Charlotte's Blessing

announcing the blessing of
charlotte patricia phipps

march 8th 12:30 pm
eccles park ward
friends and family welcome
(call for directions)

we're so lucky to have two beautiful little girls!

At Last! A virtual tour of our home

Finally, I have pictures of my entire house. I am calling this a virtual tour because I am probably posting more pictures than most of you care to see, but nonetheless, here they are. We haven't done any work on the main floor yet, just the upstairs.

I posted these first few pics a while ago. This is the front room--what you see when you come in the front door.

Dining Room

Kitchen

(This one turned out dark)

Half bath off of the kitchen

Back in the front room are the stairs. If you look closely, you can see that they need some work. They used to have a carpet runner going up the center; I'm planning on painting the tops black or dark brown.

The hallway will be painted a shade or two darker than it is now.

3 Bed 1 bath upstairs
Master bedroom. This room was covered in layers of wallpaper so we had it dry-walled, painted and the baseboards redone.
I love these windows; I'd like to build a window seat under them one day if we can make it work.

Other half of master. There's so much space here that we hope to add a master bath where the walk-in closet is now (door at the end).

Office/Guest room. This room we painted ourselves; it used to be an ugly yellow. Once we get shelves and a bigger bookcase, we're going to display all of David's treasures from Africa in this room (at least until baby #3 comes along). It's the brightest and warmest room in the house.

I wish we had the before picture; Imagine hot pink tile and mirrored walls. All that we kept was the floor and the sink. It feels so good to know that any grime in this bathroom is OUR grime! No one else!

The girls' room. This room used to be a muddy brown color that was sponge-painted on--ugh. It is a perfect size for two little kiddos, although Charlotte is still in our room for now.

Love this wall; I found a picture and David made it happen. What a stud. This crib was my project right up until Charlotte was born. It used to be an unattractive oak color; I still have to add knobs on the drawers. Love it now.

So that's it! Come and visit us anytime! We're all finally healthy and well although I'm still not taking Charlotte out and about until after her blessing on March 8th.

the Phipps

Sisters

As you can see, Hazel loves her little sister.

Look at that fat little belly.

I LOVE these little booties!

Activity Time

So every day I try to do an "activity time" with Hazel to make sure she still gets some one-on-one time with mom. Lately, it seems like my coolest activity times--the one I'm most excited about--end with her having a meltdown because she can't eat the crayons or spread the chocolate pudding all over the floor. Finding activities for a one year old that maintain their attention for longer than just a few minutes can be a challenge. So, yesterday I got brave and we tried painting. It soon ended up all over her face and then my face, which was just fine because it was washable. I was so excited that we finally had an activity time that didn't end with a tantrum and tears, and then as soon as we grabbed the camera...

Oh well, we at least had fun for a little while. I love that you can see how messy my house is in the background plus the fact that I'm still in my pj's. Gotta love motherhood!

So this isn't the best picture we've ever taken together (sometimes my camera does not live up to it's potential), but yesterday we celebrated our three year anniversary! David told me to get all dressed up and then took me to a shooting range (ha!). It was really funny because the guy helping us wouldn't look at me, he just kept talking to David. Then he finally looked up at me and said, "You smell really girly and it's kinda weird to smell that here at the shooting range." I'm sure they're not used to seeing someone in a dress and heels either. Anyway, we actually decided to come back on a weekend when we had more time because they closed sooner than we expected. SO, we headed over to Cassar jewelers--a jeweler that David did a deal with and received some instore credit--and I got to pick out a beautiful white gold necklace with a tiny diamond penant (I'd post a picture, but it's gettings sized). We're also making some changes to a chocolate pearl necklace David got me last Christmas. After that we headed over to Jasoh's restaurant for some fine dining. I should have taken a picture of my unbelievably tender filet mignon with garlic mashed potatoes, carrot bisque soup and very rich chocolately dessert with berries. Yum.

If I had lots of time on my hands, I'd dig out some cute pics of when we first met, David's prom we went to together, our wedding, etc. but I just don't see myself doing that. Maybe next year!

David James Phipps, I love love love you. You're perfect.

Janelle