The Brown Brick Road

Capturing our adventures one photo at a time...

Christmas decorations

Just a few pics of the decorations around the house so I remember. With our new windows, I did our wreaths a little different this year and I sure do like it!

wreaths

I did add the lighted garland and bows to the downstairs rails. Didn’t do anything to the upstairs rail because now it seems too pretty to cover up. I’d like to figure out a way to get lighted garland around the door next year. Hmmmm.

More fun decorations!

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Samantha’s squishy setup!

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I also got a little creative and made a dried citrus wreath with one of the real wreaths we got from the Boy Scouts.

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wreath

Was feeling preeeety proud of myself!

wreath

I also loved displaying my new Santa collection from GJ! Ho Ho Ho!

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Our tree was a leaner but she was a good one!

tree

Our stairs didn’t get decorated this year because the rail was being stained. We might not have been as festive as in previous years, but it all felt just right! Very merry indeed!

Oh Christmas Tree!

Last week after school, the kids and I went up to get our tree! We wanted to wait for Robert but it gets dark so early and the tree lots were starting to look sparse so we just went for it. I’m glad we did because I think we got the last 9 foot tree on the lot. It was a beauty though!

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While we were standing at the tree lot, Spencer looked over at me with his tooth in his hand! ha! He said it just fell out.

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Love that kid.

That night we got all the lights and ornaments on and, well…I think it’s the best one yet!!

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We also have our upstairs tree that Samantha helped me decorate…

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and plenty of other decorations inside and out!

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decorations

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Merry merry!!

House project

When GJ and Daddo bought the house next door, we were all thinking they could just move in “as is” and not have to do too much work! Hahahahahaha! It never works that way, does it?! It ended up being a MUCH bigger project than they thought but, all worth it in the end (at least in my opinion!). The house is all fixed up now and hopefully virtually maintenance free for years. Check out the before and afters…

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The final result! New paint, new roof, new copper awnings, new yard…looks so good!

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The best part? Seeing the kids run back and forth on their own whenever GJ and Daddo are in town. Can’t beat that!

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Best setup ever!

Backyard project

Last summer we ended up getting some new neighbors – GJ and Daddo! The house directly behind us went on the market and, even though they weren’t planning on buying a house here, the situation was too perfect to resist! With them right next door, it made sense to finally do something to our backyard so we could connect the two houses and clean up all the unusable parts of our yard. Here are the befores:

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Some pics during…

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See that pole up there? Yea, that pole delayed our project by several weeks because we could NOT get the comcast people out to remove it. It was the most frustrating part of the entire process.

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There was a lot of dirt around for a long time and, yes, this is when we had our awesome mud party!

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and the afters! We gutted out an entire area of yard that was nothing but poison ivy and sticks and put in an awesome parking pad. Now we’ll have plenty of space for 16 year old drivers to park their car someday! 🙂 We also took out the beds and put down more sod, got rid of the falling down fence, and put up an entrance between our yard and GJ and Daddo’s new house! We have a gate that we will hang there eventually, but it’s nice for the kids right now to just have it open.

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We love our new backyard…and our new neighbors!