Laundry Room Remodel

Here's the before of our "laundry room" in our basement. We call it "the dark side", as one side of the basement is finished and the other is well....not. Notice the shower next to the washer and dryer complete with bathroom doors for walls.

There used to be a fruit closed with shelving and storage space in one corner but it was rather nasty and when we lifted the linoleum floor that was laying on top of the concrete we found quite a bit of mold.

Unfortunately the cool old concrete sink that was original to the house had a bunch of cracks in it and leaked so we couldn't keep it. It was super heavy!

Patching and sealing the concrete foundation walls

We taped out how we thought the room should lay, then we used random objects to get a better idea just how big or small it would feel. We had quite a few limitations...sewer drain line, plumbing, duct work, furnace - it took a bit to come up with a plan.

That's what 84 year old cobwebs look like! Nice before and after huh? We kept the ceiling exposed and painted it all one color. Kept a few of the old knob and tube remnants for character. Having it open sure makes the room seem more spacious.

Framing it in and drywall all up!

We had my uncle do the drywall finishing (he's a pro)...his payment was a couple pots of soup - deal of the century! :)

It's all painted and just waiting for finishing touches: molding, windows cleaned up and painted, door installed, utility sink (can't find one we like), cabinets (maybe phase 2 of the project). A washer and dryer would be nice too! It was supposed to be delivered 2 days ago but should be here by Jan 10th....we haven't had a washer and dryer since Thanksgiving and can't wait to be able to do some laundry again! (remind me I said that) :)

It sure is a big change from where we started. This is what we've been up to every evening after work for the last month with a little holiday fun thrown in the mix.

Merry Christmas

"I promise I was good!"

Call Me a Duck

We love our ducks and love On The Rocks too! Watched every episode of "The Sing Off" while they were on it! We saw them perform so many times on campus - good memories! Getting pumped up for our big game! GO DUCKS!

Halloween

For halloween this year Ella was Mr. (or Miss) potato head. She even went trick or treating. She knocked on a few doors on her own (after we pushed the doorbell) and grabbed candy out of the bowl on her own (sometimes more than one time). Thank goodness for our smart thinking next door neighbors that had goldfish crackers ready to go...Ella picked them out herself - they were the only treat she was allowed to have...mean mom & dad ate all the rest!

Short on time so this is the short version of the day - but it was a fun filled weekend!

Super Girl

Our own little super-hero in her terry-cloth cape! :) After her bath she ran around with her "cape" on her head, laughing and dancing throughout the house. She thought she was pretty special with it on!

Pure Joy!

You can't have it mom, it's mine!

Shoe Fetish

This girl is starting early, she raids our closet and wears our shoes around the house daily. She hasn't mastered heels yet, but we see it in her future.

Children's Museum

Splashing away!

Ella enjoyed a visit to the Childrens Museum a while back. It was really a ploy to make her happy for a bit after we stopped giving her her pacifier. She started calling her pacifier "Bobby" so we decided it was time she stopped using it. She screamed the whole drive there and the whole drive home because she wanted her "Bobby" (that's about 35 minutes each way!) but she was a content little angel the whole time she was playing at the museum. She did eye some little boy's pacifier though - I saw a swipe and run cross her mind! :)

She loved the grocery store and water play areas the most. She is such a little collector girl, she got all the fruit out of the baskets & then put it in her cart over & over again.

No More Playin' House

Watch out spiders I'm comin' in, and I have a hammer!

Here are a few photos from taking the playhouse down. There was a really big playhouse in the back corner of our yard. It was right underneath a large pine tree, so it was covered in dirt,sap, pine needles and countless spider nests. We decided it took up too much space & was rather unsightly so down it came! We didn't know quite how nasty it was until we started dismantling the thing. It took a full weekend to take it apart. There were at least 5 different types of screws and nails holding it together. It must have been the last owners stress relief...they pounded twice the amount of nails into the thing as necessary. It would have been nice for Ella to play in, but we would have been paranoid about all the bugs, so we're quite content with it out of our yard!

Scrap wood for sale!

Ahhhh, much better!

Working hard...

We've been busy trying to get little projects done around our house and yard. This project was from about a month ago. The backyard wasn't fenced in totally, there was picket fence on 2 sides and cyclone on another. We needed to match the pickets and posts to what was existing in order to fence in the rest of the yard. After much searching we finally gave in and had custom pickets and posts made. After a weekend of hard work and lots of family help we now have a fully fenced in back yard....dogs and free-roaming children are now contained!

Drilling a hole in the concrete. We had to screw a bracket for one of the posts into the concrete.

Searching for the missing screw....check your pockets Jason,
bet you'll find what you're looking for! :)

Supervising from her playroom!

The finished project...still needs paint but the rain has stopped that from happening.

Broccoli

Just thought I'd share that Ella is quite the veggie lover! Today all she wanted for lunch was broccoli...dipped in hummus of coarse. She had 3 servings of the stuff almost 2 cups of just broccoli - she's gonna be one gassy girl later today! :) Thankfully its not much work (most of the time) to get her to eat her veggies, she loves green beans, and edamame too.

SO Precious - Love this picture!

We're still here

It's been forever since we blogged yet again. Hopefully there will be a bit more blogging coming soon. It's been so super busy and pretty chaotic trying to get all settled in our house, going to work & chasing a VERY busy and energetic almost 18 month old ...blogging has gone by the wayside, obviously, but we'll have a bit more time on our hands in the near future so maybe we'll get a bit more posted. Until then enjoy this cute new picture, it took forever to get her to sit still enough to get a good shot.

Man alive it's been a long blog hiatus!

I know, I know, it's been FOREVER since we blogged. I half expected blogspot to not let me log in or something. Life has been SO busy!!! We are finally getting settled a bit but here is what we have been up to since I posted last (on July 3).

July 4th - BBQ and time with family


July 15th - Celebrated our 4th anniversary.
July 17th - Went to sand in the city with the Berger's


July 24 - We celebrated our anniversary by going on an all day kayaking trip on the Columbia River.


July 29th - Signed papers for our house...
July 31 - Stayed home all weekend so we could actually pack since we were moving in a week!

(This is Ella thinking this box is a perfect step-stool so she can turn the lights on and off!)

August 2nd - GOT OUR KEYS to our new house!!!

Home Sweet Home!!!

August 3-7th - Worked our buns off to clean and get our house ready to move into
August 5th - Older houses must mean spiders have had longer to live & grow 'cause man alive we've got em and they are meat eaters!!!
August 7th - Moved into our house (with the help of many strong generous people - THANK YOU!)
August 9th - Inspection and key hand-over of the last place we'll rent for hopefully a very very long time! (to a certain someone, you know who you are,.....they didn't even notice the garage door!!!) :)
August 10th - Realized the stove won't work....what the heck??? How do you cook for a baby with no stove - her fave, pasta, is tough to do in the micro!
August 13th - After much trial and error it was figured out that the electrician wired the stove wrong so he came back & fixed the problem and all was well in stove land.
August 14th - Kitchen sink won't drain....dishwasher overflows dirty backflow water all over the kitchen floor....one-year-old Ella had a hay day dancing in the water while I madly scooped it from the flowing dishwasher into a bowl and ran to the bathtub to dump it out...where was the hidden camera when I needed it - that would have been $10,000 I think. Did dishes in the bathtub tonight.
August 15th - Jason snaked the drain....when water is dumped in one side of the kitchen sink it still comes up the other side and up the dishwasher....getting really sick of not being able to do dishes & tired of eating out!!!
August 17th (I think) - 2 plumbers and the best $150 we ever spent later....the drain finally works & kitchen feels functional!
August 21 & 22 - Tore down the play house in the back yard. It was a tough call but it was really bug infested and not really very cute. It took up a large chunk of the yard too - it'll be a bit before Ella could use it anyway so we're really glad we tore it down.

August 24 - Emptied 4 boxes today with Ella's help - finally have a second to breathe & blog a bit to catch you all up on what we've been up to.

Photos are limited - sorry we've been a bit busy!
Did I mention that Ella is getting new teeth in the midst of this craziness? She has a new molar & another tooth on one side so another 2 teeth are sure to be on the way on the other side. She has been really clingy & not so sure of this whole new house business! She has named her pacifier "bah-bee"....so it's probably time to get rid of the darn thing.

Time for bed - I have to go to work in the morning so I can have a break!

Water Baby

We took Ella to a park with a fountain play area last weekend. It was finally warm enough to bring out the swim suit and hit the water. She had no fear at all! She played in the biggest spraying fountain first thing. There were big rowdy boys running around and she wanted to be in the middle of them. We were worried she'd get run over, but thankfully no major injuries to report. She did trip and got her first skinned knee...the first of many to come. She shook it off though and was in the water again in no time. It's been a bit of a battle getting her to wear a hat while we're outside. She's so fair skinned that even with lots of sunblock it will be easy for her to burn, well we've finally figured out that if we put her hat on and act like goofballs while wearing it for a while she's fine to wear it after us.

She is such a water lover. She hasn't been in the pool yet but we know she'll love it! We haven't done swim lessons yet with her but it's on the must do list. Until then the park's water play will have to do. We can't wait to go play in the fountains again soon!

In dance pose...she was having such a great time!

Getting a face full of water

She found a leaf and didn't want to let it go

Playing amongst the big boys...I was trying to protect her a bit without hovering too much, tough to do!

Thirsty?

I just know I can grab this water if I try hard enough!