Sunny Saturday!

So busy lately! We've been gone most weekends over the last month, but now we're finally home for a while so we're back to projects again full time :) Some of our recent trips include Brent's wedding in Boston, Memorial Day weekend at my parents' cabin in Hayward, Wis., and a Roscoe wedding reception. Whew!

The hot, humid weather is no fun for me, but is doing wonders for some of my plants out on the deck.

This morning, I finally finished up a project I started some time ago... last fall, actually. Adam and I didn't have nightstands, and I had been scouring craigslist for weeks for some cheap ones. I found two matching ones for $8 total, but unfortunately they looked like this:


They sat in the shed over the winter, and a couple of months ago I got them out and started sanding. They're not real wood (as you can probably tell from the photo) -- they are pressed wood or particle board or something that's basically glorified plywood. Not the type of thing you'd normally refinish. But, I just wanted something quick and cheap, so I decided to paint them black. Not surprisingly, the outer laminate layer basically fell right off:


Then I primed, painted, and replaced the handles with something nicer. It took longer than expected, but I really like the results:

Stay tuned for the final photos of the patio set I showed Adam working on in the last post--it'll be ready for the outdoors on Monday when the paint is set. It looks AMAZING compared to when we got it. Can't wait to sit outside in the nice weather and use it!

Summer Projects

The weather keeps getting nicer, and we keep getting busier!

We visited Sam and Becky in Ann Arbor, MI, a few weeks ago, which was a blast. We've got a busy month coming up now, including Brent's wedding on May 22.

Yesterday, both our sets of parents came to visit. It was nice to see our moms on Mother's Day, but the purpose of the trip was actually to install our new water heater. Adam and the dads did a great job, and now we have plenty of hot water! (Instead of the ~1.5 showers we had previously...)

We've also gotten to do some outdoor work, which is really exciting for me. This is the first time I've had my own yard to plant things in, so it's lots of fun to get outside and play in the dirt ;) Our house doesn't have very nice landscaping -- just some bushes, and lots and lots of river rock. I am not really a big fan of river rock, although I understand that it's maintenance-free. But really, mulch just looks WAY better. I spent a few hours last weekend pulling all of the rocks out of this small area, tearing out the existing ugly bushes (with Adam's help), replanting nicer stuff, and then mulching. The before picture:



And after:


Adam has been busy with a softball league he joined this spring, as well as constantly mowing our lawn... it grows ridiculously fast. He's also been working on sanding down an old wrought iron patio set that we inherited from his parents, but that needs some work before it can be repainted. Here he is sanding the table base in the garage:


We're going to be entertaining a larger group of friends late in June, so we're trying to wrap up the table project before then. But the weather is being uncooperative, unfortunately, so it may be a challenge.

I promise more outside flower photos next time (once it stops being rainy/windy!)

Springtime!

It's finally warming up down here -- hit 80 degrees today! -- and we are gearing up for all sorts of summer trips and excitement.

A few weeks ago we traveled to Ohio with Adam's family to visit his dad's side of the family. It was his grandmother's 90th birthday, and we celebrated at a cute Italian restaurant. It was lots of fun and just starting to get warm outside, so all in all, a good time :)

Last weekend, Adam and I hosted Easter dinner at our house -- the first holiday we've ever hosted. I was a little worried, but everything went really well. Both sets of parents and our three brothers came over for ham, cheesy potatoes, rolls, green beans... mmmm. Unfortunately I didn't take pictures.

Our next trip will be next weekend (April 16) when we head up to Ann Arbor to visit Becky and Sam!! We haven't had a chance to hang out with them much recently since we're so far apart now, so it will be super fun to see them.

April 16 is also the start of an energy credit program sponsored by the state of Illinois. They are giving 15% off Energy Star appliances, so we are going to go ahead and get a new refrigerator and dishwasher for our kitchen. I'm SO excited for them! We bought a new stove when we moved in, but the house still has its original fridge/dishwasher (circa 1991....).

Unfortunately, because of the program, we can't officially buy them until the 16th, which means it'll still be a little while before they are installed. But we've got them all picked out! :)

Finally, Adam's Aunt Vicky and cousin Stephanie came down to visit ISU last weekend (Stephanie is a high school junior, so she's starting her college search). They stayed with us for a night, and were tormented by the cats. I swear, Jack and Marble are getting more wild/ridiculous. But are still extremely entertaining!

Spring Fever

So sorry for the lack of updates. No. 1, we've been busy, and No. 2... we're slacking off on the home projects and other fun things to write about. But, don't worry! With warm weather rapidly approaching (it hit 65 degrees today!!), I'm sure we'll have plenty more projects, especially outdoors, which we haven't even started/considered at this point.

For our most recent adventure, we traveled to Boston a few weeks ago to visit our friends Brent and Andrew. Neither of us had been to Boston before, so we got the full tour: Boston Commons, Beacon Hill, Harvard, the Freedom Trail, riding the subway, visiting historic gravesites, eating clam chowder.... just awesome! Here we are in the Boston Commons:

The guys also took us to the Samuel Adams brewery, where we got to taste several different beers:


And Brent and Andrew let us crash in their living room, so that was especially fun :) We'll be back in late May for their wedding, and are looking forward to their big day!

In other Julian news, we're getting soooo close to having all the painting done in our main living space. One more wall, and we're done! We're planning on finishing it up this weekend. After that, we have many, many projects to be done... we'll just be waiting for our tax refunds to show up before starting.

Installing our first door

We had a several week long break from home improvement projects over the holidays. We spent Christmas up in Roscoe with our parents, and traveled to Michigan's Upper Peninsula over New Years weekend to go skiing with a group of friends, which was fabulous.

We jumped back into the swing of things this weekend with a bigger-than-usual project: replacing our bathroom door. Let me explain why:


This is our cat Jack. He is soaking wet. Because he just took a shower with me.

Our bathroom door has never closed correctly, and the cats recently discovered that they can get in while it's closed. They LOVE water, so this is a bad idea. Also, the doors are really old and ugly, so I was ready to upgrade. Here's the old door, taken off of its hinges:


Adam and I took the old door, trim, and frame off first. We bought a pre-hung door, so we had to take the opening down to the studs. Here's Adam in action with the reciprocating saw:


Then we did lots of shimming, including help from my dad, who stopped by after my parents had dropped my brother off at U of I. After my parents left, we finished putting in the doorknob, and ta-da!


A finished door! (Well, mostly--it still needs trim, but that part's easy.) We're planning to replace all the doors in the house, which will really brighten up our dark hallway.

No more orange!

This week, we finally got rid of the last of the orange by painting over the final wall in our family room. It was so much easier than painting in the kitchen, because there were no cabinets or appliances to have to paint around.

Here is the before picture of the room, again from the realty listing (with the former owners' furnishings, etc.):


Here is our repainted wall (we left the green wall as-is; it's not a bad color, when it isn't paired with orange...):


And another view, including the Christmas tree:


And, of course, Marble is in both pictures. They are both constantly either running around like crazy or lazing around on the coffee table:

Kitchen updates

After what feels like forever, we've finally finished painting the kitchen!! We even had some help from Lynn one weekend. Here's Adam, hard at work and wearing Lynn's sunglasses in place of safety goggles:

Note the brown and orange walls, which are now gone. Ten points if you know where this T-shirt is from... ten more if you also own one, and also only wear it while painting, to bed, somewhere you won't be seen in public, etc.:


As you can see, we went with a red and tan color scheme for a more updated look. Here is a picture (from the realty listing, before we bought it) with the original paint and appliances:

And here is our newly painted kitchen with new stove:


It's still in need of a few things (like a new countertop and a range hood to match the new oven), but it's sooo much better!