A Playhouse Update

The playhouse is moving right along, thanks to the hard work of Kev and his dad. I can't even express my admiration for how they have worked from morning til evening day after day in the hot grueling sun. The middle of July is probably not the best time of year to be roofing. But they pushed on, and it is really starting to take shape. I'll tell you what, these are two very lucky little girls. When I asked Kevin to build a playhouse for them I imagined something much smaller and simpler. But he was smart and thought long-term. Not only will this have longevity for the girls as they grow, but when they officially grow "out" of using this space, we'll be using it as our garden shed (unless of course I take it over as my she-shed? Just kidding honey!) We'll be planting our vegetable garden at the back of the shed next summer, and I can't wait to be able to walk out the door and pick the produce that I need from our back yard. I really miss having a constant steady supply of juicy tomatoes at my fingertips.

At some points during the day Kev could barely even touch the roofing materials, it was so hot. They eventually got smart and worked on it in the evenings, but then after a while his dad would end up having to point a flashlight at the roof so Kevin could see!

We also got *almost* a coat of paint on the outside, and WHAT a difference. We're putting cedar shingles on sides of the peaks (they just came in today - hurray!), and I think we're going to leave those natural. The windows are going on, which I painstakingly painted. Normally I say you can never have too many windows, but not when you have to paint them all!

Still to come, the front will be getting a pergola, which I think we're going to leave natural, and there will be a Dutch door on the front, barn door on the back, and window boxes will all add pops of color. And then! And then. I get to decorate. I am SO excited. I've been collecting odds and ends from Craigslist and consignment shops with the girls and we have found some really fun stuff. Stay tuned, I think we're in the home stretch! xo, Lauren

Half Bath Update

We finally got around to adding a fresh coat of paint to the half bath, and what a difference already! When we moved in it looked like this:

Faux gold ceiling and sponge painted beige walls. It was really busy and dark. I added some art to try to spruce things up a bit, but who was I kidding?! Here are a couple of close-ups to give you a better idea of what we're dealing with:

A couple of coats of wall and ceiling paint later and...

Hurray! Light, airy perfection. Eventually this little space will get a new vanity/sink, and probably a new mirror and light fixture. For now, it's like a million times better, don't you think? xo, Lauren

P.S. The paint color is Behr Silver Drop, the same color we used in the kitchen at our first house.

Violet & Lucy's Playhouse: Week 1

This is a project we've been wanting to start for the girls for a long time, but we knew that we weren't going to be at our first house forever, so we waited. We were super excited when we finally found our forever home that we could make this a reality for the girls. Since we're thinking long-term, we decided to make a playhouse that had a future function when the girls have outgrown it. Kevin really misses his little vegetable garden from the old house (and I miss walking out the door when I need some fresh tomatoes!), so we decided to make the playhouse adult sized so that someday it can become a garden shed. We'll be planting a vegetable garden on the back side of the play house - it's a spot that gets a lot of sunshine and we thought it would be a great natural way to create some division to the yard for our little patch of veggies. Kevin and his dad have been working on it from morning til dinner for a week now and it's really starting to take shape!

The plan is to paint it white, with a wooden pergola off of the front, and some fun accent colors. The front door will *hopefully* be a Dutch door, and the back door will be a sliding barn door. We're also going to plant lots of pretty bushy flower and things around it. The girls are so excited to walk out the door every day and see it transform.

I'm crazy excited to decorate the inside. I'm kind of a freak like that. In this section we're going to paint, and probably add their play kitchen and some fun accessories:

On the opposite side, we're planning to build a lofted area with a ladder or some ship stairs and some sort of lounge area. The girls have requested beds. We've thrown around a bunch of ideas from suspended rope beds, a hammock, bunk beds, or even moving the toddler bed out here:

I seriously can't believe how hard Kev and his dad have been working on this thing, and I am so impressed with what they've done so far. Hopefully someday the girls will really be able to appreciate the hours and hours of hard work were put into creating this for them. We're three really lucky girls.

I'm planning on sharing some inspiration photos for the space tomorrow! xx, Lauren

Our Summer Bucket List: On the Farm

We're really lucky that my parents spend a lot of time with our girls. They get them almost every week for an overnight stay, and they do all kinds of fun things with them. Parks, playgrounds, pool time, tractor rides - you name it. They've also been helping the girls check things off of their summer bucket list. One thing the girls really wanted to do was "feed the ducks," so my parents took them to a farm down the road from their house where there are always a ton of ducks and geese. The farmer is fine with them feeding the animals and poking around, so they actually visit there pretty frequently.

Normally I'm not along to see their farm visits, but I hear about them a lot. Kevin and I usually use Nonny and Poppy time to have date nights and get things done around the house. This time though, I was excited to get some pictures! My dad is really into photography (I'm forever stealing his camera!), and I was really excited when he sent me a bunch of photos from their day. Thanks, Daddy!

That guy's expression totally cracks me up. And can you tell that long stars and stripes number is Violet's favorite dress?! She always wants to wear it to the most impractical places :) Total girly girl, through and through.

Speaking of the summer bucket list, I'm super excited to say that the play house build is in full swing! I can't wait to share some progress photos with you all soon. Hope you're all enjoying some simple summer fun! xo, Lauren

Ideas for Lucy's Room

Before we moved, I had started to update Lucy's nursery to a big girl room. Her new room is massively bigger than her old little slanted space, so I want to take what I started at the old house and basically add to it. The bed, rainbow stacking toy, fawn night light, cloud mobile, wall dot decals, and baby animal artwork, and pillows were all in her former bedroom. It looked like this:

For the new room, we need new curtains (the ceilings are a lot taller on our second floor than at our former house), a new rug (bigger floor space!), a bigger dresser, and a few more accessories. We can thankfully fit the beautiful glider that we got from RH Baby & Child up our new stairs (the old ones were such a problem!), so that will be in the space as well. She's still (and will always be!) my baby, and she still loves to rock with her mama for a while before going to sleep :)

Here are a few things I would love to have for her space:

Pom Pom Curtains
Striped Rug
Cloud Pillow
"Love" wooden sign
Happy Place wall art
Vintage Dresser
Bunny Knobs
Farmhouse Light

Right now I'm trying to find the perfect warm white for her walls and scouring Craigslist for a pretty (and hopefully inexpensive!) vintage dresser. Wish me luck! xo, Lauren

A Simple Summer Bucket List

I've been meaning to share our summer bucket list with you all, but I guess we're having too much fun checking things off for blogging! The girls and I worked on it together, and we wanted to keep it simple. You know, the good parts of summer:

We've already checked a bunch of things off of the list (not to say that we won't do some of them again!) Someone got the girls one of those crazy water balloon things that you see on TV where you can fill up like 50 water balloons in a few seconds, and the two of them went at it! At first it started off really tame. They kind of faced off duel style and took turns. One would turn around, the other would walk up and slam a water balloon into their back. After like five minutes of this I eventually suggested running around while throwing the balloons (they aren't very experienced in the world of water balloon fights apparently!) and they went crazy. Water balloon fight...check. Now we have to buy more of these amazing water balloons because it's all they every want to do.

Catching fireflies is always a little challenging, because they usually are in bed before it gets dark enough for the fireflies to come out. I'm all for bending the rules and schedules in the summer time, but they just get plain tired by like 7:30/8:00 at night. We got lucky the other night though because we stayed up specifically for the fireworks, and the park that we were in was absolutely covered in them. You could literally put your hands into the grass and scoop one right up - they were everywhere. It was pretty amazing. Not to mention the perfect sunset.

We got really lucky with the fireworks too. We ended up going on the 3rd of July - not quite as legit, but that's when our little part of town has their at the local park. The big display downtown was on the fourth, but we always like this one better. It's nice to pull up, lay out a blanket on the grass, and hang out instead of filing into a big crowded stadium. This year we were so thankful that we went this route because it was seriously the perfect night (see sunset shots above!) Fireflies, great temperature, beautiful sunset, perfect weather. The actually fourth of July ended up being a big bummer - really rainy and kind cold. I didn't get any pictures of the actual fireworks because Lucy got kind of manic (late bedtime, argh!) and was basically doing flips on me during the display, but I did get the cutest ever pic of the girls snuggling with their dad:

 I'll be sharing more bucket-list fun as we check things off the list! I'd love to hear what's on your summer bucket list! xo, Lauren