A little bit of goulash

Two weeks ago the Mormon Tabernacle Choir went on tour up into Canada to share their musical gifts and spirit.  Paul's parents are both in the choir and so we and his sisters decided to plan a little surprise for their return.  The basement of their house was pretty much one very large office and we wanted to make a sitting area down there for people to gather, watch TV, and where little baby feet could run around in a relatively contained and safe space.

Before when you walked down the stairs, covering some beautiful brick work was a row of file cabinets. 

Wedged between the wall and these cabinets was a lighthouse painting.  We decided to use this painting as our inspiration for the room.  I like to call it the cigarette lighthouse.  You can probably guess why.

Standing beside the file cabinets and looking down the room there were tables of computers and some additional file cabinets against the wall.

Moving the filing cabinets to the center of the room we used them as a partition to define the space.  Next we found some couches and couch covers on craigslist.

I sewed some pillows to match the painting.

Exibit A: couches after finished pillows.

 

Here you can see the brick where we placed an entertainment center to cover the hole once used by an wood burning stove.  I don't have a picture of that.  Sorry.  But you can see the picture which we hung on the wall opposite the window.

At the dollar store I bumped into a lighthouse similar to the one in the painting except the top was red.  I painted it gold to match the color scheme of the room.

I scoured the house for other golden trinkets to adorn the mantle.  It's still a little bit of a work is progress down there but we got the space off to a good start.

We've also had a lot of family come and visit lately.  My aunt traveled from Illinois at the beginning of June and my grandmother came shortly after she left.  Andrea got to read books and play with her.  My other grandmother is also visiting so Andrea is getting to meet a lot of my relatives.

Cousin Jax also came to visit with his parents and he's been teaching Andrea new tricks like growling and clapping.  She thinks he's the coolest person and always watches him when he's in the room.

I think these two will be good friends some day.

Monday (the 4th of July) we began the day with a patriotic breakfast (which turned out hideous).  Red, white, and blue waffles.

We all dressed in red, white, and blue to show patriotism.

While I picked out a blue bow for Andrea, she saw the flower and would not let go of it.  Paul insisted she wear it too.

Andrea's finally able to sit up on her own and her balance gets better every day.

Andrea's finally sleeping through the night now that I'm supplementing her, and I feel six trillion times better thanks to some full nights of sleep.  She's already gained 3/4 of a pound so she'll hopefully return to a healthy percentile soon.