Snow Day #5

Dear Texas,

It snowed a little, but not enough to measure with a standard ruler. You closed everything anyway. That's one of the reasons I love you.

Love,
Sara

It was a nice surprise to wake up to no work for the 5th time in 2 weeks, but one thing that is NOT a nice surprise is how the dogs want to go out every 5 minutes to wrestle in the "snow". It's not snow anymore, though. It's now just really cold mud. And do you know how hard it is to wipe really cold mud off of a dog's paws? It's hard. Especially because I can't justify making them rinse off in the pool at this point in time...

They are cute, though.

In other news, I came home late from work last night, and my dear husband showed me his continued demo progress on the bathroom! He cut the studs out that were separating the bathroom, closets and toilet closet thing. He also pulled out the vanity, soffit above the vanity and the last mirror.

Now it's nice and open!

All that's left is to pull up the marble tile on the floor and get that gigantic tub outta here!

Ahead of Schedule

One way to force yourself into taking on a project that seems a little scary at first is to act impulsively!

We were only gonna take down the mirrors and doors yesterday, but as you can see from the following photos, we got a little carried away.

This is good because it puts us ahead of schedule! This is bad because we have bought nothing (NOTHING) to begin this bathroom renovation, except for a crow-bar combo pack and a sledgehammer. Oh and some construction trash bags.

Kennedy is currently working on getting the corroded vanity faucets off the wall so we can carry the vanity out to the garage and perform all sorts of magic on it!

Just to remind you of what it looked like before:

Enjoy our destruction!

Bags full of drywall greet us at the top of the stairs - This is only from today - there are 15 bags on the front porch from yesterday. I'm sure our neighbors are wondering if we are chopping up dead bodies over here. (Sorry, I let Dexter influence my imagination.)

We still have a lot of framing to tear out, but it's a start! (Hey Kennedy, nice socks!)

Look at all the fun exposed wires!

Most of the shower is torn out...

Have fun, Kennedy! I'm gonna go blog about all the hard work you're doing! (Just kidding, I helped clean!)

Total spent so far: $40.00 (New tools & trash bags) 

Total saved so far: $1500? How much does someone charge to smash up a bathroom?

It has begun

As I sit here, wasting my life away on the computer, I hear this:

Pound - Pound - Pound - SHATTER.

The bathroom renovation has begun. And it sounds like Kennedy's new sledgehammer was just introduced to our 1970s mirrored cove.

Good-bye for now - I must fetch a dustpan!

Stick a fork in my living room wall...

I've finally finished stenciling that confounded wall in the living room!

And it doesn't look bad, if I do say so myself...

And now for my disclaimer!

Do not perform this project if any of the following apply to you:

1. You have a short temper when it comes to math
2. You don't have a large chunk of time to waste (Thank you, inclement weather days...)
3. You don't have a pint of Ben & Jerry's to reward yourself when you come to a stopping point

DO perform this project if the following things apply to you:
1. You're a cheapskate (To the tune of under $5)
2. You are extremely patient
3. You have a lot of wall space and nothing to use it for

Here are the cutest dogs in the world admiring the stenciled wall.

I had honestly not even thought about this wall. Kennedy and I have commitment issues. As a result, we haven't really hung things on the walls in our house. Except for a few mirrors here and there, we have NO ARTWORK displayed. Anyway, the thought struck me after strolling through the blog-o-sphere and seeing some neat projects here and there.

I found a great tutorial from Centsational Girl's blog for a Painted Trellis Wall, and used that as my starting point.

Then I went to Wal-mart (ugh) and bought a poster board for 38 cents, and 3 small bottles of champagne colored acrylic paint.

I first decided which stencil I wanted and played around with how to draw it. I ended up using a ruler and a salad plate as guides. Here's where all that fuzzy math comes in with levels and rulers and such. It was a nightmare, but it's true what the Army says: Prior Planning Prevents Poor Performance.

I am the world's worst blogger, and don't want to show you step by step, so if you have any questions about this little project, just ask me! Right now, Kennedy is pressuring me into cleaning the house with him. He has bribed me with Jason's Deli for dinner. He knows my weaknesses and has exploited them. Quick, look at Elvis!

Don't try this at home...

Seriously, I can't wait to be done with this stencil wall. For one, it will look REALLY good when it's all done. For another, I can't wait to unload all of the complaints I have about this project!!!

For now, I will share with you a low-quality iPhone picture of the progress I made while watching the Real Housewives of Beverly Hills Reunion Show Part 1 (which I had already watched once, so I could listen and know exactly what was going on!) Progress is actually further along than the photo depicts. Yay for me.