IS THIS WEEK OVER YET?

This week has been a DOOZIE! Registration for all our students was Monday -Tuesday. Emily, my counterpart in the office worked longer hours than I did and I am EXHAUSTED!! I am ready to rest and relax over this weekend. PRAISE GOD for a 3 day weekend.

Planned activities:

• Phase 2 of Michael's room (building customized shelves)
• Hanging out with our good friends, James & Amber, who are coming up from Atlanta & the rest of the gang
• Attending BBQ's
• cleaning the house.
• hopefully making it to one last visit to a pool.

Have a great Holiday Weekend!

PHASE 1: Paint and rearrage

We are redoing our bedroom on the first floor. It has been the catch all room since I moved in, in January. It hasn't been functional other than for storage. Well, we've decided to make it Michael's office / Man Cave. It will house all his video games, etc. and have a desk for him to study on to pass the pesky A+ test. This weekend we pulled everything out of the room ..... WHOA.... I had a LOT of stuff in there and now it's still all over my house because we're only in phase one. We painted, bought and put a desk together, and organized his entertainment area. Phase 2 will be building customized shelving around the desk, putting all the stuff away and hanging things on the wall. I am hoping to be done w/ Phase 2 by Sunday of this weekend. Here's the before and afters.

Before: Green and messy

After: tan and much cleaner ... but still not there yet

GONE WITH THE WIND... NO I MEAN LAWN

As I have been nesting inside, Michael has been making the outside of our home beautiful. We are only renting but we felt all the changes would benefit us in the long run. We have been dealing with a HUGE bug problem: crickets, SPIDERS, and general bugs. This problem is due to the landscaping around our house. It has been overgrown and out of control and we've finally decided to take into our own hands, or really Michael's hands.

This is our lawn before:

Right next to the house.

Looking towards the backyard

And NOW.....

Michael Killed/dug up all the ivy and mulched it

We even found a brick wall that was covered in ivy, Why would you want to cover this

The wall lined an entire walk way that was so overgrown with trees, debree, and etc that we never used it let alone see it. Michael said the bugs were disgusting and in full force in this area.

And he even found time to wash and clean off the side of the house.
The bottles on the concreate are bug spray that we have put everywhere. I hope it works

Well -I just wanted to brag on my husband and his landscaping abilities... can't wait to see what he does with the front of the house... but we'll keep you posted.

Potential is in the Eye of the Beholder

Since June 11th, when we returned from our honeymoon, I have been in a serious nesting mode. I have been planning and plotting renovations for the house. I have already rebuilt all the closets for Michael and I, rearranged and updated rooms except for the living room, and acquired some new furniture: Our new bed (wedding gift), patio furniture (wedding gift), new slip covers for the living room furniture (wedding gift), a twin bed for the upstairs bedroom (FREE), and a leather dual recliner loveseat (FREE). But I have been on the hunt for a desk for Michael’s office / Man-Cave and a buffet to replace the Ikea table with a cloth over it to hide the items underneath it since we don’t have enough storage in the house.

This weekend, like so many weekends before, I went to a few yard sales. This weekend, however; I hit the jackpot. Below you will see a buffet that I purchased for $20.00. The owner was even nice enough to deliver it to our house since we had no way of getting it back to the house, which I said thank you with another $5.00.
Michael admitted to me that he was skeptical about the “piece of junk I bought.” While he did yard work, I had the piece completely sanded. He later went to the movies with a few guy friends and when he returned I had my masterpiece finished along with dinner for Michael & I and our 2 friends.

After about 5-6 hours of work (including trips to Home Depot), $20.00 for the piece, $15 for the hardware and $8 for the paint. I think I made a wise investment. The bonus to the story is that we have a beautiful piece of antique furniture with more storage to hold all those wonderful wedding gifts that we don’t want to put in the basement.

If we were Simpsons

I stumbled across this fun online time waster...

www.simpsonizeme.com

Here's what it's interpertation of us was:

HOW LONG DOES IT TAKE

How long does it take to combine two lives into one? We have spent the past 2 months merging all our things together. I have a full house of stuff and then adding Michael's things to do that has been ..... OVERWHELMING. We still don't have all his stuff in the house and it already seems like we're running out of space.

Thursday night, a girl from my bible study is moving to KC and donated a twin bed and a leather love seat (double recliner) and so we went to pick them up. I am so grateful. We put the loveseat in Michael's room (aka Man Cave) downstairs. I put the bed in the upstairs bedroom. My hope is that the upstairs bedroom can be a guest bedroom/my office for studying. It is a train wreck right now! I just spent the past 2 1/2 hours trying to clean it. I think it is going to take PITCHING a lot of thing to really clean. I don't even know what's in half the boxes

It seems like I am going to need to go through all those boxes and perge. I still have stuff at my dad's ----I have too much stuff, but living on your own since 18 will allow you to accumulate alot of things. Most people have their childhood home where all their things like awards, cheerleading uniforms, prom dresses, letterman jackets, etc are. I have had to drag that stuff around with me since my mom moved to PA. It was take it or have it trashed. So ... with all that said - if I want to be able to walk though my home and have it clutter free - i am going to have to throw away a LOT of things. One day -we'll be organized.. probably 1 month before we have to move.

It's been 2 Months

Michael and I have been married two whole months. I can't believe it seems like yesterday. We are finally getting settled but I don't know if you ever fully feel settled. I am officially Carin Deon Schindler. I was able to make it to the Social Security office and to the DMV all within a lunch hour - MIRACLE. We have finally merged our accounts.

We are in the process of sending out our thank you's. A bigger feat than ever expected - especially since my hands are killing me lately. I have severe carpal tunnel - and it has been enflamed so badly that it has prompted me to make a doctor appointment. So please, if you are awaiting a thank you card know this - WE ARE ETERNALLY THANKFUL, we just have been crazy busy (& in severe pain).

We have yet to order our wedding photos but have a generous $300 credit from the best photographer in the world (even though they have the same theme music as Has Weiman - LOL). Everyone who's looked at the proofs have told us we have some of the best photos they have ever seen. It's amazing to me how many people were unhappy with their pictures from their wedding. I can't wait to put our album together. Right now we are trying to figure out what photo to make into a 16 x 20 - that's a big photo... so it's got to be good.

We are beginning on transforming the downstairs bedroom into Michael's Office /"MAN CAVE". Where it will house all things manly - such as all game systems, swords, man movies, etc. I'll have pictures throughout the process.

Michael - I love you and every day I fall more in love with you. Happy 2 Month Anniversary.

Timing is Everything

How soon into your marriage, can you start buying new items for your mate?

Any ideas.
And when do you get clearance to start throwing things away...?

I received this image from a friend of mine, and knew it had to be blogged about. Ever since I have first seen my brothers running around the house in their whitey-tighties playing super heroes or just running around like ninnies, I can't look at an adult male wearing them without thinking they should have a cartoon character on them. I have had a long time hate of this particular piece of clothing. And I know what my men readers are going to say... we hate granny panties in the same way... and what does it all boil down to - COMFORT. But sometimes comfort has to go in order to grow up and leave Captain Underpants behind.

Positive Alternatives - Boxer Briefs and just plain Boxers - all women like a little mystery.