How many trips to Home Depot do you think it will take?

Why do I allow him to go to Home Depot alone? We took the baseboards off in the living room and are putting 4" ones on like we did down in the family room. You'd think he could get the right ones ... but NOOOOO ... what he came home with doesn't match. So ... trip #2 back to HD to exchange and get the correct baseboards (good thing gas isn't still $4 a gallon!). I have the painting done except for the wall behind the entertainment center and some of the trim along the ceiling. It's 5:15 now ... I'm hoping to get the baseboards painted tonight so we can get them put on tomorrow and the living room put back together ... or there will be yet another unfinished project ... not like that would be a surprise ... but I'm just hoping. Terry does a very good job at these DIY projects ... but he's very picky and as a result it takes him a while (i.e. part of why there are still not baseboards and doorframes in various parts of the hours from the flood we had 4+ years ago). Well, I better go help him with the lasagna. LOL ... NEVER A DULL MOMENT!!! Laughter is the best medicine ya know!
Let me know what y'all think of the color - I think you can tell from the pic pretty well ...

Scanning, scanning, and more scanning

I've been preparing for Chad's graduation. I finally got his senior pictures ordered and I'm now working on the previous 18 years. We've been digital since 2000, so I only have the first 9 years of his life to digitize - which amounts to about 100 rolls of 35mm film (at least I have all my negatives organized - "Thank you Creative Memories!"). Each 24 exposure takes me about an hour to scan and get saved to my harddisk. So, that is looooots of hours of scanning - and I'm only about a third done at this point. Then I still have to organize and get them scrapped! Thank goodness for digital scrapbooking. It will make this process a lot faster. Again "Thank you Creative Memories!"!! I use their Memory Manager to organize and Storybook Creator Plus to scrap them. The photo on this post was made with SBC+ ... don't ya love it? I may tweak it yet before the final version to print, but I think my first stab at it is pretty awesome.
I also made out our 'have to do before graduation day' list. HA! We should've started on it years ago! Oh yeah ... we did! We just don't have anything FINISHED on the list! Follow-thru to completion is not a strong suit in this house.
I'm going to try to get the living room painted today. It's still too cold out to do much outside - namely work on finishing painting the house. Maybe Terry will work on the family room floor and/or stairs. That we started last labor day. We were on a roll and got the floor itsself done, but then we needed to wait for the trim to come in, which was about a month later, and we lost our momentum on that. Ahhh ... the joys of home ownership ... always something to do.
Well ... I'm going to finish up a roll of scanning and then paint the living room. I'll take some before and after pics. Let me know what ya think!

Rows and rows of books

Only a few hours left until we have to depart the FHL. We've had a great week - researching our ancestors AND not having to work. We will drive a couple of hours tonight and stay in Evanston, WY and then continue on home tomorrow.
It's Brendan's 15th birthday today ... I can hardly believe it. My baby is growing up. I called and chatted with him for a few minutes this morning. I also talked to Trent. He's off to a Clint Black concert in Minneapolis. I hope they had a good drive up there ... he said it was not very nice weather - cold, snowy, blowing ....
Well ... I'd best make better use of my time here the last few hours.

And when is our next trip back here....???

Hiatus

Well ... it's time for another update. LOL ... nothing like a couple month hiatus! We haven't painted in a while now ... holidays, weather, etc. So ... the house still isn't 100% painted. Unfortunately it doesn't paint itself.
We spent a couple of weeks over Thanksgiving in Wellsburg at my parents' house, then came home for a couple of weeks and then went back for a week over Christmas. That's enough of that long trip for a while.
This week Terry and I are in Salt Lake City at the Family History Library doing genealogy. I think we've done all the easy stuff already because this week's finds are much harder and further between. I do think we've both managed to add a set or two of grandparents though.
Terry has a cousin (there's a 1st removed in there somewhere I think - but even I get lost at that sometimes, so we'll just call them cousins) and her family living here. Steve and Yvonne invited us to their house Sunday and we talked 'family history' for a couple of hours. Their sons and families came over later in the afternoon and we all enjoyed dinner together. We had an absolutely wonderful time.
Cortney, their daughter-in-law, is a member of the Temple Bell Choir and she invited us to come to their rehearsal last night. It was nothing short of wonderful and I do think it was the highlight of the week for me (sorry ancestors - but some other things just move in front of you sometimes). The director greeted us at the door and we had 4 chairs front and center! LOL ... never really expected that ... but it was the best seat in the house I'm sure. After we had listened to a couple of songs Ron gave us a tour of the Tabernacle and it's underground world. It was truly amazing. We had no idea that was going to happen and we were truly amazed and very, very thankful.
Well ... I'll try to be better at updates and what-not ... but for now it's off to the FHL for more investigation!
TTFN!
Tammy

Windows and Trim and New Paint - Oh My!

We have window trim again!! Well ... at least on two of the windows. The trim for the remaining window needs to be ripped a bit, so will get that one done later. And a couple of the vertical 1x2s are up.
We made great progress today. Terry worked past the front side of the house and ventured to the south side. He tore off some trim pieces that need to be replaced. The remaining sides shouldn't take long at all - hopefully anyway. I must admit ... I am beginning to tire of this ... and working 7 days a week.
We all ended up with no extra wounds today. We did end up with one less working drill though! Somehow Terry managed to drop one of his cordless drills from the top of the ladder. He really wouldn't admit to me what happened. I was in the house at the time, so, unfortunately, I wasn't able to witness which saddened me because I'm always up for a good laugh. While I'm on the subject of dropping (if I don't put this in the blog Terry will have some comment I'm sure) ... I was on the north side of the house painting the peak and dropped my cell phone which landed in the basement window well. After Brendan retrieved it for me it is still in working order - whew! Oh ... and I might add that Terry and Brendan went to Home Depot while I was high on the ladder! (Don't worry about me guys! I'll be ok!)
It was another beautiful fall day. Rustling leaves beneath our feet and a beautiful blue sky and the good Lord watching over us from above.

We Turned the Corner!!!

We now have new paint on THREE sides of the house. Terry has still been finishing up the East side, but I ventured to new territory. Brendan helped yesterday and cleaned/moved some stuff from the North side of the house.
We also had a minor mishap and Brendan acquired a new hole in his head. :( He and Terry were going to put up some trim with the air gun. The hose came off the compressor, recoiled, and hit Brendan in the back of the head. Head wounds bleed rather profusely, but the wound was very small - so no hospital visit required! He had a headache for a little while, but later on was able to help again.
We were so tired by the end of daylight. The last little while we painted by troublelight again. I really am surprised men in little white jackets don't show up! We got our tools cleaned up and cleaned up ourselves. Chad's job is at Margo's Vienna Station, so we called and ordered supper from him to bring home. We practically mauled him when he came through the door ... we were famished!!
We gained an hour today with the clocks being set back an hour. Terry thinks it's an extra hour of sleep ... I informed him he was sadly mistaken and it's an extra hour of painting! I know, I know ... the number of daylight hours is the same.
Hopefully today we will be able to get the 1x2s and window frames back on. I will concentrate on the North side of the house and finish scraping and maybe get that side done. The weather is suppose to be beautiful.

He Does It AGAIN!

So ... guess what he did this time? He backed the truck INTO the house! Terry has a mark in the dust on the running board of the truck that he lines up with the crack in the driveway to know when he needs to stop. Obviously he didn't line them up very good! Ya just gotta laugh!
Well, we didn't get as much done last Sunday as we had hoped. Things always seem to take longer than we anticipate.
We did get the trim board back on the peak - that was a feat in itsself ... cuz I had to go up the ladder WAY further than I was really comfortable with ... but I managed. Terry was on the roof and reached over and nailed the trim in place.
When Chad came home from work, we sent him up to remove some gutter. I really get nervous when the guys are on the roof like that.
We also got the pillars up on the porch to form the arch-way I wanted. It looks really nice!
This weekend is suppose to be very nice again, so hopefully we'll be able to progress to the north or south sides. The boys are here, so they help tremendously and do some of the strong-arm stuff to give us a break.
HAHA ... had to come back and amend this post ... the little yellow kitty sitting on the steps is not one of ours. Murphy is one of the neighborhood cats and is very friendly. When we're outside, he is usually with us. I think he gets lonely. I've heard that he 'belongs' to the people a couple of blocks away, but I'm not sure.