day Dean redid the laundry room for me. (The old post of that is here) Below is a picture of the room "in use" today. It functions SO much better than the old one. Once again I wish we had been better about taking before and after pictures.

Back out into the hall way, the laundry room is on my left and the stairs are on my right. The door frame on the right is the toy closet, the boys' room is straight ahead, and the falmily room is the doorway on the left.

Below is one side of the toy closet, aka toy store. The other side of the closet has more shelves and more toys. They boys and I are going to sort through and get rid of some toys before school starts again. (We just went through the game closet upstairs and they did great getting rid of things!)

So here is their room. Jake had really wanted a space room so we found a really dark blue and then decided that we needed to add another color so that it wouldn't be a total cave in there. He had gotten a lot of different space posters for one of his birthdays so wall decor was a breeze. There are also planets hanging from the ceiling though I am ready to take those down. Saturn has already lost its rings, Jupiter fell down, and last night I noticed that Uranus is only half a globe.

Jake gets the upper bed, Austin is below, and we just moved Griff down here and he gets a mattress on the floor. They are doing great together so far though we are already seeing that the day is coming soon when Jake is going to want his own space.

The white shelves below are the storage place for all of Austin's creations. He loves, loves, loves to build things with Legos and Knex. They are usually some type of spaceship. The paper bag on the floor is filled with his other favorite type of creation...paper airplanes.

As I've said before, one of THE BEST things about this house is the storage. Every bedroom has walk-in closets. This one goes all the way under the stairs (down to the very last step!) The little curtain hides the storage of our winter stuff and other odds and ends that needed a home. There are shelves to the left and right of the door which hold all of the boys' clothes and their Legos and K'nex (that is so the little ones at playgroup can't get to the tiny toys). Oh, by the way, Griffen is doing his rockstar drummer thing in this picture.

Finally we come to the family room. It is quickly becoming one of my favorite rooms. Dean finally got his wish after this last Christmas and got recessed lights for in here. I finally got my wish for the wall of shelves. They aren't quite finished yet. We are still trying to figure out what we want to use for the counter top. We think we want to find some wood flooring (at the Re-Store) to put on it. I am just happy to have a place for our books, movies, and the boys' video games.

The windows down here are what the windows upstairs used to look like. Aluminum windows and no trim. The cupboards down here are so handy for craft stuff and art supplies for the boys (not that they are really into crafts, but I am ready should they want to make something. Ha!)

Below is the fireplace. Dean did the surround a couple of years ago. Before is was just two sheets of metal. And we now have our official baby gate around it just as required by the state. It is nice knowing the kids can't get too close to it now though because it gets REALLY HOT when there is a fire in it. Dean finished up the touch up painting today after I took pictures (I just realized this as I see a big white spot on the hallway wall next to the toy closet.)

So that is where we live. I hope you have enjoyed the tour of the inside. If I think about it I will try to get some pictures of the outside too.

Let's Finish the Upstairs Tour...

I couldn't find the pictures of the this room before it was our office so you'll just have to trust me that this room has seen the biggest change since we moved in. When we first moved here this room was a sun room or basically a closed in portion of the deck. The windows in the picture above went almost all the way to the floor and the "outside" of the wall that it shared with the kitchen had the shingle siding on it. When we had Griffen, we were still renting the basement out and didn't really have a room for him so we insulated, added new windows, sheet rock and changed the door (just a screen door before) and it became a nursery. It was the perfect little nursery. There was a counter that I think had been a potting bench of sorts that was the perfect height for a changing table. And it was great to be able to peek in on him through the windows. Now it is our office and also where my scrapbooking stuff has landed and it works really well for that too.

Above is the new door out to the deck. It never gets used as there is usually something in the way AND it still hasn't been painted. Below is the counter/desk area. The the wall at the backside of the shelves slants in toward the room so the bottom shelf is thinner than the top. Kinda of a weird thing to work with but it still holds things :).

Now lets head down the hall toward the bedrooms. A super great thing about this house is that there is a TON of storage. The woman we bought this house from lived next door before she had this house built. Next door is small with no storage which she more than compensated for in this house. There are FOUR closets in the hallway (two on each side). The bedrooms are at the end of the hall. This is the boys' old room as you walk in the door. This was the very first room that we painted and decorated. I had been wanting to give them a fun room for so long that I had a great time with the airplane theme. Our renter at the time came up and helped me paint the clouds.

The airplane kite was a great find at the beach one year. I think that this room won't look like this much longer as we change it to be a little girls room. I am a little sad to see this go away but I know that it needs to be painted again anyway.

The cloud above the crib is my favorite. It was the first one painted and I think the one that turned out the best. Right now I am thinking about how I want to change it into a little girl's room. I think I am going to paint it a light pink and then use a light purple, light green, and other colors to make it like a garden with flowers and bugs (cute ones).

The last room upstairs is our room. I still REALLY like the red but I need to figure out what to put on the huge wall behind our bed. This room, as usual, is the last one on the decorating list.

We (Dean) put in the french door that goes out onto the deck. It was just a large window (the same width as the double door) before. After Dean built the deck we knew it was just a matter of time before we put the door in. Dean was just commenting on how much cooler our room gets at night during the heat now that we have the door.

That doorway leads to our bathroom and closet. The bathroom is just a plain old ordinary bathroom but it sure felt like living in the lap of luxury when we moved in. The last house we lived in only had one bathroom and it was downstairs, not the best thing when pregnant and needing to go down the old staircase at night multiple times. Ha!

So that is the upstairs. As soon as I get the downstairs a little more presentable I will show you around there too. Hopefully that will be in the next day or two.

Come into the Kitchen for a Latte...

There are two ways into our kitchen. The first, and probably most used, is the door to the right of the stairs as you come up to the main floor. This picture above was taken from that doorway. That's my desk there with the all-important cork boards above that hold all of the necessary things I need to know (mostly school stuff for the boys). The picture below is also from the doorway and shows one of my favorite things in the kitchen...the pot rack. It gained me some much needed cupboard space. My sweet hubby even crawled through the attic to put in the supports we needed to hang it.

We did a fair amount of work changing things in here about 7 years ago. We painted the cupboards, which use to be the early 80s brown, and added the hardware to them. We painted the walls which we would like to repaint but are fine with it for now. Changed the light fixtures, above the sink there used to be a "lovely" fluorescent box light. And the biggest change, besides the appliances, was the flooring which used to be a hideous multipurpose brown carpet. YUCK! We still have a wish list but when we talk about changing the sink (tired of the 30 year old stained one) it grows to while we're at it we might as well do the counters. But then why put nice new counters on the beat up old cabinets....etc. So, here we are and that is fine since the "wish list" seems a bit spendy right now.

One of my other favorite things is our pantry, below. It is big and has a counter that things like the bread machine can stay on. The best thing though are the doors that can close on any mess in there. We have talked about the possibility of knocking this area out and making an island to open the kitchen up to the living room. There I times I think I would love that but then I think I would really miss this pantry.

When we first moved in, we had this dining area as the play area. I figured that since I spent a lot of time in the kitchen what better place to have the boys play in. That only lasted a little while until we got tired of digging spilled food out of the carpet in the dining room. The little yellow room off of the dining room is our office. I will post pictures of that tomorrow because I am hoping to find some older pictures of that room too. The picture below is of a quilt wall hanging that my mom made for me for my birthday one year. I still really love it and it goes well in here. This room gets used A LOT, as most kitchens do. There are times when I wish it was a bit bigger but really, it is a great kitchen with lots of light and space. Thanks for coming to see our kitchen. Hopefully I can find the pictures I want to find for tomorrows tour.

Welcome to Our House....Come on In!

Once you step into our house you are on a small landing in our stairwell. The house is a split level but not in the traditional sense. You only have to go up about 5 stairs to get to the main floor but need to go down about 1o to get to the basement. Anyway, the picture above is the view into the house as you come in. The picture below is just about the best find from Ikea. We were in need of some way to contain the large pile of shoes that were collecting by the front door since they made the small entry even smaller. While at Ikea we found this shoe keeper. It looks great, holds lots of shoes, and doesn't take up much space!

As you walk into the living room we have our bookcase along the wall. Once again Ikea came through with a very useful piece of furniture. When we first moved into this house we rented the basement out and these shelves helped contain the many baby toys that seemed to multiply and take over. They actually still hold some baby toys that get played with when playgroup comes over.

Around the corner, to the right of the shelves is what is supposed to be the dining room. We did use it as that when we first moved in but it quickly changed to the toy area and now is just a part of the living room. The piano (the one I used as a kid) fits pretty well there.

The picture below is taken from the door to the deck (by the piano). I like how cozy this room feels. I still like the color we painted it, which happens to be called Griffin (a fact we remembered awhile after he was born). I also like how light it usually is in here. There are so many windows (6 plus the door).
I wish we had been better at taking before and after pictures of the house. When we first moved in, there was a freestanding woodstove in the middle of the wall where the tree picture is now. It was on a big brick platform that stuck out into the room. It was a lot of fun tearing that out! The other major difference was that the woman who lived here (and had the house built) had wall-to-wall curtains in this room. They literally started in one corner and went across the wall and around the next corner and past the door. We took those down the first day! Oh....Dean also did all of the trim around these windows when we replaced the windows. Before it was the 70s/80s no-trim look with a little strip of laminate on the window sills.

So...there is the first stop in our tour. Come and make yourself comfortable and we can chat for awhile. Tomorrow we can head to the kitchen and I'll make you a latte!

Our Little Taste of Foster Care

Last Tuesday night, after I got off work, I picked up a very sweet little girl from her daycare. Dean and I knew that it was just a five day thing while her foster family was going camping and I thought it was a good way to get our feet wet as foster parents. Talking to Dean about it a little tonight we both thought things went well. She was a very, very quiet little girl and didn't show much reaction to things. She would have times that she would smile or even laugh, usually with the boys, but overall was really quiet and just watched us. One of my favorite moments was when she walked over to the windows, pointed out to where the boys were playing, and said, "byz" with a smile. She hadn't said more than "no" and "mine" for the three days before.

I think the thing that surprised me (and Dean too) was how well the boys did with her. They were amazing! They were always looking out for her and showing her things around the house. They would find toys for her and show her how to play with them. They were so gentle and loving toward her. My heart nearly burst when Austin asked me if we were "going to keep her until she was all grown up." When I explained that she was only staying for a few days and that her foster family was going to pick her up on Sunday, he asked if we would get her back after a little while and then keep her. How sweet is that? It does make me wonder how the boys might handle kiddos coming and possibly going. I guess this is another thing to pray for and leave to God's perfect timing and knowledge. Only He knows what we can handle. I am just so thankful for the sweetness my boys showed and I know, even more now, that the little girl who is to be apart of our family is going to have three amazing protectors!

I think for Dean and I, the last five days showed us that we can herd four kids like we herd our three. Ha! It was a bit of an adjustment to have diapers to change again but it was also fun to watch her try things and watching her walk and run was about THE cutest thing ever. I think that it WAS a great way to get started and was a very positive five days for our whole family.

Ah...the Lazy Days of Summer

The weather has been so great the last few days that we finally dug out the swimming pool yesterday. The boys were so excited that they couldn't wait until it was all filled before getting in. We had talked about going to the aquatic center yesterday as our family adventure but it was so hot that we thought it was silly to swim indoors so we stayed home and played in our little pool instead. I even got in at one point though it was quite an adjustment since the water basically felt like it was a melted iceberg.

The boys didn't mind one bit and really had fun. They played in it more today and even got into a huge splashing contest. Hopefully the weather will continue to be great and we can enjoy the pool for awhile longer.

We also went across the street for a little while today. Jake and Austin decided after about 3 minutes that it was too hot to be there and they headed back home. Griff and I and our little girl for the week stayed and played for awhile. I did take pictures but as she is a foster kiddo we aren't able to post them on the web so you will just have to take my word that she is adorable and had fun at the park.

This week I am hoping to get some pictures taken of our house and do some posts with them. I read a blog that was doing "Show us Where You Live Fridays" and I thought it was a great idea but I didn't do any at that time. While in Wenatchee, I was talking to my cousin who said that I should do some posts of the house and looking at my "official" followers, 4 out of the 6 haven't been here and the 5th hasn't been here in a couple of years so I will try to do that this week. In theory it should be the perfect week since Jake and Austin will be at day camp all week and the house SHOULD stay clean longer than it has been. So...there...I have committed to it and now have to do it. I will also do a post on our first little week of fostering.

Hope you all are having fun in the sun!

We're Still Here! Really, We Are!

June always seems to go by in a big blur. The boys finished up school on the 18th. They both had great years. Austin's teachers mentioned at how much he has grown (maturity wise) since he started with them in 1st grade. Jacob had a few moments of being sad that he wasn't going to have his teacher again next year. She was a fantastic teacher and we are already hoping that Austin will get her in two years. June also brings Royal Family Kids Camp which usually means that I disappear for at least a week or two as I get ready for another week of doing Breakfast Club. For those of you not familiar with RFKC (though most of my family is :)) it is a camp for abused and neglected kids. They get to spend a week at camp just being kids with adults who pour the love of Jesus on them. I have been helping with the planning of a particular part of camp called Breakfast Club for awhile now. This is an activity time when the counselors go to a meeting and the rest of the staff is helping out. At our camp (there are camps all around the world) we break the kids up into 6 groups and they rotate through different activities like crafts, games, stories, and the ever popular cooking (they get to help make stuff and eat it too). This year was a great camp and things seemed to run so smoothly. The kids had a great week.

June also brought an end to pictures. The battery in my camera or its charger has stopped working so I didn't get any pictures in June. Thankfully, I found our old camera so I do have some pictures to share.


The boys and I traveled to Wenatchee the weekend of the 4th of July. My grandma had been really sick and my aunt brought her to the hospital in Wenatchee. We got to visit with her for awhile and see some relatives too. Grandma looks very thin but she seemed spunky and had fun talking with us while we were there. She is going to move to an assisted living place in Wenatchee soon (I think even this week) so she will be closer to my aunt and uncle and cousins. I am glad that she is going to be closer to family and not on her own anymore.

This past Friday, we started our "Friday Family Adventures" (I just named it that). Dean and I decided that we needed to make a point of getting out and doing fun things with the boys and since I don't work Fridays and Dean can sometimes make Fridays shorter, it seemed like a good choice. This Friday we decided to try Letterboxing again. We found all kinds of clues for boxes hidden around our area and, with the Sims, we chose to head up to Western's campus as there were 3 or 4 boxes there.


Well... we followed the clues to the first box and hunted all around the rocks but couldn't find anything. Since the clue said that the box had been hidden back in 2005 we figured it wasn't around anymore. So we set off following the clues for number two.


We found the tree that it should have been in but once again were disappointed. The tree looked as if it had been pruned so my guess was that a grounds keeper found it and didn't know it was a letterbox and got rid of it. So we hoped for a find at number three.


The kids raced up the hill, found the stump, but once again no box. Bummer! We walked around campus a little more and then decided to go pick up some food and take it to Boulevard Park. We got pizza for the kids while Toni and Jason got some Thai food for us adults. (Pad Thai...yummmmmm!) I also remembered that we had printed off clues for a box at Boulevard. Thankfully this one also included a "last found" date which was just three days before. After dinner we started looking. When we reached the end of the clues, the kids raced to where the box should be and very soon we heard Jordan yell, "Found it!"


There was a great stamp with a salmon and the name of the park on it. Unfortunately for us (the Hendricksons) we forgot to grab our log book and stamp from the car which was at the completely opposite end of the park. Oh well, we will just have to go back and refind it!

Well, we have a busy week ahead as we are going to provide respite care for a little foster girl from Tuesday through Sunday. She goes to my friends daycare and has come to playgroup here a few times. It seems like a good way for us to get our feet wet.

We hope you all are enjoying your summer!