Week in the Life 2011 - Wrap Up

Sunday was the last day of my Week in the Life project and I'm happy to see I did get quite a few more photos each day than the few I started out the week with. That was due in part to telling the kids I was trying to take lots of photos and letting them take the camera whenever they wanted to. I even let Kaitlyn take the small one with her to a sleepover at her friends's house. It also got easier as the week went on, in part because the end of the week was much more eventful than the beginning of the week. I'm still not sure how much I will take away from this year's exercise of trying to see the beauty in the every day but when I do take the time to sit down and pull it all together with my journaling and copies of my lists I hope I will be pleasantly surprised.

Here are a few of the shots from the rest of the week. Woke up early one day and decided to do my toes. Kaitlyn woke up when I was partially done and got hers glittered too.

Spent quite a bit of time working on crafts for my new "shop" on Etsy (woohoo!) I hope it takes off as it's already been a lot of work.

Made cornbread one night. The kids love it. But does anyone else find that this is the messiest bread in the world?! Every time my kids get near it I have crumbs EVERYWHERE.

Tyler helped me with the bathroom scrubbing this week. His favorite was shining the mirrors - it made me happy too as it kept him off the floor and out of my way so I didn't bleach his pjs.

This one is out of order - it was from Sunday morning. He had taken the motorcycle to Charlottle with a buddy while the kids and I were at Audrey's. He ended up being caught in a rain storm on the way home so of course the bugs and the mud had to be polished away as soon as possible. I totally had to follow him out to the garage to take a photo when I he came in to grab an old toothbrush, telling him I MUST document his craziness :)

Just a couple of my gladiolas chose to wait to bloom until I got back from Utah (we missed most of them :( ). Love the color.

Everyone in the pool at Audrey's - what a blast. We spent at least 5 hours per day in the water both days we were there.

Ice cream Sunday night after a long day at a birthday party and grocery shopping. We love that screen porch.

And here are a couple Kaitlyn took at her sleepover.

Week in the Life 2011

I'm doing Week in the Life along with Ali Edwards this week. Click this link if you want more info. Basically it's just taking the time to document what a regular week in your life looks like. I did it along with her last year and really enjoyed it (but shhh! don't tell anyone that I still haven't scrapped all the photos from it yet! They are sitting in a project envelope, along with the papers and journaling and everything I want to use, just waiting for me to actually get back to scrapbooking. What can I say? It's been a busy year).

So despite the fact that we're just coming off a long vacation and part of the week seems like it's not quite normal, while the other part of it feels like it's a little too normal (read boring), I'm jumping into the project. Because if I don't do it while everyone else is and all the inspiration and encouragement is there, well, I probably won't do it. Here are the photos from the first two days. Pitifully few photos. But that's ok too right? Start slow and work up to it. Hopefully more photos of the rest of the week, especially now that kids have noticed I keep pulling the camera out and taking pictures at strange times and I explained it to Kaitlyn and told her to feel free to use the small camera anytime she wanted to.

Monday:

(laundry and beach trip clean up - that's what you do on Monday's too right?)

Tuesday:

(he hates the peel and when I didn't get over there soon enough to take care of it for him, he started hacking away at it with a butter knife)

I'm finished!

It's been busy, busy, busy here the past few days. Before leaving for Audrey's house on Friday I had the electrician in. Finally.
You know those TV cords have been driving me nuts and much as I hate paying the money for something we could almost do ourselves, I wanted it done right.

See? Ugly.
So the guys came in and in less than 2 hours had solved my TV cord problem along with adding a few more outlets (including new ones in the garage so I can plug in the freezer yay!). But we were left with a big hole in the wall.

Sam taped and patched it while I was gone, then I sanded and sanded and sanded it. And added a little texture back so it would (mostly) match the surrounding wall. Yesterday I spent the day painting. And now I'm doing my happy dance because that was the LAST room in the house that needed paint! WOOHOO!
Of course it's far from being done and probably won't be for a very long time. But as Kaitlyn said today "it feels all nice and new again."

Here's the Before:

and After paint:

Monster Truck Bed

I've decided to join the ranks of all those crafty people that comb through thrift stores, buy something for dirt cheap and turn it into something fabulous. If they can do it, we can do it right? And with all the blank spots still left in this house, that's probably the only way they will get filled.

My first big find was this headboard for Tyler. Only $25 for it and the matching footboard!
Tyler and I painted them white (not as smoothly as I had hoped since my little helper really did stick right by me the whole time, much as I tried to sneak out to the garage myself to do the final coats alone) and covered it with a few coats of poly. I had also promised him a "monster truck bed" so I found a truck font online and used it to cut a monster truck out of black vinyl with the Silhouette.

Ta-da! We realized that the mattress frame doesn't have a place to connect the footboard. So we'll have to buy some wood and make side rails at some point. But we're happy with it as is. Tyler was so excited to sleep in it that first night.



Kaitlyn thought it was pretty cool too and of course wanted something added to her own bed. She even took the time to draw up her idea before asking me if I would make it. (though I found that Ty had ripped it apart when I went to take a pic - anyone else notice a super-destructive phase in their 4 year old boys??)
So Tyler and I snuck in there and decorated her bed for her this morning. I love to surprise that girl! We'll see how long it takes her to notice it when she gets home from school.

Linking to:

Before and After - Back Yard

Hours and hours, days and weeks, many trips to the home improvement store, more cash than we wanted to spend, sweat, aching backs, a couple of blisters, an ant issue, a blown tire, stain and gravel and mulch...

I now declare my yard to be DONE! Or at least as done as it's going to get this year because franky I'm tired. And sick of spending money in large chunks. And ready to have fun this summer!
We're keeping our fingers crossed that the seed we threw down in the back yard starts filling in because right now it looks like this. And half of the green you see under those cute 4-year-old feet is weeds. Even with the improvements our back yard is a little scary. And it could use some color and decorative touches, but I'm telling myself I know when enough is enough and I can work on flowers and planters and throw pillows next spring.

So without further ado, the Before:

the front of the house

a view of our back yard, looking out from the deck

the deck and the sun room

the other side of the deck and the screen porch

the same area, but what it looked like in the weeks after Sam dug the hole for the sandbox but then the pile of dirt sat there waiting for us to cart it away, stain the box, and find some sand (man was I missing having Dad and his dump truck around for that one. It's rough finding sand and gravel around here! Oh, and my back and all that hauling and shoveling - urgh)

So what work have we done on the place? Well in the front yard we re-did the mulch and moved some of the bushes. We also put down some gravel under the faucet (for better drainage and because the kids can't mess it up or get messy when they turn on the water).

The gravel also went under the deck (on top of weed paper obviously) so we don't have to deal with weeds under there ever again.

And under the back faucet. And behind the air conditioner. And we finished the rain gutter too - Sam was procrastinating on that last section above the swing because it was so high off the ground.

We installed a fence, all by our little selves! We did the back part in wood and I had to stain it all by hand. That took FOREVER (the better part of 2 weeks, doing it a couple hours every day). The front part had to be vinyl and can I just say - ick! Oh vinyl is pretty and it's low maintenance. But it isnt easy to work with. And the gate...ugh! I hate that gate. And wouldn't you know it, one of NC's crazy thunder storms and those hinges snapped right off. So I take it back. We aren't totally done since Sam has to build a wood gate (which we will then paint white and pretend it's vinyl :) ).

And there's the fabulous sandbox. Those kids LOVE that thing and I really appreciate having it. Because if there's dirt, Ty will dig, and I was so sick of trying to get him (and the neighbor kids when they are over) to quit digging holes in my poor struggling lawn. I also bought that little box to hold most of the sand toys.

The last touch was the patio. We needed something to go under the swing and fire pit. We put this and the gravel in over the weekend. In 90 degree weather with patchy rain. Do you understand now why I'm done? I'm from Utah, people - it snowed there just yesterday. I'm not made to do yard work in the heat. :)

Now look at that pretty fence. Oh and those bushes - they are some I transplanted from the front yard along with a few azaleas I added. The tree is from a neighbor that pulled it out of their front yard so they could put in palm trees (I laughed. The guy just HAD to have palm trees even though you pretty much only see them near the beach here).

More transplanted bushes.

And a view from above because I think it gives you a better idea of exactly how much back yard I have to mow. (Yes I said I. Sam may be in charge of the mowing but so far the 2 times the back yard weeds have bugged me enough to mow them down, I've been the one to do it)

I have to say, it was totally worth it. We've already used the patio and the fire pit to roast this year's first hot dogs and smores (note to us though - this isn't UT and we should do the fire in March or April when it's cooler!). And that screen porch is fabulous. We've had dinner out there almost every night this weekend, and breakfast out there on Sunday. Love it! Now, bring on summer, baby, we're ready for it!

Monogram Wall

This one is just for you Julie! :)
She and I saw this idea while we were blog hopping and chatting online months ago. (original idea can be found here) So we've both been collecting wooden letters and frames ever since. And being the more daring and driven one (prodded along by Jules who wanted to see how it turned out before she tackled hers), I got mine on the wall first.

Kaitlyn is going to be so surprised when she gets home and finds all the photos on the wall. I'm not even sure I've mentioned to her that I was going to put anything there.

Ok, the details:
-the square photo is one that I had done on unstretched canvas (when I got the deal on the shoe one - you had to order in pairs) and put it on some MDF just as I did with the shoe canvases
-the white "K" is vinyl from my machine. I couldn't make it as large as I had envisioned it so that may be something I change out later (after a visit to Audrey's!)
-the argyle "K" is just some scrapbook paper that I mod podged onto a wooden letter
-the smallest frames all came from the dollar store and I spray painted them white. The other frames were already in my collection and were already white.
-I traced each frame onto newspaper (being sure to mark where the hook would need to be placed) and taped the newspaper shapes to the wall to help me figure out the layout before I brought out the hammer and nails.

This covers the wall at the foot of Kaitlyn's bed - the only wall in the room that needed any additional decor. Scratch another entire room off my To Do list Baby! WOOHOO :)

Linking to:

Finishing Touches - Laundry/Mud Room

Time to show off my laundry/mud room! Do you know how happy I am to have 3, count them - THREE rooms entirely done?!

I'm sure you remember the great bench, shoe cubbies and coat hooks my husband installed. But that space above them needed a little dressing up. So I took some photos of our feet (fitting for the mud room, right?) and when I ran across a deal on Artscow I had them printed in sepia on canvas. The deal was for 12x12 unstretched canvas and I decided to pop them off the wall instead of putting them in frames. So I cut a piece of leftover MDF from our closet projects to size (yes I cut it all by myself! I'm getting to be seriously handy with the power tools), painted the edges black, then used spray adhesive to attach the canvas. Lovin' it! (all but that center photo - I couldn't get quite the look I had in mind using the self timer, but it'll do)
Here's the original Before:

And this is how it looks now. Like right now, as in I didn't even straighten up the shoes or put away any of the extra jackets before taking the photo :)
After:

The other side of the room got a few accent pieces too. Above the cupboard I added another one of the room definition quotes (found the printable here) and a bucket I picked up at Hobby Lobby.

And I created a little Laundry Room sign out of scrap wood (painted white then distressed the edges) and vinyl that sits on top of my drying rack. I saw something similar on the HowDoesShe blog and this is my version.

That wall Before:

And After:

The end. :)