Laundry Time

This was the conversation in our house this morning when I was leaving and Nick was getting ready (since he went in late because of basketball games...must be nice...)

Nick: Do I have any clean socks?
Me: I don't know, do you?
Nick:  There's none in my drawer....
Me: Then I guess not.
Nick:  Did you wash any?
Me:  Did you tell me you needed socks washed?

Needless to say, there are several piles of laundry on the floor of the bedroom and socks in the dryer....

Vanity Revamp

Since last week was Spring Break so I went on a mission to finish my bathroom make-over, and by the time I went back to work this past Monday, it was almost finished.  The last little project I have is to figure out what pictures I want to put in my Ikea frames.

Last Saturday, my family lost Millie, our Golden Retriever that my parents got for me and my sisters 13 years ago.  To distract myself on Sunday, I kept busy painting the vanity in the bathroom black, and now that it's done I love it.

This is what it looked like before...

Unfortunately I didn't have as good a picture as I thought.  But you can see the color of the vanity on the mirrors.  It certainly wasn't bad, but it's not exactly one I was in love with.  The door pulls were shiney silver, and the vanity was starting to look like it was 10 years old.

My husband took our mirrors down first, and they got sanded with 220 grit sandpaper and cleaned.  I just sanded the finish enough to allow the paint to stick, although I may not have sanded it quite enough...stime will tell.  I painted the mirrors and the vanity with Valspar's Dark Black Kettle paint. 

He also took off the doors, and I painted the drawers and the vanity itself.  My husband offered to let me buy new door pulls, mainly because he wanted to recycle the old ones for use in his garage.  This is what the old ones looked like, along with the wood color of the vanity.

Those are now on my husband's cabinets in the garage.  After some paint and the new door pulls, this is the end result...

And the mirrors...

And the vanity as a whole...

We're loving the new vanity, and the bathroom as a whole.  It feels much more "grown up" now, and rivals the guest bath for our favorite.

Sunday Showcase @ Under the Table and Dreaming

Just Something I Whipped Up @ The Girl Creative

Master Bath Makeover Begins

For many, Spring Break means vacations, relaxation, and fun.  For me, it means projects.  During the school year, especially now that I'm in the middle of Master's classes, I'm doing good to get dinner made and keep the house presentable.  But during Spring and Summer breaks, it's project time!  This week...the master bathroom. 

These are the before shots...

It definitely wasn't as bad as the Tiki-inspired guest bath, but I've never been in love with the striped shower curtain (especially after I accidentally dropped the toilet bowl cleaner last week and some splashed on it and bleached spots).  We registered for it when we registered for wedding gifts for lack of anything better.  I love the oiled bronze accessories, but I wasn't digging the curtain.  I found one I loved at Bed Bath and Beyond.  It wasn't quite the good deal that my Pottery Barn clearance curtain was, but a 20% off coupon sweetened the deal a little.

 

I found my paint color in the Restoration Hardware paint chip book.  I'm not above finding expensive paint colors and taking them to my local Porter paint store and getting the color copied.  In this case, it was R.H.'s Graphite.

 

The lighting in the bathroom isn't great...which is another issue we have to work on (and might have to enlist the help of my husband's bff, Dustin).

I've hung the new shower curtain, and brought the other accessories back in.  I plan on getting some frames for wall art tomorrow, and matching tp holder and towel bars at Target this weekend to finish it off.  Nick's encouraging me to paint the mirrors and vanity black.  I'd thought of doing that before I bought the shower curtain, and I think I still like that idea, so I'm thinking I'll be buying a bigger container of my cracked pepper paint this weekend as well.

I'm loving that I can reuse the accessories I already have.  I'm also loving what came out of my flower bed today...

Be Careful What You Wish For...

is a lesson that I got a good reminder in recently.  Earlier this week, southern Indiana had it's first somewhat vicious spring thunderstorm.  At school later that day, I jokingly said that it wouldn't bother me if a few shingles got ripped off our roof so that I could get it replaced.  My siding is beige, and my shutters and garage door are now black, but the roof is a brownish-red.  I'm not in love with it by any long shot of imagination, especially now that the shutters and garage door are finished.

I was getting ready for bed the night that I made that joke and looked up at the ceiling in the kitchen.  Right next to the light fixture was a wet spot.  Well crap.  Then in my infinite wisdom, I got a chair and lightly poked the spot to see if it was wet, or if I had just missed that discolored spot for over a year (not likely).  Next thing I knew, the discolored spot looked like this...

Fantastic!  You'd think one of these days I'd learn to stop messing with things.  So I had to call the roofer the next morning, and he very kindly accepted my 8 am phone call and came out the next day to check out the roof.  It turns out the rubber boots around the bottom of the attic vents had dry-rotted completely off, which was the cause of the leak.  There's also a couple of strips of edging that need to be put up, so that will be done next week.  It wasn't as urgent as the rubber boots. 

It was a bit of a scare thinking that some of the tax return money that was going to go into the beach vacation fund might have had to be used to pay the insurance deductible for a new roof...although I won't lie...I already had the new shingles picked out in my head.

Party Princess

One year ago, I was obsessively checking the website for Ke-Li's Golden Acres, knowing that there wouldn't be any new photos of the newest litter.  There were 12 of them, all little balls of golden fur.  We knew one of them was ours, but we didn't know which one.  From February to April I checked the website 2 or 3 times a week for new photos, glad that I wasn't going to have to choose which adorable little face would be coming home with me.  Although I did end up having to choose between Abby and a sister.  On the day that my sister and I went to pick up my puppy, Abby was playful, and affectionate, and liked to give kisses.  That was our puppy.

Over the past year, Abby has given us a lot of love, some headaches, and millions of kisses.  She makes me laugh almost every day.

We've watched her grow, and taught her tricks.  We've learned what sort of treats she loves, that she is incredibly social, and likes to go visit people or have people come to visit her.  She also enjoys trips to her vet, which might seem odd, but she gets lots of attention at the vet's office.

Abby loves to swim, be it in a big pool, or in her wading pool on the deck.  She doesn't like the dark or heat, and she thinks snow is the best thing in the world.

She adores peanut butter, chasing cats, and vanilla ice cream.  When we go shopping, she knows there will almost always be something for her in one of the bags.

 

We've graduated basic and intermediate training classes, and Abby pouts on Sunday afternoons when we aren't loading up to go to class. 



Yesterday our little puppy had her 1st birthday.  She got her birthday treat from Moochie & Co. and  a cake that sings "Happy Birthday".  Nick found her hat on sale at Old Navy.  We really don't make our dog wear hats all the time.  And teaching her to sit with a treat in front of her as big a huge accomplishment.  Abby's never met a treat she didn't like!

Cricut Cards

I recently discovered that I can make greeting cards with my Cricut.  It's really perfect because it's a quick little project and with teaching full time, and being a full time Masters student, my project time is limited until spring and summer breaks.  I didn't think to take pictures of the processes, but I do have pics of the final products. 

I also made this card for my cousin's birthday. 

I think my favorite part of making cards is that you can also make the envelopes to go with them.  My cricut isn't big enough to do them, but luckily my co-worker has none that is bigger than mine and very kindly loaned it to me for cutting out envelopes.  I did all mine in plain white but I jazzed one up for the birthday card.

I'm loving this new hobby.  Now I'm on the look-out for new cartidges to expand my card-making capabilities!

I am linking to...

Inspiring Creativity @ Dragonfly Designs

Make It Yours Day @ My Backyard Eden



Something a Little Different

Lately, there hasn't been anything blog-worthy happening around the Elgin household.  The only projects I've done consist of Powerpoint presentations for my Masters classes and projects for school.  Needless to say, it's not been very eventful around here aside from having a sick puppy.

I did, however, get a couple of projects done today, once again, revolving around my job.  I made a poster today for my sophomore classes who are preparing for their state graduation exam.  During their writing, it helps to have an idea in mind of exactly whom they are gearing their writing to.  After holding a "Test Lady Pageant" this was our winner...

They named their test lady Medusa Doonesbury Hotcakes.  I don't really know where they name came from...I didn't ask.

While I was working with the Cricut, I decided to try my hand at making a card with one of the new program I got for Christmas.  I think it turned out pretty cute.

I could make an envelope to go with it, but that requires a Cricut that uses 12x12 paper, and mine only uses 6x12.  So, I'm either going to have to use a friends and make a bunch of envelopes, or figure out a way to sell my Cricut and use the money to get a bigger one.  I think I'll go with the first option.