Sunday

It was a beautiful day here today. The sun shown and it was warm, with a real hint of spring in the air. After a couple of intense weeks it was nice to slow down today and cruise. We went out to the Community Center to watch Emily and Sofia's Mom and baby swim class. Babies in the water! Almost too cute to bear.

Here are my girls:

How cute are those babeeeeez!? Couldn't you just eat those little toes?

This was a great test for my camera's super zoom feature. The viewing area was at the opposite side of the building from the pool where the babies were. I could actually see Emily and Sofia better through the viewfinder of my camera than with the naked eye from where we were sitting.

I went into the dressing room to help Emily get Sofi dried off and dressed after the class. Swimming class is a soporific for babies. The dressing room was full of very relaxed, glazed, noodle-y babies. I'm sure they all fell asleep in their carseats on the way home.

After baby swimming we went over to the new house to work on details in the kitchen. It is almost functional. It's the little stuff that kills you. The plumber got the faucet installed, the refrigerator hooked up, the range hooked up. The instant hot water thingie turned out to be the killer. The connection through the countertop and sink was not long enough, so we had to drive across the city to pick up an extender. This required a little jiggering, but it all came together. Then Ray found that the pipe for the water connection is not quite long enough. A trip to Home Depot will remedy that. It's just a lot of gettin' there.

Here are the new refrigerator, lookin' very suave and pumping out icecubes clunk, clunk, and the new range. How about those IKEA cabinets? Don't they look swell? I love the insides, which work so smoothly and have dampers that make them close gently—no slams, no smashed fingers. All that really remains to be done is the backsplash.

This is the little entry "nook". This is the bench I have been working on. Do you see what it was?

It was an over-the-refrigerator cabinet. Solid oak, purchased at the Portland Rebuilding Center for $15. We cut a piece of plywood for the seat, which I upholstered. We can store boots and stuff inside. Eventually I will add some pillows and artwork for the walls. I have some neat handwoven pillow covers from Ecuador that I think will be great on the bench. The light fixture is another DIY project. It was a metal wall sconce made to hold a candle. I found a little electric light fixture to fit inside for $3. I said there would not be a smidgeon of blue in this house when I finished with it, but I lied. This dark teal blue seemed like a great foil for all the warm, earthy terra cotta-y colors in the living, dining and kitchen.