Drum Roll, Please!

Presenting our newly re-done downstairs! We are done with the flooring and we could not be happier with the results. The floors and the simplicity of our stuff makes me feel like I like I live in an art gallery and we LOVE it. There are more things we would like to do (such as get rid of the hideous brass/white ceiling fan and replace the kitchen cabinets/countertops) but right now, we are content with everything as it is. So sit back and enjoy the Before and After pictures!

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Here are a few pics where you can really see the floor. I think what we love most about it are the imperfections that you can still see without it being overwhelming.

Whew! That wore me out just posting the pictures! We've got some yummy plans for our downstairs powder bath that is off the entry...I won't say anything about it until we get that done (not for a few months, we need a break!) but let's just say it will be over the top!

Shock and Awe

All was NOT right with the universe in a certain child's playroom yesterday...

There are no words to explain the following...you'll just have to see it for yourself. This is what Lawyer's playroom looked like when I walked into it yesterday afternoon...

If you felt overwhelmed, scared, hyperventalative...you were not alone. But seek peace, relaxation and the calming powers of a clean room below.


I'm not certain I ever showed Lawyer's Playroom closet before I ended up buying a custom closet system from The Container Store. This is the best organizational idea ever...you send in your closet dimensions (or room dimensions), you let them know what your needs are and then a Container Store Rep will make a custom plan, complete with a list of what you need to buy, for you to follow when you install the closet system. Anyhow, here are before and after pictures of Lawyer's playroom closet:

Thanksgiving...

Holy Cow, I am worn out! We had 10 people total at our house for Thanksgiving and fun was had by all! I wasn't certain who was bringing what so I thought "I'll just make a dish...or 6." Well, I think there were about 15 different items in total that was sitting on my breakfast table and on my kitchen counters...that doesn't include the pre-meal snacks either!

Here's a bit of this and that:

Bacon-Wrapped Water Chestnuts

Brie en Croute with Dried Cherries, Pecans, Honey and Rosemary

Smoked Turkey and Deep-Fried Turkey

Green Bean Casserole (There was almost a mutiny last year when I made home-made Green Bean Casserole so I opted to make the regular canned version this year) and Cornbread Dressing (background)

Corn Pudding

Beets with Orange Vinaigrette (so delicious!!)

Guacamole Salad

Homemade Sweet Potato Pie

Among Other Things We Ate:
Ham
Mashed Potatoes
Macaroni & Cheese
Potato Salad
Cole Slaw
Deviled Eggs
Rolls
Pumpkin Pie
Pecan Pie
Darn Good Pie
Pistachio Pudding
Cranberry Relish

There was so much food, which was a good thing, that every family got to take home enough food to have for at least the next two days!! What a wonderful Thanksgiving full of family, friends and food!

My 100th Post

Happy Thanksgiving!! I've been prepping under a fog of constant sneezing (not in the food!), drippy, itchy, red eys and the sniffles...not how I want to be enjoying Thanksgiving but that's okay!

Well, it only seems appropriate that I say "Hip-Hip Hooray" to my 100th post right now. I'm not certain why except that others tend to see that as a milestone. And considering that I have a clinical disease (self-diagnosed, of course) called "I-Can-Start-It-But-Be-Warned-I-Probably-Won't-Finish-it"-itis, this 100th feat is amazing. I can't follow through. It's part of my nature to lose interest really fast in something that I probably couldn't think about anything else except that one "something". I see myself as baby Lawyer up in that photo...wanting to get off the chair but then struggling halfway through! But seeing as I HATE (yes, I used that harsh word...but it doesn't pertain to people so in my book, it's okay...as long as my 4-year old doesn't hear me say it!) it when I hear excuses such as "I can't cook therefore I don't attempt it at all" or "My childhood sucked so that's why I have a problem with everything else in my life as an adult" or, in my case, "I lose interest really fast that's why I can't complete this project"....Excuses, people, all excuses...and lame ones at that. So, I digress...

I chose to keep up with a blog so that my friends and family and any uninvited weirdos could see what's up in our household (just kidding about the weirdos...you aren't invited...so go away...please) and it was going to help me with one other item on my "going to follow through with" list...photography. I think the first 3.5 years of my child's life are picture-less, except what my parent's took. So, seeing as I was going to start a blog that I couldn't follow through with, I thought, might as well throw in photography that I wouldn't follow through with as well.

Well, there's something about knowing (or thinking) that other's will be viewing your blog that makes you not want to disappoint so here I am....100 posts later and I'm so glad that I started this blog.

So Happy 100 Posts to me!! I look forward to see where the next 100 posts will take me and this blog...probably nowhere except self-satisfaction but that's okay, at least I know I can follow through!

We tried...

We really did. Remember, from this post, when we took down the wall between our dining room and our living room (you can see the very small strip on the floor in the new opening)? Well, we knew that we wanted to pull the carpet up in the dining room and also the tile in the entry...one day, at least. "Not now" we said to each other, after all, the holidays were right around the corner.

And then we couldn't leave well enough alone. Before we knew it, we pulled up the carpet in our dining room and then we wanted to see what the floor would look like under the tile. Pulling up one little-bitty tile wasn't going to hurt right?

Sure it won't...and soon the tile entry was pulled up (my back, knees and hands now all feel like they are 80 plus years old and I think I have carpal tunnel syndrome in both my hands). Well, we thought, how about pulling up part of the carpet that's on the living room side, that way the carpet won't get dirty as much when you walk up and down the stairs to the kitchen and if you were walking back and forth between the entry and the kitchen?

So up came that carpet. Then, due to our consumption of alcohol while pulling up the carpet and tile and the delirium that overtook our bodies, we thought, wouldn't it be great to pull up the laminate wood flooring in the kitchen, you know, just to get an idea for what that would look like?

People, we are stupid...we have no concept of "leave well enough alone".

We rented an industrial grinder and we began the tedious task of grinding down the concrete to look even and feel smooth. If you will recall from this post, you will remember that our goal, ONE DAY, was to have bare concrete floors that we were planning on sealing...to give a more urban "loft" look. I spent 5 days grinding a 5 ft. x 5 ft. section and still didn't like the results.

So after much debating and feeling defeated (if you know Jason and I, you know we don't like defeat), we decided that our time was WAY more important than our money so we called in the professionals last Monday. Jason harassed the poor concrete guy over many voicemails begging and pleading with him to see if someone could come out THAT week to give us a quote. Wednesday rolled around and we had somebody out giving us our quote. They proceeded to tell us that it would be about 2 weeks before they could come out. That wasn't going to do, "Thanksgiving is next week," I pathetically say to the lady, "Is there anyway the guys could come out this week (mind you this is Wednesday), over the weekend, or even at the beginning of next week?" Well she said her guys might want to work over the weekend since they didn't get paid for the Thanksgiving break. Which leads me to....



TODAY! This is what my downstairs looked like at 8:00am. Did I mention that we thought "What the hell! We might as well pull up the living room carpet!" and now that is gone as well? It's Saturday and, yeah (say that like Lundberg from Office Space), I'm hosting Thanksgiving at my house in 5 days for about 12 people!!!! Luckily, we were able to get the concrete people out and as of right this moment at 10:21am on Saturday before Thanksgiving, they are happily grinding away!!

Here is what a close-up of my bare concrete floors look like right now. I'll take an "after" picture around the same spot once it has been grinded, sealed and waxed...you'll be amazed!

They said they might be COMPLETELY done with the grinding, cleaning, sealing and waxing by tomorrow!! And then I can move all my furniture back in by Monday or Tuesday...just in the nick of time. Speaking of furniture, my bedroom now contains 2 couches, 2 dining tables, my bed, my humongous TV and all the laundry that I have failed to put away for the last 3 weeks. My upstairs guest room has 8 dining chairs, art, mirrors, drapes and all the other crap that was already residing in this forgotten room.

Oh yeah, we also had to move our fridge (which was a joke that I wanted to cry about...more on that another time, I'm still fuming from the accident that my beloved fridge got into) and our washer and dryer is living in the garage right now.

I'm a positive realist about things. Things are really just black or white to me (thus the extreme nature I reported in this post about myself) and while I can think very realistic about things, I also know that there is always a solution (at least if I'm the only one that thinks so...even if that solution fails!) which makes me positive. So one good thing that's coming from all this chaos is that my house is going to be VERY clean when everything gets put back in place for Thanksgiving! Never mind that I really need to start shopping and preparing a few things in advance for Turkey Day, never mind that I have been wanting to put up my Christmas tree for the past few weeks but haven't been able to and never mind that my poor child will not have slept in his own house in almost a week (the dust is horrible!)...I'm just happy that others are doing the back-breaking work for us and will have it done in two days!

Alright I'm out like a light...I've got dust fumes to inhale and high-pitch grinding to listen to? What will you be doing on this November fall day?

A Family Affair

Well, I finally broke down and bought a few of the images from our family's photo event when we were on vacation. I haven't bought all of them that I would like to but I at least bought the one's that involved the three of us. So without further ado, here are a few pics to be shared....Oh and because it's hard for me to resist, I actually Photoshopped them.