One and a half rooms down...

Only eleven and a half to go (?I think?), along with a hallway or two. So painting has begun!! How exciting!! I love the way the dining room turned out, though I'm not sure what I want to do with the stepped ceiling...some people put a wallpaper border around the stepped part, some people stencil, some do it a different color...I was contemplating putting a quote around one step and then stencilling or wallpapering the other step. Not sure. The quote would be complicated (though I would order one from http://www.wallwords.com/ ). Cal's room (2 walls done) is an awesome blue, too. Kaycey was extremely mad that her room wasn't started...well I haven't even picked out the colors for the girl's room yet. And I was thinking about putting a chair rail up and doing one color above it and one color below it. I know it seems like I am putting way too much thought into this, but it will be way too hard to paint after the floors and white woodwork are in. It's so easy now because you don't have to be all that careful (even the windows are covered, so no need to worry about those). I think I decided on a yellow for the mudroom...maybe a green for the laundry room?? I don't know about those two rooms yet.

DINING ROOM--Herbal Green CAL'S ROOM---Indigo Batik

In the pictures of the house that I take from the road, I feel like the windows are way too small for the house. But when I see the house, and take up close pictures they really aren't. It seems more proportional when I'm not taking a far away photo.

So I bartend tonight, I hope it's busy. It hasn't been busy in a while. In June it will inevitably pick up, when everyone is riding their motorcycles regularly, and people are just out because it's nice out, and festivals and such are going on, too. Yes, it will get incredibly busy, so busy we might need 2 bartenders on, even on a Wednesday. But that's okay. And, Mike is starting to take off Thurs/Fri now to work on the house all day and night, so he'll probably take the kids to school tomorrow so I don't have to get up so early. That'll be nice!! And the mom who lives nearby the new house offered to watch Maddie for the day in case I want to sleep, or paint. I think I might take her up on the offer and paint!

I could really use a weekend scrapbooking getaway. I haven't bought scrapbooking stuff for so long...I am just dying to go nuts on stuff, though I've been so good at restraining myself, since I know I haven't been scrapbooking very much. Though at this point I would love any vacation!! Mike and I are talking about going somewhere this summer once we are settled into the new house. Just got to decide where....preferably somewhere relaxing, quiet, and doesn't require a whole lot of anything but sitting in a chair by some water, perhaps. We'll see...for now I have to keep making the big tips so I can keep buying stuff for the house, and save for a small vacation!!!!!!!!!!!!

Colorful day

So, maybe I'm a little wacky. I went to Sherwin Williams, and pretty much took one of each paint swatch. There are many more, but the ones in the picture are potential paint colors!! Mike took my paint swatches for the dining room (a sage/country green), Cal's room (dark blue and a gray), entryway (deep red), upstairs hallway (tan), kitchen (a creamy tan for most of the kitchen and dark red for behind the cooktop), master bath (creamy beige) & bedroom (taupe), and great room (a hard color to describe--straw?? A gold sort of color). He is going to pick up the colors I chose for those areas, and start painting tonight!! I will hopefully get to paint sometime this week, too. So here we are at the point where I can actually help out, but tomorrow I work all day and night. And this weekend my Grandparents leave and my Dad and Stepmom leave for vacations (people that would usually babysit or that could help paint). So the plan is for Mike and I to take turns painting I guess. I cannot decide on what colors for the laundry room or the mudroom. I'm torn!! Still have to officially pick out the 1/2 bath, kid's bath, girls' bedroom, and spare bedroom, too. I think I've decided to keep the quilts I bought for the girls. Though, part of me thinks I should try to find the same one for Maddie that Kaycey currently has. It's 3 years old, though, so I don't know that I could find it if I tried. We had gotten it free from a local Kid's Bed & Bedding store when Kaycey was sick. I certainly won't get rid of it. But it's pretty worn, being 3 years old and washed probably at least a hundred times. I also bought this mini chandelier that I decided to hang in the corner of their room where there are some built in shelves. I thought it'd be cute to make it a little reading corner with some cute chairs & a table. I have to get Cal a new bedspread yet, too.

THINGS I'VE BOUGHT RECENTLY:

GIRLS QUILTS (I'm thinking of painting their room a pink and blue, to match the quilt)








GIRLS CHANDELIER




CUTE THING FOR KIDS BATH

Happy Mother's Day!

Yep, I am going to the concert in Chicago in October. New Kids on the Block! They're back!! I also plan on going to see Everclear in July, Counting Crows in August, and Cracker in July. I love music!!!!!!! I miss the summers I used to go to Summerfest almost everyday and see band after good band (back in high school--the good old mid to late 90's: Foo Fighters, Elastica, 7 mary 3, 311, Everclear, Spacehog, Pearl Jam)

Anyhow, in other news, I haven't been feeling great all week, the girls have been sick since Monday really. I had taken them to the doctor Wednesday, who did nothing, and we ended up in Urgent Care today because they've only gotten worse. Bronchitis it is. I'm sure we got whatever Cal had a couple weeks ago. I am hoping now we are finally on the up end because we are tired of being sick!!

We get to start painting Tuesday...Mike & his brother sprayed primer in the whole house Saturday, and Mike and his Dad are doing a second coat today. It will have taken 100 gallons of paint to spray the house--walls, ceilings, closets, garage with the white paint!!! That doesn't count the colors of paint we have to go buy yet!!! Yikes. Hopefully we can start painting in the next couple of days!! Off to Sherwin Williams to pick out my swatches : ) Gotta buy appliances this week, too.

MY OVENS & FRIDGE/FREEZER:

No painting this weekend afterall : (

The drywallers were supposed to finish up some stuff end of last week/over the weekend (final touch ups). They never came, so they didn't come until sometime yesterday. So we won't be painting, because after the touch ups they still need to texture it, spray it, and prime it. Then comes time to paint. We are hoping sometime during the week next week we can start painting. All flooring has been ordered as well. I really do not feel confident at all in my choice for the 2nd floor. I wish I would've looked a little more...I think it's too dark and we should've gotten something shorter. I don't think it will look very good next to the runner at the top of the stairs. I'm also questioning my pick for the master bath. There were two of the same vinyl, just different colors. I chose the whiter of the two, now I think I should've chosen the creamier color. Too late now, at least I'm pretty sure it is since we signed the paperwork for it all to be ordered. The only thing I am sure about is the hardwood floor, we are doing that in the mudroom and laundry room, not sure how I feel about that yet. So now we have to go buy the appliances, and I am pretty sure I know what I want, it's a matter of staying under budget. As you can see in the picture, Mike has finished most of the siding on the front of the house. We also have two white roundtop vents that will go above the 2nd story bedroom windows. Now the only siding left is on the back of the house, which Mike isn't quite sure how he will get to it (the very top of the back of the house).

Happy Birthday, Kaycey!

Today Kaycey is 6 years old!! It was so cute when I dropped her off at school this morning. Her friend, Madison, came running into the hallway to tell her to close her eyes when she came into class. Some of her friends were making her pictures & cards. Amanda rushed out and gave her a big hug and said, "Happy Birthday, Kaycey!!"

So the entire house is drywalled, and they've done at least one coat of mudding and taping. They will do 3 coats. Mike spent time trying to get the furnace to work out there (which as of this morning it does). He also put one of the pieces above the windows. Even he thought it looked really nice! I am glad I decided to do that : ) (those crown moulding things above the windows).


I met with the cabinet guy Saturday morning, and it took 2 hours to go over all the cabinets in the house!! Boy, we are going to have cabinetry in practically every room. If I had my way, I would have built ins in every room!!! We aren't doing the built-ins in the kid's rooms yet, but I'd like to someday. So I feel pretty confident about my wood floor color and cabinet color. I am opting against the white island--and not because I want to!! Mike is anti-white island, and the cabinet guy strongly suggested against a white one, but maybe an offwhite with a very light brown tone. I do love that look as well, but since the built in bench in the nook is going to be white, that would've meant changing that to the same color as the island, and I didn't want to do that either. I think that we'll go with all stainless steel appliances, where I thought we'd do a black fridge. I don't want the room to be too dark with the dark floor, but there are so many stinkin' lights in the kitchen, it's almost ridiculous. We have 2 above the island, one above the nook area, and I think 8 or 9 canned lights throughout the kitchen!! I guess I don't have to worry aboout it being dark. And quite honestly, on Saturday the whole house was pretty bright (and it was a cloudy day!). Here are some pics from late last week before they began mudding and taping the walls. The first one of the house is of the moulding thing above the window in the bonus room that Mike put up yesterday.

A layout of Maddie I made yesterday.


moulding above window.


Cal climbing a tree.



Bonus room looking toward the backyard.

Dining room--you can see the stepped ceiling really well in the picture.

Standing in the kitchen looking into the great room. You can see the fireplace, the balcony above, the entryway is the open area, the doorway on the left is our bedroom, the doorway on the right is down to the basement. The halfwall is where the kitchen sink will go.

Looking directly at the fireplace from the kitchen.

Standing in the great room looking into the nook. Doorway leads to the mudroom.

Looking out great room window.

Looking down into great room from balcony




The girls love doing the dishes!! Thank goodness, because I don't!