They’ve made quite a bit of progress in the last week and started putting the drywall up. The shower is staring to take shape – as we literally changed the design 3 times this week. These are from yesterday and I haven’t been down yet today, but it looks like all the walls and ceiling should be finished soon. Then it’s just floors, doors, bathroom fixtures, and the finishing touches.
Reagan was 18 months old last week – I know, I can’t believe it, either!
We took a trip to the doctor last week for a check-up. It was an interesting, because it was the first that she didn’t get any vaccines, but she is really starting to know places. Once we got called back, she was so upset about being there, she wouldn’t even stand on the scale. She eventually warmed up, but it took a little while.
Her stats were – weight: 27lb. (between 50th and 75th percentile) and height: 34.5 in. tall (over the 97th percentile)! That height really jumped and you can really see now how much taller she is than the other kids.
Later that afternoon, we made it to Georgetown’s President’s Annual Christmas Party. It was her first time seeing Santa and she did pretty well. She wouldn’t sit on his lap, but we did get a nice picture and she’s been carrying it around all over the house.
One of Reagan’s favorite words right now is “mess” and that is quite appropriate for the last week’s worth of work in the basement. They ran all the electrical for the outlets and recessed lights. Then they got started on the plumbing and that’s when the mess started.
On Friday, they started digging to search for the sewer line and left piles of dirt everywhere. Today, they started to make some connections and fill in some of the holes.
(shower on the left, toilet on the right in the far corner and sink on the right in the near corner)
The last thing I should have been doing tonight was changing the blog background. I could have been going to bed or shopping for presents or sending much needed alumni chapter emails, but since there are only a few short hours until December is here, this seemed like a better thing to cross off my list. I did get some things posted on Craigslist tonight, though.
Now I hope we have decent weather this weekend and we can get our tree and take the fall decorations up and replace them with Christmas things.
So, after one day of work last Monday, they took a few days off (without telling us, but we’ll overlook that for now). Today, they got started again and framed out the walls so we can start to see the space that will soon be finished.
Tim and I have been talking for a while about a pretty major project for our upstairs – converting the tv room into a bathroom and shifting most of the current bathroom space into Reagan’s room for a little more space and to give her a closet.
We’ve been tossing this idea around and really didn’t have any pictures of what this would actually look like or which contractor to go with. Then, we went into a store – well, a shop full of older architectural pieces – and they had a beautifully refinished clawfoot tub. We decided that, despite the expense, it was perfect and would be a great start to the bathroom design.
But, we still had the problem of where do we live while the upstairs construction is going on? And, we would be losing a living space and couldn’t come up with a solution for moving the tv to the first floor.
So, we decided the best thing is to add a bathroom and finish part of the basement and to do that first so we can “live” down there while they work on the upstairs. We called one of the contractors we had been talking with and, over the weekend, signed him up to start today! They started today and upgraded our electrical box and they’re starting to move wires and pipes on the basement ceiling.
We Tim spent a few hours in basement over the weekend to start getting things ready. If you have ever even peeked into the basement, you can see that this is a major change already. Most of the things that were piled all over the back portion of the basement are now efficiently packed in the front, hopefully out of the way of all the work.
Now I just hope the Christmas decorations are close enough to the outside that we can get to them in the next few weeks.
So this Sunday was the first time is a long time where we found ourselves with a completely free day. No out-of-town guests, no flag football, no soccer. Just a free day and beautiful weather. So after a good nap, we headed down to the National Mall to ride the marry-go-round and kill sometime.
We stopped by the Natural History Museum and they had this cool crochet coral reef. What is that you ask, it is a huge coral reef made out of crochet, of course:
When we left, the sun was low in the sky, providing some interesting lighting:
My mom was in town (with the dog, Caesar) a few weekends ago.
We had a somewhat busy weekend, with trips to Ikea and a pumpkin/apple picking farm on Saturday. Sunday got cut a bit short, since the dog was sick, but it meant we got to go out to Centerville for a little more family time with Tim’s aunt, uncle, and cousins.
Her first caramel apple
Playing in the pumpkins (while chewing more apple)
The obligatory hayride out to the pumpkin patch
Enjoying the day
And checking out the chickens.
Our second and third events were a party Saturday afternoon, where we all got dressed up, and the 2nd annual party and parade at the neighborhood elementary school playground. The group shot from the other day was from the party.
Reagan doing her best to get as close to Dad as possible.
Side note: I am not sure why, but Reagan (I’ve noticed other kids doing this, too) calls things she associates with a person by that persons name. For instance, when the phone rings, it’s “dada”, even if they’re sitting next to each other. The red bucket is now “dada”, because it’s part of his costume. I guess it’s not uncommon.
Sunday morning, our neighborhood hosted an awesome party and parade at our favorite playground. I counted over 50 kids!
Reagan spent quite a bit of time running in the (freshly cut) grassy area.
And, she played on the see saw. Notice the awesome tattoo on her hand. We got some at the party the day before.
The bee and some honey.
We had a busy Halloween weekend and we didn’t even make it out trick or treating tonight. Friday we went down to the annual Hilloween festival near Eastern Market. We decided it was overrated, and we probably won’t go back next year. Even though we got there pretty early, it got crowded quickly and was geared towards older kids. There were 2 moon bounces, so we stood in line for one. Reagan was so excited about going in it, we literally had to hold her back from running in. Once she got in, some bigger kids bounced her, she fell down, and completely lost it. That was about the end of the fun, and it was cold, so we went home. But, it was a good trial run for the costume.
The consensus after event 1 was, she didn’t want to put the bee on, but once it was on, she was okay. And the headband, which will not be in any of the pictures, was an absolute no.
Friday night, Ted arrived and we had some costume finalizing building to do. Tim was finishing the flower and pot, the boys were in charge of the honey pot lid, and I finished the honey pot.
some final touches
a bit more sewing
the final results
I think they made a mistake. This is what happened in front of our house today.
I really hate feeling like I absolutely have to turn the computer on and get some things done once I get home from work. But, sometime that happens and that’s what I get for signing up for this chapter presidency. It’s all good, but it makes me less likely to want to play with pictures and blog either.
Though, much of my time lately has been taken up working on Reagan’s awesome Halloween costume. She’s going to be super cute. It’s almost finished, but I need to do a real fitting to finalize a few things. I also picked up some cute Halloween fabric and made her a candy bag. It’s smaller than I originally planned, but it will be perfect. And, I made one for Jack. They’re going to love them.
Since I don’t think we took any pictures last weekend and I can’t remember exactly where I left the camera, here are a few play pictures from a few weeks ago.
This morning, Regan, Jack, Jennifer (Jack’s mom) and I (Tim) stumbled upon what, I have to believe, is the only Columbus Day Celebration / Recognition event in the whole country. The circle in front of Union Station is Columbus Circle and the statue there is a tribute to that “great navigator and explorer.” There today, the Knights of Columbus were holding their 99th annual Columbus Day celebration. There were a bunch of old dudes dressed up in cloaks and funny hats, but the highlight was “The Presidents Own” United States Marine Band. We got there about 5 minutes before the start of this gallant event, and so we propped ourselves in the front row, because I know that Reagan loves marches (the musical genre that is). I know this because a few weeks ago, Reagan, my Mom and I were driving to Kentucky to visit my dad and we put on my mom’s “Worlds Greatest Marches” CD and Reagan, without prompting, began to conduct an imaginary band. Well today the band was right there.
Dancing is also something that comes natural to her. It is almost like the music takes her body over and she can’t help but dance.
We can’t wait for next year when it is the 100th Columbus Day!
So Reagan’s newest trick at the playground is to hang from and swing from the chin-up bar. At the playground near our house the chin-up bar is about four feet high, which she can’t reach, so we need to lift her up. However, when we were in Richmond, we went to the park and there was a set of parallel bars there that was just the right height that she could reach and hang without help getting up.
This past weekend we went down to Richmond, VA to visit some of Susan’s cousins. We did a bad job of photo-documenting the trip, but here are some quick shots.
Reagan had a great time playing with her cousins and so did Tim.
Olivia entertained Reagan every waking moment.
Mark and Michael both had fun with her too, but we didn’t get any pictures of them.
The adult cousins in Richmond spoiled us with perfect weather, good company, a fun time making wine and good food. Here is Reagan after her dessert
We were there Friday through Sunday and we were all pretty tired after a fun filled weekend, so the ride home was quite.
that a year ago, she was just getting strong enough to lift her head and body up
and now she’s a climbing, running, sliding kid!
To catch up on things, a few weeks ago, we visited Wheaton Regional Park in Montgomery County. (Take note of both the train and the carousel pictures).
We happened to get there just as things were starting up and other families were arriving. Tim wanted to ride the train, so we got tickets and made it on the first train of the day. This was awesome, because we saw a mama and a few baby deer running around the woods. But, Reagan was not as happy on the train and spent most of the time being corralled by Tim.
Trying to get a family picture while we waited. This was the best we got.
Two of the gnomes that were hiding in the woods…
Two of the deer…
And then, we Reagan saw and heard the carousel. She just stood and stared and then ran around the carousel (twice!) trying to figure how to get on. But, we had used all our tickets on the train.
Plus, there was an awesome playground with tons of slides. We’ll definitely be back.
