Lots going on right now. Need to make a list. Beginning to feel a bit overwhelmed and need to compartmentalize.

Garden: We'll be going to a few nurseries in the area to find plants, hopefully some of them (or all of them?) organic. I got out the Texas gardening books today and need to dig up the websites so we can figure out what we're going to do. I know B is mainly focusing on the vegetable garden, but I really want to fix the front flower bed as well.
Guests: My parents might be here starting this Saturday for a week. They won't know until about mid-week when my mother's coworker is supposed to return to work after surgery.
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Minnow Minnow Pea: I need to work on cutting out material to have saved up for sewing sessions. I also need to work on a design for a website, finding a graphic for the logo, deciding on a font for the logo, and laying out the pages I want to have. I'm trying to decide if I want to forward the blog there and lock this one down to friends only. If I do that, I'm trying to decide if I should bother putting the recipes over there as well. I will definitely have the crafts blog over there and then just dump ChaCha. I really need to get the tags/labels ordered, too.
Crafts: On a related note, I need to complete the boat blanket for Maddy (one cable panel left, and then whip stitching it together and knitting the border). I also have plenty of bibs to finish. They're just needing snaps. Gifts need to be given!
House: Lots of cleaning I want to get done. Our bedroom still has piles of artwork from when we moved... two years ago. I also want to make a final decision on the color in the bedroom and the dining room. We'll probably paint the dining room next since it's so easy, and I'm pretty sure we're sticking with the brown chip we picked out last year. I thought we had finally decided on red for the bedroom, but now I'm torn. I love the blue in the guest room so much I think I might want that in the room back there. I'm so frustrated now.
Job Hunt: I am still rather beat down about this whole job hunt. I have my fingers crossed on one position, but it isn't even open yet. I also received an email from a recruiter in Georgia for a remote position and I keep forgetting to call him back. I get a few minutes when Sophie is sleeping and my brain just shuts down and I forget about all the other things I need to do until she gets up again. I hate that.
Craigslist: I was able to get a few things sold from the last big listing I did, but not much. I took more pictures of items today and will be posting those soon. This stuff needs to be gone!
Weight Loss: I have been overweight my entire life. I am tired of being overweight. Unfortunately, I like food. My portion control isn't bad, nor are the foods I eat, normally. However, my metabolism is in the toilet and I really need to work on giving it a good jump start. I need to focus on drinking more water, getting better sleep at night, and cutting out the things I eat/drink on a regular basis that are detrimental to my overall health. I also need to figure out an exercise plan that I can manage with Sophie around.
LJ: This is low priority, but still something I want to work on. I changed the layout and it's okay, but I think I'd like to find a different one. I really like the three column layout, so I don't want to give that up. That limits the layouts that work for me, of course. I also really want to work on my user icons and setting up various mood themes. Of course, I'm fairly behind on comments right now, so I'd like to get those cleared up as well.
Future posts: I have a few ideas running around in my head regarding future posts. Some of these are posts I have said I'd be writing for over a year now, some of these are newer. I am horrible about writing these down or actually getting around to writing them. Meh. Some of these ideas include posts on children's books, working from home, various movie and music reviews, various tips and tricks in the kitchen (such as how I store my bacon, exciting I know), as well as the picture and video posts I keep promising.


I think that's about it for now...

Because I like uawildcatgrl and her writing rocks, PLEASE go vote for her here in therealljidol. When voting for her, you'll actually need to vote for wildcatwrites. Also, vote for her teammate, lilmissmagic71. The links to their entries are listed next to their names in the poll. You don't have to be a member of the community to vote.

If you haven't seen it yet, the big Friending Frenzy post (dubbed as such by uawildcatgrl) is located here. Check it out, have some fun, and make a few friends! :) By the way, this entry is a friends-only entry because I didn't want others to worry about putting stuff out there about themselves if they normally keep a locked journal. For those of you who aren't part of LJ yet but are interested, sign up, jump in, and splash around a bit; the water's great! ;)

Sophie and I had a play date the other day and we met up with isyllt and her little girl, Lillie. I have a few pictures of the kids that I want to get up eventually.

B recently posted about the fence and the bike here. Nothing terribly exciting to anyone other than us, most likely. It doesn't appear as though the pictures are working properly, though. Something is amiss.

Sophie and I went to MOPS today. I was doing daycare with one of my neighbors (extra cash always helps) and Sophie had fun playing with the kids. I love watching her with other kids! She was running around at the end when the older kids were playing tag. She was just running back and forth like a crazed child.

I think I might let Sophie audition for Signing Time. If she gets in, it will cost us more than she'll make as far as money is concerned, but I think it could be a great experience for her. I could handle a non-work related trip to Salt Lake and I think she'd get a kick out the whole thing. I'm not sure if it would mean she gets to meet Rachel again or not, but it's worth a shot. I just have to take a video of her now.

I think that's about all... for now, at least.

The trip to the park today was rescheduled for Sunday. While all of the fence panels were down today, the neighbor's yappy dog decided to sneak into our yard (thereby essentially escaping into the great wide open). I'm not sure what type of dog they have, but it's small, black, and very high energy. She runs a lot faster than Chui. Since the dog escaped and the neighbors weren't home, we decided to try and catch it (one of the neighbors and I). Needless to say, that didn't work out so well.

Of course, when I went to put Chui out on his run, he zoomed right out of my hands while I was trying to hook him up. He wanted to play with the little black dog (go figure) but she wasn't interested. I think someone down the road finally picked Chui up, and the little black dog decided to follow. What a pain in the butt, seriously.

Because the guys were out working on the fence, one of the neighbors had the idea of grilling out and getting together for dinner. This was such a great idea since the weather was so perfect. I baked a pineapple upside down cake (yum) and we offered beers. Sophie had a blast once she got used to everyone. She was playing with the kids, running all over the yard, being all sorts of crazy. B pushed her on the little kid swing and she had a blast. He left her in the seat just to chill and she just couldn't wipe the grin from her face (talk about cute!). I went up to her and she was just going on and on about being on the swing. "Sowie swee?" I pushed her a little and she was all giddy.

However, when I went to get her out of the seat so we could go home, it was the end of her world. She screamed and cried for close to an hour, with few breaks. She would stop to listen to me talk about her going down the slide and swinging tomorrow at the park but then would start screaming all over again when she realized she had to sleep before we could go to the park. She was having such a good time and she just wanted it to last. Poor kid. It really broke my heart, her crying as much as she was.

They should be able to finish up the fence on Sunday and then we'll head over to B's parents to watch the game and have dinner. I am rooting for the Giants, but have a feeling it's a lost cause.

But, that's enough for now. I need to find my bed. Legs are rebelling.

Sophie decided she wasn't on board with the morning nap. This isn't really a big deal, other than it puts my shower on hold. I got her up, changed her diaper, and got her dressed. As we were heading back to the living room, I noticed something different about the neighbor's backyard. It took me a minute or two to realize that the difference was the fact that I could actually see the neighbor's backyard. We lost a fence panel to the wind. It's the panel smack in the middle of the back fence. I'm just glad Chui was inside when it fell down.

What's really frustrating about this is the fact that we've been talking about replacing the fence with one of our neighbors. Of course, the back fence wasn't the part we were talking about replacing, although we knew it needed to be done soon.

I wouldn't be surprised if other panels start to tumble now. They're doing a lot more flopping in the wind now that the first panel has gone down.

So I was right about the lights in that it was the GFCI that was tripped. Unfortunately, that ground fault circuit interrupter is located behind the refrigerator in the garage, which means the fridge is on that GFCI and hasn't been working since last Tuesday. The contents of the fridge itself (extra beverages) are fine, but the meat in the freezer has to go (and there was a LOT of meat in the freezer). I guess the good thing about this is I have lots of room for our next Dream Dinners session now.

Merry Christmas to our friends who are lucky enough to live close by.

I should really be in bed or cleaning, but I'm sitting here doing the picture dump I promised. This post is of the big switch-a-room. Most of the pictures show the absolute mess that invaded my home for about a week. The room being painted is the old office. I wish I had taken pictures of the floor before I steam vacced in there because it was nasty. Neither the office nor the guest room are finished, but the guest room is getting closer day by day. I think I will have to order curtains online since I haven't been able to find the size I want in the stores yet. The office will be painted eventually and we'll have new furniture in there as well, but that won't be anytime soon. The guest room just needs a few more accents and we're done in there. The only other thing we really want to change in there is the flooring, but it's fine for now. I will need to go back and repaint the trim at some point because like the idiot I can be, I patch-painted with eggshell instead of the high shine stuff. Duh. Oh well.

( makin' with the clicky to see the pickys...  )

I haven't been at the computer much lately. I've been pretty busy getting ready for the holidays and having my parents come to town. There is a list a mile long of things that still need to be done, but I just had to catch up a bit. I know I'm awful about commenting lately, but I am reading, I promise.

The Christmas tree is lit, the cranberries and popcorn are strung and on the tree, and all the ornaments are up as well. We just don't have a tree topper.

Stockings are hung and all the decorations I own pretty much are put out. I need something with a little height for the mantle, unless I decide to go ahead and get a wreath. I've been waffling between a wreath and a swag, though. I think I'm going to make a candy cane wreath for the front door. I just need to get a wreath form. I have all the mini candy canes.

I need to make ornaments for the three girls (Sophie and my two nieces) and I think this year will be cinnamon applesauce ornaments. They're easy enough. Next year I'll probably do a few felt ornaments. We'll see. Perhaps if I'm actually able to pick up my needles again, I'll knit little ornaments for them.

I also need to make the blankets for the girls. Once the ornaments and blankets are done, the gifts for my nieces are all done. I still have a little shopping left to do for Sophie. I'll probably do some of that while my parents are here.

The dining room needs to be cleared out (again) since it's covered in boxes from Christmas decorations. At least I have the Halloween/Thanksgiving decorations put away.

The guest room is complete except for the curtains. I bought some at Bed Bath & Beyond yesterday, but they're not what I want. They're not long enough, but they're also not as plain as I want. I just want a simple white flowing gauze type material. B wants sheers, but that is SO not what I want for that room. I got a gate for the door to the guest room so we can keep it open without having to worry about little critters running around.

The office needs to be organized. My desk has a mess of crap piled on it. I'm not sure how it all got there, but now I have to deal with it. That room and Sophie's room are on the hot list. I need to get those taken care of before the end of the week.

I also need to make a trip to Central Market. There are a few things I want to purchase for Sunday's dinner and I have a coupon for three free knives (nice knives, too!). Of course, this means I need to go through my menu, which I now have to locate and finalize. Yeah, not so organized this year and it's driving me nuts!

To top it all off, both B and Sophie are sick right now, and I'm having to fight off what they have. It's been lots of fun this week, that's for sure.

And because I have so much time to kill, I give you my little Christmas tree (ganked from a_groovy_gypsy):


Get Your Own! | More Flash Toys

Our innerwebs was down this weekend due to the big Switch-A-Room (TM). We have made much progress, but we are still far from being finished. The new office is close to being done, although we still have lots to unpack and set up. It looks so cool now that it's in the bigger room. The new guest room has been painted in Lost Atlantis (not one of the original choices I posted) and I absolutely love it. I have to find my camera to take a picture, but we're not done yet, so I might just wait. We will be applying a Candlelight top coat (Ralph Lauren) tonight and hopefully moving furniture in tomorrow night. We might paint trim tomorrow night, though. I seriously can't wait to have this room done. Not only do I think it will look incredibly awesome, but I'm sick and tired of having furniture and boxes scattered through my dining room and hallway.

Saturday night, before all of the painting, I spent over four hours steam-cleaning the carpet in the new guest room. The area under the desks in that room was positively disgusting and there were plenty of Chui spots on the floor. The floor looks so much better now, but I am so sore. That was seriously hard work!

I still have to buy curtains for the guest room, and we probably will have to add a few accents. I only have a poster for the wall and two beaded bowls.

It's been tons of fun watching Sophie will all this extra stuff all over the place. She's walking up and down the hallway right now with two different purses on her shoulders, stopping to peek into the "blue" room (this is what she calls the new guest room) every time she reaches the end of the hallway. Thankfully, she's at an age where two boxes held up with blue painter's tape will still keep her out.

Pictures of the new rooms will be posted upon completion.

I seriously tried playing catch up last night, but LJ was being lame and shooting blanks. Every page I loaded came up empty.

Oh well.

This weekend will consist of lots of moving and cleaning and rearranging and *fingers crossed* painting!



These are some of the colors I'm considering (all colors are Behr paints). I'm not sure about Mesmerize. That color might be a bit too purple for me. I want to take the poster I have for that room up to the store to do a match. I also want to check out Lowes. The walls will all be one color and we're talking about doing a candlelight glaze on top of the base color, but I haven't decided if that will look good or not. The accents in the room are all white (doors, trim, blinds, comforter) and the furniture is a light wood, beech I think. I think because of all of this and because the room gets so much sunlight, that we really won't have to worry about the room being too dark.

Unfortunately, we won't be able to afford flooring at this time. We'll need to steam clean that carpet in there, though. It is not pretty at all!

Interview today at 2:00 PM. Eep! I'll have to leave here around 1:00 PM to drop Sophie off and get out there on time. I am nervous beyond belief. I can't wait until that is out of the way. If it doesn't go too late, I might stop at the Primrose school just to see what it's like. I know there are others in the area that I want to look at as well.

I have decided that this really just isn't the best time to try to start a new job. The holidays at this time of the year, no matter how much I absolutely love them (and I do love them, they're my favorite!), always stress me out to some extent. Working, or in this case looking for work, adds to that and just gets me all sorts of wound up. I know things will be okay, but I still stress.

One thing I like about the idea of working again, especially if B and I can carpool, is the chance to knit without having to worry about chasing after the baby. I might actually get that blanket finished for Madeline before her first birthday. ;)

I feel like I've done nothing but run around today. We started our day by dropping Sophie off at B's mom's so we could head to Dream Dinners. Come to find out, the two Dinner Stations close to us closed, and one lady at the session today said she decided Super Suppers was no good for her and that DD worked better. B and I worked together on one meal but split up for the rest. While we were waiting on the last station we needed, B offered to help a mother who brought her little boy with her (she was wearing him) and wound up making one dish for her. We placed our order for next month and it includes prime rib! I'm pretty excited about that.

After that, we stopped by B's house to pick up the Kritter, ran back home to throw the food in the freezer, and then headed out to HEB for B's drum class and me to do a bit of shopping. Sophie and I met up with some friends and we shopped around Hancock Fabrics. I finally picked up cushion and material for the footstool (25 cents spent on this thing at a garage sale when I still lived in Minnesota... over 10 years ago!), as well as fleece for the girls' blankets for Christmas.

We went and picked B up after his class was over, ran through the drive through at Whataburger (mmmm, what a burger!). When we got home, we at our meal (so healthy) and then got started on the big switcheroo. Sophie actually played with her toys in the hallway for a while (so cute, filling her pumpkin basket up with her stacking cups and Noah's Ark Little People) while I cleared out the closet in the guest room.

I eventually had to stop to feed Sophie again and put her to bed, and then B and I ate dinner, but we've been going solid pretty much ever since then (until now, when we stopped for a snack). We're in the middle of cleaning out the closet in the office right now, and there is a lot of crap in there. We've found things in there I thought were lost forever though (old pictures, my camera case, etc).

I love when we're productive like this. We've really gotten a lot accomplished, although so much more needs to be done. I don't think we'll be painting this weekend, but hopefully sometime this week or perhaps next weekend. I think we might be moving the desks tomorrow, but I don't know what we're going to do with the bedroom furniture. As it is, B's parents will be here for dinner tomorrow and we'll have to eat in the kitchen (meaning, I'll have to add the leaf to the table and clear off all my magazines that get piled up).

And now... back to work.

My Mother's Day gift this year (belated and picked out by me) was a new faucet for the kitchen. I love everything about this faucet! It makes the kitchen look so much nicer! It's a Price Pfister and is brushed nickel, with a tall arm and a sprayer in the arm itself. It is very beautiful. Of course, after buying and installing (B did the install, not me) this faucet, I saw an ad for a Delta faucet that was similar but had a magnet around the sprayer to get it to stay put, but I'm still happy with my faucet.

If any of you new folk are interested, let me know and I can share a picture with you. ;)

I know I've been talking about getting new office furniture from IKEA. That purchase is on hold for now. I was just browsing "desk furniture home office" and found a desk I truly love, though. If you scroll all the way to the bottom, I am in love with the dark contemporary table style desk. I thought I wanted something lighter, but after seeing this I'm not so sure. That desk is beautiful!

Today was actually fairly productive. Our dinner plans were rearranged, but that was perfectly fine since we wound up working on the guest room instead. Many of the boxes are out of the room and most of the yarn is out. Furniture is staying for now since there's not really any place to put it just yet and we still have to get the office in order before the move.

We also rearranged a bit in our bedroom, and I love it. It makes the room look so much bigger. B moved my dresser to the wall between the windows. There is still plenty of room between the dresser and the bed, and it frees up the wall up by the door (eventually I'll take pictures, I promise). We moved the bentwood rocker in there from the guest room (temporary move, I think) and moved the cedar chest up against the wall instead of at the foot of the bed. The room is absolutely enormous now!

Tomorrow night we will be working in the office. I have no desire to do this whatsoever, but it needs to be done. I am so tired of having an office that is half unpacked. I think this move will really help.

I really need to start listing items on eBay to get them gone. I listed a few items tonight on Craigslist, so hopefully those will go fast. I don't know why I dread eBay so much, but I do. It's such a whip writing up the descriptions so everything looks all nice and pretty and people want to buy from me. That's one of the reasons I love Craigslist so much. It's not nearly as pretentious.

B and I are talking about painting the new guest room a slightly darker blue. I may have to take the poster with me to the store to see if we can do a color match. It would be really nice to put in new flooring as well, but I don't think that's going to happen just yet.

So, in a nutshell, what still needs to happen:

• Sort through office papers and boxes.
• Toss garbage/recycle.
• Box up stuff to sell/keep.
• Move furniture from guest bedroom to dining room.
• Run cable (expect crappy innerwebs) in new office.
• Move office contents (minus bookshelf and closet items for now) to new office and set up.
• Paint old office.
• Possibly put in new flooring.
• Move in furniture.

Yeah, I'm not exactly sure how long all of this is going to take us, but I have a feeling we'll still be working on this next weekend. I'm very excited about it, though. Hopefully once this project is completed, we can finish the nursery.

As of now, B and the neighbor are going to work on the fence the weekend after Thanksgiving. This is a good thing, but might need to be moved up. B had to replace a few boards today, and in the process wound up shaking the fence so much part of one of the other neighbor's fencing fell down. Oops. ;)

Someday, when we have our many acres out in the country somewhere (where we will have animals and gardens and solar panels and such), B and I want to build a house. I was looking at some historic home plans and was just drooling. Of course, I'm not sure how efficient these are, and that's always a factor, especially if we're wanting to live off grid, or as near to off grid as possible. Perhaps we can make a home like this work for us. Then we can have the old home feel I crave, and the newness B demands. Someday...

I wonder if he would go for something like that. ;)

I have to chuckle. B saw the iFLOOR entry and suggested we replace the flooring in the old office/new guest room (which should be next weekend or the weekend after, depending on when the fencing is replaced outside) before we move the furniture back in there. My jaw nearly dropped. I would love to replace the carpeting in there! I'm so excited. I'm not sure it will happen, since we're in a crunch now to get all these projects done before my parents get here, but it should would be nice.

He's thinking bamboo, and I'm totally on board with that. I was looking at the cork flooring, and I think the bamboo is just a little less expensive. Maybe sometime next week we can head out to the showroom. Of course, we don't have to buy from iFLOOR, but it doesn't hurt to look. :)

When B and I were looking for a house last year, I started doing a lot of research on various companies that sold certain housewares and the like. I have links saved for faucet and fixtures as well as furniture and flooring and I am constantly weeded by the email from lists I don't even remember signing up for. In all honesty, I've been on iFLOOR's mailing list for some time now.



iFLOOR, America's largest online flooring retailer, today announced a $1,000,000 limited warranty designed to protect its customers from predatory manufacturer policies that exclude warranty coverage from online purchases.

The policy, which goes into effect immediately, offers up to one million dollars of coverage in the event that a customer's warranty claim is denied specifically because they made their purchase online. It is complimentary for every iFLOOR customer, and protects the buyer under the same terms as the original product warranty.

iFLOOR, Inc. CEO, Steve Simonson, came up with the program to combat "scare tactics" used by manufacturers of hardwood floors and laminate flooring. "Their idea is to discourage you from buying at a discount!" wrote Simonson in his blog "It's About Flooring". "This is not right! You deserve to save money! So we're going to take care of this problem once and for all."

And it would appear that federal law is on his side. Section 108 of the 1975 Magnuson-Moss Act, states that, "In general, tie-in sales provisions are not allowed. Such a provision would require a purchaser of the warranted product to buy an item or service from a particular company to use with the warranted product in order to be eligible to receive a remedy under the warranty."

Under iFLOOR's new warranty, a key provision allows for iFLOOR to "seek justice" on behalf of the customer in the event of legal action. According to Simonson, "I'm putting iFLOOR's money where my mouth is."

About iFLOOR, Inc.
Since 1998, iFLOOR.com has been the leading online and retail flooring company, with 36 local retail stores nationwide offering more than 70,000 products, including hardwood floors, laminate flooring, bamboo flooring and cork floors. iFLOOR.com is the largest online flooring retailer according to Internet Retailer Magazine, and was named by Inc. Magazine as one of the fastest growing private companies in the United States for the past three years. Committed to quality customer service, superior selection and friendly expert advice, iFLOOR.com enables customers to buy flooring both online and in its retail stores at a substantial savings over traditional retailers. For more information about iFLOOR, please visit www.iFLOOR.com.

Apparently companies are hiring monkeys to deliver various items from door to door now. Actually, now that I think about it, it's likely they're not even hiring monkeys since monkeys are more intelligent than this. I'm not sure what they're hiring to do the job.

Today, we received a Verizon phone book. I'm not sure why since we don't have Verizon. This is the third phone book from as many companies within the past few months. We don't use phone books. I don't understand why now, when we don't use physical phone books, we're all of a sudden getting what seems like thousands of them, and years ago, before computers and internet access were standard in every home, we had to fight to get just one phone book sent to the house.

I'm not so upset by the receipt of the phone book (although it's an unnecessary waste of resources). I'm upset with the delivery of the phone book. Whoever (or whatever) delivered the phone book threw it at the front porch (most likely standard practice). However, in doing so, the phone book hit the front door and literally shook the house. I checked the door on the way in from getting the mail this afternoon and noticed there is now a large chip of paint missing. Nice. If they're sending out phone books to entice people to switch to their service, perhaps they might want to hire competent people to make that first impression.

Urgh. Sorry for the rant.

B and I have talked about certain upgrades or changes we would make to the house if we had the money. We have done a few things here and there, but there are some big ticket items we would still like to tackle some day. One of the things we mention from time to time is possibly redoing the kitchen. It will probably be one of the last things we ever touch since we like it for the most part. We've already replaced the faucet but we think we really want to replace the sink as well.

My mother has a sink that is split in something like an 80/20 split, with a huge sink on the left side and a tiny sink where the disposal is on the right. I think the placement of the faucet isn't quite right on her sink, but other than that, I love the sink. The Blanco sinks at Zoe Industries have better placement of the faucet. I really like some of the sizes they have. I also like that they're stainless steel. My mother has a plastic sink (which I don't like at all), and we have a white sink (which I hate just as much). I'll be saving this for later, that's for sure.

We have two inch white blinds throughout our house. I like them mostly because they're not metal and they can't get all bent up and creased. As far as blinds go, however, they're not terribly attractive (or unattractive, really). They're just... vanilla. I'm not sure I would want anything with color in the house, but something a little more exciting than the plain ol' vanilla white blinds we have might be nice.

I know I've said this before, but I would really love to have some honeycomb blinds. I think they would help keep the heat out in the summer and in during the winter. I know Just Blinds carries the cellular blinds. They even have blackout blinds (something I would love to have in the bedrooms). We won't be buying blinds anytime soon, but when we do shop for blinds, I'll be looking at Just Blinds as part of my shopping research.

B and I aren't planning on putting too much work into our bathroom when we paint, but we do want to change out the bathroom fixtures. There are some tacky brass fixtures in there we just don't like at all and want to see if we can replace them with brushed nickel or something. We want to replace the faucets on both sinks (I hate having two sinks, by the way) and in the tub and shower, as well as the towel racks, but I think we would have to replace the trim on the shower and I really don't want to tackle that. I mean, I do, but not right now. I want to tear out my entire bathroom and rebuild it with all sorts of glass tile throughout. I want just one sink and lots of storage space.

In any case, the master suite is being put on hold for a bit. We're going to take care of the office and guest room first. It involves painting only one room for now, so it will cost much less than our original plan. It's just as well, since I have a feeling once we get started in the bathroom we aren't going to want to stop upgrading things.

Well, we've decided to restructure our redecorating plans and skip the master bedroom and bathroom for now in order to save money. Hopefully, within the next few weeks, we'll be emptying the guest room into our dining room and then moving the office into the old guest room. We are going to hold off on painting that room just yet until we get new furniture. I don't really care to have a blue office, but I don't spend much time in there anyhow.

Once the old office is all cleared out, we will be painting that room. After seeing euphrasie's bedroom walls in pictures posted to another community, I really love the look of the Ralph Lauren Shale Blue and I think that would be perfect for the guest room. B's not terribly fond of it, though. Hopefully, we can get that figured out soon. I want to get this done before November rolls around.

I also want to finish the nursery. Sophie is almost a year and a half old and the nursery still isn't done. It's annoying, but I understand why it's not done. We just don't have the time and when we do we don't have the energy. B only has one more panel of fence to finish and then we can put it up on the walls and figure out what to do with the rest of the butterflies and other bugs. I am so tired of us starting projects and not finishing them (he's not the only one at fault here, either).

I wish we didn't have to wait on office furniture. It is going to be a nightmare when we finally decide to buy the furniture and then paint in there. I think I dread that project more than any other right now.

Fingers crossed we have something done before October is gone!

My parents have this issue with their basement from time to time. It likes to flood. They have a submersible pump to help prevent the flooding, but that only works when the electricity works. Unfortunately, they also have a small issue with their electricity from time to time. Whenever it goes out, it seems as though it's out for more than one day, which means all the food in the freezer chest in the garage and all the food in the refrigerator in the house will go bad unless it's winter and they can put food in snow.

I know they were talking about looking at backup generators, but I'm not sure if they ever made the purchase or not. With as many problems as they've had with their electricity going out, if they haven't gotten one yet, they probably ought to. Between losing all the food in the fridge and freezers, and the possibility of the basement flooding yet again, I think it would be a worthwhile investment for them.

... Or they could continue to rent a generator for the rest of their lives (and they will need one again, I'm sure) and wind up losing money on the whole deal.

B and I have been talking about appliances we would get to replace ours when they finally give up the ghost. I don't think we have to worry about this any time soon, but I do love to dream about what the kitchen will look like years down the road. Of course, I know electronics and appliances change, and by the time we go to replace our appliances, the choices we've made might not be available any longer, but at least we'll have an idea of what we want.

We have talked a lot about refrigerators lately, and right now, LG Refrigerators are at the top of our list. I would love to have a fridge with the freezer in a drawer on the bottom and double doors on the top, but I'll have to do a little research to determine which icebox is most efficient before we make our final decision. I absolutely hate the fridge we have now. It's a side-by-side that is just SO inconvenient!

I found a site closer to home for exterior work, but still not quite as close as I need. However, they have pictures of some of the beautiful work they've done. All-Tex Exteriors has completed some wonderful Houston decks. They offer a free consultation and estimate, too.

I'm very disappointed they're not in the Dallas area. B and I were both impressed with the photos of their work. It got us to talking about what we want to see in our backyard. By the time we're done adding everything we want in the backyard, there won't be any yard left. I am really looking forward to the garden, the patio cover, and the shed being put in, even if all of that does cost us a little bit of yard. It makes me long for the size of yard I had when I was growing up. Hopefully, we'll have that again someday, and more.

While I know foundation problems run rampant down here, I am so glad we don't have a basement. I think a basement could be so much worse. Not only would we have to deal with foundation issues, but we would also have to worry about basement leaks and flooding and whether or not the pump is working. It's a nightmare.

My parents had the misfortune of having cracks in their basement wall early this year. They had several people come out and give estimates and were amazed at what people had to tell them and how much it all was going to cost. I remember someone trying to sell them the B-Dry system, but I'm not sure if that's what they chose or not. All I know is they weren't happy about having to get it done in the first place. I can't say I blame them. I hope whatever they chose holds up for the rest of the time they're there.

I am always searching for different ways to improve our home. B and I have talked about certain changes we would like to make, not necessarily all right now, but some day. I am a little disappointed Anglian Home improvements site is UK based, but they have some excellent ideas. I really like the driveways they have, and while we won't be changing our driveway here (think it's against HOA rules), we are toying with the idea of putting in a nice patio in the back.

Their conservatories are beautiful. When we lived in Watauga, we kept trying to figure out how to enclose the back patio and still have it open. The only thing we could think of was adding roll up shades or something to the sides so we could cut back the wind in the winter. That never happened, which is probably a good thing. If I weren't so worried about heat inside a conservatory, I would have one added on here. I think that would work better up north. It is possible, however, that this might actually be a good idea for our garden and we might be able to garden all year long that way...

I hate our carpets. They are an awful nasty Berber that didn't last very long at all. The house is six years old and the carpeting looks like it's about 20 years old. Granted, I know some of that is because of Chui, but it looked rough before we moved in. I would love to get rid of this stuff and get hardwood flooring, perhaps even bamboo, and I know B agrees with me, but again, it's all about the money. The carpeting will probably be last on the list of things for us to replace.

At one point, our vacuum cleaner stopped working and B determined we were going to have to replace it. I was so excited because I had been looking around for a cheap Dyson vacuum. I know a Dyson won't make our carpeting better, but it would make me happier knowing I had a vacuum that was reliable, at least.

I can't wait until we can do all the things we want to do to our house.

B and I are in the middle of redecorating (perpetually, it seems) and even though we aren't planning to do anything major anytime soon, it's still fun to talk about the things we would eventually like to do. One of our big dreams is to redo the master bath. Both of us agree it would be pretty cool (yet very expensive) to rip it all out, buy all new, and rearrange a bit in there. The layout of the bathroom is plain silly and there's very little storage space.

One of the things I would love to put in the bathroom is some interesting glass tile. We have boring white tile on the walls and a very vanilla beige tile on the floor. I'm sure the plans we have for painting the walls in there will make a difference, but I can just imagine having glass tile on the walls around the room. I am getting excited just thinking about it, even if it is just a dream. I would put in a couple basin sinks and ditch the extremely large mirror on the wall. I should plan it out and sell the idea to B so we can start saving up for it, especially if we're going to be stuck here as long as he seems to think we are.

Now, if I didn't like my kitchen so much, I would be buying some seriously red tiles and putting in white cabinets a la IKEA style. I would probably have to ditch the red in the rest of the house, though.

How much fun I could have.... ;)