Basement in Progress: Good News & Bad News

So we'll start with the good news The downstairs kitchen is looking KILLER AWESOME! It only took us 4 hours to get the grout laid on Saturday (tons of work and tons of scraped up fingers), but the results were well worth it! Check out our perfect tile lines! Even the trim lines up perfectly!

 

This center design Dave created on a whim while I was hosting the bridal shower for Angela. Wow, talk about the most amazing thrown together center design I've ever seen. It doesn't exactly match the modern style we were going for in the kitchen (this is far more classic), but I love it and we can tweak other things around to make this work.

 

The cabinets & sink will be on the right hand side, so this design will kind of frame the under the sink area. Hopefully it will have a nice effect!

 

First of all, isn't this Russian Blue delicious??? I didn't realize how much we love blues and greens until we started painting the house. I know every time we paint I say this, but this is by far my favorite of the blues! I took a picture of this wall in particular because this is the wall that used to have the wood panel on it. It's the one I had to rip the dry wall out of and replace, mud and tape. All in one week. Almost all by myself. Needless to say, I'm pretty proud of this wall.

Now for the bad news... So last night I was trying to recover from our insane Saturday of work (7am to 11pm we worked with a break during Women's Conference). Dave decided to head downstairs to check out our handy work and see if we needed to do another coat of paint in the downstairs bedroom. He comes upstairs with bad news. the last coat of paint is drippy and there are white spots... we have to sand down the drippy and do it again!!! I was so exhausted that I didn't even want to go look at it and think about how much more work this was going to be.

Long story short, after much searching this morning, I found the drippy part. It's behind the door in the far left hand corner of the room. It's not at all bad! We can sand it down, or I can rub alcohol on it to smooth this down, or we can just leave it (I'm voting for the latter).

 

I threw this shot in not only because of the drip, but notice the color of the trim? It's a peach color!!! We thought it was off white until we painted the primer on the yellow walls. and the peach trim and ceiling popped out. so then we had to paint the ceiling and next we'll be doing the trim... Sigh, the work is never done!

Here's the white spot. It's completely my fault. I did the last run with the roller and scraped up this edge... The problem with this part is the line is about a foot long! So off to Home Depot today to see if they have sample size little paint jars so I can fix this one spot... MAN why did I do that last run with the roller?!?

On the table for this week: seal the grout, install the cabinets, paint bedroom trim and order counter tops, fridge, and door to basement! The end is in sight, oh yes it is!

Work it harder, Make it better, Do it faster, Makes us Stronger, More than ever, Hour After, Our work is never Over

Sorry to have to start with lyrics, but "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger" pretty much sums up our life lately! We go to work (& school for Dave), come home work on the basement, go to sleep, and start all over again! Dave does homework while I try to keep up with the house work and cooking, we go to church on Sunday, and that's about it. But we've gotten so much done!

This weekend we did the tile in the kitchen downstairs!!! Well, we have it laid, we still need to grout and seal it and add the trim... but I'm feeling good about what we got done.

Dave and I started laying the tile out Saturday morning around 8. His brother Blaine joined us around 9:30 - 10:00 and I left them to the hard work so I could tear out that wall in the basement bedroom (let's be honest, I have really enjoyed tearing out walls, and I've gotten pretty good at it lately). We found with tiling two is the perfect number, 3 is too much help. When Blaine left I was able to help out with the last half of the basement. We got a pretty good system down by the time we finished.

Last night I was able to start the tile trim. I'm going to have to either rent a tile cutter for an hour or see if I can sweet talk a Home Depot worker into cutting 4 pieces to finish off the edges. It kills me to have to pay to rent the cutter again, so we'll see what I can do when I go into Home Depot. I think I should be able to finish the trim up tonight so we can grout and seal the grout this weekend. Maybe ambitious, but it's worth a try! I'm really not sure how long it takes to grout and seal... but We'll read the directions and figure it out. I'll post some pics once we get the trim completely in (or when it's grouted... I'm not sure yet).

Admit it, the next time you need to tear down drywall, you're totally going to call me for help! Last night I was able to cut out the drywall for the new wall and put into the bedroom. It's not too hard now that Dave's taught me how to do it. The drywall and mudding I figure this could be a side project for me when he's busy this week. That way we can spend our major time together finishing up the kitchen. We have just about 3 weeks left until Blaine and Angela get married and want to move in... so it's really getting down to crunch time!

Side note, I totally fought off a lady trying to cut in front of me in line this week! And I WON (did you honestly expect me to loose?). I got in line, a few minutes later she comes up and steps right in front of me (she made eye contact, she knew I was there). So I move in front of her. We do this a few times before there was a cashier ready to help "who was next".

We both sprint to the cashier and I throw my stuff down on the counter as she blurts out "I'm ready... oh, did you need something?" Yes,  I was in line before you. What makes you think I'm just going to let you go first. You don't look terminally ill, elderly, or you don't have a screaming kid... maybe you're hung over and have a killer head ache and really need to get back into bed? If so just tell me and I'll let you go first. But I didn't say that... instead I used the PC "Yes, I was waiting to check out before you. Maybe you didn't see me." So she could use the lame excuse of "Oh. You're right, I must not have seen you standing there." What can I really do but roll my eyes?

People can either make you mad or make you smile. I decided she would make me smile and roll my eyes.

Friday Already?!?

I can't believe it's FRIDAY! What a crazy week it's been. I went on a business trip to Santa Barbara, CA in the beginning of the week. The weather was a little to beautiful and I came back sporting a pretty red sunburn. My co-worker Te and I manned a booth at a convention that was outside, so the left side of my face, my part line, and my left arm are a pretty shade of red.

Between meetings the next day I decided to go swimming (we were literally across the street from the beach, who wouldn't spend their hour break swimming?). I ran right into the water but found it to be FREEZING, so I decided reading on the beach was a better option. So I pulled out Dracula and settled in for an hour of quality time with my book. The book was great, the temperature was perfect because there was a constant breeze from the ocean, and I was one of the only people on the beach. It was great until later that night when I couldn't figure out why my back was so itchy... turns out I'm so white that I ended up with a red back too.

The conference was great! We were able to hook up with several potential partners that will do extremely well in our program. We also met a few crazies... I'll leave company names out of it, because it's not the company's fault their employees are insane. First was the man from South Africa. I've never had someone so angry at me because I market for the top credit repair law firm in the nation. Even when I met our competition they weren't as hostile! His beef was he "couldn't get credit because he wasn't born in the USA". Unfortunately he has been seriously misinformed, but he was to angry to discuss it with me.

Second was the man from Boston that followed me around wanting to talk to me about music, partying and beer. I remember meeting this guy last year and after he found out I was LDS following me around asking me weird questions about polygamy and the temple. So this year I steered clear of that subject and ended up hearing several times about how he's been to Provo once, and there was no "WOOOH" when he was on BYU campus. By WOOOH he meant crazy college kids doing something stupid and cheering each other on in their stupidity... So we talked about BYU, beer and music every time he "happened" to run into me.

Wednesday my brother Mike got married to Allison Poulson!!! We all grew up together: our families were best friends in Michigan. So we're glad to finally be able to call the Poulson's family (even though we've been calling them family for years). They looked so stinking happy, and her dress was beautiful! They didn't do a reception, just a little luncheon for the family that came out for the wedding. It was nice how mellow everything was, more focus on the covenants than the party. Here are a few pics:

Right outside of the entry way of the Mt. Timp temple in American Fork.

We had to teach Mike how to dip Allison... They certainly had fun trying!

 

Dang Gina, look at those BLUE eyes! What a beautiful bride

 

Mt Timp and the happy couple!

 

   Bride & Groom

Here's the Brown side! Love the matchie matchie?

Mike and Allison headed off to France and Germany for their honey moon last night. How cool that they have the opportunity to go out and explore the world together? I asked mike to bring me back a kids lederhosen if he can find one for less than $30. Can you really deny that this would be the cutest halloween costume?

Dave took a paid day off today so he can finish his homework today, so tomorrow we can focus on the tile in the basement!!! We've finished the mudding, sanding, and painting so we're ready for the tile. I'm pretty excited to get that taken care of

Windows of Heaven are OPEN, Blessings are Pouring in!

I realized last night how blessed I have been over the past year! Here are just a few things I’m thankful for:

Dave – My best friend! We have so much fun together and he’s such a great support to me. My last semester of school I was working full time and finishing up, and he did all the cleaning, cooking and laundry so I could get good grades and survive the insanity of work. He’s just got this way of knowing what I need and providing for my needs…

Our House – we’ve loved no longer having to rent from psycho landlords. We even love all the fix-up we’ve done! We're especially grateful we'll be able to rent out the basement and put that money directly toward the principal!

$8,000 FTHB – we got this check yesterday!!! Not only is it nice to have the $8,000 now, but they also threw in 80 extra bucks for the “interest they owe for not getting this to us in April”. Wow, the IRS isn’t too bright, but we’ll take it

My Job – I’ve been blessed that the internship I started 3 years ago turned into a salaried position with a company I absolutely love! Between their tuition reimbursement and Federal Grants I didn’t have to pay tuition for my last year of school. It’s been the perfect job, and it has the possibility for me to work from home when we start having kids

Dave’s Job – Dave has worked for about 2 years at an Architecture firm downtown. The whole industry isn’t exactly thriving right now, so we’ve been concerned that he might get laid off for about a month now. Yesterday they did their second round of layoffs, and all the drafters except two were let go. Dave was one of those two. We feel extremely blessed about that

Dave’s School Opportunity – Dave decided to go back to school and get a Bachelor’s in Graphic Design. I’m so excited that he will be in a field that is growing and will LOVE what he does! He’s been bored with drafting for a while now, and needs a new challenge. I’m also grateful that we are able to afford to send him back to school, even if us being married means he’s no longer qualified for any Federal Grants L

Our Families – We’ve both been blessed with fabulous families that have helped and supported us every step of our lives. Recently they’ve been so helpful in fixing up our house. We really appreciate the moving, painting, dirt hauling, tile removal, plumbing and yard help that everyone has provided. Wow, thanks guys! I don’t know how anyone can get into a home without family

Great Friends – They keep us sane, have fun with us, go camping, play games, help us move, and help us find cheap stoves ($250, whoot!). We’re so glad we’ve had great friends to supplement our lives

New Ward / Neighbors – We’ve probably moved into the best ward in the world! Our neighbors help us with anything they see us in need of, and are soooo friendly! The neighbors across the street saw me struggeling to use the hand edger, so they came over with their electric edger and had our whole corner lot edged in less than an hour! Did I mention they’re in their 70’s??? The guy next door has told us he will snow blow our sidewalk in the winter if the car isn’t blocking it! The couple down the street let us borrow their hose when our plumbing was stopped up, so we could rinse out the pipes after we snaked it out. They’re just a friendly, helpful bunch of people!

Travel – We’ve had the opportunity to go on a few trips over the past year (Hawaii, Glacier National Park, Grand Canyon, Zion’s National Park…). It’s been so much fun to explore the country and see what is out there

I’m sure I could think of more to be grateful for, that’s just a start. It makes me feel spoiled rotten to think of all we’ve been blessed with!