Changes around the bend...

Hard to believe we've been in this apartment 2.5 years! It's been a good season, a very very growing season...The girls ages have nearly doubled in this time (if you think about it since Roo was newly 3 and Friendly 18mos). We added the Pip to our family. It's been a good season.

Our Paper chain 2013! I love a good paperchain!

This spring we seemed to be doing a lot of reflecting, we knew changes were in the air and there have been MANY MANY things we've been praying about in regards to the future. We were reflecting on our time living with my Mom...The things we learned in our years living together. That busy crazy time learning to parent the babies that Roo and Friendly used to be.
We learned some things that we liked about living in a communal (if you will) setting. We learned some things that didn't work.  But the most important thing we learned was that we are a family.

Living apart the last few years we realized how much we love having my Mom as part of our family unit. How we would like to be her home base, no matter where she goes or what she does...We want to be a bit of a tether for her.

We had that on our hearts increasingly over the spring, and I guess she did too when she approached us with her idea.


 The idea?  To combine our household again.
But a bit differently this time. Taking what we learned before and implementing what will make the arrangement really great for all concerned.

Nana and Friendly 2009

So that's what all the work at my Mom's has been about. The plan right now is to make her current house work for us all. But we are also trying to think "resale value" and fix some things up so that we leave our options open to possibly sell her home and buy one together with a "In-law suite" if we find that that would be a better fit for us.

So we tore down the deck and are installing a patio....we're painting and fixing galore! We're moving the garden beds around and making the big back yard the best it can be.

A work in progress...

 We are also...

• We are repainting the kitchen (DONE! wohoo!)
• re-tiling the kitchen floor
• fixing/replacing windows
• repainting the attic and extra bedroom (will be our families bedrooms)
• We are looking into renovating the upstairs bathroom, putting another bathroom up there (so my Mom has her own bathroom)AND a laundry closet next to the already existing linen closet so all our laundry needs are on the second floor.
• We are refinishing the finished basement (redoing the flooring and adding more lighting and bright fresh paints). We are also considering adding (eventually) another 3/4 bath down there and a guest room for when we have family visiting. The basement will be our Family Room and school room - we will have our living area and dinning room set up down there so our stuff will be completely separate from my Mom's area on the first floor. 

There are a few smaller projects/improvements we hope to add as well to bring up the house to the best it can be regardless of what is decided. We've been putting a LOT of hours into these projects this summer and we're really making a lot of headway! It's really exciting! 

We have no idea when we will move in. The basement MUST be move-in ready before we make steps to move in - as that will be our living area and we want every thing to be as nice and stable for the girls as possible. We also need to have the bathroom/laundry room area all set as well. Our lease is up in March - so that is kind of the idea is that we will wait until then. But there is the possibility we will move things closer, it really depends on projects getting done.

The front garden- last year? Some thing checked off the list already- giant monster arborvitae taken out and new fencing put in! yay!

So there is the exciting announcement! My Mom has hopes to travel extensively (like leave the country) in the next few years and the hope is to have us all set up and taking care of the house and property for her to have the freedom to do that- but also for her to have a home to come back to.

Roo on the front porch circ 2009

Here's to bends in the road, making changes, and HOME! :)