Pantry Progress

Tyson and his dad began working on building a pantry in our house about 3 weeks ago. So far I think this is the fastest home improvement project we've ever had. He's been motivated to get all of our projects in this house finished so that it will be ready to rent out when we close on our new-to-us home. We are in underwriting for the bigger house we are trying to buy. Our fingers are crossed that everything will work out quickly before the seller gets tired of waiting, as we were supposed to close June 30 and we still don't have an ETA for our closing date. We were told they are putting a rush on it and will try to get everything approved this weekend, but we'll see how that goes.

Here are the progress pictures for the pantry. Everything is primed, we just need to pick a wall color for the exterior and paint it.

Hall bath floor

We've been working on more home improvement projects. On May 9, Tyson and I decided to take up the indoor/outdoor carpet in the hall bath and scrape the paint off of the floor so that we could lay new tile over the floor. BittyBit wanted to help, so we let her go behind us with the trashcan and pick up all of the scraps of paint as we peeled and scraped them off of the tile.
This past week Rex and Tyson cut and installed the travertine tile.

Spunky Girl Add On Freebie

Tyson finally finished the attic foil on Tuesday morning, shortly before the installation company came out to install the new insulation and seal the ducts. They didn't actually end up sealing the ducts, I don't know if we misunderstood what they were going to do or what, but they did seal all the leaks around the vents where cool air could leak into the attic. We had 29% leakage of cool air before they sealed everything, and now we're down to 8%. I don't know how much more effective the new insulation is than the old (except that we have more of it), but it sure looks cleaner. If that's any indication, I give it an A+. :PWe had the cable company come out yesterday and install new cable wire so that we could switch our internet service from DSL to cable. Our service is almost twice as fast, at half the cost. You can't beat that. Tyson spent half of this morning running the cable in the attic and trying to push it down into an interior wall where he's going to install a cable jack. The installer would have done it yesterday for an additional $75, but Tyson said "No thanks, I'll do it myself."
Now I have blazing fast internet and Tyson won't have to crawl around in the attic for anything anytime soon.

Here are some new layouts by Amber spotlighting my Spunky Girl and Stars & Stripes Forever Kits.I posted this originally at the beginning of the week, but if you haven't picked up the first part of my Spunky Girl kit, you can snag it below (image is clickable).
And now I'll leave you with a bonus, an Add On to my Spunky Girl kit! Click on the preview to go to the download page. *No longer available**Sorry, this is no longer available as a freebie. You may now find this and other products available for purchase in my Blog Store.*

Energy Efficient Attic

Tyson found a local company that will give us a bunch of rebates for adding insulation to the attic. They are coming out next week to install the blown-in insulation. We won't get any rebates for the attic foil, but Tyson researched the foil, vs the spray on barrier and found that installing the foil barrier will prevent 97% of the radiant heat from coming into the attic, vs. the spray - which only prevents 15-79%, depending on brands and application method. That combined with the new insulation we'll be getting, and the new windows that we have in half of the house should save us a bundle on our utility bills. We should recoup all of our costs for the insulation and the foil in savings on our electric bill by the end of the summer.
Tyson and Terrence have been in the attic since 6am clearing out the attic and installing the foil. They were trying to get most of it done before the temperature got too intense. As of noon, they had the attic foil installed on an eighth of the ceiling, and they could already notice a difference in the overall temperature in there. Apparently it still feels like a sauna, but it's a cooler sauna than it was a couple of hours ago. When they called it quits for the day they were finished with about 1/4 of the attic. They'll work on the rest of it next weekend.

Tyson is planning to redo some of the duct work as well. Apparently when the house was originally built (in the late 1950's) electricity was so cheap that the builders didn't worry much about energy efficiency. The ducts are connected at each joint with two screws, so dirt and insulation from the attic can get inside the ducts, and then that debris is blown through the house via the air conditioning unit. He's going to clean the ducts out and reseal them before we have the crew come out and put more insulation in the attic.

Tonight Terrence, Tyson and I are meeting some friends at the Sports Bar to watch Rampage Jackson destroy Forest Griffin at UFC 86. It hasn't happened yet, so I suppose Forest could win if he has a miracle (remember when Serra got lucky and grabbed the victory from Georges St. Pierre?) but barring that, Jackson should win easily.

New Windows

We had a local company come out an install new windows in half of our house. Tyson previously installed the small bathroom window in the pictures by himself, and he did the windows in the baby's room too. We found such a good deal on windows and installation though that we decided to let this company install the rest of them for us. As soon as we pay off this half of the windows, we are going to have them come back out and do the rest of the house. My house should be so much more energy efficient, and just in time for the hot Texas summer. Next Tyson is going to put more insulation in the attic.

Out with the old...
...and in with the new.

I created a couple of alphas to coordinate with my "Sunshine Day" kit. The one with the dots is a clear epoxy alpha with glitter polka dots. The lowercase letters are in the same font but are solid blue glitter. I also have some bonus punctuation and numbers included in the files. Thanks for all of your encouragement, it makes me excited to design a new kit. Click on the previews to be taken to the download links. *Sorry, these are no longer available as freebies, they are now available for purchase in my Blog Store.

How Firm a Foundation...

...at least it is after today. We had the foundation company who did the repairs 12+ years ago come back and adjust 7 of the piers, as well as install 5 new steel piers. The piers that they previously installed were still under a partial warranty, so we only had to pay 50% of what they cost to install twelve years ago. The other owners never had any supports put on the front side of the house, although the foundation needed them. Because of that the house shifted down several inches on the front side and slid off of the piers that were supporting one side of the house. That is what caused the pipe to burst under our slab several months ago. We are going to fix everything correctly this time, and hopefully we won't have to deal with any more foundation drama while we own the house.This is what the house looked like with all the foundation jacks sticking out from under it.
I thought these jacks looked kinda cool. They must be strong to be able to lift the house.

Dinner & a Movie?

Saturday morning Tyson and I packed up the kids and headed to a nearby park for a family picnic hosted by the Priesthood quorum. The guys (and a few girls) played softball while the rest of us watched the kids run around on the playground, then we ate hamburgers and hot dogs and chatted.

Saturday afternoon, Tyson and I asked Connie to watch the kids so that we could go to a movie. At least she thought that was why she was watching the kids. Tyson helped her reface the frame of her kitchen cabinets last fall and they built new cabinet doors together. Connie primed the doors months ago, but between her surgeries, social life, and Tyson's busy work schedule, the doors never got installed. Tyson headed over to her house and dusted off all of the cabinet doors, then lined them up to see which one went where. Then we fastened the hardware and installed the doors, assembly line style. Tyson drilled the holes for the hinges and screws, then I attached the hardware to the door and took the finished door inside and placed it in front of the cabinet to which it belonged. Then I would bring out another door and we would do it again. We had a pretty good rhythm going and finished the project in about 3 1/2 hours. We wanted to affix the knobs to the doors too, but the cabinet doors needed another coat of paint, and I knew if we spent any more time away, she would be suspicious of our "dinner & a movie" ruse.
This is the "before" shot.
Some of the openings are different sizes, so we lined up all the doors to see where they fit.
Tyson drilled the holes for the hinges.
I attached all the hardware - with a screwdriver at first, until I began to get blisters, and we hunted for a spare cordless drill.
I held the doors in place while Tyson marked where to pre-drill for the hinges on the cabinets, then we took turns attaching the doors.
Finally, after all our hard work, the doors were all in place. We couldn't find the drawer panels to go in front of the sink, and we didn't have time to make more this time. Later Connie told us that she already has the wood to make them, she just hasn't gotten to it yet.

We tried to put everything back where we found it, but we almost made the garage too clean. We had to sweep up all the sawdust and beat it out of some carpet runners that she has next to her car. I think I put one of them back in the wrong spot. She told us later that she walked from the garage into the kitchen and thought, "I don't remember leaving the garage this clean". But she was still surprised when she walked inside and was greeted by nearly finished cabinets, instead of open shelves. She was pretty happy that we'd gotten all that done for her for mother's day, but she also was a little disappointed that we hadn't actually taken time to go on a date ourselves. Connie is awesome that way, always looking out for everyone else. I think we did get our date, and it was a service date, which was somehow much more fun than a traditional date.

Master Bath progress report

This is the famous master bathroom remodel that is 3+ years in the making.
Here is a picture of what the shower area looked like when we first bought the house. There was not even room to put your arms out to shampoo your hair. Tyson and his dad demolished the old bathroom and discovered termite damage in the sheetrock and studs, so he had to completely rip the bathroom apart. He replaced the studs one at a time and re-sheetrocked the entire bathroom and outer walls. We decided to enlarge the shower, so we took about a foot from the linen closet that was on the other side of the bathroom wall. This picture below shows Tyson's dad helping to install the new window. This picture was taken from the hall before they re-sheetrocked the wall between the closet and the bathroom.
This is what the shower wall looked like after Tyson installed the travertine tile in the new shower and on the floor of the bathroom. He even built in a bench.He poured the shower pan in our master bathroom earlier this week and today he installed the mosaic tiles on the shower floor. Terrence came over to help. Really he usually offers moral support, but it gets Tyson motivated to do the projects, so I welcome all the "help" we can get.
This is the completed shower pan, all ready for the tile installation.
Tyson and Terrence prepping the floor for tile installation...
And here is the floor with the tile. He'll grout it next week, then we're going to pick out a new pedestal sink and faucet and install all of the fixtures and hardware. Tyson still needs to seal all the tile too, but the end is in sight!

Remodeling, blog books, teeth, and BittyBit-isms

Final Phase of LittleMan’s room
Today Tyson and I picked out carpet for LittleMan's room. It looks like we will not be able to have it installed until the middle of next week, but at least everything else is finished. They are going to come measure our house tomorrow so that they know how much carpet to order. We are only installing the carpet in LittleMan's room right now, because Tyson wants to update all of the other rooms, and said it will be much easier if he can just tear up the carpet when he is ready to do each room. That way he does not have to worry about messing it up when he busts up the old windows and installs new ones. He also won't have to worry about making a mess when he re-textures the walls, replaces the trim, and paints everything.

Blog Books
My friend Elizabeth sent me a link to this site, which allows you to turn the entries from your blog into a soft or hardcover book. I have not used it, but I will definitely give it a try. I know a lot of you use your blogs as journals and this might be useful to keep all of those entries from getting lost in cyberspace.

Teeth
LittleMan now has one, on the bottom. I would take a picture, but it is barely poking through the gums and it is usually covered with drool and his tongue. He has been working on this tooth for about a month and a half, so I was very excited today to see that it had come in.

Big Momma
I had to add another BittyBit-ism. Sometimes at naptime or bedtime, I will tell her, “I love my big girl”. A couple of days ago after I told her this, she followed up with, “I love my big mommy”. Uh…thanks kiddo. I guess it is the sentiment that counts.