In Which There Is Progress On All Fronts

The painting is done! Well, barring a few touch ups and a color correction in the girls' bathroom, it's done.

On the door to the green bathroom (also referred to as the girls' bathroom, the kids' bathroom, and the guest bathroom), you will find this sign. I wanted to make sure the bathroom was clearly labeled.


THIS is the green bathroom. The green actually goes pretty well with the shower curtain (left behind by the heirs), but it tends to *glow*. In fact, when The Eldest first used the bathroom after I had finished painting, she said something along the lines of "Cool! My skin looks green in here!"




We knocked out the last remnant of purple awfulness this weekend. I think the bathroom looks lovely in blue and brown, and the shower curtain from Walmart certainly helps.




This is my room! Excuse the mess. I love the dark green--it makes the room feel soothing and cozy. Well, to me, anyway. The Hub's still getting used to it.


As a compromise, we painted this wall all brown, to "take a break" from the green. The closet doors would be closed, but they're broken. The shiny gold curtains (one is in the picture), used over the patio doors in the apartment, will be replacing them.


Here's the red wall! And a silly Afton at our "new" dining table. I love that table. So big! So sturdy! The green baker's rack will be spray painted black as soon as I have time.


I'm likin' the red. I think it works.


The Room of Requirement (formerly known as the homeschooling room), with the help of many in-laws and an extended family FHE, is now blue. Hurrah!


It's not the bastion of learning I want it to be, but we're getting there! Homeschooling resumes tomorrow. Sewing resumed Thursday, when I decided that my bedroom sorely needed curtains.


And that's enough about the house for now. It consumes a goodly portion of my free time--my reading time has been cut in half--but it is SO worth it. On the to-do list for next weekend: wash the cars and start working on the yard.

In the meantime, The Boy has not quit developing. He's a seasoned crawler at this point, but more importantly, he's started cruising along furniture. It's his second-favorite mode of transportation. His first favorite is me--on my hip, in my arms, whatever.

So I took this picture because I loved the contrast of small child and big boot.


Two seconds later, I had this:

The kid is SPEEDY!

Here's one of my favorite faces. He's snorting. It's hilarious.


More cute baby!


It's not totally apparent here, but The Boy adores his sisters. And they love entertaining him, even if their form of entertainment is to yell, loudly, their favorite songs in an attempt to calm him down.



In other news, The Hub and I have/are starting new jobs. I started mine three weeks ago--I'm a private in-home tutor to three students through a tutoring company. It's only a couple of hours a night a few nights a week, and the money ain't bad. More importantly, and somewhat surprisingly, it's something I really enjoy. Three students is a bit much for me--two of them are once a week, but the third is three days one week, no days the next week. She comes in waves. Anyway.... It's nice to feel like I'm contributing to our finances, but I truly enjoy helping these students improve.

THE HUB, on the other hand, IS A REAL GROWNUP WITH A REAL, GROWNUP JOB! On Monday, he starts with LDS Employment Services. Here's an excerpt of the farewell email he wrote to his coworkers on Friday, describing what he'll be doing:

"They [the employment center] are implementing some new services, and I have been invited to come in and help them incorporate mental health services and build relationships with area job training programs so that we can help people who have been in long-term unemployment situations get back on their feet. Outside of a pilot program that has been running in Salt Lake City, this is the first place that the church is attempting the program, and I get to come in from the ground up. The intention is to run a successful program and help it get started in the other 114 employment centers around the country. I am very excited."

There will be some travel, obviously--The Hub's responsible for the training in our region--but there will be the excellent benefits and the much-prayed-for increase to his salary, allowing us to finally pay our debts. As we were looking over these past seven years of sacrifice and learning, it became so very apparent how involved the Lord was in every detail, every decision, every trial and experience that we've had. Sometimes we would get frustrated when the timing would, for no obvious reason, be slowed down, but The Hub was in the absolute PERFECT position to take this job exactly when he did. It also helps that he FINISHED the copious amount of hours required for licensing last Tuesday. Oh yes he did! And he couldn't stop grinning for two days straight.

So there are a lot of new, happy things going on in our life right now, we're busier than ever, and we are loving it!