Our new basement!

We finally finished our basement! Luke moved into his new room and we are getting settled. I think the boys adjusted better than I did! We still have to decorate, but here are a few pictures to give you an idea of what it looks like.

Home Stretch

We are almost done with the basement - finally! I have posted some pictures of our progress. We are getting carpet on Friday and will spend the next week on building the bar and the finishing touches. Luke can't wait to get into his new room and I can't wait to have my house back in order.
The first door is the storage area, the second is the bathroom, and the french doors go into the future exercise room.

The bar area, minus the actual bar. I need to take pictures of the inside so you can see Ben's wonderful beer sign!

Progress on the Basement

We are finishing our basement! Ben has been working on the basement over the past couple of months so I thought I would show you our progress...

Part of the project was to change the countertop on our kitchen island. It used to be 2 levels and we ended up not liking it or using it. We ordered a new countertop and switched the dishwasher and the sink around. We have used it so much in the short time that it has been changed.

Once the basement is finished we will have a bar area, a family room, Luke's room, bathroom, and a workout room. This picture looks into the bar area. There is a log beam at the top and will be stone along each side. There will be a bar sink and a fridge near the bar.

This picture looks into the work out area and the bathroom. Luke's room is to the left. We still have several things to pick out like the doors, trim, vanity, etc.

Ben installed a fireplace in the family room area. We will put a TV above the fireplace at some point.
I will try to do a better job posting updates. Hopefully the next time I show basement pictures there will be drywall!

Happy Mother's Day!!

Ben, the boys and I decided to go for a hike at Castle Rock State Park for Mother's day. We tried to take a few pictures so I had something to put in my new digital picture frame that they gave me! Here are some of the pictures of us at the park.

Goodbye Sinnissippi :(

Sinnissippi Tree Farm is closing after this season. It was our last Christmas tree from a place that Ben and I grew up going to. It was a tradition for us to go there, eat hot donuts, drink cider and hot cocoa and cut down our tree. We are sad to see it close. What will we do next year???

We always go to the main area to get the donuts and drink hot cocoa. Santa is there, but my non of my boys have ever sat on his lap!

We then drove over to another field to cut down our Frasier Fir. Its my favorite tree, although we had a hard time finding one that we liked this year.

We pulled a wagon to carry our tree, but the boys decided to take it for a ride down the hill first.





It was a little more difficult keeping up with Dylan this year. He loved running down the rows of trees. We all took turns watching him and trying to find the perfect tree. We always hope to see a big light shine down over the right tree like in the movie Christmas Vacation, but for some reason it never happens!

Happy Halloween!

We held our annual pumpkin carving day last Sunday afternoon. We are very competitive about carving the best pumpkin! No one can see each other's masterpiece until we are all finished. This year seemed to be the year of the mean faced pumpkin. Caden was so helpful that he carved his own and also carved Dylan's.


Everyone hard at work on their pumpkins.


My dad and Debbie were here for the weekend so they helped get Dyl's pumpkin ready. Thanks guys!!


The finished product! Scary!

Do you think Ben is a die hard HUBS fan or what?

Dylan with a carving knife - scary! Do the boys realize he has the knife? Someone could lose an eye.

Good job guys - the pumpkins turned out great!

Homecoming and picking pumpkins

Luke went to homecoming this year with Mackenzie Crandall who is a sophomore. They went with a group of 32 people to Lino's in Rockford. He had a great time at dinner and at the dance. It's hard to believe he is in high school already. He is really enjoying everything about high school and I am glad. Luke is doing really well in his classes and in football so I think he has adjusted to high school.

This is a portion of the group Luke went with. There were so many kids we couldn't get them all in the picture. The girls all had beautiful dresses, remember when we wore sweaters and skirts to homecoming???

We went to the pumpkin place over the weekend. We each picked a pumpkin to carve. It has become a tradition to outdo each other with our carvings. I must admit my pumpkin is usually spectacular :) Luke picked out his pumpkin in a record 30 seconds, while Caden took a little time trying to look for the perfect one. He ended up going with a small, fat, green pumpkin so I will be excited to see how it turns out. I went with a "Cinderella" pumpkin which is short, fat, and a reddish orange. Even Dyl picked out a pumpkin, which I think is as big as he is!

Caden wasn't feeling that well during the pumpkin adventure, but was excited to go anyway. Luke had other things he wanted to do so he tried to rush all of us. Doesn't he look thrilled to be there in the picture?

On a side note, Caden is also doing really well in school and did a great job in football. This seems to be his favorite sport, at least for now. We start basketball in a couple of months so we'll see how well he likes that.

On a final note, the Dyl has been growing and doing new things every day. This includes becoming very mischievious. He even has a laugh to go with his new personality and it is very sinister. I'm starting to worry what the terrible two's will bring, because he is a crazy man already! He has also started growling, really for no reason. He has little temper tantrums where he throws himself on the floor and does a little fake cry. Isn't he a little young for that? It couldn't be that he is a little spoiled?? He does have 2 brothers that will do anything for him and shower him with love and attention. He's got it made!