the remaking of a kitchen

look what happened as soon as everyone left minnesota! several inches of snow fell during the day and continued into the
evening. they say we could get up to 8 inches. it is quite beautiful.

david and sarah went to the airport to catch their flight a bit after noon. got there early and zipped thru the security line so had the joy of a long wait at the gate. games we all get to play. they had a HOT breakfast with bacon and eggs to send them off with full tummies. this left the third child at home alone with her parents......seen smiling on the sofa. her flight didn't leave till 7:45 and she had a long night before finally reaching home.

cheers to the birthday girl! and then some more bubby!

opening the bubbly and sharing it at the end of the day. sarah and david sent it to us from bonny doon winery in santa cruz. it was delicious and the perfect way to celebrate the big 35.

jewlee has placed her hands on sarah's head and is moving them back and forth as directed. now sarah feels lots better.

the celebration continues.....joy all around! :)

sarah and david are enjoying sarah's opening presents after dinner. it's been a good day.

sarah has admitted to celebrating her bedhead, and this is the special rendition. happy birthday sarah!!! she is wearing her bedhead and her mother's robe.

the next day sarah went to lunch with her friend betsy and her little boy charlie. while they were gone don, david and i went to the minnesota history center. it was absolutely packed....we waited in line to get into the parking lot! we found out that a gajillion minnesota baseball nuts were checking out "baseball as america" a collection of memorabilia from cooperstown. we wandered thru the weather section.....blizzards to tornados and then gave up and checked out the baseball exhibit and really enjoyed it. they had some great things.....quite a collection. i also checked out the red wing pottery and loved that. david spent some time in the library checking out dylan, and had to leave without making copies of some of his writing. rats
betsy stayed so she could meet david which meant i got to meet charlie. he is a darling little boy and looks much like his sister emma at the same age.
sarah felt a bit puny and took a nap after dinner.....pizza courtesy of her and david. yea! that didn't keep us from staying up WAY too late after her nap solving most of the world's problems.
don got up at 3am on the 29th to take pat to the airport......so he had to miss sarah's birthday. we did sing to her after dinner on the 28th.....so she was serenaded two days in a row.

this is the day after the day after, like the 27th, when david, sarah, patrick and i visited the walker art museum. david loves frank gehry's fish and it forms a great backdrop.

here's patrick in front of the fireplace enjoying a quiet moment with a book.

jewlee's friend margie who came and took j away for a couple of days of bonding.

sarah and karen met in 5th or 6th grade, and the friendship continues. pictures are of them together and with pat at the door as karen prepares to leave.

sarah's long-time good friend karen came over and joined us for dessert. she was coerced into the photographer mode and took our picture before she left for her mom's house.

david is pretty excited about his book from patrick

sarah looks a bit surprised by this gift....but i think she liked it.

david is taking pictures and then checking them out while patrick sits in front of the fireplace.

there seems to be a problem here......these shoes need to be made bigger, which means a trip to the mall-o.

the right colors....pink and orange were might pleasing.

yup, finally everyone was here and under our roof and the day after christmas was when the holiday began. sarah seems pleased by what she found under the tree.

chestnuts are not roasting on an open fire, but i suspect jack frost would nip at my nose were i to step outside. alas, i'm inside for the evening, making scones.....yum. the marmalade is already made, so the scones are a necessity.
patrick arrived last night, jewlee, sarah and david come tomorrow evening. this will be a lovely holiday for sure.

in keeping with our promise of a white christmas.....here you go! but hurry and get here, it may not last!

the sports day (saturday) was magnifico. final game of the volleyball final four. it was so sweeeet. after last year's disappointment they have worked so hard to make it really happen this year, and it really did. they defeated stanford, no mean feat, in 4 games.
today was painting day as planned and we completed our assigned task, so now we can settle down to doing some serious holiday prep. that would be as if finishing the paint job wasn't included in prep! on to baking and planning and perhaps wrapping a surprise or two! i am getting excited!!! not too many days till the arrival of the rest of the family. :)

we were able to fetch the bench with the help of a neighbor's suv. after getting it home and living with it a few days, we have come to the conclusion that it's HUmongous.....it's the right color and style but the scale is all wrong. it will have to return to the store. alas.
today was a busy volunteer day, tomorrow is a sports day, so the final paint day will be sunday. it will be great to have a stairway without a ladder in the middle of it.

we are really, almost, well, close, getting there, not much more to do.............ready to say, it's done! does that sentence sound like i'm not ready to say FOR SURE? well, yeah. we drug the humongous ladder up the stairs yesterday and don worked on edges with a brush from the top of the stairs and i worked from the top of the ladder. still amazes me that i can do that. that height thing is just GONE. don then worked his way on down the stairs with the brush getting all the top and bottom margins painted while i used the roller and covered the rest of the space with that.....it really needs that second coat, and that will probably happen tomorrow.
we finally picked up the bench from the store with the help of a neighbor's suv, and it is BIG. i suspect it will return to the store. it's too tall or something, but it's sad as the design works as does the color of the upholstery. it's hard to tell scale in a store with high ceilings and huge spaces. this one's disappointing, but we can really live without a bench. the other new things are great in the rooms.....so think positive i say.
is it finally time to consider shopping for christmas gifts?

Labels: painting

monet you say. yup, it's here and we love it. it is comfy altho i do find myself in the same position as edith ann. in the store i could reach the floor, on the sofa anyway. in our home on the loveseat, dangling feet. no matter, i can adjust! honest! it's such a warm lovely red. sigh
now it's back to painting. again.

this could easily be called a work in progress. the good news is that it's progress! we still have a bit of painting, but man we are close to finis! woohoooo! tomorrow the monet, yup it's called a monet loveseat will come to live here.

huddled in the otherwise bare corner with bare walls, but GORGEOUS floor, we find the new chairs. they look extremely lonely but are amazingly comfy. they need some friends.

well, this is a start. we've had a request from the west and always aim to please, so this is what happened today. will keep working on this project! :)

the chairs arrive on sunday, and the loveseat will be ordered tomorrow. the shelving is GONE for now, but may return. we need to see what happens when the chairs are in place.....do they really fill the area, or is there room for more? we really need to have something with some height on that wall, so will continue to work on that.