Easter Boy

We spent Easter weekend down at my parents house and B had a very fun time. I wish I could show you pictures of his cute little plaid shirt and bow tie from the Easter service, but he ended up having a jacket over his shirt and decided he wasn't going to be caught dead in a bow tie. It would have been the most adorable thing ever. He didn't believe me. Stinker. But I did manage to get some super cute pics from his other Easter adventures.

Starting with an Easter egg hunt! This is his new cheesy face when I say "smile!"

I was a kind of warmish day so we squeezed in our first trip to the park. He had a blast. We had to drag him away crying when it got too cold.

Hope you guys had a great Easter weekend too!

Basement Planning Update

You guys know we tend to hop around from project to project. And we're at the point in the cycle when we start thinking about the basement again! What's that? You forgot we even had a basement? Yeah... it's been a while since we've touched anything down there. Partly because we decided to focus on some of the big kitchen projects first, and partly because winter hit and we couldn't go out to use the saws and what-not. But now that spring is on the horizon, we're ready to jump back in. Let's peek at where we left off:

Last year we started working on our plans for the bar area. We got as far as installing cabinets, running water lines to the sink, and we even have the countertop bases all in place now. But that's where things slowed down.

Our next step is installing the tile countertop (we already have all the slate and grout ready to go!) but we're missing one important thing - a wet saw. By the time we started thinking about tiling it was already too cold to think about sitting outside and getting wet anyway, but we did a little research and found out Menards rents them out (I think it was $30 for 3 hours, but that was last year so we'll have to check again). And let's be honest, that's not a lot of time pull off a whole countertop and we don't want to pay an extra 30 if we can avoid it. So we're going to try to do some planning ahead of time and see just how many tiles we'll have to cut. That way as soon as the weather is warm enough we can git 'er done. I'd really, really like to get it finished before #2 makes an appearance. We'll see. :)

We also made some tentative plans for using the rest of the space. The bar area is really all we've touched so far, but we're planning to make it a fun, liveable space that can double as an extra guest room when the whole family comes. And of course there needs to be lot's of storage.

Now that I'm really itching to tackle this part of the house again, I'm looking for some style and design inspirations for the space. So far we've been working on lots of functional aspects, but we definitely want it to look pretty too. I'm still trying to decide on what direction we'll go, but here are a few of my favorite inspirations from pinterest.

You may not have noticed, but the cement floor is currently red. And scratched. And really really ugly. So we definitely plan to re-paint it. Now I'm just trying to decide if we should keep it simple with a solid color or try something a little more fun like stripes or a stencil.

painted floor via pinterest

I would LOVE to pull off this feel. Exposed wood, metal work, muted colors, just really comfortable and casual. I don't know if it's something we'll be able to do with shorter ceilings, less natural light, concrete floors, and no metal to speak of. But I'm keeping my eyes open for ways to get them same vibe.

basement via pinterest

I know I shared this picture before, but this is still my favorite idea for the laundry space. I want to dress it up bright and simple so I can leave it open to the rest of the basement.

laundry room via pinterest

We're still planning to section off the storage area since it probably won't be pretty. Right now I'm thinking we'll either do some white flowy curtains like in the pic above, or bring in the wood aspect with an up-cycled pallet wall like this.

pallet wall via pinterest

Apart from the countertop, most of the work is going to be cosmetic. You know, the fun part. :) Plus lots of cleaning. Boo. But I really feel like we should be able to pull off a good part of it this spring. So this me starting the timer before baby #2 gets here in July. Game on, husband.

Banana Juice

B has a new love. He calls it "banana juice." And he will literally beg me to make it daily. Which I feel okay about, because it's actually good for him! Yep, "banana juice" is just a green smoothie, meaning it has green leafy veggies in. The kid goes gaga for it.

And it doesn't hurt to add a bendy straw for extra fun. Do you see how full that cup is? Most days B will down the whole thing if I let him. But I usually try to get a little for myself too....

Which is no easy task when a certain little boy doesn't even come up for air.

He will come up long enough to protest if I say "Hey! Look at the camera! Look at mama!" enough times. Apparently he has no time for such nonsense. My mistake.

The basic gist of green smoothies is just a mix of fruits and veggies put through the blender. So it's a really easy and yummy way to get some veggies in your diet. I especially love sneaking in things like spinach that B would never put in his mouth. But it's not even really sneaking. He knows we put spinach in, so when we're making a smoothie he pulls it out of the fridge for me. :)

You can pretty much put whatever you want in there. We always start with a banana (sometimes frozen) and add another fruit or two like strawberries or kiwi, and a big handful of spinach. Sometimes I add other veggies like carrots too. For liquid I'll usually add a splash of water or sometimes milk, and sometimes a little yogurt too. It's pretty flexible. Then I just blend away until it's nice and drinkable. If you like to have more specific recipe ideas, I just found this site with lots of yummy sounding green smoothie ideas. I can't wait to try a few!

Thrifting with B

Guys, I'm itching for yard sale season. For realz. So little B and I headed to the thrift store this week to get a little bargain-hunting fix. All the clothes are half-off on Mondays so we went hoping to find a wool sweater or two for making nighttime diaper covers. But it turns out they stopped carrying sweaters already! Boo. It wasn't a complete loss though - we still found a few things to carry home. For me it was a couple t-shirts and tanks for summer ($1-1.50 each). I'll be too pregnant for them when summer starts, but with a baby coming in late July it will be great to have something cute and comfy to wear the rest of the season. I also found a pair of sweatpants for B ($0.99 - which turned out out to have a pink tag... so they may be girls pants... but no one has to know, right?), a belt for B ($0.99 - he wants to be just like daddy), and a pampered chef food chopper ($4). It was a fun trip and B was sweeter than ice cream the whole time. He stayed right by me and followed me all around the store. He even obeyed when I told him not to touch certain things. And since he loves to be a helper, he wanted to carry my clothes around until we went to the dressing room... where he insisted on trying on clothes too. He makes his momma so proud!

And speaking of B, he got an early birthday present from his Papa & Grandma. A slide. Also known as little boy heaven - especially when we're trapped inside on cold days!

He was a little timid about it at first, but now he dives down head first. So brave. :)

Anybody else ready to hit up some yard sales? I'm even super prepared this year and already have started sorting through the house and making a big pile of things for my own yard sale. And this year I'm being merciless. Seriously. If we don't need it, it's going. I think being in pre-nesting mode is helping.:)