Camp Kelly - Open for Business!

With our "little" home reno project on the cabin finally wrapping up, I thought I would indulge in a Pinterest/Houzz before and after slide show to impress you all with our impeccable good taste.  What started out as some relatively easy (and needed) home improvements to the home we bought in Shenandoah 3 years ago (replace the roof and deck, update the bathrooms etc.), blossomed into a full on renovation extravaganza that took 10 months to complete and involved doing much more than I just described.  All in all, we did all that and also:  added a mud hall, added two bedrooms, replaced all the light fixtures, repainted the exterior and interior,  redid the hardwood floors and replaced all the carpets, added a bar counter in the kitchen, rebuilt the screened in porch, added an outdoor shower, replaced the hot tub, replaced the existing outdoor stairs and added a new set of stairs to the lake, updated all of the hardware in the house and on and on and on. In fact, we are still working away on a few last items, but the house is now in usable shape.

And so, the new and improved Camp Kelly is open for business and we are excited to receive our first guests!  The door is open anytime so just say the word and we'll roll out the pine needle carpet!  We can now sleep 6 adults and 7 kids comfortably.  We have the lake in the summer with all that it offers (canoeing, fishing, swimming, kayaking etc.) and the ski hill in the winter (skiing, snowboarding, snow tubing, apres skiing next to the fire).  In between, we have hiking and exploring the area which is full of neat little towns from a different time.  So come on down!

Before:  The exterior front of the house

Before: Stairs to back of  house and front entry porch

Before: Front porch

After:  We painted the house a barn red, put in some bigger windows and redid the landscaping

After:  We enclosed a large portion of the old porch to make a mudroom, replaced the decking  and added a chic new blue door and lighting fixtures.

After:  the mudroom with sliding barn door, industrial lighting and built-ins

Before:  Family room/dining area, loft and stairs

After: New hardwood stairs with cable railing

After:  We replaced the fan in the family room with a new antler light fixture and refinished the floors in here

A different angle of the same room - the view is out over the lake.  We closed in the open loft to create a new master with lake views.

Before: old deck

After: new deck
 

After: new deck

Before: bathroom

After: bathroom

After: bathroom

I won't bore you with any more - you'll just have to come out and see yourself.  We look forward to enjoying a cocktail and sunset like this one with you soon!

April Round Up

Things have ramped up around here and somehow two weeks have gone by since the end of April!

So what did we do in April?  Well, our cabin is FINALLY complete-ish so we have been heading out there on the weekends.  We spent three weekends in all out at Bryce last month and slowly but surely we're putting the place back together the way we like it.  It is a painfully slow process when you are also caring for 4 small children, as you can imagine.  Basically we are either preparing a meal, feeding someone, cleaning up, changing diapers, doing laundry, putting together furniture,  and/or cleaning AT ALL TIMES.  There isn't much sitting around and relaxing going on but if we can just push through this phase we'll get there soon.  I cannot wait to head out to the cabin on the weekends and have nothing to do but hang out with the kids, read, swim, do puzzles and play cards.  It. will. happen. I know I keep promising this, but this time I mean it - a post dedicated to the cabin project is coming soon.

June looks out the window at Bryce from her rocking chair

The boys on a box

June

Dylan

A walk in the woods

The last weekend in April, Matt and I traveled to Tennessee to stay at Blackberry Farm.  If you haven't heard of it, BB Farm is farm to table concept resort in the Smokey Mountains.  Amazing food. Amazing views.  Amazing spa. We had a wonderful time exploring the property, hiking, paddle boarding, getting massages, eating and drinking our faces off and playing with puppies. Yes, they had no less than 15 puppies on property that you could just go play with whenever you wanted.  Oh, and we hung out with Michael J. Fox, one of my best star sightings ever. If you ever have the chance to visit this place, go go go.

Kids are good.  Hank and Gus seem to have evolved their relationship beyond one of constant bickering and fighting over toys to one more like a friendship.  They are getting along very well and I think that Gus had really come into his own, which in turn has caused Hank to respect him more as a person (not just as an antagonist).  The girls are slowly starting to say some words and June has been taking some tentative steps.  The boys play very nicely with the babies which is always a pleasure to watch.

June with her baby

Gus

Dylan on the left, June on the right

Hank selfie (I have hundreds of these on my phone)

Dylan

Matt is super busy at work but it's all for a good cause so that makes it tolerable.  Between the house renovations, school activities, a couple of trips, and a nasty flu virus that worked it's way through every member of our household including the nanny, I've had my hands full this month.  I cried over Prince, bought my Woman Card from Hilary and continue to watch in horror as Trump keeps making his way towards the nomination.  It seems that there are more idiots in this country than I had initially thought, and that is saying something.  Speaking of idiots, these are the words now being said most frequently by my boys:  idiot, stupid, shut up and what the f*!k.  How did we go so wrong so soon?

Last but not least, recipes for this month included:

Pad Thai Salad from The Londoner - Really flavorful and healthy meal, now frequently in rotation.
Soba Noodle and Grilled Chicken Salad with Miso Dressing - from Goop.
Tarragon Chicken  - Food and Wine
Grilled Chicken Stuffed with Mozzarella and Sage - from Williams Sonoma Grilling

That's all for now - more from me soon! xoxo

March Round Up

Hello friends - hope you had great March.  We certainly did. We enjoyed record breaking high temperatures that felt more like summer and we had a phenomenal flower show thanks to it.  Spring is always my favorite time of year in DC thanks to all of the flowering trees around the city.  I don't know if I didn't notice them when I was living in Canada and England as a kid or if they just didn't exist, but the blossoms here are on another level and every year I walk around with a big dumb grin on my face at the sight of them.  Gorge gorge gorge!

The beautiful weeping cherry (I think) in front of our house

The best shot I could get holding both babies and trying to make sure Gus didn't fall out of the tree

Cherry blossoms in Kenwood

The month kicked with some weekend trips.  Matt took Hank skiing for the weekend in Park City for a Dad and me weekend sponsored by his company. They had fun on the slopes and hanging out at the house with all of the other dads and kids.  Hank is getting close to doing parallel turns and really seems to love skiing.  We are looking forward to the day that we can all ski together - shouldn't be long now.

The Kelly ski team

That same weekend I took Gus with me to LA to visit with Chanel's family and meet our new little lady cousin Henley.  Gus was a star traveling companion and compared to being with all four kids, it was almost like being on my own :) He is a just an easy going and content little dude.  Gus hung with Hayes and Greyson over the weekend and even showed some interest in the new baby.  She is a doll, of course, and I was so excited to hold a little newborn again.  Just love those little curled up peanuts.

Waiting for the bags after our long flight. He wouldn't take the free headphones off. 

The boys enjoying breakfast.  Chanel and family had moved into their brand new house only 10 days before the baby arrived - yikes! 

Henley

Being sweet with his cousin

Being groped by her cousin...

The following week that we took off for a fantastic week-long family vacation in the Dominican Republic.  Naturally, I approached the whole thing with great trepidation and anxiety.  Packing for 5 people, planning for every kind of worse case scenario under the sun and worrying about the goddamned Zika virus will do that to you.  So in addition to the regular stuff one would pack, we had about 100 pounds of sunscreen, bug spray and medicine along with with us.

All the worries melted away once we arrived at our beautiful house.  A gorgeous view, a lovely pool, lots of little spots to relax into and read or play cards.  Did I mention that it came with a full blown staff who catered to our every need?  It was heavenly.  I literally did nothing for 7 days straight but lie by the pool and read some books.  The girls traveled well and our nanny, Rohini, came along for the ride so that we were able to get some real rest in on the trip.  Oh, and Dylan really started walking this week.  With a vengeance. The boys had a blast playing with their friends Johnny and Devon who joined us along with their parents for the week.  The pool was used from sun up to sun down, as were the golf carts, which became the boys' first practice cars for driving.  By the end of the week Hank was chauffeuring us all around the resort entirely by himself.

Dylan

June

Dylan walking, modeling her Lily Pulitzer suit, natch

Gus in the entry way to the house

Beach boys

Casually climbing a palm tree

Me and the girls

The kids on their ride

Sun downers on the beach

Dad and Dylan (I think)

Gusser

The Easter bunny came to our house with lots of treats for the boys.  The greedy little candy monsters asked "What is the next holiday and when is it?" to which I answered "Mother's Day!" and cackled like a witch.

Boys and their baskets

"Are you kidding me with these outfits?"

This was not a month for cooking. It was a month for eating. I am pleased to report that I barely cooked at all and that I loved every minute of it. Sometimes you need to take a break even from the things you enjoy doing and just do nothing at all.

Last but not least, good progress is being made on the new house build and I am pleased to report that the cabin is 99% finished.  Expect separate posts on those little projects soon!

Much love and happy spring,

Maman
xoxo