Finally - progress! - cleaning up my drafts!!!

I am cleaning up my drafts section & found some floating posts, so I'll be posting them this week!!!

We have finally put up the siding to finish our living room window project. Don't get me started on the interior trim... The siding is up. If it stays warm enough this week it will be painted & then I can say that the exterior portion of that repair will be complete!

We decided to replace instead of change the siding. So instead of putting up something new & different we just matched (sort of) what was there.

FYI:
We used a type of cement board. We purchased 16 foot lengths. I caulked the joints and exposed nails. We primarily used a hidden nail installation method, but some locations that just wasn't possible, or since we were installing over some areas of old siding we hadn't removed just wasn't working!





Stumble It!

My late Tackle it Tuesday!!!

We spent most of the day Sunday finishing the bathroom (well almost, it still needs trim). But we did get the counter & cupboards in & cleaned (they've been in the basement for 2 years)! There is a mirror to go here, but we have to be creative in the way it gets hung, no studs in the proper places! Thankfully we bought lots of base trim, a construction pack! The Ugly spot on the left will get covered by a wide piece of painted wood & have towel hooks on it (That's where there used to be a wall & door).

The other mirror matches the one over the sink.


I hung the towel bar all by myself!

I picked up this laundry hamper at Big Lots for $15. The trim next to it will get installed at some point, just not anytime soon! I'm not even sure where it was supposed to go, found out too late hubby didn't measure the right areas, oops. I realized when I went to dry fit it, after painting it. That was a lovely afternoon!!!

I still need to finish painting the door & window trim in my "Bear Rug" brown. Think chocolate bar, milk, not dark!!!

I also picked up an extra box of the floor tiles. We need to do the laundry room & upstairs bathroom. I guess I really like the gray slate vinyl tile look!!!








Stumble It!

My Laundry Room Closet

I swore I had posted about this project before, but I can't find it now...




My coat closet may not be as pretty as the Organizing Junkie but when it's cleaned up it's functional. Barely, but hey details! I was hoping for more space to use the shelves & the top self is so high I can almost reach it using m y step ladder... It's become a good place for hubby to store his hunting gear.









We moved the dryer to carve out this space. When we moved in there was a table here for folding, but my old dryer wouldn't fit side by side with the washer. Now that I have 2 new appliances they fit in the proper space. Of course they usually look like this.

It's hard to fathom just how much this house has changed since we've moved into it. I hope it likes us! We rip out carpet and walls & paint over ugly wallpaper, bad owners!!!




I have no idea how I'm going to pare down our stuff when we sell. But the house we are moving to (maybe, someday, 3 years down the road...) is HALF the size of our space... I am just going to keep decluttering and hope that I can get rid of a lot in the auction my parents will HAVE to have when they move.

This room photographs well, the ugly purple paint doesn't look so ugly or purple in these pictures. Maybe I won't have to paint it! And I found the border at the dollar store, so I know the previous owners didn't spend a small fortune on this room to decorate it!




Stumble It!

PODA update

So, it's been too humid to weed, it wouldn't be so bad if there was any amount of shade to be had! That's the only bad with full sun exposure! And of course since it's on my list of things to do I haven't touched the apartment side of the house, I did paint the trim on our side porch though. I even washed out my brush and container! Woohoo!!! We are preparing to re-do the screen and install a sliding screen door, so that needs to be painted before we hang screening.

I am off to spray paint one of my wicker chairs, then I need a break!

Daily
Laundry
Dishes
Food
summer Rec for boy
27 Fling boogies
surfaces, surfaces, surfaces!



Weekly Zone Chores
Zone 5 is the living room and apartment side yard, usually there are only a day or 2 here, but this week it's 5 days.
1. Flat surfaces
2. Detailed vacuuming
3. dust knick knacks
4. dust trims and cobwebs
5. put something pretty in the room - like flowers

outside
1. weed around steps
2. scrape siding on entry
3. if weather is nice paint


Special weekly things
~Make sure carport/tent is ready for neighbors to borrow & us to set up Thursday
~RSVP for wedding
~golf on Thursday
~art program Wednesday
~sweep
~mop kitchen
~mop bathroom


Menu Plan Monday

Our Menu:

I'll be making pasta (penne and canned sauce), pizza (crust is in the freezer), grilled chicken legs (probably with home made BBQ sauce), freezer pickles, boxed mac and cheese (with peas and tuna), somehow using up the lunch meat (grilled salami and provolone sounds good to me!)!!!


Stumble It!

Painting the Money Pit

Painting the house (at least part of it) is a big project for us. We've had the paint for 2 years, I was waiting to get a sprayer to make it easier but it couldn't wait any longer! We needed to get the spot ready where the hot tub is going (hand me down from parents).

Why Cheap is not always Frugal

DH is upstairs on the other PC researching repair parts for his miter saw. Apparently the flat parts that are supposed to keep the blade straight are not very flat anymore (if they ever were). We haven't used it a ton for actual miters, mostly just straight cuts. But I noticed when he cut the trim for the bathroom the angles were "off".

I discovered that the tilt was set to below 0, Dh had only paid attention to the angle it's self. Apparently there are parts that are worn or bad that would have made this error less likely.

We knew this wasn't a top of the line power tool when we bought it but I did figure that it would make it through the "little" bit of trim work our house requires. And it makes me angry that after maybe 2 years of owning the tool & maybe having used it 20 times it needs repair.

Thankfully it seems the part is fairly common & we should be able to upgrade it when we replace it. How inexpensively I don't know yet.

Sometimes I just want to ask...

What does the world have against us??? We received our tax refund & made several much needed purchases (and some not so needed, but nothing over the top obnoxious). SO what happens Friday??? I am in the kitchen one minute all is well, I grab the remote to turn on some cleaning music & then I hear it. WATER??? Nothing was running, so I go investigate only to find a leaking pipe in the laundry room. Of course, I should have known. We had just gotten the dryer moved in all happy next to the washer & bam we have to move everything out to fix the pipe. The lines froze overnight in the cold & I didn't run the washer just the dryer so it thawed the joint & made a leak, oops am I bad???

So after hauling out all the laundry products on my newly well placed shelf, the shelf & the dryer... Hubby cut out the bad joint and we headed to town for some fittings. While it was all apart we insulated the pipes & filled the wall with more insulation. For anyone who doesn't know our house is 141 years old, so it has issues, BIG ones. Like big gaping holes in the walls that just suck cold air into the house. The laundry room was an addition over a crawl space so the plumbing is all run above the floor & outside of the walls. The dryer vent hole (not cut by us) was HUGE and in the same location as the pipes. Of course we also wrapped the heat exchanger over the furnace which has been effective in lowering the temperature of the basement, maybe we need to rethink that one!!!! My dryer vent is very effective at pulling in air so the metal vent laying on top of the copper lines just wasn't a good plan. Sorry to all the experts but hey, live & learn!

It just figures that the one thing we didn't buy in our Home improvement shopping spree was a soldering kit, so we had to borrow my Dad's. OF course it never dawned on me that we should have just called a plumber. If hubby wasn't capable of piecing in some copper my Dad can. It is nice to have handy people in the family.

But while we were at the store we also bought a new hot water heater, electric to replace the 2 that heat our upstairs water. The apartment's gas hot water heater appears to be one of the first tank heaters ever invented and is very scary when it fires up. I'll be glad to get rid of it. I am impressed at how long it has lasted, usually 10-12 years on a water heater is tops, but this baby is O-L-D! And it will also supply hot water to the front bathroom, which will be part of the Master Bedroom soon.

Looks like we'll be making a scrap yard run sometime in the spring!!!

New Energy Saver in the House...

Sigh... Doesn't it always seem to figure, as soon as you think you are at least caught up if not ahead a little when a bottle of laundry detergent falls into the washer & blows it to pieces (I had to leave the lid open because the trigger fell apart) this is the same part we had to have fixed a few months ago so there was no way I was spending another $100 on this 7 year old washer (that's 2/3rds the original price, pushing 3/4). We had Lowe's cards from Christmas, they were going to go to a couple of kitchen cupboards but I can't be with out a washer.

We got so LUCKY! Someone had returned a pair of GE front loaders the day before. We grabbed the washer at $200 off regular retail, bought the extended 5 warranty (cuz ya never know) & paid almost the same out of pocket as we did for the old one. Bonus: Energy costs on this washer are $10 with electric hot water at $0.086/KWH, our rates are about half that, so we'll see just how much this saves us. The old one was listed at $76 per year.

Still in the Bathroom...

The wallpaper is up now I am pre-painting the trim... Looks like a hershey bar, makes me hungry, probably not the best choice of color...

We did start gathering tax info, so tis the season!!!

Hanging Wallpaper

...is not nearly as hard as I thought it would be. Of course I didn't pick a restricting pattern with impossible matchings to be made. It is however highly time consuming.

It took us about 8 hours to do the ceiling. Our mistake was marking every 21" with a line, that took a while, especially when all we really needed was one line to work off of. Much of the rest of the time was spent waiting for the glue to cure, 5 minutes per strip. The pattern was easy to line up since it was mostly boxes (think tin ceiling tiles). The walls aren't done yet, but I only have the old closet left to do & I am waiting for some Spackle to dry. I was almost done with it yesterday but I noticed that there were some areas that just needed a little more help & it was time for the school bus to arrive anyways! What is left should be simple & only take me half of the day LOL! It's at least 6 strips of paper so that's 30 minutes just waiting for the glue!!!

The wallpaper project cost us just around $100 including tools we didn't already have.

We still have $114 to spend the rest of the project will be stuff we already have (approx $150 worth) So we'll be around the $1000 mark (in approx value of stuff we bought & already had) & it will look like we spent so much more. Mostly because we used a lot of things we already had, bought carefully & reused a lot of stuff (I LOVE spray paint!)

The been busy remodeling

So here's what I'm reading post...

Make it from Scratch

I will be giving this one a try...
MYO Pita recipe
This would be a great addition to the "Un-Grocery" list.

Carnival of the recipes

Pop on over to Renovating the Money Pit to see what we've been up to & what our remodeling goals for the year are. The bath is almost done, we just need to put up the wall paper (ew, but there is no other way to get a smooth wall), we did pick a nice neutral texured paint looking paper. If it wasn't a bathroom I'd do the technique myself. We bought the "tin" look paper for the ceiling, should look nice painted with the mold resistant paint & then rubbed with a tin color paint. Then some new trim & the project will be done, sigh. On to the next room!!! Kitchen I think, that is cabinets small counter top & some trim. Think it's the least destructive of our future projects!!!

2008 Goals

Goals, resolutions whatever you call them! I was working on these while babysitting 2 8 year old twins, so I may need to tweak them.

1. Budget our money better. Pay bills on time- while our village doesn't report to credit companies, the pay the electric bill every 2 months is starting to drive me batty.

2. Pay down our debt by at least $2400. We have a loan payment of $130 a month so we'll snowball the other $70 into the best place for it. Number 3 was list debts so we know what we have to pay when, but it fits better with #2.

3. Use savings, rebates & misc found money to fund our emergency fund. We had a good start to it last year but it was depleted opening various checking & saving accounts that are more accessible to us. Once we get the direct deposit fixed we'll set up a weekly payment back into the ING account. We want to have at least $1000 in the EF by December 31, 2008

4. Blog daily, I have been neglecting my blogging. Mostly because I work online as well & it is just a lot of sitting in front of the computer.

5. Work on one DIY project everyday. We have a HUGE list of improvements we will be making in 2008 and most are to be done by us. The only thing I won't do is the roof!

6. Do better at cards to friends & family. Birthdays, anniversaries, etc. I have been really slacking lately.

7. Focus on MYO (make your own) mixes and grocery items. Now that I have the stand mixer of my dreams, and while it still wasn't the "Frugal" thing on my list it was a deal you just couldn't walk away from. The day we bought it the Licorice was available for $259.99, free shipping & a $50 rebate. So we end up only paying $10 more than my Mom did for her Artisan. Plus I have the horse power I need for it to last a very long time.


I mean really, the bread machine I want was $199 and it only took me a year to kill the $50 bread machine I had!!! Plus I will be selling my old stand mixer on ebay sometime after the holidays (last set like mine sold for $102).

8. Eliminate more clutter. As we can replace substandard items with good quality items I need to get rid of the old stuff!!!

We have to be really careful with our money now that we are back to one main income source & we are planning on moving some rooms around again on top of the remodeling & updating.

Of course I am babysitting again. When school is in it's only a couple hours a day, but they are friends with my kiddos so it's nice. And they were here almost everyday while someone else was getting paid to watch them...

So who knows what 2008 will hold, I am going to spend the last few days of 2007 reflecting & celebrating with my family!

Happy New Year!

October 1st????

The month of September went by in a blur! A blur of early mornings, late evenings, arguing about homework, almost daily baths/showers, bills and ignoring the budget.

WE got totally upside down this month, which stinks because it is going to take another month to get right side up again. Started with the washer breaking, $92 later I am back to abusing my GE! We bought a used car & had to fix it up & put it on the road. A much needed expense, but an expense none the less. And my poor van is still sitting at the repair shop, I'm not sure if it's because we can't pay the almost $1000 bill or if the mechanic really doesn't feel like tackling the huge project! Unfortunately for him we are wanting it fixed. I was so discouraged earlier in the week I had considered cutting our losses & sell it for scrap or a project car. But hubby told me that if we put this $ into it, we'd be able to trade it in for full book value by the end of the year (or shortly after). So I am trying to look at it as a win win, either way I will finally have my soccer mom vehicle back & we'll be back to a 2 vehicle family!!! Progress!

We are still trying to sell our concession trailer. I think that if it doesn't sell locally in the next month I'm going to list it on Ebay. Everyone around here is looking to haul their motorcycles & snowmobiles, it is just too finished for that!

We opened a checking account attached to our TD Ameritrade account. I missed checks so much! It was convenient, they arrived just in time for school pictures & a PTA fundraiser (cookboks). The account earns interest, plus it isn't one for everyday use, so we won't be using a ton of checks just more checks for things I would have used cash for in the past (like the MIA school book order from last Christmas...). Which means that the $ will actually earn interest! Woohoo!

Other progress an the home front, we had a tree taken down (our unexpected expense, he just showed up and started cutting, he was supposed to come & tell us when we were on the schedule, oops). It was old & wasn't ever going to fall in the direction we wanted it to, and it wasn't nearly as expensive as I've heard from others. I can't imagine having to pay $2500 to have a tree taken down, we are spoiled it only cost us $400.

That's about it, I'll have to go over the goals and do an end of Summer wrap up! Maybe after dinner :D.

Busy Weekend.

Just a quick Hi ! some pics of what we hope is a positive home improvement project... We finally got around to installing the window we bought in June. Once we started pulling off the trim we realized just how wrong this window was installed. It had to come out. After we started there were only a few sets of nails holding it in, no caulk, just mouse visited insulation & rotten siding. EEEWWW!

Sorry the first two pictures are so dark, it was almost 9PM before I realized I hadn't taken any pictures yet. You can see the OSB boards we installed over the side of the house. We had to pull off 2 layers of siding & paper. The reason we took off so much is because it was rotten to that point. The Masonite siding was wet under the window & most of it folded like cardboard. The wood clapboard siding that wasn't soft was brittle. Both sets of backing paper were marked with water from some point in time.


This is us hanging the wrap. I didn't get pics of us taking out the window because I was underneath it hauling it out one pane at a time!



This is the finished window. It is not clean yet, but I will be working on that later today. We still need to find screens to fit, but I'd say that the $60 window + the $175 in other materials we bought (OSB, insulation, wrap, staples) and the 6" of lumber my Dad gave us was worth it in the end! Bonus: We only used about 20 feet of the 150' roll of wrap. Now we'll have plenty on hand for the next repair project!

Why do we torture ourselves so???

The hubby & I had a realization, a light bulb moment, if you will yesterday. We took BOTH children to Wal-Mart. What were we thinking? Well the Prince has a birthday party today & I wanted him to pick out the gift & The Princess, well she is 3 & I'm pretty sure CPS would frown upon leaving her home alone! The realization - neither one of us EVER wants to do that again! The 4 of us in a store is just too much.

All in all I think we escaped with little damage. It was later in the evening & both kiddos had already had a full day of outdoor fun, so I figured they would be too tired to fuss obnoxiously. Was I wrong or what! We only made 1 unexpected purchase, zoopals utensils. They were a little cheaper than the frosted animal cookies they like, so they had to trade. We'll see if reason works come Wednesday when they want a snack!

Anywho - Total damage $83
$10 gift
$10 pool filter 2 pack
so $63 for food & household stuff

We went out Friday for dinner using Restaurant.com Dining Certificates
for a local restaurant. I bought the $10 certificates during a sale so I paid $6 for $40 in certificates. Regular price would have been $12 (still not bad). You have to use them one at a time, but even with 4 of us our bill was only $28, so we paid $18 + $1.50 (for the certificate). We had enough leftover for a small dinner last night for all 4 of us so that $19.50 fed us twice. Plus the kids were rather well behaved, so bonus!

We have been spending more money than I would care to lately, but we are doing it to finish some much neglected projects. We found windows on clearance, and we bought one to replace the icky leaky window in our living room. It was $60 for a 72"x63" window. I don't remember original sticker exactly but I think it was $198. It was cheaper than the sliding door we originally wanted to put in the space (that was $1500 for the nice door + installation & permits).

We were hoping to pick up a few windows, but that was the only one they had the correct size for. The window in now is a triple with 2 crank outs, one crank out is broken & warped so it doesn't close & the frame cracked so it is unsealed (ant super highway). I've thought about caulking it, but hubby was supposed to replace it the summer we moved in... The new window is a double vinyl double hung with mullions between the panes. It is missing the screens but it WAS on clearance!

We also finally bought the "stuff" to set up the batting cage. Not a very frugal purchase but I was informed about it the day before it arrived via UPS. He picked that up last spring & it has been sitting in the box ever since. Now it will at least be a useful splurge! It came with a golf net too, so maybe I'll be able to practice. I'd love to be able to hit the ball farther than 25 yards a swing before hubby drags me out on the course!

I also went to a bunch of yard sales this weekend (reason there was no Frugal Friday Tip!) A neighboring community had it's attic & sellar days. I scored big time for the Princess. $29 for 3 bags of clothes, most new with tags. In the bags were 5 dance leotards (she'll be taking dance in the fall), a winter coat, lots of t-shirts, 4 skirts, 2 pants, 3 pjs, 3 sweaters, 4 or 5 turtlenecks & a boutique style dress/outfit. I figure she is set for clothes for the next 2 years with minor filling in with some seasonal stuff. Right now she is a 3T/4T so most of what I bought was in the 4/5 range. Lots of good preschool clothes. If it needs a little altering I can handle it, but I figured out that I'd have spent more on the dance outfits than I did for the entire purchase! Sweet!

I also picked up 3 pair of shorts & 2 t-shirts for the Prince, 6 books (including Harry Potter- Sorcerer's Stone), 6 silk ties for hubby, 2 new table cloths & a pair of pillow cases (for either fabric or the Princess's room haven't decided yet).

If anyone here is into sewing/quilting sign up for my Fat Quarter Swap. It's themed Patriotic, sew here comes the red/white/blue!!!

Also if you have faved me in Technorati & I haven't reciprocated please let me know. Last time I went to Technorati I couldn't find the list of people who had faved me so I feel I must be far behind!

The countdown begins

And other stupid stuff going on in my life right now...

It is Thursday - Hubby starts his new job Tuesday & so far we are expecting a paycheck Friday, otherwise it won't come until May 4th, that could make things tight...eeek! So we are 6 days away... It may not seem like a HUGE thing to most, but it is going to cause major upheaval here. He has been working 3rd from home for over a year now, of course we had the food shops too, but he took last summer off from the job. Now he will be 8-5 working 45 minutes away. We have no cell phone & at the exact moment no car on the road. The next few days will be challenging to say the least!

To top this event off, hubby broke a bone in his foot 2 days ago. He was carrying the desk chair upstairs & rolled the foot. I sent him to the ER when it started swelling in only one spot, I've sprained before & it swelled EVERYWHERE... so 1 1/2 hours in the ER & an air cast. The instructions he was given said to use crutches, but he wasn't given any or any assistance getting out of the hospital. How does "Stay off of it completely for a few days" translate to "walk yourself to your car with out crutches"... We were able to locate a pair in the family so we didn't have to go buy any, thank goodness!

While annoying, (and painful for him, ~eye rolling~) it wouldn't have been so bad if:

a) It is still cold here & our furnace is still going, it HATES me & I have an impossible time of dealing with it

b)we ran out of coal & had to have a few bags delivered, which means I am lugging 50# bags of coal down our basement stairs, cuz the store dropped them on our porch not outside our basement door, grateful & yet... (ok wouldn't even be worth mentioning, except delivery guy & store partner is hubby's best friend)

c) we are now mid way through taking over the upstairs apartment, I had to haul the file cabinet up by myself & my sewing stuff could be in the basement for a month at least, the next piece of furniture I get to haul (without injuring myself, knocking on wood!) is my old sewing desk. It is heavy & old so it's wood, up 16 stairs with a 180 degree turn, wish me luck!

d)we need to do minor reworking of the plumbing before we can use the bathroom up stairs, we had the gas shut off so no hot water. We are going to reroute the line through our hotwater heater & move the back apartment to the newer tank. So we are getting rid of the ancient hotwater heater (sounds like a jet plane taking off when it runs, creepy).

e)he starts work Tuesday, which means I will only be able to get him to help on weekends, oh wait baseball starts next week, hubby is possibly coaching (on crutches hehehe!) so the 5th Saturday of never I may get him to do the heavy lifting...

f)we decided to get my sewing studio out of the basement (better light, no musty smell) so I can start sewing things to sell. I still haven't figured out what I am doing, but I'll get there!

I think I forgot to discuss the apartment.

We decided a few things that are life changing 1 - we aren't going to rent the front apartment out again, it was the easiest way to get our 2nd bathroom, the kids a playroom, a bigger office & upstairs sewing studio... 2 - We are stuck in this house for at least 5 more years & I am going to be doing that on my terms, don't want another terrible tenant abusing privileges & flooding my house 3 - hubby's new job is going to double our income so we can afford to pay more $ on the mortgage without the rental income, we still have 1 apartment to help out 4 - going from a 3 apartment to a 2 apartment we may be able to lower our insurance premiums (for some reason 3 was where things went up...) So I think the benefits outweighed the cons on this one & now I am burdened with the task of not only completing the transition, but also to make it worth while & make $ from up here (we used the argument that our business was leasing the space to avoid the you can't afford it argument from my parents).

So much to do & so much time spent re-doing my myspace layout this morning...must go do laundry!!!

Monday Morning

So we were finally able to show the apartment this weekend. It isn't 100% finished but we are close. We'll be listing it in the paper this week.

Still need to do:
Clear coat the floor (requires a trip to store, I only have oil based poly)
hang mini blinds I bought yesterday
clean larger mini blinds
hang shower curtain
clean tub
touch up bedroom ceiling
install stove & washer
clean fridge
finish clearing out our tools & leftovers

Then we'll be done, for now atleast. If anything we learned how much we need to put insulation in the attic & rewire the upstairs on our project lists. Each apartment has it's own sub panel, but they run into our panel as one, except of course for the circuits not run into the sub panels... Make sense to you? Didn't to me either!

I put frosted window film on the lower part of the bathroom window. My plan was to eliminate any window covering, allowing more light in. It worked, the film looks great & I don't see a reason to turn on the lights unless it's dark out. Before the window had a blue mini blind covering it & the lights got left on all day & night (did I mention I pay the electric bill...) I also hung the roller shades half way instead of all the way at the top of the windows in the main living areas. I will also be moving the kitchen blinds. I figure privacy isn't an issue, but the more light we can let in the lower my electric bill will be!

I wish I had that option downstairs. Our kitchen is so dark the only 2 windows look onto a covered & screened in side porch. I have to have lights on all day, as long as we are in the room. I had the main light converted to CF light bulbs, but they went upstairs with the old fan. My new fan is too pretty to put the ugly twisty CF bulbs in. SO next time we are at the home store we'll pick up 4 of the prettier ones!

I hope it gets rented soon, the longer it sits empty the more I want to keep it that way! I really don't want anyone messing up all the work I just did...

Wednesday...**Updated 5:30PM!

It is anti-procrastination Wednesday in the FlyLady world. I am going to clean my kitchen!

The mission that I have chosen to accept is to clear off my side table & counter. Most of my small appliances are out on the counter & the side table is where EVERTYTHING gets dropped when we walk through the door.

I am also going to:
Painting the ceiling in the upstairs kitchen
Touch up bathroom walls
3rd coat of gloss on cabinet doors
Take hardware off above fridge cupboard before painting
Install repaired window (with dh)
Start priming the floor (front of windows & inside of closet)
Laundry (1 load)
Make spaghetti sauce w/meatballs for dinner
~I bought the meatballs, only because it was cheaper per pound than ground to MYO, what is up with that???
Vacuum the Princess's room & living room

My To do for Thursday is:
Laundry
Dishes
zone mission (kitchen)
finsih kitchen cupbaords for hanging
wash mini blinds upstairs
put up window frost film upstairs bathroom
clean floor & tub in bathroom upstairs
WALK with my sister
scrub my tub out with comet & soak toys overnight in bleach water

ADD
VACUUM house
Paint kitchen floor, first coat


Left to do in apartment
Move stove upstairs, convert back to gas
get washer & install
buy 2 mini blind to replace broken ones
clean!

Our weekend

I think my life is far too focused on these darn repairs... I'll post our $ totals once I know what they are. I'm sure it will depress me, but I'll get over it. It'll just be one more notch to my side of the not wanting to re-rent it argument! There is nothing frugal about this, but we are trying to do our best, using things we already have, replacing with energy conservation in mind...

We spent Friday at Lowes. Pretty much all day, I don't recommend it if you are trying to NOT spend $ ! I did get lunch out of the deal (and dinner & lunch the next day thanks to leftovers!), we used a couple gift cards we ordered with our tax refund.

In trying to decide on a light fixture for the kitchen upstairs we spotted a ceiling fan that I instanly fell in love with! So we ordered it for our kitchen & we are going to move our current fan upstairs (I don't like it, too white!). So ours will be going upstairs as soon as that ceiling gets painted (today). Woohoo! I love that somehow in all this I am getting things I want too!!!

Still have to do:
Finish painting bathroom cabinet door fronts then done!
3rd coat of gloss white on waiscotting
paint upper walls in bath
paint over spackle in closet/pantry
replace 13 plugs & 2 light switches
paint 1 wall
paint bedroom ceiling, I still have a couple spots to touch up, but it's mostly done.
paint kitchen ceiling
New light fixtures
Fix window replaced with new plexi & glued & strapped frame, it'll hold just won't be able to use it (of course it's one of the curved ones...)
caulk kitchen counter
paint upper cabinet & rehang It is mostly painted (1 more coat)then I need to finish once it's hung...
wash blinds & rehang
clean carpet
clean rooms
hang shower curtain
hang curtain hardware
install digital thermometer
caulk & paint kitchen floor *Started caulking yesterday
bring stove upstairs
replace back apartment stove
install washer
I'm sure there is more, but I can't think of anything yet!!!

Of course our home is starting to look abandoned! I managed to get the dishes almost caught up yesterday & a couple loads of laundry folded & the kids stuff is put away... I will have my bedroom back by the end of the month or there will be mutiny here! I have to cook something that really qualifys as food for dinner & we need to vacuum, but I need to get that apartment rented ASAP!!! Priorities, I know...

Update on me!

I know like you care!!! We have been so busy with repairing the apartment that I have fallen behind where I wanted to be in posts & surfing (networking sounds better!). I recently was approved for loudlaunch here so I'll be giving that a try. Anything to help pay a few bills around here! I am waiting another 3 days for this blog to be over 90 days for the Pay Per Post approval. I'll let you know how that is going as well, after I begin at least!

I did submit a tip to daytipper.com (ok 4 so far, but only 1 was accepted) but it hasn't been published yet, so I haven't been paid. I submitted my blog to www.money4blogs.com & received $15 for putting a link in the side bar for the year, not bad & it's just a text link.

I didn't start this blog to make me a million dollars, but making a little here & there is a nicety. I don't think I am entertaining or knowledgeable enough to put up a "tip jar" so browse, click & enjoy.

I need to go start dinner, so I'd better wrap things up here!

The Prince seems to be feeling better, so maybe he'll go to school tomorrow & then we can go to the store & pick up the stuff we need to finish the apartment (gotta get it ready to rent before the 15th). We still have to paint a couple ceilings, one wall, the bathroom & the kitchen floor. Then we need to pick up a washer, cover a pass through door, & clean. We'd like to put a new entry door in but it's not gonna happen yet, since we technically need 2 & the one directly into the apartment will have to be fitted, I doubt we'll find a reasonable 84" x 31" prehung.

I did change the locks & we have already done:

Removed the paneling on almost all the walls
Repaired the plaster
Painted the walls (3 coats)
Painted the bathroom vanity
changed out ugly window blinds for nicer roller shades
removed a window & measured (now we need to find 3 matching cheap HA)
repaired the kitchen ceiling (we have a minor roof leak & materials to fix when the weather is 65+ degrees it can be fixed)
Removed icky boards under washer & dryer
Had heater motor rebuilt
inspected attic
insulated the weird old window holes we found behind the paneling
removed all old curtain hardware (boy can the years & number of tenants add up in that regard)
broken dryer hose removed

Still have to do:
Finish painting bathroom cabinet
3rd coat of gloss white on waiscotting
paint upper walls in bath
paint over spackle in closet/pantry
replace 13 plugs & 2 light switches
paint 1 wall
paint bedroom ceiling
paint kitchen ceiling
caulk kitchen counter
paint upper cabinet & rehang
clean carpet
clean rooms
hang shower curtain
hang curtain hardware
install digital thermometer
caulk & paint kitchen floor
bring stove upstairs
install washer
I'm sure there is more, but I can't think of anything yet!!!