Holy Awesome Floors, Batman!

Yep, that's right, I married a superhero. He installed three new floors in ten days! We're so glad to get all of these boxes and materials gone from the piles they've been in for six months. There was no time to do any of this over the summer, and then pregnancy stole our lives for a month. 

I kinda missed getting the full before pictures, but got a few partials:) The linoleum in these rooms was peeling at the edges and cracked and cut in the middle. After four and a half years, we're happy to say goodbye to them.

Main floor bathroom--Before:

Upstairs bathroom--Before:

We had black tape over that whole crack and believe me, that was an improvement.

Laundry room--Before:

This was after Shad cut off the peeled parts. It didn't just look that bad!

After:

It feels so nice to have all these done!

Craftiness

Just found this post in my draft folder from December 2013:

In December, I tried out making some slippers for Tom and Katie. I wouldn't normally take time to do something like this, but we thought we were potentially going to France (loooooong story), and so I was preparing "house shoes" for the kids to wear. Anyway, here's the "No-Sew" Slippers (they do require sewing, just handstitching and not machine):

I used my fleece socks for a pattern. I cut out three pattern pieces--foot, top, and back. Then I cut two of each piece out of my fabric. I used a sweater from the thrift store.

There's the bottom, back and top piece for one slipper. I have the heels of the bottom and back facing each other.

Lay the heels on top of each other and blanket stitch using yarn.

This is the bottom and back sewn together, only at the heel.

Then I laid the top piece on top of the open bottom and back, lining it up at the toe. I continued stitching from where I ended on the side of the heel. I stitched down the foot, around the toe, up the foot, up the leg, around the top, and down the other side of the leg, finishing at the heel.

I guess I forgot to take a picture of the final piece. Dang it.

While I was sewing, Tom kept me company and built me a castle house with wood pieces.

He's a sweet boy.

He's getting better with the camera.

Building our own swing set

And so it was that the week after Earth Day, and after the kids spent a week watching The Lorax, we spent a weekend cutting down the Tree of Paradise in the northwest corner of our yard. Irony.

I never really liked that tree, and when I'd rather use my yard space to plant edible food for my family, the amount of saplings that tree dropped made it impossible to use the surrounding space as long as the tree remained standing. And after Shad spent some time staring at the tree, pondering upon it, he concluded that we could easily use it to build the tower portion of the swing set we've long been planning to build for our kids. So the cutters and saw came out. Shad did the major cutting, I did the minor cutting once the branches were on the ground, and Tom and Katie, and sort of Dancy, helped haul the little sticks to the truck bed.

The following day, Shad and his friend Tim began construction.

We've worked on it steadily, day by day as we have time and it's not raining.

No blueprints, just making it up as we go, making it what we want it to be.

 The slide was purchased a couple years ago at a garage sale for $5, and the ladder had been lying around in our garage for who knows how long. Shad reinforced the sides with some of the leftover lumber we purchased.

We bought a camo tarp on ebay and used zip ties to secure it. The steering wheels and periscope were scavenged on a Trash-Swap Weekend.

The pirate flag (from Paul Jones) now has an appropriate use, and really completes the tower portion of the swing set. 

We would have built the swing portion last weekend, but when we went to buy a 4 by 6, both hardware stores told us they don't carry that piece of lumber. And they didn't offer to order it in, either.

Master Bath Decorated

A while ago I finished decorating my bathroom. It has officially become our "cruise" room. We didn't plan it that way, but once we saw the color on the walls, it just fit. I bought the clock at a garage sale, and it reminds me of a porthole.

I acquired this candle and holder collection at the end of a garage sale when they were giving everything away. I painted the holders (and used the same paint on the towel holders), and glued on snail shells. There's a creek bed behind my house and it's covered in all of these snail shells.

We googled how to roll the towel animals and I bought this white towel and hand towel at a thrift store. Admittedly, the elephant's head needs a bit of work. I haven't tried any other animals yet.

I compulsively buy pictures frames for dirt cheap at garage sales, and also claimed a bunch from my grandpa when he was downsizing and moving. I scooped up a bit of sand from our lake and used homemade Mod Podge (the commercial stuff is INSANELY overpriced!) to cover the frames in glue. I gave them all a spray with clear coat paint out in the garage (this was back in December!) to seal it in. I haven't had ANY problems with grains of sand falling off. Then my nephew Ryan made the shell arrangements and I glued them on with the glue gun.

Look at how the color of the wall and the color of the water are an exact match! We love it, and we didn't even do it on purpose!

Ryan is an awesome 8-year-old. I mean, he designed these frames for me AND he knew what DIY means when he saw it on one of my baskets.

UPDATE: I forgot to mention that I find these shells in a ravine behind my house. There must be loads of snails inhabiting that small, wooded area because the ground is littered with shells all over!