Optomistic

I removed the old thin casing and re-built it with thicker trim .

I am loving all the addition of white .

I was overly optimistic I suppose thinking I would be finished .

I still need to sand and paint at least two coats on the beadboard , you would not believe how many people say "what is beadboard ?" when I tell them what I am doing to my bathroom , how can they not know ?

I need to re-install a towel hook , and I am making a new towel rack , a few little finish bits of trim , but it will be finished very soon , the most work is behind me.

The nice thing about installing mouldings in a room with lots of mirrors is that you get a doubled effect .

Sick in Bed

The dear baby is sick in bed , of course he picked the prettiest and most comfy bed in the house , my bed. But that is fine , I don't mind sharing it with him. You will never believe this but his CLAW FELL OFF , he had hurt it somehow last week and it was black and blue and last night it came straight off , exposing the root , so he is socked to protect it for now , what is next for my poor pup?

Things are moving along in the bathroom , the shellac based primer nearly knocked me out , happy that is done , don't need to worry about an knots finding their way through , so well worth the fumes.

Hope to show you it all complete tomorrow .

Off to the Depot for more supplies.

I finally got something other than cleaning done

The kids were out playing and I was able to accomplish a little project I have been meaning to tackle . This section of the entry where I extended the height to allow for higher hooks to accommodate for the children's growth , they no longer have itty bitty short coats especially my oldest , anyway I never liked how I had dealt with the transition , so I tore out the small bands of wood and replaced it with beadboard .
I am much happier with this look.

It will look great all painted .

I needed to unscrew the switches and move them forward over the beadboard , so that they wouldn't be sunken , quite easy to do , but it is a novice mistake not to move it forward { which I learned while tiling our backsplash , it is all a learning experience}

Priceless

Curls created with dollar store bendy rollers , perfect,

Striped bowls in my favourite color for under $10.00 , lucky,

New toy that brings joy to sick puppy , priceless.

I am slowly starting to put back together my bathroom , look at this sweet job I did fitting the beadboard around the counter and down around the drawers , this was quite a challenge {click on the photo to see my handy work}, but it fits like a glove , I am so impressed with my skills , I have come so far , patience was the key , I really need to get a table saw though , it would make cuts like this much easier .

I have shown my bedroom before ,here it is again maybe some haven't seen it before, actually I can call this the official {before} shot because soon it will be changing , all the furniture is staying the same , but soon this will be a vision of cottage chic , light ,soft and dreamy , really this will be my dream come true.

Look at my wee poor puppy , we needed to pull out the dreaded {cone} , he is having the worst case of hay fever ever , he looks sore and ill, and when not wearing the cone he scratches his face to bleeding , he even has conjunctivitis caused by the allergies and scratching , so I have to give him polysporin eye ointment, he loves that , it is breaking my heart to see him so uncomfortable .

Damn RAGWEED ! my girls are also allergic but only have the sniffles { thank my lucky stars for that }, we are going trough Benadryl like crazy , I hope ragweed season is a short one.

What is your Hobby

Everyone has a hobby , it could be sewing , shopping , scrap booking , blogging , fashion ,doing your hair , collecting , cooking , golf ,travel there are no limits to what hobby or hobbies you can enjoy.

I would never have thought my hobby would be home improvement , I really love the thrill of transformation . I tease my husband and say I am "such a boy" but truth be told I don't know any other girls who window shop the newest and latest powers tools at Home Depot like I do.

What tools do you consider yours ?, I started out with a hot glue gun and staple gun and now I wield a mean brad nailer with compressor and I have spent many hours in front of the miter saw , I really need to get a new one , a sliding with a clamp to hold the wood for me , aw a girl can dream .

What is your hobby ? hobbies?

Do you feel guilty to indulge in your hobby , is it wrong to want time for yourself , I don't think so we all need to ask for time for ourselves , we can not just give and give I don't ask for time for myself , or go on girl's weekends well EVER but I do ask for time to make our home the vision I see in my mind, the backdrop of our lives. This is not the kind of hobby you can enjoy late at night in the quiet while the kids are dreaming, for my hobby causes a racket , sorry neighbours , so I do long for school days, even if it makes me selfish I know I give my children nearly all of me.

I also love showing my daughters a strong role model , I am a woman who gets things done , who can myself make changes , my Mother was always a get it done kind of woman , and so am I , its just the way we are wired I suppose, it will be interesting to see if they follow my lead or not , Sophie has shown an interest asking to use my drill and to help out.
I am always thrilled to hear I inspire other woman who read my blog to try things they never have before , to think that they can do it too , if I can , and that is exactly why I started blogging to share my talents and to inspire women to take things into their own hands if they want to .

Sharing and counting down

13 more days until school is back in , until I can breathe and get things done , 13 days until I have a clean room for more than 10 minutes at a time ,in 13 more days I will have 7 straight hours where I will need to cook for NO ONE! in 13 days I will enjoy the peace of not hearing my children get into a fight for 7 hours in a row, it is just out of reach.
Can you tell I am looking forward to school?

I wanted to show you how talented my cousin is , look at this ceiling , he installed this , it is incredible , don't you want a ceiling like this ?

I am dying to get back to my laundry room transformations , but with these kids home from school for what seems like a million years it is impossible to get anything done around here , between the food preparation , and the cleaning up from the food messes I have no time for progress.

I thrive on progress . I really don't enjoy living in limbo , my bathroom is a disaster , maybe I will pull an all nighter .

I thought since I have nothing new to show you I would show you this beautiful laundry room , isn't it great ?

Things to do after school starts

~finish up the basement ceiling

~finish up the basement insulation

~learn how to install electrical outlets and lights for the basement YIKES ! , I have a big spool of wire just waiting to be used

~finish off beadboard wainscot in the bathroom , as well re-frame the bathroom door

~install door into new walk-in basement closet

~finish the remodel of our bedroom adding 5 foot high recessed paneling and re-painting the brown out of the bedroom

~finish the basement stairs

that should keep me busy well into October

New blog button

Although my kind husband helped me come up with a blog button recently I decided I would hire someone to help me come up with another . What do you think, is it me ?? How much do you love that door , as soon as I saw it , I knew it was perfect it's {just beachy}. I can't bear to get rid of the one my husband made so you can choose which ever one you like.

<center> <a href="http://chriskauffman.blogspot.com/"> <img src="http://i193.photobucket.com/albums/z104/danielle982/Just-Beachy-Button.png" /> </a></center>

Thanks to the design girl.

Homesense goodies

Black side table , and most decor items on the shelf and table of course are from Homesense.

Chair is from Homesense , it was yellow , I painted it black and recovered the cushion.

Chair I got for a great deal , I added the nailhead detail.

Lanterns I added the paper to .

The silver lined lampshade I got from Homesense and used to create this hanging fixture for the powder room .

The wire window box was a gift from my mother and the buckets I also found at HS were great to hold ice and drinks as well as magazine for the outside deck.

The perfect pillow HS.

The green pillow my daughter picked for her reno'd playhouse.

Lantern and crown from HS .

Best and cutest cream garbage can HS.









I am a big fan of Homesense , which is Home Goods sister store in Canada.

What have you found at Homesense or Home Goods, would you like to share?

Bad photos of pretty cakes and blue beauties.

I found some old pictures from before digital camera days , from when I used to sell cakes , this one was Mason and Sophie's 1st and 3rd birthday cake , their birthday's are a day apart , a little wedding cake seemed in order.

The blue cake had hand cut flowers applied that I made out of gum paste, I remember it took me days to make the flowers.

Pretty Martha Stewart colors.

They are white on the inside, aren't they pretty , I think they would be nice over my desk as pendants.

I picked up these two glass shades on clearance at the Canadian Tire store , you think it would be easy to find the fixture for these but no you would be wrong so far, I will search until I find ones.

While at Lowe's last night I picked up some fresh colors to ponder...the chain and knob are for a ceiling fan but I am planning on using it for my laundry room light chain.

Tornado's

This is twice now that I have been out and alone at a grocery store when a big storm hits , I was out doing errands and picking up today's lunch when the super market went black ....that has never happened , I did see a dark storm approaching but didn't here the severe storm warnings , I heard from another lady checking out her groceries that there was a tornado warning in our city , so I rushed out with my few bags , when I saw the most vicious and brilliant lightening just on the other side of the parking lot , I moved out of there as quickly as I could , of course the light turned red while I watched this storm barrel through , I was a wreck , I got home and ran inside to bolts of lighting just to the north of our street so close , the sky was "green",it turned out there were tornado's, this morning in near by communities many are without power as we were for over 4 hours and many people are just seeing now how their homes have been destroyed or damaged .
This is not an area where tornado's happen , this is quite an unusual occurrence .
I was glad to get in the house with my family last night , also glad to have multitudes of candles to light the house during the massive blackout .
My thoughts are with those who sustained damage .

Two years ago

I decided to see what we were up to two years ago and look what I have found , my how they have grown . Wasn't he the cutest puppy , the poor guy has the worst case of hayfever , that is right my dog is allergic to hayfever , he is scratching his skin raw to bleeding, I had to give him children's bendadryl 1mg per pound of dog.

Finders Keepers

While searching for the missing plastic food containers to the many lids I have plenty of {why does that happen} and I found all of this , a lovely tin canister , totally forgot it was in the "Tupperware" cupboard holding bowls for no real reason , and two large jars collecting dust , this made me think of a project I saw just yesterday in an old issue of Country Home magazine , Ki Nassauer had taken some old mason jars and attached them to an old piece of trim with clamps , I thought this would be a good idea for my new work room area , then I found these hiding also int he "Tupperware" cupboard , I thought they would be just fine , a little apple green spray paint and a hole will turn one into my twine holder and the other yet to be filled .

Are these sap buckets? well they sure look like it don't they , I had used them last year for flower buckets outside, they were dirty and empty and it occurred to me to use them downstairs for wall storage , they were already this perfect blue ,so much better than the paper towel "holders" out there don't you think.

So cute and functional too , the paneling and shelves need some paint , and the sink needs a skirt but it is so much more functional and a pleasure to spend time down there now , it was one of those places I would never have let anyone see up until now, and then I looked down to see a giant spider and inch away from my foot , I still get the creeps just thinking about it , sure glad I had my shoes on. Splat!
Gosh I really hate spiders.

The stairs are slowly improving , yes that is v-groove, I am using the off cuts , waste not .

My new spot for the bucket , to hide more clutter or bit and pieces.

This vintage camera was hanging around the basement not being displayed until I found it , it is a nice addition here , and it is from my father in law's old camera shop , at least I think so , and it has a K , our last initial.

Didn't the jars turn out nicely , I love the pop of fresh apple green.

I love the look of these willow laundry baskets with liners.