Remodeling projects

My WONDERFUL husband decided to redo our upstairs bathroom over Christmas. The remodel was quite an undertaking and a labor of love. (I asked him to do it before the baby came.) Here is what he has accomplished over the last month during his spare time.
1. demolition -remove door, dry wall, shower enclosure, cabinets, sink, toilet, floor
2. rewired bathroom
3. reframed wall near sink
4. framed in space for recessed drawers
5. install new lighting
6. install new vent system
7. new plumbing (with a little help from plumber)
8. new subfloor
9. hang new drywall
10. prime and paint walls
11. tile and grout new floor
12. install toilet
13. install shower
14. put in new medicine cabinet

Here are a few pictures of his progress...


Meanwhile the other Millers were busy doing projects of their own. Noah took some scraps that Drew had lying around and made this chair without any help other than to ask his Papa to cut off one side of the circle in order to fix it to the bottom of the chair. I think he may have a future at Harrison Higgins Inc.



A lot of the rest of their time off school was spent outside making forts with the fort building stuff my dad gave them for Christmas. Here are just two examples of the forts they built. (They also spent time building "see-saws" to launch snowballs, a pumpkin left over from Halloween, and each other into the air.)






This week Noah stayed home with a bad cough which kept him home from school but didn't keep him from going outside to play. The boys spent an hour trying to catch a neighborhood cat with a crate hooked up to a rope. Ben sat under their newest fort without moving (for 20 minutes-I counted) holding the rope in hopes of catching the cat. (don't worry...I would not have allowed them to do this if their trap had any chance of working)


While all of the boys in our family have been busy building, I have been busy growing a third boy in my tummy. He is doing very well and we are all excited about his arrival some time in April.

more fun in the snow

Oh yeah...and some pictures from our trip to the Christmas Tree Farm

The boys found the hidden candy cane tree in the middle of the field of white pine

I love the fact that there is snow in the background of this picture of our tree.
Who ever heard of a white Christmas in Virginia?

Igloo in our yard

Thanksgiving in Richmond

We spent our Thanksgiving in Richmond with my family. Here are some of the pictures from our time together. We spent Thursday night at my mom's and Friday night at my dad's. We packed in a lot of fun in just a few days.

Mom's house...

We played football outside, but the pictures didn't turn out very well. Here are two picture taken on the front porch of my mom's house. The people seen here are my sister, Patricia, two of her children, Betsy and Philip, and my brother, Harrison.

After football we came inside and decorated gingerbread houses. Grace helped me set up the decorations while the boys played outside. Then we all went a little crazy with frosting, candy and sprinkles. In the back ground you can see some of the grown up treats that were available. :)

Dad's house...

We got a surprise when we showed up at Drampa and NuNu's house for Thanksgiving. They met us at the end of the driveway with the tractor.

Ben, NuNu and Noah

Leaves

One beautiful Saturday in early November our family spent time outside in the leaves. I think leaves are a lot more fun when you are a kid. Drew did not enjoy cleaning them out of the gutters (which he has to do way too often). But the boys spent hours playing in the pile in front of our house. They wrestled for over an hour and NEVER CRIED or got carried away and never needed parental intervention. Praise God for making leaves and giving our family a few hours of pure fun.



This is what playing looks like at our house....











For those of you who only have girls...the boys are not fighting. They are having a blast together.

Ben in his Superman clown costume

Ben finally rides a horse

Ben has been asking to ride a horse for months now. So during our church's Fall Festival, I gave Drew the one goal of getting Ben on a horse. Drew is not a big fan of large animals, so I am grateful for his willingness to help out while I was running some games during the festival.

Speaking of running...Noah didn't bother wasting time riding the horse but instead ran from game to game collecting as much candy as possible.

Speaking of candy...both of the boys raked in the candy over Halloween. They each have a gallon size zip lock bag full of candy (and that is after I took out all of my favorite things).