12.29.2009

O' Christmas Tree

These two shots are of the tree in the front room. It is decorated with silver, white, and blue ornaments (balls)...heeheheehehee.
The tree in our living room is decorated with bright & cheery ornaments. We went to Target after Christmas and got more ornaments for both trees at 50% off.
The wreath was a gift from Debi, our realtor, and was shipped fresh from Washington. It smells pine-y and wonderful.

Animal House

I felt as though Scout needed some more time in the spotlight. She is, after all, my precious.
Adorable Atticus.
Now this is more of a dog search/count/connect the dogs. That's right. FOUR dogs in our house while Jeremiah's parents were here. Coco is in the chair and Pancho is on the floor.
Santicus and Pancho.
I guess chihuahuas gotta stick together.

Christmas Miracle

Jeremiah had promised me that he would build a stand for the washer and dryer. While I was away, there was some work gettin' did! Jeremiah and his dad built the fantastic stand that is pictured below. I was completely impressed and it is better than I could have imagined. I'd like to give credit where it's due, but both of the guys were doing this - "Well, he actually did most of the work." in gruff man voices. I do know that Jeremiah's dad painted it and even filled in the little screw/nail? spots with the white putty stuff to give it an even nicer finish. So thank you, Frank!


The total price came to about $70, which included some sort of new saw blade or something. The cost of the stands that are sold with the washer and dryer run between $400 - $500.

p.s. I plan on finding some stout little storage containers to hold goodies underneath.

Room updates! Or, Emily finally found a rug that she likes.

Here is Jer's music station. I'm sure he has a fancy name for it, but I'll just call it a music station. It isn't complete yet. I'm still planning on using a funky fabric or paper to look like a wall behind the stereo and drum to hide the wires. The rug (which I adore) was purchased at World Market and is made of jute.
Scout is loving the new setup, too. She has such good taste.
Here is a view from the top (isn't that a movie?). You can see that we divided the freakishly long room into two smaller rooms using the bookshelf. We doled out some moolah for the white boxes so we can store goodies without looking messy.
Here is the view of just the music area. We plan on adding/switching out the chair for a small (yet fun) couch or like I mentioned, adding another chair.

Somewhere over the rainbow, finches (and flickers) fly

The hummingbird above is called an Anna's Hummingbird. It has a bit of purple on the throat that is just barely visible in the picture but is beautiful up close. Below is a picture that Jeremiah took (right in our front yard!) after a rainstorm.

Finches! They eat out of my finch feeder and the hummingbird feeder!
My most beautiful woodpecker/flicker. He sits right on the fence that borders the patio and noisily waits to get his food.

Let there be light!




Now, I know that some people are probably content with having a jar lid and a bare lightbulb serving as fancy shmancy lighting on their outdoor patio, but it wasn't really doing it for me. I found a fixture that I liked at Lowe's and Jeremiah hooked me up with some lighting I could not only live with, but actually liked. Oh, by the way - we needed to use electric (electrical?) tape and found a bit in my emergency roadside kit that I got from dad - that kit has come in handy while working on the cars AND the house - thanks, Dad!

11.15.2009

Washin' and Hopin'

Three things. One, the washer and dryer arrived. Hence the "washin'". I know I sound like I should head back to the fifties, but I love my washer and dryer. I love doing laundry. Things start out dirty and they come out fluffy and smelling so nice. Sigh.
Plus, I painted the laundry room. The entire house - including doors, hinges, ceilings, etc. are painted a horrible yellow-y beige color. I'll be repainting everything. EVERYTHING. The door is the original builders bellow (that's beige yellow). The rest of the room was primed and painted pale sage with the trim primed and ready to be painted cottontail (a fancy white). If possible, I now love laundry even more.

Lastly, the hopin' refers to the fact that I am officially sick. blech. Here's to hopin' that I can get better. I was sick last month. I feel like I deserve a break, you know?

Finally! Internet at home!

Here we have our slightly messy kitchen. It does, however, show off the nicely painted new floor and the new microwave. Anyway, no judging. We just moved in.
My ten dollar dining room table that I threw in the back of my Subaru. I found it at a yard sale in the ghetto. Plus, the chairs are so pretty.
Okay, I cropped this picture because I was on the couch and I looked like a slob. Both the couch and tv center thing were donated to me from a friend at work. The tv thing will be sanded and painted. We are seriously searching for rugs!
Okay. This is one room that looks quite different. We've moved the big bookcase from its spot in these pictures to create two smaller rooms. It now comes out into the room. It acts as a divider. We've yet to find a rug for either area.
These chairs, which I love, love, love, were only ten dollars each. They are cute and comfy and if we ever get something we like better, they can head outside.

11.10.2009

Who moved my cheese?

Not my cheese, but seriously, I can't find anything else. Jeremiah JUST found his digital camera this weekend (we knew it was safe, just not where it was safely hidden), but we have yet to find the card reader so I can load up the pics onto my computer at work. There has been lots of beautiful progress, you just can't see it yet. Poo.

Things I would like to find:
card reader
my jewelry
clothes
many cosmetic items
the notepaper - this completely throws me because I CONSTANTLY make lists!
pencils & pens - see above

Oh, look! I've found all of these random things:
the skull
all of my candles
Twilight (so I can reread before the movie comes out)
my Tocade perfume (it's my signature fall scent)


I've even found things I didn't know we had. For example, I found a pasta grabber-thing that must belong to Jeremiah and a decorker and a grapefruit spoon (we don't eat grapefruit) and a sheet of glass and on and on and on.

Ooh, and on the agenda for tonight is wall washing to prep for priming, which comes tomorrow. Ah, the glamorous life. Eat your heart out. You can use the grapefruit spoon if you'd like.

11.03.2009

Rib 6

Saturday morning (moving day) started out smoothly. I dropped off the dogs at the groomers, picked up the truck, and we (Jeremiah) started to load that baby up with all of our homestuffs. I packed up things that were odds and ends. Those odds and ends sure add up, don't they? Holy smokes, I have boxes and boxes of things that absolutely do not have any sort of category. When the truck was filled, we went to the new house. I helped with a couple of things, and then I was informed (very nicely) that the rest could be done without my help (translation - get out of the way, pretty please). So I went in the kitchen and had breakfast (cold leftovers out of the tupperware and using my fingers). Shortly after I started my delicious breakfast, I heard Jer outside yelling. I stopped and listened. Nope, he wasn't calling for me, so I kept eating. And he kept yelling. So I stopped and listened again, thinking that he must have stubbed his toe or something and would stop yelling soon. Nope. I set down the dish and headed outside where I found Jeremiah on the concrete. He had fallen from the truck (lost his footing?) and was hurt. Long story a bit shorter - three hours in the ER later we were told he had fractured rib 6 and it would take 6 to 8 weeks to heal. By that time it was mid afternoon. We picked up the dogs, got lunch, and hired some suspicious looking movers to move the rest of the stuff. It was a long day. No pictures this time.

10.28.2009

Reconfirming My Fear of Clowns

In honor of Halloween, we've been netflixing scary movies. Both Poltergeist and Saw had evil clowns, which just goes to show that nothing good can ever come from having a clown around. So there.

I'm experiencing a surge in productivity with regards to preparing things for our move. We've coated the floor with a glossy sealant. I called and got both puppies into the groomers and reserved a Uhaul truck. This way the dogs will be out of the way when we are loading things up and into the new house. Plus, they should look and smell better than when we dropped them off.

For all those that love a bargain...I got 20 cents knocked off the rate per mile on the truck due to a bad experience that I had last time at Uhaul. I mentioned that we were going out of our way (by a mile) to avoid a different Uhaul store (with the bad service) and he appreciated that we were staying with the company and offering his store our services.

10.25.2009

Chocolatey goodness

I did the painting. I'm quite proud of this. I did the priming, too. On areas where we left the trim (laundry room, bathroom, hall closet) I had Jeremiah cut in. We will be painting (I will be painting) the walls and Jeremiah will be putting up trim. Tearing down the old trim made painting so much easier because I could paint right up to the wall and all the paint that is on them will be covered when we do the wall work. I love, love, love the new floor!





Floored

Carpet - gone. Adhesive - sort of gone. Paint spatters from the horrible paint job - did our best. We rented the sander. We did more of the adhesive/paint remover. We truly did our best. Then we swept, vacuumed, mopped, and finally I could apply the primer/bonding adhesive. I've also included two fabulous shots of our ancient oven and a picture of me reading (probably some warning about chemicals, paint fumes, etc.).

Here we have a gorgeous close up of the CLOCK on the stove and a picture from farther away so you can truly appreciate the ugliness of our stove/oven.

Yep. Dangerous chemicals & paint.
Primer/bonding layer
The Sandman

10.20.2009

One sticky and mean motor scooter

Repeat the following phrase: I will NEVER use linoleum anywhere in my house EVER.
That adhesive gunk underneath does not come up at all. We used harsh chemicals. Actually, Jeremiah used the harsh chemicals. I patched up the concrete (wearing a mask, of course) in other spots of the house. The chemicals tore up the top layer of adhesive, but left us with a tacky layer of funk. I checked websites. One stated that this (the laying of the linoleum) is the one time that you hope the workers skimped and didn't do an effective job because it makes tearing it up easier. Yeah, this might be the one place where they didn't skimp on quality. Tons of glue. I've included some pictures of this craptastic process, as well as my handy patchwork. I've found my niche with the patching, I tell ya. I'm the Rainman of patching. Just give me that flat thing, some patch stuff and my ipod and I just go.

The photos show the layer of adhesive, me picking up the adhesive layer after Jer has put the chemicals on it, covered it with plastic, and scraped it loose, one picture of the sticky funky goo, and then of course, my handi-patchwork.




10.19.2009

Outside pictures

So pretty!



On the outside looking in and vice versa

One of my favorite things about the house is the low-maintenance front yard with beautiful cacti. After I snapped the picture of the saguaro, a flicker flew out of one of the holes! The backyard is also looking lush and green! I can't wait to add more plants.





Even more pictures...and some ch ch ch ch cheap vinyl

As Jeremiah tackled the carpet, I headed to the kitchen to try and pull up the linoleum flooring. I pulled it up all right, but it left an ENTIRE LAYER of funky adhesive. This would turn out to be the biggest pain thus far.