Wednesday, May 27, 2009

Memorial Day fun

Some people spent Memorial Day BBQing and relaxing. My dad and I spent the day doing some serious gardening. By the way, who knew gardening was such a workout?? It sounds pretty lame, but I really don't think I've ever been this sore in my life.

Our lovely front/sideyard before we got to it. You can't see the iceplant too much, but it was everywhere and had such deep roots. From far away all the wildflowers looked ok, but when you got a little closer they just looked overgrown-- some of the weeds were almost shoulder-height.

This was about halfway through. You can see all the iceplant that we tore out, it reminded me of seaweed. It was lucky for me that my dad came over at this point, my muscles were pretty much done and my dad was laughing at how I could barely swing the pick.

Looks a little sparse now but at least we're starting fresh. There was a row of lavender along our property line so I decided to keep that going, other than that, I left very little that was there before. The biggest negative to this is that now everyone can see how badly the house needs a coat of paint. Hopefully the "outside paint"pics are coming soon!

Monday, May 18, 2009

May updates

It's been quite a while since I updated the blog, but we've been busy between working on the house, working at work, and celebrating Justin's big 3-0.
Here's a peek at what we've been up to. Lots more pics to come soon, we've started doing some landscaping and my dad cut down most of the huge bushes in the front. It's a huge improvement already, we can't wait to get some paint on the outside of the house.

Almost looks like a real kitchen-- just don't look out the windows.

The Man Room. Justin did a great job of shopping on Craig's List for these chairs. Once we get a tv stand for this room, I don't think I'll ever see him again.

The living room. We are so classy, we even have art!

Hallway- there is finally light in this wing of the house!


The entryway. I had a very specific idea of the mirror that I was looking for and this wasn't quite it, but I gave up. I'm not as good of an online shopper as Justin, I just don't have the patience- shocking, I know.

The guest bath, new light fixtures and fresh paint.


The front yard before Mom got to it...

And after. Lucy helped too :)

We cleaned the brush behind the house and planted some roses. Let's see how long before we kill them.