6 Months

In the blink of an eye 6 months have passed. Ezra's growing strong, she's eating all sorts of baby food, she's sitting up on her own, and while she can't quite crawl, (she's trying her hardest, the arms just aren't there yet), she's perfectly content to just roll where she needs to go. And she's fast. Which brings us to the subject at hand.

We bought our first house last year and were super excited to find just exactly what we wanted...a 1957 ranch in the city, a bit of a fixer upper, but with potential. Some of the quirks are small obstacles, like the fact that the previous owner thought that it would be a good idea to wood glue and screw the towel hooks into the wall, so when we started to replace the bathroom fixtures we inadvertently peeled a big strip of drywall off too. And some of the quirks are rather disruptive, for instance the house did not have central air when we moved in, only old moldy window units...some mounted in the middle of walls, which left us with gaping holes in the house to patch.

Our latest project was more of a safety concern that required some immediate attention. Our family room was added in the 60s or 70s, I'm guessing, because it includes a rather hip conversation pit in front of a giant fireplace, which, I suppose would be pretty freaking magical if you lived anywhere that the temperature dropped below 50 degrees. I imagine you could gather 'round the pit with your loved ones and sip cocoa while your faces were lit only by the twinkling Christmas lights and the glowing fire before you while your husband lazily strums the guitar. But since we live on the face of the sun, and I currently have no memory of the temperature falling below 100 degrees, the pit/fireplace proves to be more of a nonfunctional area of the room, and here recently it's more like a giant gaping 2 foot deep crevasse of a hole in the floor, inviting baby to roll into it and crack her head on the terra cotta tile.

Enter my hero-handyman of a father-in-law and my hardworking husband. The two took matters into their own hands and built a cover for said pit. They toiled tirelessly and got it built in one Saturday, all that's left to do is to cover it with a flooring material. It's sturdy and well crafted and best of all it's keeping the baby from plummeting into a world of pain. My sincerest thanks to PaPaw and Dad.

Before

After