Final House Pics...Only 2 Months Later

Since I posted building progress pictures along the way, I figured I should post final pictures of our house.  It's only taken me two months, ha!  I guess maybe I thought I'd have more done as far as decorating goes, but really, I haven't done much since we first moved in.  Eventually:-).

 

We are so happy with how everything turned out.  When you see your house on a print, you really hope it all turns out like you're picturing it as far as room sizes and such go.  And it really did.  Thankfully.  I really feel like the whole building process was pretty painless.  We had been warned about how much work it is and how stressful it can all be, but Baumann Builders made it all very simple and were very easy to work with.  Moving in was the hard part:-).  But we are now feeling very settled.  There is definitely some closets and such that I need to better organize, but that's what winter is for, right? :-) 

 

Half bath by back/garage door...

 The big kids were gone the other day, so I thought it would be a good time to finally take some pictures with only one kid taking toys out around the house.  Greta thought she should pose for the pics:-).  I love how she sees a camera and does her "cheese" face.  This is the back entrance.  The door on the left comes in from the garage and the other goes out to the size of our house where we'll (hopefully soon) put our swing set in for the kids and eventually (some day) a barn.  The laundry room is to the right (Greta's left).  The bench/chest on the left is where lockers are supposed to be...eventually:-).

 This is probably my least favorite room, only because laundry is pretty much my least favorite thing to do:-).  Our old laundry room was in our basement in our mechanical room, so it's great now having it so close the kitchen and I really love having a counter and a sink in it and cabinet storage. 

 I also really love having a desk in our kitchen now.  As there keeps getting  more to keep track of with school and activities and such, it's great having a place to help me try to keep it all straight!  It's also handy having my printer in my kitchen now too.  

Front entry... 

 Joe's mom found this bench and it couldn't be a more perfect fit!   Now I just need some hooks/shelf to put above it.

 Living room...

 

Dining with a door to our covered deck that we'd like to screen in...

Kitchen (obviously)...  

 This is the kids' sitting area between their rooms that clearly doesn't have a lot in it right now.  When they're older, we'd like to put desks up there for them.  For right now, it's where we keep their books (to the left there is a spot where there could be a built in cabinet that we have a big book shelf in now) and where they can play or watch tv.  The doors on the right that you can see are Greta's (the one that's open) and the game closet, and Gibs' is to the right, directly across from Greta's door.

 Layla's room...

 The kids' bathroom...

 Greta apparently wanted to look relaxed in her room...

 Greta's room...  

Gibs' room is clearly a little heavy on the buddies, but he loves them:-).  He also LOVES all his trucks and his trains.  He can play farm/trucks/trains for hours by himself.  Although this week with Layla being in school, every afternoon for rest time, he's been playing for awhile, and then tucking himself in bed for a nap which is funny because normally he only naps a few times a week now.



 I thought this old book that I found in a box of old books from my parents was a perfect decoration for Gibs' room since he loves Donald Duck and the colors of the book cover match his room perfectly:-).

I really need to work on our room.   The curtains I bought for our room, I ended up using in the living room since I couldn't find anything else I liked, and I have things to hang up, they're just setting on the floor:-).  Plus, Joe is very anti-hanging things on the wall, so things can only go up if I'm positive it's going to be there for the next 30 years, lol:-).

 

This is the play room on the main floor which has been great having a place to put all their toys and to (try) to keep them out of the living room.

Maybe we can close the doors some day when it's an office:-)...

 

So that's our house...we still definitely have things to do (especially outside!), but we are loving where we are now and it definitely feels like home.  When we sold our old house, we didn't know what our next house would be, so it's nice now for whole process to be done with and to be settled in our new house.  We are enjoying our country life :-).



Silly Grets and School Update

I took this pic of Harper and Greta on Tuesday because it is just very them.  It shows what they like to do together--goof around.  I don't know if Harper does this by herself or if it's Greta's influence, but Greta loves to walk on the couch and jump off onto pillows.  Here's hoping she never gets injured!  That silly girl can be pretty brave!

 Here are a couple of other cute recent pics of them having fun together. 

 

School is not going the greatest for Layla yet.  Well, the main problem is in the morning.  Her teacher said by the end of the day she seems more comfortable.  Layla complains that it is too long, she doesn't color enough, and she doesn't like eating lunch there.  She doesn't complain about her teachers only talking in Mandarin though, so that's good!  She seems okay at the end of  the day, it's the drop off that is has been going bad.  Lots of tears from her still which then leads to mom wanting to shed some tears too!  Of course on her first day, her dress strap broke (so her teacher had to pin it) and she dropped her whole applesauce on her lap (which normally she is a really neat eater, so I never even gave it a thought that applesauce might be too messy!).  But that stuff doesn't even phase her.  It's everything else about school that she says she doesn't like.  I found it cute yesterday that she said that she ate part of her sandwich at snack time because she thought it was lunch time.  But she wasn't embarrassed that she thought that, just said that that was okay and that she just had the rest at lunch and ate her snack for lunch.  Just a good reminder of how innocent they are at that age and how everything is so new to them.  

Yesterday she was singing the clean up song in Mandarin and it's just of amazing how quickly they pick things up.  And to her, it's not weird that she know sings it in Mandarin.  She was just like, "Last year I sang it like this "Clean up, clean up, everybody clean up.  And now in kindergarten, I sing it like this..." (and I can't even write down what she was singing, no idea!). I'm not sure she was singing it correctly, but sounded good:-).  She also has learned "hi" and "thank you", but that's all she could remember.  Then I asked her what "good-bye" was and she said she didn't know.  I then tried to repeat what I've heard her teachers say to her (which was completely wrong) and then she said, "Oh, it's Zài jiàn" (I had to Google that:-) ).  And what she said sounded like what the teachers say.  What I said did not.  Just amazing how their little ears and minds can pick that up so quickly and mine can not!  Tomorrow she has off for Labor Day weekend, so hopefully next week goes a little better.  She is already not happy about taking the bus, so we shall see how that goes!

 

I Have A Kindergartener *Sniff Sniff*

Yesterday was Layla's last day of summer vacation.  It was a hot August day and so they of course spent time playing outside.  Greta loves when Layla zooms her around the driveway in this car.  It's nice for me since Greta is safe being pushed by her sister in it.  Otherwise, Greta recently likes to sit on bikes or stand on scooters or sit in cars and just let go and since our driveway is on a slant, she just flies down our driveway until she hits the gravel at the bottom.  I'm thankful now that we didn't pave the whole thing--otherwise she'd go flying into the road! 

 During the day, ZCS had an open house where you could bring your school supplies to school and check out the classroom.   This is her teacher, Zhang Laoshi (Laoshi means teacher in Mandarin--still can't get it right how you say it, it is not how it looks!) and she seems so nice so I'm sure Layla will love her.  There are also 2 teacher assistants in her room since the Mandarin Immersion class is K-2nd combined.  When the Mandarin preschoolers are there, then I believe that one of the assistants will take the kindergarteners to the preschool room. 

At night, we had the bus practice run.  The bus picks you up at your stop (unfortunately 3 country driveways down), brings you to school where  we had a parent meeting, and then drops you back off.  Layla was excited to go, but then was very apprehensive the whole night and not herself.  Before bed she said she wasn't ready for kindergarten.  After some talking through how she really was ready--she knew where her room was, had met her teacher, had all her school supplies, etc--she seemed okay with it and fell right asleep. 

 She's not on Gavin's bus (last year they would have been, but they had to change routes around this year), but when her bus goes to Adams Elementary, Gavin gets on her bus and her bus then takes the ZCS kids over to ZCS.  She is the last stop picked up in the morning which is nice and her route isn't very long, so even in the afternoon, her ride shouldn't be that long.

 Ready for the first day of school!

 Looking so grown up...

 She was fine before we left.  Then started crying in the car before she got out.  She sort of held it together for this picture.  Then started crying in bathroom (which she wanted me to go with her to the bathroom before school started--last night she went by herself while I was filling out paperwork (Em walked her to the bathroom) and was just crying by herself in the bathroom--breaks my heart!!  A lady found her and tried to console her and then Em heard her crying thankfully).  Then stopped crying and happily found her locker.  Then went to sit at her desk and when I looked at her before I was going to leave she was bawling.  So then I was about op0-0crying and decided I needed to just leave:-).

 Only the kindergarteners' names are written in English, which is good so that she can find her locker/desk/etc.  So crazy how much Mandarin the 1st and 2nd graders already know and they only started the Mandarin program last school year.  We had a hard time deciding between Mandarin and Spanish Immersion, but are feeling good about our decision.  The class size is very small, but hopefully in years to come, it increases.  I think there are around 10-12 Mandarin preschoolers which is big increase from only 4 kindergarteners!  I think it's a great opportunity for her and hope she really loves it.  I can't wait to hear about her day!

 I am curious how lost Gibs will be without his big sis.  They do everything together and love playing together.  He seemed just fine dancing by himself or with Greta and Harper:-).