let's just see....

Yesterday, Emily Anne stopped in on her way to the small city. Em is my oldest child, no longer a child, but a grown up lady, who is now my friend. It's weird to think you have a baby, nurse and change and rock and love that baby with all your heart, then that baby grows into a child whom you have to guide, discipline, teach, encourage, clothe, shelter and feed...then all of the sudden, they are grown up and making their own decisions! Then you're their friend, and ha, yes, I did make you stay in your bed with a stack of books during nap time, so I do get credit for your lifetime love of reading. And I am sorry you had to hide in trees in the yard to find quiet time to read, and that you were followed around by noisy flocks of children all of your life.

Anyway, she stopped in, on her way to get her clarinet serviced. She graciously accepted my request to accompany, as I sensed she wanted company as much as I wanted to go bye-bye, ha. Jonathan and I had big plans to actually purchase the flooring for his new room, and Em said we could go to Lowes while we were out.

Coffee first, at Simple Roast, I am not getting paid to say that I LOVE this local place, they roast their own coffee, and mmm. I opted out of the flavor, sometimes I get just one or two pumps of peanut butter, or better yet, Reeses peanut butter cup, mmm. But I am trying to behave here!

Then Lowes. Now, I do my research before I make a major purchase, I google the heck out of it. I still hadn't made a firm decision when we got there, so I had some thinking to do. Sam called. I was using my phone to figure out how many boxes, prices, ect., so I had to be rude and tell him I would talk to him later:(

Long story short, we chose laminate over the luxury vinyl planking, because it's cheaper, and it looks nice. It has a 30 year residential warranty, and is 8mm, so I thought it'd be okay.



And this isn't our house, as this flooring is still in the packages, acclimating.




Fifteen boxes, four hundred and forty dollars. That's not too bad for two rooms, but I'm not sure if we'll need more. I'm thinking to do the hallway too, as it also has the original carpeting from 26 years ago.

Anyway. It was fun and exciting to actually purchase this. I have SO many home improvement ideas! I didn't get a BEFORE pic of this room, but I'll take one today...Jon and the little girls ripped out the carpet, the carpet pad, and all of the fasteners from the subflooring yesterday. We've painted one coat of paint so far, but will remove the bottom wood edging and do a second coat before installing the floors.

Anyway. We also stopped at the thrift store, and I bought a huge mirror for ten bucks!!!
I'll chalk paint the frame for Sonja for her new room! We also got a really good sled for just a few dollars, winter IS coming!

Spaghetti and meatballs for dinner, then I made a fort for Lydia by pulling my chair away from the wall. I actually moved my chair because um hum, things get cluttered, newspaper and coupons and pieces of popcorn, so I cleaned it up and swept, and then put a blanket down, a string of lights, and a dollhouse, Lydia was happy for quite a while back there.

She went home last night around nine. In a few minutes, Anne will arrive. And Lyd will be back this afternoon for a bit.

We ordered new tires for our minivan, we might have to have it towed to the garage because the flat tire is on too tight and we can't change it to the spare, or maybe triple A can get it changed, not sure. But we can't drive it. The other van has almost 200,000 miles on it, but it's still going. I'm thankful we still have it!

So it's cold and dark and rainy mixed with a bit of snowy mess, but it's cozy in here. I'm thankful for so many things!

Time to get moving...tomorrow I'll write about my new fitness plans, I am getting in better shape! Ha, just started yesterday, but hey, that's better than my usual idea of starting tomorrow!!!!