To Do List for this fall

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- NEW CARPET (Yeah, I know we got the carpet cleaned. The pee smell came back. Long story short, we got a refund for the pet cleaning thing and we are just going to suck it up and get new carpet. I swear I will quit talking about the carpet soon. We are waiting for our tax return. You know, the rest of it.)

- Possibly get a new couch for downstairs, but depending on finances this might get pushed back to spring

- Get some patio furniture covers. We are so ghetto looking. We don’t want the cushions to get moldy so we just keep them in the garage. Then we can’t sit on the chairs when we go outside, unless we go get the cushions. It annoys me a lot.

- Clean out all the weeds growing in the landscaping where we used to have bushes. It’s along the east side of our house. The bushes got too big and the previous owners planted them too close to the house. So we got them all taken out but now there is an empty nasty area there with lots of weeds. I think we are going to plant pampas grass there.

- Hang more pictures up in our bedroom

Little Bits From Today

Filed Under Church, Clothes, Home Sweet Home, Sixteen Months | 7 Comments

This morning we got up and went to the Tuesday morning childcare program at my church. My grandma and I had a class, and Bailey went to the nursery. The kids in the nursery were all different ages (just for today) but it never seems to phase Bailey. I watched her as an older kid tried to take her book, and she pushed her away and said, “No no no!” I’m glad she sticks up for herself. Also, she doesn’t cry when I drop her off, at least 90% of the time. I think it’s because she has always gone to the nursery or some type of morning childcare at least once a week. Also, we leave her with my mom and a few other people from time to time.

I thought she looked so grown up this morning so I took a few pictures of her before we left. I can’t believe my big girl will be in the Toddlers class this fall!

And finally, she cooperates!

Tonight after Jonathan got home from work, he was working on fixing some of our outdoor lighting and I was working on dinner. Don’t worry, it was just spaghetti and garlic bread. You should know by now that I don’t do anything too complicated. Anyway, I had the oven mitt out to get the bread, and Bailey found it and ran off with it. I just managed to find the camera and get a quick picture before she lost interest.

Then later this evening, I was working on cleaning my office. The endless project that never gets all the way finished. Although, someday it will, and I will show pictures! Bailey was wandering in and out while I was cleaning, and she found a Sigma Kappa hat from when I was in college. She had fun modeling it and ended up wearing it for quite a while. She announced “hat” and pointed to it every time she saw one of us. Just in case we weren’t sure.

My Busy Day

Filed Under Doctor Stuff, Fifteen Months, Home Sweet Home, Movies, Toys | 3 Comments

Today was a busy day for me. The morning started off by Bailey climbing out of her highchair. Then the carpet guy came to reclean our downstairs carpet. You know, the cat pee carpet? Well apparently the pet odor treatment didn’t work because after a few days the smell was back. (And to think Jonathon wanted to spend money on stuff like cat trees and condos for this stupid cat). The guy who they sent out today did injections into the carpet padding and onto the floorboard. We are hoping this works. If not we get refunded and have to buy new carpet. A friend of mine mentioned today, she thought we had already gotten new carpet. Well that was abandoned last minute due to money being needed for other things. So cross your fingers that this carpet cleaning works!

Then my Avon order came and I couldn’t sort it downstairs because of the carpet cleaning, so I completely trashed my office trying to find room to do stuff… but at least I can deliver things tomorrow and get some money!! Bailey did a great job playing by herself in the living room and watching her Elmo video.

Tonight I had to go get my eyes examined at my old eye doctor. Apparently the crazy woman I saw last time at the cheapie place was right, and I really do have an astigmatism. So my contacts are now like $65 a box. I am just waiting to go back for my “recheck” of my new contacts and then once they give me the prescription I will go get it filled online.

After that I ran a few errands- stopped by the grocery store and stopped by Best Buy to get a new Elmo dvd for Muffie. She is absolutely in love with “Mo” right now. Then we had a late dinner and let Bailey go outside and play in her new Cozy Coupe for a little bit. She can get in and out on her own and then picks up her feet so you can push her around. I’ll have to get some pictures of her in there!

Our Hot Tub

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Our hot tub has basically been one issue after another. We really enjoyed it in the beginning. Then I got pregnant, and we didn’t use it. Then, we had Bailey and we didn’t use it for a while. This spring, we tried to clean it out and fill it, and there was a dead mouse in it. Yuck. So Jonathon got that all cleaned out and then found a part that needed to be replaced. Went to fill it again, and there was another dead mouse. SO the conclusion is, we definitely need a new hot tub cover.

We have been kind of wanting a new cover for a while since ours is torn up looking. Our excuse was always that “at least it was functional.” Now it’s not even that. Not only does it not work, but it is ugly. So we are officially shopping for hot tub covers. We have been to a few pool places and it looks like we will end up spending between about $300-$600 on a new cover. Which stinks, since it’s not like something we are really excited about.

However, I did find one cool thing while doing some online shopping. This company makes these cool pictures that basically fit into your cover. Then when you flip the cover up, you can have an instant “background” that makes it look like you are on the beach, or in the tropics, or wherever you would rather be, other than your backyard in Missouri! The website also says that the water reflects onto the scenes and makes them appear to come to life- like with waterfalls, ocean, etc. Once we finally get a new cover, I would be interested in getting one of these to put on the flip side.

It seems like we always have a million home repair/improvement projects, though. We just got the carpet taken care of (finally) and now once we get a few extra cents we can move on to the next thing.

Clean Carpet

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Here is my Tuesday Toot. I can’t really take ALL the credit for this, but I scheduled our carpet cleaning and got the carpets cleaned today. Including the oh-so-nasty downstairs carpet. We had it deep cleaned and pet odor treated and sanitized, which killed 99.9% of the germs and bacteria. NOW I feel like Bailey can play on that floor. So we are going to turn that room into a play area for her. We are going to get a big fun rug for the middle of the floor and bring her big toys down there. The ones that are cluttering up our living room and leaving not much room for anything else. Jonathon said he would set up a laptop for me down there. And there is a recliner and a tv. So this should be a very good thing.

I have been saying I wanted that carpet clean for three years now. Seriously. Then we were going to replace it. Then we didn’t have the extra money… really we still don’t… That’s why it’s such a big deal to me.

(If you are local and you want the name of the company, contact me. They have a special, 5 rooms and a hall for $40. What ran the price up was all the extras we had done to the downstairs.)

House for Sale

Filed Under Future, Home Sweet Home, Money, My Childhood | Leave a Comment

Not ours! My childhood best friend’s old house is now for sale. The one we grew up playing in all the time. So many memories there… This is the house where we went “tanning” on the roof. We played Nintendo for hours until we beat Zelda, sitting on her brother’s top bunk and looking down at the tv. We got locked outside and climbed in through the kitchen window more than once. We jumped off the deck onto the trampoline. It was just the house where we always hung out. She hasn’t lived there since 8th grade when they moved about a half hour away, but when we went to stop by a friend’s house last week we drove past and I saw that it was for sale. I looked at the listing and it looks amazing. And, get this- it’s a SIX BEDROOM house. How cool would that be. We could sell our house now and pretty much trade even, price-wise. It also has all new cabinets, countertops, hardwood, etc. Living room, family room, eat in kitchen, formal dining room, finished lower level with rec room and big storage room…

If I thought we could sell right now we seriously might be interested. I would just be afraid our house wouldn’t sell. We started looking at online mortgage stuff and it looks like we could get even a lower interest rate than what we have now. (Just under 6%). Gah, I know it’s not realistic but it’s fun to dream. I should be content with this house for now. Why is it that we are always wanting the next, bigger, better thing?

There goes our stimulus check

Filed Under Complaining, Home Sweet Home, Money | 5 Comments

Want to hear something that sucks? We have termites. Not actually in our house but in wood right near the foundation, in a big colony under the driveway, and in the mulch in our flower beds. So… time for termite treatment at the low low cost of only $1000 :(  This area (midwest) is apparently pretty bad for termites, and we live in a wooded area with lots of big old trees. The Terminix guy we had out said that was good and bad- there were lots of trees so the termites didn’t have to resort to ONLY eating houses, but also that there tend to be more termites. So. We are going to get a treatment done that lasts 12 years. They come back and check every year and as long as you pay for that visit every year, their service is guaranteed and also you are not financially responsible for any damage to your house. I talked to my dad later and he said we should check with Semo, who they use at their house. It’s a smaller company but a lot cheaper and they offer the same warranty. Terminix wanted $250 a year to keep up the warranty and Semo only charges $60 a year! Big difference. Not that you care about all this but it was just annoying to deal with.

And the other thing our check is getting spent on? A new part for our air conditioner. We were lucky and Jonathon found a guy to do it after work at his cost plus just a flat $75 for labor. Jonathon always finds nice people who want to help him. He’s just a likeable guy Seriously though this is still going to run almost $500. So now you can see that we have no stimulus check left once we’ve paid for these two things. That sucks. There goes my dreams of shopping, vacationing, pedicures, The Melting Pot…

Home Improvements

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I have been inspired by Nicole at Here’s the Diehl to start showing pictures of our home improvement projects- or our “wish we could afford this right now” things. Since we bought this house in 2005, we put in all new windows on the main level, replaced one of our bathroom vanities, got new white faux wood blinds, repainted almost everything, changed some hardware… there are still a few light fixtures and fans and stuff that I want to change. Also I have been thinking about redoing our hallway bathroom vanity/countertop. It’s still that shell style and kind of a cream color, but it fits with the way the bathroom is decorated. What do you think? Here is how it looks now. I am trying to decide whether it’s worth spending the money on.

Oh and I forgot to mention that we will definitely be replacing the faucet, I know it’s old looking. But here is the rest of the bathroom. And we are NOT spending the time or money to replace the stupid gold shower doors. Someday we might pull the glass doors out and just put a curtain up to cover it. The walls are more of a sage green and match the rest of the decor. For some reason they have a more blue tint to them in these pictures.

And I know the cabinet locks are classy. Link a doos, baby.

Wordless Wednesday- Mess

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Anyone want to come clean my office? a.k.a. the room where everything gets tossed when we don’t have time to put it away…

Playdate last week (not so wordless Wedneday)

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I hosted a playdate at our house last week. It went better than I expected in a lot of ways. I am a horrible hostess, and I hate hostess-ing. I am just not good at being hospitable and helpful and letting people put their shoes on my couch. But I decided to suck it up and invite my moms group over here. There were six babies and some preschoolers. I don’t know if I have mentioned this before, but my living room is not exactly large.

Anyway, we survived. The babies (and moms) seemed to have fun. Nobody got hurt. Nobody got mad at me. For some reason, I am really worried about people being mad lately. And I have been stressed out about my blog. Learning Wordpress. Griping about our server. (Basically talking a lot about things I don’t understand). But enough of that. Here are some pictures from the playdate. And a promise that I will be back to my regular posting. I can’t believe how much I have missed blogging!

Bailey has a serious fascination with waterbottles! She has managed to take the lid off of one of them and spill it all over the floor. It may have just been an accident but I keep a close eye on her now!

Can you believe all these babies in one room? And it’s not a Gymboree class or anything; it’s my house!

Bailey with her friend Kaitlynn, whose birthday party we went to this past weekend… more on that later.

I don’t know much

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Something I was thinking about… I really have no idea what we paid this year for home owner insurance. I know that our taxes have gone up like $500 since we bought the house just less than three years ago! So much for a declining real estate market. I doubt we could sell our house for all that much more than we bought it for. We’ve done some improvements, but the market sucks. But was I was wondering was, if our taxes went up then did our insurance go up too?

A lot about nothing… Happy 2008!

Filed Under Eight Months, Friends, Home Sweet Home, Money | 4 Comments

I don’t feel like posting, but I feel like I owe it to 2008 to make a quick little post. I was feeling really down about New Year’s Eve going into it. Some of my girlfriends were going out together for what sounded like a fun evening. We are pretty broke at the moment, and my mom kind of jacked us around on the babysitting thing, so we weren’t able to make big plans.

My friend Sarah invited us to come over and bring Bailey with us. It turned out to be a really nice night of just snacking and hanging out together. It was very low key and Bailey got to play and then sleep in the pack n play in the other room. She did pretty well going to sleep. We watched Finding Neverland, which I hadn’t seen before.

By the way, Sarah, my friend Faith said it was definitely Tuberculosis.

Today I got to see Faith for a while, I worked on straightening up my office (trust me, I have a long way to go) and we went shopping for new carpet. We went three places and I think we finally decided to buy from GCO but it was getting close to dinnertime and Bailey was about done with looking at carpet. We will probably go back tomorrow to do the paperwork. Tomorrow we are also thinking about taking B to Gymboree Play and Music to try it out. Jonathon has off until Monday so I wanted to do something family-ish at least one day

Tonight has been spent listing on eBay. Not very exciting, but hopefully profitable. I am selling some of the cloth diapers that I don’t like, such as the Fuzzi Bunz which leak horribly out the legs on Bailey. (I have been trouble-shooting and we determined that it is really just that they don’t fit her right).

Wow, enough rambling. I’m heading off to read a little bit before bed.

I’ll post pictures soon

Filed Under Holidays, Home Sweet Home, In-Laws, Travel | 5 Comments

from our horrible trip

Today and tonight I have been running around trying to get things ready for our “real” Christmas celebration at my parents’ house tomorrow. I had a few things left to wrap, and I have been trying to unpack and get the endless loads of laundry done from our trip. Our downstairs is still a mess and I feel like I haven’t gotten a whole lot done. I took Bailey to my parents house to play for a little bit because they couldn’t wait to see her. I listed a bunch of stuff on eBay tonight.

Jonathon has been talking about what he is going to do with the Best Buy giftcard from his brother. He really wants to get some sort of flat panel tv for downstairs. He also wants a plasma mount thing to put it on the wall. I told him we should at least get it carpeted before we worry about stuff like that.

Big news: WE ARE GETTING CARPET FOR THE DOWNSTAIRS ON TUESDAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Over Christmas Break

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Yes, it is called Christmas Break when your hubby gets two weeks off work. Other than traveling Oklahoma (a.k.a. big fat miserable waste of time) we are planning to look at some furniture stores to get some ideas for downstairs. We are also going to an 8-hour carpet sale on New Year’s Day. Yeah, have big holiday plans. (By the way I am seriously dreading going to Oklahoma. I have tried to think of tons of excuses for Bailey and I to stay home. Last year I prayed that I would get sick, too sick to travel. It’s that bad).

I am just so tired of looking at the downstairs and how awful it is… not to mention that last night Jonathon dripped rotten potato juice all the way down the stairs and across the basement floor on the way to the garage and then didn’t clean it up. I wasn’t home at the time and I got home and asked him why he didn’t clean it up. His answer was that he thought we weren’t going to keep that carpet anyway. Lazy man. Then when he finally DID clean it up he used Fantastik bathroom cleaner and paper towels. If you want something done right you might as well do it yourself.

Wow, this turned into an unexpected rant about my husband

I am the worst decorator, EVER

Filed Under Home Sweet Home | 4 Comments

I wish I could afford to redecorate my entire bedroom. I would get new furniture (the stuff we have is what I bought straight out of college and it’s black and silver) and new bedding and actually hang some pictures. Oh and new curtains. The only thing I really like in our room is our bed, which is a Tempur-pedic, and our bathroom, which is fine now that we had the vanity top replaced.

My mom and I are going to go look at some luxury homes to get decorating ideas. Not that we can afford the exact same things they use, but we can always go to Kohl’s and try to find the cheaper version. I am the worst decorator if I don’t have ideas to copy. My bedroom is STILL not decorated and we have lived here since June 2005. It is starting to get depressing. The rest of the house is done, but I hate our room.

I can’t believe I am even posting a picture of it. Well, normally when people see it the bed is made and has a bunch of pillows on it. But we don’t have a headboard anymore, because we got a king size bed and our queen headboard wasn’t gonna work with that. I have no idea what kind of pictures/decor to hang in there. I hate the curtains. And the wrong wall has the accent color on it since we rearranged our furniture.

Any ideas?