7/31/2008

On the Mend

When Trent & I returned from our weekend trip, I found a message from my Dad that my grandfather had fallen and broken his hip on Sunday morning. The break was far enough up that he had joint replacement surgery on Tuesday. It went well and rehab has begun. Yesterday morning they got him up and moving a bit. Things are slow going, but that's probably to be expected. My sweet Calendar Girls at 2ps have been keeping him in their prayers and I truly appreciate it. :)

Finally I have an update about my tooth pain from 2 weeks ago...
Trent & I had switched dentists over the past year because our previous one moved his office and it was out of the way for both of us. I had received referrals from my current dentist to get another look at my tooth since she could not find a crack or other problem with it. Instead, I called the previous dentist to get his opinion.

Yesterday he took a peek. Did a few bite tests. And then came to the conclusion that the filling I had last month may actually be the cause. It changed my bite pattern causing me to put pressure on the outside section of the tooth. He ground it down to prevent that area from touching the bottom teeth. I'm supposed to give it a few days to see how it goes, but I've already noticed a difference. For the first time in 2 weeks I was able to chew on that side at dinner last night!


7/29/2008

HRP - the layout

I felt inspired yesterday to create a layout of our fun at Hard Rock Park:


Supplies: Bazzill cardstock; Avery baseball card holder; Basic Grey patterned paper; Making Memories Tiny Alpha letter stickers and star eyelets; Die Cuts with a View adhesive backed cardstock; QuicKutz Metro SkinniMini unicase alpha; Uniball Signo white pen; park map. Inspired by July 7th & 10th of dw2008.

7/28/2008

Hard Rock Park

All work and no play isn't any fun. We had already planned to spend this weekend at the beach before the bathroom fiasco. Since we managed to make so much progress, we packed our bags and headed south to spend the weekend playing just has hard as we had worked.

Saturday we went to the new Hard Rock Park in Myrtle Beach, SC, to do just that. :)


Not sure if it's the economy or lack of awareness of the park (several people we mentioned it to before the trip said, "Where?") - but the park was nearly empty which was great for us. Lines for rides were short and good show seats were easy to grab five minutes before starting time.

We rode this coaster (Led Zeppelin - The Ride) twice. Both times I let out blood curling screams for the entire ride. There are cameras in front of every seat so you can purchase a video after the ride. We probably should have - my terrified expressions were hilarious. :)

Other rides we enjoyed were:
We saw all 3 major shows (Roadies Stunt Show, Country on the Rocks & Malibu Beach Party) as well as a few street shows.

And crossed Abbey Road:

Yesterday we finally grabbed a little downtime and relaxed on the beach:


7/26/2008

My Week in a Wordle

I decided to play around on Wordle using my blog's RSS feed:



7/25/2008

Almost There

Day 5 update: nail holes in molding filled. Caulking complete. Toilet in place. Bathroom 95% cleaned.


Once the caulking is dry, I'm going to mop the floor and then we'll be able to start using our bathroom again. The remaining painting will wait until next week. It's been a long, exhausting 5 days.

7/24/2008

Special Inspection

The cats have been locked out of the bathroom since Sunday. We didn't want them getting into any trouble - particularly before we repaired the subfloor. I had visions of their curiosity getting the best of them and finding them running around in the floor/ceiling space! :)

Chester is our little scaredy cat and was quite unruffled by the loud noises of the saws and hammer. Last night he peeked in the doorway and that was as far as he would go. Cali also isn't a fan of the louder noises, but her curiosity always overcomes her fear. After we finished working last night, I went back in to take a few photos and she came right along to do her own inspection:

Progress update: quarter round molding installed and recessed area behind the toilet painted.

Next on the list: reconnect the toilet! :)

7/23/2008

And there was Floor...

I gave in to Trent's idea and we began installing the new flooring last night:
About 3 hours later, we were finished and I had reinstalled most of the quarter round molding around the toilet area. Tonight we're planning to finish installing the molding. Some of it snapped during demo so this will require another trip to the hardware store. And then I want to paint the recessed wall behind the toilet before we put it back - much easier than trying to work around it as I've done in our other two bathrooms.

7/22/2008

Picking Finishes


After work last night, Trent & I went shopping for paint & flooring at Home Depot. They offer a no VOC paint. It's more expensive than some other brands, but we feel worth it to not have those fumes particularly in the vicinity of our bedroom. I picked out a very pale green color called "Hidden Sea Glass." Looking forward to seeing it on the walls, but first we have a good bit of cleaning to do. I swept multiple times and vacuumed twice Sunday, but there is still sawdust everywhere - even on the walls. And there's the flooring debate. I think it would be easier to paint and then do the flooring (no worries about spilling or dripping on it). Trent thinks we should put the flooring down first. His argument is that once the floor is down, we can put the toilet back together and regain our bathroom. Then paint. I see his point but also don't want to take the bathroom apart twice - it's nearly empty as it is right now. Stay tuned for the coin toss. ;)

Thanks!

I've had 2 mentions over the past week....

Toni was so sweet with her blog post Cat Squares from Sarah. Very glad to know that Pickle and Aspen are enjoying their new toys! :) Aren't they beautiful furbabies?

The second mention was on a blog I recently discovered called 3,141 Postcards. I've always been fascinated by postcards. Enjoyed receiving them from friends & family on trips and purchasing some for myself as souvenirs (sometimes mailing them home to myself!). So when I stumbled across this blog, I was very intrigued. Carey is trying to collect a postcard from every county in the United States. Here's the one I sent: Raleigh (Wake County), North Carolina.

Thanks to both Toni & Carey for mentioning me!

And, thanks to everyone who stops in to read my various stories and peek at my latest craft projects. :)

7/21/2008

Down the Drain

Our weekend started out so well. We knocked out a few errands. Managed a thorough cleaning downstairs. Went out with friends on Friday night to the Carolina Ale House. Had a couple more friends over for a cookout Saturday night. I experienced bratwurst for the first time. Not sure if I'll eat it again, but I at least gave it a try.

Sunday morning, we went to church and listened to a wonderful sermon by the director of youth ministries as our Pastor is with a group of members on a mission trip. During the service, I was thinking about how blessed we were. Really grateful for that. There are so many trying times around us. A line of prayer included in the bulletin really caught me eye as well: Help us to be faithful disciples who recognize that everything we have in life is a gift from you (GBOD | Stewardship).

Being grateful and having patience was on my mind all afternoon. See, this was our master bathroom before Sunday. Starting to see where my title fits in?

After we returned home from church, I made the discovery of a possible water leak around the toilet. Trent stepped in the area. Soft. Uh oh. It was gray and cloudy looking. I tried cleaning the sheet vinyl flooring. Still gray and cloudy. Bigger uh oh.

Trent lined our tub with newspaper, dismantled the toilet and placed it there. (And, yes, we clearly have an obsession with Paul Mitchell Tea Tree products, but that's for another day....)

Pulled back the sheet vinyl and, sure enough, there was a slow leak that had soaked the subfloor and started growing mold (the gray stuff I saw through the flooring). It's hard to see clearly in this photo because of the sawdust. Trent began cutting out the damaged subfloor. Once we had removed about a 30x30 inch section, we were able to see to the ceiling below and, thankfully, the water had not seeped through.
Over the next few hours (including a trip to Lowes for supplies) we managed to install additional 2x4 supports between the floor trusses and cut new sections of flooring.

As frustrating as it is, I'm trying to find the positives. I can either laugh or cry. Trying to laugh instead...

- Had I not discovered this yesterday, we might have discovered it falling through the floor and into the kitchen below. Seriously. The subfloor around the toilet that was wet literally crumbled apart. There are no joists directly below it. Just open air to the kitchen ceiling.

- I've been wanting to paint the bathroom. It's on "the list" of home improvement repairs I wanted to tackle this year. Now I get to.

- I've been thinking about replacing the current light fixture over the sink area. Trent & I talked about doing it when we paint. Now we can.

- I never really like the sheet vinyl flooring that was in the bathroom. I could live with it though. And have. But now I can pick out one I really like.

I still have a roof over my head. Another full bath (thank goodness because we were both covered in sawdust from head to toe). I still have food on my table. And neither of us went through the ceiling. That would have been a crying moment. Frustrated? Yes. Exhausted? Yes. But very grateful. Because in the overall scheme of things, my bathroom dilemma isn't so bad.

So, how did you spend your weekend? ;)

7/18/2008

Friday Freebie - Summer Fun template

This week I went back a year to the first full digital layout I created:


I loved the bright blue of the water & wanted to make it a focal point. So, I kept the design simple - filling it with photos - then adding a couple embellishments. The template contains all the layers to recreate this design except for the sun & "summer fun" layers. Those are from free digital kits available at Two Peas in a Bucket.

Click here to download the Summer Fun template

Enjoy!

Supplies: sunbrush from Kate Teague's free Vacation Holiday kit; "summer fun" rub-on from Rhonna Farrer's free "live laugh love" June 2006 kit; Berhard Modern Std and Adobe Caslon Pro fonts.

7/17/2008

pinwheel thank you

Simple card created from a variety of items in my stash.


Supplies: Die Cuts with a View card; We R Memory Keepers patterned paper; Staz-On brown ink pad; Autumn Leaves sticker; Uniball Signo white pen; Fontwerks cardstock sticker; American Crafts rub-on letters; Making Memories Tiny Alpha letter stickers.

7/16/2008

Cheery Birthday Card

One of the members at Two Peas posted a request for birthday cards for her son. He's serving our country in Iraq and next month will celebrate his 20th birthday there. Here's the bright & cheery card I created for him:

Supplies: Die Cuts with a View card; Scenic Route patterned paper; Studio G stamp; Fiskars threading water punch; black stamp ink; colored pencils. Inspired by July 16th of dw2008.

7/15/2008

The Good, the Bad, and the OUCH!

So many things going through my head tonight. Mostly the latter of that title. The ouch! One of my molars started hurting last night during dinner. I had a filling put in it last month and assumed that was the problem. It still hurt this morning so I called the dentist and managed to get squeezed in at 10am. After x-rays (very uncomfortable x-rays I might add), poking, looking, thinking, a bite test (OWWWW!) and more thinking - the cause is not officially determined. It's been narrowed down to 2 options. Either I somehow upset the ligament holding the tooth (root with me for this one, ok?) or I cracked my tooth. If it's a upper tooth crack, I'll probably need a crown. But, if it's in the roots, she said it'll have to come out. Definitely rooting for the ligament problem.

So, what does one do for a ligament issue involving a tooth? Apparently take anti-inflammatory and wait. Sounds simple enough? Nah. I like to complicate things. See, I don't react well to medicines with naproxen. All anti-inflammatories have it. I've been through this one with the pharmacists enough to know that ibuprofen, Advil, Alleve, etc. are all bad for me. But the dentist wanted to check. Ok. I wait and let her. She comes back with another option (still has naproxen though) - try taking aspirin. Only be careful because aspirin can cause allergic reaction in asthmatic patients. Uh huh. Great. I have asthma. And enough allergy issues.

After that excitement I found myself in the drug store looking through my aspirin options. Every thing had "(NSAID)" as part of the label (ie, that equals "contains naproxen"). Frustrated and hurting, I opted to grab a bottle of ibuprofen. Yes, it's on my "do not take list" but so is every other option. The tooth hurts and I was getting pretty irritable. I really thought it was *just* the filling and she would refill it. Then bye-bye pain. Nope. Still here. And, so far, no horrid reaction to the ibuprofen.

7/14/2008

good eats

I've been trying to decide how to scrapbook about the many restaurants we ate at while in Walt Disney World last fall. The sketch used for July 21st in dw2008 gave me just the inspiration I needed to capture them all (well, the table dining restaurants at least) in one page:


Here's where Friday's Stickle fun came in. Love the sparkle of those letters. I foresee lots of sparkle in my future. ;) Also, a little of the stitching shows up in this photo. See the red around the journaling circle?

I played around with several rub-on alphabets I have in my stash to list the restaurants. I also played around with the design in the bottom sheet of patterned paper - adding white snaps & Mickey hands as well as a bit of stitching which is hard to see in the photos.

Supplies: misc. gray cardstock; Creative Imaginations patterned paper; Making Memories Tiny Alpha, snaps and rub-on letters; Basic Grey chipboard letters; Stickles; Doodlebug rub-on letters; misc. red & white thread; Love, Elsie rub-on letters; Micron black pen; American Crafts rub-on letters; Mickey head button & hand brads from Walt Disney World.

7/13/2008

Stampin' Up goodies

The Stampin' Up party was a lot of fun. We made 3 cards and a cute little post-it note holder for our purse. I ordered 1 stamp set and the scallop punch. Looking forward to getting those soon. In the meantime, I have 3 new stamps to play with from the door prize I won:


Last night I made a quick card using the parasol stamp:Supplies: Making Memories patterned paper & metal rimmed tag; Stampin' Up! Blooming with Happiness stamp; Studio G "For My Friend" stamp; American Crafts ribbon; Marvy & Prismacolor markers; chalk; black stamp ink; Uniball Signo silver pen. Inspired by July 14th of dw2008 and July week 1 challenge on the Two Peas stamping message board.

7/12/2008

Hello, Weekend

No cows sighted around here. Did anyone else spot (or maybe dress as) one? :D Even without any cows, I had a very good day...

One of my favorite things about any Friday is that I only work until 1pm. Afterwards I went to my monthly massage appointment. Ahhhh.

Came home and scrapped for a bit.

Got the mail. My latest order from ScrapbookPictures.com arrived and a notice from the courthouse - I've been summoned. So I added jury duty to my August calendar (after placing my new digital layout prints in their albums, of course - I have my priorities. LOL).

Tonight I worked a little more on my latest scrapbook page. It's slow going, but I think the result will be worth it. Just a short bit ago I added Stickles to Basic Grey chipboard letters for the title. This is my first time playing with them, but I already can see why they would be so addicting. :)

Today the only set item on my agenda is a Stampin' Up! party at my neighbor's house this afternoon. Another first for me and I'm really looking forward to it. My only concern is that I'll want too many stamps!

7/11/2008

Chick-fil-A Cow Appreciation Day

I am on far too many email lists. Recently I received one from Chick-fil-A about Cow Appreciation Day and, well, I couldn't help but laugh. I'm seriously considering stopping by to just sit & watch to see if anyone does this today. Here's the deal: dress from "head to hoof" like a cow, stop by Chick-fil-A today and get a free combo meal. "Partial" cow attire will earn you a free entree.

See their promotion site for more details.

Oh, if you do dress as a cow, please share. :)

7/10/2008

Tagged

I've been tagged by Darcey! :)

Ten Years Ago: I was at home for the summer between sophomore & junior years in college. I worked part time doing website design & coding for a small company.

Five things on today's To-Do list:
  1. Blog
  2. Wrap up a set of construction drawings for plotting on Friday
  3. Attend a small party w/ Trent after work
  4. Play with my furbabies
  5. Sew a few more Cat Squares
Snack I Enjoy: dark chocolate peanut M&M's - not good for me, but so delicious! ;)

Things I would do if I was a Millionaire: donate to charity; travel

Places I have Lived: Although I've lived in a variety of zip codes, I've only called 2 counties in 2 states "home." For the last decade that's been Wake County, NC.

The 4 people I am tagging are: Lori, Tina, Linda and Ter.

7/09/2008

Garden Gnome


Wordless Wednesday

7/08/2008

Happy Birthday, Kim!

Hope you have a wonderful day! :)


Supplies: Autumn Leaves Oak Leaf Words patterned paper; My Mind's Eye journaling block; BasicGrey chipboard

7/07/2008

creativity

The prompt for July 26/27 in the dw2008 calendar is to scrap about another hobby. It inspired me to play with a bit of fabric remnant from my Cat Squares to create a page:

Close-up of the cd sleeve:

Supplies: Misc. dark brown cardstock; fabric & thread from stash; greenroom eco CD sleeve; Martha Stewart Crafts letter sticker tabs & sepia pen; Fontwerks cardstock sticker; American Crafts rub-on letters; Doodlebug Designs rub-on letters; Sharpie marker.

7/06/2008

Eye Pillows

It's been a very stormy couple of days. We've spent a good bit of time indoors and out of the thunderstorms that have passed through. Lots of natural fireworks. :) It's given me a chance to work indoors on a couple of projects including eye pillows.

I made a couple pillows with removable flannel covers in a purple floral print:

And a couple of extra covers in this green dot flannel:

7/05/2008

Saturday Freebie

I decided to switch things up a bit and have a freebie on a Saturday. It's a 12x12 template I created while making the softball layout I posted on Monday.

The template features 7 layers in all. The dot pattern is divided among 3 layers allowing a quick drop & mask of three papers to create the "random" pattern.

Click here to download the Dots template

Enjoy!


7/04/2008

Happy Fourth!


Many thanks to those that sacrifice
for the freedom we cherish so much.




7/03/2008

Q&A

I've gotten a few of questions recently that I thought I'd address in a post. Afterall, there never really is just one person in a group that is curious about something. :)

How I added text with strike through (ie, this) in my Weekend in Review post:
Use this HTML code: <strike>grocery shopping</strike>
Your text will look like this: grocery shopping
The inside of the Pretty Tote Bag has a pocket made of the striped fabric. Here's a photo I grabbed from JustUsGirlz shop:

Oops. I guess I didn't post the best photo of the California T-Shirt Bag. I took a couple of new photos & added them to the listing on Etsy. Here's one using it as a beach bag:

The Making Memories patterned paper on the Pink & Black card is from the Boho Chic line - Multipack Olivia 6x6 pad. It was part of my Big Lots shopping spree back in May.

7/02/2008

Pretty Tote Bag

Yesterday, Trent picked up a package waiting for me at the Post Office with this fun tote in it:


I bought it from JustUsGirlz shop at Etsy. So perfect for summer. :)

7/01/2008

hello

Very quick, simple card I made last night:


Supplies: Autumn Leaves Oak Leaf Words patterned paper; QuicKutz die; American Crafts rub-on; Making Memories brad.