Christmas Celebrations

Christmas has come and gone again with a new year just a few hours away.  After church on Christmas Eve we tried taking family pictures and after all was said and done got a good one.

 The girls together in their Christmas best

Our Christmas Eve celebrations centered around our annual piano recital.

 Christmas morning the girls slept in until around 9am and then we were finally able to open presents.

The girls got snowshoes for Christmas but we have yet to use them as there isn't much snow to be had.

Home Improvement Project

I will be the first to admit I am not a DIY type of person or interior decorator. This year for some odd reason I decided to take on a project that actually turned out pretty good even though I had a lot of anxiety during it--our kitchen/family room area.  We had been talking for awhile about redoing floors and a friend told me about this gel stain you could use on cabinets so I thought I'd give it a go. I ended up staining our fireplace mantle, bathroom vanity, kitchen cabinets, and kitchen table.  We had new floors put in and purchased new chairs as well.  Here is picture proof of the whole process.

The before pictures.

 The during pictures.  The mantle after 1 coat of stain, already a significant change.

 The kitchen island after a coat of stain.

 The kitchen with all the cabinet doors removed exposing the mess behind.  The hardest part for me I think was not having drawers.  Everything from the drawers were either on top of the counter or in the garage.  This is probably two coats of stain into the process.

 Here was me hoping the flooring would match pretty well as I picked the color out online with no physical samples.  It is vinyl plank flooring and actually went over the existing floor. This choice seriously caused me anxiety and a few hours of precious sleep.  I did like the color after all, not too light or dark and complimented the cabinets but we'll see about durability.

 An empty family room ready for new flooring.

 A kitchen with the stained cabinets back on but cleared of appliances and other furniture.

 Our living room filled with items from the family room.  We may have too much stuff!

 The process of laying new floor

 Floor is in! Now need to paint the new baseboards and put furniture in.

It's all put back together, just don't look too close!  Love the dark brown and so glad to have a functioning kitchen with all the pieces put back. 

A timeline recap:
November 25 (Saturday after Thanksgiving) purchase stain (General Finishes gel stain Antique Walnut) & start staining mantle, vanity, and island
Week of November 27 Take off cabinet doors (Eric's job) and put on coats of stain on the doors and cabinets.  Each coat needed about 24-48 hours to dry and our garage was covered tarps, painting pyramids, and doors. 
Week of December 4 Finish off the 3-4 coats of stain needed, wait at least 72 hours to dry before applying 3 layers of topcoat each needing at least 2-4 hours dry time
Weekend of December 9 put cabinet doors back on
December 11 Take all furniture out of family room and all appliances out of kitchen in preparation of floors being put in
December 12-15 New floors put in, caulk & paint baseboards
December 16 Start work on table sanding and putting first coat stain on
Week of December 18 Put 2nd & 3rd coats stain on wait 72, apply 3-4 layers topcoat
December 24 The table is ready to put back, just in time for birthday & Christmas celebrations

I know I have touch-up to do but have absolutely no motivation. Maybe that will come in the new year.

Our Christmas Eve baby is 14

Eric and I will always remember December 24, 2003 when I woke up and my water broke and I said we would be having a baby that day. Fast forward 14 years and we have a beautiful teenager on our hands (when did we get that old?).  This year Christmas Eve fell on a Sunday but thankfully we only had one hour of church but it was at 9am and I had choir practice beforehand but Elizabeth got her wish of hard boiled eggs and toast--the kids are really letting me off easy this year with breakfast wishes!  We came home from a church service of Christmas music and were able to relax the rest of the day before Lisa came over for birthday festivities.  The dinner request was savory chicken, ham, and mushroom crepes in a gruyere sauce, probably the fanciest thing I can make and they were delicious.   Birthday dessert of choice was apple pie which Eric made and it was delicious too.

 Opening presents and eating dessert, two of our favorite pastimes.

 Me and my favorite Christmas Eve present!

On Friday we were able to have a birthday party for Elizabeth and the theme was Escape Room.  Elizabeth and her three cute friends love mysteries and often talk about some at lunch during school so they had fun working through a scenario of The Escape Room the game and then watched a movie.

A few things we love about Elizabeth:

• She is a sponge of information and has transitioned from books to scientific YouTube videos
• She has so much energy and is usually very happy
• Loves having a smart phone to text friends and watch videos
• A great big sister to Rachel & Evelyn.  Right now they are enjoying building worlds together on Minecraft
• Elizabeth is very empathetic and aware of the emotions of those around her
• She loves nature and I only wish we could get up into the mountains more together as she is a great hiker
• She has set a goal to earn a 4.0 all this year and has so far met it with getting 100% or above in a few classes
• She shows courage in her conversations and in addressing the issues that inevitably arise in life
• She's very conscientious and concerned with making the world a better place

We love you Elizabeth, our Christmas Eve baby!

Rachel is 12!

Turning 12 isn't quite 13 but big enough of a deal for church reason as girls graduate from Primary to Young Womens.  Rachel is now almost as tall as Elizabeth and me and continues to grow.  We have been watching the Netflix show "Stranger Things" and so for her birthday breakfast, Eggo's were requested.  Easy enough for me.  Rachel must really like breakfast foods because she asked for crepes for dinner.

Banana Cake for dessert, definitely a family favorite!

One thing she asked for were color changing stress balls so there you go, courtesy of Grandma B

Showing off her new purse, jacket, and boots--quite the fashionista!

As I only put on friend birthday parties on even year birthday, Rachel had one this year and we returned to Boondocks for bowling, laser tag, pizza, and arcade.  The girls had a blast!

Things we love about Rachel:

• She still hates anything dealing with kissing and we love having fun with that
• She is very studious and loves reporting when her grade is over 100% in a class
• She decided to join band this year and is doing very well at the trumpet
• She likes to make lists so whenever I need present ideas for anyone, I can go to her for help. When we are packing for trips I just make a list and she makes sure to mark it off.  Recently she made a list of breakfast foods to make each day of the week.
• She still enjoys soccer and now that the season is over will do some physical activity (running, workout video, etc) on her own
• Style wise she vacillates between wearing workout clothes and skirts with nice shoes--she loves maxi skirts!
• As a middle child Rachel is good about playing with both her sisters

We love you Rachel!

A Truly Despicable Family

If you don't know, we get kind of serious with Halloween costumes in our house.  Some years there's a family theme, others to each their own but always with a fabulous couples costume.  We especially like to play up Eric's bald head and all the great characters that come from it (Mr. Clean, Daddy Warbucks, Charlie Brown).  This year the girls thought months ago that we should be the Despicable family as it was the perfect size with three girls and each character's personality kind of matched ours.  After some trips to thriftstores, clothing stores, Amazon (of course), and Halloween stores we had our costumes and were very happy with the result.

Here we are at our church trunk or treat where we even won for best family costume.

On Halloween proper, the girls dressed up separately and pulled out some oldies but goodies from our Halloween costume repertoire.

 Other Halloween creations that made their appearance

What will the Carlsens come up with next year?  Stay tuned!

Fall Break 2017

This year for fall break we stayed in town and enjoyed some pretty beautiful weather.  The whole time though I kept getting memories from "this time last year" with pictures from our Maui trip last fall break and I really wanted to go back.  We enjoyed hanging out here and enjoying some good old Colorado nature and fun with friends.  The first day of any break seems to be a pajama day mixed with some cleaning so no pictures from that.

Tuesday we went for a ride around the reservoir.  It was a nice 60-ish degree afternoon and the girls had fun playing at the park near the end.

Wednesday was a record high day so we went up to Boulder to the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder and took a hike up to Mallory Caves (the actual cave was closed due to bat activity) before touring the facility

 My hiking buddy

After NCAR I thought we were close enough to Eldorado Canyon state park that we headed over there for some pictures.

My failed attempt at a selfie with a small waterfall in the background

We eventually found a different "cave"

Such a beautiful day and as usual in Colorado in fall/winter a nice warm day precedes a cold front so Thursday we headed indoors to Boondocks just down the road. The girls bowled, played laser tag, and I joined in on a little arcade fun.  The day went by so quickly and everyone had a great time.

Back to school for the kiddos on Monday but at least they had some down time and fun to call Fall Break!