Superman?

So now i know.

One of the reasons my 11 year old son LOVES to go to work with his dad!

I knew he got to do "demo work", and build fences, and learned how to repair things, and all that male bonding, using tools... what's not to love about that?

LOL but i did NOT know about this....That not only is he "allowed" to jump off roofs...

but thoroughly ENCOURAGED to!!

(insert shocked face here!!)

I was told..

"you know... it's that whole male ego thing. We all think we're superman!"

oh boy!

Kreativ Blogger Award

~Kreative Blogger Award~
I have just received a Kreativ Blogger award from Julie at Plum Run Creek , and Cyndi at

She Seeketh Wool...

Thanks Cyndi and Julie! I'm honored !

The award comes with instructions...

1. The winner may put the logo on her blog.

2. Put a link to the person you got the award from.

3. Nominate 5 blogs

4. Put links to the blogs.

5. Leave a message for your nominees.

It is tough naming only five blogs.... especially when I see several of you have already recieved it!! So I'm stepping outside the rug hooking world and nominating a few you may never have heard of - but will LOVE!! Here they are ~

Meg from 'Whatever'

The Nester from 'The Nesting Place'

Susan from 'Wildflower Wool in Texas'

Debbie from 'Woolen Sails' - unfortunately i can never leave a comment on her blog, something about yahoo hosting? but i love checking it everyday!!)

Catherine from 'Red Shoes Blog'

Congratulations ladies! :)

I hope you all enjoy reading these blogs!!

xo

Bren

Dog Days of Summer

I've been taking the kids swimming lately. It's been NICE!! It's been so darn hot here the last few weeks, we are all melting!!
Well... miss Calli who has ALWAYS had to wear floaties, got to have a little freedom this day - and ho boy did she LOVE that!! LOL!! She can now stand in the 3 ft section, and is practicing dunking herself under the water. I was in the pool with them the majority of the time, helping her work on her kicking and reaching. And then Danny has been joining us at the end of the day for a nice dip and a few laps to cool off. It's been soo nice!!
This day, poor Emily had a headache that she couldn't shake, so went to Nana's house to lay down, and ended up falling asleep. (me thinks it might have had something to do with the fact that the day before she didn't go to bed until 4 am with 10 other 12 and 13 year old girls at a sleep over!!!)
And i never seem to remember to bring my camera... so these were taken with my phone!! Please forgive the fuzzy quality to them!

Yah.. and don't even ask about the dorky faces Bay is making??? LOL It's an AGE thing i guess!! hahahaha!

See that marking on the side of the pool that says 3 FT ???? THAT was her BOUNDRY line. Why do kids always feel it's neccessary to push their boundries??? And why is it that mom's feel it's neccessary to PLACE those boundries and reinforce them?? hmm?? (i know the answer to the second one. lol but the first still stymies me!) I grew quite a few new gray hairs this day!

And who knows if this little video will work? It is turned sideways and i can't figure out how to turn it the other way??? Taken again with my phone... lol .. i was just playing to see what it could do! :)

Hope you are enjoying the "dog days of summer" !

Blessings,

Bren :)

In Progress Rugs

I don't know about you - but i LOVE to see rugs in progress, and then seeing more come to life, and finally being finished!!

A while back i posed a pic of this one just started. Andrea was in Jayne's class with me, as well as being part of the team that was running the camp. So she didn't get much time to work on hers in class. She brought it last month to our hooking bee, and i didn't have my camera!! So this month i made sure to bring my camera to grab a few snapshots of what everyone was working on! How i wish i would have had it last month also - as we had a HUGE group of people show up and tons of awesome rugs!!! Ah well.. maybe next time? :)

You can click on these to enlarge them a bit and see better!

I am not sure of the name of this pattern? The way Andrea has hooked it is soooo rich, and warm!!! Stunning!!

This one was hooked by my friend Judy. I WISH i could capture the coolness of this rug!!

She added this darling border - which i think MAKES the rug complete! And she did each flower with a different technique. Do click on it to enlarge and see!! She brought some loops higher, some are clipped, - very very fun! :) This is my design, hooked by Judy - i can't wait to get it up on the website!!

This one is Sue's. I also posted a pic of this back in the camp pics. She's almost done!!! There is only one little section she ripped out and needs to hook back in. OMGosh this is STUNNING in person!! I left the photo pretty big so you can zoom in a bit and check it out! I believe this one is called Aunt Tilly's Garden, by Woolley Fox.

Oohhh i wish my camera would take great pics like some of yours!!! This incredible rooster is being hooked by Cheryl Bollenbach. It's her own design and is called "Mardi Gras Rooster". This entire rug is sooooooooooo soft and soooooo old and still sooo whimsical!!! I am in love!!

Cheryl has a website if you want to check out her designs!! She's an amazing artist that just recently started offering her designs for sale and has some great things to offer!!

This is just closer up so you can see how many wools are being used. Very very kewl!!!

That's it for today! Just a bit of eye candy! :D

I got all my orders packed and to the post office and i'm getting ready to take the kids to the pool for the rest of the day!

Have a very blessed day!

Bren :)

Sneak Peek

I know you are waiting for the "big reveal"!!

Guess what?

SO AM I !! LOL

It's driving me a bit crazy to be this close to being finished, and having to wait for my hubby to have about an hour free to help me do the things I can't do on my own!!! Arrrgghhh!!

But he's been sooo busy since getting back from his trip - trying to catch up his business from taking a 5 day haitus. I have to understand. And I do!

But i still have ants in my pants to have this done! lol

Sooooo...... in the interim... i am finding things that still need touching up....

Painted our drop down folding table yesterday .... decided to go with a chalkboard finish, and a surprise trim!
And figured since you've been sooo patient, with me extending the deadline, I would give you a few sneak peeks!

Guess what?

It IS all balancing like I thought it would!!

i'm so glad i didn't give into that worry about the yellow overwhelming!!

The white and yellow is GORGEOUS and CHEERFUL - i love it!!! :D

I can't wait to show you the whole thing!!

And I found the perfect spot for this adorable whimsical clock that I won from Michelle Allen!! THANK YOU SOO MUCH AGAIN MICHELLE!!!

It's perfect in our new bathroom!!! :)

And for all of you that know how much I LOVE primitive... this IS the brightest room in our house now! haha!! I still love color!! But for our living space, i tend to tone it down quite a bit. This time i embraced the fun bright whimsical colors and ran with it! hee hee... it mighta been Michelle's clock that tipped the scales! And i gotta say i'm glad i did! It makes me smile everytime i go in there! :)

I promise the finished pics will be coming... i just can't give you a definite day yet, since it is all revolving around when my honey gets a little free time and isn't exhausted!

Until then...

patience, patience, patience!

(that was more for me, than for you! lol)

blessings,

Bren :)

Tuesday 7-15

Well today is kind of another day of "rest". Yesterday wasn't so much restful. LOL
I had 10 errands to run, and our monthly sam's club grocery shopping. Then came home and made a cake and got dinner going after putting everything away and portioning out the meats and such.
My mom came over for dinner, and birthday presents and cake :) It was nice!!
Right as my mom was getting ready to leave, my sister called and it was soooo nice to get to talk to her! We ended up talking until wayyy too late.. i think we finally hung up around 1 am? LOL Mebbe it was 12:30? Sheesh i don't remember, but regardless it was awesome to just hang out and talk to my sis!! I miss her so much, and wish we were both a lot less busy! So it's a nice treat when we are actually able to connect. :)

This morning has been a bunch of running around trying to get the right size screws for the vanity knobs, and trying to locate my curtain rod that i had set on the couch right outside the bathroom. Well... there are 4 sets of hands that could have absconded with it - and obviously did! An hour and a half later... (it drives me nuts wasting that much time looking for something!! grr!!) i found out that "the one that shall not be named" was using it as a "gun". Niiiicce.
And in that process it got bent, torqued, twisted, and pretty much all around mangled. Even niiicer. So "the one that shall not be named" WILL be buying a new one!
Why is that one of the hardest lessons for kids to learn? Messing with things that don't belong to them, or treating other's things with respect? It seems to be one of the single hardest things for them to grasp! And one of the top things that drives this mom nuts!

Onto better things! lol
I was asked if i was able to get the toilet tank off and get that painted. YES!!! :D
I gotta tell ya - it was much easier than yanking the whole toilet... at least i imagine that would have been hard! Simply turning off the water to the toilet, and flushing it... then going in thru the tank there are two big bolt screws in there. Holding under the tank with a wrench and screwdriver on top, i was able to get those loose and undone. Lifted the tank off ... and DUH... the water line is still attached!! hahaha! No kidding!? :P So i just laid the tank on the ground next to the toilet and real quick painted the wall and the trim back there. (lolol there were 3 other colors left bare there as well!! So looks like i wasn't the only one who got stuck there!)
Put it back together and then ran into a kink. Trying to hold the screwdriver and using the wrench blindly underneath was a real struggle!! Definitely something that is much easier accomplished with two people!! But it CAN be done!

Well my "break" is over. Thought i'd pop in and say hi, so ya'll don't give up on me!
I'll leave you with a picture of Calli last night, brushing Bailey's hair. This was a riot.. she would lean forward and run her finger from the tip of his nose, up his forhead and into his hair! We couldn't figure out what in the world she was doing?? And after about the 8th time we realized she was trying to find his center part!!! LOLOL!! Makes sense! Your nose in in the middle of your face... so just follow it up!! hee hee! Cracked me up!

Hope you have a wonderful day, filled with unexpected blessings!
~Bren :)

Oh boy

Well thought i'd give ya'll a little laugh today.

I didn't work on the bathroom yesterday, with church and my honey coming home. And working Saturday to Saturday nonstop, i indulged in a MUCH needed break!

Well...what is that saying? A rolling stone gathers no moss? or.. a body in motion stays in motion.. and a body in rest, stays in rest????

LOL! That's because rigamortis sets in the minute you allow it to rest!!!

Holy cow.

I can barely move!

EVERY muscle in my body is soo tight and screaming at me - "WHAT THE HECK WERE YOU THINKING?!?!?!!!"

Oh yah. It's like a huge nonstop chorus! And i'm payin for it now! LOL

OUCH!

And unfortunately i can't work on it today either. It's my mom's birthday, and Emily's mom is flying in for a 3 day visit today also! So i have Sam's club shopping to do, and a dr. visit, and a bunch of errands to run. uh... or rather walk... um... crawl to!

Wishing i could just take an Advil as i know that would help immensly! Sadness!!

So... as you are laughing at me, maybe say a prayer for me too, that my body will recouperate quickly if not immediately in the name of Jesus! LOL!

Looks like we might get this project finished by Wednesday, since we are taking sunday and monday off! Can't wait to show you!!

Blessings,

Bren :)

Almost there!

Ooohh wait till you see!

I worked all day and night getting the floor put down, and putting the finishing coats on the door way and vanity and cabinet. I was ready to put the bead board up, but didn't have the right size nails for our nail gun... so that has to wait until tomorrow.

And I think i'll be totally done with it Monday or Tuesday! woohoo!! What a longgg haul!

But i'm not going to post any pictures until i can show you the finale !

I know. Hate me. LOL

But I think it will be worth it! :D

I am one whooped puppy!! Time for ni ni for this girl!

And my honey comes home tomorrow morning. YAY!!! I can't wait to see him!

I hope you have a very blessed day, and enjoy your day of rest that the Lord has given you!

Bright blessings,

Bren :)

Too much of a good thing?

So the creamy "mellow yellow" that i chose yesterday... looked great going on... and was definitely much more mellow than the other yellow!

We painted our hearts out yesterday...

even cut in the trim at the top (my least favorite part of painting)

got the chair rails painted.. and all the trim work done except for the baseboards and one other thing.

And in my head it looks awesome! LOL

In reality.....

I'm starting to question if this is too small of a space to do this in... and if it's too much of a good thing? (ie yellow) ???

But yes... even with all that yellow, i am still waffling back and forth!

Because the balance isn't IN yet! It will all be balanced out with a bunch of white!

That one big wall will have wainscoting of white beadboard, with white foot board and chair rail all the way down the wall. The washer dryer is white, as is the toilet and sink, and the vanity will be white, and we are painting the "medicine" cabinet and towel holder white - which will be on the opposite wall. And an antique 4 foot cabinet will go next to the washer, and it's a creamy old white.

In essence EVERYTHING else will be white!! (except the vanity countertop.. it will be the "black sheep" - literally. lol But i can't afford to get a new counter right now!)

Can ya see it?

Will it balance?

Or will that yellow take over everything and overwhelm?

Sitting here questioning myself now. Asking myself those questions!! Wondering if i need to repaint before pulling down the tape and coverings!

But in my gut i think it will work. In my mind's eye it works well.

ha!

Ok... so we ran into one small little problem yesterday! How does one paint behind a toilet tank? It doesn't even have an inch of space back there!!!? I ended up calling one of Dan's friends... HELP?! ... he said "just yank the toilet!" and told me how to do it. Ok then! I was all ready to tackle that this morning. LOL But i texted my honey last night and let him know his buddy was going to come over and help me put it back on and all that good stuff.

Well i got an IMMEDIATE call from Dan after sending that text!! He was more than a bit irritated. LOL Vehement is a good word. Saying "DO NOT - WHATEVER YOU DO - DO NOT PULL THAT TOILET!!! It's a miserable experience trying to get it back on level, and it's FINE right now!" Ok honey.
He said there is a way to take the tank off. And do that instead! Wow. Okeedokee! So i will be attempting to take the tank off today. haha! Praying i don't screw this up!!!

I had left a big white space down where the bead board will go, and I let Calli and her friend Taryn go to town painting. :D They loved every minute of it!! LOL!! Look at those faces!!! Need i say they both had more paint on them, than the wall by the time they were done?? :)

Weds

Definitely not "exciting" pics... but Jacque said i need to post them! LOL
This is this morning... before we started painting. And working around that honker washer/dryer is tough in such a small space!
The drop down folding table will be put in last, and we will be putting matching beadboard inside the cubby, so when it's open, it looks good too. :) You can kind of see the texture here... and the color i chose.
Well after looking at that patch of yellow for over a day, i decided it was way to bright. I DO want a bright sunny yellow in there with bright crisp white trim.. but this was bordering on school bus yellow! LOL So i chose a more creamy mellow version... still sunny and happy though! You'll see tomorrow!
We just got done painting the ceiling and cutting in the trim, painted the chair rails and seam rails, still need to do the foot boards... but that probably won't happen today. We are currently waiting to make sure the trim work is dry before starting on the yellow. Emily is being a great help!!! So in the mean time, we are scraping all the drywall mud off the floors. ugh! That stuff is like cement! The new floor is going right over this one, so we do actually have to do it. I thought about ripping out the linolium... might be easier! LOL But Danny said no. So a scrapin we are!
That's it for now. Very very soon this will start looking like we've actually accomplished something! haha!! Considering i've been working on it 6-7 hours a day, ya sure couldn't tell at this point, can you? :P
Soon! Berry soon!!
xo
bren

Doing "that" thing...

Well it occured to me yesterday that i am in the throes of doing "that thing i do" ! LOLSee what i mean about how it kind of sneaks up on me?Granted, I didn't have a CHOICE about this project, like so many others! But i did have a choice about how involved to get, when there are so many other things on my plate!

Oh well! I'm thoroughly enjoying this one!I sanded the other day - woah talk about a HUGE MESS and massive dust cloud!! haha you could barely see to the other end of the bathroom! Then we mudded a second time and sanded a second time - second sanding wasn't as bad because we had learned soo many valuable lessons the first time around! Ha! :) Then i got everything taped off, and covered in plastic - including our stackable washer dryer wrapped in plastic wrap! (lol that was an interesting job!) the toilet, the mirror.. you get the drift.

Then Dan and a buddy came in and proceeded to try their hand at texturing!! Ho boy!! LOL!!There were globs everywhere! it was wild!! We went thru later and knocked it down a bit flatter, and it dried last night - looks pretty cool!!Granted... if we had a clue... or we had hired someone i would have asked for less texture! :)

But considering it was our first time we didn't do too badly!Today i am going to prime the walls, and start painting the beadboard and chair rail and stuff. Hopefully tomorrow i will be able to roll on the color.I'm taking my honey to the airport this morning, i'm really going to miss him!! But i know he'll have a great time and come back so refreshed and full of the Holy Spirit!! So very excited for him! Calli is at VBS this week. I was supposed to take part in it as well. But because of a mix up in communication i never heard from the church! I was kinda bummed.. but God knew what was going to be happening this week, so i guess this all fell into line the right way!

Hopefully will be posting pics by tomorrow. Snot much room for anything else this week in my life... so hopefully i'm not boring you to tears with this! :)

Bright blessings, Bren :)

Mudding...

Haha! I was excited to get in there and try my hand at mudding! (i know... ya'll think i'm nuts! lol I know my husband does!!) But go with me here for a minute... Big thick gloppy gooey clay like stuff that you "paint" on with a spatula! HELLO??! Who WOULDN'T want to get in there and play with that stuff??? (and just for the record.. no.. i did not put both my hands in the box and play with the goo... although yes i did think about it! haha and Danny even said "i'm surprised you haven't dove into that box hands first!" LOL! He does know me well!! ) Anyway, i convinced him to let me putty the screw holes, because really.. how bad could i screw that up? LOL And got that done in a flash, and asked permission to try one of the seams. He said yes! Yay!! I was having a great time! :) So i got to do one side of the wall, and he did the other. And because i am so anal about some things, i went back and "prettied up" some of his! ha! And... as it turns out, I seem to have a natural knack for it! I think i might even enjoy this more than painting! And i LOVE to paint!!! Wish there was more for me to mud! Danny says "no one ever becomes a dry waller so they can mud! That's the "worst" part of the whole job!" LOLOLOLOL I suppose that's up to WHO you ask!!! :D Ok.. i'm off to start sanding now. In my opinion the sanding is the "worst part" of the whole job! I'd much rather be playin in the goo!! :) Won't be anything to see today... so no pics. :( Hope ya'll have a wonderful day! Blessings, Bren :)

Sunday

Well we got the drywall up, and mudded, the window cut and framed, and the beadboard bought and cut (we just laid it in there to see how it will look :) )

Next is sanding the mud and doing any finals to that and waiting for the finisher to come and do his gig. In the meantime i sanded the vanity and will be painting that, and starting on the floor IF the texture guy won't be coming for a day or two! I can always cover it with paint paper.. although i'd rather not do it until all the painting and texture is done. But the waiting is going to kill me! I'd rather be in there working on the rest of this while i'm waiting on that step! LOL

I'm at that place now where i am very excited to get it done - and can see it in my mind's eye.. and know exactly what i need to do.. but because the other steps have to come first i am on "hold" !

LOL "Hold" is not a good place for me! Especially if the hold is any extended period of time. I WILL lose interest!! I am a do it now while i am motivated kinda person!! So i may jump the gun and paint the vanity or work on the floor even thought i truly "shouldn't" ! Guess we'll see what tomorrow brings!

Blessings, Bren :)

July 5th, 2008

We had a wonderful 4th of July!! Hope ya'll did too!! :)

Hanging out with good friends, watermelon, hot dogs, tons of fruit, macaroni salad, brownies, chips and to top it all off SMORES! LOL Let's just say the kids were WIRED!

But it was wonderfully relaxing just hangin out with the adults while all the kids ran thru sprinklers and climbed trees together! As it should be, right? :)

This morning, we had several plans!

A day filled with fun, art, antiques, and a gorgeous

sunny day!
But instead of going here to the Cherry Creek Arts Festival...

OR here.. to the Paris Street Market, antiqueing....

(i LOVE this market!!)

OR scooting around with my honey, like we'd hoped....

Instead.... after we both showered and were walking out the door to the above places, we saw a huge puddle of water in our downstairs bathroom/laundry room.

Hmmm... wonder where that came from? It's not near the toilet... or the sink... or the washer!

Hhhhmmmm.... well.. when one put one's ear to the wall and heard "pssshhhhhh!!! tink tink tink" it was pretty obvious where that water was coming from! So THIS is what we did today..

And the immense mess that dry wall - wet and dry - produces all through out the house!

Ok... so the "bad news" - my husband passionately HATES plumbing! Anything plumbing related! Hates it with a capital H ! Give him electrical, construction, you name it - as long as it doesn't have anything to do with water or pipes! LOL!

The "good news" - is he actually tackled this and DID it!!! He's my hero!! It was a small pin hole in the copper pipe.. apparently it was laid next to a nail that rusted a small hole in it. I never knew such a small hole could emit sooo much water! haha!!

(bad news...) Granted he had to go 3/4 of the way across the wall and then up into the ceiling before he found it. But... the good news is that we are now going to frame in a drop down table in the wall - so i have a place to fold my clothes and wool ! More good news.. is that i was planning on painting and replacing the floor in there come August when the kids went back to school - so i already had a plan in place for my colors and what i was going to do!! It's just a month sooner is all.... ok... and an unplanned remodel that wasn't budgeted for! LOL!

But the best news of all is I have the best husband a girl could have!! He rocked this out today demo-ing, saudering pipes, more demo-ing and putting up drywall!! And he didn't even complain about the plumbing!! LOL !! (that's HUGE!!) He's about half way done with the drywall install... tomorrow we'll finish up and tape and mud it, but then we have to call someone to come and texture it for us, since we have NO clue how to do that part! Then it's my turn and i am putting up beadboard, painting and flooring, and sanding and painting the vanity!

I'll post a picture (hopefully) by the end of this next week of the finished product! :) Wish us luck!!

We are hoping to run away from responsibility tomorrow for a little while and get down to the art festival, as it's the last day, and we don't want to miss it! It's soo awesome, inspiring and just gets the creative juices flowin!! Hope you have a blessed Sunday, and enjoy the rest of your weekend!

Blessings, Bren :)