You Can't Trust Monday (or Tuesday apparently)

This week I feel like I've had two Mondays. And it's only Tuesday. I'm a little nervous to see what tomorrow brings.

Thinking back, I couldn't tell you specifically what was so bad. It was just a mix of a little bit of everything, and a bad mood.

Tomorrow WILL be a good day.

High on Paint?

I ♥ my orange dining room!

and it doesn't even have trim on yet!!!! (here are some views of the work in progress. YOu have to wait to the end to see the paint!)

This is an old pic from right after we moved in. Looks like an innocent wall, doesn't it???? No, it was textured paint over very awfully done wallpaper. It was an eyesore up close. The worse areas were behind the fridge (pic will show later) beside the patio door, and between the light switches (there was just nothing between them. Kind of weird looking...) Not the greatest pic...
The end of this wall (the part that is discouragingly HORRIBLE...)is behind the fridge. Eventually that wall, and the wall behind my counters and stove will be covered by beadboard and white paint. BUT, it does give you a taste of what we were facing for the rest of the walls! (its truly amazing what wallpaper can hide!!!)Also, you will notice, in this picture the area between light switches now has sheetrock/tape/mud/texture/primer!
This picture just shows some more areas of new sheetrock. I wish I'd taken more pictures, but that's how it goes with 2 little kids and a full camera card.
We have put a lot more work into this dining room than we'd hoped. But, honestly, probably not more than was expected. My previous blog with the label "home improvement" tells of the....difficulties we experienced. Unfortunately, I didn't get good pictures of HOW bad it was, and I don't want to go into it here. I'll just say, the pictures you see where we had to patch and add whole new sheetrock were un-salvage-able. The other areas, Luke (with some help from his brother Justin) were able to patch, and retexture.

This is us choosing colors. I chose the one on the right!
Then Luke painted: 3 coats of orange, 2 coats of Polar Bear white.
It looks like NEW!
...well...new without trim...I guess. (there will be a chair rail where the paint meets (obviously) and crown moulding, and floor trim...and hopefully laminate wood flooring!!!!
AND NOW (drumroll, please!) here are the long awaited, still not finished pictures of the dining room!





UM. Can I just LIVE in my dining room now?

Happenings in the Antonich Household

This week we are watching my nephews Collin and Warren. It has been fun and Kaden has thoroughly enjoyed the company! Even Kate has loved the extra action! Their parents, Justin and Rose, stayed through the weekend with us. Justin and Luke were able to finish mudding the new sheetrock and all the places that needed patches, retextured, primed, and now are dining room has 2 big orange wall tester blobs on it.

AM I REALLY GOING TO DO ORANGE?!

Justin and Rose left Monday, during the kids' naptime, to head over to Rapid City to attend an AMF Missionary Conference. I had cooking club that night, so I spent the afternoon cleaning up from all the mudding/texturing/extra dishes from company mess. The kids played and played and it was actually easier than if I'd just had Kaden and Kate!

Today I have another cooking club, but I'm hoping to get the kitchen/dining room clean before it gets warm out. Then when it's nice I hope to take the kids out to play in the pool!

Justin and Rose will be back tomorrow afternoon, and the time with the kids will be all to short :(
Back to the walls...I will post pictures soon of the progress and colors!

Roseola

Well, my baby girl seems to have Roseola. Have you heard of it? It seems that it's easier to diagnose after the sickness has pretty much run it's course. I didn't know what Roseola was until she started getting little red rash looking dots alllll over her body. I didn't know if it was an allergic reaction, heat, or what! I quickly took some pictures and sent them to my might-as-well-have-been-a-doctor mom. I then called to implore her to please check her email as soon as she could. She, however, was not even in town and could not. I said "But! Katelyn has a rash!" (Like that can change whether mom has access to her email!) and mom replied "Is it on the trunk of her body, not hot, and not very raised?" Me, confused: "Um, yah pretty much." Mom: "It's Roseola." JUST.LIKE.THAT. No, "It's ok honey, your baby's gonna be fine it's just...." Nope. Just this is what it is. So, I asked "Is that...like...a good thing? A not good thing? A slightly OK thing? Or should I be hanging up and calling an ambulance?" (Fairly certain it wasn't that last option.) It turns out it's not really good, but definitely not bad...since the rash part means its over.

SO. For those of you unexperienced like me. Roseola starts with a (usually) high fever (102-105*) that lasts 3-5 days. It can be accompanied by runny nose, cough, and diahrea. Needless to say, this is why it is hard to diagnose! When the fever breaks the rash appears and can last from 1-3ish days. We all hope for the 1 day. That's when you know what it was. It is highly contagious as well, until 24 hours after the rash appears.

Thankfully, I cancelled all playdates this week, did not attend church, and did not attend MOPS on Thursday. I am glad I made that decision. So as of tomorrow morning we should be contagious free and on the upside! WHEW. I'm getting sick of having sickies.

Ghost Gallbladder

Today is 6 weeks post surgery. How do I feel? FANTASTIC. Energetic. A whole new person. And a little surprised that it was so easy.

I had a little back pain for a few weeks after surgery. I also had what I've now, affectionately, come to call my lack-of-gallbladder-feeling: ghost gallbladder pain. You know, when someone has something amputated, I've heard that they have a hard time convincing their brain that it's gone. Really gone. I think that was my brain and it's tramatic parting with my gallbladder. Every day, sometimes several times a day, I would have a burny-stretchy-knifey pain where my gallbladder used to be. I actually thought it was kind of neat. However, that ghost gallbladder has also taken leave of my body. I will miss you, my fair ghost- at least a little.

The hardest part about surgery was getting back on my diet. Which I didn't. Yet. Tomorrow, I expect that to change. I wanted to try a lot of different foods right after surgery so I would know if I had any adverse affects to talk to my surgeon about. (Yes, my surgeon. I now have a surgeon to call my very own.) I tried all the yummiest, fattiest, sinfulest foods I could imagine. And I had absolutely NO problems. However, 6 weeks later, I'm afraid I can no longer use the excuse "I need to see how this affects me without a gallbladder" excuse any longer.

SAD day.

I am, however, happy to report: I gained no weight while trying all those greasy, sinful, yummy meals/desserts/snacks/etc... Which leads me to wonder-was my gallbladder hoarding calories? Or is it just coincidance that I didn't gain.

I don't actually wonder. I know. But it sure would be nice if it could have been a "got rid of my gallbladder and now I'll never gain weight again" kind of miracle.

Only 10 more pounds to lose tho!

"No Gingin'!"

Lately, my hilarious little boy has been begging "no gingin'!" (NO SINGING!) anytime we so much as threaten to sing/hum/whistle or otherwise. It's kinda cute, and sometimes, I'll admit, I even do it to get him to say it. :) Today, however, I was trying to sing to Katelyn as I attempted to rock her to sleep. She looooves me to sing to her and will calm down immediately. So. Picture me, singing-in my not so lovely singing voice-to Kate. Kaden standing about 10 feet away "NO gingin'! NO GINGIN'!!!" and I was ignoring him. Finally, i looked up to see him almost in tears, "NO GINGIN'!" and plugging his ears! PLUGGING.HIS.EARS.

I had to stop singing.

Home Depot Broke My Wallet

Yes, you read right. Figuratively speaking, Home Depot broke my wallet. It was unkind to us today as we purchased many tools, supplies, and gadgets for the near future. We are still working on the wallpaper removal project. There are moments when I wonder what I've gotten myself into, and moments where I am just so, SO excited to finish. I has become almost monumental. We have now taken down all the trim around windows, doors, and floor, since the wallpaper was on, under, or otherwise hindered by it. Most of it is junk because between wallpaper and paint it would be more work than it's worth to try to clean up. Thankfully, I had already decided i wanted to put up crown molding, so when it became a must at least I wasn't irritated. The previous owners painted all over the ceilings (and by all over, I guess I don't really mean ALL OVER. but at least an inch into the ceiling..with lovely TEXTURED gray/tan paint.) The only other option would be to paint the ceiling which reaches over the stairs, into the living room, and beyond. I ♥ crown molding.

SINCE we have the trim off....I am *hesitantly* trying to convince Luke to go ahead and do the flooring as well. I would LOVE to have laminate wood-looking flooring in the kitchen and dining room. It would require pulling up carpet to certain point in the entry, and pulling up the kitchen linolium..which, SURPRISE, is also painted all over. (And by all over I DO mean all over. Its like they flung paint...)

I think I have decided that instead of repainting the parts behind my counters, I want to do beadboard. I {think}. I am still going to browse the world wide web for more inspiration. I decided to do something other than paint when I realized that both behind the fridge and my counters IS wallpaper after all. Not only that, but it's been impossible to get more than a millimeter of wallpaper off at a time. Also, the paint over the wallpaper is peeling terribly. I'm sorry, I don't want to face it. Let's cover it.

I am very excited though. I just can't wait to see the finished project. And even if it isn't perfect, it can't be worse, and I KNOW it will be better by a long shot If you haven't seen, here is the photo that inspired this whole project...Its the one I keep going back to -daily- to remind me how great it's going to be!!!!