Home Sweet Cloquet

I'm back with a few photos of some our favorite spaces in our new house! I'll post more some later, these were all the rooms that I had the energy to clean today. You know how it is! Don't even say that you don't.

And yes I did run outside across the street in my bare feet dodging the bees living in our front steps to take some of these. YOLO, bees!

Featured in these pics are the dining room, the living room, the sun room, and the pool across the street. Ya pool!!! We love the pool. We also love built-ins, which this house has a lot of. Ya built-ins!!!!!

You remember that this is an old house. Over a hundred years old. That's a century!! Right? I enjoy pondering how many generations of families have lived here and done work to make it their own. There were a lot of updates done in the 60's (can you say WOOD PANELING! in our loft and basement) and quite a few updates done in the last decade or so. And now we get to do some of our own! Of course, despite the updates, this old home didn't come without it's issues. We've got some water problems in our basement to figure out, first off. More items on the list include replacing the outer siding (and however many windows we can afford to at this point), taking down the blue wallpaper in the sunroom/Paisley's play zone (paint? or a different fun wallpaper?), and re-doing the bathroom. 

Oh, and getting rid of those bees. 

But, we're project people. You know? At least I think we are. And we're excited that there's opportunities to make this place our own.

Plus, we love the neighborhood. It reminds me of that old movie, Now and Then. Remember that one? Mostly just because there's a graveyard down the street. Dear Johnny! 

Man I love that movie. 

And I love our new home, I do, despite the stinky basement and that one weird cupboard in our kitchen that for some reason smells like sour milk.

What do I do about that, by the way? Bleach it? A cupboard bleach bath?

Anyway. I hate sour milk. So let me know if you have smelly cupboard advice.

See you next time!

Trip number two.

So! I'm working on preparing a post with photos of the new place but don't have all my ducks quite in a row yet. They just keep wandering all around and I just can't get them to stand still. C'MON, ducks. So in the meantime, here are some pictures from our recent 1 1/2 week trip out to North Dakota!

The first few days we were out visiting Brian's sister Beth in Hettinger, ND. She had a garage to build and lots of delicious vegetables to be eaten from her garden. Paisley loved picking all the veggies and eating them fresh out of the dirt, but had to be coerced and bribed into eating the same veggies as soon as they were cleaned and cut up on her plate at the kitchen table. Typical, child.

Brian's parents were out there with us, and we had a grand ol' time exploring Hettinger and the nearby towns and the nearby playgrounds and the blow up pool in Beth's yard. We ate lots of tasty fresh veggies and salads and Paisley supervised all the garage building with a heavy hand.

Other destinations on our adventure were Cavalier, ND where the hubs was standing in a dear friend's wedding and Detroit Lakes, MN to stop at Castaway Club, a camp that we will be frequently involved with through Brian's work. It was all a blast and so fun and simply marvelous, except for the very darkly looming fact that I developed some horrible case of the stomach flu amidst it all.

And that's why there are tons of pictures in Hettinger, two pictures from the wedding, and only one picture from Castaway which features Paisley rolling in the grass. Something about having to spend most of your time in the bathroom makes trying to take lots of beautiful and lasting pictures seem super unimportant.

So now we're back! My stomach no longer hates my guts (pun INtended, heh heh heh), our bags are unpacked, and the cats did indeed survive our longer than usual absence. Hallelujah, praise be.

Thanks for reading folks! Tune in next time, and all that.

Even though the mayflies were bad

Well, so here I am! Attempting to get back on the blogging train. Choo choo, chugga chugga. Let's start with a few quick updates.

We moved! The hubs got a job as a Young Life area director in Cloquet, MN. While it was hard to leave our beloved Minneapolis and all our special people there, Cloquet is a super fun and beautiful town surrounded by tall gorgeous trees and just minutes away from Lake Superior, Duluth, and the super awesome Jay Cooke State Park. Plus, to say we are excited about Brian's new career path would be a pretty large understatement.

We have moved to a home that is over one hundred years old, so we are now officially "old house people." It's big, it's beautiful, and it's going to be a lot of work. We love it. Anybody know how to work a radiator?

I'll show pics of the new place soon! But first I have to take some. So for now I'll play a little bit of catch-up, and show some photos from our family vacation in June. Because that was a long time ago.

We went and stayed at a lakeside cabin resort with my mom, brother and sister in a town called Hackensack in northern MN. Yes, Hackensack is the actual name of an actual town, it's really quite endearing.

Boats! Lakes! Beaches! Fishing! Swimming! Water slides! Excellent food! Delicious drinks! Games! Laughter! Great discussion! Mayflies as far as the eye can see and the foot can crunch! Need I go on?

No I think that's good.

Alright, pictures coming at you right now!

And now we have a short series of "surprised face." As I mentioned in my last post, "surprised face" is a big deal these days.


And with that, I bid you adieu.