Great dinner guests

My Grandma and Grandpa Girard came over for supper tonight.

They don't live far but we don't get over to visit them as much as we should.  So I was happy when they excepted our invite to Sunday Supper.
We had some time to visit before supper was ready.  Levi made sure to show off plenty by spinning around in circles and introducing great Grandparents to all his cars and trains.

Gabe roasted another amazing piece of pork for dinner.

He rubbed it with rosemary, thyme and oregano.  And made a sauce to go with it inspired by this.  The meal was completed by some mashed potatoes, turnips and chives.  (I threw in some cream cheese and cream too.)  And my favorite, roasted asparagus.  I also cut up some strawberries and whipped up some cream for dessert.  My son has a new found love of whipped cream.  After he finished his strawberries he insisted he was still hungry but declined Gabe's offers for more pork, asparagus and fruit.  So he had some oranges...with whipped cream!  His dad's idea.  Not mine!

Guest Bathroom Revealed

 This is what we started with:

We took this picture of the downstairs guest bathroom when we looked at the house almost three years ago.
Notice the cheap red vinyl tile? The outdated standard builder vanity?  The fake marble blue counter tops and the striped wallpaper?  It was a beauty.
The only thing we ended up keeping was the toilet and shower.  Neither of us could justify buying a new toilet (even though it is off white) when it works perfectly fine.  Eventually we'll hire someone to come and redo all of our showers but that will require some more saving first.
So we tore everything else out.  It was a lot of work! (Remember this post about all the work we did in a short amount of time?)

 And it was just play for one of us!

As always, the hard work and time was worth it.
Drum roll please...

Here's the finished bathroom:

All ready for my sister and her family to visit at the end of the month.  That is if I can convince my mom to let them stay over at our house instead of her house!

Sunny Sunday Supper

I had this great plan to create an Earth day post along with our Sunday supper this week.

But this weekend has been pretty much non-stop activity and I'm exhausted.  The weather has been amazing and the last thing I wanted to do was put together a thoughtful post about the Earth.  I figure enjoying the sunshine was probably the best thing we could do to celebrate the Earth any way.

(But if you want a glimpse at what I was planning, do a little research in how bad eating meat (and dairy) is for the environment.  Here are some articles to get you started.)

We think buying our pork (and lamb) from Gabe's Aunt Jaki helps our footprint since her animals are treated like pets and their place is 2 hours away.  But we've decided to try and limit our meat consumption.  Clearly we'll have to work on dairy next!

That was the amount of cheese that went into tonights supper.
I decided when trying to feed 2 & 1/2 year old boys it's not really the time to try an ambitious truly meat and dairy free meal.  So we made this for Sunday supper today.  It is hands down the most perfect macaroni and cheese recipe.  Just not the most eco-friendly!
As you can see, the Weisserts joined us for dinner on this beautiful evening.  We even got to eat dinner outside!

Here's my attempt to get a shot of the little boys sporting their Lightening t-shirts.  But there were so many other things they would have rather been doing than posing for photos!

We'll keep working on the whole meat and dairy free eating.
And the bathroom photos will finally be coming later this week!  Gabe has to paint the new baseboard some evening this week if he's feeling up to it.  He starts a new job tomorrow so we'll see how it goes.

A new baby & a new bike

Ok, so the baby is not exactly new since she's now 7 weeks old.  But she's pretty darn close.  And she's definitely new to Levi so introductions were in order.

"Levi, meet Brooke."

"Brooke, meet Levi."

Levi sure snuggled her up good.  She got lots of gentle kisses on her head and some not so gentle tickles on her knees.  She's a wonderful little thing and all of us enjoyed holding her this morning.  Sorta makes me miss having a little one around.  But then I remember I get to sleep without interruptions at night...

Levi also got a new bike this week.
Last weekend we went to three different bike stores in town looking for a red kick bike.  With no luck. We found lots of kick bikes but none that were red and this kid knows what he wants.  He wouldn't settle for the really nice yellow and black one they had at Bike and Hike.  It just wouldn't do.  So the UPS man delivered a wonderful red bike for Levi this week!  And a new helmet with red flames ("Just like Lightening").
And we had a beautiful afternoon today to take it out for a spin.

Spicy Sunday Supper

We're finally getting back into the Sunday supper swing of things.
So glad!
I've missed it.

This evening Mike and Sharon joined us for dinner.  Gabe spent some time cleaning up the barbecue yesterday afternoon and he fired it up for the first time this "year".  Some chicken thighs smothered in  Gabe's favorite buffalo sauce (he's found it bottled at New Seasons...no surprise) came off the grill perfectly.  I wanted to make a side dish that felt sorta like bar food but without the need to deep fry.  So, I made these to go along with the spicy chicken.  Highly recommend them!  What a yummy dinner.
Then to top it off...Mike and Sharon brought an interesting (and delicious) twist on floats for dessert.  Levi had the traditional root beer float.  But us adults had this as our floating liquid instead.  Good stuff and good friends.

Packy's Big 5-0

The Oregon zoo's oldest elephant turned 50 today!
(Packy was the first Asian elephant to be born in the western hemisphere in 44 years.  You can read more about his historic birth here.)

So we got our party ears on and enjoyed some music (and birthday cake) with the big birthday boy.

 

They had Packy in the inside viewing area this morning.  With the glass, it's not the best spot for photos and we weren't able to get a great photo of the birthday boy!  But we had fun celebrating this morning.

Happy Easter

A fun filled Easter celebration occurred this weekend.

Levi dyed his first eggs.

He was a little disappointed we couldn't dye the eggs red.  So, he wanted to dye them all pink since that's the closest color we could get to red. 

The Easter Bunny hid eggs at Levi's house and at Grandma and Grandpa G's.  He got really good at finding eggs today.  And he was pretty excited the ones at G&G G's house had treats or money inside them.

And we got to spend some time with family.

When I asked Levi at lunch what his favorite part of Easter is, he whispered to me..."Jelly Beans."
So, after nap time we're going to enjoy the sunshine and probably eat some jelly beans.

Imaginary Friend

I think I've mentioned Levi's imaginary friend before.
In the last month, Levi's been mentioning him more and more.  He never talks directly to his friend but tells us all kinds of things about him.  Levi's friend's name is Doosher.
Here's what we know about Doosher (all according to Levi of course):
1. Doosher likes Levi's toys.
2. He likes Lightening.
3. He drives his car to Levi's house.  So that means he's big.
4. He likes to play at the beach.
5. Sometimes he takes toys away from Levi.
6. He's strong.  "Mommy, Doosher can help you.  He's really strong."

Such a silly kid!

All work and no play

makes Gabe happy that he can go to work and "rest" tomorrow.

Gabe and I have spent the last 4 days working on our downstairs guest bathroom.  The bathroom we haven't really thought about in 2 years since we never use it.  But when we bought the house, it was the room that came in second for the race to a complete remodel.

Even with all the work we put in this week, the bathroom isn't done...yet.  But we have a deadline of Friday because Gabe's mom will be here to visit.  I do have to thank my parents.  Levi got to spend two days at Grandma and Grandpa G's house so we could get some uninterrupted work time.  It was definitely needed and appreciated!

Here's what we've been up to in the last 4 days:
-Lots of shopping (5 trips to Home Depot/Lowe's/A-Boy Hardware and 2 trips to Target)
-Cleaning off all the leftover wallpaper glue.  Yes, there was wallpaper in the bathroom.  I'll show you the before pictures when we're all done!
-Taking out the floor.  Gabe had to remove two layers of vinyl and the underlayment.  That's the part of the project that took the longest.

-Taking out the vanity/sink and toilet

-Painting two coats of paint on the ceiling

-Painting two coats of paint on the walls

-Laying new floors (underlayment and cement board)

-Laying tile

-Grouting tile

I was hopeful that we'd be almost done tonight.  But I don't think my time frame for home improvement projects is always realistic.  And sticking to my timeline wasn't helped by the 4 hour appointment Gabe had on Friday afternoon and the fact that we went to see this with our friends (Alexis and Eric) afterward.  Obviously, we didn't have the time or energy to do a Sunday supper tonight.  Plus the house was a complete disaster until about an hour ago.  Hopefully I'll be back in a few days to share the complete before and after of the project!