Trav, Ash, Mom and myself (a mini HGTV crew) put in long hours and lots of work this past weekend updating our house. The whole thing started when Ash and I were sitting in the living room this past week and Ash says to me, "do you think we should paint the kitchen?" I immediately perked up and said, "how about we do the walls that have never been painted instead (the living room, the hallway, the huge wall going down the steps, etc.)?" She doesn't even think about it (which was probably a good thing, no time to really think about how much work it was going to be), and says, "let's do it." After we both agreed, I had to get the okay from Trav, and once he was on board, it was time to figure out what to do with the kids. Luckily Grandma and Grandpa Quast were brave enough to step up to the task off having all three of the kids for two nights and three days - thank you, thank you, thank you! With the kids figured out, I moved onto getting more help. I needed just one more person, someone who would keep going even when we wanted to stop, someone who would do all the icky jobs no one else would. And lucky for me, that person was Mom! With the crew assembled, we got to work. Ash and I got most of the pre-work done (taping, removable of face plates) on Thursday, and when Friday night came, it was straight to work. By the end of the night, Trav and Ash had one coat of paint on (I wasn't feeling so hot so I didn't help much) and were ready to take on more. Between the two of them, they decided that it was best for us to paint the kitchen as well (pretty sure they were delirious by this point). I of course agreed with them (it was after midnight by this time) and everyone wrapped things up and went to bed (so much for our early night we planned). Saturday morning came early with Mom calling to say she wasn't going to be able to make it up because of the weather (last weekend - beautiful and warm, this weekend, lots of blowing snow). We were still a little sleepy when she called so I didn't think much of it, but when I really woke up and realized that she wasn't coming, I felt a little panicked - we needed the "task master" to keep things moving. After a little thinking, I called Mom up and offered to meet her half way if Dad would drive the other half - with no hesitation on her end, we agreed and the team was four strong again. By 10:30am, we were back in action, and by 7:30pm that night, we had everything painted - six cans of paints later, we were finally done!! We treated ourselves to a meal out, took showers, then called it a night. Sunday was our fun day. The girls went shopping for "finishing touches" while Trav slept off all of his hard work. By 3:00pm, with multiple shopping trips to Ikea, Lowe's, and Micheal's, we had everything done - the window treatments hung, new hardware on the cabinets, the pictures up on the walls, you name it, it was done (except the blinds that we had to special order). And now we get to sit back and enjoy the fruits of our labor. The place looks completely different - think warm and inviting vs stark and cold. And when I went through all of my receipts (and there were many of them), we got it all done at a reasonable price. I like to think that we pulled off one of those HGTV "Designed to Sell" makeovers . . . $2,000 budget and two days to get it done - it's not impossible after all! Here are some pictures to show off our hard work. I had intended on taking some before and after shots, but somehow I managed to forget the "before" - oops ( just picture gross, bare, white walls and you'll have a pretty good idea of what it used to look like) - enjoy!
The last picture is the new wall unit to house all the kids' toys downstairs - pretty sure they have way too many, the thing is completely full already!
As you probably already guessed, we spent some time down at Grandma and Grandpa's house this weekend. Ash had her wedding shower on Saturday morning so everyone (minus Trav and Mike) packed up and headed south. It was a tight squeeze with everyone and all their things (most of those "things" belonged to Ellie and Colton - they are some needy little people) in the house, but it was fun to have everyone together. Dad said it best, "I like having everyone here, but I would never want to do this everyday - it's a lot of work." The good news is that Dad will have a little break - we all won't be back again for another 7 days! See you soon Grandpa (and get lots of rest while you can)!
Ellie's face says it all - time to wrap things up and go to bed.
