welcome to the world!

 I am not posting a picture of baby Emilia yet, as they have not sent out any announcements yet, but she was born yesterday, and she's beautiful!  I had a hard lesson in it, as I found myself anxious, knowing they were in the hospital and the birth was imminent, then not hearing anything for a few hours...when she was born, and I saw a picture, I cried.  She is so beautiful, and what a miracle a newborn baby is.  

My hard lesson was a memory of when I was having Emily, 41 years ago when I was just 19 years old.  My m-i-l was there at the hospital in the waiting room, and the nurse kept telling us she was asking how we were doing, she was there all day long...and now I wonder why on earth didn't I have her come in to see me while I was in labor?  Even for a quick hug?  Now, being in her shoes, I understand so well how much that would have meant.  

Now we have 19 grandchildren.  

Ben and Ashley have 3

Molly and Josh have 3

Sam and Grace have 4

Margaret and Adrian have 3

Kathryn and Darius have 4

Sonja and Oscar have 1

Jonathan and Rosi have 1

And, three more this year!  I'll tell when I can tell! 

I didn't go anywhere today, woke up to at least four inches of new snow.  It was cold and windy too.  I've just puttered around, vacuumed, washed dishes, did exercises.  Miss Char stopped at the store on the way home from class.  It's so strange not to be going places all the time, but it's SO challenging to walk through a store...especially when you have to go through ice and snow in the parking lot, and just to get to the car in the driveway.  Hopefully it clears up by tomorrow, I have pool, then PT in the afternoon.

I don't usually eat lunch, but today I decided to take the last bit of corned beef and red skinned potatoes and chop them into a hash, browned up in olive oil in the iron frying pan, with an egg cooked on top.  It was SO good.  I didn't eat most of the potatoes, but they were good.   

My two youngest children who aren't even "children" anymore...Miss Charlotte Claire is 19, and Miss Camille Anaya is 18, they are grown up college students.  I can't believe it.

They went to D.C. this past weekend, and spent some time in the Nat'l Museum of Art.  

In other exciting news, our new stove hood/vent arrived today, and is in the box at the foot of the deck stairs.  Paul is working on an apartment we need to rent, putting in a new kitchen faucet, and re-installing the toilet after putting new flooring in the bathroom.  Our present stove hood is only a few years old, but stopped working, so we just ordered another one, not black this time though, stainless steel.  

The apartment is almost finished, so Paul can start doing more here, ha.  When you own a home, there is always something to be done, whether it's just maintenance or updating things. (add in a few rental houses, and ugh!!!!)  Springtime brings yard work, and then there's the pool to work on.  We have it on our list to put in new countertops, as our are original to the house, which was framed in 1991, moved in in 1992.  They're blue with wood trim edging, and I actually don't hate them.  We were thinking to go with wood countertops, but now are reconsidering and thinking to do formica/laminate that looks like wood, some of the new ones look absolutely convincing, and are far easier to take care of.  We never had a backsplash, and I want the PVC beadboard, all the way up to the bottoms of the cabinets, I love the timeless old fashioned look of it.  I'd like new tile behind the stove too.  We have a white porcelain divided sink, and would like to update to a large one bowl white sink.  (Our sink is nice, but it is wearing out along the edges, porcelain chipping off!).   I also want the cabinets changed around...we built this house ourselves, and when I say WE, I mean mostly Paul and my brothers Bob and Tom.  We had newborn baby Joseph, our fifth child, when we started framing, he was ten/eleven months old when we moved in.  The kitchen cabinets:  two got switched around and put in the wrong places, and every so often it bugs the heck out of me.  You might never notice, but once you see it: 

This first cabinet is supposed to be the same size as the second two.  (also, that's where the vacuum cleaner landed after I vacuumed up a muddy mess AFTER I had already vacuumed, someone's boots:)(also, that's how the counters look right now, oops)

(there, I cleaned off the counters a little!)

See the cabinet above the clock?  That's the one that belongs with the other two, and the wider one belongs over that clock, matching in size to the lower one.  It's not the end of the world, but I would like them switched, for once and for all, before we put up the bead board.  Or whatever backslash we decide on:). (The tile behind the stove was blue like the countertops, with some printed tiles with baskets of flowers on them, I kind of wish I hadn't painted over them...)

Anyway.  Projects beget projects, and we aren't moving anywhere, so we may as well make our space as nice as we can, for as reasonable as we can.  Right now, I have chicken in the air fryer, but the girls are in more of a hurry, as they are going to help with the little kids at Activity Club, so they are making street tacos with chicken that Char cooked up last night.  

Paul is home now, since it took me all the live-long day to write this.  :)

You all have a really good afternoon!