DUCKS!

Here's m house warming present from my sister. Little duckies from the Victoria and Albert Museum in London.

Decorating the house.

The tree got me in the mood to get the rest of my house all jazzed up. Here's what I did.

 I remember these from Christmas as a kid. I assume they were my Grandmother's

 Harper, Greg and Beth all have a stocking. The little ones on the end are for Kona and Tabor

 What? The Doctor is up on the mantle too.

 so is this guy.

 the fun light up tree I remember fondly as a kid.

 NOT Christmas, but I snagged this painting from my Mom's place. I like it.

 I put a little something on the door.

What else are you to do when you have a perfect little Christmas tree right outside your front door??

Christmas Tree!!!!!!

It's the first Christmas in the new house. I felt like I HAD to get a tree. I thought about going and chopping our own down and Greg was on board. So he, his daughter, and I all went to Illinois to get our tree. It was okay. You just go, ride on a wagon, get your tree, ride back and your done. It wasn't like the places my family used to go to where they had hot chocolate, Santa and a store. So next year we'll go to Pea Ridge. Any way, here are pictures of our lovely tree all set up and gorgeous.

 Harper and Greg enjoying the wagon ride out to pick out our tree. 

TADA all nice and pretty. I think we didn't think the long needle type tree through all the way. It's really hard to decorate. 

 One of m favorite ornaments

Another favorite of mine. My first Christmas!!

 So my sister and I have started a trend of giving each other ugly ornaments for Christmas. This is mine from either last year or the year before. 

 This is another one from my sister. 

And this is probably my favorite ornament. I have no idea why. I just remember liking it as kid. 

Tardis Blue

I really want to paint something Tardis blue.
But, the problem is trying to nail down a color. There are many different opinions on what the color is. And to make things even ore confusing there are different shades for the different seasons of the show and doctors. So, let the fun begin.

http://www.lowes.com/pd_432981-4-PN8050PANTONEPRINCES_4294643579__?productId=4751213&Ns=p_product_qty_sales_dollar|1&pl=1&currentURL=%3FNs%3Dp_product_qty_sales_dollar%7C1%26page%3D2&facetInfo=

http://www.homedepot.com/p/BEHR-Premium-Plus-Ultra-8-oz-S-G-570-Sapphire-Lace-Interior-Exterior-Paint-Sample-S-G-570U/202180651#.Uo6DzsSsiCc

or some people don't have it as a paint st all and have a blue stain on wood. Minwax makes a great blue. 

http://www.minwax.com/wood-products/stains/minwax-water-based-wood-stain#Colors

I found on Etsy a magnet of the sign on the door of the Tardis. 

CLICK HERE

maybe I should just paint my fridge blue and stick the magnet on. 

I know I can't paint the front door because I've already stated that I want it stripped of the paint thats on there and refinished back to the original look. 

but who knows. I might change my mind. 

trying not to be overwhelming

This house could cause me to go into some serious debt, even with someone that works for free.

1. I need a bathtub, all we have is a shower and I hate it. 
2. The walls need to be painted in the dinning room, living room, and master bedroom.
3. I need all new kitchen cabinets
4. I need to replace the window in the bathroom.
5. I need new bathroom flooring.
6. The bathroom walls will need serious plaster repair.
7. The retaining wall will need to be fixed eventually or I will get cited again
8. The back sun room needs to come off the house. It's ugly and it's leaning. 
9. The electric issues in the house need to be addressed. ie outlets not working

That's a list of stuff I NEED. There's a whole other list of stuff I want! I know I don;t have to do this all right NOW. But I really want to avoid living in a construction site or half finished house for years and years. 

Don't get me wrong I'm so grateful to have this house. I never thought I would own a house anytime soon. I mean after all I'm a full time student and I work at Starbucks. Things worked out amazingly though and I was lucky. So now I have this place that I come home to everyday, always with a since of disbelief. 

The hidden bathroom window

This was one of the first things we uncovered. I knew this window was behind the built in shelf unit thingy because outside you could see the glass blocks. Why did you cover this up? you needed shelf space that badly? Just hang a shelf on the wall like a normal person. Or if your shit doesn't fit in the closet, that's already in the bathroom, you might have too much shit. So, now I have a big bright window in the bathroom. Love it.

The first guests

This is a picture from the day I bought my house. These are my two first ever house guests, my friend and agent Demi and my bff/sister Jenny.
We drank champagne.

Color and inspiration: Living room.

I apparently love to pick out paint colors and work on color schemes for rooms. Who knew I would have so much fun doing this. Who knew its also one of the hardest things to do?! I have several paint sample card things in my purse at all times. It takes me a very long time to settle on a color. I finally picked a color for all the trim in the house, this is after I had already decided, went to home depot and saw the color underneath their lights... gross, changed mind. Behr Polar Bear is the color for the trim. It's white without being too white, but it doesn't look like a dirty white either. I thought I decided on the gray for the dining room, but after I bought a sample and painted part of a wall, I hate it. Square one. The living room inspiration came after we got the couch and chair. I was going to put of a print the I have framed and that's when I realized it matched the couch. What looks black in the print is actually dark blue. So I took advantage of the color scheme and went out and bought mustard colored pillows and a throw. Now I want to get the lightest of the three blues in a paint and paint the walls that color along with the color of the out margin, the color of the actual paper. I have even bought gray spray paint to paint all of the pots for the plants. I bought bigger clay pots for them to since they are getting larger.

I snapped a picture of the print I am talking about. I hope you can see the color well

Semi functional kitchen

Well, I guess it's not really "semi" functional as it has pretty much everything we need. It's just not put together. When we gutted the kitchen I sold off the kitchen sink, stove and dishwasher. They were all crappy and I wanted new appliances. I thought the stove was so gross and dirty, Greg said I should just clean it. But there was no way. The dishwasher looked like it had seen better days. And judging on what shape the house is/was in when I got it, I doubt the owners took care of the appliances. So, I bought new ones. They are bright and shiny and clean! And since we ripped out most of the cabinets I have no where to store stuff, so I am utilizing a industrial shelving unit I got from my mom for my first apartment back in 2000. This thing is our pantry, Tupperware holder, pot and pan storage and spice rack all in one. Our sink is one Greg got from an old job site, it's resting on a demoed cabinet and scrape piece of wood. It works though and even has a garbage disposal! I haven't had one of those in years. So, yea, the kitchen actually is functional, just not pretty. Soon though. Soon.

silence.

So yes, it has been awhile since I posted. We really haven't done any major work since we have been moving and I have been in school. I have all of my stuff in the house and Greg does too, finally. Now our basement is home to boxes of random shit we both don't know what to do with. One of the rooms upstairs has become Greg's man den. He has his musical stuff up there and want to move his tv and video games up there too. The other room up stairs is mine. I can't decide what to do with it because I know that eventually I would have to move everything out of it because we want to redo the upstairs. But, that's not going to be for years... still can't bring myself to move anything up the steep steps. Soon I'll cave. On the main level though, we finally have the bedroom switched and set up. We started painting the spare room for Greg's daughter. I bought a couch, chair and ottoman. We can finally have company over now. Hung some new blinds since Greg's dog decided to destroy the other set.

YIPPEE my first citation from the city!!

I knew when I bought this house that the back parking pad had a bad wall. I thought, whatever I'll get it fixed when I have the time and money. First things first, the inside of the house needs to be fixed. After all I'm living inside not on the parking pad. But, STL city doesn't think so, at least one of my neighbors doesn't think so. I got a citation for it being too leany. One of my neighbors called it in. Asshole. I got the deadline pushed back by a month. After that I need to call the person in charge of the neighborhood stabilization. In the mean time I'm still waiting for the sewer department to come and fix their cracked sewer lateral in the back alley. I couldn't do anything to the parking pad yet even if I wanted to because the city might have to tear it back up. Yes, I know it looks bad but come on! I'm living in a house that sat vacant for almost a year. I'm fixing it up and taking care of it. I'm helping to stabilize and even raise the home prices over here so the neighbors should be happy, not bitchy.

Moved in!

Well,  I have most of my stuff in.  Now to paint,  get a kitchen, fix the bathroom, and get a couch.

First coat!

Today we put the first coat of poly on the floor. They look wonderful. I can't wait to move in!

The first floor sand

This is the first round with the sander to refinish the floors. I'm so excited with how they turned out. We picked out a great dark red mahogany color. Can't wait to see the end product. Can't wait to show it'

The crazy weeds!

The parking pad out in the back of the house had become overgrown. Here is the first weeding job at the new place. Many more yet to come I'm sure. But I sprayed everything with a homemade natural weedkiller so hopefully it doesn't come back.

I'm still away....

I'm still away, and the boyfriend is still slaving away in the kitchen. Look at the progress. I'm amazed. I do not think I will have a kitchen when I get back. That's okay though, I've come to terms with it. Can't wait to see more.

More to uncover

These great tiles are in my bathroom. That's under two sheets of linoleum one sheet of plywood and a shit ton of glue. Tearing this up is going to be hard and we're not going to be able to save the tiles. I want to save as many as we can for a project, but I can't say for sure what will happen.

Why do people do this? Someone called my house  a retro onion because we keep peeling layers off and finding better things. Its true. What's next?

while I'm away. ...

The boyfriend is un updating the kitchen. Yes there's hardwood floor under there.  That's tile,  cement sheet,  linoleum and then wood. I can't believe how Much he has done already.  Incredible! I'm a very lucky girl.