Anya's Room

Anya gets her own room again! She has spent most of her life sharing a room. When we moved to Texas for three years, we had a four-bedroom home. We asked her then if she wanted her own room, thinking we could have Hannah and then Baby Cora share. She told us that she did not want to sleep by herself, and she would just go sleep in Hannah's room on the floor if she was by herself. Well, not wanting to "waist" a room, I let her conitnue sharing with Hannah and Cora got her own room. Flashforward to California, she finally was ready for her own room. That was very shortlived, since the boys joined our family and joined Anya in her room. Now She finally gets her own room, for real. She is so excited!"before"

"after"

Anya got a new bedroom set as well, since the boys took over the one she was using so they will match. We joke with her, that she now has the nicest bedroom in the house. Since Matt and I don't really have a bedroom set (haven't found one we both like yet...it has taken 14 years, wonder how much longer it will take to find one :) Anya really does have the nicest looking bed.

She has ample room for all her stuff. This daughter of mine is a packrat, and now with the addition of her desk...there is plenty of space to hide her aquisitions.

Anya has a few "loves" in life: Dragons, bats, wolfs, and...Pokemon! She is still very much into pokemon. In our last house she had a pokemon wall as well. It was really cute, because we had this awesome little friend, T., who would come over occationally and the first thing he would ask was to see the "pokemon room". Anya loved this, and loved dispersing her vast pokemon knowledge around. The reason I am posting this...Kelly, when you read this, Anya wanted to make sure that T. saw that she still had a pokemon wall in her room.

Go Pokemon!

Girls room and Kid bathroom

Here is the girls room, as we call it. Or the room that Hannah and Cora share.

"before""after"

setting up their bunkbeds really added a lot of space to their room. They have a nice open area as you first walk in to play in or sit in the bean bag chairs to read. There is also another little open area on the other side of their dresser. Hannah wants a desk, we will see about that one. I don't want their room to feel too crowded...

another shot of the little open area with their bean bags and closet.

I didn't change much in the kid's bathroom, so these are both after pictures. I basically just added mats. I do love having a separate shower and bath in kid bathroom. I can have the girls in the tup, Anya in the shower, and be done lickety split. It is awesome.

In California the double sinks were in the Master bath...here the doubles are in the kid's bath and the master just has one :( While I miss my double sinked bathroom, I am finding that I really like having double sinks in the kids bathroom. It has really cut down on arguing over space during teeth brushing and such.

Boys Room

The boys bedroom got a little more cramped since they are now in "big boy" beds.

" before "
" after "
One thing that makes me nervous about the big beds, and having them set up this way, is...the boys like to jump from one bed to the other. We have already had knocked teeth, and bumps on heads. But this set up gave the boys the most room, so I am hoping to encourage them to stop jumping...we will see how it goes?
This is over on the other side of Jack's bed. The boys love this little area by the window. On the other side is a toy box with their toys, and they will just play here for hours soaking up some vitamin D from the floor to ceiling window next to them.

Basement

Ahh, the basement. This is the first full basement we have ever had, and can I tell you how much I am loving it! It has been an awesome addition to space for our family.

Laundry room "before"

"after"

As you can tell, we made this the catch all room. I moved the dryer over closer to the washer (having it across the room was a pain). Then I moved in my sewing table (which is our old computer desk, but nice to be able to keep my sewing machine out all the time) and we moved our workout equipment in. It works out really well, ha ha.

Little room "before"

"after"

This room had no windows, so we just made it a storage rooml. This is most of the stuff that was out in our garage for lack of space in California. This is the storage we wanted "access" too. The stuff that is "deep" storage goes up in the attic.

big room "before"
"after"
This room probably saw the most dramatic change. We had housing lay carpet, and we kept an army loan couch. This has become the play room or kid hang out room. The kids already have tons of fun down here with their friends.

Can you believe that all these toys used to be in the kids rooms!!!

This will also double as a guest area, should the need ever arise. Hint hint...

Cora's cubby "before"
"after"

Cora is proud to announce that she was able to keep her "cubby", but the boys did move in too:)

Kitchen/ Half bath before and after

O.K., not the most interesting, but hey, it's still part of our house.

Half bath "before" and "after"

Kitchen "before"

kitchen "before"

"after", tell Grandma Gale, that I still have my apples!

"after" again

not sure why I put this one on, but I can't get it to delete...so you get to look at even though not much changed between the before and after.

Living/dining before and after

These next few posts will probably be pretty boring to most. They are mainly for family, well those that have been bugging for the "after" pictures of our place. Now that we are all moved in, I am finally getting to posting those pictures for you guys. I thought it would be fun to post the before and then after pictures by each other. So, here we go...a tour of the Jeppson residence.

This is the "before" picture of a little entry alcove near the front of our house.

Here is the "after"

We ended up putting our computer hutch right there in the entry. The nice thing is, it closes all up so the computer isn't neccessarily the first thing you see. It just so happen's that ALL the computer and phone hookups are right there in the front of the house, or over by the T.V., no where that was convenient to put a computer desk (like by the dining room table or bookshelves), so this is where it ended up. I am ok with it now, even though it wasn't my first choice. There are no wires strung through out the house, which would have been the case if the computer was elsewhere, and it is still in a public area. So it works.

Dining area "before"
"dining" area after.
a few of our chairs didn't make the move in tact. They were broken before anyway, so we are short a chair. But that is fine, because we pull the highchairs up to the table for meals anyway.
Living are "before"

Living area "after"
I couldn't really get a good shot of the angle I wanted. So the next few pics are of the living area from different view points.

So, that is the living/dining area's of our sweet german house.

Pottenstein

So about a half hour from where we live is this little village called Pottenstein. It is also known in German circles as "little Switzerland". It is like you are driving in a little town, tucked away in the swiss alps. All the homes are wood trimmed with shutters, nestled in this little ridges and hills in the sides of the cliffs that shelter the town. It is very atmospheric, and I fell in love with it. Don't I say that about every town I visit...there is just so much to love about Europe!

While there we visited the lime stone caves that are on the edge of town.

They are called

Teufelshohle Caves

This is a picture of the girls coming out of the caverns. Once out, we were on this trail that wound back to the cave entrance, but it was an amazing little hike. It felt like we were miles from civilization. We also got to see saber tooth tiger skeleton/fossil inside the cave, Mammoth bones, and the remains of an Ice age man. It was a pretty cool cave.

There was a mini golf course nearby, so we decided to stop and play a round.

The boys LOVED it!

I love these little European doors. It almost looks like Matt might take off his head if he goes through, but he has just enough clearance.

Where does this door lead...

To this!

A beautiful Baroque style church. You would never guess at the oppuelence and beauty that is held inside these old churches.

Out and about on the cobble stone streets of Little Switzerland.

Here are some shots of the Schloss that is located above the little town. It doesn't really have a name, but most just call it Schloss Pottenstein.

It was a wonderful little adventure, discovering this town.