dear universe, take 2.

ok, so i was totally kidding about that whole 'we are fighting' thing yesterday, and i take it all back. you are a much more worthy adversary than i could have ever imagined, with access to weapons more subtle than lightning, and methods more devious than simple birthday parties to play with my emotions, break me down, and make me desperately crave chocolate. touche, universe. touche indeed. you win. no more fighting, mmk?

love always, Mando.

note to self: save yourself some stress, embarrasment, and tears - always check ALL your mirrors when backing out of the driveway.  you, your husband, and both your cars will appreciate it.

*note:  Mark's car is actually fine, even though i did hit it.  Sophie unfortunately picked up a dented fender and some extra silver paint, but 'tis merely a flesh wound. no people were hurt in the making of this blog post. just my feelings.

dear universe.

you knew that mark and i were starting a certain-dvd-based-excercise-program-that-shall-remain-nameless-because-i-said-i-wouldnt-mention-it-for-a-while and its coordinating meal plan. some may even go so far as to call it a diet. you knew that this meant that i was swearing off the sweet stuff for a while. you knew that this would be hard for me, the girl who has been known to snack indiscriminately on anything from skittles to oreos to jellybeans to nutella-covered-marshmallows and anything inbetween.

i decided this would be good for me. i told myself i could do it.

but seriously universe?! what gives? i decide to stop eating sugar and sweets and treats, and you go and reward my health-conscious choices with not one, but FOUR parties in a week!??  thats just cruel. do you even know the pain it has caused me to turn down ice cream cake, toffee bars, bridal shower cake, chocolate chip cookies (twice!), brownie cookies, chocolate chunk brownies, pumpkin roll, AND ultimate chocolate birthday cake? all in the past 5 days!!?!

we are fighting. (but not really please dont strike me dead with lightning)

love always, Mando

how not to get craigslist-killer-ed.

i think i mentioned in one of the bathroom posts that we were selling some of the less gross items from our old guest bathroom. out of everything we tore out of there (which was everything) there were just a couple things that were still in good shape, but just not the right pieces for us. specifically, the vanity cabinet/sink, and the light.

having a yardsale didnt make any sense at all since those were the only two things we had to sell, so i decided to see how easy it would be to list them on craigslist. the answer? incredibly easy. once i took my pictures, i think it took me maybe 20 minutes to make the two listings. this ease of use, however, is exactly why its so easy for internet crazies to post fake listings and then do bad things, a la Craigslist Killers.

but now that i'm a surviving craigslist veteran (we sold the vanity last night!) i figured i would share with you all some of the tips that i picked up on my successful adventure of using craigslist without getting killed.

1. be the seller. the chances of you showing up to a random run-down shack with hopes of scoring an immaculate vintage armoire for $5 and instead being greeted at the door by a dirty maniac with a gun are going to be greatly lessened if you're not actually going anywhere. make them come to you.

2. be discretionary. dont put all (or any!) of your contact information in the product listing. give your address to as few people as possible. and if you are creeped out by the guy who demands your phone number right off the bat, go ahead and just delete his email.

3. dont be home alone. safety in numbers and all that. also, the chances of you having to help load a two-ton vanity cabinet into a pickup truck are greatly lessened. many hands make light work!

4. if you are home alone, have a just-in-case contact. many thanks to my sister for this suggestion. having a local friend who knew that someone was coming to my house and that they should call for help if they didnt hear from me by a certain time made me much less leery about the whole process. Dan the vanity man turned out to be a very nice guy and nothing bad happened, but it made me feel safer to know that someone had my back just in case.

5. arrange a meeting place. if you're selling something small or easy to transport, offer to meet halfway. not only will you look like a really thoughtful person, but you also get the added benefit of not having to tell random strangers on the internet where you live.

6. dont use craigslist. probably the most obvious way to avoid the fear of being craigslist-killer-ed is to just not use the service. there are plenty of other ways to search for and buy and sell junk. check out yardsales, consignment stores, goodwill, or salvation army if the whole craigslist process skeeves you out.

now go forth and sell your junk safely!

PS the vanity light is still available if anyone is interested...

operation knock-down drag-out: week 4.

this week was another week of more prepwork in the bathroom. mark said that this is his least favorite part of the project, and i can see why. it takes a long time, and it doesnt really have a satisfying endpoint or even show a dramatic difference between before and after. these are also the reasons why i am finding this phase of the project to be spectacularly un-photo-worthy. seriously. two photos. all week. thats it.

even a shirtless subject couldnt entice me to take more process pics. 

so its come to this: mudding the joints in the shower. i learned something this week: drywall joints get mudded with paper tape and joint compound, aka spackle. BUT cement board joints get mudded with mesh tape and thinset. two very different* things, both called mud. real life homographs up in here. homophones too. its all very homonymy. (which is a real word i just learned on wikipedia, the #1 source of all things true and reliable!) so there's your little informational tidbit of the week, just in case you are actually reading this blog under the assumption that i have any idea what i am talking about or hoping to find practical help for your own bathroom reno.

as far as physical progress is concerned, at first glance the bathroom is still looking pretty much the same as it did at the end of last week. but we're still moving forward, and making progress. so of course i can't help thinking WAY ahead to the finishing touches. most recently, i have been thinking about the shower curtain.

since i first mentioned it, i have pretty much decided that i would like a white, ruffly shower curtain. but i dont want to spend a zillion dollars to buy one, or spend a zillion hours trying to DIY one. right now, i have basically two options: the first is a white eyelet shower curtain with three little ruffles along the top for $35. the other is a full top-to-bottom ruffle shower curtain for $20, which is maybe a quarter of the price of most other ruffled shower curtains.

the background is the wall color.

i think maybe the all-ruffled one will take up too much visual space and make the room feel smaller, but i worry that the eyelet pattern will be too much in the same room as a beadboard ceiling. (oh, have i not mentioned that we're planning on having a beadboard ceiling? bad blogger.) tell me your thoughts. please?

another detail i'm looking forward to are the hooks i plan to make for hanging towels, instead of trying to find a towel bar that will fit in the skinny space between the door and the tub. i have a feeling they are going to look a little something like this:

source

and i have it on good authority that a variety of vintage cast iron faucet handles may or may not have been ordered off etsy yesterday afternoon! getting ahead of myself? maybe. staying excited about this project? definitely.

trips to Home Depot: this week - 0.** total - 8.
trips to Ace: this week - 0. total - 2.
trips to Lowes: this week - 0. total - 2.

times Amanda has cried over this project: this week - 0. total - 1.
times Amanda has cried in Home Depot: this week - 0. total - 0.

days until Thanksgiving: 65.

*i honestly have no idea what the difference is between joint compound and thinset.
**mark did make 2 trips to the depot this week, AND one trip to Lowes, but somewhat surprisingly none of them were for reasons pertaining to this bathroom. so i'm not going to count those.

meal plan monday: sept 24.

has anyone else noticed that lately this blog has turned into nothing but meal planning, bathroom updates,  and pictures of sunrises sprinkled with an annoying smattering of p90x*? does it bug you at all, or is it just me? some days, i feel a little bad about not having a ton of fresh new blog fodder every week. other days, i figure that this is our life right now, and i'm just documenting it the way it is and i dont have to pretty it up, or pretend that we are exciting just because i choose to chronicle our lives on the internets.

case in point: this weekend. we did some laundry and dishes. we worked out, a lot. we went to a birthday party but we did not eat any cake. i spent a wonderful afternoon just sitting on a friend's couch. mark worked a little bit in the bathroom, i did a little painting, the grass got mowed. and i had to physically stop myself from taking a picture of the sky at least 3 times, and found myself talking about p90x way more than i meant to.

and somehow, in the midst of all of that exicting excitement in our lives, we still manage to find time to make and eat food. here's what we will be eating this week:

Monday: zuchinni, black bean, and rice skillet. (recipe)
Tuesday: chilled cucumber soup. (recipe-ish)
Wednesday: crock pot italian turkey meatballs (recipe)
Thursday: citrus herb chicken on spinach salad.
Friday: tilapia with steamed broccoli.
Saturday: crock pot chicken enchilada soup. (recipe)
Sunday: veggie omelets and roasted potatoes.


*i just have this one more thing to say about p90x and then i promise i wont mention it again for awhile: this shiz is HARD. the first two workouts made me cry, and for a second i thought i might actually die. not eating sugar is NO FUN, especially at a birthday party. i have discovered muscles i didnt even know i had until now because they are all SO SORE. and i take back every mean thought i've ever had about yoga because it has knocked me on my butt several times. BUT. working out with mark is fun. i love that i have my own special weightlifting gloves. and four workouts in, i've already lost two pounds. so yeah. i think i'll keep going.

new every morning.

severe storms at our house last night. and a tornado watch in the area too. praise God that even the darkest nights can be followed by a beautiful morning.

"the steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness."

Lamentations 3:22-23

operation knock-down drag-out: week 3.

so i was all prepared to get next to nothing done on the bathroom this week. in fact, i had the post pretty much all pre-written in my head. it went something like this:

"so, not a lot happening in the guest bathroom this week. it turned out to be a pretty busy week around here, what with monday night football, tuesday night softball, wednesday night community group, thursday happy hour, and then camping all weekend. busy, busy, dreadfully busy, much much too busy for working on the bathroom. so no new progress to report here. check back next week."

while part of that turned out to be true, (seriously, i dont think Mark and i had an actual conversation until thursday night) we didnt end up going camping this weekend. sadface. because it would have been a gorgeous weekend for it. so instead of having hilarious anecdotes about my nature-related mishaps that were certain to accompany two days in the wilderness, you'll have to settle for listening to me yap a little about the progress mark managed to make on the bathroom over the weekend.

first up: finishing the subfloor. just to recap a little: since we removed three layers of flooring when we demo'd the old bathroom, Mark had to build up the subfloor with plywood so that the new tile floor will be the same height as the hardwood in the hallway. we accomplished this by layering 1/4" plywood over 1/2" plywood. (why not just use 3/4" plywood? lets just call that one a slight miscalculation) each layer is glued down with subfloor adhesive, and secured with a zillion screws.

next up: fixing up the rest of the walls. this involved some large-ish areas of drywall patching around the tub area, removing the last lingering bits of nasty wallpaper, sanding and scraping all the walls to get rid of lumpy areas, and starting to throw up some tape and mud over all the various cracks and holes.

its not a ton of progress, but its more than i was expecting to get done this week, so i'll take it. plus, i got to do some fun little things like buying paint (finally decided on ice folly!) and listing a few of the still-in-good-shape-but-just-not-our-style things on craigslist.

a little leery of the word "folly" in the name, but excited nonetheless.

if you were to judge our progress based on photos alone, you probably wouldnt notice much of a difference between last week and this week. but just the fact that we got to buy paint this week (and knowing that soon that paint is going to be on the walls!) is keeping me excited about this project.

trips to Home Depot: this week - 1. total - 8.
trips to Ace: this week - 0. total - 2.
trips to Lowes: this week - 0. total - 2.

times Amanda has cried over this project: this week - 0. total - 1.
times Amanda has cried in Home Depot: this week - 0. total - 0.

days until Thanksgiving: 72.

meal plan monday: sept 17.

recent happenings that drive me crazy:
- a chirping cricket in the master bathroom: impossible to ignore.
   (as opposed to crickets by the front door, which are annoying, but ignorable)
- time we got a wake-up call from the cricket in the bathroom : 12:10am.
- time Mark caught and killed that dang cricket: 12:40am.

recent happenings that make me smile:
- song currently playing over the intercom at work: Baby Got Back.

turns out life isnt all that bad, even for a Monday. lets just hope that things dont go south when it comes time to do the grocery shopping.

Monday: veggie omelets and roasted potatoes. (and the p90x fit test)
Tuesday: frozen raviolis and jar sauce.
Wednesday: crock pot minestrone soup. (recipe)
Thursday: broiled fish, steamed broccoli. (recipe-ish) (p90x day 1)
Friday: turkey burgers. (recipe)
Saturday: grilled chicken, spinach salad. (recipe)
Sunday: zuchinni, black bean, and rice skillet. (recipe)

i'm going to do something crazy.

anyone remember way back in january when i made my list of non-resolutions? no? ok, how about just remembering back to the end of June when i checked up on my progress so far?  still no? so i guess you expect me to just tell you where i'm going with this? ok fine.

one of my non-resolutions for this year (and beyond... remember, no deadlines for these) was to feel good about myself in a bathing suit. but to be honest, i didnt quite get there this summer. not really even close. zero progress on this goal so far. but the sad reality of my summer was that i was hardly in my bathing suit at all. i think i spent a grand total of one day at the beach, and i could count on one hand the number of times i went swimming. seriously people... where did summer go? now there's football on tv and a chill in the air. not exactly bathing suit season anymore.

but i'm not going to let that stop me from working on this particular goal. and unlike my crazy idea to run the rebel race with no training, Mark is totally on board with this plan. in fact, it was kind of his idea. (not because he thinks i'm fat, he is more than happy with how i look, but he also understands that I want to be happy with how i look too) which is why this showed up in our mailbox yesterday:

not gonna lie - now that these DVDs are actually in my house and not just floating around my brainspace as a theoretical maybe someday sort of thought, its a little bit intimidating. this is going to happen. its going to be hard, i just know it is. i am going to want to quit. a lot. which is why i'm putting it out there on the internet: we are doing this. i might even do weekly updates to keep myself motivated along the way, because 90 days is kind of a long time to stick with something hard like this. wish me luck. here goes nothing.

a preview.

i painted some things this week. i am super excited about them. in fact, i am ridiculously happy with them.

and i'm not even done with them yet...

operation knock-down drag-out*: week 2.

*i was going to try and abbreviate the title of this series to something like "operation k-dd-o" or OKDDO but they looked too much like "oh, kiddo!" and i didnt want to alert anyone's bump watch prematurely. no kiddos here yet. no babies yet either.

first things first: i cant believe i forgot to share this last week, but check out this little gem that Mark discovered hiding underneath our old bathtub:

that, my friends, is an old vintage beer bottle that was just chillin in our bathroom. and it makes me inexplicably happy. so much so that i went to great lengths to dig it out of a big black trash bag of debris after the hubs had the audacity to throw it away before i even got a picture of it. not to mention the fact that i secretly want to keep it as a quirky accessory in the finished bathroom because i have a not-so-secret obsession with old glass bottles. and as a bonus, this one's got such a good story! not only does it work as a sort of carbon-dating for the house (we know know for certain that the old tub was original to the house thanks to the '83 stamped on the bottle) but it also makes me kind of curious what other little hidden 'treasures' might be hiding in the walls and other unseen corners of our house.

ok, now back to this week's adventures.

we headed into the second week of this project with a general game plan of what theoretically needed to happen next, but next to no idea of how exactly those things were actually going to be accomplished. what we did know was that the next steps were plumbing related: fix the broken tub drain pipes, and make sure all the copper piping was in working order.

Mark jumped right into the fray on Tuesday night with the directions from the tub-drain kit and a couple youtube videos to guide him, and added a brand new overflow and p-trap to replace the broken ones from the old tub.

this husband of mine? super-impressive.

once the drain was reassembled, the next step was obviously to test it to make sure it held water. this is where we hit our first snag of the week. you see, in order to get the new tub to fit into place, we had to cut the copper pipe that used to run through the old faucet. so now, instead of having a pipe that would run water into the tub, we had a cut-off pipe that would run water under the tub. not exactly ideal. also, remember the corroded shower arm i mentioned last week? we determined that the only way to fix that would be to cut the copper pipe that leads to it and replace the whole fitting. and on top of those pipe issues, there was this little lovely we had to figure out:

this is the shower valve. it turns the water on and off and determines how much water flows through it and what temperature it is. most manufacturers have their own version that is not compatible with any other manufacturer, so you have to keep buying parts from them. not really a big issue, except that we had already taken our old shower fixtures to the landfill without noting the name of the manufacturer. yeeeahh...

in a nutshell: we had a bunch of copper pipe that no longer lead where it was supposed, to, a shower valve we didnt know the manufacturer of, and no desire to try our hand at soldering things that were currently installed in our walls. open flames + exposed studs and drywall = we dont wanna go there.

we got the answer to one of these issues while we were discussing some of our concerns at a family party over the weekend. (yes, we talk about cool things like our bathroom reno problems at parties. deal.) apparently there are these things called sharkbites. aka the coolest, easiest plumbing-type thing ive ever seen. they are fittings that just snap right on, are instantly watertight, and are actually removable if you somehow manage to screw it up! perfection! sure, they're a little pricier than regular pipe fittings, but since we only needed a couple of them, it was totally worth the couple extra bucks to avoid soldering.

but even so, we were still kind of stalled. because we didnt know the manufacturer of our shower valve, we didnt know which replacement handle would be compatible, which meant that there was a possibility that we would have to replace the whole valve, which would involve soldering for sure, which is what we were really trying to avoid. so we just bought a couple different handles to see if any would work. when we opened them to see what was included in the trim kit, we were absolutely THRILLED to find out that the Moen-compatible kit had an extra adapter plate that fit our valve! (seriously. i never thought i would ever be jumping-up-and-down-squealing-level happy about something like plumbing. but it happened) turns out that instead of being manufacturer-specific, this style of valve is what's known in the plumbing world as "standard." good to know.

with all our plumbing-related almost-crises averted, we forged ahead and checked the tub drain for leaks. we did two tests. first, Mark turned on the water and let it run while i stood in the basement under the drain to watch for leaks. then, we filled the tub with water and just let it sit for a while. this was for two reasons: to make sure the drain stopper worked, and also to make sure that the drain could handle going from zero to full in 0.1 seconds. the results? no leaks! success! cue awkward happy dance!

the tape marked the water level so we could tell if it was leaking over time 

once we were sure all the plumbing was in order, Mark decided it was safe to start closing it all up behind new walls. so on Saturday, in between mowing the grass, taking the bathtub to the landfill, attending a friends' housewarming party, and making a panicked and unnecessary trip to the Depot, that's exactly what he did.

to make cutting the cement backer board easier, Mark borrowed a pair of electric scissor-things from his tile-expert uncle. they had little pincers on the front that basically ate right through the board, just like a cement-hungry insect or something. except more fun because hello fun new power tool to play with!

one thing i learned: cement board is installed with roofing nails. this makes installing cement board a rather loud process, even with the door closed. an appropriate solution to this extra noise is to relocate your tv watching to the basement, turn up the volume, and paint your nails.

this is what i got when i said i wanted an 'action shot'

with all the backer board in place, the shower area is looking good! i can almost picture it all decked out with shiny lovely bright white subway tiles... almost.

Mark was really on a roll this weekend, so he just kept going on Sunday after church, cutting and laying the first layer of new plywood subfloor.

i got to help with this part. after Mark measured and cut the first (and biggest) piece to size, removed the bathroom door, and dry-fit the plywood in place, he needed my help to get the piece back out so he could put the adhesive on the back and then fit it back in its final resting place for good. my job was to guide the piece from the doorway so that the adhesive didnt end up getting all over everything it wasnt supposed to. the result? well, considering i managed to walk away with only one minor battle wound and without any adhesive on me, i would have to call it a success.

the rest of the floor got covered with smaller pieces of plywood, (the bathroom isnt really that big, so it took less than a full sheet to cover the whole floor) so my help wasnt needed for those.  instead, i did my best to stay out of the way and away from the noise that comes with driving screws into the floor every 6-8 inches without having a door to muffle the racket. when in doubt, just turn up the music a little bit louder.

so that's where we stand. we still have to lay another layer of subfloor to build the floor up so that when the tile goes in it will match the height of the flooring in the hallway, and then after that we get to finish up the walls and start painting! this process is flying, and we're keeping our fingers crossed that everything will keep going as smoothly as it has been so far.

trips to Home Depot: this week - 3. total - 7.
trips to Ace: this week - 0. total - 2.
trips to Lowes: this week - 2.  total - 2.

times Amanda has cried over this project: this week - 0. total - 1.
times Amanda has cried in Home Depot: this week - 0. total - 0.

days until Thanksgiving: 79.

meal plan monday: sept 10.

Some semi-notable things about this weekend: (in lazy list form)
- Mark made a bunch of progress on the bathroom. and still managed to mow the grass too. he's pretty awesome. more on the bathroom project tomorrow.

- i killed the most giant cricket i have ever seen in my house because Mark was too busy to come to my rescue. i sucked it up with the vacuum cleaner and then refused to touch the vacuum for the rest of the weekend because i was scared the cricket would crawl back out.

- i started painting some art for the dining room. i accidentally painted the first canvas sideways and i hated it. but now i think they're going to turn out pretty well.

- we ordered p90x and plan to do the workouts together. i'll be sure to let you know how that turns out.

- last night, while staring into the empty abyss of our fridge, Mark asked me if i would mind going grocery shopping today. guess that means its time for a new plan.

Monday: zuchinni, black bean, and rice skillet. (recipe)
Tuesday: crock pot beef burgundy (recipe)
Wednesday: fish with corn on the cob.
Thursday: frozen raviolis.
Friday - Sunday: camping. its gonna be in tents.
(yes its still hilarious. every. single. time.)

stasi's painted shoes.

on this latest edition of "projects that have taken me way longer than they should," we will be following the story of a pair of shoes.

in January, my sister Stasi entrusted me with a pair of wooden Dr Scholl's sandals she had found at a yardsale. she gave them to me so that i could paint something fun on them. i told her that it would be no problem, and i would get right on that because it sounded like a fun little project, and she should look forward to wearing them this summer. and then the sandals sat around in my closet for a few months (ok so maybe 8 is more than a few) until two weekends ago, when i was finally inspired to actually do something with them.

the inspiration came in the form of a can of stain. you see, i wasnt really loving the shoes' original honey-color, and i figured that a darker brown would be more likely to make a good background for the bright colored paints i had chosen.

first, i sanded them. i was border line terrified that this would ruin the shoes forever, but luckily for me their shiny finish came off with just a light sanding, and no harm was done to the overall shape of the shoes.

then i stained them the same color as our entry bench, and victoria's recipe card box, because that's the color i had on hand. and i was so excited with how they turned out that i forgot to take more pictures of them until i had already sketched out some designs and started painting.

after i added some details and shading, and i sent Stasi a teaser picture to see what she thought of them, and to see whether or not she would freak out that i had stained her shoes.

the verdict? she didnt even notice that they had changed colors. i guess it had been a while since she had last seen them. but the important thing is that she loved them. at least she loved them so far. because they weren't quite done yet at this point, since we both decided they could still use a little something to really make them extra special. we agreed that the answer was stripes.

so to make a long story short-ish and jump right to the end; after 8 months of waiting and two weekends of painting, these shoes are officially done-zo!

please to be enjoying a ton of detail shots from every angle imaginable:

outside of the left sandal 

inside of the left sandal 

outside of the right sandal 

inside of the right sandal 

verse across the back 

view from above 

 view from the front

close-up of the toe of the right sandal 

close-up of the toe of the left sandal 

the last shot i got before my camera battery died.

i'm super happy with how these turned out. i put two coats of varnish on them over the weekend, and as soon as i let that cure a little longer, i'm planning to wrap them up and send them to Stasi, since she has already told me she won't be able to wait until Thanksgiving to get them if she knows that they're done.

so my painting project queue is finally getting pretty small, (the only thing on it is my dining room canvases) but who knows if i will ever really run out of things to paint. probably never. because there are always things to be painted, and at the rate that it takes me to complete these kinds of projects (read: a very long time, i work super slow, i dont work well with time constraints or deadlines, i believe in the power of delayed-gratification) i'll probaly always have some little fun painting project on the back burner. and i like that.

operation knock-down drag-out: week 1.

**this series is brought to you by the Home Depot. ok, so maybe not officially, but it might as well be for how many times we have been there over the past week, and how many times i suspect we will visit there over the course of this project. 

hear that Home Depot? if you want to sponsor our bathroom reno, just let me know!**

as of last Tuesday, this bathroom renovation is officially underway! Mark started by turning off all the water to the bathroom and removing the toilet and vanity. the toilet is headed to the landfill. the vanity is headed to craigslist just as soon as i get around to taking a good picture of it. 

my role in this whole reno is going to be pretty small, since the space is small and Mark is handy enough to not need me getting in his way. but i have been helping: my job on tuesday night was to open and close the back door so Mark could carry out the toilet.

oh yeah, we're just that classy. toilet in the backyard. we're not above it.

on Thursday, the messy part of the demo started, as Mark busted out his big guns and a sledgehammer to take out the floor: all three layers of it. turns out we were working with tile on top of tile on top of a layer of masonry and metal mesh reinforcement.

the door stayed closed for pretty much all of this part of the demo process to keep the dust and the smell of man-sweat contained as much as possible, but i did manage to poke my head in a few times for photo-documentation purposes. Mark got both layers of tile out on Thursday night, and he took out all the masonry and mesh on Friday.

the demo continued on Saturday morning, because the shower walls were also coming out. so much for that brand new caulk-job from a few weeks ago.

once the shower walls were all down and everything was bagged up, it was a race against the clock to borrow a truck, load it up, and make it to the landfill and unload the truck before it closed, so we wouldnt have all this construction debris just chillin in our backyard.

spoiler alert: we made it. with 2 whole minutes to spare. it really was very exciting and all kinds of nerve-wracking. sidenote: the landfill kind of smells.

unfortunately, Mark wasn't able to get the tub out in time to make it into the truck for the landfill run. i'm not sure if replacing the toilet in the backyard with a bathtub is a step up or down on the scale of redneckery. either way, this is where we are.

we made a couple more trips to the Depot on Saturday and Monday, and our house officially turned into a full-blown construction zone. there was not a single room that was not covered in some sort of construction-ness as we momentarily gave up on keeping it all contained to the general bathroom area.

we ran into a few bumps this week already: the shower head arm is completely corroded into place and we havent been able to remove it yet. we are going to have to tweak the copper piping. we have yet to find a tub handle that will work with the existing pipe arrangement. the tub drain pipes broke when the old tub was taken out. and replacing the tub has been a complete pain: from removing the old one, to getting the new one to fit into the just-the-right-size space, to figuring out what to do with the fact that once we got it all leveled up it wasnt actually sitting on the floor since the floor isn't level, it was just one headache after another.

so at the end of our first week and the long Labor Day weekend, this is where we're at: all the old stuff has been demo'd out. the new tub is in and set and level and just waiting for plumbing.

the construction mess has been cleaned and contained back to the point where it is manageable and the rest of the house is mostly unaffected again. we are still excited about this project. we are still having fun with it. we can't wait to keep going.

trips to Home Depot: this week - 4.  total - 4.
trips to Ace: this week - 2.  total - 2.

times Amanda has cried over this project: this week - 1.  total - 1.
times Amanda has cried in Home Depot: this week - 0.  total - 0.

days until Thanksgiving: 86.