Just Plumb Stupid

The last few weeks have given me the chance to learn a little about plumbing.  A few weeks ago, thanks to Google, I learned how to fix my toilet so everything goes down with the first flush.  You can't have that problem in a bathroom overrun by kids.  It's gross and disgusting and thinking about it makes me gag.

And now we're having the bathtub adventure.  Our "vacation." 

I'm learning a lot.  Mostly because there's nothing to distract us.  The kids are gone and all we have done is the bathtub.  Maybe we can sneak away to see a movie tomorrow night.  Maybe.

Anyway, here are some things I've learned:

• Glued pipes do not move, even if you really, really want them to.
• Turning the water off and working in sweaty conditions is a bad combo.
• I know what a P trap is.  And it has nothing to do with urine.
• Vanities are heavier than bathtubs.
• I thought that, in conjunction with copper pipes, the word was "sauter" but it's "solder".  Who knew?
• Home Depot owns half of my soul.

And the greatest lesson I've learned:

• Never, ever, ever, ever, ever replace your bathtub DIY-style.  Ever.  It's stupid.  It sucks.  It takes a lot of time and money.  It will make you insane.  INSANE, I TELL YOU!!

Insane.

Extreme Make Over -- Johnson Home Edition Part 3

Matt's Room.....

Before....

It's hard to see it in detail, but the following pictures are the artwork that are on the wall on the right. The wall facing the window bore the name "Skye" in huge 12" letters of red marker. Guess what the little girl's name was that lived in this room.

This is a combination of paint, marker, crayon, pencil, and pen. I was able to mute the colors, but they wouldn't fade completely.

Two coats of primer and two coats of primer/paint later, this is what we got:

Matt's room is the Marvel Superhero room. Now, before you get the chance to judge me, let me just tell you that Matt's bedding is Superman because that's what we already had. Superman is not Marvel. I know everyone was getting ready to jump me for that Superhero faux pas, but I knew it was an error from the beginning, thank you.

Josh originally envisioned an Ironman room. We may get Matt some Ironman bedding eventually, but for now it's just a heroes-in-general room.

Josh's painting project in here was the racing stripes around the top of the room. They are really incredible looking and by far the more difficult of all the projects he did. Somehow, a bunch of straight lines are harder to pull off than freehand murals. I can't do either, so it's all impressive to me.

Matt loves his room so much that the second night he slept in it he saw his Wolverine figure on the wall, got all kinds of excited and went to jump onto his bed. Unfortunately, he completely missed his bed and landed on his face instead. We can't all have Super moments.

Extreme Make Over -- Johnson Home Edition Part 2

Abby's room.....

Before....

After....

Abby's clue word was "luck." Can you see why?

Josh's painting project was to recreate a mountain scene from Abby's new bedding.

Isn't he amazing???

Abby loves her room. We've found a few more pink touches to add to her decor. Abby can't have a room without pink.

Extreme Make Over -- Johnson Home Edition

When Josh and I made plans for this house, we decided to do a themed room for each kid. We love watching the make overs on Extreme Make Over: Home Edition and thought we'd put our hand at it. Of course, if we had Sears as our sponsor we could've beefed up our budget quite a bit. But alas, such is not our lot.

The kids were dying to know what their rooms would be like. We gave them no hints as to their theme or even color palette. Finally, Emma conned me into giving them each a clue. Emma's clue was "mushroom," Abby's was "luck," and Matt's was "steel."

Finally they got to see what Josh and I had been working so hard to do.....

Here are the before/after shots of the kids' rooms, beginning tonight with Emma.

Before....

Middle.....

Josh did a special paint project in the three big kids' rooms. Emma's was a full wall mural of vines. We were inspired by the Tinkerbell room brochure at Home Depot.

After....

Emma's clue was "mushroom."

She got Tink and her friends in stickers. Underneath the fairies and their leaves reads the words, "Magic's Where You Least Expect It."

She still needs some closet doors. But her room is pretty close to being done.

Her bed is a Tink-green with vines. It was a fortuitous find.

Emma loves her room. It's also going to be the official guest room since we gave her our queen bed since we got a king size bed.

Anyone up for a visit?

Huffing Paint Fumes

I'm not a drug addict. I promise. I'm just a woman on a mission. And that mission is getting closer to being done.

To Do List:
Emma's accent wall
Matt's walls cleaned
Matt's room painted
Downstairs bathroom edges
Upstairs bathroom painted
Master bathroom taped
Master bathroom painted

To Done List:
Every other wall in the house!!!!!

There are still some wall/ceiling edges that need to be done, but three bedrooms are completed. All living spaces are completed. Stairs, hallways, washroom are completed.

As I sit (or stand) and paint, I can't help but let my mind wander over several random things. I forgot the radio today, so that made it even worse than usual. Unfortunately, the fumes from the paint have effected my memory and I don't really remember anything. I guess it was a lot of really important stuff. Hmmm. It really is too bad I can't remember any of it. It could have made for an interesting blog post.

da Vinci, I am Not

We're still painting and will be for several more days. Mostly because I suck.

Back in the day, from ages 12 to 18, I attended Girls Camp with the girls from church every summer. Girls Camp was filled with your typical expectations of girls camping: matching t-shirts, skits, girls screaming about bugs, late night talks around the campfire, bras flying on the flagpole.

And every year there was a craft. I am not a crafty person. I wish I was. I have the desire, just not the patience. You have to sit still and pay attention to small details when you do crafts. You have to start out slowly and through consistent practice you become proficient. I always dreaded sitting in the big canvas tent with my pre-cut supplies to make whatever cute thing it was. I wanted the cute thing, but I didn't want to spend the time doing it. I would've preferred sneaking off to play poker with Tootsie Rolls as our currency. Don't ever tell my daughters that, especially Abby.

Painting a wall is like completing a craft, but on a larger scale. You have to make sure you cover every little speck on the wall. And the trickiest part is the edges: the wall/ceiling, wall/baseboard, wall/trim, etc.

I don't do slow and steady. I want to get this sucker done with and move on. So, because of this I know I have to tape every surface that isn't supposed to be painted, otherwise it will be. This probably takes me as much time as it would if I just painted slower, but I know I won't mess up too much if I tape.

It just all takes soooo long!!!!! Day 3 is over. Josh goes back to work tomorrow, so I'll be painting solo for the next 6 days.

I just have to remind myself that we are actually still on schedule. We're just not going to be done early.

Finally Making It Ours

So, since I shared just about every step in our process to buy our house, why not share just about every step in moving into our house? I know, you've just fallen onto your knees in JOY and HAPPINESS. I'm just a generous sort of person like that.

Well, Saturday we changed the locks and got our new doorknobs. They are very beautiful, by the way. Josh had to work that night and Millie had a fever, so that was all we got to do that day. Then on Sunday I spent five hours of my Mother's Day washing walls. The previous tenants' daughter was named Skye and she's six. I know this because she wrote her name and and age on the walls. Along with lots of other artwork. I swear that mother had better have had a good Mother's Day since I was left cleaning her kids' junk off the walls.

Luckily, today we painted over most of what I couldn't scrub off. We began yesterday and we'll be working a lot tomorrow as well. I'll post pictures when I can.

And, I swear, if any of my kids ever write on the walls, I'll do something. I don't know what, but something.

The Good With the Bad

The Good News: We have a good shot at signing the final documents tomorrow. It's just a matter of a phone call to tell us to come sign.
The Bad News: We could be called at anytime to head to the office about 45 minutes away. To complicate matters, the girls have early out tomorrow, so we'd probably have to check them out of school so we can bring them with us.

The Bad News: Our tax refund, which we planned to use for most of our clean up of the new house, is currently being held until we send the IRS some information. Because they won't tell us over the phone what they need, we have to wait for a letter. It's been 8 weeks since we filed our taxes. Not cool.
The Good News: We should be getting back most, if not all, of our earnest money. Not as much as the tax return, but still it's money.

The Good News: Dad is coming back to town tomorrow.
The Bad News: He has to go almost immediately to report to his new job. Just a tiny, short visit.

The Bad News: The car died on Josh this evening before he headed off to work. Don't know if it will start for him in the morning.
The Good News: We have a large, shiny, vehicular target to site our guns on.

The Bad News: I have a lot of things to do around this house -- cleaning, packing, sorting, scrubbing, etc.
The Good News: I can get off the computer and do some of that stuff tonight. And I think I may actually do that.

Selling A House Is Like....

I've decided that selling a house is kind of like pregnancy.

1. You plan and plan and plan and things never go as you expect.

2. You have to redecorate.

3. You prepare to leave your old life behind you.

4. You wonder if the end result will ever happen.

5. You know the end result has to happen, but you're suddenly nervous because it's going to cause you to begin a whole new adventure.

6. Your stomach gets so upset you want to barf.

7. You wait in anticipation only to discover it was a false alarm.

8. And everyone has great advice about what you should do.

I've taken to heart some of the "Old Wives' Tales" for selling our home. Today, before our Open House began, I made cookies. I baked them so everyone walking into our house would smell them. Then I put them on a platter for potential buyers to eat. That's right. I will bribe people to buy my house if necessary.

It reminded me of a story I heard when I first went back to school in 2003. I was preparing for my first audition on the theatre. A young woman entered into her audition and confidently walked toward the front of the room to her "hot spot" which is right where the spotlight shines the brightest. As she approached the light, she tripped, stumbled, and fell to the ground. She got up and knocked the director's socks off with her great audition. Her secret was this: she practiced that fall nearly as much as she practiced her audition piece. She knew that in a cattle call of good auditioners, she needed something else to make her stand out. Everyone remembered her and she got the part. I took this story to heart and decided that if people come through and see ours and other great homes, maybe they'll think, "But remember the house with the cookies...?" Maybe.

Life in the Fast and Furious Lane

Things in the Johnson Household have been INSANE to put it lightly.

Our fury in getting the house ready to show went into frenzy-mode as Josh's time to leave for Arizona grew closer. We painted, cleaned, demo-ed, retiled, grouted, plumbed, drywalled, and noticed the sun rising nearly everyday for over a week. It was rough! Seriously, the sunrise thing. I know that watching the sun rise is supposed to be a beautiful, introspection of the beauty of the earth and our place within it, but when you're getting three to four hours of sleep a night (morning), that sunrise is not as wonderful to see. But, we got most of it done before Josh left for Arizona Tuesday morning and my dad and I finished the rest of it. (Thanks, Dad!!)

These are poorly taken, but try to envision the fruits of our labors.

Our room-- no longer the beige room with beige curtains.

The family room with the infamous drywall replacement where we found the money and porn.

The new bathroom with new tile and countertop. It used to be 1970s light blue countertop and tub tile with blue/brown linoleum.

The new bathtub tile.

The newly painted mailbox, new porchlight, and new address. It's pretty.

Today's To Do List

I've decided to continue bragging about the many exploits of Shelly the Conqueror. Here's what I did today...

I scraped paint off the cement foundation and repainted it.

I helped Josh hang drywall downstairs. He had to go to work, so I finished mudding it for him. He's got plenty of places to touch up tomorrow, but it should be paint-able soon.

I painted an accent wall in Millie's room.

Now I'm sitting on my behind. This whole "fix the house so you can sell it" business is for the birds. Tomorrow's to-do list includes: getting stuff together for a yard sale, cleaning out the girls' room and Matt's room, prepping our room for paint, cleaning up the office. Unfortunately, this list includes every single thing I've been avoiding for weeks. Oh, procrastination, why do you haunt me so?

Too Tired To Sleep

I was very busy today. So busy that I'm too tired to go to bed. Ever get that way?

Today I:

-got bills paid
-found out the camera survived its dip in the hot tub (hooray!!)
-turned in the books on cd we listened to on our trip south
-stopped by the gym (to cancel the membership, not workout -- I'm a fatty)
-prepped Millie's room for some accent painting (took down the Ariel border, removed the baseboards and washed the walls)
-helped Josh get the new drywall for downstairs
-cleaned the toilet, then put the new toilet seat on
-scrubbed the anti-slip dirt ring out of the bathtub
-moved the rocks away from the house so I can scrape the old paint off tomorrow and then repaint it
-cleaned off the table which was covered with crap from the van from our trip
-purchased the paint for Millie's room, our room, the upstairs bathroom, the downstairs family room, and the front doors.
-let Emma and Abby make their own (and Matt's) dinners tonight. Gotta love quesadillas.
-and I even got a shower today

At Walmart, after purchasing our paint and such, Josh noticed that we were being charged less than what we expected. I said, "Wow, we're making out like bandits!" Matt said, "Bandits? Bandits are bad guys! They kill you! We are bandits!"

The Gypsy Daughter

My dad called me his Gypsy Daughter the other day. I think it's pretty accurate.

I've attended

8 elementary schools

1 middle school

1 junior high school

1 high school

2 colleges

I've lived in

Montana

New Mexico

Louisiana

Idaho

Utah

Colorado

Arizona

Colorado

Montana

And now we're moving again. Josh just got a job in Scottsdale, Arizona. He'll be working at a good facility in their Emergency Department. He impressed the interviewer immensely and she called to offer him the job within two hours of his interview. The best part of all this is that our family is so adventurous that we're all excited for this new change. I'm really sad to move away from my parents and grandparents, and we love our friends and Josh's job here, but we have to get more income so Josh can go back to school easier. It's going to be fun and scary and we totally expect it to be absolutely worth it.

So, now we have to put our house on the market. We think we can list it for a good $10,000 below other houses in our area so we can get a quick sale. The kids and I will have to stay here with the house until it sells. So not looking forward to that one. But before we can list it, we have to do a little fix up here and there. Josh took the wood panels down in the family room and discovered that the drywall behind it needed to be replaced. So today we demo-ed the drywall. It was like finding junk behind your wall. We found an entire thing of electrical tape. We found a nearly dissolved mouse (totally hid that one from the kids). And then we found a few other things. Matt pulled out a purse from under the stairs. (That open area in the back.)

In it was $1,863,500!!

It's hard to see, but the money is actually from the game of Life. I made the mistake of telling the kids to look for real money back there. Instead, Abby pulled out a magazine she found. Josh and I looked at the cover and FREAKED OUT!!!

Flashback: Years and years ago, I was at my friend Cindy's house and her nephew was watching as Cindy's sister-in-law and I shucked corn. He asked us what was in our hands and we told him, "Corn." His eyes brightened and he shouted, "PORN!!" We said, "No, Corn." And he shouted again, "PORN!!"

That was funny and pretty cute. Not so cute when that porn is hidden in your walls and your daughter discovers it. I think I grabbed it and threw it into the trash can outside before they realized what the lady on the cover was not dressed in.

Our next step is to put up the new drywall and paint a few rooms. I'm hoping to have everything done so we can list the house by next Monday. If you know anyone who wants a 2000+ sq ft home with 4 bedrooms (and no porn) let me know. We'd love to show them around.