We've been busy ...

We've been SUPER busy these last few weeks ... so busy that we haven't had time to update the blog. The estimated time of arrival (or ETA, if you please) of new posts: Monday, May 3. Can you wait that long to hear all about our adventures in continued Home Improvements and sewing projects???

Too bad if you can't ... because you're just going to have to! Enjoy the weekend!!!

Watch Out! Guard Dog on Duty!

It's a ... SMITH!

If you haven't heard already (and then why haven't you taken our phone calls or read your email???), we are excited to announce that we are expecting a baby in late Sept/early Oct!!! Nothing too exciting to report just now as I'm only about 3 months along, but here are some answers to questions we've gotten so far:

1) Yes, we are overjoyed at the news! It was somewhat "planned", but if we were really doing it right, our kid would not be finishing baking (Hint, hint: bun in the oven reference!) just in time for El Paso's extreme heat in Aug/Sept.

2) We have NO IDEA when or even if Cam will be deploying this year and therefore, around for the birth. Let's just hope they decide to postpone any trips overseas until 2011.

3) We're not sure if we are going to find out the sex. The Army Healthcare plan is very stingy with Ultrasounds, so if we find out: that's fine; if we don't: that's fine too.

4) No, I haven't suffered from any sort of morning sickness (Thank goodness!)

5) No names are picked out yet, though we have a few floating out there that we like. It's not like we can just name him/her John or Jane Smith. (Because we're now in TX, Cam's pushing for William Robert. If you can figure out why ... you get a gold star!)

Keep checking back for further status updates on Baby Smith!

Do you see what I see?

Home Improvements, Stage 2, Part B

As promised earlier, here are a few "AFTER" shots of our latest painting projects and the new furniture in our Living and Family Rooms. (Note to self: Work on taking straight panoramic pictures!!!)

Cam really wanted a "Patriotic" room in our house and since he was being so nice and letting me pick everything else, I figured I could give in just this once. So, we painted a GIANT wall in the Living Room dark blue! We framed copies of the Declaration of Independence, Constitution and the famous painting of Washington crossing the Delaware. We will soon be adding an ADA-commissioned print, photos of the military men (past and present) in our families and other red/white/blue accessories as we find them. We also need to find a coffee table, end tables and bookshelves to fully complete this room. Until then, here is our partially decorated Living Room:

Panorama view of 1/2 of the Living Room
(No, the beam is not crooked, the panorama is ...)

Walkway into the Kitchen/Dining Room from Living Room

We decided to stay more neutral with the Family Room, Dining Room and Kitchen. Since these 3 rooms all flow into one another, we chose to use a dark gray-brown accent color in the Kitchen and fireplace wall of the Family Room. We also liked the light brown color we used in the Living Room so much we continued it in the other 3 rooms of the downstairs. We busted butt on Saturday to complete the Family Room, Dining Room and Kitchen.

Family Room with new comfy couch

Dining Room
(Please excuse the mess on the table. The Kitchen still needs a few touch-ups done!)

*Almost* Finished Kitchen!

Now we just need to finish the 1/2 bath and hallways for downstairs to be complete!

Easter Adventures

To celebrate Easter 2010, we invited our very good friends, Jason and Charla Welch, over for a little egg-dying fun. Charla and I had found a Camo dye kit and decided that our Army boys needed to try it out!

Unfortunately, the kit was a big disappointment. The colors were not very colorful, the stickers that were supposed to be used did not stick very well, and to achieve a desired look almost all the camo stickers were required. Oh well! I think we all had fun ... and had some yummy hard-boiled eggs to enjoy afterward.

The egg dying gang

Concentration required!!!

Cam's one camo egg

Jason's camo egg progression
(R to L: The Good, the Bad & the Ugly)

The Smiths' contributions

As for actual Easter, Cam and I attended a local Lutheran church that we found a few weeks ago. (While it's not perfect, it might just have to do until we decide we want to keep looking at other local churches.) We were dressed in our Sunday best ... including Cam looking very handsome in his Army Dress Blues. Unfortunately, we were in such a rush to get changed so that Athena couldn't: 1) get Cam's uniform dirty and 2) snag my nylons that we forgot that we were going to take pictures of us all snazzed up ... so please enjoy this artist rendering!

Artist Rendering:
Sunday Best

We were invited to join Susan, our realtor, and her husband and friends for Easter dinner. The food was delicious and we got to meet a few more new Army people that have moved to the El Paso area. It was a great way to cap off the day.

We hope that you enjoyed your Easter and were able to get together with friends, family and loved ones to celebrate this joyful time. Christ is risen! He is risen indeed!!!

Home Improvements, Stage 2

So much for our original plan of tackling the small home improvement and beautification projects first...

We finally received our tax return (with our $8,000 first-time home buyer credit!!!) and immediately headed to the furniture stores! After traipsing through at least fifteen different stores one Sunday afternoon, we determined that the first store had the two couches we wanted most. (Murphy's Law, of course!) We then decided to focus our painting energies on finishing the downstairs Living and Family Rooms before the new couches arrived and tackle the remainder of the upstairs at a later time.

Prior to our shopping spree, however, we did manage to finish painting the upstairs guest bedroom. We chose to do one wall a slightly darker color so as to have an "accent" wall. Both colors are in the same family of sage greens as our guest bathroom.

Painting the Accent Wall

We (really, Cam) took on the Living Room first. He patched holes, removed baseboard trim (and ALL the caulk from the trim), scraped popcorn texture from the underside of beams, taped, prepped etc. I just showed up for the fun painting part! :)

Taping off

The Living Room proved to be a little tricky as it has two two-story walls that required the purchase of TWO new extension ladders and thankfully Cam has no aversion to heights!!!

2-story walls are a PAIN!
(And yes, he's standing on the support beam ... halfway up the wall)

Safe and sound on the ground!

Once our furniture has arrived and everything is decorated, we'll post the "After" photos. Until then, hope you enjoyed the "During" photos!

P.S.
Athena helped in all of this process too ... by staying out of the way in "Puppy Jail". She was blocked from entering the living room as we painted, so she watched from between the stair railings.