::project::

OK, so here's the living room project.  Our moms and dad have already seen this, so they won't be that impressed, but it is fun to see all the pictures together.

Back in 1990-something when the lady built this house, she included a large deep cabinet in the living room, just right for a deep projection tube television.
Well, it was large for back then, but there's no way it would've fit any of the flat screens we've had for a long time.

So the cabinet was just sitting there looking cruddy, and our TV was sitting on top of the fireplace looking kind of tacky.

We decided to CHANGE it all up.  We called our contractor who's done a few things at the office for us, and he came to get started.


Remember this picture from the other day?  It's a before for you.  I don't have a straight forward before picture that I can locate right now.

So John came and framed out the cabinet.  Then he drywalled it.

He put in all sorts of tubes and channels and smart places for cords to go so that we could keep all our auido components and boxes down in the lower cabinet. (I moved the baby toys to a better place.)

Yep, there's the good old monster TV looking super tacky up on the mantle with all it's cords running to it.

So John got the cabinet all covered and drywalled nicely.  Then it was my job to paint the wall.  Easy enough I thought.  There are cans and cans of paint in the garage--usually well labeled.  I've patched many a wall in this house.  I figured it would be a breeze.

I had a couple of free hours one morning.  I put the baby to bed and I got out all the stuff I needed except the paint.  Then the power went out.  And I couldn't find a flashlight.
When the power is out in your garage, not only can you not see anything but you can't open the door and let in the light--unless you're my dad and you like good old manual garage doors best.

So I had to haul all the cans in and try to figure out which one I needed.

Who thought there could be so many shades of green on the walls of one poor house?  I tried can after can and none of them worked.

Turned out this seemed to be the one color that didn't exist.
So my couple of hours were gone and I rushed out to try to make a match at the Home Depot.  Family was coming the next day for Max's baptism, I had to get it done!!
Of course the paint chip I had was too small and the old man with long groaty fingernails working the paint desk sent me away in disgrace.  I had to match it using the eyeball method.
It was stressful but I found one that seemed to match pretty well.
Then we went home and painted, and since half of the light bulbs in our living room are out right now, in the dim light it looked like a perfect match!

When the sun came out the next morning it was obvious to me that perfect wasn't exactly the word--I could see the difference between the new paint and old for sure. But it's truly close enough.  When you come and visit you'll have to see if you can spy my brush marks.

But all that aside, I think it looks much better now.  And I have a fun photo which we printed on canvas up on the mantle.  It's a lot nicer that way.
That's it for the project report.  I'm going to bed now!

::why::

Why do they (read Max) insist on sitting so far apart?


It's like the lord & lady of the manor or something.

We love our new rustic looking table supposedly made out of an old door from Mexico. Who knows what it's really made out of, but it fits the house's esthetic nicely--and the shape of the room!

::table::

Woo Hoo!!!

::our yard::

Here's a little tour for you.
Our yard isn't well manicured, and it's not well maintained. The soil is really sandy since we're very near the bay, and so grass has a really hard time growing. We, as well as the landlord have fertilized the grass, but it's really a disaster. And somebody planted bulbs at some point, but the squirrels or some other sinister creature ate all the blossoms. We have plenty of leaves coming up but no blossoms. So anyway, our yard isn't super nice looking, but it has some perks. Number 1, it's a yard. Number 2, there's room for a boy and a dog. Number 3, there are a few pretty things growing in it. Just a few!
The front yard has this little tree:


It's not the prettiest tree I've ever seen the rest of the year, but in the spring it's amazing!

Then there's the lilac bush we borrow from the next door neighbors--it hangs over the fence.

I can't wait until it fully blooms--lilacs are so wonderful!

And then there's this crazy tree.

The leaves are red. All the time. They come out red in the spring and stay red all summer. I don't remember ever noticing a tree like that before me moved here, but they're all over our neighborhood. And most look much better than ours. Ours has some sort of sad disease and by fall all the leaves are all eaten up. Oh well. It looks nice now.

Pretty color, isn't it?

So there's the tour. It'll be interesting to see what our yard in New Mexico will look like. Probably a LOT different. But there can still be lilacs I think!

::welcome::

Welcome to our house. This is what our front door looks like:

(See Nancy, it's red!!)
It's also outdated. Max was concerned that there might be somebody out there unaware of the date, so that's where the "Januay" sign comes in. The others mean "No cats No dogs" and "No people." These two confuse me. I mean the no cats thing works for us, but the no dogs and no people? Plus the dog in the picture looks so happy.
Mysterious...

--Huh huh and a Walk Home From School--

Max learned about huh (the letter H) last week. Or wait, I guess it was the week before last. His teacher somehow made a deal with the calendar and got Halloween scheduled during Huh week. They had a great time on Halloween and carved pumpkins and made finger puppet ghosts and even got sent home with a couple of treats.
Besides that during huh week they got to talk about hamsters, hippos and horses. One of the teachers brought in her pet hamster for the kids to observe. That was really exciting for the kids, probably not so much for the hamster.
They ate hummus (really??) honeydew melon and havarta (sp?) cheese. I've never heard of havarta cheese, and in fact it could be something entirely different, like humbolt cheese or something. All I know is that it started with H!
And would you join us for a walk home from school?
Here's Max at the end of our street, ready to sprint. He's been into running or skipping or galloping home lately. This is a run.
There's a house halfway down the street where the yard is lined with big rocks. Max has to walk along the rocks every time we go to or from school. I usually hold his hand so there are no crashes.
After the rocks we visit the dog that lives two houses down from us. Her name is Galaxy and she's very very cute. I scratch her ears and she gives Max a kiss on the hand.
Then we head home. The biggest challenge for me is keeping Max on the sidewalk and off of people's lawns and front porches. He's making good progress though and we usually really enjoy our strolls to and from school.
We made it!! Here's Max on our front porch steps holding a "glass art" project from Guh week.
Thanks for walking home with us!