Shopping

We decided to check out Lowe's on Sunday as we hadn't found some of the items we still needed anywhere else. We ended up buying 2 of these sinks, which were just like the ones in one of our inspiration photo.

We also finally found a chandelier for the dining area that we agreed on! The shades are a little more yellow tinted than shown in the picture, so we also picked out a nice warm buttery shade of paint for the kitchen walls.

That's it for now folks, I still am in the middle of holiday details. We are doing our Christmas celebration with my family on Friday. And I'm busy being sick. My husband should be off of this job by the end of the week and we can get back to some house remodeling! I can't wait to paint the kitchen and put those cabinet's in!!!

Central Air!!!!

Oh yes... we have forced air. Sniff... I'm so proud and excited! I've never not huddled in front of a window unit all summer long sweating. Who honestly takes pictures of their temp control units? Me... that's who. I went to look at my cabinets and was suprised to see vents when I walked in the door. The heating was finished today! And the unit is all white and glows green in the dark... I'm in love :)



Sorry about the mist, it's extremely foggy in Vancouver. This thing is massive! It takes up half of my sidewalk by my garden!


Eeeee!


Look at my beautiful return vent!


Then I saw my garage... all of my cabinetry has arrived! Our garage is completely filled with supplies at this point and you can hardly move!

It was really dusty in there, but here is the front of a cabinet!

Drywall

Just some pics to tie you over until we start working again. My hubby has been working which is a huge blessing. Unfortunately it'll be over tomorrow. But we'll go back to work on the house! The cabinet's arrived today. I'm going over there to check them out later tonight when I have a car available! Here's my two wonderful handymen hard at work. I am so grateful to have them in my life and home!

My Brother in law Matt

My wonderful Husband Dan

Love you boys!

Happy Holidays everybody!

Ceiling and Doors

Do you want to see what my hubby did today? Do ya? He's a good hubby.
Remember when we ripped out the old soffett boxes and the ceiling in the kitchen looked like this? Ugly isn't it?


Look at it now!!!! Wohoo! We are ready to sand and paint and hang cabinets! I definately can't wait to slap some primer on that ugly old green paint so I can stop staring at it. Or maybe I'll leave a little behind the cabinet's for the next person who remodels to stare at.


While my hubby and brother in law were working on that Tim, our contractor and his guys were installing our brand new doors. Remember this bad boy?


Check it out now!!!

And the old garage door?

The two front doors now match!
Outside.

And inside! The window is so fresh and pretty, not like the old bubble tinted window that used to be there. I'm still debating about whether to paint the outside of the front doors black to match the lighting fixture. What do you think? Leave me a comment!

And apparently the neighbors decided we needed a housewarming gift. Because when the guys got there this morning we had a huge pile of trash and furniture on our front lawn! Including this.

Which aside from the slightly green poo colored pleather, is in gorgeous condition! So Lysol, here we come. We have a new rocking chair!

IKEA!!!

While the boys are hanging drywall in my kitchen, us girls decided to take a trip to IKEA! So we loaded up the baby girls and headed out to do some imaginary shopping. Because we're both broke. But I got some great ideas of things I'd love to put in my new house and beg for for Christmas!

This vase was beautiful and had no pricetag, but I am sooooooooo in love. LOVE!
IKEA PS JONSBERG
Vase
$39.99


Thinking about these mirrors for the bathroom, but have to take a cabinet door in to see if it matches.
Hemnew Mirror
$49.99


These lights are flat glass with a light behind. I'm not sure why, but I'm intrigued and wish I could find some way of working one into my house. I just can't see how though.
GYLLEN
Wall lamp
$59.99


Thinking of this chandelier for the dining room, but need hubby's take on it first.
MOLNIG
Chandelier
$39.99


This was a super cheap rug we saw, and I'm not entirely sure about the quality, but it's a maybe. KARBY
Rug, flatwoven
$17.99


I am in LOVE with this little table and chairs. I am dreaming of my daugther with a big hat on having a tea party with her teddy bear at this pretty green table. Mom if you are reading.... THIS is what she wants for christmas :P
MINNEN
Children's table
$29.99


We are planning on making a headboard bench seat for the entry way. But if we didn't do that. I LOVE this shoe holder and coat hooks. Basically everything in this set I would love to see in my entryway!
HEMNES
Shoe cabinet with 4 comparment
$99.99


This sofa is way out of my price range. But I could so see myself curled up on it with a book in front of that huge window in the living room.
EKTORP
Left-hand chaise
$379.00



This headboard is regularly $79 and was marked down to $39. I wouldn't use it for a headboard, but it would make a gorgeous fireplace screen, or you could make it into a tealight holder on the wall. Hmmm... my hubby the sheet metal worker could make fine work of this!
MANGER
Wall-mounted headboard
$79.99 on sale for $39.00


I have a picture from a magazine of a craft space where they hung hooks from a bar and had cups like these filled with pens and scissors. And I LOVE them!
ASKER
Container
$5.99


I think these would be great for our under cabinet storage.
GRUNDTAL
Countertop lighting, halogen
$34.99


I love these curtains, I just wish the dots were red instead of orange.
I couldn't find a price on these. They had no tag.


I don't really like these colors, but thought a shelf like this would be great in the nursery with stuffed animals perched precariously off the edges!
LACK
Wall shelf
$29.99

Fun Times

We've been super busy the last week, and at times it feels like nothing is getting accomplished at all. However, we've got a lot of small things done. The kitchen is completely rewired, all of the bedrooms have new lighting fixtures, I redid all of the edges of the paint in the hallway and nursery. And I finally painted our bedroom!

I think we've also agreed somewhat on a color for the office. Dan is ready to hang new drywall in the kitchen and then it'll be ready for a coat of paint and to hang the new cabinets that will be here on the 18th. SO excited about those! We also have our new refrigerator chilling in the garage with the rest of the appliances.

We invited some friends over to see the place and they will be giving some of our fruit trees a new home. They were planted way to close together and I just can't keep them. And she pointed out this giant nest in our backyard tree!

We saw a bird the size of a jay popping in and out of it. I was shocked it's super cold here now!

Oh, and we got our first snow storm driving home from Dan's grandma's tonight. It was beautiful. Sadly, by the time we got home it was all gone. Tomorrow the plumbers assured us they are coming back to clean up their mess!

Sorry

Sorry Readers. I promise I'll try to update tonight. Really busy!

Holiday Cheer

While the plumbers are busy knocking holes in my walls, and we are arguing with Sears about the definition of "existing" ductwork, I thought I'd post some holiday cheer!

We got our tree yesterday and set it up in our tiny apartment because it's very obvious we won't be moving this year. :) Charlie the cat decided to help out.


I also stole an idea from a friends blog here: http://ourlifewithatoddler.blogspot.com/2009/11/ornament-wreath-revealed.html

And she stole it from either
http://www.eddieross.com/eddie_ross/2008/12/no-wire-hangers-well-maybe-just-one.html or
http://thriftydecorchick.blogspot.com/2009/11/hardest-easiest-diy-wreath-ever.html

I changed it a big though. I don't own any metal hangers, so I used one that I've had for years that was covered in yarn and instead of stringing the bulbs, I removed all of the tops and hot glued them all together. Then I added some cute silver and gold jingle bells and plastic candies. All of the ornaments I got at the dollar store. The gold and silver big balls were a 7 pack for a dollar!

New windows and wires

This is going to be another long post full of pictures.

Yesterday we were met by my dad to again work on the wiring in the kitchen. We had a lot of wiring dangling down where the old soffett boxes used to be.

Dan crawled into the attic and pulled and pushed wiring where my dad told him to.

Dad stayed below and snaked and directed and redid the outlets. We took out the old manilla colored ones that hardly worked anymore and replaced them with white.

Tada! no more dangling wires.


While dad finished up the wiring, Dan crawled under the bathroom to cut out a small portion of the subfloor that had rotted under the wall and into the hallway under a few inches of the hardwood floor. It's done and ready to be replaced after the plumbers repipe on Monday-Wednsday.

During all of this, Tim's crew from A New Image Exteriors were finishing up the window installation. This is the giant living room window before.

And after. It took 4 guys to lift this one into the hole!

Here is the sliding glass door before.

During. Tim informed me that this was his best side ;)


And after! Hi Gizmo!

Even the shed is getting a much needed facelift. Yah I know, it still needs a new roof. But we're getting there!

This is what they'll look like with the trim on. This is the only window currently to have it. They'll be back monday to trim out the rest of the windows!

Dan and Dad are going back today to work on the rest of the wiring and Dan will start dousing the bathroom with dryrot sealer. Therefore baby and I will be staying at home until the fumes clear.

Electricity

My hubby Dan met my Dad over at the house this morning and together they crawled all over our attic and rewired the kitchen! Yay! Now we can start fixing the ceiling and walls where the soffett boxes used to hang. We can also finish this suprise project we started yesterday!

That's right, there used to be a solid wood door leading to the family room. That is because it used to be the garage, when they turned it into a family room they built a bathroom off the backside and our new garage on the frontside. Well, I thought, wouldn't it be nice to open up a nice archway so we can converse while I'm cooking? Yes it would. So we're just opening it one more stud, 18 inches that is. I think it'll make a great change! And since we are having forced air installed very soon, we eliminate that old thermostat, and tomorrow Dan and Dad will move the light switch over. They will also be installing a new lightswitch on the other side of the kitchen so I don't have to stumble in the dark around the island to find the switch.

On a side note, as I was driving to the spa to meet my momma, I noticed somebody had just set out two solid wood end tables from the 70's. My mind instantly saw them sanded, painted white, and with a new pretty antique knob on each. I almost caused a scene as I slammed on my breaks. Then the sensible lady in me told me if they are there when you get home you can have them. Well guess what, they were. So I went home, told my hubby, can you do me a favor and look at those and if you like them put them in the car to take to the new house so I can work on them? Well he came back with a great big grin on his face and said they are gorgeous thick solid wood pieces with an opening on the bottom and a drawer face on a hinge on the top. Perfect for hiding books! Yippee!!!

Please forgive the mess in my trunk.

I was planning a trip to IKEA to buy matching end tables and instead I got them for free!!!! I will probably replace the hinges, or possibly turn it into an actual drawer. Not sure yet. Any ideas?

Window Heaven!!!

The windows are starting to go in and look fabulous!
It was freezing when we showed up today so we started a toasty fire.

Our contractor Tim told us we can use his business name A New Image Exteriors, everybody in Portland/Tigard area. This is the place to go for any kind of remodeling you need done! He did my parents kitchen remodel, and his crew is wonderful. Oh, and he's going to be a grandpa by tomorrow morning! Congrats Tim, we're really happy for you :)

These are the old bathroom windows, I hated them.

We are replacing them with these, I think they let a lot more light in, while still allowing for privacy.


Under construction

New windows!

They said they'd go around and do all the trimming after all the windows are in place.

We're so incredibly exicted. I can't wait to see the new sliding glass door, it's sitting in the garage looking beautiful!