New Year, New Kitchen, and a Forgotten Blog!

Whoops, a bad start to the year getting to *March* before updating my blog! I always mean to get round to it, but it just hasn't happened yet. Figured it was time I took a few minutes to post something here before the year is half gone. :-)

Here are a few photos from a forest walk back in January - seems ages ago now!

After many months (or even a couple of years) of thinking about the need to replace the kitchen, we finally planned it all out and got with Ikea to sort out the layout and then order the kitchen, and plan the installation! :-D Everything arrived at the end of January, and work started the next week. We were without a kitchen for about 12 days, but it was totally worth it. The guy who Ikea jobbed out the work to did an excellent job and made sure everything was exactly how I wanted it to be. I couldn't have been happier! 

This was after all the boxes arrived: 

And this was the old kitchen, which was badly designed - half depth shelves in all the wall cupboards, and corners that were deep and impossible to access. As well as starting to fall apart with age.

And then a new kitchen when it was almost finished, but not yet 100%:

And here was the finished kitchen, with cupboard handles put on, and I'd just done the blue wallpaper around the window! :-) But before I made the curtains.

This shows the kitchen better, but was before the wallpaper:

We're amazed at how bright the room is with the new cupboards. It's the dark side of the house, but we didn't get a kitchen to bright up the area. Yet it has done just that, and is soooo nice! :-)

The biggest bonus is actually having a place for everything, and being able to *get* to everything - nothing is buried away! Ikea certainly are the best at helping you organise things, and when you have a large family like us, being organised is essential for survival! ;-)

Oh yes, and found the photo with the curtains up. 

So, that's my kitchen! :-) When you spend as much time as I do in there (often say I live in the kitchen!), then it's such a blessing to have a happy and cheerful room! 

Oh, and I can't forget the wonderful utility closet that Peter made for me in January! I'd realised that the space next to the stairs had a lot more potential than being just a place to dump things. (It used to have the sewing desk in here before it got moved to the sewing workstation upstairs in the autumn.) Anyway, I had the idea of a shelved walk-in closet, as not having a utility room of any sort in our house, there's so much non-food stuff that just ended up cluttering kitchen worktops and everywhere else. So my wonderful husband took on board my idea and make it a reality! I am surprised at just how much capacity it has! 

So, I guess that's the bulk of what's been happening this year! And now that everything is back to normal, then just lots of everyday life. Studying for me - I can't believe I'm in the final few months of my course. It's just flown by, which I guess means I'm really enjoying it! :-) And then homeschooling the children - that always makes for busy days! Especially when the two preschoolers like to be included in everything! ;-) 

Fergus stole my chair and my book today - think he wanted to teach their history lesson! ;-)

Fergus is now 16 months - they grow up SO fast!

He's recently discovered "Thomas the Tank Engine" and is crazy about it! He loves to dig out all the books Elijah has collected over the years, and play with the toy trains. He is always saying "choo choo" and that means he wants the box of trains out to play with! :-)

Fergus and Elijah have the closest bond you could imagine! They absolutely love each other! :-) "Elijah" is the first thing Fergus says when he wakes up every morning, and he goes up and hugs his big brother many times a day! And plenty 

Last week we had some homeschool friends over for lunch, and the girls always have such a fun time doing creative things together! :-) This time Abigail had bought a big canvas for them to do a joint painting. The weather turned out bright and sunny and they had so much fun out there.

You can tell they are dreaming of warm days - painting a beach scene! :-D 

Some flowers that Deborah picked out for me last week. She goes to Lidl each week and helps her daddy with the shopping, and loves to bring home flowers for her mama. :-)

So, that's my update for now. We'll see how long it takes for me to get round to a second post for the year!

End of Year Blog Catch-up - November & Abigail's 10th Birthday, etc

When you've got a 1,000 word essay you're meant to be writing for your university course ... you decide to do a blog post instead, right?! :-) I guess it's that time of year when you realise that you've not updated your blog in a while, and doing it will be one less thing on that mental "To-Do" list, so I'll concentrate better once I get it done. Or so I'm telling myself! :-) I've already got photos for a second post - who knows, maybe I'll do that tomorrow - or at least soon.

This is my little study buddy! :-) Though he likes to grab all my pens and highlighters and throw my notebooks over the couch!

He thinks it's great fun hanging out with me when all the other kids are asleep at night!

In November, my biggest girl turned 10!! It's hard to believe I've already got a child this old. It feel like she'll be grown up before I realise it! Abigail is a huge blessing - so thankful for her! :-)

Goofy faces! ;-)

Sister cuddles

My girls!

Opening presents - books are always appreciated!

Birthday cake!

Candles

Fergus likes to hang out in the kitchen with me - using spoons on metal stuff is always fun - and noisy! :-)

Right now Fergus is a bit mad over trying to fit *into* things - like toy boxes, buckets, anything! This time, I had to laugh when he sat inside a small casserole dish! :-D Yes, he's a lot of fun!

Stacking tins of food is fun!

As I said, sitting in toy boxes! ;-)

Over the past several weeks, I've been doing lots of re-organising of bedrooms. The girls room is very small and an odd shape, and as they've gotten older, it's become more cramped and not enough proper places to keep their things tidy! So it was time for a major makeover, and thanks to clever Ikea stuff, the room has been totally transformed. THIS is the horrible *before* photo! Yes, it was bad!

Girls' room before - it was a mess!

This was after, but the other end of the room - don't have a before photo posted of this end of the room. But they had a large bunk bed with double bed on the bottom, so it took up a lot of room in their small space. So we replaced it with a short/compact bunk bed which made the room feel so much bigger. The girls love it! (Oh, and the wood trim here has since been painted white! lol This was an early "after" photo.)

This is the after photo (same area as the very messy photo above). Ikea wardrobes have given them lots of space for clothes (because girls always like lots of clothes!) and the Kallax units are amazing. I like the one under the window, which is a favourite place for the girls to sit and play. It's 4 units wide, but only part of it is seen in the photo here.

Wardrobe being filled here - it's totally full now! ;-)

My second "project" was to re-purpose this under-used hallway into a sewing workstation! Again, with Ikea space saving units! This is the hall between girls' and younger boys' bedrooms (the whole area was originally un upstairs lounge/living room when we bought the house - but we turned it into bedrooms soon after we moved in).

Part way thru creating the sewing and craft workstation area! I came up with the original idea of using Billy bookcases, and Peter did ALL the assembling and putting it together for me ;-) and also he thought of using a Billy shelf extension unit to make the top shelf to bridge the gap between the two bookcases. Then doors on the front to keep the fabrics and sewing supplies tidy and out of the way of small hands!

And being put to good use! :-) Deborah was designing doll dresses before school, before breakfast, and before she even got dressed in the morning! :-P They quite like having this creative space outside their bedroom! :-)

I've also re-organised the little boys' room too! Someone local-ish was selling some secondhand Kallax units, and having seen how well they worked for the girls' room, I just had to sort out the boys room too! Yes, it does look a bit like a toy store! ;-) But Fergus loves being able to see all the toys. And having an orderly place for everything, means it's easy for the children to tidy the rooms by themselves, so less work for me! ;-)

One last photo - yes, it will be Fergus, of course! :-) He was trying to SIT in the sink of the toy kitchen set! He loves to explore everything, that's for sure!

Well, maybe I'll go work on that essay now ... or just do some more housework and other jobs that always need to be done! ;-)