Hammer Time

As you might be able to tell from other posts we are doing some minor changes in the house.  Painting, installing new doors, updating here and there etc.  Well...our house looks and feels like a mess right now b/c we, like big ole goobers, started 3 or 4 projects all at once.  This past Friday the hubs got a little hammer happy.  The story goes a little something like this.  Warning there is a TMI in this story.

I drove to Augusta (about 2 1/2-3 hours away) to pick up my niece, Chelsea, for my sis-in-law, Lynn.  The plan was that I would grab Drew  once we got back to ATL and we all would meet Lynn and my bro for dinner.  I called him about 20 min away and told him we were near and he sounded a little funny. He called 5  min later to tell me that we had a slight problem and that he'd accidentally hit a pipe and had to fix it.  See, we are restoring our guest bathroom (new vanity, tile, and putting in new sheetrock).  Well, he decided that Friday night, right before dinner, was the time to take out the old sheetrock. He was being careful...but hammer time got a little too exciting...and he hit a pipe...and it broke.  wanh wanh!

Long story short...he worked on it until 12:30-1am and couldn't fix it b/c he needed a part from Home Depot. So we went to bed w/ no water in the house. And the tmi here is that the dinner I had was great going down...but not so much later that evening. SO plumbing problems were abound in our house! And I teach on Saturday mornings....and we had no water....hmmm.  When he finally gave up on the plumping that night/early morning he told me he'd wake up at 7 and turn on the water so I could brush my teeth/wash my face before classs. 

Fast forward to 5am...my adorable cats decided to find a bag of catnip and play with it...under our bed...for 2 hours...I was so mad.  Sat morning mommy was a major cranky pants!  No shower and no sleep...at least my hubs did make coffee when he turned the water on.  The other good news is that I got a text about 10am that he was able to fix it after he got the part at Home depot.  YAY! The hubs made a boo-boo but at least he figured out how to fix it. I got a shower after class and our cats were in a fog all day and covered in catnip. Drew offered them some cheetos ;)

Oh what a night!  Thanks for letting me share.

Yay for Friends!

The past two weekends have been just awesome.  Interaction w/ fellow Atlantans has been great : ).  On Friday my gal Brandy came to visit w/ her daughter Lynsey. 

Brandy and I have been friends since 1992 and have been inseparable since then. We got to visit and all went to lunch together.  Lynsey is almost 11 months old an incredibly adorable.

She is the happiest baby and I was so thankful for this special visit with them.

Friday night we had our dinner w/ church peeps and it was super yum.  The chili was seriously ah-mazing and the fellowship was great.  Saturday I taught and had a great trip to Trader Joes.  I finally got a cinnamon broom and let me tell you our place smells GREAT! Then I hosted a mini craft afternoon w/ a couple of friends.  Nothing like girl talk and crafts...lol.  Saturday evening we joined our friends Tim and Denise for dinner.  After dinner we hit this brewery with great views of the city.  I of course forgot to take pics of the views but I will say that it was a great reminder of another reason why I love living here.  I did manage to get pictures of everyone w/ their funky brews.

                                          Tim got a brew called Thor.  It made him strong : )

                                      Denise got a Manhattan w/ an aged, oak barrelled bourbon.

                                                    The hubs got an oktoberfest brew.

 This pic quality stinks but you can see that I got the shaft w/ my drink. Just kidding, I sampled a pumpkin beer that was awful and then got a saison beer that was great.

This was called 5 seasons brewery and I highly recommend.  Their menu looked great and it was all organic and local stuff (we had eaten at another good place called Six feet Under beforehand).

Sunday we had a great church service, I made us blueberry chicken sausage and french toast and then we did house stuff.  We finally chose some colors and we painted our guest bedroom a pretty, lavenderish gray.  I will take a picture soon.  I am really happy with the color, as is the hubs.

Today I got to meet up w/ another BFF, Andrea, for coffee and window shopping.  We had a great time visiting each other and catching up. We did deal w/ one of those pesky mall mart vendors...he was very rude but we didn't let it ruin our fun!!  Andrea and I are buds from college and she and her hubs and their adorable son live in the ATL area.  If you know something about ATL is that the 'burbs are huge.  We are about 40 min apart which is not terrible, but we definitely aren't able to get together as much as we like.  It was a great treat : ) An interesting fact about Andrea is she is a runner and doing a BIG one Thanksgiving...whoo hoo Andie!

                                     We probably should have taken this turned around...oh well!

Tonight I am heading to an Arbonne party.  Have you ever used their products?  I haven't but am interested to learn more.  Will let you know if I find any interesting products.  Hope you guys have a great week!

The AH-Mazing world of Craigslist

My husband has an obsession with craigslist and I am COMPLETELY ok with this!

He finds great deals like this mantel ($45). 

I love it and it adds SO much to this wall-o-brick : ).

He also found 2 great ceiling fans for $20 each.  Those puppies can be $80 and up.  What a DEAL!

The hubs will browse the "For Free" section from time to time and such browsing got us this:

Can you believe it? There is absolutely nothing wrong with it.  Ignore our messy garage! This is great for those days we can't make it to the gym. 

For the most part we have had only positive experiences.  He did make one trip to see some windows for sale....and it was a BIG bust.  But other than that it's all been good business.  We have even given some things away on the Free section too.

My least favorite thing he has found....adult diapers...can  you believe someone was giving those away??? Gross! Also, someone was trying to give away a pet goat. Oh the randomness of the interwebs!

Up to my ears

This is my life right now:

Paint samples, paint samples and yes...you guessed it more paint samples. I am kind of sick of looking at paint samples.  Yes, yes it's fun at first but then the colors all start to run together and you go back to the store and get more samples...but you get home and they are the same colors you picked last week.  Ahhh...it's a vicious cycle that I can't get out of.  I do think we are VERY close to making some choices which is exciting.  I will show pics once we choose and paint.  One weird thing is we need to decide on is whether or not to repaint a couple of rooms or just do some touch-ups.  The Sherwin Williams guy said it might match but it's unlikely it will match if we do just the touch ups...so that's another decision we need to make. 

Decorating is fun, time consuming and and also exhausting.  We have always moved so much that we've never really had time to hang anything.  Knowing that we are going to be here for a while has prompted me to find more wall decor, pictures, paintings etc.  I've also been looking for some fall decor too. It's been fun searching stores for ideas.  I've gotten some great deals lately which is good b/c I am doing some interior design on a very small budget. Love me some Tar-jay! 

I got this cute little pumpkin from Target for $2.50.

I found this great pillow on clearance at Target for $6...Harpo the cat didn't come with it : ). But isn't he just adorable! It kind of looks like he's smiling.

The pillow Harpo is on (which by the way, is his new favorite napping spot) is an old/new addition from Pottery Barn and Ikea.  Let me explain why it's old and new. We used to have the pillows that came w. the couch and chair but the cats decided to show them some "love" in NYC (they hated it there).  So we threw those pillows out.  Oddly enough when we registered for our wedding we choose three green pillowcases from pottery barn.  We didn't buy our couch until 2005 and had long forgotten the pillowcases.  Well we got our couch and were unpacking some wedding things that had been in storage and found the PB pillowcases and they matched perfectly. But we haven't really had a need until recently so they've been living in a closest.  When we were recently in Ikea window shopping I noticed in the textiles area the pillow inserts.  I bought one and it fits our pillows perfectly.  Yay! Only took us 9 years to get those PB pillowcases out but aren't they cute : ).

Had to take a pic of the other cat, Artie, so she didn't get jealous!

Alright, my last little find is from Cost Plus World Market.  I spent some of today finding pics to go in it.  I love my find and I got $10 off with a handy, dandy coupon!



It's been fun seeking out stores to decorate.  I do wish I had some friends in town to go shopping w/ b/c my poor mother got so many text pictures of me trying to get opinions this past weekend.  The husband was filming a short film all weekend so I couldn't bother him.  Oh shopping buddies...where are you?

On another note, I'm sorry I didn't post a Friday Five last week. I had the time but I couldn't not think of ANYTHING to write about...just empty...or my brain was too focused and drained from paint samples and decorating.

Our House is a very, very, fine house!

Ok, first off I have to say that I am having a FIGHT with blogger.  I have written 3 blogs, saved them and then come back to work on them later and they are NOWHERE to be found. SO annoying and time consuming.  UGH! Sorry, had to get that out.

The hubs and I moved back to our house a couple of months ago. We bought the house in 2006 and I love it.  It's not the prettiest, newest, fanciest...but it's just right for us.  We choose to buy an older home and live closer in to the city (10-15min) as opposed to living further out in the 'burbs in a newer home w/ a 45min commute.  Our house is a 70s Spanish Mission Ranch. 

                                            Our house back in 2006 right after we bought it.

Since moving back we have definitely started a "dream list".  This is all of the things we want to do to the house.  When we lived here before we did some minor renovations but now that we aren't going anywhere ANYTIME soon (please, dear God...no more moves...k...thx, Lindsey), we are moving ahead full throttle.  Which is exciting...and depressing at times...b/c you need moola : ).  But we will take it one project at a time. 

One HUGE thing that the hubs did several years ago was completely change the look of our den. The den was one of those wood panelled rooms from the 70s. Now some people paint their wood panel and it looks awesome and brings a unique look to the house.  But our wood panelling was the cheap kind that wouldn't have looked great either way.  So Drew tore it down, sanded the walls, primed and painted them and added crown molding.  It looks SOOO much better.  I'm so thankful for my handy man.  

                                    Here is some of the old wood panelling. Isn't it gorgeous : )

                                                                    
My camera just died so I will have to show the updated pics next post. Another big change he and his dad made was in the master bathroom.  Our bathroom had this strange shower/tub thing that was supposed to be a therapeutic type tub...but it was scary.  Booger green w/ metal panelling on the outside that had a fake wood wallpaper.  It was awful and I wouldn't go near it.  The first 6 months we showered in the guest bathroom.  Drew and his Dad installed a beautiful stand alone shower.  They did such a great job and it looks amazing.  I wish we'd taken pics of the old shower...it was hideous. 

It's amazing what a few changes do to make a place look brand new.  Have you done any renovations at your place? What were the best changes? Were any a big nightmare?

Our list is big but we will tackle it eventually...right now I'm trying to pick out paint for the rooms that aren't painted.  Our next BIG challenge this winter is to attack the jungle that is our backyard...scary! Isn't that little brick fence great too : )