Tonight the toliet decided it didn’t want to fill up any more. Luckily we had an extra “incomplete” toliet repair kit that had the right parts so that Gregg could fix it. So we can be the optinum poopers that we know we can be.

After watching “10 grand in your hand” on the DIY Network last week my brain has been running over several ideas for the house. Of course some are not that new. If you check back on the September post “Thinking, Thinking, Thinking”, I almost want to hold off on moving forward with the kitchen to turn our intentions to changing the 2nd story bathroom.

I don’t think it will be that hard & we won’t have to be without the bathroom for long since it’s basically going right beside the other one. But that would opened up the space & make or change the bedrooms up stairs to something that would feel alittle more modern in scale & size.

Recently I got a free subscription to the “Country Living” magazine just to check it out. & what does my little eye spy? Our kitchen in the magazine. Ok not really our kitchen but it’s the same cabinets, same countertops & almost the same pulls. I thought it was funny because when we were thinking of what scheme to go with we could never find any photos of what we had in mind. So I guess we were just ahead of our time.

It’s an ad

Compare

Amazing isn’t it!

Well I hope everyone has a Happy New Year & many new projects to do & finish (don’t we all hope)!

Thank you Santa but sometimes you do need help with your job.

The Tree

Weather forecast is for 3 inches of the white stuff so while I was still sleeping the guys got up & finally made a little over-hang for the tractor. Now I know your wondering why not put it in the shed & normally you could but with 2 motorcycles there isn’t enough room. And since the tractor helps with plowing snow it’s a pain to have to shovel it out to help shovel everything else out. One of these days we will also going to add a back wall & maybe a curtain in front to help when the wind blows snow & rain in. For now this will help keep most of that out & off the tractor. Plus we still want to run electricity out there too.

The boys working

Tractor undercover

November 30th was the day we closed on the house 4 years ago now onto a new year for our house. This past year had our biggest project & our best success as well. I think it will be awhile before we have something that big again. Projects this coming year might not be as big but could help make our lives better, especially if we work on the kitchen more this year. So here is to year 5 of the house & hopefully many more! But we all know the projects never stop … lol.

After watching our favorite home improvement channel we were going to start putting up some of the new lights in the dining room. That we had gotten on wednesday but while I was in the kitchen Gregg asked me if it was okay to go crazy so I said yeah of course. And that’s how we got to the bare ceiling in that room. Once we were done pulling down the old tiles Gregg got a little worried that we has gotten over our heads.

The sky is falling

Prepared for a new face-lift

But since we still had the tack boards used, we can just put drywall up instead plus not have to worry about replacing the tiles while we put up the lights. Plus we don’t have to bring down the old plaster ceiling and we get access to the old electric wires to get them up to date. Electricity is a important part of updating this house but it always surprises us on how they did it.

Look wires

Another day off, another chance to get more done. Well if we were more motivated then we would probably have more done. But we did move the light switch from the outside to the inside & I have only wanted that for 4 years. So Gregg had to drill though one of the beams in the basement to get the wire up to the plug. Then he started to turn off more breakers to turn off the electricity & we thought if we got the one that the fish tank was one that we would have the right on to be able to fix the light & switch in the sun room.

Old Switch on the outside

New Switch on the inside

We have a working light again in the sun porch. But Gregg did find out that the breaker for the fish tank isn’t the same as the sun porch light. Those shocks don’t tickle. Don’t worry no fish were harmed.

Sun Porch Switch

New Light Fixture

Since we had the day before thanksgiving off & I needed to go get my allergy shot & since it is close to Lowe’s we stopped to pick up a few things. Gregg wants to make a over-hang to cover the tractor next to the shed so hopefully we will get that done before it snows. But he had also been talking about getting a light for over the new table but while we were there he talked me into getting a new one for the 1/2 bathroom since we have never changed it plus we have been talking about finally rewiring the dining room.

New Fixture

Possible new sink stand for the 1/2 bathroom

Happy 35th Birthday Gregg!

We haven’t gotten to do much yet but the day after my birthday we drove down to Ikea to pick up our birthday/christmas present to us. We knew whatever we got each other as gifts we could get ourselves or hope that someone else might get it for us making them happier. We saw the table in the catalog first, I liked how it could expand to fit according to it 15 people around it. Gregg liked the black color of the table & the idea that it could be expanded for occasions but still shrink down enough to be a normal table.

We had to get it then because we have a mock thanksgiving this Sunday instead of the actual day. So during the week one night we started putting the table together. Then the following weekend I went out of town but Gregg & his brother were able to move some things around so it could fit better in the space.

Hopefully with a few straight days off around actual thanksgiving we might get to some real jobs on the house like some new electricity in the dining room & some insulation in the basement.

Old Table Put Away

New Table with some mess on it already

The piece that used to be at the end of the table

Other piece that used to be in the corner with the old table

Legs

Under Belly

*Sorry about some of these pics we couldn’t find our camera so we had to use Gregg’s phone & my old camera to get these shots for you.