Construction

Rick and I stopped by the house this weekend to take some pictures of the inside of the house. We wanted to document the condition of the inside of the house as well as for remodeling, painting and decorating purposes. They have to give us the house in a similar condition to what it was in before they started all this work. Wow, it is hard to believe that that can happen with the current state it is in now. It is a crazy disaster over there. There is a five foot deep trench around the whole back of the house, the patio in the back and side yard is all torn up, the bushes and trees are pulled out and half are dead, there's bulldozers in the backyard and big dumpsters in the back, thirty foot deep holes all around the front and sides of the house where they are going to put concrete pillars under the house. It is hard to believe they will be finished up and things will be back to normal in just a few months. It makes me a little sad to see it in such disarray, all though it has been vacant for the last few years they have had a gardener keeping up the yard and just a month ago when we took pictures of the outside of the house the yard looked pretty good.

Here are a few pictures of the outside and yard.

The front of the house with the dumpster. Poor neighbors have to deal with this mess and all the noise for the next few months. Isn't it a charming house? We are going to take down the arbor. It is getting a little old and hides the charm of the house.

Here is our front patio area with big 30 foot holes all along the side.

30 foot holes

This is the side. They have torn up the cement and brick pavers and dug some of the 30 foot holes but haven't started on the 5 foot trench yet.

Side patio all torn to pieces.

This is the back patio all torn up with the five foot moat as we like to call it. It is hard to see but the dirt really is like a wet dark clay which is why the house had problems to begin with. It looks just like clay you would use for pottery class.

Backyard patio and garden area destroyed. You pretty much can not walk back there without it being a major hazard. Good thing we didn't bring the boys with us to take pictures. As much as they would of like it, it wasn't very safe.

Backyard 30 foot holes and 5 foot moat.

This is the side patio area. This is looking out from the boys bedroom doors. The cement is all torn up as well as the brick pavers.

Looking into the backyard patio area from the family room.

Front porch area all torn up.

Crazy! We can't wait to see the finished project. 

Fondue Fun

We have been celebrating birthdays and father's day around here for the last few weeks. Rick turned 38 on Monday so we had a Fondue Fun dinner party on Saturday night for him at Lake Merritt.

We sent out invitations and then passed out more information to those who RSVP'ed yes. They got a little envelope that told them a little about what we were doing and a picture of the meeting place. We originally had 18 RSVP but ended up having 12-14 people come.

 Party invitation

Fondue Fun info and meeting location

Our meeting spots was the decorated trash can along Lake Merritt.

I teamed people us as the arrived to the meeting place. They got another envelope with instructions and clues on where to go. There were 15 different pictures of locations that they had to find around the lake. The pictures were slightly distorted in color and appearance to make it a little more difficult to figure out and to make it look a little fun. Each team had to find as many locations as they could and take a picture with group memebers in the picture using instagram. They had to load all the pictures to the same instagram site so everyone could follow the progress of the other teams. The last location - X marks the spot was the location of the fondue party.

 Clues and pictures of each location.

Here is our table of fondue fun.

These were the prizes for the winning team.

I made name tags for each person and put them on their fondue stick so no one would get confused on which stick was theirs.

I made some thank you for coming sour cream cups that were filled with lemon candies, and some personalized hershey kisses.

I  had a caramel and chcocolate fondue with strawberries, bannanas, pineapple, apples, yellow dye dipped marshmallows, toasted coconut and pecans.

We had lemonade with pomegranite seeds, mint leaves and lemon wedges.

I made a creamy cajun cheese fondue which had parmesan, asiago, provolone, fontina and herbed goat cheese in it. I served cajun chicken, penne pasta, cheese tortellini, broccoli and bread for dipping. I think it was a hit, it was gone pretty quickly.

This is the winning team with their prizes.

This is the second place team.

Standing around enjoying some company and some fondue.

It has been hot in Oakland for the last month or so and of course the one night we have our outdoor dinner party it is cold, overcast and windy. The wind kept blowing the sterno and tea lights out and our fondue was not heating up so well. We ended up running home to grab our Coleman camping stove to heat up the fondues and then used the sterno to keep them warm. While doing this the hot burner burnt our chocolate fondue. That is okay I guess there was plenty of the caramel to go around.

We had a fun time!

Sewing

I have been busy sewing lately. I made curtains for our little girls room. It took me a while to find fabric that I really liked and I was a little unsure about the orange polka dots but once they were made I was super happy with my choice. I love them. They are currently hanging up in our room instead of our closet doors. Once we move, we will put them up in her room. They go from ceiling to floor.

I used the same fabric to make her baby bumper for the crib. The one side is the same and the other is pink with white and orange diamonds. It is kinda hard to see that there is orange in the picture but there is. My favorite part is the top binding - the zebra print with the pink, orange, navy blue, yellow and white. I love that fabric. I will use that fabric and those colors in other parts of her room as well.


I have also been making some baby quilts. A girl one for my little girl and then a few boy ones for my sister in law and a friend. I finished another girl one as well but just gave it to my other sister in law last week and forgot to take a picture of it. The things I love most about these quilts are there size. A lot of times I get these big beautiful quilts but are just too big for a little baby. These are nice and small and will fit perfectly. The other thing I like about them is that they have a soft fussy backing to make the blanket extra cozy and attractive to the baby.

Baby boy


Baby boy


My little baby girl



Soft backing of the blankets:

Crew's birthday

Crew is turning 2 on June 11th but we decided to celebrate a little earlier this year so we could celebrate with family. He doesn't have many friends around these days because most of them have moved away so we decided to celebrate with the family.

We had a BBQ dinner at my mom's house in Livermore. We BBQed some honey marinated salmon with fresh strawberry cucumber salsa, some marinaded flank steak, pasta salad, corn on the cob, fruit kebobs and some carrot cake with cream cheese frosting. It was all very delicious.

Crew had a great time playing with his cousins, blowing bubbles, playing on and under the trampoline, wrestling, swimming and most of all eating all the treats and cake we had for him.

Here are some pictures to document our big boys birthday celebration:

Crew opening his presents.

The kids swimming in the pool. It was 95 degrees out so they spent lots of time in the water.

Our marinated salmon with strawberry cucumber salsa and our flank steak. Delicious summer time family favorites.

I made Crew a green ombre cake. Green is his favorite color. Although he thinks every thing is green.

Getting ready to sing and eat the cake.

Both boys were excited to sing and cut into the cake.

Crew's favorite part of the day, digging into all that sugar.

Party decorations.

I made some sour cream cups with gummy bears inside for everyone. Another one of Crew's favorite parts of the party. He loves gummy vitamins and claps his hands and gets so excited to eat them each day. Today we got real gummy bears not just the vitamins.

Birthday kisses for Crew.

The boys playing with their cousins in the backyard down by great grandma Aimee's house. This is the new play area for the kids. They love playing and digging in the dirt under the trampoline. Although they are beyond the white picket fence they are still gated in down there and can't escape. It is a win win for everyone.

Jumping on the trampoline and wrestling with the cousins.

We all had such a great time. The people who attended were: Grandma and Grandpa Sanders, Great Grandma Aimee, Uncle Josh & Sara, Cousins Alyssa and Blake, Uncle Jason & Jana, Uncle Jesse & Morgan, mama, papa, and Athen.