One Year Home Makeover Celebration!

Recent renovations started with a successful yard sale and the purchase of a new light for the dining room. (the plant and screen are also newish additions) To mark the ONE YEAR ANNIVERSARY of owning our home. I felt it was time to finally get around to decorating the boys' room. This is before, somewhat decorated...And here is the after...a more toddler appropriate room. The blue dresser was moved into the closet after the boys broke the bottom drawer while climbing inside...over and over (and over and over) again.

Then, work continued outside with new plants in the front.

Iris for Nana.

Into the backyard for removal of the dead tree and over-grown bush. We placed lattice on the only part of the old fence left (we lost the fence on the right during Ike) and planted Carolina Jasmine to cover it. Here's a peek at the before and after of our first year!

The den:

Formal living:The kitchen:

Breakfast area:

Laundry room:

The master bedroom, there isn't a before picture...just imagine a white box.

The exterior before:

Freshly painted door...

You can get a glimpse of the new house color and shutters in this picture...

A Sick Boy & A Dirty Sink

Sloan and I were on our way back from a morning appointment when I checked my voicemail. The dreaded call from daycare. We'd hoped the sickness was over and we could get away with sending Zachary to school, after all he didn't have a fever. But there's no way to disguise vomit...we were caught. After picking him up and a quick stop by the grocery store for the makings of the B.R.A.T. (bananas, rice, applesauce, toast) diet, we were home. Zachary managed to eat a little and quickly surrendered to a nap.

I used this time to catch up on some blog reading when I came across the Fly Lady. As I came across her baby steps, I knew I could handle this guide to cleaning. Day 1, what a great place to start. Shine my sink??? Okay...

What I would have ordinarily considered a "clean enough" sink:

My sink now (I only did one side so far):

And while my sink was enjoying it's soak, I whipped up this:

When the sink cleaning instructions called for bleach, I was reminded of my sad excuse for an apron. Since our budget didn't involve a shopping trip, I got resourceful, I used up leftover material from a quilt I made for my mother-in-law. It's nothing fancy...but it's a lot better than my old one.

Tackle It Tuesday: The Front Door

I can't call it a new front door because the old, ugly one is still hiding under there. This weekend, I revamped our front door. Doesn't it just say "Welcome"?

Here's the old, peach, rusted handle door:



And here is the new Mark Twain House Brown (that really is what the color is called), freshly painted handle, antique brass accented door:

This job was made possible by my hubby who took the kids to his mom's for the weekend.

The rest of the peach will soon be gone, we purchased all the new paint to redo our "oh so ugly" house. More pictures when it is complete, which will be a while since it will have to be done in the evenings after the boys are in bed.

Photo Story Friday: I Win!

Hosted by Cecily and MamaGeek

Don't I look excited (and kinda silly)?

That's because I won! But not without a fight (literally).

Here's the story:

We bought a house in March. A house previously owned my an older, single woman. Over the past 20 something years, most of the lawn/trees were neglected for obvious reasons. With new homeowner ambition, we set out to right the wrongs in our yard. We quickly demolished what greenery there was and replaced it with new, younger shrubs. However, the two HUGE oak trees in our yard were hogging all the sun and not letting any through to our little plants. After months of discussion about trimming the trees, I decided this was the perfect weekend...being a holiday and having an extra day in the yard...what better time?

I'm sure you can see where this is going. Sloan had other plans for his extra day off...rest. Who rests on their day off when they can be doing yard work?

I took matters into my own hands and headed off to Lowes for a telescoping tree pruner. I set out to trim the trees myself...and I did for about an hour. Then I decided the roof provided a better platform for getting the big branches. I poked my head inside and asked "Honey, is there a way to get on the roof without a ladder?" My husband (and many others) knows the amount of gracefulness I was dealt. Next thing I knew, he donned his tennis shoes and was on the roof with a saw.

I won!

You're right honey...here they are!

The next morning from the front porch he planned his strategy for more tree trimming. The first plan was to exchange the saw that broke with the previous day's work. On the way home from Lowes this is what I heard:

Sloan: "It's good that we are being aggressive with the tree trimming...this means less raking in the fall."

I won again...only this time he thought it was his idea!

Now my little plants have sun! Thanks honey!

The last few weeks in pictures...

We planted a new tree. Lowes had trees on sale for $5.00...who can beat that? I have never seen a grown man so excited about a tree!
We also cashed in on the clearance sale at Lowes. We got 1 Fan-Tex Ash tree, 6 Cleyera shrubs, 1 Wax Myrtle, 2 Dwarf Nandina, 9 Jasmine (some to cover our neighbor's ugly chain link fence and others to grow elsewhere), 2 6-foot lattice, 2 bamboo blinds for the den, and two pretty robe hooks for our bathroom! Even the cashier was excited about our deals; the plants were all $2.00-$4.00!
Zachary and Grant enjoyed their first fish fry in our backyard. Thanks goes to John for the table and chairs!
We didn't get to see Daddy much with his busy schedule, but we the time we had was great!
I had the privilege of reading "Santa's Workshop" countless times.
Grant picked out all the teddy bears in the book. He can say "bear" very clearly now.
We got a new "inside" toy, although it wasn't much fun unless Mommy was inside too.Nina probably enjoyed it the most.

New Cribs

After not receiving the "recall kit" one week after requesting it...I decided to call Jardine and see what the hold up was...we had to have this kit before we could proceed with the lengthy process of getting a voucher. They agreed to let us go to Babies R Us and buy a new crib; we can then go back and be reimbursed with the voucher.

Here are the boys checking out their new cribs:

Were were able to keep all the parts we needed to convert the cribs into a head board and foot board. We used the back of Grant's crib and the front of Zachary's, along with some side rails to a bed we are no longer using. No money spend and a bed for our guest room...what a deal!

Stretching a small budget...

As I'm walking out of CVS, I often feel as though I am doing something illegal...is this stealing?

So far, with the help of the Money Saving Mom, Hooray for Free-bates and my Sunday coupons, I have come away with things our family will use...all while paying less than a dollar or getting things for free after rebate. This picture only represents a fraction of what I have gotten. I keep my "free" make-up in my bathroom, most of my "free" cleaning products in the laundry room, and my huge stash of diapers in the boys' bedroom. I have now accumulated a stash of all the things we use so that I can eliminate the possibility of running out of something and having to pay full price for it.

Here's my loot (all of this is unused and waiting for us to run out of something we are currently using):

5 packs of razors, 6 men's deodorant, 5 women's deodorant, 4 body wash, 2 hairspray, 7 shampoo, 6 conditioner, 3 face wash, 3 face lotion, 2 mouthwash, 13 toothbrushes (anyone who knows how I use a toothbrush understands the need for 13 spare), 4 toothpaste, 5 pkgs feminine products, 2 astringent, 2 pkgs bar soap, 3 face scrub, 2 pkg q-tips, 5 hair color, 2 OFF, 1 sunscreen, 2 soap refills, 1 Lysol wipes, 1 toilet cleaner, and 3 pkgs toilet paper

Other stores I like to "rob" are Walgreens, Target and Kroger. Check out these websites for more help in stretching your budget:

Freebies 4 Mom, Baby Cheapskate, Hooray for Free-bates, Money Saving Mom, the 2008 Coupon Schedule, The Motherload

I know there are plenty of others, but these are the few I use regularly.