thebarkleybabes

THIRTEEN: VERSAILLES

We had the most incredible time at Versailles. Every little girl ( and even Mama) wants to imagine what it would be like to be a Princess. As we walked through the Royal Apartments I chatted with Lyla about the things I knew about life at the Palace. She was really interested in everything and got plenty of inspiration on how she wanted to decorate her bedroom. Insert eye roll here.2017_JANKOWSKI_CEREMONY-56.jpg2017_JANKOWSKI_CEREMONY-60.jpg

The girls danced together in almost every room possible. It was so great to see them interacting this way. They were pretending that they were at a ball:)2017_JANKOWSKI_CEREMONY-53.jpg2017_JANKOWSKI_CEREMONY-54.jpg

After the spending some time in the hall of mirrors we headed outside to my absolute favorite part of the day….. The gardens.2017_JANKOWSKI_CEREMONY-46.jpg2017_JANKOWSKI_CEREMONY-47.jpg2017_JANKOWSKI_CEREMONY-48.jpg2017_JANKOWSKI_CEREMONY-49.jpg2017_JANKOWSKI_CEREMONY-50.jpg

We spent a bit of time in the formal gardens near the Palace before we boarded the “little train” to see Marie Antoinette’s Hamlet. As we rode the train Lyla couldn’t believe that everything was part of the King and Queens “backyard”2017_JANKOWSKI_CEREMONY-59.jpg2017_JANKOWSKI_CEREMONY-58.jpg2017_JANKOWSKI_CEREMONY-61.jpg2017_JANKOWSKI_CEREMONY-76.jpg2017_JANKOWSKI_CEREMONY-81.jpg2017_JANKOWSKI_CEREMONY-62.jpg2017_JANKOWSKI_CEREMONY-63.jpg2017_JANKOWSKI_CEREMONY-64.jpg2017_JANKOWSKI_CEREMONY-65.jpg

We had the most wonderful day at Versailles. While traveling with a 2 year old and a 6 year old you are forced to take things slow and to not over plan too many activities in a day. Watching them play chase together warmed my heart in ways I can’t even describe.2017_JANKOWSKI_CEREMONY-73.jpg2017_JANKOWSKI_CEREMONY-70.jpg2017_JANKOWSKI_CEREMONY-75.jpg2017_JANKOWSKI_CEREMONY-77.jpg2017_JANKOWSKI_CEREMONY-67.jpg2017_JANKOWSKI_CEREMONY-66.jpg2017_JANKOWSKI_CEREMONY-80.jpg2017_JANKOWSKI_CEREMONY-79.jpg2017_JANKOWSKI_CEREMONY-78.jpg2017_JANKOWSKI_CEREMONY-55.jpg2017_JANKOWSKI_CEREMONY-45.jpg

TWELVE: THE JUGGLING ACT

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The last few months have been an intense juggling act to say the least. We have been in the process of rehabbing our entire backyard and we took a two week vacation to Europe with the girls. Add on to that the end of the school year ballet recitals and soccer games and if that wasn’t enough I also decided to completely redo Lylas bedroom. There are lots of balls in the air right now, but I’m hoping to complete everything soon. I realize that these are seriously first world problems. I am in no way complaining. I feel very fortunate for my life right now.

This has been one of the most wonderful summers of my life so far and I owe it completely to Wayne and the girls. I have loved traveling with them. Lyla is headed for first grade this year. It’s our first year of her being in school for a full day and I think that I am more nervous than she is! It is going to be strange to have her gone for such a large chunk of the day. It feels like it was a couple of days ago since we brought her home from the hospital and I can’t help but feel as though her childhood is rushing by at the speed of light! I think that might be why I’m trying to soak up every second that we have left of this summer. I will be sharing more about our adventures shortly!!!

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ELEVEN: KITCHEN LIGHT PLAN

Our house was built in the late 1920’s. It has a lot of charm and over the years we have tried to put our stamp on it. We originally bought the house in 2005 and it was a MAJOR fixer upper. At the time I was 23 and Wayne was 25. Yes, we were babies. The housing market was crazy! ( this was during the housing bubble) so we knew that we needed to look for a home that needed updating.

There was a ton that we did to the house before we even moved in. The young bucks that we were back then we would wake up. Go to work. Drive to the house from work. Work on the house until about 10pm go home to our separate parents homes and go to sleep. Wake up again and do it all over again.

We did this for months.

Looking back of course there are things that we probably would have done differently, but I loved the experience of working on our home ourselves.

Flash forward almost a dozen years later and there are always small projects or updating that need attention. We have a few in the kitchen including adding a light over the kitchen sink so that I can actually the dirty dishes in the sink:)

As you can see. Our kitchen is not symmetrical. To the right of the window is a walk in pantry that we need access to; so this was as far over as we could go with cabinets. The kitchen is small and does lack some storage so I wanted to also have a pot rack as well to have easy access to our most used item.KITCHEN-1

When I looked online for pot racks I was sort of shocked at how much they cost. I didn’t need anything as sophisticated as what I was seeing online so I thought that I could rig something up myself using pipe and industrial lighting.

I did a funny little sketch to sort of explain my idea for our much needed lighting plan to Wayne. He approved! and the next step is to create a cut list and assemble it hopefully with no major headachesKITCHEN-2