Painting

Well, it's official. It took the painters 4 days to finish the exterior of our house. It was intense. They power washed the entire house, fixed trim, calked everything, fixed some rotting flashing, patched cement on foundation, and everything in between. We were house bound for 3 of the days because they needed an outlet to use the sprayer and the outside outlet wasn't working. LAME! I was going stir crazy! AH! But they are finished and our house looks terrific. And after seeing them work 4 days in a row from 8:00am-5pm, I realized that is why we paid someone to do it:) They earned every single penny it cost to get the work done. Good grief. My newly painted walls just want to say thank you.

Deck

My husband has just about finished the deck.  We need to put the skirting on the bottom but here's how amazing it looks so far.  The floor is Fiberon a composite decking.  We looked forever at products and liked that this started out with a 10 year warranty but changed to a 25 year stain and fade warranty.  It basically is Trex wrapped in plastic.   I was worried it would look fake but it doesn't at all.  Trex has had alot of problems and this Fiberon won't stain and peel like our other stairs and decks did.  The edge color is Rosewood and the inside boards are IPE.  Want more information click HERE for their website. 

 

BEFORE

 

The metal is our wind screen.

 

Fiberon handrailing was around $22 a linear foot.  To save money made it out of hog/cow panels from Cal Ranch.  I love how they look.

On the right is a built in table for entertaining.  The BBQ Grill will go where the chairs are.

Foundation Stucco

 We hired someone to do the stucco and it was worth every penny.  They had to remove this black tar and smooth the cement first.  Next they power washed it.  After that I stopped watching because I had hungry kids. 

  BEFORE

 AFTER

 BEFORE

AFTER

 BEFORE

 AFTER

They did the side of the stairs

Fire Pit

We've had alot of people lately ask when we were going to start on our yard.  FYI that is not what you ask someone who is doing all their landscaping themselves in a  new yard.  My husband spends every spare minute working and he has done a ton.  I just laugh because all anyone can see is that we have no grass.  They don't see the 60 trees we've planted, the dirt piles we've moved, dirt that has been smoothed, shed we added, cement, etc.   It doesn't make us mad we think it's funny.  I would almost bet that years ago I asked someone when they were going to start on their yard, not realizing how much work a new yard takes. What goes around comes around.
This past weekend I heard a story about a family that finished their yard, laid sod and before it could root a big rain storm came and washed it all down the hill into the river behind them.  I wanted to cry, and throw up because we know how much work and money that cost.

Here's our fire pit we've added.

 BEFORE

 DURING

 AFTER

This picture looks like we have gravel all around the firepit, but it's crushed travertine and granite.  

To give you an idea of how much time things take notice in the 1st picture the hay field in the back has just been cut.  In the last picture it's green and ready to be cut again.

Hope we can teach our children the value of hard work.

Is that Mine!?!

Is this really my kitchen!?! Say what!?! I think it is!

So, hubby and I have officially made some upgrades to the kitchen. We bought new appliances off of Craigslist. And replaced the counter tops. They look like granite, but they are just laminate.

Before:
This shot was before we moved in. We put the overhead microwave in really quickly so I wanted you to get the REAL before shots.
A gloriously ancient stove and no overhead microwave.
On the right, a porcelain sink with the lip on the counter and I HATE it! Bonus material: a great side shot of my friend:) Also, notice there are no knobs on the drawers. We replaced the handles and added knobs.

Our old refrigerator. Someone was getting ride of it for free and we needed something until we could save up for one. I sold it for $50!

Lovely cream laminate counter tops that get stained extremely easily and drive me crazy and I hate them more then cooked fruit and that's saying something. FYI: I HATE cooked fruit. Apples are the worst. To me fruit should not be excessively soggy. It's a texture thing. If all desserts were pies I would be the skinniest person on earth. HA!













After: We put in new counter tops

an acrylic sink with NO lip.  I am completely happy with how everything turned out! YIPPEE!

Matching appliances all around. Perfect!

House Shutters and a Shed

We've been working on our yard all month.  It cracks me up when people say, "are you going to plant grass first?"  No that's really the last thing.  We've got dirt to move around, sprinkler system to do, and a long list of other things.  On cold, windy, and rainy evenings my husband worked on shutters for the house.  He bought cedar fence pickets and cut them to the size of the windows.  He took a picture of the front door to Sherwin Williams and they matched the stain color pretty close.  Here's some photos of how it changed the house(wish my photography skills were better because they never do the projects justice).  I love how they turned out. 

BEFORE

AFTER

BEFORE

AFTER



Simple and really inexpensive. 

 Putting them together.

 Our baby likes to help.  He wouldn't let me hold him once he saw dad working.

 His FAVORITE and FIRST place to go once he's outside.

I couldn't get this picture to stay rotated. 

DURING: I believe this is called pole barn style. 

FINISHED: Matches the house.

Yard Work

Here is a glimps into somethings I have been doing. Hubby planted some tulips someone gave me. They didn't last long as you can tell. They use to be a gorgeous purple.

We planted these bottle brush bushes in our back yard.

They are really small right now, but they should grow into column bushes to provide some shade.

Plus, these beautiful flowers attract humming birds.

So, then this sad little humming bird feeder will FINALLY get some love.


















Hubby finished painting our front door. I, being the organized person that I am, forgot to take a before photo, but I did find this. Just imagine that sun bleached wood all over the door.

It really does look fantastic. It only cost us about $30 for supplies and now our front door looks a lot more appealing.

Exercise

Saturday my hubby was insistent that we go the the gym and exercise. I kept dragging my feet and saying, "I think we will be okay." He wouldn't let off. So, I finally caved and did a 1/4 mile run with him. Now, before you think I am lazy, I knew we would have a large delivery. That delivery was 4 tons of rock. Yep, 4 TONS! I am pretty sure he under estimated how much work would be involved in moving that rock. At 8 pm we were finally finished and hubby flopped onto the couch and said, "I am so glad you won't let us go to the gym today. I am exhausted." See, I was smarter then he realized. Here are some before, during, and after shots.

So, don't judge people. I seriously HATE yard work. I want as low maintenance yard as possible. So, Here is the un-weeded needs serious help before:

 

 

 

 

Notice the dead tree bushes!?! Yeah, there's four of them that were killed by frost a few weeks ago. That's $320 down the drain. I am not bitter at all, just bugged. We are putting ever greens in because they can withstand heat and frost. Much better bang for our buck.

 

Of course a huge pile of rock is any little boys dream. He had so much fun on it. He pretended to be on the moon. Can you see how high he can jump without gravity;) 

 

He jumped off of it multiple times.

 

He used it as a slide, Pay close attention to his face. I left it on so you could see how cool he thought it was.

He also pretended it has a huge mountain that he had to climb up. "It was very difficult mommy, but I made it!"

First we laid down Weed Block. Then hubby and I got to work shoveling the rock into a wheel barrow and dumping it all over. We smoothed out the rock and here it is in all its glory. Finished and ready for a few bushes and a drip system. I am soooooooo glad that is over. FYI: buying direct from a rock quarry is the way to go. $20 for 1 ton.

It was dark by the time we finished so we still have a few areas that need smoothed out.

 

 

 

 

 So, for exercise on Saturday I increased the value of home a little bit for under $100:) Hubby needs to fix some of the brick around the boarders, but that is for another day. Our next home improvement project will be a drip system and a few bushes.