a year ago

things were looking like this.... (damn i am glad it is not a year ago.)
and now they looka like this
and it only took 345 hours in the yard, 200 plants, 150 bales of pinestraw, 75 cuss words, 8 gabillion gallons of water and one axe slinging. those are exact numbers.

merry Christmas

because we missed it here. and i know you are sad.

these are just snippets of the house, but it was our first Christmas in the new homestead.

this is not at our house, but its a rare picture of the 3 of us together. and my hair looked good that night. it hasn't looked like that since. truly a Christmas miracle. plus, i have on a men's plaid shirt, pearls and a fake fur vest. what doesn't say feliz navidad like that combo?

one of the three trees. i have no clue where the other pictures went...
the trifecta of Christmas morning: A Christmas Story on tv, a snuggie. and a kid opening a gift that she will tell you wasn't what she really wanted.
this she did want.dear lord look at those terrible green walls.

i think chris would fight her for that peanut butter and jelly sandwich if it came down to it. she would win. we hope you also had a real nice Christmas 3 months ago too!

how to paint a room in a brand new house, part 2.

with a little bit of halloween and thanksgiving thrown in, because well it has been a while.

so lets all remember this...we will not even get into the one million reasons why it needed to be repainted. you know it did. know its looks a little bit more like this...
and a little bit of this....

a lot of things are still a thorn in my side in this room. but at least it is not a pink thorn any longer!

if you are asking yourself "what is this room?". don't ask me. i am not sure yet. and clearly neither is the room.

stayed tuned for more, yes more, in the series of how to repaint a room in a brand new house.

and because we have missed some major holidays.

how about some ghetto annie for halloween?
and what my house turns into at holidays. in particular, thanksgiving. i am not going to post what i turned into after this...
check back soon to see how i have yet again, screwed something up.

how to paint a room in a brand new house. part 1.

the before. and yes, that is a cabinet door on the counter. no we don't have a trap door in the island. chris ripped that off for us about 12 o clock one night, because it swings the wrong way. thanks cabinet guy.

step 1: suggest to your painter that you don't really know what color you want this room, so just leave it white.
step 2: realize after you moved in that white = this room ain't finished. then realize you paid a painter not to finish a room.
step 3: quit caring that the room isn't done because you have too many other projects to finish in your brand new house.
step 4: finish 37 other projects and realize you still don't like the white.
step 5: look online at other peoples' kitchens and realize you wish you had a different kitchen.
step 6: get cussed by your husband.
step 7: see a black kitchen you like.
step 8: google black room images about 45 times.
step 9: tell everybody you know you are going to paint your kitchen black.
step 10: get shot down by everybody you know, except your husband who surprisingly says this is a good idea.
step 11: go buy more paint.
step 12: wake up on a saturday and think you will knock this out in about 2 hours.
step 13:realize that its going to take more like 8 hours. painting a wall black, around stark white trim is not easy going.
step 14: take pictures of black kitchen. show them to everybody you know. tell them they were wrong.
step 15: take a night time picture. also be sure to get a good picture of your trash, because there is no door. which is convenient, but unsanitary.
step 16: take a daytime picture, but from the other direction. so you can't see directly into the trash.


step 17: take another picture from another angle. so you can't see the open air trash can at all. but you can see the cabinet door. now on the floor.step 18: be really happy you painted your kitchen black.
step 19: decide you really need to paint another room now.

it has been a while. obviously.

and since it has. we have accomplished a few things at the homestead. if i had done this post in a more timely fashion, i would have gone on and on about how much work it was. lucky for you i have the anesthetic of time, so you won't be subjected to all of that. just some nice pictures.

the yard no longer looks like this....
and looks more like this.
oh what a difference 100 bales of pine straw, 50 new plants, and about 170 plants from your old house can make.
this once, i am not exaggerating. we literally had at least that many plants. day lilies, iris, amaryllis, spirea, hydrangeas, some purple things that i am not sure of the name of and whose fate is yet to be determined, and a few other random things. my mom and i dug up all of these items, hauled them across the road to the new house. then my parents and i planted them. sounds fun, right?

this is about 1/25th of what we had going on....
somebody mentioned that i may be the worst tenant ever. basically because i moved out of a house we had lived in for 10 years. and then took everything in the yard too. this sounds like i am a gypsy or something, which may be true. but i took the plants because they were my great grandmother's, then my grandmother's, and some of my mother's. so i have a history with these plants. so i feel this is justified. plus i cleared it with the new residents beforehand. so fingers crossed everything blooms beautifully next spring. or i am moving it all back.

also if you think you don't see plants in those flower beds it is because we cut everything back before we planted it. so i am not faking that number.

stay tuned for more fun new house posts. like "how to repaint two rooms in your brand new house that just got painted 5 months ago".

finally

the porches have been stained. it should have been done probably 3 months ago, but you know. things happen. i couldn't hardly stand looking at what i deemed an unfinished porch. see the before.and now they look like this.closer, shall we?
we still have some small trim details to accomplish, but this is 100% better.i think i could have done a tad better with my color choices. and the dogs could wipe their feet. but what done is done. we will get another chance at it in about five years anyway.

fingers crossed that we may get some plants in the ground this weekend. more importantly, some pine straw on the ground. the dirt is keeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeelling me.

welcome to the augusta national

ok, not really. but it's just as good to us!

until yesterday, our yard looked like this. dirt. just dirt. no weeds. only dirt. hard dirt. dirty dirt. dirt that likes to come indoors. and its looked like this since, um, well lets see when did we start building this house? almost a year ago? ok so a year. of dirt.and this isn't the nice kind of dirt. this is more like clay. you need a tractor to cut through it. much like most other things that happen at this house, this clay is an anomaly. There is no clay is this part of the world. there is sand, everybody has sand. it drains well. clay does not. we have clay. as a result, chris has spent the past two weeks installing drain tiles and an expansive sprinkler system. and bringing in other dirt that is not so terrible. so our yard has looked even better with a series of trenches everywhere. which is a problem for low riding dogs such as ours.

so chris has spent all his energy and time installing 80 something sprinkler heads. i probably lost count while i was putting them together. nonetheless, he has worked himself past the point of his normal working himself to death. (p.s. he says hes ready to get back to farming, that is easier than landscaping). so yesterday i came home to this. hard work pays off.


i cannot even explain how wonderful it is to finally have something living in the yard. chris had to hire someone to help him cut and lay the sod. he didn't have the equipment for it, otherwise he would have done that himself too. he has pretty much done everything thing ALL BY HIMSELF. with the exception of a couple of days he had some help. he even grew the sod. he may have some sort of OCD thing going on for real.

there is no way. noooo way that we would have any of this if it weren't for chris. this stuff is crazy talk money, unless of course you grow the sod, grade the land, haul in free dirt, dig the drain tile, dig the trenches and install 80 plus sprinkler heads by yourself with some friends. so chris should be commended. he said he wants to move now. he's had it here.

the dogs say thanks.as a side note. when chris isn't digging ditches, he spends his free time growing cotton, soybeans, peanuts, corn and carrots.