Pretty in pink

Ever since my daughter realized she was going to have a new room she has begged us to paint it pink and purple.  Pretty intense for a three year-old but she tells everyone those are her favorite colors and her new room will be painted in those hues.  The first time we went to look at paint chips, she picked out the absolutely most brightest shades of electric pink and purple for the walls.  Of course, why not...if I was three I would probably want the same.  However, this mom has a different idea.  I finally settled on a powder pink and a pale lilac for our pallet.  As you can see from the pictures, the job is underway!  Under the picture rail will be pink and above it will be the lilac.  Even this color is a tad bright for me but for a three year-old princess, I have a feeling it is going to be just fine.


When I poured it into the pan,
I thought of a strawberry milkshake!



It felt great to finally get some paint on the walls.

The edge of the fireplace. What a difference
a little color can make!

Whoa! There's a lawn under there!!!

When we first closed on the home, you could not see the back yard for the mounds of magnolia leaves that had not been raked, the waist tall grass that had grown over and the small trees that had sprouted up.  It was very apparent that the back yard was in need of some TLC, stat.  I am not sure how many times our lawn guy had to run over the grass or hack at the saplings with a machedi but the man did a great job.  What was underneath that jungle is absolutely amazing.  We are super excited about having a fenced in yard for our daughter to play in and our dog to roam around freely in as well.  This is going to be a great retreat.  Just like the rest of the property, it needs a little love but we are ready to give it!

This flox was blooming underneath the brush. It looks like there might be several in one of the overgrown beds.  I am hoping we can fix up this neat, old birdhouse.

One, two, three....

I moved three boxes this week! Yay, me!  Ok, so I know that doesn't sound like a lot but it is a start.  I decided that if we are ever going to get out of our current home into the city home, we've got to start taking baby steps to get there.  We still have a ton of cleaning and painting to do before we move in the furniture. But at least by taking over dishes we only use for special occassions or pictures that will eventually go on the walls, we are starting to transition.  That is the hardest part about owning two homes - there is really no one pushing your rear out the door so they can move in while you move out.  We've been cozy staying put in the "current" home while the "new" home has been getting its pipe facelift.  For now, I will take pride in my three boxes...and see what I can add to them this weekend.

Pipes, eggs and sheet rock

Labor Day weekend is coming to a close and I don't feel as though we accomplished as much as we should.  We have season tickets for UGA football and sitting in the sun completely drained us (plus we are just getting old, let's face it)! We leave the house by 8:30 am, spend some time with friends pregame once we arrive, then sit in the sun for the duration of the game and afterwards, grab a quick bite before arriving back home by 6:30 p.m.  So Saturday was football and Sunday was recuperation and a bit of work in our home we are trying to sell. 

Today, we did spend some money at Lowe's (shocker) and did some prep work at the dream house which I have also lovingly named the "city house" since it is so close to town.  We ordered and purchased a waste overflow for the claw foot tub.  That should be delivered within 15 days and our plumber said he would come back out and install that at no extra charge.  We chose the one with the chain-plug since it felt more antique-like. Here is a visual aid:

We also picked out the paint for our daughter's room.  She loves pink and purple so we chose a light sugar pink for the main part of the walls and a light lavender for the space above the picture rail.  My husband spackled the walls and patched plaster while I scrubbed down the two bathrooms upstairs (I will spare you the before and after pictures of those rooms. YUCK).  Here are some pictures of her room in the prep stage:

Her room has an awesome old fireplace in it that will be great for decorating purposes.  Unfortunately, a previous owner capped all the chimneys so the fireplaces do not work.  One day we hope to reverse that as you can see the chimney tops in our attic.  That will be years and years from now but it is on the long term to do list.

Last weekend I was on a mission to shoo Miss Charlotte and her webs from the house.  I sprayed more webs outside than I care to admit.  I know spiders are good and they eat bugs and all that wonderful stuff.  However; I do not need a web every 12 inches on my porch ceiling complete with an egg sack waiting in the wings.  The spray did its job so this weekend I tried to knock some of the old cob webs down.  In the corner of our porch, an abandoned nest was perched on top one of the pillars.  I was able to knock it down and found these poor little things.  They were abandoned and hollow.  Speckled but not blue...maybe they belonged to a wren?  So sad...

While my husband was prepping the walls for the upcoming tape and paint job, he also decided to vacuum the vents which needed attention desperately.  The great thing about this old home is the original wood is as hard as a rock.  Petrified is a complete understatement.  The bad thing about this original wood is once something is nailed or screwed into it, getting said nail or screw out of it is quite a challenge as you can see here:

After much tugging, pulling, twisting, cussing and finally the location of the right tool, the grate came down.  We will not be cleaning this one. A new one is on the way. 

I can't end this post without showing off our new pipes one more time.  Here is the finished product.  The dry wall was supposed to go up on Friday but the contractor was told it would be a small job and well, it isn't.  The Friday before a holiday means yet again we are waiting for a project to be done but this one I will gladly wait on.  I will take exposed pipes over broken pipes any day.

On the eve of September...

It is hard to imagine we closed on the house two months ago and we haven't moved in yet.  It took five months to purchase 1910 Dream Street and now weeks and weeks have passed in order to make progress on the plumbing.  However, I do believe in patience and I do know that good things indeed come to those who wait.  As evidenced by the pictures below, new pipes are going in!  The pictures are from day one and today is the second day of renovation.  When I drove past the home this evening there were three company trucks in the driveway.  I decided not to stop.  Silly, I know but I just didn't want to know if something was not going as planned.  I figured if it was horrible, the plumber would call as he and his company have been fantastic. So I will wait until tomorrow to find out the status of the project.

Day one of plumbing renovations

The new pipes make their debut!

I don't even want to know what that is

A massive cast iron pipe had to come down on the
outside of the house.  I believe this was the sewer line.

When the walls, come crumblin' down...

Well, not the walls but definitely the ceiling!  In order to save on labor costs on the plumbing job, we bought a jagged, sheet rock knife and then had a round of stress relief sawing this weekend.  Most of the ceiling under the pipes was water stained and in dire need of replacement, so we where thrilled when the plumbers wanted it all gone so they could do their work.  My husband and I took down half the ceiling to expose the pipes.  It was a bit of a chore and certainly a huge mess but certainly a great sense of satisfaction once it was all down and in the trash pile.  Even our plumbers said we did a really good job! 

I owe you some pictures as it has been awhile, so here you go! The first is of me cutting away from the ceiling fan which my husband took down shortly after this shot was taken.  The second photo is the original cut that the first plumber made to find the infamous leak.  Next is a picture of our handy work to expose the pipes.  We then decided we should really go ahead and cut down the half of the ceiling that is water stained so it can all be replaced at the same time.  You can see my husband attacking that plan with a vengeance.  The last picture shows the ceiling after demolition.  Success!  More tomorrow as the plumbing job has started and I have new pipes to show off!

When He hears you cry out, He does listen...

Once the news came through from the warranty company about the plumbing and what they would/would not cover, I had finally hit a wall.  The representative I spoke to boiled my frustration level to a point where I just couldn't stand it any longer.  There are days when you just have to close your office door and let the tears flow.  There is no sense in keeping them locked up any longer because all it will do in the end is ultimately add to your stress level.  I remember putting my head on my desk and crying out, "Lord, please help," several times.  I did not ask for anything other than help from Him and eventually found a way to calm down. Thankfully, it was almost time to leave work, so I hit the restroom, splashed my face and headed to the gym for a spin class with a dear friend which is always a great way to pound the stress out and clear your mind. The days after this were certainly much better.

God has a way of reminding you all the time that He is in charge and that He will never give you more than you can possibly handle at any one given time.  He does things to humble you.  He does things to make you happy.  He does things to make you laugh or sometimes cry.  In the end, you have to have faith that everything you go through, His hand is in it to make your life better.

On Thursday, I happened to be teleworking.  I had just dropped the dear daughter off at school when my cell phone rang.  It was the warranty company.  I hit ignore and let it go to voicemail.  I did not want to talk to them at this point.  If it was important enough, they would leave a message. BEEP.  A message had arrived.  I continued to ignore my phone and ran a quick errand.  When I got back in the parked car, I decided I would give a listen to the message.  I had to play it twice to believe what I heard. "I received a call from my supervisor today that they are going to cover the cost of your plumbing job..."

Later that day (after I am sure I called just about every one I know who was praying for a miracle for us regarding this project), I caught up with the warranty company.  We are going to "cash out" the amount and use our plumber, not theirs and the job starts on Monday.  Tonight, hubby and I will be taking down the ceiling fan and cutting the remaining dry wall to expose the pipes in the ceiling.  This will save us some labor costs and it will allow the plumber to start immediately on the pipes rather than trying to get to them.

Never lose faith is the motto here.  Also, make sure you have a great realtor who is willing to go to bat for you in cases like this.  I know all of his hard behind the scenes work and arm twisting made the warranty representatives see the validation of our claim and ultimately why the job is being paid for now rather than just a fraction of the cost.

God is good, y'all!