Good Tidings I Bring To You!

If you're viewing this online (and not in your e-mail), you'll notice some changes. First is the most obvious. The font color is now red! And the font has been changed to Veranda! Exciting times here. The bloggin' bug has struck again and this time I'm going to be posting about the usual and now hopefully I will be adding some stuff that I'm looking to bake.Well, new post to follow later today (if you live on the East coast).

-Brent

Time is...no longer...of the essence

Wow. It has been a while since I've posted. For that, I'm sorry. I'm not doing to well on my promise to post at least once a week. I don know that for the next little bit, I will be posting on a daily basis. On to what we've accomplished these past couple of weeks. As you can see from the picture to the left, Savannah likes her new room. The primary wall color is... I'll get back to you on what colors we used. But needless to say, that Savannah's room loos good. And she loves it! She likes to walk around and point out the flowers and the butterflies. We picked up a butterfly night light and this Umbra Papillon Butterfly Wall Art Set at Target. And...Savannah loves them. The butterfly night light gives the whole room a nice purplish glow and has a 15 minute timer.

Another thing that was accomplished was the removal of the wood trim around the cabinets in the kitchen along with their hardware. Then they were sanded down. Or, I guess it would be more accurate to say that the grease was sanded off... Cait says that it was pretty nasty. While continuing in the kitchen, my dad and I removed the old non-working microwave. It was a little tricky, but after much grunting, huffing, and finagling we were able to take the microwave and its holder out. Of course nothing can be quite that easy. After we got the microwave out, we found that there was a fairly large hole in the wall. Good thing we're no planning to attach anything to that wall... I was able to repair it with a neat little patch from Lowes and some mud. Not like dirt and sand mud...

Other repairs that were completed are the attachment of down spout extensions for our gutters. These allow water to flow AWAY from the cement pad that our house sits on and into the grass. No more lakes next to the house! Yay! Thank you dad for that. My dad also got up on the roof and plugged a hole that was created by one of the roofing nails no longer being where it should be. He also sealed the edges around the chimney. Hopefully this will help keep water out until we can get everything replaced. *Fingers crossed.* Once my parents left for the north, Cait and I worked on getting the house cleaned up for our trip. We're going to Idaho to visit my Grandparents so that they can see their Great Granddaughter. And Kyle. Savannah will finally be able to meet her other Uncle. Well, that's it for now. I'll be posting on our travel blog for the next little bit. You can follow it here: The Occasional World Travel.

Mmmm...turtle soup.

Imagine coming home to help your wife out because she's not feeling well and almost hitting this. This snapping turtle was making his way down our driveway from the forest going to who knows where. That was pretty neat. Another thing that is neat is when your wife says "Honey, the paint is peeling off" while looking at our newly painted front door. That's a lot of fun. There are going to be a lot of pictures in this post. Most of the work...okay...ALL of the work we did was painting. And in order to appreciate the work, we need pictures!

On to the work done around the house. As I mentioned before, we painted the front door red. As you can see from the picture, there is a devilish handsome man in the process of transforming a plain, dull, ordinarily boring black door to a brilliant, beautiful, lustrous cranberry. Of course, the handsome man did have help from a wonderful lady who wasn't feeling to well. I should mention that the paint is an oil based paint made for front doors. That was some really sticky paint. It was nothing like painting with a latex based paint. Just some food for thought if anyone is planning on painting their front door or using an oil based paint. And the smell was really, really strong. Good thing it was the outside of the front door and we were able to close it once the edges had dried some. But in the end, the door looks great! Next slide.

The big project of the past week has been Savannah's room. For those of you who don't know what her room looked like, it was a fugly mintish color with PEPTO ® Pink accents peeking through. And let's not forget the fact that the previous owners let their kid(s) do the painting. I'm fine with kids helping painting, but the parents need to tape off the areas that shouldn't be painted. Things such as...electrical outlets, light switches, TV jacks...things like those. Grrrr... I really don't like the previous owners. Oh... I almost forgot to mention that there was also TV stand mounted to the wall. That was a pain to remove as well. I should mention that we're watching recorded "Extreme Makeover: Home Edition" and we just saw Xzibit start to pimp out a tractor. We'll have to see how that goes. As you can see from the picture above, Savannah's room has come a long way. But in order to get this nice blue color, we had to prime the whole room. That was a lot of white paint, and it was really hard to tell a difference after the primer had dried. I need to thank my mom for helping us with priming the room. Because of her, the room was completed a lot faster that Cait and I would have. Although you can't see it, the trim around the doors, the crown molding and the baseboards were all repainted with a nice semi-gloss white. It really stands out against the blue. Cait has done so much for Savannah's room. Although fairly indecisive about the colors to use (I think I helped to finalize those..) Cait came up with the concept of the room, she drew out the designs, brought them to life on the walls, and I am now in the process of helping add color to those designs (well, not right NOW. I'm typing up this blog...). I've been working on the vines while she paints the flowers and fuses the colors together to create a nice blend.

I need to stop watching this show while typing. I know have the urge to shop at CVS. They payed off a family's medical bills, provided a state of the art air filtration system, and started a fund for a heart transplant. Way to go them. And now X to the Z is driving a renovated tractor that looks brand new. I wish I had an unlimited budget to work on the house...

Back on track. This is the room after the primer. You can still see the mintish color through the thick white primer. *shudders* I wasn't too keen on the colors. Well, our show's over, Cait is falling asleep on me and I need to work in the morning. I'm off to bed y'all. Plans for the week include the removing of trees from our yard with power tools, some gardening and more work. See you next time!
- Brent

Attack of the Ducks!

Attack of the ducks! Story a 11:00pm. It has been brought to my attention that there are some out there that would like to read more in each post. So, with that in mind, I will try to add more to each post. Keep in mind though, most everything I post is something I've experienced. I would also like to point out that this blog is best viewed in its original form. I'm not to sure how it looks in the e-mail, but all of the references to picture locations are how things look online. Now, let's take a look at the past week. For the first half of the week, my parents were in Idaho, so not a whole lot got done. The big push was getting the house ready for the party last Sunday and once that was done, everything kind of died (as far as enthusiasm goes...). Cait and I spent the time relaxing for the most part.

We saw some good movies this past week. 2012, Planet 51, Avatar, Sherlock Holmes. I enjoyed all of them, although 2012 was a lot longer than I was expecting. 2 1/2 - 3 hours long. It would help if I read the time on the back of the box to see how long the movie was going to be. During the movie, I kept expecting water to come flooding in at any moment. I just wish I had hooked up the surround sound for the movie... Planet 51 offered some humor and was all around enjoyable. I'm pretty sure I laughed through a lot of the movie. My memory isn't doing to well at the moment. It's pretty late Saturday night (almost Sunday) and I need to get this out. Back to the movies. Avatar was awesome. I kind of wish that we had a 3D TV to watch it on (and Blu Ray wouldn't hurt...hint hint) along with the surround sound. It's a movie that I know I want to own. For those of you who haven't seen it, rent it, but it, borrow it, just watch it. I'm telling you it's well worth it. With the first 1/2 of the week gone to movies, its time to get back to work now that my parents are back.

Some of the projects that we're going to tackle now that the parents are back are working on this blank dirt canvas that you see on your left. Cait has come up with a really good idea that is going to reduce the amount of dirt and weeding...but increase the amount of grass I have to mow. I'm fine with it though. I'm still not sure what exactly she wants to plant there, but as you can see, there is a bush in the corner already. That bush is lucky to be there. We were talking about getting rid of it. But my parents moved it for us. They really helped us out today. After Savannah's lunch, they came over and watched her for a few hours while momma and I did some shopping. It was nice being able to get through more than 2 stores in 3 hours. We went to Goodwill, Salvation Army, some consignment shops, and a book store. I got a lot of books. A couple of Robert Ludlum books and some Star Wars books. The nerd in me has emerged! Again! I might have a small obsession with most things Star Wars. Only just a small obsession. Ask Cait... We also found some art for the office and a sprinkler for the yard. I'm sure the yard will appreciate being watered. On a side note, it is now Sunday morning and neither of us are asleep at this point. Cait is working on some drawings of what we want to do to Savannah's room and I'm typing and watching an Extreme Makeover: Home Edition marathon. I'm not sure if I'm inspired to make our house look that good or if I'm just jealous the while the family is off at Disney World, a team of people are building them a new house. Probably jealous. Back to the house...for now.

While Cait and I were off spending money, my parents leveled out the large patch of dirt and moved the bush. I know I was pleasantly surprised when we got home. I can't wait to see what Cait comes up with for that area. With that done, the folks went next door to the trailer and started dinner for us. Tonight we enjoyed a Low Country Boil. It was delicous! I think you can throw almost anything into one of those. My parents used a large turkey fryer to boil water then added shrimp, potatos, corn on the cob, lemon, onions, secret spices (I call it this) and sausage. It was delicious! I think I mentioned that before... Afterward we kind of relaxed and tried to get Savannah use to Grandpa. I think its the facial hair that scares her. I could be wrong though. If you were wondering about the ducks at the beginning of the blog, here is the story behind those. The spot at the trailer park my parents are staying at was vacated the day before by a lady who lived there for about 2 years. When she left, some things stayed behind. These plastic ducks (that's right..plastic) are on little stakes and just stuck in the ground. There are 2 groups, one on either side of the ditch. Savannah loved them! For almost the entire time we were there, all she wanted to do was go play with the ducks. Toward the end of the night, she spent some more time with Grandpa. Of course, offering to put her shoes on her helps... But there were some tender times in there as well.

Like this one. I just wish that the bugs weren't as bad as they are. Otherwise we would be able to spend more time outside. I suppose that I could remedy that. There is a nice pile of wood sitting behind the shed that could stand to be burned. Maybe a bonfire is in order before my parents leave. I wish I had brought over the ingredients necessary to make desert. I was going to make the Almost-Famous Orange Milkshake from the Food Network Magazine. It is pretty tasty. As I'm looking at it online it is just making me hungry. Mmmm...funnel cake.... Moving on from food and back to work. There are a couple other projects we're looking to tackle. My dad found an old school door at the Habitat for Humanity's ReStore. $5 for the "Study Lounge" door to go on the shed. We just need to trim it down and put the hinges on and we're in business. He and I are going to be doing some minor repairs to the shed.

The drawings Cait is doing right now is another project that we want to tackle this week. She's drawing a new design for Savannah's room and more specifically, she's drawing out the artwork she wants to put on the walls. It's going to be really nice when its done and I'm pretty excited to see it go up. Well, that's it for now. I'm exhausted, Cait is getting sleepy (finally) and its 1:00 in the morning. Good night for now and I leave you with this. The picture above is the color of a budding flower on our Magnolia bush. They were white when we got them. See if you can figure that one out. Good night y'all.
- Brent

Swimming in the Sanctuary

Hello internet readers! It's been a busy couple of days. Yesterday was all about getting everything ready for the party. I mowed most of the lawn, trimmed around the basketball hoop, edged the driveway and walkway, removed some grass that was trying to claim part of the driveway and swept it all up. The end result as really nice, but it took most of the day. I was out until the sun was almost gone. Cait finished painting the dining room and knocked out the hallway as well. Now, most of the house is "Timeless Taupe." At least the ugly wallpaper is covered. Cait's parents and brother drove up last night as well for the events of today.

Today was pretty eventful. This morning started off with my baptism! I think that the most nervous part for me was how cold the water was going to be. Thankfully the water was nice and warm. Almost like a heated swimming pool. Of course, everything became cold when I stepped out of the water and had all of the cold, wet clothes clinging to me. But I had a change of clothes and a dry towel near by. After the service, Cait and Savannah went to go pick up the food we ordered for the party and I went home with the in-laws. By the time that I arrived at the house, there were already two families waiting. We got the party started fairly quickly. Within about 30 minutes, most everyone was here.

We quickly got the food out and it was a big hit. We ordered a platter of wraps from Publix, served buffalo popcorn chicken, boneless honey-BBQ wings, chips, dips, a myriad of beverages, and a desert tray that we made ourselves. I wish we had remembered to take a picture or two of all of the food. You can view the pictures of the baptism and party here. After the party was over, there was no food left over. The party itself lasted about 2 1/2 - 3 hours. It was wrapped up with a few of us playing Rock Band. I know I had a blast, and I know Cait did too. I would like to thank Cait's family for coming up here for this event and also everyone who came to the party. It was worth all of the effort that we put into it. One of my co-workers was also kind enough to a) bring some family friendly video games, and b) letting us borrow Super Mario Bros Wii. Cait is loving that game. I on the other hand am getting frustrated with that game. Why are the mushrooms dumb enough to get captured? Grrr... Oh well, it's just a game. That's it for today. More to follow within the next couple of days.
- Brent

All work and No Play

More work to get done. I was able to leave earlier than normal yesterday (liberty is normally granted at noon on Fridays). It was actually more like I was ordered to go home around 1000ish. I'm not going to fight that order... Once I got home, I helped Cait tape off the hall and I primed the wallpaper with some lovely white primer. Now all that need to be done is to put some color on the walls.

While I was doing this, Cait had managed to paint the dining area. The top color is "Timeless Taupe" and the bottom is "Almond Fudge." You can find both at Lowes.With the amount that we shop there and as much as I mention them, I should get them to sponsor this blog... We both agree that the colors look really good. We're going to be putting the Timeless Taupe in the hall as well. I started to do some yard work, but was interrupted by one of our neighbors who took most of the river rock that was left. He should be coming back today to collect the rest of it. We also rearranged some of the pictures in the house and now have an American Flag that flew over Pearl Harbor hanging on the wall behind the TV. It looks really good. Good call Cait. After I put Savannah down, we settled down to watch "Secrets of the Mountain." For as much as Wal-Mart was hyping that up, it was pretty disappointing. I thin Wal-Mart needs to not be involved in any part of the movie making process. After that, it was off to bed. That's it for this post!
- Brent

Shorty says gah!

So Thursday night was date night! We haven't had a night alone in quite some time. But, it couldn't start until the babysitter got here. Until then, we continued to work on the house. We started to paint the dining room and prep the hall to be painted as well.

On to the date. After getting ready, we headed down to Olive Garden for diner.  It felt weird at first, not having Savannah with us, but we quickly got over that. Olive Garden was nice. Cait ordered the Stuffed Chicken Marsala, and I had the Manicotti. Apparently there was a back order on the chicken, and the poor waiter thought we were going to be upset that we had to wait a little bit. But we didn't mind (mainly since we haven't been on a date in quite some time). After diner, it was off to the movies. Hopefully, by now you've figured out what we saw (although we saw the 2D version). It was a really good movie. We laughed through most of it and had a really great time. I think that this is going to be a movie that we're going to end up owning when it's out on DVD (or Blu Ray). We got home around 2300ish and Savannah was still up! I'm really sure if she was aware of anything going on, but her eyes were open. Cait took the babysitter home and I put Savannah down to bed. That's it for this post.

Magnolia tree

Here is the info on the Magnolia tree that we planted. We pulled the info off of this link.

Name: Magnolia, Jane (Magnolia x 'Jane')
Zone: 4-7 (for some info about the zones, click here or here)
Type: Flowering Tree
Height: 10'-15'
Spread: 10'
Growth Rate: Slow
Sun: Full Sun
Soil: Various (acidic, loamy, moist, rich, sandy, silty loam, well drained soils)
Shape: Rounded
Description: A member of the "Little Girl" group of hybrid magnolias developed in the mid-fifties at the U.S. National Arboretum. Hardy shrub or small tree. Impressive reddish purple flowers outside, white inside opening late in spring to avoid frost damage. Flowers are a gorgeous tulip-shape with a lightly scented fragrance. Leaves are dark green and somewhat leathery in appearance. Great choice for any accent, specimen, or border use. Grows 10'-15' high. Grows best in full morning sun and partially shaded afternoons. Prefers rich, moist, and well-drained soils.

Busy, busy, busy!

Wow. What a busy couple of days it has been. I apologize about not posting yesterday. This will encompas the past 2 days. And a little before that. Let's take a trip back a couple of days. We're going back to Saturday night. We have this pile of yard trash that needed to be "disposed" of. So, we had a fire. Sounds pretty easy right? Not if what you're trying to burn is a) full of dirt and b) full of moisture. The picture is when we started to burn our Christmas trees. I know, its April and we still haven't disposed of them. But that is no longer the case. I will say that Christmas trees that have been baking in the sun for 4 months burn really fast. We put a big dent in the pile, but it was taking to long. Whats left is going to be tossed into the woods out back.

Moving on to Tuesday. Not a lot done outside, but there was plenty to do inside. We're hosting a party this Sunday (after church of course) and we're working on getting the house ready for guests. Part of that is going to be painting the hallway (well, I'm not sure we needed to do this for the party, but it is something we've been meaning to do). But in order to do that, we wanted to remove the wall paper first. The picture is the wallpaper. Imagine that covering an entire hallway. **shudders**  I found a rental company in town and was able to rent a wallpaper steamer for a day. So, when Cait went to her bible study, I put Savannah to bed and got to work.  After about 3 1/2 hours, I had only removed 4 panels. I must say that removing wallpaper is not all that fun. That was the big project of Tuesday.

On to Wednesday. I managed to get the kitchen tidied up before heading off to work. When I got home for lunch, Cait had managed to remove one panel with much pain on her part. The problem with the wallpaper steamer is that all of the components get really hot. Which can result in some pain. We decided to just paint over the rest of the wallpaper. We went to Lowes that evening and picked out our paint and took a look at the garden section. We finally found something to plant in the empty spot in our garden. A magnolia bush. I'll provide the details in another post. We got it into the ground and covered and put our last bag of mulch over the large plot of dirt...only to discover that we needed more mulch. Once again...off to Lowes. You know you've been there to many times when the employees ask what you're back for. But we got some more mulch and got it spread out. It looks really good. I'm going home for lunch now. I'll post the info about the magnolia after I get back.

- Brent

Oooohhhh.... aaaahhhhh....special

Good mornin' y'all. Today started off alright in my book. Nothing like a game of soccer (or football for you Europeans or anyone else that's not American) at 0700 (remember...military time) to get the blood pumping. I even scored the game winning goal. Too bad I was on the losing team. But, it is only a game...although some might want to knee me in the Solar Plexus because of my goal (you know who you are Mr. Medic)... This morning also reaffirmed my distrust of auto mechanics and my irritation with them. We bought Cait's car two news tires and when she got there the shop kept trying to sell her an alignment. I can understand trying once. But to continue after she said "no" the first time, that's just greedy. I don't think we will be going back to that shop for anything else. It finally came down to her calling me and me stating that it wasn't required for replacing the tires and rotating them. GRRR! But I digress. On to what I said I was going to post. Below are pictures of the plants that have been planted and some info on them.

Here is the beautiful Snapdragon. We got these for a bargain! Only $0.50 each at Home Depot. We have this pink and a hot pink color. Here's the details:
Name: Snapdragon
Size: 12-15"
Spacing: 4-6"
Sun: Full Sun (6+ hours / day)
Blooms: Spring - Fall
Water: Every other day
Habitat: Upright
Fertilize: Once a month
Care: Prune after bloom
Cold Hardiness: Unknown
Note: These add a nice splash of color to the blues and purples that we have going.
This flower is the one that I wanted and Cait agreed would look good in the front! They sell a couple of different types at Wal-Mart, but here's the info on the ones we got:
Name: Salvia
Size: 15-18"
Spacing: Unknown
Sun: Full Sun (8+ hours / day)
Blooms: Spring to Summer
Water: 2-3 per week
Habitat: Unknown
Fertilize: Regularly
Care: Unknown
Cold Hardiness: Hardy to -30°F
Note: The purple color works really well against the red mulch and the future color of the house. It really draws your eyes to the front of the house.

These are flowers that my mom picked up.
Name: Speedwell
Size: 6-8"
Spacing: 12"
Sun: Full Sun
Blooms: Summer
Water: Moderate
Care: Remove old foliage before new leaves begin to emerge. Divide clumps every 2-3 years in early spring
Cold Hardiness: Hardy to -40°F
Note: It's a fairly small plant with small bluish (I think) flowers. You'll have to ask Cait about the actual color.

This is the "run around all day" bush. A pain in the butt to find, but it was worth it.

Name: Sky Pencil Japanese Holly
Sun: Full Sun (8+ hours / day)
Water: Keep moist
Size: 8' tall x 2' wide
Growth rate: Slow
Cold Hardiness: Hardy to -10°F
Fertilize: Regularly in order to reach optimum growth and flowering.
Notes: Evergreen lustrous foliage. It prefers light, moist, acidic soils with good drainage. Densely branched shrub. Black fruits follow blooms.

This is another nice shrub that Cait and my mom picked out. It looks pretty good in the garden. Sorry that I don't have a picture of it surrounded by mulch. Oh well.

Name: Wintergreen Korean Boxwood
Sun: Full Sun (6+ hours / day)
Water: Semi-Moist
Bloom: Inconspicuous Flowers
Spacing: 3-4'
Growth rate: Medium
Size: 4' x 4'
Cold Hardiness: -20 to -30°F
Pruning: Prune to maintain shape
Fertilization: Spring and summer
Notes: Deer resistant but not deer-proof depending on scarcity of food.

Those are the plants in the front of the house. There are more around the house, but I'm not going to get into those. That's it for this morning. If anything exciting happens today, I'll probably post it tomorrow as well.

- Brent