It’s been our tradition for 4 years now to do a photoshoot every year. It started because our engagement pictures and our wedding pictures were a gimme and we’ve done them each summer since. The plan is to continue taking family pictures every summer so we can watch ourselves and our offspring grow. This year’s pictures double as a maternity shoot and we’re pretty thrilled with them.  Jessica Crawford took the pictures and while she hasn’t edited any of these yet we still love them. She’s also lined up to do Cheeper’s newborn shoot in September so stay tuned!

We’re up in Virginia celebrating our 2 year anniversary with a 4 night stay not dissimilar to our honeymoon. We spent Wednesday night in a bed and breakfast on the same street I lived on in Blacksburg, spent last night in Lexington, VA, and will head up to the Homestead tonight. So far it’s been perfectly chill and the weather has been semi-cooperative. We walked around VT yesterday and had lunch in town before heading up to Lexington via the Blue Ridge Parkway where we stopped and napped/read at an overlook. Lexington has a 4th of July/Air balloon festival which we walked to (by the way being 8 months pregnant has made 2 mile round trip walks seem like insurmountable challenges) and then came back to the B&B to watch a movie and laze. We have finally committed to never again choosing a random movie off Netflix but overall it was a really nice day.

Also, the “Durm.” shirt was my “cotton” anniversary gift from Chris. I’m planning to wear it everywhere.

The nursery begins to unfold! Annie and Matt helped us move the furniture around and list the oven and tv on Craigslist for free, I’m pretty sure they were gone in less then an hour.

Still need to assemble the crib, affix all the furniture to the wall, hang curtains, and decorate the walls.

Chris is a magnificent plumber! Sure it may take him a little longer then your average plumber, but he gets the job done! He completely redid all the plumbing leading away from this bathroom (sink, tub, and toilet). A lot of it was all cast iron pipes too. He installed a new toilet too!

The road Chris’s work is on, glad we live at the top of a hill. Also, it’s easier to defend against marauders.

The painters have finished up all the upstairs windows now and are working on the rest of the paint. As of last night they had done at least a first coat in all 3 of the bedrooms and they’re at it again this morning. Hopefully they’re going to put the second coat on in those rooms before tackling the hallway, bathroom, and stairwell. I’m anxious to start putting my nursery together. We chose the same light gray for the entire upstairs (minus the front apartment) since it’s a clean, neutral, modern color. The drywall ceiling in the room pictured doesn’t look very different, but the bead board ceiling in the nursery is looking really great for having been painted! The picture is also a little dark but we love it!

The windows have been delivered but not yet reinstalled. I started working on curtains this morning at Mom’s but the room will have to be painted too before I hang them.

The white with dandelion is the curtain material and the green is the rug.

Spring has sprung in downtown Durham and we couldn’t be more excited for it! We’re still trying to beat the back yard into submission and Chris can be found out back with his axe on any given weekend. You’ll notice from the 2nd picture that we haven’t removed anything he’s chopped down, one of these days we’ll have to borrow my Dad’s truck and take a few trips to the dump.

Mary Kyle’s parents visited and brought us some hydrangeas which are loving the “April showers” we’ve been seeing. Otherwise we haven’t improved the yard much, we’ve put down some new mulch but we’re mostly just trying to maintain what we have.

However, the real motivation of spring are the changes going on around us! All the flowers are in bloom, there’s no end of renovation projects going on in the neighborhood, the weather is beautiful, and a doughnut shop AND an ice cream parlor opened up within walking distance. It’s enough to make us smile and feel endlessly optimistic about our choice to invest in this old house and neighborhood.