#1,046 Big News + Staging.

No, we’re not having a baby. Ben is going to run for the Ward 5 city council seat in 2013! We’re so excited! We’ve been praying about this for months now, talking over if it’s a good idea, if it’s what God is leading him toward, and it feels very much like it’s the right time and the right thing to do.

He’s been writing down why he wants to do this and reading his thoughts make me fall in love all over again. He just CARES so much. We think that if you want your town to be this certain way, then make it that way. Don’t wait for someone else to do it. As the Avett Brothers sing, “decide what to be and go be it.”

In other news, Andrea has been here all day fluffing up the house to get it picture perfect. It turns out, when your house is being featured by a magazine, they send someone like her to make you look like you are rich and have better taste. Point in case, the grainsack wingback chair. I’m head over heels:

The Book of Beards made the cut and gets to stay on the coffee table:

Even the dogs get “styled.” Chevy got a grooming this morning and his collar got washed. He’s feeling anxious about being in a magazine but we told him, “Baker’s so fat you’ll look like a sporting dog next to him.”

And Ben finished the porch bed. Hanging it from the rafters was going to be impractical, so he built legs with casters. It’s so comfortable and craftsman inspired. That dude can do anything!
The photographer, Jean Allsopp got into town this afternoon and we gave her the walking tour of downtown. She snapped pictures along the way which tickled us to death. She said Laurel was “just like Mayberry!”

Tomorrow’s going to be crazy. Yikes.