1st, 3rd, 6th and more remodeling

Our cute Kylee started 1st grade the beginning of the month. I was a little worried because she loved her teacher last year and her good friend is going to a different school this year. But she seems to really like it. She has homework every night! That part, I don't like so much, but we're really good at doing it. It seems like she is gone a long time, but it's so much better than 2-3 hours of kindergarten. One morning, Aaron came up all dressed ready to go to school himself. It was really cute and really sad that I had to tell him he couldn't go until next year.

Kylee also celebrated her 6th birthday this month. She got some princess toys and lots of cute clothes. She also lost her 3rd tooth the day before her birthday. Hopefully her bottom teeth can start to straighten out a little bit. Though, we have already told her braces are in her future. It's amazing how fast 6 years have gone. We love her so much and glad she is a part of our family.

And more progress on our house! After moving all the bedrooms downstairs, we converted our bedroom into the front room and the kid's bedroom into the office. We had the carpet put in about 3 weeks ago. It is so nice to have a front room and office back. We don't have couches yet, but the kids love to play in a big empty room. It's just nice to have more room to spread out. It is also nice to have the office back! For the past 6 months, our office was packed away in our kitchen pantry. I was so excited to get a desk and set up my computer. Sean was excited to get all of his books out of the boxes.

Now we can use our pantry for the intended purpose and start working on our food storage. We also got the stairs carpeted and a new railing put up. I've wanted to have that done for 7 years (at least the carpet part)! But it wasn't so important when we weren't using the basement. I always used to say "can you imagine looking down the stairs and seeing it finished instead of the ugly steps and cement at the bottom". And we are finally there! Last, but not least, we had our basement toilet hooked up this week (thanks Cody). We don't use it yet because we still have to install the sinks. But it's progress and it's one step closer to the end. Hopefully another week and the sinks will be in. I'm still loving everything we've done so far and am so glad that we've made it this far.

Finally!

After many months of wishing, hoping, dreaming, and praying, we finally made major progress on our remodeling. We spent the last few weeks working like crazy to get things ready for carpet. The kids were so excited, they started moving down 10 minutes after the carpet installers left. I was just as excited as the kids...o.k. probably even more excited. By bedtime, we had moved all the beds down. The next day, we had everything cleared out of the bedrooms upstairs. There is still lots and lots to do, but at least we now have room to spread out a little (four kids, one bedroom...made bedtime a little difficult). Although it took way longer than I ever would have imagined, it was worth it. All the planning in my head and on 3D Home Architect paid off. I'm loving everything about it and can't wait for the rest to get finished. Now I just need to find the energy to get it done. Thanks dad for all your help, we couldn't have done it without you!

Here's Sean priming the walls. I seriously can't even tell you how I dreamed of this day!

Kylee in her pink room. I actually think she kind-of misses sleeping with the boys.

Alyssa's little room. We don't care about the size, we're just glad she can sleep without the boys climbing in her bed.

The boys room. It seems like so much space when there are just two beds instead of four. They still don't go to bed good.