This year has gotten off to a lovely little start. We’ve done a lot of the usual sort of stuff–school, work, ignoring dirty dishes, etc.–and some less usual stuff.

The one extra unusual thing we did was take a break from the kids last weekend. My parents (mostly Mother) watched the cuties while Josh and I had a little staycation! We stayed at a hotel downtown, went out to eat, played games in our room, and enjoyed the downtown scene for the evening. After we checked out of our room the next morning, we still had some time to spend together before we had to go get the kids and we didn’t want to waste it. But we have found that we have a hard time knowing what to do with free time. We decided to get pedicures, (Josh was totally on board, which I thought was studly!) but we didn’t think about reservations and they were packed, so that idea fell through. We went back to our house to brainstorm and finally came up with the perfect thing! It was something both of us enjoy and can’t be done very well with the kids. We decided to build something!  Josh drew up plans and we headed to Home Depot, and though we didn’t finish that day, we made some decent progress before we went to retrieve our cuties.

The project is something I have been dreaming of for a good number of months. It is a entryway table with cabinet doors (I call it a hutch, but I don’t know if it fully qualifies as such). I wanted it so there would be a place for Josh, Fay, and I to put our backpacks out of sight but still highly accessibly. And, it gives me another surface to decorate!  And it is an extra special project because Josh and I really did do it together! We put in approximately the same number of hours on it and Josh made sure I used all the power tools! So now I have at least some experience with the table saw, miter saw, band saw, circular saw, drill, impact driver, and nail gun. Not bad for a single project!

We have used any evening time we’ve had this past week to work on it, and we used WAY too much of what should have been family time yesterday, and now it is done! The kids helped with the painting which they loved and Josh and I survived. 🙂 But it is up and in use now! I am really excited about it! Check it out!

Anyway, that was the out-of-the-ordinary bit. Now for the ordinary parts of our life. They are also sweet and delightful.