Vintage Christmas Balls

Found these original 50's satin ornaments and added ribbon. I want to sell them on Etsy but am not sure how much people would pay for them. Do they look retro enough? Or just "found them in my mom's basement?" How much could I price them for?

I refinished this little cupboard in "shabby chic" style. Thought about selling it, but I like it so much I think I'll keep it.
Before

After

patience

I had a dream last night about wanting to leave for a trip, getting left behind by others in the group, and doing everything I could to get my family to get out of the house. It was all I could do to contain myself and be patient while waiting for others to get ready. Hours and hours went by and I was losing my mind, going crazy, I just wanted to leave so bad!!!
I think dreams are usually just your emotions coming out in another form. I have been feeling impatient alot lately. I REALLY want to refinish our hardwood floors, but we have run out of money for the moment and I have to wait. I think about how great it will look EVERY DAY! When doing projects around the house, I do it the quickest way possible. And then Thurm usually has to fix the mess I made of things. When I cook, I cook on high so it will cook faster, but I usually end up burning it because I get distracted. And I get distracted because I usually have seven different things I'm cutting, cooking, stirring, etc. because I want to fix dinner as fast as I can.
I used to work at a company where I had alot to do and was usually stressed (I was getting stress headaches and grinding my teeth at night!!!) It was too much work to actually get done in a day, but I busted my butt to get it done. I usually skipped lunches, came in early, etc. After making a few mistakes in a row, my boss said "you need to slow down and get it done right." Which he was right, but I was so pissed because he was the one giving me an impossible amount of work to get done in 8 hours.

Thurm is Mr. Laid Back. He is as chill as they come. He is rarely in a hurry, unless I'm with him. He has been a good influence on me and I have gained ALOT of patience being married to him. I think my dream was a reminder that I need to chill out.

On a different note: Thurm & I have been married for THREE years! He took me to a movie and Thai food. Which, by the way, was EXCELLENT Thai food. We consider ourselves Thai food connoisseurs, and we were both impressed that Tooele's restaurant was so good! We saw "Where the Wild Things Are." We both really liked it, but agreed that it wasn't necessarily a movie for kids. Not that there was anything bad in it. It was just moody, symbolic, and seemed more aimed at adults. I just don't think an eight year old would enjoy it.

Quinn has been SOOO cute lately. He has added "hi" to his list of words. He now has "mama, nigh-nigh(night-night), hot, hat." He has said other words in the past, but has either forgotten them or just chooses not to say them. He has been climbing out of the bathtub all by himself. I had my back turned and felt his hand on my leg, I was so surprised to see his wet little self out of the tub! He loves to read books in the morning when he wakes up. He lies next to me and cuddles in real close while I read to him. In the evenings he likes to watch TV on the laptop while he drinks his bottle. Its so funny how he just develops his own routines and likes and dislikes. What a little person. He eats pretty much anything I give him now. He LOVES fruit snacks, which I don't give him very often, so they are good bribery snacks.

Our basement is ALMOST DONE! I can taste it! Thurm is figuring out how to plumb the kitchen sink. I need to give everything a good cleaning and we are DONE! I posted an ad on KSL, so if you know of anyone in Tooele that needs a 2 bedroom, 1 bath for $675, utilities included, let us know.

Upstairs Kitchen Before and After Photos

I've posted before and after photos of my kitchen, basement living room, and basement bedrooms. We are almost done with the basement and can probably get it rented for November! YAY! I'm sort of dreading having it rented though because it's been so nice having this huge house to ourselves!

I'm hoping that the kitchen isn't a case of "shoulda just stayed with the before." After I bought the blue and put it on my wall it suddenly reminded me of my mom's kitchen in the 80's. Does my kitchen look 80's or modern? I can't tell. But it doesn't matter because I'm not painting it again for a LONG time.

Before

After

Basement Living Room

Thurm & I took different angles of the basement living room, so its hard to see the dramatic difference. But basically we painted and carpeted the living room and two bedrooms. You can't tell how bad the walls were in the before pictures, but being down there, you can really see the difference.

Before



After

Bedroom #2

This room also had a huge hole in the ceiling that we had to fix.
Before

After

Basement bedroom #1

I keep seeing traces of this teal color ALL OVER the house. I'm pretty sure the ENTIRE house was this color at some point! CRAZY!

Before

After

And the Award for "Mom of the Year" goes to....

I was feeling pretty good about my day yesterday. I woke up, read Quinn books in bed. Made a healthy breakfast. Made a batch of peach freezer jam from the peaches on our tree.I did several loads of laundry. Gave Quinn a bath. I went through our storage and found our boxes of winter clothes to switch out. While Quinn napped I finished edging the blue paint in the kitchen. I gathered dried flowers and plants from our yard and made many decorative soaps. And all of this before 3pm.

THEN I left the front door open because it was a beautiful day and I wanted the warm air to come in. I wasn't worried about Quinn because he always stays in the front yard. I heard him go outside and I made a mental note to check on him in a minute. But before I could, I heard the door bell ring and a woman yells "hello! are you missing your baby?" I ran to take him and asked where he was. "In the street! Maybe you shouldn't leave your door wide open!" was the accusatory reply. I gave a really lame "he's never left the lawn before," while she stormed off, very holier than thou. I was embarrassed, relieved that Quinn was ok, mad at myself for leaving the door open, and ashamed that I was a negligent mother. So that completely ruined my day. And to top it all off, I glanced into my room later and Quinn had the string from the blinds around his neck and was swinging his head around. I cut those off immediatly. He is getting so tall! I'm going to have to baby proof a little higher!

I guess pride comes before the fall : ) I re-learn everyday that Quinn is not to be trusted. Just when I feel secure, he mixes it up.

Past owners of our house have left pieces of themselves for us to either clean up or adopt. One owner left corn cobs & old antenna's hanging in the attic (those will be cleaned up). Another owner left Christmas wrapping paper. One owner left green house lights. There were some soap making supplies left so I decided to use them. I gathered leaves, petals, etc. from our yard and made a bunch of little soaps. It was pretty fun, but now what? What do I do with all of them? Christmas gifts?

I stole some pics from Amy's blog of our cruise. Go to her blog to see Thurm & Ben doing "Ice, Ice, Baby!" It's awesome!

Thurm & I snorkeling!

Cruisin'

Thurm's family reunion this year was a Mexican cruise with just the adults. It was VERY fun. We loved the ship. I have never slept so good in my life. The short version is we went to Catalina Island and snorkeled, kayaked, tandem biked. Then to Ensenada where we took a tour to La Buffadora (sp?), an awesome blow hole that is one of three in the world. (I've seen the one in Hawaii as well). On the ship we ate and ate and ate. DELICIOUS! My favorite food was strawberry bisque. And it was a good as it sounds. We hot tubbed, went to a few shows. I learned how to make an elephant out of towels, Quinn now has one in his bathroom. We sang karaoke! I'm a huge chicken. I only sang once with Thurm, "Don't Stop Believing." Our family assured us it was great :) Thurm, being the secret exhibitionist that he is, got up a number of times. He did an Elvis solo, "In the Ghetto" that was excellent! He and his brother also entertained the crowd with "Ice, Ice, Baby." Even though after three years of marriage, and I know Thurm has this side to his personality, it still surprises me that he will perform like that! He is such a great singer!
I would absolutely go on a cruise again! It was so much fun to be with family too.

Here are some "After" photos of the house. The day we moved in Thurm did a great job document and taking a picture of every part of our house. Every tree even. But somehow, he missed the basement bathroom. It doesn't look that much different except we tiled and installed a shower. A little boy I was babysitting ran by, stopped, pointed, and said "CLEAN!" It's very white. But it'll look good with a shower curtain.
I also painted my kitchen cabinets white this week. I did a horrible job and just hope we replace them if we ever sell the house. I told Thurm I was going to take my time and do it right. But no, I have no patients. So I laid them all in a row on our drive way and did them all at once. Of course every particle of sand, dirt and bug on the driveway ended up in the paint. Oh well. My friend, Marie, came to look at them and had the brilliant idea of spray painting the hardware black! Looks awesome!
I still need to paint the walls blue, but we are leaving for a cruise today and it will have to wait!~
Bon Voyage!

I have to post a retraction on my ward missionary post and the bad attitude I had. Yesterday at church I felt so strongly that we were really called by God to be ward missionaries. And when the bishop set us apart he said some amazing things that I know are true. My attitude is gone, I'm excited to get started.

Kitchen

I want to paint my kitchen cabinets soon. But I can't decide on colors for my kitchen. I have my dark gray wall right next to the kitchen so I want the colors to compliment each other. I like the idea of a white and yellow kitchen because its so bright and airy. But it doesn't really jive with my damask living room. What do you guys think? I like the white cupboards with blue too.

White cupboards seems like the safest bet right? I saw some cool blue cupboards, but blue could go terribly wrong.

Everyday I have a two hour window in which to get things done that I can't do with Quinn around. And yet, I'm blogging instead of mudding the basement walls in preparation for painting tonight. I have been dragging my feet on getting our basement done. Ugh.
Saturday, Thurm & I canned peaches, jam, salsa, apple pie filling, and dried apples. It was fun, but I can imagine it not being as much fun next year when Thurm grows a huge garden. A HUGE garden.
Thurm has been called as ward mission leader and I as a ward missionary. I'm intimidated. I specifically didn't go on a mission because I don't like talking to strangers and I don't like selling things. I know that's the wrong attitude. I know that I'd be doing someone a huge favor by telling them about the gospel. Not just a favor, but the single most important information they need to know in this life. That Jesus Christ died for their sins and if they live a righteous life can live happily with Heavenly Father in the afterlife. I think its just the "cold call" way of knocking on some one's door saying "would you like to hear about the gospel of Jesus Christ?" that turns me off. I just know if I was on the receiving end of that knock, it wouldn't matter what was being offered, I wouldn't want to hear it. I know it will be different as a ward missionary. These are my neighbors, people we will become friends with. But even after giving myself this pep talk, I'm still intimidated.
We are going on Mexican Baja cruise at the end of the month with all the adults in Thurm's family. I'm getting really excited. I'm not sure if I'm more excited for the "mid-night all chocolate buffet" or laying on sandy beaches. We have plans to go snorkeling and kayaking at Catalina Island and taking a tour in Ensenada. I'm not as nervous to leave Quinn for a week this time because the last time we dropped him off for 3 days, he acted like he didn't even miss us. Like he didn't even realize we had been gone. Little bum. I would have appreciated at least a hug of joy or something.
Alright, off to mud the basement : (

Before Photos:: Attic & Bedroom

After Photos::Attic Room & Bedroom

This is our bedroom till we can build a master bedroom upstairs. I don't take any credit on this room. My mom came down the 2nd day we were here and painted it from blue to tan. She also made the quilt on our bed. She pieced it together and my aunt quilted it. Lots of work!

We painted this attic room white, from pink. And I also recovered the bench. I want to paint one wall, but couldn't decide on a color until I got fabric for the bench. What color do you think?