In the swing of things

I cannot help but feel as if my life is out of balance right now.  I am constantly praying for patience!  Jason is such a scatter brain when it comes to home improvement.  For being an engineer his planning skills are lacking.  He just wants to rip into everything.  This would alright if he was good at finishing what he started.  I am ragging on him and I really shouldn't be!!

So I have officially finished my guest room just in time to host my parents next weekend!  Here are some photos.  The only thing left to do is hang the Art work on the walls and find some cute bedding and make some curtains to hang.  This will happen overtime.  Since I was ragging on Jason I should say the fabric I bought for the curtains in my Living room and Dining room are still in the bags I bought them with.  I too have a way of moving to the next project before the current one is finished.

Another View.  We haven't worked on the doors yet.  

 

Guest Bedroom.  That Paris poster needs to be hung

Another veiw.  Another Paris poster along with our wedding guest book frame thing to be hung.

Surprise!!  No I am not pregnant. (seems every time I say I got a surprise that question is asked)  There are original hardwood floors in our kitchen.  Jason's father Larry came of Saturday to "motivate" him into working on some things and they discovered the floors.  Thus half my floor in the kitchen is torn up and now I'm searching for a weekend that the floors can be re-done with minimal impact on our lives.

Hardwood under the Kitchen. Needs to be refinished.

Jason has hung 3 new cabinets in the kitchen.  He is working on that room while I am going to continue working on the hallway, back bedroom and finally our master that is up stairs.  I will remind myself again..I LOVE MY HOUSE!  Not every young couple could take on such a challange and I am happy that we are doing it together and that we are sharing some funny stories and memories making our home OURS! :)

Until next time..pray for my patience...EM

Front Bedroom & What's Next

I have officially found my motivation.  It took me a while but it is back.  Jason and I are the King and Queen of half finished projects.  We get really excited, plan what we are going to do, buy half of the things we need, get halfway through the tear down and prep part and then QUIT.  I have been working on finishing projects and I think the nagging Jason to help me finish is wearing us both down.  However tonight he did mention that I have been a huge help and that he appreciates me working so hard to get things done around our house.

 Ceiling Fan in the Front bedroom.  It's neat looking.  The next home owner is going to hate how many different light bulbs there are in this house.

Front bedroom...this room is multi-functional.  It will eventually become our office but for right now must remain the guest room.  For those of you who don't know me my parents live about 9 hours away and come to visit about every other month if I'm lucky.  We also live about 500 yards from one of the local hospitals.  By choosing this house I have accepted that if at anytime a friend or family member was in the hospital our home would house a few people.

 Front room walls before primer and the rest of the wall paper removed.   I took off layers and layer of wall paper and paneling and glue.

The theme for this room is very girlie.  I LOVE PURPLE and BLACK AND WHITE!  I have an amazing poster from France that is to go in this room and a few little decorations that are very Parisian.  I am surprised that Jason has allowed me to make a room this girlie but you will have to stay tuned for the back bedroom's theme which was probably how I convinced him. I am putting the final coat of Purple Princess paint on the walls tomorrow and I will post away a photo for everyone!

Hardwood floors pre-stain and varnish post standing.

Next steps from here.  Remember the part of multiple projects going on at once? Well....while I've been working on this room we have found lots of amazing deals at Lowes.  First one day while our hardwood floors were drying (we refinished them over this past weekend) we were wasting time a Lowes and found Cabinets that I wanted!  Jason was going to build me cabinets because I could never find what I wanted that wasn't a million dollars.  I actually found the semi-custom cabinets that were affordable. We are going to remodel the kitchen slowly cabinet by cabinet that way it's not torn apart for a long time.  We have also found the tile and counter top I like...I guess that is our next steps...that and the bathroom vanity we've found...and the back bedroom that I have big dreams of..that and the half build fence..Man this is endless.

 Counter tops, paint color (middle one) and back splash.      Cabinet! :) iLOVE!

Thanks for reading.  I need to update more often so I can remember the day to day!..Until next time!!

Behind

Well I feel as if I have neglected my blog for about two months.  I wish I could say I was so busy working on my house that I didn't have time to update this thing.  That would be a BIG FAT LIE!  Life has gotten in the way.

Our fence is still half put up and the grass seed in our back yard has grown along with some weeds that we did not plan.  The plan this week to motiviate Jason to get motivated with me.  So I have started removing the LAYERS of wallpaper in our front bedroom. Hopefully this will jump start him into helping me out again.

In the past two months we've gone on 3 trips (Dallas, Pennsylvania and Concordia) and Jason had his appendix removed!  Add in there a few weddings, one funeral and many nights of softball.  So far our summer has whizzed by. Well I'm off to peel and scrap more wallpaper while my husband naps on the couch.

Hope everyone is having a safe and happy summer.  Hopefully soon I'll have beautiful photos of my renovated home. 

Backyard Grass Planted!

I am trying my best to make this post not boring but everything I write seems to just be rambling.

Sunday must be the day during the weekend we can get the most done on the house.  This weekend was no different after an event for Catholic Charities Friday night, English Tea Saturday morning/afternoon and Mother Daughter banquet with my grandmother in Medicine Lodge Saturday night the only time left for working on the house was Sunday. I must say that we did pretty good considering the lack of time to get this project done.

 Katie (My older sister), Mary (Grandmother) and I

 Jason and I at the Catholic Charities Event 

We started the day by attempting to finish removing the tree.  We did not get it all the way done but since Jason has to crawl up the tree and use a hand saw and a chain saw to cut the tree and then he has to climb down for us to pull the rope and get a 6 ft chuck to fall in the right direction.  He used a lot of energy to get the pieces he did cut off. I also used a lot of energy worrying about him falling off of the tree!

Jason using the chainsaw to cut down the top of the tree.        Ava was supervising!

After lunch and a quick trip to Johnson's Garden Center for grass seed (and seeds for my herb garden that hasn't been started yet) we started to use the rototiller to mix up the soil.  The grass was killed a few weeks ago.  We then began to move dirt around for proper drainage.  At this point EVERYONE in our neighborhood decided they would do work in there yards too!  Maybe we are setting a good example?!  The grass seed is now spread along with fertilizer and we watered the crap out of it.

 Using the rototiller to get the soil moved!

My goals for next week: Get the TREE down and the roots dug up! :) Start on the fence. 
For now I think 7 pm is a great bed time for tonight!

Side Project-Front Garden and tree down!

While my busy hubby is putting up a few fence post and cutting down the 3rd 60 year old cedar tree that was planted too close to our house. I have been working on a more fun little project. Sunday afternoon I heard about the fill a flat for $12 at Johnson's Garden Center. I begged and pouted for Jason to take me there and he finally gave in. $150 later I was ready to plant my garden.

Before: Just lilly's of the valley in the garden

All my flowers!
Done! Not very pretty YET!

Since this garden on the north west side of our house was right by our front window I got flowers that *hopefully* attract lots of butterflies for me to sit in my chair and watch. I planted lillies, hollyhocks, forget me not's, Avens geum, SNAPDRAGONS and a hosta. There were a few more kinds but I didn't get photos of the tags so I don't remember what they were.

Jason spent Thursday and Friday night cutting down all of the branches on a tree in our backyard. This tree is HUGE and between the cable line, two power lines and two houses it is quite a challenge to cut down. It is also very expensive to hire someone to cut down. Jason being a manly (CHEAP) man decided to buy a tree safety harness. He must be a monkey because he spent HOURS holding himself in the tree while cutting down limb by limb all the way up in that dang tree. We now have what we like to call a Dr. Seuss tree with no limbs. Soon he will cut down the stump bit by bit. I'm pretty nervous about all this so his dad comes over to "supervise" and I stay in the house!

Jason in the tree not even close to being done.

No more branches

My monkey..I mean husband.

Today Jason installed 4 fence post. We have an existing chain link fence in our back yard that is sunk to the ground using t post. He is using concrete to put fence post over the t-post and then attaching a 6 foot wood privacy fence to the metal fence post. I am excited for this because our neighbors yard isn't the best and our houses are so close it will be nice to not be able to see in her windows if you catch my drift :).

I went on a walk through College Hill tonight. I hope my next house is a little further south and east of this one and it smack in the middle of that neighborhood. A girl can dream right?

Next Project is BACKYARD

Side Yard
Back yard. Fence will be taller.
Tree removed
Privace fence to hide the neighbors yard. Yuck!
Where the Porch will go :)


Since spring is here in Kansas we have decided (along with votes from friends on Facebook) that we are going to fix up our backyard next. So far we have killed the weeds (not grass) that were residing in the yard. We have yet to use the rototiller (sp?) to mix up the dirt but we have guest with a dog visiting this weekend so we don't want to have a mud pit for both dogs.

Next step is pricing fencing. Jason is now working 4 am to noon everyday. Which leaves lots of daylight hours for him to work and get things done around the house and I have a great excuse for not helping called MY JOB :). We should be installing a privacy fence along the west side of the house so that we can't see into our neighbors house and vise versa and then a taller back fence to block out some of the noise from Central.

We want to put a small patio by the house next after the fence. Then hopefully move inside and get our kitchen done :)

Here are some photos of our backyard before and I included one of our new/use dining room table! Gretchen's parents donated it to The Koehn we don't have enough money for furniture fund :)

Enjoy!

Dining room DONE

Ok so I am officially finished with the dining room. Wow was that a lot of work. I started by Kilzing the ceiling on Monday March 29th. The texture and kilz on the walls was done previously. Tuesday Jason has old man beer league softball so that night was wasted. So Wednesday I decided to texture the ceiling. After finishing that I ate dinner and got up to paint the walls gray/notre dame. After getting most of the way through I RAN OUT OF PAINT. Jason was by the way at work all night Wednesday night on one of his overnight shifts.

So Thursday Jason was going to be off during the day and able to "help" me by buying more paint and a few other things a lowes. So Thursday night I came home and tried to finish painting. I also had to squeeze in church on Thursday night for an hour. So I finally finished the walls. The texture on the walls made it extremely difficult to get paint in all the nooks and crannies adding time and stress to finishing this room.

On to Friday, I usually don't work Fridays and so I decided I would try to sleep in. Jason came home from work around 10:30 am and announced that Tim (our brother in law) was coming over to help us finish that room. At first I thought how I just wanted to lay there all afternoon but then I was happy that I was FINALLY getting help!

I hopped out of bed and tried to get everything set up. However our ceiling paint which was purchased last spring had mistakenly been put away in our garage and had been ruined. Off to Lowes for the 2nd day in a row :) (Typical). We already had our light bought so Tim and Jason installed it while I put the light switch covers back on.

So Saturday I got ready for Easter dinner and had to buy a paint brush that would help me do the line at the top where the wall meets the ceiling!

Sunday Easter went off with no problems and we enjoyed the first meal in our new dining room! :)

Here's some photos of the fun!

Dining room Next

I am now in the process of planning for the dining room. The floors are refinished in that room. We have removed all of the wall paper and killz the walls. The popcorn ceiling has been scraped off and the repairs to the ceiling have been patched. Jason has also rewired all of the switches and the outlets. I also have the covers for all of them. For some reason I have a addiction to cool looking covers. This are silver with neat lines. I need to take a photo of them.

We picked out a gray paint color called notre dame. Jason wouldn't let me paint it green :( but He loved the green I picked so that has been moved to a bed room.


We went to lowes yesterday and found a light fixture.

I need to prime/ kills the ceiling. Texture the ceiling and walls. Paint the walls.
Then have Jason install the light! And that room is DONE!!

Give me Two weeks and it will be done! Photos will be added of my finished product!


paint color

primed walls

before (look at the wall paper with stains gross)

switch plates.. :)
Lighting

So Far

I should have started doing this a year ago when we started renovation our home. A little background. Jason (My husband) and I bought a house in January 2008. We wanted to take on a renovation project and love older homes. We don't much care for the "cookie cutter" homes.
We immediately got started tearing down walls, wall paper, pealing paint, and sanding! I should also mention that we got married in May 2008. So in the middle of tearing apart our house we were planning a wedding.
So far a year after buying our house we have: 1. Taken off wallpaper in every room (still more layers in the kitchen and three bedrooms.
2. Kills'ed the living room (living room ceiling), entry way, dining room and hall way.
3. Texture painted the living room, ceiling, and entry way.
4. Painted living room and entry way.
5. Installed crown molding in the living room. Except one corner piece JASON!
6. Sanded all of our hard wood floors, refinished the living room and dining room. (the two bedrooms and the hall are exposed and we are trying to find time to do them and NOT walk on them)
7. Killed grass, rototiller and planted grass seed in our front yard. (will probably have to re-seed this spring)
There is a summary of a year's (off and on) work!

Living room finished (except the window trim)

Living room (1st day after removing carpet)

Living room (window down)

House photo from listing