A Very Merry Wedding

In the middle of moving, we all went to the wedding of some dear friends, Tom and Alaina, in Friday Harbor. Nick was an usher, Bethelle was the flower girl, and Rigby the ring bearer.

Isn't Rigby cute with all those men?

Bethelle looked forward to this day for a long time. She knew she would really get to be a princess. She had tried on her beautiful dress and practiced walking. Slow and sprinkle, slow and sprinkle, slow and sprinkle...

The wedding was the Saturday before Thanksgiving. On Friday, we drove up to Anacourtes to catch a ferry to the San Juan Islands. On the ferry, a fun strings-and-harmonica band was playing folk music and the kids ran and danced. The views as we navigated thru the islands were phenominal. The islands jut out of the water like forested volcanos.

Once there, we went straight to the wedding rehearsal. We knew Bethelle would be great at her part, but Rigby was a wild card, so we trained him to walk down the aisle with Twizzlers and Starburst waiting for him at the end.

Of course, Bethelle had to get the candy too. We had some pretty sugar-jittery kids by the end of practice.

After the rehearsal was the rehearsal dinner. What fun. We sat with another little family in a beautiful restaurant called Vinny's. The kids were troopers, but we did end up leaving a little early. They are not used to adult schedules. Before we left, the bride and groom handed out presents and the kids got theirs first. Bethelle ran up to the bride and whispered in her ear, "You look just like Cinderella, and that's my favorite princess!" Alaina almost teared up telling the assembly about it as she gave Bethelle her gift: a tiara, rhinestone bracelet, and a My Little Pony coloring book. Then Rigby got a race car, and Nick received a black, engraved baseball bat.

After a good night's sleep, it was all we could do to keep up with the wedding schedule. Nick had a special breakfast and usher duties to attend to and I had to get the kids ready. Isn't Bethelle's hair beautiful? I had eagerly anticipated doing that! Also, I made Rigby's vest and tie to match. Don't tell the bride, but I didn't finish it until the night before we left. I take that back; I sewed on the buttons the morning of the wedding itself.

Right at what would otherwise be nap time for Rigby, we all went to the church for pictures. Considering the lack of sleep, I would say that Rigby did fairly well. He had never missed a nap before, so I was nervous for his role he had to play. The wedding was to start at 4pm, and I wasn't sure what state he would be in.

When it came their turn to walk down the aisle, they both did so great! They walked slowly and went straight to the rest of the bridal party. Bethelle sprinkled her flower petals, and Rigby picked them back up to put in her basket! So cute.

The ceremony was beautiful, and I could really feel the spirit of the music and the words spoken. Afterwards, there were more pictures. The bridal party was all seated on pews in the church and Rigby just leaned onto the nearest bridesmaid and fell asleep.

Then we went to the dinner and reception. The bride's father, a pastor, gave a welcome speech and prayer. In the speech, he quoted Bethelle's earlier "Cinderella" comment, and said that she really was a princess today, but that someday the fairy tale would fade, and she would be Alaina again, but that what remains true is Christ. It was a beautiful speech, and again, Bethelle felt special.

As we were eating, Bethelle commented that all the princesses (bridal party) were at the front of the room except her! She needed to join them! After eating, she went straight to the bride and didn't leave her for the next hour. When the couple got up to wander through the room to greet all of their guests, Bethelle was right there with them, thanking everyone for coming to her special day.

And then the dancing. Oh, the dancing. I took Rigby and Curie back to the hotel to go to bed, but Nick and Bethelle stayed. Bethelle danced. To every song. Until midnight. She was the talk of the party. It was truly the best day of her life. The entire wedding might as well have been hers, as far as she knew.

Bethelle has two dreams: to fly with angels and to go to Disneyland. That night when I tucked her in, she was laying in bed with an unstoppable smile on her face. I said to her, "That was as fun as going to Disneyland, wasn't it, Bethelle?"

"No," she said. "It was better."

An Answer

Here is a comment from a recent post:

Just curious and for the record, Elke, did you and your brothers ever find where I hide gifts? Did you try?
Love, Mom

And here is the answer:

I once found (after looking for it... ) a big shopping bag full of what seemed to be presents in my mom's closet. Excitedly, I looked in and found a rubic-type toy (not a cube, a flat thing made of about 5 squares that fold around each other). I felt so bad about it and so disappointed at the lack of mo-jo that generally exists when you open a present, I put it back and didn't dig any deeper.

What about the rest of you readers out there? Leave me a story about finding/not finding presents. My favorite will get a Christmas itune of my choice. Tell me if you would want my favorite quirky Christmas song, or my favorite Christmas standard.

Here's What I'm Making for Christmas Dinner

This is sooooo yummy!!! A few of you out there requested this recipe when I made it at Curie's blessing dinner. Warm up your printers; here it is!

original recipe:

Scalloped Yukon Gold and Sweet Potato Gratin with Fresh Herbs
1 1/2 pounds medium Yukon Gold potatoes
1 1/2 pounds medium red-skinned sweet potatoes (yams)
2 cups heavy whipping cream
1/4 cup (1/2 stick) butter
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 tablespoon minced fresh Italian parsley
1 tablespoon minced fresh rosemary
1 tablespoon minced fresh sage
1 tablespoon minced fresh thyme
1 1/2 teaspoons fine sea salt
3/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 1/4 cups (packed) coarsely grated Gruyére cheese (about 5 ounces)

Fill large bowl with cold water. Working with 1 Yukon Gold potato at a time, peel, then cut into 1/8-inch-thick rounds and place in bowl with water. Repeat with sweet potatoes. Combine cream, butter, and garlic in medium saucepan; bring to simmer. Remove from heat. Mix all herbs in small bowl. Mix sea salt and black pepper in another small bowl.

Butter 13x9x2-inch glass baking dish. Drain potatoes, then pat dry with kitchen towels. Transfer half of potatoes to prepared baking dish. Use hands to distribute and spread evenly. Sprinkle with half of salt-pepper mixture, then half of herb mixture. Sprinkle with half of cheese. Repeat with remaining potatoes, salt-pepper mixture, herb mixture, and cheese. Pour cream mixture over gratin, pressing lightly to submerge potato mixture as much as possible. DO AHEAD: Can be made 6 hours ahead. Cover with plastic wrap and chill. Remove plastic wrap before baking.

Preheat oven to 400°F. Cover gratin tightly with foil. Bake 30 minutes. Uncover; bake until top of gratin is golden and most of liquid is absorbed, about 25 minutes longer. Let stand 10 minutes; serve.

my changes:

1) I use all Yukon Golds. I'm just not a big sweet potato fan. But I had this at Trisha's when she made it with sweet potatoes, and everyone loved it.

2) I save my oven space for the ham by making this in the slow cooker. I cook it covered on high for three hours, then uncovered for half an hour.

3) You can save yourself $15 on this dish by using Swiss cheese in place of the gruyere.

Time to step it up

I've never really had to hide Christmas presents before. I just stick them in a closet or something. This year, Bethelle keeps showing me the great things she is finding in the most unusual places! How exciting!

Oops.

Murphy's Law-ndry

I just wanted to do some laundry...

I put off hooking up the laundry machines in the new house until I really needed them. Then I got behind the dryer and found that I would have to run to the store for a flexible dryer vent connection. With three kids at home, this would take a few days to schedule.

When I finally got it, I found that our dryer plug did not match the outlet in the wall. After another few days and a trip to the store, I had a new cord with plug (the only other kind at THD) to install on my dryer. Turns out, this did not fit my outlet either. More time and another trip, and I had returned the cord and bought a new outlet to switch out on the wall. Here you go, Nick. Just be sure to turn off the breaker first and have at it!

The breaker box is in the garage. Behind the mountain of stuff that we are storing. Centered, behind the mountain. With several hours of labor, we were to it. Breaker off. Outlet installed. Mountain in garage put back together. And the dryer was working.

Another day and time to install the washing machine. Easy, right?

The faucets leak. Both of them. My brother (and landlord) came over to inspect and fix. I hooked up my machine's hoses and got to the laundry, finally! In the middle of the load, the drain hose popped out. Good thing we caught it. And good thing we had towels. Catastrophe avoided. Drain pipe re-secured. The load finished washing and I got the newly wet towels in as a second load.

We started up the dryer for the first time and the breaker tripped. I spent a couple of days without the power, as we had to move the mountain in the garage again to get it started back up.

We were all wearing dirty clothes that did not match.

Finally, we were up and running again. I had cleaned a couple loads and was feeling like everything that could go wrong with the laundry had already happened. It could only get better from here. I started up a load as I went to bed. In the morning, Nick asked if I had been getting up in the night to keep the laundry going. No. Good idea, but no.

Nick replied that the dryer had been going all night. The clothes were OK, but really hot. We seem to have burnt out a heat element or something. Now, it takes all day to dry a load.

That afternoon, Nick called to tell me that the offer on our house (the first one, see below) had been terminated.

As I sat, a bit dazed, holding a sleeping Curie on my lap while the kids watched a cartoon, I heard a noise, like a loud faucet. I threw Curie on the floor and just knew it had to be the laundry room. Good thing I had that load of freshly cleaned and dried towels. They came in pretty handy again, as the connection to the faucet had come a bit loose and was spewing water. Catastrophe was avoided once again, but laundry could no longer be done. At least I had gotten a few loads clean.

It took at least a week to get new hoses. I didn't even want to think about it for a while. I finally just bought them on Thursday, and am installed and running.

Could anything else go wrong in the laundry room? I just want to be prepared. I seem to be jinxed.

Property in Gig Harbor

We have some property for sale in Gig Harbor. It is currently wooded and very buildable. There is enough slope for a basement. Perk tests are all great for a septic. It is currently .4 acres, but there has been a lot of talk from the county about abandoning a strip of land they own next to this lot. Our lot would get half of the abandoned section, making it .7 acres.

It is off of Artondale Drive, near the Gig Harbor Golf Course, if you are familiar with the area. Despite the picture of GH above, it does not have a view of the harbor. Sorry.

If you or anyone you know may be remotely interested in it, let me know asap. We are going to list it with a realtor this weekend, but I can make a list of names that would not have to pay realtor fees if they purchase it later.

And that's not the half of it

We had to move to our new place a week before close, as we had a wedding to attend the next weekend (that's a post and a half, but I'm waiting for pictures). So when the closing date came, we were already settled in our new place. And paying rent. And the buyers wanted a three week extension.

Then another week went by and we got a sale termination notice.

What do we do? Move back? Stay and see if it sells again? How long can we make two payments? Should we start packing right now? What if we move back in just as we get another offer? What if it takes another year to get an offer?

I think I put my brain in hibernation as a self-defense mechanism.

In the next 36 hours, our house had three showings. We got an offer the following day. We'll be staying here.

The Move Itself

What a fiasco!

After our buyer's inspection, they sent us a wishlist of items to complete before close. What are you to do in a buyers' market? I looked at that list and and my house full of stuff to be packed and realized that I had an impossible task ahead of me. Nick was out of days off and takes an evening class... so it was all me. Until I enlisted a lot of help. I had contractors, in-laws, my parents, my brother, and several church friends over to help or watching my children. For a stay-at-home mom, I sure didn't see much of my little best friends for a couple weeks.

After working my fingers to the bone, not sleeping, not eating (I literally lost 6 pounds), not seeing my kids, and spending too much money, the list and the packing was complete. On time. Nick asked the men at church to come help us load the moving truck. 30 people showed up. I could cry just thinking about it. Thank you all so much. We will miss you!

To my great shame, we filled a 24 foot moving truck and a long trailer. Our new house is less than half the size of our old house, so we will be going through things for a while...

When we arrived at the new house, my brother had arranged for men from the church here to meet us and unload. Again, we had a great group and we were unloaded quickly. Nick then left to return the truck. About ten minutes down the road, the truck broke down. He called the company and they arranged to have it towed. I picked Nick up and brought him back home. It actually saved us from having to take it all the way back, but can you imagine if that had happened while full of our stuff?! Quelle désastre!

The biggest kudos go to the Congers for packing, cleaning, loading, driving the extra trailer all the way to the new house, and unloading. Wow.

Thanks to all who helped with the move. I don't think any of the helpers read this blog, so pass the message along for me.

Back in the Saddle

The move was never complete until we got our internet service.

Let the blogging begin.

Moving Day!

We're loading up the truck! I can't believe today is finally here.

Recent Pics

Me and my girl.

We're moving! And we're taking Curie with us...
I think her eyes are turning from blue to green. What do you think?
And how do you get kids to smile like this?
Call in these yay-hoos...

Just a Cutie

... and her brother.

Halloween '09

Nick and I made no attempt at dressing up this year. We are officially old.

I know... It's just wrong to put make-up on a 4 year-old. Cut me some slack; I only do it once per year.
I'm sorry that you missed her expression when she saw her hair in the mirror. It was priceless. "I look just ... like ... TINKERBELL!"
Rigby was a boat. At first he didn't want to wear his costume, but then he figured out that all he had to do was put it on and say "trick or treat" to get his bag filled with candy. This decision was not rocket science. Here, he is modeling it sideways, but you get the idea.

Lookout, Ladies

I love him.

Was It Yesterday This Morning?

Trying to finish, list, and sell our house has been a huge endeavor. When we finally got to the selling phase, all we could really do was wait and pray.

So that's what we've been doing. A lot of waiting and a lot of praying.

Rewind to Labor Day weekend. Nick felt inspired that if we built a particular section of fence along our property line, we would get on offer on our house by Rigby's birthday. Nick got right to work, and the fence was done the following day.

Last week we had our first unexpected showing. The house was less OCD than I like. I was very stressed about the toys on the floor and the unmade beds. I could do nothing about it. But the people liked it! A few days later they scheduled our first second showing. I got to redeem myself. The house was perfect, the lawn was mowed, and there were fresh-baked cookies on the table (and their scent in the air!).

This morning we received and accepted their offer! We are so excited!

Rigby's birthday was yesterday, so my only question is:

Somewhere in the world, was it still yesterday this morning?

The Pumpkin Patch with Grandma

Yesterday we went to a pumpkin patch. I would have thought that implied a pumpkin garden. Oh well... at least it was covered... it was raining pretty hard outside.

They had a hay bale maze that the kids loved. OK, Bethelle loved it. Rigby walked all through it, but he never smiled. He just followed.

Here's Curie in the maze with Grandma. No fair being carried, Curie! You can see the end of the maze!

Our cousin, Joee, was there...

And her brother, Rushy.

Rigby doing "hay angels"...

And Bethelle posing as a scarecrow.

I have recently felt like I have more cute pictures of Bethelle than Rigby, so I followed him around for a while. I got one!

Rigby is Two!

We do birthdays in groups around here. Curie, Nick, and Rigby are within a month and a half of each other. Bethelle's is a month after mine.

Rigby's birthday is October 14th, but we had a family party last night. This little guy is all about race cars (and trucks, buses, airplanes, helicopters...).

And this is how much cake is left for me to eat. OK, there's a little less of it left now... Please come over if you like cake. Save me from myself.

I have made several posts today. Keep reading...

First Day of Preschool

I didn't bring a camera to the actual locale (c'mon... I have three kids to tow in and out of the car), but I did get some pics day-of. Here's my school-girl:

And here she is with the brother who wanted in on the picture fun:

And with little sister:
Don't they look like twins in this picture? Except that Bethelle has my green skin. Curie gets her healthy pinkness from Daddy.

One of the Best Moments in My Life

The green-skinned momma and her little pink baby:

Grandpa got to enjoy it too...

And just two more cute ones.

Nick's Big Three-Oh

This post is long overdue.

Nick turned 30 on September 11th... a full month ago. I realized that my baby would only be a couple weeks old, so when would a surprise party be more surprising? It totally worked. He had no idea.

We had the little soiree at Round Table Pizza. The picture above is Bethelle's present to her daddy. She did a beautiful painting entitled, "Balloons and Decorations". Fun was had by all.

Kid Update

Bethelle started preschool this week. I told her that she would love it, and she does. Bethelle is into projects and learning. She never really spent much time with toys. At preschool she paints and draws and makes things. This is her version of heaven. I had debated in my mind whether or not to send her, but I'm so glad that I did.

She is also an excellent big sister. She sets a good example for Rigby, and he really looks to her for that. Today I asked her if she would hold Curie while I did the dishes and said that I would even pay her to do it (she's trying to make money to buy Rigby a birthday present -- her idea!). She told me that she would do it for three cents. Perfect.

Rigby, Rigby. I feel that I haven't talked enough about him in this blog. Rigby is my little sweetheart. He is attentive and kind. He pays attention to everything that is going on around him. If I am looking for my shoes, he notices, finds them, and lays them at my feet. If I mention to my mom that we'll probably leave her house soon, he starts cleaning up the toys. If Curie is crying, he suggests to me what needs to be done until she is happy again. If he is getting a toy at the store or a cookie after dinner, he makes sure that Bethelle is getting one too. When we leave somewhere, he says good-bye to everyone in the room individually, and he usually adds a "thank you!" to his "bye!" (even tonight as he said goodnight to Bethelle he thanked her). And he picks the most sentimental little moments to say, "I happy" and just melt your heart.

He is really picking up on speaking in sentences lately. Every day he surprises me with new vocabulary and uses of words. Today he jumped and then told me that he jumped. In past tense. I try not to be too surprised, but that was new. He can be a little hard to understand, though, if you're not used to him. For example:

moo = juice

muk = milk

nuk = music

ha-nuk = all done

Most of his words are more clear than that, but those are some of his funny ones. One of his favorite things to say is, "Oh, nice!" This generally presents when someone has thrown something (a ball usually... hopefully). And he calls Curie "m-my C'wee" (my Curie).

Curie is an angel thus far. She is happy and content most of the day. For the first time in my life, I have a child who does not consume my constant attention and both of my arms at every moment. I don't remember being able to get anything done with a baby around before, but so far Curie lets me. And she sleeps well (knock on wood). In the last week, she has slept for six hours straight three times. Just when we thought things couldn't get better, she slept for eight hours, and then seven. Please, please let this be how she is and not just a phase!

The only other thing to say is how much they all love each other and how well they get along. My greatest fear as a mother is that some day this will end and they will fight and have moments where they don't even like each other, much less love each other, but for now we're okay. For now, they are each other's whole world and I love it.

FREE nursing cover

I just came across this steal and thought I'd share. If you want one of these (and everyone swears that they are FABULOUS for nursing mothers):

go to www.uddercovers.com, pick a cover, and enter promo code Cinderella. It reduces your price from $32 to $0!!! I'm serious. There's a $9 shipping charge, but you'd pay more than that for fabric and supplies to make it. If you're not soon to be nursing, get one anyway for a gift. You'll be loved.

A Birth Story

WARNING: if words like "cervix" bother you, you should skip this post and go straight to the pictures in the next post. No cervixes there.

Some of you might not really care about this stuff. That's fine, but I want to document it. Curie will care some day. And my mom cares.

This is going to be a long post. Seriously, you can skip it. I'm not offended.

...

I was having contractions for a couple months before my due date, but not enough to worry about. At 36 weeks, I realized that I really wanted to have this baby in August so that I could choose her school year. I was due Aug. 26th, so that wasn't unreasonable, but as my date got closer, I was not a good candidate for induction because I (my cervix) wasn't progressing. This was no surprise to me, because in the last two births, my water broke before I dilated at all. So Nick had me walking miles, eating spicy food and pineapple, and swinging on our swingset. After a couple of 3-4 mile walks with the family, the kids lost interest, so we resorted to walking up and down the driveway after they were asleep. These walks were 2-4 miles long. 12 lengths of the driveway per mile. It would have been very boring if Nick hadn't walked most of those lengths with me. Counting laps with chocolate chips didn't hurt either.

The evening of the 27th I went to a movie night at a friend's house and while there was having a lot of contractions, but didn't say or do anything because I really wanted to finish the movie. Silly, I know. When I got home they had slowed. The next night, we walked four miles in the driveway. I was totally spent, and told Nick that I'd rather not go into labor until 10 the next morning. I was pretty close. I'd say it started at 8:30 am. I've always had long labors, so I just finished up packing and getting ready while Nick packed the kids and did the dishes. We finally took the kids to my parents' at noon. Then we stopped for lunch on the way in and checked in to the hospital before 2pm. My contractions were starting to get pretty hard and had been 2-3 minutes apart all day.

From the moment that I stepped onto the hospital's vinyl floors, my contractions all but stopped. It was so frustrating. "No really, I've been in labor all day. I promise. Don't make me go home!" The first nurse couldn't even find my cervix. Not a good sign. She told me I could go walk around for half an hour before she discharged me. She had another nurse come check me first (I do have a cervix, after all), and she said, "Oh, yeah. You're a sssss......"

Ssssss..... ? That means six or seven! Hope was restored!

"Six." The verdict. Does this mean I'm staying? "Yes." Relief. And I was going to have a baby in August!

She still sent me on that 30 minute walk to get the contractions going again, and it worked. My water broke as soon as I got back to the room. With the lack of this cushion came the pain, so we started my epidural process (you have to get a full bag of IV fluid in you before the epidural). The pain was manageable, but increasing. I got my epidural around 3:30 pm.

As the time went by, I dilated to a 9 (10 is the goal), but the baby was still very high and not "engaged" in my pelvis. The midwife was there by then and had me push a few times to encourage her down, but it didn't work. They kept saying I was "stuck at 9" and we were just waiting. My nurse said that I might begin to feel pressure in my pelvis when she dropped. And finally, I did, so I told the nurse.

"Great!"

After a little bit longer, the pressure turned into pain, and then a lot of pain. The nurse explained that the pain had just increased over the blocking power of the epidural and gave me a button to push to increase my dose every 10 minutes. This didn't help in the slightest. It was getting worse. I started crying with each contraction and they no longer had breaks between them. One contraction would just start coming down on the monitor when another would hit. They were about four seconds apart. I just needed a break for a little bit! Just a break! I could hear another woman screaming with her contractions, but I was crying.

Nick, who had been a trooper through Rigby's pain-free birth, but had had a seizure when I was in pain with Bethelle, had to go lay down on a cot with his feet up while I cried. I was trying to hide the pain from him, but couldn't. And as the pain increased, my whole body began to shake violently and uncontrollably and my jaw clenched painfully. They said that it was just due to the dumping of hormones into my body. Nick really didn't like the shaking.

The midwife called the anesthesiologist who took a good 15 minutes (of constant contractions) to come. She gave me an additional super-size dose of the epidural and some time to let it kick in. Then she checked my abdomen, asking me where I could feel moisture as she swabbed. Pretty much everywhere. She turned me over to see that the epidural catheter had slipped out 5 centimeters! All of the medication that they had been pumping into me had been dumping somewhere unintended and ineffective. I now think that this is what caused all my shaking, but I haven't confirmed that yet.

Being a nine (dilation), I wasn't sure if I could have it put back in and was a little panicked in my mind. The anesthesiologist asked my midwife if she could redo it. Yes. Even though she's a nine? Yes, no problem. Phew. In all, I had been without it for about an hour and a half.

I realize of course that many women choose this option. Also, most women throughout the centuries have not had the option of an epidural. My respect for these women's ability to stick it out has greatly increased, as has my resolve never to attempt such craziness! I love living in this age!

When the epidural got back in and securely taped, Nick was able to join me again. Poor guy. The delivery is as hard or easy on him as it is on me. He's pretty lucky that he chose a wife who likes her epidurals.

With the pain relief, the contractions slowed to a normal, one or two minute apart rate. The baby descended and we were ready to push. I haven't mentioned yet that my amniotic fluid was tinged with meconium, causing a little concern. A nursery nurse and a nurse practitioner were called in for the birth to hopefully clear the mouth and throat before her first breath. I pushed for 45 minutes. Two steps forward, one step back. My midwife said that Curie didn't know which way to go. She kept twisting around and cocking her head to one side and another, slowing down the process. The throat clearing was a success, so we have no worries about lung infections, etc. that come with inhaling meconium.

As she came out, the nurses oohed and aahed over how big she was. They couldn't believe that this chubby girl came out of such a little mommy. Everyone in the room had a guess, and all were in the nine pound range, which turned out to be right. She was 9 pounds, 3 ounces. I didn't get to see her right away because of the meconium clearing, but Nick pronounced that she looked just like our other babies, but chubby. He was perfectly right. She was born around 9 pm after a 12-hour labor.

I only needed two stitches; same as the other babies, but surprisingly so. The other two were 6-14 and 7-7, so I would have thought that 9-3 would have really messed me up. We left the hospital 21 hours after the birth. It's nice to have the meals brought to your bed and to be taken care of by nurses, but honestly, they bug you way too much. You cannot get any sleep there. We were ready to get home.

I think this has been a long enough post. I could detail more, but I'll wait. Love you, Curie! You were worth it.

A Tiny Photo Shoot

There were an awful lot of good ones... Here are my favorites.

This is her blessing gown, made by her personal heirloom maker, my mom.

And I found this dress in a box of my old clothes that my mom saved. It looks brand new and I love it. I have decided that peach and purple are her colors. I think I'd repaint her room if our house weren't for sale.