Brian thought it was a good idea to start painting the trim.  It is not very noticeable if you don't look for it but it looks great if you remember what it looked like before.

We had some guys come and teach us how to stucco this weekend.  We were able to have them do the rebuild on three areas that were pretty bad and now they look great!~  We just need to go back and paint.

 The balcony off the master...

 By the garage...

 This is the other side of the wall by the garage.  He did such a great job matching the pattern of the stucco too.

We are working in the office this week and have it painted and the trim done.  All we have left is the floors and we can finally move our office stuff out of the guest room.  I am super excited!

Changes

So we finally got all the workout equipment in and the mirror hung (which was a challenge) but it looks great!

Brandon's room is completely done too. We carried the same slate tile through the bathroom that the boys share and into Hunter's room. His should be done this week once we get it grouted.
I like to call this "That 70's Room" because it is completely paneled but Brian loves it and wouldn't let me change it. The floor turned out great though.
This is commonly known around our house as the "bitchen" because who really needs a butler kitchen?? This is one of my favorite floors in the whole house and I plan on using this as my craft room so I love it :)
This is the breakfast nook with my new penny table. We had the base and chairs but found a tabletop at a resale shop. We glued pennies down and then coated it in epoxy. It is the coolest thing ever and you would not believe how many pennies it took!
We have made a lot of progress and I will add more pictures in the next few days. Hopefully this week we will be crossing of the rest of the major downstairs projects and they will also be starting on the resurfacing of the pool. I will post a picture tomorrow about what we found in the pool today... yuck!

Are You Kidding Me??

So if you look very close at the photo above you will see that in my freshly painted window sill are small little footprints. Not we do not have any animals at the house right now. So this had me wondering and saying aloud... Are You Kidding Me?? We apparently have some kind of small rodent (raccoon, etc) that has decided to move in while we are not there. And if that is not bad enough it decided to walk on my freshly painted window sills because this is not the only one... I have several sets of prints.
And this is our first FINISHED room!! Yeah! This is the breakfast nook and isn't that color awesome! I just love it. I am not sure who had the brilliant idea to paint the whole house... yes, all 6500 sq ft but that person was CRAZY! I am tired of painting. But then I look at the FINISHED room and I am happy so I continue to paint and paint and ... well, you get the idea. By the end of the week I think we will have several finished rooms.
The boys went out with us today and Brian and I had a surprise for them. We found this fusball table at a resale shop yesterday and so we got it and took it to the house. We told them they had to go out with us today to do some work but this is all they did all day (except play soccer over the pool where the goalie had to be on the diving board. Needless to say, they were fishing the ball out of the pool with the net most of the time...) And anyone that knows Brian knows that he could not even keep a secret for 24 hrs... He told the boys last night once we got home :) It has been a good week and I feel like by the end of this week we will see some PROGRESS!

Making Progress

So everyone can breathe a sigh of relief that the snakes are dead! Hunter killed them all and now the very fat toad is eating them... TMI! We have had a very busy week the last two weeks and have made some progress. It feels like we are getting little things done and they are taking way longer than they should but I guess that is how most things go. The most major of these is the overhang... You can see that it is pulling away from the house and the only thing supporting it was the scrolly brackets underneath. So we tore it down...

We have also got some paint and texture on the walls... We are going through 5 gallon buckets like nobody's business. Tomorrow the breakfast nook should be finished and I will post pictures because the color is AWESOME! I only have the crown molding left to paint and then I officially have a room DONE! Stay tuned...

Say Hello to my Little Friend

Ok... not really! This is one of 3 snakes I have living in my pool right now... UGH! It is nastier than nasty and it totally freaks me out... But I go out and check and make sure they are all still in the pool and move along... Today Brian and I were able to make some progress. We are still waiting on the water well to be installed so we can only be there for a limited time (before I have to pee). I was a caulking maniac and Brian ripped out carpet and pad that had been glued to the floor (really? REALLY??). He started to pull up the tack strips which were laid times 3 and then realized that there is peel-n-stick under the pad (AGAIN, REALLY??). So we kept trucking along and will be back tomorrow when I will finish pulling up the peel-n-stick while he rolls a lovely turquoise blue on my kitchen nook walls :)

I've Got a New Reason to Blog :)

So today has been a very exciting day!! We closed on our new house two weeks early. It will be a fun, exciting, interesting, challenging task to bring this house to it's intended glory but we are going to give it all we have. I can't wait to start seeing the progress and to navigate the bumpy road from city slicker to country bumpkin... Stay tuned :)

I Really Love Him...

I am on the home stretch now... I will honestly be able to say that I stuck with a New Year's Resolution for a WHOLE YEAR!! I love my husband because...

Oct 1. I can still make him giggle which I love
Oct 2. He did all the concession runs for the kids at the FC Dallas game.
Oct 3. He convinces me to do the right thing.
Oct 4. Sometimes he still surprises me.
Oct 5. He will take the kids every year to look for costumes.
Oct 6. He is opinionated (I wouldn't want it any other way!).
Oct 7. He is sexy.
Oct 8. He tells me he loves me often.
Oct 9. He is passionate and makes it contagious.
Oct 10. He is encouraging (even though it doesn't come naturally).
Oct 11. In many ways he is like my Dad.
Oct 12. He is really, really funny!
Oct 13. He works to find common ground.
Oct 14. He educates himself and me.
Oct 15. He believes conspiracy theories.
Oct 16. He is skeptical.
Oct 17. He is completely random!
Oct 18. He doesn't care what other people think.
Oct 19. When something is wrong with me, he worries.
Oct 20. He is honest.
Oct 21. He makes it so I can be where I need to be.
Oct 22. He is gentle.
Oct 23. On his birthday, he shares the day with everyone.
Oct 24. He is faithful!
Oct 25. He KNOWS me.
Oct 26. He is easy to please.
Oct 27. He is an awesome listener!
Oct 28. When the kids are sick he will stay up and check on them so I can get some rest.
Oct 29. He makes me happy!
Oct 30. He can be persuaded into doing something he doesn't want to do.
Oct 31. He has never considered not trick-or-treating as a family!