And the baby had its first party...

Fran had a really beautiful shower for us to celebrate our little kiddo.  It was right on the water in Erie.  the views were spectacular:

 (there's the Niagara!)

And the room was gorgeous too:

And, as you might have seen in that middle picture, Fran does not kid around in the dessert department.  The food was fabulous, but these were divine:

We had such fun!  It is so incredible to be in a room with so much love.  And I had some really great helpers:

We are so loved and spoiled.  Incidentally, the room was split almost evenly between those who thought we were having a girl and those who were sure it's a boy.  We'll see!  Aunt Vera tells me she thinks boy, and she says she has never ever been wrong, so let the record reflect...

The Baby's Room

It used to be pink, a sort of very light dirty pink.  Anthony removed weird shelves, repaired the walls, primed and painted.  Here's the wall color:

It's really pretty with the floor.  Anyway, then it was on to furniture.  We considered giving the baby the dressers we have in our bedroom (mine from childhood), but they are too big to use both of them in this little room and we wanted the baby to have something we thought was lovely and fun.  So, baby got a new bookshelf, rocking chair and dresser (crib too).  The crib came two days ago and Anthony and Tony put it together.  Here's how the room looks right now:

Sadly, the rug is temporary.  It's really fun, but it's also really too big.  It will reappear soon in another room; we'll keep you posted.  The door to the right of the bookshelf is the baby's own cedar closet.  Please don't tell the baby about that, because we're going to use it to store winter coats for a couple years.  But this baby does have a lot of books to read (considering its parents, really, this seems quite tame.  It could have little baby-sized chemistry textbooks, you know.).

The pink bear, top right, was my mom's when she was small, then mine.  The orange bear to its right (barely in the picture, really) was mine.  The baby deserves and is getting its own stuffed animals, of course, but it's nice to have those in there for now.  Once the kiddo is mobile I think they'll go somewhere else for a while.

And I absolutely love the crib.  Mom has accused it of being over-engineered, but it is gorgeous and built like a Mack truck.  We worked really hard to find something very safe that was made in the US from real wood by real craftspeople without glues or other things that might offgas into our little defenseless baby.  And we found it!  Here's the wood (also maple, like the new floor; anyone sensing a theme?):

Isn't it gorgeous?!

We are still working on lighting and a rug that's a little smaller, so stay tuned.  In the meantime, we'll leave you with the baby's first handmade present, a gorgeous blanket knitted and crocheted by Mom's friend Donna, who has been so sweet to us:

Not an accident that it matches the walls.  This is one resourceful, clever woman!  And it's so soft and cozy.  What a lucky baby, to have something made just for him or her!

We have a floor!

Tony and Anthony worked long and hard over two weekends - it would have taken them one if they'd had all the materials they needed, but we had a little oopsie - and downstairs, where we used to have really hideous alternating squares of 9"x9" asbestos tile, we now have gorgeous maple floors. 

Let's review.  Here's what it looked like before:

Now, it looks like this:

Forgive the weird assemblage of furniture, baby stuff, extra floor pieces and shop vac.  We're working on it.

Pretty neat, huh?  It's now a warm and cheerful space that we like to be in.  We watched a movie down there last night when I was too tired to move (hence the ottoman in front of the bench; the little table next to it was for our dinner).

And the wood itself is gorgeous:

And check out what a beautiful job these guys did in the corners:

It's stunning.  We're so, so lucky.

We like it so much that we want to be down here now, so we're going to have to figure out how to furnish this space.  Also, the office looks a lot like this but isn't pictured; we'll give you new office pictures soon.  For now, isn't this an amazing transformation?  And, lastly, our fun lamp in the corner:

A major update on the outside - part 1

Somehow it's been a month.  Oops.  Here's what's been going on:

I remained obsessed with our new violets, and found a lot of containers to put them in.  We had more than a month of continuous violets in the house, joined at the end by lily of the valley.

And our two majestic tulips just outside the front door bloomed.  They are quite spectacular.

And these other elegant blue things bloomed in front of the house and back by the porch.  I still don't know what they are.  Anyone?

And our bleeding heart sort of went rogue:



It made so many flowers!  Amazing!

And we discovered the lily of the valley; it's all through this bed:

And then the big bearded irises started:

And the lilacs were doing their thing - we have about five bushes and they are averaging about one bloom per bush, which is not my idea of a good time, so some pruning will be in order later in the year:

But at least they are a pretty color!

Lately the rhododendrons are in full bloom:

And then the peonies are hot on their heels:

We have a couple of cute little columbines:

We have found evidence of upcoming asiatic lillies, which I really hope rabbits don't like to eat, because I'd like to know what color they are:

More still to update you on, but I have to go wrangle the bok choy, because Anthony has made the whole rest of dinner.