What's New at the Pennington's?!

These are the during and after pictures of our newly improved family room! As you can see the walk through to the living room and the closet have been replaced by the gorgeous, hand-made birch book cases and cabinets. A new mantle was built and the top (above the t.v.) has a crown molding that matches the mantle. (You can click on the photo's to see them better). All this work was done by our good friend, craftsman, and former student of mine at Rochester, Jim Cousin. We are thrilled how wonderful they look. They're a seamless addition to the room. I thought for awhile it would take some getting used to, they are so big and new, but when you look at them it's almost as if they've always been a part of the house!
Now we're prepping for the demolition of the backyard! Next week the fence around the pool will come down so that all the concrete can be torn out and replaced, along with the little deck outside our bedroom. Then once the concrete and deck are done, the new fence will go back up! Just in time to close the pool and not enjoy any of it, ha, ha! There's always next summer, right?!
On another note, totally unrelated to the built-ins, school has begun again and Noah is back at the baby-sitters. It's a little different this year, since his friend Frankie isn't there this year. It's just Noah and Landon, who is two years younger. The boys are getting along great, most of the time. Noah loves going to LaVella's which is a relief for both Mike and me. There's never any tears when he gets dropped off in the mornings. The pictures are of the boys playing together. Noah would help Landon get situated at the top of the slide, then catch him at the bottom!
Well, we hope this finds you all well and looking forward to a nice, relaxing Labor Day weekend, then, hopefully, a cool autumn around the corner!