A bedroom remodel

So I decided that this year, we will re-do our bedroom. It seems that since we've been in this house, we tend to re-do about one room a year. Last year was the downstairs basement (remember that "simple project"?). The year before it was our family room. And the year before that it was both of our spare bedrooms - well one was Hannah's nursery. Oh, wait, now that I count back the years, I guess we missed a room in 2006 because we had to have done the spare rooms in 2005 BEFORE Hannah got here! OK, I guess we didn't do a room that year. But the first room we had done was our living room and it kind of needs a freshening up already, so it's high time to do our room since it's never been done!

Here's what we're starting with:

(I'm glad I remembered to take before pictures, because I usually remember 3/4 of the way through demolition!)

Our room isn't that big, which sort of stinks, but it's what we've got. We bought our bedroom suit when we first moved in and I still really like it. It's gained a few scratches over the last 5-1/2 years, but nothing terrible. The one crappy thing is that our dresser has a mirror and the mirror covers one of our two windows, so we don't get much natural light in the room. And there really aren't any other alternative ways to arrange the furniture that we have, so I guess we're stuck with that.

This is the view from our hallway outside the room

We plan to hang a new white door and get rid of the '80's brown door.

This is from the doorway into the room.

I'm not sure yet what I'll do with the windows. I'm sure I'll replace the cheap plastic mini-blinds, but I'm not sure with what just yet.

This is our bed & night stands

Are you noticing the "nothing is on the walls" theme? Yeah, that sort of seems to run rampid through most of the house. I guess I'm not good at accessorizing that way. I'm trying to improve.

This is the view from our bed to the front of the room and the amoire

Love the rubbermaid tub that's been sitting there for about 3 years....guess it's time to get rid of it since I don't wear the clothes that are in it.

And this is our hideous closet.

Until last winter, we did actually have doors on this closet, but they became a huge problem, so we opted for the hilbilly look and ripped them down. This is a HUGE reason for choosing this room this year...it's becoming unsightly! I plan to re-organize the whole thing and add doors once again!

We also have navy blue carpet in there that has to go as well as we will replace all of the woodwork with more up-to-date trim.

I decided that I don't want to knock this out in like a weekend or even a week or two like I normally do, but rather spread it out over the summer so it doesn't seem so labor intensive and also not so costly all at once. I decided that I'd pick bedding first so that I can have some colors to work with. I ordered some online last night from an online place called Linen Bargains. I like the picture and what you get in the set and the price was great, so I'm axious to see what comes to find out if it was really a deal or not. I should have it early next week. Here's the picture of the bedding:

The colors are supposed to be sage, chocolate, ivory and beige...I sure hope that's what we get because I like the color scheme.

If this is a keeper, we'll probably paint a light sage green, but that's not totally decided yet.

I guess my first task at hand to get this project going is to tear off the border that currently is pasted at the top of the walls. Then I suppose I'll have to get the ceiling painted and start priming and painting the walls. I will want to do the closet reorganiziation project in there some place as well. We'll pick out carpet, window treatments and paint the new woodwork and door. Oh, what fun this summer will be!!!! But it will be worth it to have a nice space to turn into every night!!

Past couple of days stuff

Last week was very busy. We seemed to be on the go almost non-stop. I've been having such muscle tension that I decided to go get a massage Saturday morning. It was good and did relieve some of the tightness, but unfortunately, by Sunday evening, it was all back. Although, I have to say, I haven't gotten the tension headache back yet, so it must not be as bad as it was before the massage. That was pretty much the excitement of Saturday. The rest of the day was just running errands, out to lunch and out to dinner.

Sunday I cleaned the house. Then I started preparing and cooking the meal I had planned for my mom's birthday. We had my mom, Randy and my Grandma over. I made quite the feast. I picked all new recipies that I've never made before (except my salad). I went to Foodnetwork.com and just randomly picked some stuff. I love the site because they have a lot of reviews of the recipies so you know if people liked it or not and also what they may have done differently to the recipie.

Anyway, I spent pretty much all afternoon cooking. It was a lot of work, but well worth it. The meal was great.

I made a salad that we enjoy with spring mix greens, red peppers, feta cheese, gold raisens and sunflower seeds tossed in a home-made balsamic vinegar dressing....very good!

Then the main course was Red Wine Marinated Flank Steak Filled with Prosciutto, Fontina and Basil. This was a Bobby Flay meal and very good! Tony grilled it perfectly. We all thought it was great, but I may subsitute the basil for spinach or something next time. The basil got to be a little much and there were so many flavors that we could do without the basil.

For sides, I made Neely's Zucchini Gratin which was very tasty. Wouldn't change a thing about the recipe. And Warm Potato-Tomato Salad with Dijon Vinaigrette. Everyone liked these pretty well, but I think the splash of red wine vinegar to the cooked potatoes made them too vinegary. Other than that, these were good too.

Then for desert, I opted not to make a cake since more than half would either go to waste or MY WAIST, neither of which would be good!!! So I made Strawberries-and-Cream Parfaits. These made a nice light summery dessert, but I had hoped the filling was more of a custard, but it turned out to be pretty much tapioca pudding.

So the meal was a success and everyone seemed to like everything real well, which was good when you made a meal full of things you've never tried before! Thank goodness the feedback on the website seemed true!

Mom opened her gifts with Hannah's help.

And then we hung out on the deck for a little while before they left. I pretty much collapsed on the couch around 9:00! What a day!

Nothing note-worthy about yesterday. A little funny that Hannah told Tony was in reference to brushing her teeth: "I don't use a lot of water. I'm saving the Earth"! Thank God for her!!!

Tonight after dinner, we played outside. It turned out to be such a nice day. Hannah and I drew on the driveway. Here's my picture of her:

Then she skinned her knee playing ball with daddy, so we had to use the new Boo-Boo Buddy she got. She loved it and it seemed to really help her boo boo feel better.

Then just one of us girls!

Have I ever mentioned how much I just love that kid?!!? Man, she's cool!

The flower girl saga continues

So Hannah had a complete meltdown the other night about being the flower girl in Bo & Courtney's wedding. She was pretty adamant that she didn't want to be the flower girl. I can only imagine what her little mind has invisioned about this responsibility.

So we had a long discussion about it and I showed her our wedding pictures and what Kendal looked like, because she was our flower girl. I explained that she just wears a pretty white dress and carries a basket of flowers.

She got real upset with me when I told her that Courtney would get to pick out her dress because she was the bride and the bride got to do that. Hannah then changed her mind from a week ago and now wanted to be the bride. I told her it was too late, she already said she didn't want to be the bride, so that was going to be Courtney's job.

I then gave her the choice of staying home with a babysitter while we went to the wedding, or she could come with us to the wedding and be the "princes" (aka - flower girl) and wear a pretty white dress. She finally agreed before bedtime that she wanted to go and she would be the princess.

I though the crisis was averted until Tony called me at work the next morning to ask if I had heard Hannah's new song. I hadn't so I asked what it was. (you see, she sings all the time and in the car often sings nonsense songs). The song of that morning was "I don't want to be the flower girl"!! Oh, boy! So then I was left with whether to discuss it and make her feel better about it or just leave the subject alone. Still not really sure which to do, but the wedding is in just a few short months, so between now and then, I've got to get her on board with the idea!

Last night, I was cleaning out our files and she was downstairs playing dress up. She ran upstairs to tell me that she already had a white dress for the wedding!! She was so excited and so proud because it is a dress she already has and likes! I told her that it was a nice dress, but maybe we'd buy a new one for the wedding. She was very firm with her decision that we didn't NEED to buy a new one because we already had this one and it has a bit of pink in it, so it would be just right!

So, Courtney, here is your flower girl:

She's definitely cute (of course) and thrifty (love that), but don't worry, we'll find a new dress for you're special day!! We might have to "lose" this one first though!!!!

Gymnastics Expo

Hannah's regular gymnastic season has ended and yesterday was the gymnastics expo for the kids to showcase their skills! I wasn't going to have her participate, but I'm glad I changed my mind. I think I have mentioned it before, but I wasn't crazy about the leotard they picked, but it was cute on the kids - I guess!


Here's Hannah at home before we left for the big show.



Then when we got to the gym, she went off into the warm up room with all the other kids and we took our seats. It was funny seeing her name in a program - she's just not a baby anymore! They separated the kids into small groups and did the show in rotations like a gymnastics meet. Hannah led her group out onto the floor for opening ceremonies:



Nevermind the grainy pictures - I guess there is no taking a good picture in that gym, at least from any sort of distance. Since we weren't allowed to use flash during the show, I took video instead.

Here she is on her first event, the bars:


And the next event was the floor:


The third rotation was a floor/vault combo:


And finally, the beam:



After all the kids performed, they went through the medal ceremonies. The picture I took of Hannah getting her medal was really bad unfortunately, so here she afterward proudly displaying her ribbons and medal!







It was really cute and Hannah had an absolute BLAST! She was so hyped up all evening and had a smile on her face the entire time! She totally crashed in bed when we got home, especially since it was past her bed time. She's excited that she's going to be in summer gymnastics which starts a week from Saturday. We'll play it month by month during the summer to see whether we've really got time for it or not.


In other news, Tony put his back out this weekend. Not sure what he did, but he was in some serious pain over the weekend. Or maybe it was his way of getting me to cut the grass for him! I didn't mind doing it at all, but bagging it is for the birds! It also wouldn't have been that bad, but by the time I finished around 3:30, I still had to make a grocery list and go shopping. So I didn't get home from that until about 5:30 and then it was make dinner and give Hannah a bath and I pretty much crashed not too long after that too.


Tony thought it was pretty funny to take a picture of me mowing the grass. I told him he acted like it was the first time I had done any work around the house or something!



Anyway, it's a good thing I did do it because he was still in pain this week and it has just not stopped raining. He went to the doctor Monday and got some muscle relaxers and prescription motrin, which seems to be helping. He didn't golf tonight in his league, so maybe that's the confirmation that he didn't just fake it to make me to his chores!!!


My cousin Bo and his fiancee, Courtney have decided to move their wedding up to this summer. They've asked Hannah to be the flower girl. We're excited, except for one problem....Hannah doesn't want to be a flower girl. So when I asked her if she wanted to be the bride, she said no...the maid of honor?...no....the groom?...no. So I asked her what then did she want to be? She said the princess. Oh, but of course! So I complied and said that she could be the princess and could wear a fancy princess dress. She was glad to hear it and said she'd like to wear the Cinderella or Snow White one. Oh, boy!! I hope the idea warms up to her over the next few months!



And the last blog-worthy item for this post is: Happy 60th birthday to my mom!!! (yesterday) We'll have them over on Sunday to celebrate, but Happy Birthday now!! I love you!

Happy Girl

Hannah was acting sort of grumpy in the car a couple of weeks ago and I was trying to cheer her up. To convince her that she had to be happy, I told her I even had a song about being a happy girl and introduced her to Martina McBride's "Happy Girl". It worked that day and ever since, she asks to hear the "Happy Girl" song all the time in the car. The past week or so I noticed that she was singing along to most of the song and it's really cool and very cute to listen to! So, we captured it on video for all to enjoy!
So, without further a-do.....turn up your speakers....here's my Happy Girl!!

I did have the whole song on video, but had trouble uploading it, so this is just a snippit!! Too cute!