7 points of Happiness

1. Home Depot finally had the doors we were dreaming of putting on our pantry on sale. $139 off each door X 4 doors = very happy Dutch people! Here's the before:


Very rough cut wood, slab style door, but at least they protected visitors from seeing the scattered contents of our pantry.

2. Here's the after:


Sigh of contentment!

3. Now I just have to decide if I let my neurotic persnickety side win, and ask Mark to try to re-stain the trim to see if it will come out a little darker.

4. Did you notice the BASEBOARDS?! Also a new little addition to our entire living area. No more pencils, marbles and dust bunnies hiding between the wall and floor!

5. AND...the screws we had used as door handles for the last 5 years...


6. Have also been replaced!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Skipidy-Do-Double-Da!!




7. I'm STILL in love with new paint colour!

7 Quick Takes Friday

In an effort to post more often, I thought I'd give this a try... 7 quick thoughts, once a week.

1. This will probably be more difficult than I think, as I've discovered that when I get a keyboard in front of me I discover my love to gab.

2. I will not fret about whether my thoughts are profound or not; I will not try to change the world through my blog.

3. I will not share only the funny things my children say, or the amazingly intelligent things they do, or the creative activities we participate in. I will make every attempt to be real.

4. It is 8:05am. Only Brent is up. I've had a bowl of porridge, but am still in my pj's and need to shower. Enjoying a cup of Bengal Spice Tea from Celestial Seasonings. If you love Chai Tea, try it!

5. Our Christmas Tree still stands in the corner. The children took off the decorations, a few days ago. The box remains in the living room. I will take off the star and lights this weekend so that we can toss it outside.

6. We brought Mom and Dad to the airport this week Monday for their 2 week trip to Dominican. Believe it or not, we had a lot of fun as we waited the 1 1/2 hours in line for their check-in. Their flight was a direct Ottawa-DR so the whole plane load was checked-in in Ottawa, by the three CanJet check in ladies. As time progressed the children got more antsy, and more silly, and more giggly. I continued to reassure the people around us that they would not be spending the next 5 hours sitting next to them. We went home and the kids enjoyed the rest of the week skating on the pond (after their school work was done...)

7. How I wish I could have just pulled out our passports and the cash to buy a few extra tickets that day!!! Oh well, our day will come, maybe. For now, we will look forward to our camping trip with the deHaans in June, the Norgs in August, and try to plan something extra in between. Any ideas?

7b. See. I knew it would be tough. When you pluralize last names do you just add an s or 's?

Photo Editing

I've been learning a lot about photo editing recently; just picking up the colour a bit, making eyes sparkle, skin a little softer or doing complete overhauls and adding textures and turning the photo into art.

Here's a quick example of what I did with the picture of the kids jumping. Not a total do-over, just a few little things (including covering up Brent's Belly Button! (which he is so ashamed to have showing))

In discussing the possibilities of photo editing with a friend yesterday, she said they had discussed it back in university (before this even became a possibility to the average Joe) and their prof asked the question: "Is altering a photo a little like altering history, and not leaving the true story behind for future generations?" Hmmmm.

So here is the original Straight Out Of the Camera (SOOC)



And here is the touch up...



I think history will be OK with that.