big boyness and stripping the bed

after about 12 hours worth of work.

baby boy is growing up.  

we recently started the process of moving him out of his crib and into a big boy bed.  we didn't need to move him because he was climbing out, but because every time he would go into a room with a bed he'd shout "BED" and run and lay down on it with his hands behind his head like he was relaxing.  we thought just maybe he was trying to tell us something.  

i purchased a jenny lind style bed frame off craig's list last year for $50.  it sat in our garage for about 8 months until we thought he was just about ready.  then, a few weekends ago we went and purchased a mattress and began the process of cleaning up the bed frame to get it ready for a make over.

turns out the bed was slathered in two layers of latex paint and ever since then we've been chemical stripping, scraping, hand sanding, electric sanding, rinse and repeat.  its been hours and hours of grueling sweaty hard work out in the garage, but i think we're finally getting to the stage where i might (just might) be able to paint in the next few days.  i've always enjoyed a project (ahem) but not necessarily the prep work of said project.  so, the fun part is coming up and i can hardly stand it.  we let dax direct the redesign of the "new" room and he's using his favorite colors and we think he's really going to like it when its all said and done.

the mattress was delivered last thursday night and we set it up in dax's room on the floor on friday.  he's done a very good job of sleeping in it at night, but naps have proven to be a little more challenging because he is not yet "that" tired that he can omit all distractions and actually lay there untempted.  we're hoping that with the mattress actually in its frame and a side rail up that he may feel a little more confined and thereby a little more "sleepy".  

i have to go public and say i did get teary eyed the first night we tucked him into his big boy bed (a.k.a. mattress on the floor).  it was kind of sad to say (yet another) bye bye baby and move onward towards big boyness, but i keep having to remind myself like i remind him - that the crib is for babies and we're probably gonna need that soon for his baby sister.

into the swing of things

james, conti carla, great granny, will, dax, adri, vicki, tom

we had a great time on vacation and this week has been a shock back into reality.  that's always the hardest fall!  at the beach we really enjoyed spending time at the ocean, swimming in the pool, cruising around on the golf cart, hanging out with our family and pigging out on some seafood.  even great granny (90.5 years old) drove the golf cart!  everyone had a great time cruising around!

dax's favorite game of the week was taking all of the pool toys and throwing them into the pool.  great granny would attempt to pull them all back out, but within minutes he'd gather them all and toss them back in.  at one point we had so many pool toys in the pool that people actually could not swim.  

it took us about four days that week to get things together before we could obtain the family picture above.  we had issues with humidity, a photographer stalker who hijacked my camera (don't even get me started on this one), a child with a mask wandering around the beach that scared dax to death, and rain.  however, everyone was a trooper and wore these same outfits (we did a lot of laundry) three days in a row.  one night we went to the same restaurant wearing the same clothes and they had to wonder if this was our uniform.  

special thanks to conti carla for taking our family portrait!

our fundraising efforts are officially in full swing.  will recently received two unexpected monetary donations that we're extremely grateful for and we sold quite a few t-shirts this past week.  there's additional progress on the book illustration and are excited for that to be completed so we can start selling those.  every little bit adds up and we know that when it's meant to be - we'll be ready.