How We Spent Sunday

My friend Stacie invited us to go boating with her family. They have a "banana boat". They pull it behind their ski boat like a tube, only it can hold 10-12 people. Very fun. A wild ride, though. We all have minor injuries, from sunburn (you know that one spot you miss with the sunscreen?!) to head bumps, to scrapes.

The kids loved it. The point of the day seemed to have been to try to shake the kids off the banana boat by driving the speed boat in so many loops and figure eights that they couldn't hold on any longer.

I fell off the banana boat once, got pushed off by my kids, got my face scraped up by the rope, and was seasick. I had a good time, but I think I might be too old for this kind of a good time...I still felt seasick a day later!

The Finished Room

Well, I didn't refinish the piano, or any furniture. I didn't repaint the stove or buy bedding or window coverings.

The paint job was SO HUGE that it took all 5 days just to get it finished. It took 5 coats of primer to cover the walls! Painting the hallway and the closet took an extra day! At least we bought the bed!

Clint, who avoided the project for the first couple of days, ended up making 4 trips to the store for me for extra paint, and bought, cut, painted and installed mouldings for the windows(an unfinished project from 6 years ago)and in other places where moulding was missing. Then he cut and reworked the closet shelves so they would be more useable. He helped move furniture into the room on the last day, and installed the curtain rods (no curtains, though!), vent covers, and outlet covers. He picked up Shelby when we discovered she was arriving 4 hours earlier than expected, and took her with him to turn in our fair forms so I would have an extra hour to get all the stuff moved into her closet! I was just doing a final vacuuming when they arrived.

Tamzin spilled the beans by saying "Shelby, I got your old room!" the minute she walked in the door. But she loves her new room all the same. It's working great to have the two older girls downstairs at bedtime. The bathrooms are less crowded for teeth brushing, and I'm finding it easier to keep Tamzin focused on getting ready for bed without the older girls there to visit with.

Shelby's new space is bright and airy. We rigged a sheet and a bead curtain as a door since the room doesn't have one, and she seems content with that, for now anyway. And she is looking forward to going bedding shopping for a new quilt.

The whole experience wore me out. On Wednesday, in a panic because I wasn't making any progress, I painted from 5:30 to 12:30 am. That's 19 hours! Thursday I put in 13 hours, and finally the room was painted and we could start moving in.

I'm still recovering. Part of me can't imagine ever painting another room again. The other part of me wants to get started on Rhiannon's room right away!

While You Were Out - Benton City Style

I dropped Shelby off to camp yesterday morning. She will be gone until Friday. We are going to spend the week painting our old basement rec room and redecorating it as a bedroom for her 14th birthday.

I am typing with hands covered in paint! We are going to paint the panelled walls a pale blue, that is, if we can ever finish primering them. I just ran out of the second can of primer, and have to head to the store for MORE. We’ve done 2-3 solid coats, but I can still see some bleed through on the wood and I don’t want to take any chances on the look of the final color. I had a friend who painted over paneling and it looked nice, but you could definitely tell where she skimped on primer. Her advice was, do extra coats of primer for the best result.

The kids have been really into helping, and have actually been helpful, too! Thats a new one for me. The last time I let them help me paint, Clint was really mad because there were so many dried on drips on the walls that the room was pretty much ruined. Gillian and Tamzin helped me all day yesterday, and still had the energy and enthusiasm to go at it again this morning.

I am hoping to not only paint the walls, but also buy a larger bed, repaint some of her furniture, and even strip and refinish the piano(which will be in her room), paint the stove(also a permenant fixture in the room, and I have to find high temp paint for that), and figure out cool bedding and window coverings without spending any $$$ on it.

It's been a long time since I've tackled a project this size. Of course, while I was out getting paint, I managed to sprain my thumb, slowing me down before I had even gotten started! At least it's my right thumb, so I can keep on painting. It's surprising to me how much I use my non dominant thumb, though. I'm keeping it taped becaues I'm too tempted to use it, and then it hurts!

Office Blues

I've been buried in office work all week.

I didn't realize how behind I had gotten over the last few months. As the girls springtime activities kept getting bigger, more numerous, and more time consuming, I guess I was just doing the minimum to keep my office work under control. I would sort mail, pay bills, update my checkbook, clean up the clutter, do payroll, and so on. But over time, I collected a massive pile of "stuff to be dealt with later" that could finally wait no longer. So this week, I took advantage of our first whole week unscheduled to catch up on things. It's amazing how long it takes to process all those random projects and bits of paper.

The upside is that once I got on a roll, I just kept on going, and now I am ahead...just a little! I've already done my monthly taxes(not due til the 15th) and my Quarterlies (not due til the 31st!)

Then, to top it off, I even did a REALLY LOW priority office project...I burned a couple of mixed CD's from my growing MP3 files to listen to while running or in my new 'burb...which has a CD player!