Creed Finds a Place to Call His Own

Someone mentioned to me the other day that I've never shown Creed's room on my blog (so much for the home tour, I have yet to show you about half of our house).  Creed has one of the coolest rooms in the house architecturally, and we have big plans for it, but they'll have to wait until next year while we take care of more immediate needs.  I'm a little embarrassed that I've put so little effort into, but why bother for something temporary (and I must admit Ollie's room is much worse off at the moment).

Another reason that I haven't posted pictures is that with so many windows, it's really hard to take pictures in Creed's room so I hope you'll excuse the messy photos.

Welcome to Creed's room for now.

 For the past few years I've been picking up letters here and there with the hopes of someday spelling "abracadabra" on Creed's wall.  I know I could have easily gone on a site like Etsy and picked them all up, but the fun was in the hunt.  Most of them are vintage sign letters picked up from neighborhood consignment shops when we lived in Salt Lake.  The last letter that I picked to complete the collection was the letter A with wings, and it actually is a new letter from Etsy, but it was too amazing to pass up (You can custom order any letter in several colors at Edie's Lab. They were remarkably fast, and they happen to be having a holiday sale right now).

I'm not even sure how we ended up with The Cat in the Hat wall stickers, but Creed found them in a donation pile when we moved and begged to put them up in his room, which is fine for now.

 The original plan was to spray paint the letters in different gold finishes, but I ended up loving them just the way that they are.

In the corner we have the bookcase that my dad built to hold bedtime stories, which we are always rotating from our bigger library, and a rocking chair to sit in during the bedtime stories.  The map of the US is from a printer from our old hometown, Columbus, Ohio, These are Things and it looks like they just got in back in stock.  We've had this printing sitting around for a year and I'm glad we finally found it a home.  I'm pining away for a few of their other maps because they are all so cool.

 In the opposite corner is a shelf to hold Creed's toys plus a couple of odds and ends that I have yet to find a home for.

 And next to that is a whole wall of sliding glass doors with a balcony (did I mention that every bedroom in our house has a balcony and they all have big gaps at the that my children could easily fit under?  Yes, we keep those locked)

 The view is pretty amazing.  It's the best place to watch thunderstorms when they cross the valley.

 The wall next to that is basically covered in doors so it's not terribly exciting, but you can see our one splurge on this room, that David Trubridge pendant.  Luckily, we got it for an amazing deal and had out electrician install it when we were remodeling.

 My fingers sure hurt after putting it together, but I think it was totally worth it.

And that's Creed's room.  What do you think?

Making Spirits Bright

Friday was one of those days; I was tired, I was having a terrible day, both boys were melting down, and I tried to sneak into the bathroom to shed a few tears and calm myself when both boys stood outside the door, banging on it and crying.  It's moments like that that I try to take a deep breath and think about how all of those little frustrations that come along with being a mother are signs that I truly have everything in life that I could want; if I didn't have those frustrations, I also wouldn't have kids. There was a time in my life that I thought that maybe I might not be a mother, I would have done anything to have even just those moments of frustration.  Instead, I made other plans for myself; I went to graduate school, I thought about a PHD, I worked really hard at my job, but all my daily actions felt hollow.  I didn't have what I really wanted.  In a strange way, I think those days have made me a better mother. Now all the yogurt Ollie throws on the floor, all the snot I find wiped on my shirt, all the crying and banging on the bathroom door, are little reminders of how I have two little dreams come true in my life.

Friday, I picked myself up off the bathroom floor, and took Creed and Ollie to the lighting at the Shops at Riverwoods.  I promised Creed we would go as a reward if he memorized his part for the Primary Program.  Larry was stuck late at work so we headed off to fight the crowds on our own.  I wish you all could have seen Creed's face light up when Santa arrived!  The line was so long and Ollie was so tired so I promised we would visit Santa the next day.

We usually put off visiting Santa until much later in the season, but Creed REALLY wanted to see him, and I must confess that Larry and I had an ulterior motive. For weeks Creed's been telling us he's going to ask Santa for a Barbie Princess Dream Castle. Yikes!  It's not the princess castle I have a problem with, it's the massive unstorable size of the plastic monster and the $150 price tag.  I tried to explain to him that it's too big and too expensive and he patiently reminded me that it doesn't matter how much it costs because Santa's elves will make it in his workshop. Hard to argue with, so Princess Dream Castle it looked like it would be.  We let it go. Who are we to crush his Christmas Dreams?

But then, with no prompting from us, Creed told us he would wait until next year to ask for a Dream Castle because this year what he really wants in an accordion.  What?  And AWESOME!  So we were in a hurry to get Creed to Santa to make that wish official.  Wouldn't you be?

Saturday evening we went to the mall, we got in line, and about a minute later one of Santa's helpers told us Santa was leaving to feed his reindeer and would be gone for an hour.  Creed was heartbroken.  I told him we would visit Santa another day, there is still a lot of time before Christmas.  He looked at me with eyes full of tears and told me this was really important to him, he needed a chance to actually talk to Santa.  So we headed off to see where Santa's reindeer took him next.  Luckily, he didn't fly too far and we found him at the Riverwoods (Which is an awesome place to visit Santa if you're in town.  There was no line, Santa was wonderful, and they didn't even have a photographer so they expected you to take your own picture.)

Ollie was a bit bewildered by the whole experience, but he didn't mind sitting on Santa's lap one bit.  And Creed was all smiles once he had the chance to tell Santa how much he wants an accordion for Christmas (we've taught him that he can only ask Santa for one gift. Is that wrong?)

PS-earlier in the day we took some pictures for the Christmas card I have in mind this year.  Here are the out takes.

Poor Ollie!

Have you seen my sister Candice's mantle all decked out for Halloween?

And my mom's mantle, which was equally amazing?

 Incredible, right?  You should check out both of their blogs to see all of their decorations.  I, on the other hand, was sort of a Borup family fail.  My style has evolved and I don't really love most of the decorations that I have anymore nor do I think they really belong in my house so I just put out some pretty pumpkins and some mouse silhouhettes and paper decorations my mom brought over, and called it good.

But then I was hosting bookclub and the only part of my house decorated for Halloween was my kitchen.  What's a girl to do, but call her mom into action while she whisked her son off to ice skating lessons.

An hour later, I arrived home to this, because my mom is magic.

Don't let the pigeon Steal Your Candy

 Creed started out Halloween as a bee at our neighborhood preschool and he was stinking cute. He decided on his own to take a break from being a pigeon. We have a lot of dress-ups to choose from, but instead of a shark or airplane or doctor, he opted to wear this slightly too snug bee costume.  He regularly wears it around the house so I guess it was ready for its public debut.

 By the evening he was ready to be the pigeon again.  He waited oh so patiently for the rest of us to get ready to go trick-or-treating.

 This year we made it to more than five houses, we made it all the way around the block. I'd like to credit the company of friends and the wagon ride for this great accomplishment.

Who knows, maybe next year we'll make it to two blocks?