O Christmas Tree

countdown calendar

Made this at our homeschool mom's project night last week. It's pretty cute and we've had fun putting up the new magnet every day.

backyard happenings

more stuff blooming




apricots

peaches



early girl tomatoes - living up to their name


yellow pear tomatoes

I am soooo excited about my tomatoes -- nothing like a vine-ripened tomato, still warm from the sun. I tried to grow tomatoes in GA, but didn't have the right spot. They rotted before they ever ripened. Had lots of green ones to fry, but no ripe ones. Hoping this year will be different.

Funny story about the yellow pears. One year my dad had 2 tomato plants in containers out on the back patio. One was yellow pears. They were awesome. My sister and I went out every day and picked all the ripe ones before dad ever got any. I'm not sure if he thought they never produced or what. All I know is that it was the last year dad ever had tomato plants.

photos of the house

Since a friend asked, I dug around on the hard drive and found some pictures of the house. Of course they were taken before we moved in. I guess that means you don't get subjected to looking at all our junk in said house.

view to the east - looking out the front door

view to the north from the front yard

The mountain is part of the Red Cliffs Desert Preserve. There's a trail at the end of our street that heads up there. The view from the top is pretty amazing.

entry way

from the entry way looking toward the living room & den

living room

still the living room

den

Those built-ins are really nice. But, no, I did not get to comandeer them for my scrap space.

breakfast area

The fireplace is a double-sided fireplace, same one as in living room.

kitchen

kitchen again

laundry

The ceilings in here goes waaay up. So we use the shelves on the right & on top of the cabinets on the left as our substitute attic.

master bedroom

It has 2 "sections" of ceiling that sort of divide it up into a bedroom area and a sitting area. We have a couch up against the big window & a desk against the left wall of the sitting area. Our bed is under the ceiling fan & dressers are in that area of the room.

master bath

Note the slightly weird kokopeli/southwest/bear/whatever motif in the bath tile -- it is also in the shower and on the wallpaper in the stall. Niiice.

master bath still

patio

It has a nice covered area where we have wicker furniture & an outdoor dining table. We spend lots of time out there in the evenings. There is more patio all along the length of the house, uncovered.

view from the backyard facing west

Sorry about the weird lines. I had to do a composite of several images to get the whole view in there. I took this on a day when there was snow on the Beaver Dam mountains. It really is an amazing view and since it's west-facing, we get a great sunset every night.