my real actual life

For a tiny breath this morning I felt like a normal adult.

Coffee + Brennan Manning + a house closing at our bank with Daniel before he went into MFD.

{makeup & skinny jeans & black top & cute scarf. . . you almost feel human.  People don't shout at you.  Life doesn't seem to be an emergency.  Well modulated voices.  Good morning. Just a moment. Would you like a pen to sign with?  No rush, we're just waiting on copies. }

After that meeting the real, actual part of my life commenced.  This pretending I can swim in the business world is really quite an illusion.  What I really do is stuff like this:

Eli throwing the jar holding the frog across the cement porch floor.  It breaks, oh yes, it breaks everywhere. Frog, shell shocked, realizes he's still alive, and finally free, hops off through the glass.

Cambria brings me Time magazine:  "Mom, wouldn't this be awesome?" I look down at Flo, the Progressive girl, surrounded by probably 389 white bunnies.  Yes.  Yes.  Just awesome. 

Jacob and I, desperate, dig his fave athletic shorts out of the laundry hamper.  He reasons: "You know, no one ever gets close to you and actually smells your shorts."  This reasoning is . . .flawed. . . but it will work today. 

JD and I work on painting and cleaning out a storage shed.  I forget that there are calendars up on the inside of the shed from the previous occupants. Fortunately the calendar subjects are (sort of) clothed, but he pops out of the shed, scandalized:  "Mom,  there are awful pictures in here!"  I remove them with him.  Well, here's the deal, it's not respectful to women to put up pictures like this.  Keepin' it simple. He thinks those women shouldn't be dressing like that.  True.  That too.  There are so many things wrong with this, I begin and he interrupts Yes, like girls don't even ride motorcycles! Seriously! Sure.  We'll stop there for now. 

I vacuum new carpet at our current rehab with Eli.  I turn my back to take a picture to email a prospective tenant and suddenly my day spins into a panic of how did you get that cleaner in your mouth?!!!  **gagging **coughing  ** spitting 

what if some awful chemical is eating away at his airway??  how did he even get this??

I definitely heart poison control.  I called Daniel, but it is a rule of thumb for firefighter wives everywhere that if you have a panicky question for your husband, he will definitely be tied up with some other panic. 

Anyway, Cheryl from Poison Control sounded just like a grandma and was just the perfect calm to my lil storm. 

forced bath time for Eli David

Daniel calls me back finally and I find that he was on a fire.  So yeah, definitely legitimate reason he couldn't answer my phone call. . . I process this through the lens of oh, yeah, I forgot I have him to worry about too!! Oh my. . . are YOU okay???

WORRY

I gotta kill it.

JD gets invited swimming with friends. I drop him off and chat a bit. I go home and discover my zipper was down. Yes. That's awesome too. 

Awesome like the way I was in the shower last night with Eli eating his supper on a paper plate next to the tub with all the doors locked and our small group meeting in twenty minutes in our living room.  I've got this.  WE CAN DO.  Except. . . I forgot. . . my sweet friends bringing food. . . early. . . bless their patient hearts.   

The two little kids and I finish vacuuming and painting and I get out the camera to dutifully finish my photo-emailing job.  Battery exhausted.  I scroll back with the bit of juice left.  Apparently while I was painting, Cambria was using the camera to video journal Eli's nap.  Well that explains a lot. 

YOU, my prospective tenant, are going to have to be happy with three pictures tonight because it is Friday and I am clocking out  and ordering pizza. 

Oh, weekend, I love you. . . .


and just for the fun of it I'm popping up some before and afters: 

before                                                                                             after

before                                                                                 after

How unfortunate that the real, acutal  part of life and motherhood doesn't show before and after results.  Sometimes only God sees the seeds we sow.  That's okay.  I love 'em anyway. 


Especially on Friday nights when they're all tucked in bed. 


Happy weekend to you!

so i painted a fireplace on my wall

I really really did.

And there are about 100,000 other things I should have been doing in place of tootling with chalkboard paint AGAIN.

But I saw this idea last summer and stored it away in my mind.  I remembered the other night when we were out to dinner celebrating my youngest sister's birthday.  We were laughing about the positive spin realtors put on bad houses and my brother said, "yeah. . . a realtor can just wave his hand at a wall and say, you could put in a fireplace there!"

That comment reminded me of the faux fireplace.

before

I penciled the lines for the mantle and . . . mmm. . . firebox?  is that what you call it?  I don't know, I've never had a fireplace.

(best paint cleanup tool ever)

so the outlet stumped me for a while.  I came to the conclusion that I would either put a basket in front of it or somehow incorporate white lights into my fireplace using the outlet.  I briefly considered painting it black as well, but only for a moment, after I remembered that Daniel replaced every single cream/70's yellow outlet with updated bright white- just for me.

So then tonight after Eli was in bed I saw that my phone said I hadn't talked Deeann since October 16. That was definitely something that needed to be taken care of so while I was talking to her THIS beautiful art happened on my fireplace.  Not what I had in mind. You can see the remnants of a big orange chalk fire that my artist drew first. Sigh. 


Later tonight after EVERYBODY was in bed I repainted the firebox. 

 

I kind of like it.  I'm not done yet, it needs some tweaking.  I will add grey lines in the white to make faux crown moulding and I will either draw fire or add some logs.  (Somehow. )

A fireplace my firefighter can approve of.  Except that he didn't really approve. . . he saw it and said. . .
*long pause*

"WELL!  I can see somebody is totally ready to paint things!" 

Of course he is referring to that entire rental house that needs to be painted from top to bottom.  I will be getting started on that very, very soon.  After I finish my coffee by the fire. 

(before & after snapshots)

My back is out

my arms hurt

helped my good friend Carter (age 10) retrieve the middle squirrel of a trio he and Daniel trapped on the roof 

{drumroll for me helping.  This involved a ladder, which I don't do, and tin snips to cut the wire cord attaching the trap to the roof, which I have since been informed, were the wrong tools for the job.  But Daniel was on duty and Carter needed help on the ladder. . . sooo. . . I cut the wire, he held the trap and the hissing, spitting squirrel.  He thought he'd tease me with the little varmint, but I told him I wouldn't speak to him for the rest of his life if he let that trap touch me.  JD heard me and I spent the rest of the afternoon explaining what a threat is. Deeann stood at the foot of the ladder and laughed.  Not funny, Deeann.} 

Oh for a camera when you need one.

I fell off of a bench while rolling the kitchen ceiling

I feel guilty staying home after working so hard for so long

I still have scrapes on my hand from reaching up into a fan that JD had turned on (unbeknownst to me)

But here are a couple pictures of my part (Daniel obviously does the things that really matter. . . like water heaters and drywall and tearing trees out and buying appliances. . .)

Kitchen {BEFORE}

Why, oh why, peach and burgundy?

Kitchen {AFTER}

Obviously the flooring and counter tops stayed.  Cupboards, bright white, walls *journal cover*

What???? You didn't think there was going to be chalkboard paint?

Check out that cool brass fixture.  Seriously, at what point in history did brass ever look good?

Enter, hammered metal spray paint + new shades - new light fixture for $12



So much of the work involved in foreclosures is just simple TLC. . . like super cleaning these vents and cold air returns and giving the grates a fresh coat of shiny black paint.

Dining room and into Living room. . . fresh white paint on all of the trim. . .

Lots of Murphy's Oil. . .



Stairway {BEFORE} . . . how about mustard for a stairway and hallway color?




Stairway {AFTER} . . . oh yeah. Much better.



Master bedroom {BEFORE} . . .  three layers of ceiling falling down and shiny olive walls. . .



Check out the *non mustard* hallway. . .



Oh whew.

I'm so tired.

So today I treated myself to Bath & Body hand soap {spiced pumpkin and pumpkin cream. . . yum} + new boots + aimless shopping + bookoo free samples at the mall + lunch with my gorgeous sis-in-law Karen at Panera + the Hawks who weren't a treat today + a mini candy bar + two matching $3 lamps to make over at Goodwill.

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

Goodnight.



Fireplace, meet dripping water.

Why I wouldn't be a good investor:

Today, trailing behind Daniel and our realtor through a triplex.

Me: {sighing at the eclectic beauty of a huge old house with a grand entrance and beautiful staircase}  "Look at the fireplaces."

Daniel: "Uh huh. Look at the water dripping from the ceiling."

We're spending our four day together tearing into a house that Daniel bought in August and getting it ready to lease.  It's really fun, albeit exhausting work.  There's parts about the house that I grow to love as I work on it. This one has diagonal wood flooring that I adore.  And closets. Big closets.  I also adore closets.  (You don't know how much you love closets until you end up in a house that oddly has none.)

The kitchen is the next project- can't wait to do an after picture.  But here's the before:  (ahem.  The right now.)

How do you like that droopy ceiling fan?!