Tile Phase 1 and Other Bits

Yesterday tile installation began.  Exciting and very messy.  Even though I sold flooring for five years it never dawned on me just how messy it is.  I was up early today vacuuming construction dust out of my living room, fully realizing I'll probably have to do it again tomorrow. 

Much to my chagrin, the installers don't seem to be in too much of a hurry.  Of course they aren't the ones living in the basement and washing dishes in the bathroom sink.  (Thankfully I now have a nice basement to live in.)  This is what they accomplished yesterday:

Hopefully they move quicker today!

Last night in celebration of Valentine's Day we had a romantic family dinner at IHOP.  It gets tiresome eating sandwiches and washing dishes in the bathroom sink.  Eating out for dinner is somewhat preserving my sanity and keeping Ryan from asking the contractor to add a padded room for me. 

Dinner was quite comical.  Aric decided he wanted french fries and mac and cheese from all of the choices Ryan offered him.  Aric was quite happy with his decision until our plates arrived and he realized everyone else had pancakes.  I've never seen Aric try to hop over the table before after food.  We pacified him by splitting his dinner with Kellyn and giving them the best of both worlds. 

After dinner we headed to the mall to walk around for a bit and allow Aric to burn off some extra energy.  The hit of the night was a ride on the kiddie carousel:

It was such a hit that it was the first thing Aric talked about this morning.  He asked to go back and ride it again.

Living downstairs hasn't been all bad.  The room is finished for the most part and I don't worry about it not being safe for the kids to play in.  The other night I painted a post for Ryan:

Yes, it's purple.  A little piece of K-State.  He keeps talking about painting powercats on it.  I think I should get bonus points for painting it while Ryan was sitting nearby watching the K-State basketball game on TV.  My project for the kids isn't quite finished.  When it is complete I'll share that too.

Aric and Kellyn have really enjoyed having their play area put back together.  For the most part they play well together.  Yesterday I took this picture:

Which reminds me of this picture:

Except for the over-exposure of Aric's underwear (which happens more often than not), the kids are bigger, on different sides, wearing different clothes, and you get the point.

Finally, I leave you with something that may be slightly disturbing for some viewers.  Yesterday Kellyn was "shopping". 

Nothing too disturbing about that unless you are one to freak out about a child riding in the basket of the shopping cart and not the seat.  It was even cute since she brought along her purse.  It was this photo that was disturbing:

I didn't realize this was the proper procedure for pulling a baby out of the shopping cart.  I guess that's why little girls are given baby dolls to practice on and not real babies. 

Sorry Raggedy Ann for the torment you are going through.  (And now I know I've watched Toy Story one too many times!)