Well, there's another boy in the Farmhouse! Jameson Theodore surprised us on January 23. Surprised is maybe a strong word as I was already two days overdue, but it sure felt like he was never going to come. We're so thankful for a healthy delivery and a healthy little dude. We didn't find out the gender at our ultrasound so there was a true surprise at the hospital. We were so excited. Boys are great. We know boys. He's going to love growing up here, following in his brothers' footsteps. Jameson is a name that Ben has loved for forever, and it took me a little while to come around on it but I love it now. I hope he doesn't ever have a complex that it took me having three boys to finally agree to this name. We also call him Jay, Baby Jay, and "The Baby" if you're Ellis. Theodore is after Ben's late grandpas, Theodore Reuschel and Theodore Sternberg. We sure miss them and are glad we have another reason to think of them often. Theodore is also Ben's middle name.
And then there's the Farmhouse addition we never covered. To be honest, it took some serious nesting back in December and January to even get the interior addition in a decent enough spot to photograph. Things are finally settling here to some extent. Although Ben did just empty out the front entry the other day to renovate that space, so now the living room downstairs is impassable again. But that's a problem for another day.
The addition we put on included an attached garage, master suite above the garage, mudroom/laundry room and converting old attic space into a family room. The closet from one of the existing bedrooms was taken out to make a hallway to the addition. We now have two staircases and a two story house that is completely circular. Super fun for kids running around. And functionally very nice. Countryside put on the addition for us and did all of the trim work, then we (Ben) did most of the other finishing. We opted for natural pine floors in the whole addition, as well as pine ceilings rather than drywall.
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| before: attic |
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| after: bonus room |
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| hallway in master suite |
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| bedroom and bathroom |
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| new staircase |
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| birds-eye view of new mudroom - door goes to the garage |
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| shiplap-ish wall used to be an exterior wall. this was under layers of siding and we decided to keep it exposed rather than drywall over it. |
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| before: dryer in the kitchen |
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| before: washer around the corner, on the stairs to the basement |
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| after: side by side duo in the mudroom. countertop is from wall studs taken out of the upstairs bedroom closet that became the hallway. this is also currently the main floor diaper changing zone. adaptable. |
It's crazy to think back to where we were a year ago. Ben was re-finishing the kitchen floors and working on installing the tile floors in the main floor and master bathrooms. Our neighbor and friend Jen forced us to go on a Valentine's date and took our kids for an evening, knowing that we just needed some "us" time away from the house. If I'm being completely honest, last winter totally stunk! All worth it in the end, I'm just super happy to be on this side of the renovation. Even though we still have projects, some of which are going to be sizeable, at least we are all at the same house. Perspective is a funny thing. I used to call Ben "Project Ben" when he was working on something at our old house. I did not care for Project Ben at times. He would be single-minded on whatever he was working on and it would take most of his time and attention. Now? Having gone through what we did last winter? Project Ben is a saint. I love Project Ben. See? Perspective.
