I love Before and After Pictures!

We have an amazing house. I love it! But there are some cosmetic things I have been just itching to change. One of those is my very outdated kitchen. The cabinets are in pretty good shape but after 30 years of being used and sitting in the sun, the finish was a little blah. So I decided to paint them and after a week of very long days, the cabinets are finished. What do you think? 

The pictures really don't do it justice. You just need to come and experience it yourself. It is so bright and crisp and clean. We still have some work to do in here, like the fluorescent lighting needs to go and we need some crown molding, but I am so very, very pleased with how the cabinets turned out.

5 Years Old

I was just a few months pregnant with Eleanor when we moved to Shelby and now she is 5. We knew we were having a girl but we had no idea that she would be so girly!

We are trying to get Eleanor to stop walking on her tip toes all the time because her heel cords are tightening up, but that is like asking a bird not to fly. So we bought her some cowboy boots for her birthday in the hopes that they will keep our little ballerina's feet planted a little more.

 

 

We saw this costume on clearance at Target and Sullivan just had to have it. He doesn't really know who Captain America is, but he doesn't care as long as it is a superhero. This picture below is not an action shot. This was how he posed for me when I asked to take his picture. Oh and he kept telling us, "Look, I Captain Cacerica." Awww, the cuteness!

And one more super good pose.
Little boys are just superheroes in disguise. - Art Moms

 And Penelope couldn't be left out. :)

Littles and Loot

Little Red Riding Hood, Little Bo Peep and a little Superman.

We had so much fun trick or treating, especially Eleanor. She just couldn't contain her excitement. It was just bubbling out of her in the form of skipping, giggling and impossibly high-pitched squeals of delight. I wish my camera was faster because I tried to get a picture of her running up to me with her face alight with delight but I had to settle for one of her falling at my feet and tugging at my pants because she was so happy.

This was Sullivan's first Halloween that he really knew what was going on and he had soooo much fun. In fact, almost daily he asks if we can go trick or treating again when it is dark outside. I had fun sorting the candy with the kids. It was a good wind down activity and then I could easily remove most of the candy bars to freeze for later after they had gone to bed. We still have way too much candy! I think we will go to less houses next year.

Extreme Pumpkin Carving

I don't think Aaron can ever do anything the way "normal" people do. And I mean that in the absolutely best way possible. Morgan actually told us that he never really liked carving pumpkins before but the way Aaron does it is so much fun.

Sure, it looks pretty normal here, but we're just getting started.

 The appearance of the first power tool.

 

 And now, the blowtorch. Yes. I said blowtorch.

 And the vampire teeth enter the picture.

Notice the creepiness that the blowtorch added to Sullivan's pumpkin?

Yeah, we don't do silly pumpkins in our house. Only super creepy jack-o-lanterns.

 My powertool-loving boys.

 See the concentration on Sullivan's face? He should know how to run the blowtorch next year.

So this lovely spider pumpkin has plastic vampire teeth, nails for eyes and cornstalks from the garden for legs with wires for the joints on the legs. Pretty cool right?

 I call these two the vampire frog and the pirate.

 Sullivan's "creepy guy", Morgan's I have no idea, and my ghost.

 Another of Morgan's creations and the creepiest of all the pumpkins which is Aaron's.

 Yes, those are screws in the mouth and eyeballs. I might have to cover this one at night.

 Penelope's pumpkin on the left and Eleanor's "pirate princess" on the right.

 

7

Penelope turned 7 last week! We had fun celebrating with 7 pancakes in the morning, Aaron went to lunch with her at school, favorite dinner of Cajun shrimp and, of course, cake and presents.

My cute kiddos with an oh-so-excited nephew in the background. (I think he was really having fun, just acting bored. He is 15 after all.)

My Grandpa Cox used to buy us birthday cakes at Albertsons and bring it over and say "I baked it myself." (I so miss his laugh that would come after that statement!) My favorite cake that he would bring was a white layer cake with a raspberry filling between the layers, so I thought I would do that myself. But then I thought, why use store-bought raspberry jam when I can use homemade Nanking Cherry jam. Oh, it was heavenly. My wonderful husband who doesn't eat cake. Ever. Loved it!

I think that Penelope had a wonderful day and she is very happy to be 7.