Mudroom

Hooray for spring! Though slow in coming this year (it didn't even get above freezing yesterday!), it IS coming. Along with mud. LOTS of mud. With re-doing our driveway a bit last fall just as things were beginning to freeze, we didn't really get a chance to do it right, and it's a mess. Plus, we have almost no yard left anymore, thanks to all the dirt work and big machines that were tearing stuff up last summer. At least where the swingset is there's grass--under the snow still. I'm really hoping the new grass grows FAST this summer!!!

But, with the presence of mud comes a dilemma. What to do with muddy church shoes and muddy jeans and, well, just muddy everything? Well, the back entry is one room we hadn't really touched yet. Even though it's one that need the least amount of work, and we did rip out the carpet, it was being used for storage. We blocked it off over the winter because every time the wind blew from the west (which is to say, a lot) there would be a cold wind blowing through our house too, coming from that entry. Even though there's heat ducts running to it, everything we'd put out there would freeze. Which we didn't discover until we went to use some of the paint, and it was frozen. Ooops. But now, it's warming up, and I was feeling a great need to have a mudroom. So, Jere dug in on Saturday and, with the children's help, cleaned out the room of all the building supplies that we were storing in there. Then he started getting ready to lay tile...

All done!

I'm SO excited to have another room almost done. All he has left in this room (for now!) is to cut a hole in the counter, set the laundry tub in, and hook up the plumbing to that. I think later, once we have some other things a bit farther along, Jere wants to take down the sheathing on the outside wall and ceiling and add some vapor barrier and maybe insulation so hopefully next winter it won't be so frigid. But, that's not a necessity, and we need to get some of the necessities done before that happens! I'm hoping... maybe we can actually start working on the upstairs bathroom this weekend? Maybe? Now, that would feel like progress!

I also got a few random shots of my little folks. I just got thinking that I have lots of cute pictures of Jaron when he was Leanna's age, but because she's the third I hardly have any of her. And she's at my favorite stage! So, I took time to grab my camera...

And I couldn't quite ignore the handsome little fellah sharing the school table!