The Kind of Mundane Thing That Makes Me Happy

Some weeks ago Summer and I had a lively discussion regarding our living room, which had long suffered from a sort of schizophrenia, split between a living room and a home office. The basic problem--the basic problem we encounter throughout our house--is a lack of space. The simple fact is that we have doubled the number of children in our household since we moved here over seven years ago, and the children we had back then have gotten a lot bigger.

But, I digress. The point of contention was how we could rearrange the room to better make use of the space we have available to us. Thursday night we revisited the idea, coming up with a plan. The essence of the scheme was simple: move the bookcase in the entry way to the corner of the living room, move to the entry way a set of dressers we had converted to storage, put the piano in the dining room, move the desk to the corner where the piano has stood since we bought it, pull the couch to the far wall, and move the chair and ottoman to opposite sides of the coffee table.

So I got working on the project this morning, and by the time Summer had returned from grocery shopping I had done all the easy work. She and I then moved the piano, desk, couch, and chair. Here, then, is the finished product:

The dressers in the entry way

The new, wide-open living room, perfect for playing games

Or Legos

The desk is much less obtrusive in the corner, and the couch up against the back wall opens up the room nicely

The piano makes a nice addition to the dining room

Happy Birthday to Evan!

Tuesday Evan turned the big 3.0, and we celebrated with cake and presents. First, the presents. Here the birthday boy opens the gift from Grandma and Grandpa Turner (a set of interlocking plastic blocks like Legos but for smaller hands--way cool):

Next, with his homemade gift, an apron sewn by Summer:
Being our kids, he also got some books:
And my favorite, a marble race set with interchangeable pieces for building all sorts of fun ramps, loops, and towers (I've played with this every evening since his birthday after the kids have gone to bed):
And here he blows out the candles. The cake is chocolate with a chocolate ganache between the two layers and a caramel frosting (super decadent):

Painting

I spent much of this past week--with Summer and the kids out of town visiting my in-laws--painting the boy's bedroom. We chose a sort of sand-yellow color, and I think it turned out well. I also moved the furniture around, which may be subject to change if Summer decides it's not a good layout.

Anyhow, here are some pictures of the room.