Peter Rabbit Painting

One project I have been working on is painting some Beatrix Potter scenes in Bryan's room. Here is naughty Peter eating veggies from Mr. McGregor's garden. Uh-oh. Next on the list is Jeremy Fisher and Jemima Puddleduck.

Busy Month in the Life of Bryan

Hi! I've had such an exciting new year!


I'm learning to sit...
... and play with my toys.

... which is hard work and requires a nap.

We went to the park for Daddy's birthday..
Daddy made me wear his hanky on my head so I didn't get sunburned. I didn't like it...

.. but Mommy and Daddy know best.

We had some cold bundle-up weather too this month.

I got two new teeth on the bottom front, and so my fingers are good to chew.

I've become a casual thumb-sucker...

... but desperate times call for desperate measures --when two at a time are required!

So I have had a very very busy month- and it's been a good one!

Happy New Year!

As with everything else in the past 3 months, I've been embarrassingly late! Here are a few pictures of the last two weeks since Bryan has been 2 months old. He's almost three months, I can hardly believe!

Hope you are all having a happy new year!

Love,

Karen

Bryan Paul Teague

He has arrived! Out little bundle of love arrived on October 26th at 10:41 pm. "It's a boy!" Paul announced as he laid Bryan Paul on my tummy after delivery. He weighed 8 lbs. 9 oz. and was 20.75" long.

I have not been much of a "baby person," in the past, preferring to spend time with children that are older (4+ years being optimal). So I was worried that I would be always hoping my baby would be 4 years old sooner rather than later. But no, he's already 5 days old, and I'm instead worrying that he's already growing too fast! I could hold him all day long and look into his little face and not be bored for a minute, and I can't think of anything more precious (even a kitten, which I always argued was the cutest type of baby on the planet). So, yep, motherhood and me will be just fine, thank you!

Proud Daddy with Bryan just after delivery

All cleaned up and content as can be!

Green, yellow and white all over

What's green, yellow and white all over? Our laundry! The project for yesterday afternoon was washing all the baby clothes, blankets, bed linens and cloth diapers so that they can be put away and ready for use. It was pretty cute seeing all those newborn Onesies folded up! Ahh simple pleasures.

We finally got rain in South Carolina, too, which has been the big news around here. People practically dancing in the streets with joy. I think it's been something like 35 days without rain and that is something to contend with when all the plant life around here is used to at least one thunderstorm per week. We'd all given up on our lawns and I think Lawn Patrol has too, thank goodness. My rain barrel/soaker hose system amazingly kept our veggie garden alive through the blistering heat and "drought" although we didn't get much of a crop this year. We got a total of 2 cantaloupes, 4 cabbages, 1 bell pepper and 4 tomatoes and a bushel of jalepenos (odd that they did well)... and we are talking edibles, not number of plants here.

Yesterday was a really fun day of being showered again! Tracy, her mom and best friend came over and commandeered the house, setting up food and Beatrix Potter decor all over. About 20 people ended up coming from the neighborhood, church, and also the wives of the guys Tracy and I work with (the wives are so much more fun). We had a fun time visiting and eating some delicious southern food that I hadn't tried before (such as Pimento Cheese dip). Tracy, being the clever one that she is, had a Beatrix Potter name for all the food such as Jemima Puddle Duck's Devilish Eggs and Mr. McGregor's Garden Patch (veggie sticks and dip) and Mrs. Tiddlemouse's Pimento Cheese.



We had some oooing and ahhing and present opening too.

Backtracking to a few days ago, Paul thought we better get another belly picture because it's been awhile, so here I am on Thursday- yikes! hardly any shirts fit me anymore. I mainly wear dresses now.

And here is the crib set up in the finally-finished painted bedroom. All that's missing now is the chair rail that Dad's putting up when he arrives (and a bit more decor, lamps, etc to cozy it up).

Seeing Stripes

The first round of stripe-painting was last weekend and we were surprised at how fast it went. We also painted the ceiling a pretty pale blue. So by the time that was done our arms were tired and we decided to post-pone the second coat to this weekend. Stripes should be done today but sadly the paint store was closed on Saturday due to the holiday so we couldn't get more blue for the ceiling. Hunter Paints is the only store for hundreds of miles that sells the Mythic Paint that has no VOCs (bad for breathing) and is non toxic. By the time we realized we could order it online from Mythic, it was too late to have it for today.

But that's OK because stripe painting will be just enough painting for one day to wear us out and will also give us time to do other things like relax and enjoy the Monday off! It gets really hot in these rooms when you are working hard and there's no ceiling fans to help. Even setting the air conditioning down lower than normal didn't seem to make much difference, so painting was done with as few layers of clothing as possible.

The dark green stripes outlining the medium green stripes is one of the types of tape we are using to keep our lines straight, but will be coming off once we are done.

Happy Labor Day everyone! :-)