Our New England Home

*disclaimer* I am not an interior designer/decorator and I am not a photographer. This post is purely for the purpose of showing curious family and friends what our little home looks like inside. :)  

I posted this picture awhile back, but here it is again. Cute, huh?

It was built in 1900.

 front entry way - isn't the banister gorgeous?! The woodwork is so beautiful - I wish I had a close-up! And do you see the cool little stained glass window on the right?

Here's a close up of the front of the front door - I love the blue. And I love the crocheted valance in the window pane.

 The parlor - I was so excited to have a room I could call the parlor - I'm living the Jane Austen dream :).

 The parlor (view from the dining room)

Isn't our piano perfect for the parlor. This was Aaron's family's piano growing up. (He is the only who still plays, so he got to inherit it - lucky us!) It used to be a player piano and has tune dates from the early 1900's (possibly even late 1800's) - COOL!!! Unfortunately, the humidity has not been kind to this piano, but hopefully it's something we can fix later on down the road.

Dining room (view from parlor)

A close up of the china hutch I got for FREE a couple weekends ago (my neighbor couldn't sell it at her garage sale and said she would rather have me haul it off for free than to have to take it back down to her basement).
And I got all this pretty china (for the girls' tea parties) for $6 at a consignment store! Isn't it so pretty - I'm sure I'll be collecting more.

kitchen from the front - we totally lucked out again and got a large kitchen with plenty of cupboards. (It's definitely been updated in the last 100 years)

 kitchen from family room (back of house)

 Family room - TV/library side (We just bought our first TV a couple weeks ago - pretty exciting. By the way, this TV is the ONLY piece of furniture in all of these pictures that we have actually purchased - everything else has been given to us.)

 Family room - girls' side - crafts, etc

 itty bitty teeny weeny half bath off of family room

That's basically all of the downstairs (except I didn't show you the laundry closet) and there's not much to see of the upstairs. It's just three little bedrooms with beds and dressers - nothing unique (except some peeling lead paint).

Oh, I will show you a shot of the upstairs full bath (the only full bath). It's way tiny also, but for the first few days it was my favorite room in this home - it's probably the most updated room in the house, the cleanest, and it didn't stink, didn't have peeling paint (in fact new paint) and even though I don't LOVE the yellow color - it is a happy color.

Oh yeah, and one more picture from the girls' room

A furry little friend we found in their room yesterday morning - caught in one of those sticky spider/mouse traps. So sad! It was making the most forlorn little squeaks and the girls were just about in tears over it - they wanted to keep it. Aaron "helped it" later that day find it's way "home".

Just the two of us

Now that Carly and Ellie are in school all day, it's just me and Aubree now. It's a little weird - but good-weird. :)

Here's what we've been up to:

 Going to the beach

(I have a similar picture of Ellie wearing this same swimming suit back here.)

 We've been going on walks - Aubree and I both feel a little weird just being the two of us, so she usually brings her baby. :)

 We're also doing a preschool group (really just music and movement) with some other moms and kids in our ward - this was her first day. She was so excited to go to her own preschool.

I just love this little girl - every picture of her that I ever take turns out so cute!

Aubree still takes a nap, so I get a couple hours where it's just me.
Aside from regular, I've done more internetting (probably too much) and I read this book


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 We have a book club in my ward and this is the book we are discussing tonight. It's a non-fiction about people who are outliers (people whose achievements fall outside normal experience, such as Bill Gates or the Beatles), and how they become outliers. It's really made me think. I'm really looking forward to the discussion tonight - and a chance to have a GNO (I think Book Club counts)!

I'm still waiting for my life to get really organized and productive, but the time just slips by so fast (probably the internetting). :) I guess I'm learning that an organized and productive life doesn't just happen (even if kids are in school all day), I still have to work at it.

Nanny Nette and Grandpa came!!!

My parents came to visit the week of Carly's birthday and baptism. This was their last week before their mission in Salt Lake City. We kept their visit a secret from the girls, so when Nanny Nette and Grandpa came knocking at our front door, the girls were super surprised!

Our first excursion was to go to the Gillette Castle here in Connecticut. It was the home of William Gillette - the most famous Sherlock Holmes on stage in the early 1900's. He designed this home and it had so many interesting and detailed features. It was very gothic and dark looking, but so so cool! (My parents were in Europe for a month over the summer, so I'm sure this was nothing in comparison to what they saw there. But for us homebodies it was pretty neat!)

 The girls had their first day of school on Wednesday! They were both a little nervous, but also super excited. It was nice to have N. Nette and G'pa there for this big day.

One day we just drove around Rhode Island enjoying the landscape and the enormous, gorgeous homes.

We found this little evergreen tree near Misquamicut Beach in Rhode Island. They decorate it with lost and found beach toys - funny huh?

My parents don't just relax when they come to visit - they get to work. I don't think they know how to just sit around - they're always doing something helpful. Aside from the regular things grandparents do, like shop and play and cook, these are the projects my parents got accomplished while here:
My Mom cleaned the house every day. She went out shopping everyday - groceries, clothes, miscellaneous..., And on Saturday she made a double batch of cookies and a pan of brownies, just because the girls wanted some. (She also wanted to make homemade mints and an apple pie, but I didn't have all the ingredients.) My dad put up a clothes line, installed curtains in parlor and dining room, installed sink aerator (disposal), and fixed a lamp. My parents are such hard workers and so giving - I am so grateful for them!

 Ellie, Grandpa and the new sink aerator! Yay! It's so nice to not throw food in the garbage and have it get all stinky!

My parents arrived back in Salt Lake Sunday night and reported to the MTC Monday morning. They are going to be such AWESOME missionaries.

Carly's 8th Birthday and Baptism

Carly's first birthday surprise was the arrival of Nanny Nette and Grandpa, three days before her birthday. Nanny Nette and I made this cake for her. We got the recipe from the friend magazine - it was a cake that President Monson's mother would make for his birthday (which is also in August). It was really yummy and really easy to make too (of course Nanny Nette did most of it though).

 For her birthday she got a new outfit, a couple kickboards for the beach, some American Girl books, craft stuff, and money. Her biggest present (aside from having N. Nette and G'pa there) is gymnastic lessons for this next year. She is so talented when it comes to gymnastics (and a lot of other things too). She got a really sweet birthday present from her cousin Kali. Kali put together a slideshow with music and quotes about baptism and pictures of Carly from when she was a toddler to now. She sent the DVD of it with Nanny Nette and Grandpa. It was so awesome and so thoughtful - brought tears to my eyes!

The baptism was really small, just us and about a dozen other people, but it was still wonderful. We gave her a set of scriptures on her baptism day. Aaron and I also got a set of scriptures when we turned eight. I used my 8-yr-old scriptures until Aaron and I got married and he got me a set with my new last name on them. I'm sad that this is the only baptism picture I have! So many reasons (excuses) as to why this is the only one. But, anyway, isn't she cute?! We LOVE you Carly!!!

Aubree's Dream Job

The other day we were talking about jobs and what people might consider dream jobs. Aaron's dream job is to do landscape design for high-end residential properties (lucky him) or to teach landscape design at BYU-Idaho. My dream job ever since I was a little girl was to be a Mom - cliche, but totally true. Carly said her dream job was to be a teacher. Ellie agreed with Carly. Then Aubree said,
"My dweam job ... is to be a big sistow. And hold the baby in my awms." Awww.... just melts my heart!

Holding her baby cousin, Alice. (I guess baby cousins will have to do.)



Picnic Lunch with Daddy

One thing we are loving about Aaron's new job is that his office is only about 5.5 miles away from home, so Aaron usually comes home for lunch every day. Excpet for today - we went to him.

This little pavilion is right on the water and is just barely down the street from Aaron's office. (It still seems like this is a vacation and not really real. I never thought I would live by the ocean.)

 View the other direction from the pavilion of some water-front homes down the street from the office

Many of the homes on Water St. have the year they were built on a plaque. This one was built in 1765 and the door was tiny.

 Cummin Associates on Water St.

A front-view of some of the homes on Water St - they are so beautiful!

Children's Museum

Today we took a little day trip to the Children's Museum in Providence, Rhode Island . It was such a beautiful drive going down the highway to Providence and I thought to myself - "I could get used to this". It really is so beautiful out here. I'm starting to get little glimpses here and there of feelings of "home". Not that I feel at home here yet, but feelings that I someday could. And that's really good, cuz I was pretty homesick the first few days and had a couple good cries. Luckily the homesickness hasn't stuck - it still comes every once in a while - but it doesn't stay. It helps to have three little kids to keep busy and to find friends for.

Aubree getting ready to go to the museum

It was a really fun museum - kinda' like the one in Salt Lake City, but not quite as nice. I learned something about taking my kids to a childrens' museum: Let my kids hurry through the first time (without nagging them to slow down) and then go through a second time and they'll slow down and choose some of their favorite spots to spend more time.

Aubree's little work of art.

Poor little Aubree got a big owie at the museum just as we were getting ready to go. She tripped and hit her head (corner of her eye) on a stationary bike pedal and cut herself pretty good (no stitches though). Ouch!!! We were pretty lucky, because if it would have been even two centimeters over it would have been her eyeball.

 Carly and Ellie's construction work of art

 Aubree's hand-made tower

My little midgets