it's the little things...

Front door is painted.  Awhile back I discovered oil-rubbed bronze spraypaint and finally bought some last weekend.  I've now ORBed the door handle, the wreath hanger, and the flag pole.  It's been an ORBing frenzy over here.  I think I may be getting somewhere with the curb appeal thing.  So tell me, does the door look obviously blue?  Or would you just think the house looks nicer but not be able to put your finger on why?  (Before (which used to be the After) and the new After) Yeah, it looks blue.  I hope no one turns me in.

It used to be the meh outdoors.  If you recall, the front yard started like this: I must apologize again for the crappy before pictures.  Anyway, the front beds contained FOUR sago palms.  These are not my favorite plants.  Not even my favorite palms.  I in no way felt like they belonged in the front yard of our house.  We also had a wall of oleander.  I don't mind them but I don't appreciate them being planted right in front of my dining room windows.  Lordy, people.  Do me a favor.  If you decide to plant something in the ground?  Read the tag that comes with it.  Plants are like puppies--they get bigger.  Anyway, we also had a mishmash of three different kinds of hardscape (none that I like) and a TON of this crazy groundcover (see front left of the photo above).  And some poorly placed shrubs. So I enlisted the help of nice people who found my ads on Craigslist.  They came and dug out about 90% of the groundcover I hated.  I gave it to them for free.  Same thing

My goodness this was a busy month, Buns!  Yesterday especially.  We took so many pictures and had so many wardrobe changes.  But more on that later. You have gotten so big!  I think you're around 20 pounds now.  Still a good 10 pounds lighter than your sister (which makes a world of difference) but you're so squirmy that you're hard to hold sometimes.  You still love being held, though.  You're in 9-month clothes.  We had to buy some the other day since Mama was still trying to squeeze you into some 3-6 month stuff. You've gotten better at eating solids and have 3 meals a day.  You've tried yogurt now and had meat once (chicken).  We've tried to give you finger foods (peas, puffs, bread) a few times and it's hit-n-miss.  You have managed to squeak out 2 teeth, though!  I swear, they've looked ready to pop through for months now.  You're still on the bottle.  Mama wants to try to get you started on a sippy cup.  Still a lover of the pac