Wednesday, August 31, 2011

Finished quilt

Finished the quilt for the guest room and got it up on the wall!


I used a red print for the binding. This is the first time I have used a different fabric for the binding, I usually use the same fabric as the backing (I say this like I have done so many - NOT)


Anyway - here it is hanging on the wall. That pretty much finishes this room off for now. I may or may not remove the corner cabinet and the round wicker table. Somewhere down the line - like way down the line, I hope to put up crown molding in the rooms that don't have it. (the master bedroom and dining room had it when we moved in and we added it to the laundry room when we did that room)

Well - that is it for today. Now I'm getting ready to paint the last bedroom. (won't start until the weekend but I'm getting the room ready!) When I went to get paint the guy at the paint counter asked if I was ever going to finish painting! Think that means I might have bought more than a little paint?

Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Some things I miss

There are a lot of things I miss from our old house.




Painted bead board paneling



White cabinets


Stained glass windows and hardwood floors


My front porch

But some days the thing I miss the most

Is in the wall on the left in this picture. Can you see it? This was as we were leaving on the last day and it is closed but if you look closely you will see the doggie door. Some days I really, really miss that doggie door. Unfortunately, there just isn't a good place to put one in this house - but some days I think about it, all day long, trying to figure out where we could possibly install one!

I finished the binding on the quilt for the guest room and it is hanging on the wall! I'll show pics tomorrow.

Monday, August 29, 2011

Tied at 109


Saturday our temp hit 109 to tie the record - not the record for the day, the all time record! Sunday we only got to 107. Still breaking daily records but we are supposed to gradually make it down to under 100 by the end of the week and hopefully that will be all of the 100+ temps!

Obviously I didn't do a lot of outside activity this weekend! I did get some pictures back on the walls.

Wanna take a tour through the r/w/b guest room?


This is a before picture


I had a really hard time deciding on a color. All these paint chips were taped to the wall for weeks. There were a few more that I discarded before making my final decision. I guess my biggest problem is that this 'room' was pure white painted paneling in the other house. I really miss the bead board paneling! I had a hard time picturing the room not painted white.


This is what I decided on. Faded Burlap. The Sailcloth is what I used inside the closet (I'm using it in all the closets as I get to them) It is hard to really see the difference in pictures but it is quite a bit darker than what was in there before (and way darker than the previous white!) At first I wasn't sure I was going to like it but after a few days I'm getting used to it. It is kinda cozy in there. Wish I had room for a small chair.


From the door - the wall on the left will have a quilt hanging there (the one that is folded at the foot of the bed) The one on the chest in front of the old gate (from our first house) is the one that was hanging there. It is an old quilt and it is fairly heavy. It isn't in great shape and I decided it had been hanging way too long and needed to come down. The bed belonged to my grandparents.
The picture above the gate is hubby's grandmother's high school diploma (from 1913) It is in the frame we found it in - I just cleaned it up and put acid free foam board behind it.


I'm undecided about the cabinet in the corner. As sure as I get rid of it I will need it for something. If I decide to keep it, I might paint it.


The dress is red velvet. It was made by my great-grandmother. (for me, my second Christmas)


The smoking table on the right side of the bed belonged to hubby's grandfather.


Wish the dresser had some really great history behind it, but I bought it at a consignment shop a few years ago. (We didn't paint the ceiling so you can kinda see the difference in color in this picture though the lighting makes it seem more yellow than it really is. Think coffee with cream)

We now have one room and a few closets left to paint. (plus the kitchen cabinets but I'm undecided if I am going to try doing those myself or hire someone) Here are the paint samples I carry in my purse (which is why they are kinda beat up) - the colors we have used in the house so far.

The other guest room is on the schedule to be painted this coming weekend and it will be painted Dockside Haze (the same color as the master bedroom) My plan is to paint one of the beds too but they are saying we have the best chance for rain that we have had in a long time so if it rains, I will get the room painted and paint the bed later.

Now I suppose I should go move some laundry. The fun never ends! :)

Friday, August 26, 2011

Don't ya just love technology?

I guess I should use a picture of my phone for this post but that would mean taking one and uploading it and I already had these pictures ready for today.


My cell phone has been out of service all day. I had been trying to send a text all morning and it wouldn't go through. I could send an email and get online but no text.

(Look how big this potato vine is getting!)



I finally tried making a call. Nothing. So I call my cell from the home phone - it says my number has been disconnected or no longer in service. Grrrr.

(it started out as just a little twig)


Can't remember the password for the account but I finally got a real person (I hate phone trees) on the (home) phone and she got it reset and finally got my phone working again. Good thing we have a home phone!

(look at the size of the leaves! That is a dinner plate in the pot with it and some of the leaves are almost as big as the plate!)

Hope you have a great weekend. We are suppose to have temps around 104. Yuck. Sounds like a good weekend to do something inside but I promised the hubby no painting this weekend. Maybe some stitching? Or maybe blog reading - my reader has 784 posts waiting to be read!

Thursday, August 25, 2011

New Dress


Bertha has a new dress. It was almost a mini-dress since I trimmed a side I shouldn't have! Good thing she has that insert thingie there. I might eventually make another one that is longer to use if I leave her on top of the table, but this is how she sits most of the time.

Now off to make binding for the guest room quilt!

Wednesday, August 24, 2011

A little Bliss

Instead of doing all the things I 'should' be doing I've been working on a new 'dress' for Bertha.


I had part of a charm pack of Bliss left from another project - I had to add a few extras from my stash but I managed to find some that blended well. I'm hoping to finish it up this afternoon but I've got other things to do first - and I have a headache. Dang it.

I'm pretty far behind on blog reading again and when I do sit down to read it usually either early in the morning or late in the evening and I read from my netbook instead of the desktop and sometimes it is just down right stubborn about letting me comment.

Back to some of those 'must do' things.

Tuesday, August 23, 2011

Progress pictures

I'm not totally through with the bathroom but I thought I would go ahead and show pictures. Grab something to drink - this ended up being kinda long! (sorry)

First a few befores. This is a pretty small room - big enough for it's intended purpose but small when you are trying to take pictures! Walls are the same builder beige as the rest of the house was.

These are before we started 2 weeks ago, I had added the cabinet knobs awhile back. There wasn't a cabinet knob or curtain/rod in the house when we moved in. There was a shower curtain rod but you can see how low it was hanging - it was a tension rod and I couldn't get it to stay up any higher (it is resting on the shower surround!)
See the cabinet hanging on the wall? Look at the top - I can't believe it didn't fall off the wall! When we went to take it down the toggle bolts (or whatever you call those things) were just stuck in the sheetrock. They had not even been pushed through enough to spring open! Accident waiting to happen. This is the last of these cabinets - we have removed all of them and re-purposed them in the garage.


Moving on. Builder faucet. Spout too short and plastic handles - I hate those. (nothing against you if you have/like them, just not my cuppa)


'Hollywood light' - our first obstacle. I wanted to replace it. Should be simple, find a new one, cut the power, swap fixtures, turn power back on.


Nope. Do you see anything wrong with this picture?
Yep - the box for the light is way off center! After looking at who-knows-how-many fixtures I finally picked one only to find out it would not work. I am grateful the wiring was done correctly but I swear the guy that was cutting holes for some of this stuff must have been drinking - not the only odd fixture/switch placement. It was easier to pick another fixture than move the box and patch the wall!

You really can't tell the colors in these pictures but the new paint color is green (pebble - the same lighter green color we have used in other rooms of the house) No window so no natural light. It doesn't look like much of a change, but it is a huge change in person!


Changed out the shower rod for one that is curved to give a little more elbow room in the shower and this one actually screws into the wall so it won't slip back down! (also raised it up several inches so the curtain isn't dragging the floor)


Put up shelving where the cabinet was removed. I'm not through with the 'pretty parts' yet so the stuff on the bottom shelf will change. Need to get some more white towels too.


Painted the cabinet white - much better! Also replaced the faucet. (problem #2. weird plumbing - nothing 'wrong' with it, just wouldn't work with the new fixture so hubby called a plumber which pretty much doubled the cost of this makeover!) Anyway - it is done, and it is much better! (and would be easy to replace again - not that that is likely to happen!)


New light fixture (finally!) Added a towel ring since there wasn't one in here.


Framed the mirror. There was another issue here. Took some thinking but problem solved and mirror is framed.


here is one with the light off so you can see the fixture - I had to find one that was wide enough to center over the mirror and still cover the hole. Wasn't my first choice but still better than the old one! Don't look too close - you will be able to see where I just filled the corners on the frame - it is still pink and I see I need to clean the smudges off the mirror.

So there ya have it. Between dry time for paint and minor 'issues' this took nearly two weeks! I still haven't put anything on the walls yet (because I haven't decided what to put up!)

Working on getting the bedroom back together but not sure about what I am going to hang in there either. ( still haven't put the play posters back up in the game room either! I need to do some picture hangin!)

Have I bored ya to sleep yet? If not, thanks for hangin in there!

Monday, August 22, 2011

Enough already!


Enough with the extra hot, dry weather already! I feel like this poor hosta. (this is one that is supposed to take the sun and it did fine last summer - was doing fine this summer until the last couple of weeks) Geez. It is too hot to do much of anything. Frozen stuff is already thawing before you can get it home from the grocery store. (less than 2 miles, in the car with a/c going but that isn't even far enough for the car to start cooling off!)

Anyway - I was hoping to have an update ready for today. Not. We worked on both the bathroom and the guest room this weekend. (why did I start one before finishing the other?) Just couldn't get it all done. Had to do some cutting (shelving and mirror trim) outside yesterday and we did it early but it was still hot. Felt like it took forever when it really didn't take that long - you couldn't tell it by the sweat dripping off us.

I'm not even going to pretend any of it will be finished by tomorrow- heck, I'm not sure it will be finished by the end of the week. If you are still hanging around, I will eventually get back to stitching and sewing!

Time for a diet DP.

Friday, August 19, 2011

Farming


Our front yard looks like we are starting a mushroom farm! These things keep popping up overnight. Hubby picks them almost daily. He mowed yesterday (he pulls them before mowing, he doesn't mow over them) We will see how many pop up over the weekend.

The guest bathroom is moving along. All I have left to do is put up some shelves (I don't have the materials for this yet) and frame the mirror (have this, just need to get it done) then I can decide what pictures/decor I want to hang in there and it will be done. If I can find the shelving supplies maybe I can finish this weekend. I seem to be having a problem finding what I want.

The other weekend project is to paint one of the guest rooms. Bought paint today - Faded Burlap. If we can knock out that room this weekend we will just have one more room to paint upstairs, a couple of closets downstairs and the kitchen cabinets! I'm hoping to hire someone to do the kitchen cabinets but will see when that time comes. (it's kinda last on the list)

I'm off to take stuff off walls and get the room ready to paint. Shhh - it is a surprise, I haven't told the hubby that I made plans! :)

Have a great weekend!

Thursday, August 18, 2011

Paint can war

Have you ever done battle with a paint can? After I posted yesterday I took on a paint can. Apparently the last time this paint was used it got put away without cleaning the rim before sealing. (this was when we did the master bath - many months ago) Since I'm the one that painted the cabinets, I guess I am the idjut that didn't clean the lid off.

Anywho - when I tried to open the can, the lid wouldn't budge. The rim of the lid just kept bending - the harder I tried, the more it resisted. Well, I was determined to get that paint on before hubby got home from work - here is the result of my efforts


Take that paint can. You would be surprised what you can do with a big ole screwdriver and a rubber mallet!


Of course I fully expected the lid to fly across the room when it finally let loose so I kept my fat self perched over the top and avoided that mess. Since it was nearly a full can of paint I wasn't about to let the whole thing go to waste so I sent the hubby to get a new paint can.


And I made sure to clean the rim before I closed it this time! I'm waiting on coat of paint to dry at the moment - hopefully it is the last one, but I won't really know until it dries. (it started getting kinda draggy and I may have to sand a bit and do one more)

I'm working on the upstairs (guest) bathroom. I had hoped to have pictures to show by now but there were a few snags along the way so hopefully by next week I'll have something besides an old paint can to show for my efforts!

What are you working on this week? Something fun? I hope it is something indoors! Our temp is supposed to reach 103 today - painting indoors beats anything outside!

Wednesday, August 17, 2011

My Three Sons

Got busy yesterday and never got around to posting the rest of the pics from when the boys were here.


A typical scene - Timothy has a stick trying to see how deep the water is. The boy is always curious about something!


L-R. Jason (aka - baby boy), Brian (the oldest) and Timothy.


One with baby boy's bride, Ashley


Another one of all four.

Can't believe I'm putting my mug on here twice in one year, but Ashley took one of us with the boys.

Don't get scared away - I won't be putting myself back up for a long time!

Guess I should go see if my paint is dry so I can paint some more.

Monday, August 15, 2011

I'm back!

Did ya miss me?

We had a great week. Hubby had the whole week off - I can't remember the last time he has taken a whole week that didn't involve a u-haul truck! We had a few (not nearly enough) days with the kids, met friends for dinner one night and did some stuff around the house. I didn't get a lot of photos - we were busy visiting and time just passes so quickly when we only get them all together once a year.


The kids wanted to take the dogs to the dog park. Middle of a work day and no other dogs around. I can tell ya, I didn't think it was a good idea being as it was blistering hot! We didn't stay long and the dogs were just as happy it was time to go as I was!


Squeaky was visiting too - she has now moved to the big city with the baby boy and his bride.


Nicholas was tuckered out - he thought he had to see as much of the place as he could - it's not like he hasn't been there before!


Baby boy and his bride got the shrimp and fish ready


and hubby fired up the grill. It isn't a big grill since it is usually just the two of us so it took awhile, but they grilled steak, sausage, veggies, fish and shrimp! We had enough meat for two days and just added some more veggies the next day.

We did manage to get the kids all in one spot at the same time for a few pics - I'll show those next time.

Not a single needle picked up all week but I did get together with 'the girls' for awhile yesterday afternoon. Nothing ready to show yet - maybe soon. :)

Waiting on a plumber at the moment - more about that later. It's always something!




Wednesday, August 3, 2011

Not quite straight


I finished up the quilting on the quilt to hang in the guest room. I went with (not quite) straight line stitching. I was hoping to get the binding done but with the kids coming I've been working on getting things ready. I don't think they really want to sleep with all my quilting stuff I tend to scatter all over the upstairs when I get in the middle of a project! I'll get the binding made and attached after they leave.

Just thought I would show you the quilt (so far) before I take a little break. I'll be back after the kids have all gone home. I may or may not find time to read a post here and there, but I won't post again myself until sometime next week.

Have a great week/weekend and try to stay cool! All I can say is thank goodness for air conditioning!

Monday, August 1, 2011

A new friend

My birthday present came in this weekend. Bertha has a new friend - her name is Olivia.


Isn't she just too cute? We got her all put together Saturday afternoon and I spent time with 'the girls' (as hubby now calls them) yesterday. I need to find a chair mat that will fit better but that one will do until I can find another - beats trying to roll that chair on the carpet! (oh, but I do miss my wood floors!)


I changed out the green knobs that came with it for some pink ones I picked up at Lowe's and added some pink and green boxes to the cubbies on each side. It's hard to get a good pic since she sits right in front of the window.

Now I need to make a new cover for Bertha and a cover for my chair. I'll get to those but not until after the kids have all gone home. Too much to do before they get here this weekend!

Hope you have a great week!