A Post about The Post

Since we bought our house, we've spent most of our time, energy, and cash working on the inside...which has been great! But, that's meant that the yard hasn't gotten the attention that it deserves, and so desperately needs in order to get it where we want it to be.

Bobby does an excellent job keeping the lawn (which is getting more and more brown by the day, through no fault of Bobby's and despite his valiant efforts to keep it alive...which has grown more and more difficult thanks to Royal's treatment of the sprinkler...but I digress) mowed on a regular basis. This act in itself is more attention than the yard had been getting before we moved in, but the flower beds are overgrown with weeds (there's only so much we can do, Grandma!), and there are shrubs that have turned into trees. 

I'm really hoping that next year (or even this fall, perhaps?) we'll be able to focus a bit more on outside projects. That seems likely. 

But, we have been able to make some progress lately in the landscaping department....

The lamp post in the front yard (I think of Narnia every time I say that..."lamp post"....) had a clematis plant attempting to climb it...key word, "attempting". It was really just more of a mess, and the look was quite dated. So, it had to go. (We still have a clematis in the back yard that is thriving, so I didn't feel quite so terrible ripping this one out in the front.)

Much better. Except that then we were left with the issue of the rotting wood at the base...which isn't quite the look we're going for. So, it had to go, too. 

After the wood was gone, the initial thought was to create a rock border around the base instead. So, we carried (okay, Bobby carried; I was on doggy-duty) lots of rocks from the backyard that had previously been used near the fountain. 

The fountain, I should mention, is no more. My sister said months ago that we "aren't fountain people", and though I can't say that I agree with her entirely, it was seeming to be more of a hassle than it was worth. Yes, the sound of trickling water was pleasant, but Royal was growing interested in the area, we didn't want to mess with chlorine tablets, we weren't particularly excited about paying for the electricity to run the thing...and, well, we know what it was doing to the bird population. So, when the pump stopped working and the standing water attracted bunches of Japanese beetles, we decided that enough was enough. Out came the fountain.

Anyway, Bobby carried lots of rocks to the front of the house, and I arranged them around the flower bed. And, wouldn't you know, I didn't like the finished look of it at all. It did coordinate well with the other rock landscaping around the yard, but it just wasn't working for me there. So, the rocks were removed...again (thanks, dear!)...and now we've decided to flatten out the dirt, lose the flower bed, and just let the grass grow around the lamp post. (Sweet Mr. Tumnus....)

I'll keep you posted. Pun most-definitely intended.

"Royal, NO!" - Part Three

Our screen didn't always look like this:

I'll give you one guess as to who is responsible.

Bingo. (Well, of course, not B-I-N-G-O.... It was Royal.)

Apparently the doggy door was just too tedious an exit, so Royal made a new one. Bobby says he was chasing a bug on the other side of the screen (Royal was, not Bobby...that would be weird), and just got too excited. 

Speaking of bugs. Screened-in porches are great...when all of the screens are present and accounted for. When they aren't, though...well, let's just say that I think our chances of being not surrounded by insects are better outside of the patio. It's been quite the popular stop for flies and wasps lately. And when I say "stop", I mean stop as in "last stop", since once they're in, they can never find their way out. 

Do we have problems, or what? 

(No, we don't. I love that my "problems" are having to fix a messed-up screen on the porch of the home my husband and I own because of our sweet puppy. Life is pretty darn good these days.) 

Once Royal started trampling on the flower bed, wouldn't you know the little tea roses started blooming? Go figure.

Then he trampled too much and they died. It happens.

The good news is that we found some matching screen out in the storage shed from previous owners. The bad news is that the piece doesn't fit. So, I guess that negates the good news. Rats.

We've Bobby has since removed the ripped screen, so at least it doesn't look mangled anymore. We'll replace it soon, but until then, Royal still has his "doggy opening"...and we're getting really talented with the fly swatter.

The End.

"Royal, NO!" - Part Two

I mean, you saw the title of the post...so you have to know what's coming. 

The none-too-pleased puppy parent.

The culprit.

Bobby and I came home one evening to find that the hose had been dragged into the middle of the yard, and entirely severed from the sprinkler to which it had previously been attached. 

I love this one.
"Son, I'm not happy with you...."
"Yeah, I know, Dad. So sorry about the hose. Couldn't help myself."

"See? You have another one! No big deal. Let me help!
By the way, I really like it here...please don't make me leave."

Sometimes he actually rests! (Sometimes.)
And he sure does look cute when he does.

The hose we're left with now has yet to be severed entirely, though it has been chewed to the point of having multiple holes throughout. Sure, it's annoying, but we're actually able to water about five plants at the same time...can you do that?! (It is pretty entertaining...the duct tape "plugs" didn't hold, so the holes are getting bigger and shooting off in several directions. Thank goodness it's so hot and getting a bit wet is refreshing!)

Anyway, there's not much point to replacing the hoses right now...who knows what else he's capable of?!

Stay tuned...I'll show you.

"Royal, NO!" - Part One

I've been looking through photos from the past month with the intention of getting up-to-date on all of Royal's latest "learning experiences". And, I'm discovering that in order to best showcase all of them, they need to be written in a series that I think I'll call, "Royal, NO!"

So, thus begins aforementioned series...the length of which depends on how quickly I can get these tails tales written...and what the dog decides to do in the meantime.

A few weeks ago, we had a morning thunderstorm. (You know, back when it still rained around here.) To be fair, I did very much appreciate that Royal decided to spend the rainy morning on the patio, instead of being outside and getting wet. But, mornings are usually his playtime and he had lots of energy to kill...so, he killed his blanket.

The blanket ended up with a lot less batting inside than was there before, and his bed got a lot less comfortable. His teething and chewing phase had begun...look out, world!

Doing the Laundry...Room

So, where were we when I last wrote in June? (June?! Has it really been that long?)

Ah, yes...Royal ate a squirrel and the living room was lined with file folders. We'll catch up later with the specifics of the last month, but let me just say that Royal has caused more destruction and the house has been further updated.

Speaking of house updates, I am happy to report that we have made serious progress in the laundry room!

Before.

During.

After all of the wallpaper removal...and mold treatment...and re-mudding the damaged sheetrock, we painted the cabinets and the walls (and the fuse box!). The room is adjacent to the kitchen, so we opted to use that same color scheme in an effort to make the rooms feel more cohesive...and, truth be told, we needed to use the rest of the paint. I was skeptical with the choice at first, but I'm quite pleased with how it turned out. The rooms really do flow quite well now. (Thanks for the idea, Mom!)

On our initial cleaning day at the house, my sister and I made short work of removing the mirrored cabinet above the sink. It seemed out of place and bulky for the space, so it had to go! I was thrilled to find a black mirror at the thrift store ($6.98, thank you very much!), and after giving it a quick spray paint facelift, it suits the space perfectly.

Here is the laundry room as it stands now:

I'm picturing (pun intended) a gallery of frames
to the right of the mirror...we shall see!

Now, the dryer is actually pushed up against the wall.
We still had some work to do getting the dryer duct in place at this point.
(I'll spare you the details...it was every bit as boring as you might expect...
except when Bobby cut his finger...that was kind of dramatic. He's okay, though.)

Big difference, yes? I think so. There's still work to be done, of course. (When is there not?) I can imagine a patterned Roman shade over the window, and the walls need...something. There's also still the issue of finding a hanging space for clean clothes, but we're getting there.

Oh, yeah...I'm back in the blogging mood now. More to come soon!

Royally Disgusting

I'll update about all of the cute things little Royal has been doing soon; we really are loving having him around. At the moment, though, I'm too frustrated with his disgusting behavior this morning.

A few minutes ago, I looked out the window to see Royal frolicking in the yard, per his usual morning routine. "How sweet", I thought. "What's in his mouth? Is that his rope? No.... Is that the washcloth? No.... Is that...? Oh, no...."

Yes, our dog was playfully tossing around a dead animal of some kind.

My mind quickly went to this possibility, since just last night we were sitting on the patio when he came in from exploring in the yard, and he had a distinctly gross scent. (Note to self: When the dog's mouth smells like something died, investigate the situation further.) 

It was a squirrel. A rotting, stinky squirrel. But it might as well have had "Toy for Royal" written all over it. Ugh. I corralled the animal (the live one), tied him to the porch (a task in itself while trying to minimize our contact...gross), grabbed the shovel from the garage, and scooped up the carcass.

And then, Royal got a Milkbone. (No, he shouldn't have gotten a treat, but his breath reeked...what would you have done?!)

The dog has a bath in his future today. He's due, anyway. It's 10 days past his surgery, so we should have the all-clear for bathing. But, because his first bath is not a task I care to take on by myself, that will have to wait until Bobby gets home.

Bless that puppy's heart. He was just playing, and I hated yelling at him for that...he really didn't understand.

But, well, whatever...we don't play with dead animals.

Folder Fodder

What, your living room isn't lined with manila file folders? No? Guess it's just me.

We're getting ready to paint the trim throughout the house, and realized that it wouldn't be as simple of a project as it was in the kitchen, where a strip of painter's tape on the tiled floor got the job done. No, for the rest of the carpeted house, we were preparing ourselves to either have to pull up the carpet along the edges, or take the trim off.

And then, last night, I had an "ah-ha!" moment.

The conversation between Bobby and I went something a bit like this:

E: "What if we buy a thin plastic drop-cloth and slide strips of it under the trim?"
B: "That could work."
E: "OR...(running through the house to grab a colored folder)...what if we can slide this under here...(shoving the folder under the trim to try out my theory)...Hey, let's just buy a bunch of these and cut them in half! They're probably about to be on sale with school starting!"
B: "Great idea." (He really was in more of a 'hang-out-with-the-dog-and-not-do-home-improvement' mood. I don't blame him.) 
E: "OR...(running through the house again to grab the box of 100 manila envelopes)...we could use these! We already have them! Do you want to do that tonight?!"
B: "I think that would be a great project for you to do tomorrow. You need something to do." (See what I mean? Oh, well. He was right...I did.)


So, there you have it...the story behind why our living room and hallway is currently lined with halved-manila file folders. I must say, this technique seems to be working quite well. It appears that the folders are thick enough to prevent paint bleed-through, but thin enough to slide easily under the trim, over the carpet...and, if it works, they will make what could have been an awful, awful project of removing carpet and/or trim, quite simple indeed.

Here's hoping this "look-what-I-did-creatively!" post isn't shortly followed by a "why-did-I-think-that-would-work?" one. Oh, well. This is how we learn!

Without Further Ado...

...allow me to (finally) reveal the updated kitchen in our new abode!

We've had the kitchen at this stage for a couple of weeks now, but what with our overwhelmingly-busy schedule as of late and, quite frankly, being rather tired of talking or thinking about the project overall, it's taken until now to write about it. You understand.

Anyway, a quick reminder of where we started and what we had to work with...

After staring at this in the living room for far too long getting all of these painted...

A coat of primer on each side + 2 coats of paint per side + drying time
= a much longer project than anticipated!

...and, after removing wallpaper...

Oh, so much wallpaper....
I'm still not ready to talk about it.

...mudding, then sanding, the sheetrock...

...priming and painting the base cabinetry...

...buying a fridge (!!!)...

...priming and painting the trim and walls...

We used two tones of grey, one above the chair rail in the dining area,
and a darker tone on the island and above the cabinetry.

(Valspar "Clean White", Olympic "Thin Ice", Olympic "Flagstone", & Valspar "Graphite"
all color-matched to Olympic Premium Semi-Gloss, Zero-VOC)

...painting the back of the built-ins, a la Young House Love...

We used the same deep tone for the built-ins as was used
below the chair rail in the dining area.

...and using a kitchen that looked like this for a while...

Mom was right...
it was surprisingly handy to not have the cabinet doors! 

...we bought and installed new hardware, and ended up with this!

We could not be happier with the finished product as it stands now. (I love the way YHL refers to their project photos: 'Before' and 'In Progress', instead of 'After'. There's always something else to do. Is it ever really finished?!)

We chose the white kitchen in order for the cabinetry to coordinate with the already-white built-ins, and it is most certainly a much more cohesive look now. The room feels far more open and inviting, and we were tickled by how our color choices really do work with the existing tile flooring. I absolutely love how much lighter the room is, how the white appliances (that I was never particularly fond of) now blend in almost seamlessly with the cabinetry, and how the butcher-block countertop really "fits" now. As my mom said, the kitchen now "feels contemporary, yet classic"...and, more importantly, it is very much "us".

Sure, there's more to be done. We have visions of a silver pendant light above the sink, new (non-fluorescent) lighting fixtures for the ceiling, and under-cabinet lighting, too. Bobby wants to paint the trim in the ceiling above the table, and we still need to paint the window trim...and the door frames...and the doors. But, all in due time. For now, we are just absolutely enjoying this feeling of completion and success for what we've done together so far! (And, I do mean "together". This project was so much fun, and so meaningful, because it was a joint effort. I'm having a blast making this house our home, with Bobby.)

We really did start our home renovation career with what I would consider to be one of the more challenging, costly, and lengthiest projects. We've agreed that anything else is going to seem like a piece of cake! Take, for example, our next project in the line-up...painting the non-wallpaper-covered living room! Shoot, that'll be a breeze.

The 100th Post

As this is my 100th blog post, it seems only fitting to briefly acknowledge the occasion. 'One hundred' sounds like a rather large number when I think about how, for each one of those posts, I've had to sit down, collect my thoughts, and share my musings with the world whoever wants to read about it. It's taken some discipline and confidence to do that! But, I'm so glad I decided to give this whole 'write-a-blog' thing a "go". 


In my very first post I wrote:

"What this will become I’m still unsure, but at this time with a changing world and the changes that I am facing at this point in my own life, the opportunity to write my thoughts on a regular basis seems to be a good idea."

January 20, 2009

I couldn't have said it better myself. (Wait....) Truly, though, that sentiment seems as fitting now as it did two years ago, and it continues to be a really fun thing to be able to reflect on my life through this medium.

Thanks for letting me share with you!

The "Royal" Family

The face that stole our hearts and we couldn't resist.

Bobby and I have been "puppy parents" for almost 48 hours now, and we are having entirely too much fun. We brought Royal home from the Humane Society on Monday evening, and he has been a joy ever since! (Interesting fact: Royal, formerly known as 'Brandon', is from Joplin. He wasn't misplaced by the tornado, but was moved to Springfield in order to make room at the Joplin shelter for other animals who were.)

That night, Royal made himself right at home. He was still a bit drowsy from his surgery (a fact which we realize even more now that he isn't), but he was very friendly...lots of snuggling and kisses! We like to think that he was grateful to be ours.

He slept through the night, with no whining, barking, or otherwise bothersome puppy behavior. Bobby and I were quite impressed, especially since there was a storm that night, complete with thunder, lightning, and rain. And, for a puppy at a new home sleeping on the patio, we were a bit worried about him. But, when we got out of bed at 2:30 a.m. to sneakily look out the window, he was neither upset, moving around, or otherwise disturbed. All seemed to be well. (Of course, we still had a hard time falling back to sleep. We are new parents, after all.)

Now, after two days of settling into his new home, Royal seems to be a playful (chasing his tail, robins, or running around with a leafy-stick seem to be his favorite hobbies), happy (that tail hasn't stopped wagging!), and loyal dog. He seems to handle being alone decently enough (he lived in a shelter, after all), but he really, I repeat, really, wants to be close to us all the time. In fact, he rarely leaves the patio by himself...which means that he also doesn't use the patio's doggy-door of his own accord to "go potty". Hello, house patio-training! The bad news is that he treats the patio as though it's indoors, and waits for us to let him out; the good news is, he (usually) waits for us to let him out.

The plan is for Royal to stay an outside dog. But, he really is happiest when we're with him, and the fact is, we love hanging out with him, too. Bobby said last night, though, that he doesn't want to live outside...which is pretty much what we've done for the past two days in order to spend time with our new pet. I was incredibly adamant during our pre-dog days that our soon-to-be-dog live outside, although multiple people tried to tell me that that never works. This is how we learn, I suppose. So, we'll see. There is most certainly a lot to consider!

In any case, Royal is now learning how to sit, how to deal with being on a leash, how to use one spot of the yard to "go potty", and that it isn't okay to bark at people. As my mom said, it's hard to know if some of his current behaviors are a result of a) being a puppy, b) his breed--Golden Retriever mix, in case you were curious...we're pretty sure there's some Beagle in him, too, c) living in a shelter for months, or d) all of the above. 

We've got some work to do, but he seems very teachable, and very eager to please. The biggest lesson I hope he's learning is that we're not going anywhere. No one's going to take him away, and we'll always come back. It's fun to think that maybe he's starting to understand that....

Bobby and I have a new joint "project", a new shared love of another living thing, and we're really enjoying this adventure together. If the excitement we feel about waking up early in the morning to see our "baby", the absurd number of photos I've taken to capture it all, and the joy we're experiencing in loving (and being loved by) this animal is any indication of what parenthood is like.... If being a puppy-parent is even remotely comparable to the joy that being a person-parent is...well, that's pretty incredible, and definitely something to look forward to.

Welcome to our family, Royal. You're a keeper! We hope we get to love you for a long, long time.