And We're Back

Well, I'm back from my self-imposed blog exile. Not really sure what brought it on - other than a complete lack of anything to write about (I'm pretty sure complete lack of ambition played a part as well). Anyway, I still don't have MUCH to write about...work on the house kind of ceased for the holidays and you know how hard it can be to get back into the swing of things after a nice little hiatus! So, I don't have much to report on house-wise, but there are a few interesting things I want to bring up:

1. Target has begun carrying (mostly online) some really nice wallpaper. Not totally cheap, but not designer prices, either. Wallpaper is definitely making a comeback. Now, if you find a print you like, it doesn't necessarily have to go on the wall. A nice, bold wallpaper pattern looks great on the inside of a glass-doored bookcase. Or inside bureau drawers. Here are some pics from the Target website:

2. I know many people (myself included) are feeling the pinch right now. It can be very depressing when all you do is visualize your dream room(s), but don't have the extra cash to make the dream a reality. With the economy continuing to tank, now seems like a good time to explore alternative ways to get things done. Like craigslist. I've noticed that there's a real abundance of good, quality stuff on my local craigslist. Maybe people are downsizing. Maybe they're trying to make some extra money. I don't know, but for whatever reason, it sure seems like there's a lot to be had right now. I strongly urge everyone to take a look on craigslist before going out to purchase new. Now, I totally understand that there's quite a difference between buying a used side table and a used couch. It's not for everyone, and obviously you have to draw your own lines. But, as far as nice, solid, wood furniture goes, they don't make 'em like they used to (or, if they do, they're reeeeally expensive). There's plenty of stuff out there that would look brand new (not to mention unique) with a little paint and some elbow grease. As a matter of fact, I think I'll go check it out right now.

I'll try to get some new pics of the backyard skating rink up tomorrow. We have ice! Mike is in hockey heaven :)

A Tale of Two Christmas Trees

It was never our intention to be a two-tree house. Sure, we knew that a nice big tree would look lovely in our front, street-facing window. But it wasn't exactly high on the priority list. The "real" tree, the tree we'd chop down ourselves and celebrate Christmas morning under, would be in the den, off of the kitchen. And so it was, last year, on our first Christmas in the Big Yellow House. All was right with the world. For a few weeks, anyway.


On December 22, 2007, a Saturday, we were frantically preparing for our family's Christmas party. I don't remember exactly what I was doing, but rest assured it involved last minute cooking, cleaning, gift wrapping, kid bathing and a whole lot of last minute hurrying, in general. Earlier in the month I had purchased a beautiful, big, white poinsettia plant from Home Depot. As I do most years, I tweaked it to my liking, decorating it with whatever sparkle-y holiday fare from Michael's struck my fancy, and used it for a kitchen table centerpiece. In my maniacal gift wrapping, child dressing craze, I had forgotten to return the poinsettia to its place of honor on the table, which had become wrapping paper central, and so it sat on the corner of our kitchen counter for the night, while we were out partying it up with 40 of our closest relatives and Mr. Claus himself.

When we returned home, I brought the little guys up to bed. One had fallen asleep in the car and the other required some slight coaxing and "rocking chairing" to return him to his previous state of slumber. Mike headed into the kitchen to do some post-frenzy clean up. When I came downstairs a good half hour later, a found Mike frantically wiping down all flat surfaces in the kitchen, with a look of disgust, mixed with...."I don't flippin' believe this"on his face. Mike turned to look at me and the first words out of his mouth were, "Thank God you didn't get here first." What? Did I miss something? Mike's eyes were darting all around the room as he told me what he walked in on....


He had begun clearing off the kitchen table when something caught his eye.....a web. A spider web. Between the pendant lights over the kitchen table. A spider web with spiders ON IT. Many spiders. MANY MANY MANY spiders. all the size of a "." Then, another web, from the pendant lamp to the very top of the poinsettia plant. The poinsettia plant, covered in mini-webs. And then, as his eyes followed the plant to the lights, the lights to the ceiling, an entire ARMY of them. Marching in line, all the way down the center of the living room. Some had paused at the ceiling fan, creating yet more webs and others had moved on....to the Christmas tree. Thousands and thousands of tiny, brand new baby spiders. Calling our Christmas tree their new home. About 48 hours before Santa's due arrival.

It took hours to clean up the disaster. All in all, the spiders had made it over twenty feet away from their nest. All the while fanning out in different directions. The tree had to be bagged and thrown out. The same fate awaited the garland that had decorated the cabinet tops. And the damn poinsettia plant, that I had had my hands in and out of so many times while intricately positioning my decorations, that got the boot right out the back door. The poor kids woke up to a scene straight out of the Grinch. Someone had stolen Christmas! We called Home Depot first thing the next morning.

I listened while Mike explained what had happened. Yes, we bought a poinsettia plant from your store, yes it housed a nest of unhatched baby spiders. Yes, the spiders hatched in our house and infested our living room, kitchen and ALL of our Christmas decorations. Yes, we still have the plant (for evidence, just in case). Yes, we'll be right down.

As soon as we got to Home Depot, the woman behind the customer service counter called the manager we had talked to on the phone. He came down, found out who we were, shuddered just a little bit and said, "Give them whatever they want."

Now, I like to think we didn't abuse the situation, though I do believe we deserved to abuse it. We picked out some garlands to replace the ones we had to toss and then it was time to grab a replacement Christmas tree. Of course, Mike had already told the manager, in no uncertain terms, that his wife would NOT be allowing anything further from the Home Depot gardens into the house. So naturally, we went with an artificial tree.

And you better believe we picked out the biggest, most expensive one they had. It looks perfect in our front window ;)

So, we are now a two-tree family. One artificial and one real. It's been very nice having the two trees. One more for "show" and the other for all the usual, sentimental reasons.

We are also now a strictly artificial poinsettia family. But really, can you blame us?


Wishing you all a wonderful, spider-free Holiday Season! See you in '09!

Now How Do I Explain This to the Neighbors?

When Mike and I were house-shopping, we had a list of the usual criteria to fill, for the most part.

In or close to our hometown? Check.

Big enough to grow into? Check.

Historic charm? Check.

Affordable? Check. Kinda.

Yard big enough to house a hockey rink? Check.

Yes, that really was one of the things my husband took into consideration when buying the house. Normally, I would've given him some grief over such a thing, but the words "three shower-head shower" worked a strange kind of magic on me. And so I caved, with visions of future hour-long showers dancing in my head.

I guess it's only a minor technicality that the shower still isn't finished. The hockey rink, however, is moving right along. Just in time. I'm sure Mike and the boys will get much use out of the rink this Winter. Actually, I'm not sure the boys have much of a say in the matter, especially since our college plans for them are "hockey scholarship." I'm only kind of kidding. Besides, isn't "Finn Granara" is great pro hockey name? See, that's what I thought!

Can you believe they sell kits to do this? Hockey fans must be especially die-hard. Mike still has to add the liner and fill it with water, but here it is so far, in all it's glory - our very own hockey rink:

He's so crazy. But that's why I love him.

You Gotta Love That

Thermostat set at 63 and the house a balmy 70 degrees.

Sometimes that Mike really knows what he's talking about! I have to admit, when he first started babbling about some cellar-dwelling, wood burning stove-type thing that could heat the house, I had my doubts. But the man pulled it off. Screw you, Keyspan.

Oh Crap.

Tagged!?! I'm not so sure I can come up with 8 random facts about myself (sad, isn't it?). I'm also not so sure I even know 8 other bloggers well enough to tag them (also sad). But here goes anyway, because I really like Jen and she's the one who tagged me :)

1. I am a HUGE Lost fan and am counting the days til January 21st!

2. Mike and I were high school sweethearts and started dating at the ripe old age of 16. There was a five year relationship hiatus in there somewhere, but obviously things worked out the way they were supposed to.

3. I gained 12 pounds during my last pregnancy and gave birth to an (almost) 9 lb baby. One of the few genetic traits I'm thankful for is the ease with which I have gone through my pregnancies.

4. I can moonwalk.

5. My husband lost his best friend five years ago. Cullen is (middle) named after him.

6. I fell in the "log ride" at Canobie Lake Park when I was six. Obviously, I survived.

7. Mike and I renovated our entire house via craigslist. You name it, we got it on craigslist. If anyone out there needs any reno on a budget tips, we're your guys.

8. I am a Tetris prodigy.

Okay, now I'm off to find 8 blogger friends...this might take a while.

Tis (Almost) the Season

On Monday, when I left for work, there weren't any speakers in my kitchen ceiling. On Monday, when I got home from work, there were. Just like that. Magic.

Last year, when Mike was putting up new ceilings on the first floor, he wired the entire floor for in-ceiling speakers. We didn't actually have the speakers at the time, but he made a "map" of the wires, for when the time came. And the time came on Monday, with the purchase of the first set of speakers.

They still need to be painted out to match the white ceiling, but they aren't as terrible of an eyesore as I feared they'd be.

When we bought the house, there was a little broom closet in the kitchen that would be surviving the gut job, so Mike and I decided this would be a great place to house all the electronic components for our surround sound and ceiling speakers. I had an old set of bi-fold doors and a single door from that set ended up fitting the frame perfectly! No adjustments needed.

The door's frosted glass front ended up being a surprising bonus, as all of our remote controls work right through the door and that eliminates the need to open it. All of the unsightly electronics and wires are conveniently hidden. We still haven't decided if we should paint the door or not.

Although he won't admit it, the real reason Mike wanted ceiling speakers throughout the house is for Christmas music. Yes, that's right, he is going around cutting holes into our brand new ceilings and installing speakers in every room so we can listen to Christmas music throughout the entire first floor of the house. He's just one of those people who loves everything about Christmas. And most of the time, I love him for it. Our radios (house and car) have been tuned to the "Christmas music station" since they began playing (on November 1st!).

All in all, I think the speakers are a nice idea. At the very least, they'll make for nice ambiance during our first Christmas party in the Big Yellow House.

On another note, Cullen continues his run as Kid Most Likely to Give an Adult a Heart Attack. Honestly, the kid has zero sense of caution. On Monday night, while attempting to climb up the wrong side of a chair, the chair fell backward on top of him, hit him in the face, and caused his right canine tooth TO GO RIGHT THROUGH HIS UPPER LIP. Clear through to the other side. I've heard of this happening, but had never seen it and promptly proceeded to flip out until Mike assured me that there was nothing that could be done for it, and cleaning it would be enough.

To top THAT off, once Cullen had calmed down (which literally took five seconds - I was still breathing into a paper bag at this point) he went for some extra gross-out points by chugging a large bottle of ORANGE JUICE while every adult in the room simultaneous groaned and cringed. The kid didn't so much as bat an eyelash.

Oy. My heart can't take much more of this.

Mudroom, Interrupted

I have written (complained) before about the complete and utter lack of storage space in the Big Yellow House. Which, in a 3,000 sq. ft. house seems slightly ridiculous. Supposedly, the lack of storage is due to the fact that back in the day, say 1897, people didn't generally own 1,200 outfits and 500 pairs of shoes. Not that I do (although my husband will tell you otherwise). It just seems like I do - comparatively speaking.

The little mudroom off the kitchen was a part of the house that really sold me on the place. Not only is it conveniently located, but it's not too big and I've always liked the idea of using a back door entrance. Now, with two little boys who, I swear, secrete dirt from their pores, I like the idea even more.

Mike has created a really great plan for the mudroom, complete with custom Mike-made, bench, cubbies and coat hooks. I have been waiting with bated breath to have full access to and use of our new mudroom. Til then, we have coats on chairs, coats on doors, coats on coats. Seriously. They. Are. Everywhere. We need this mudroom like Gary Busey needs rehab.

We were full steam ahead on the project for the last couple of weeks, painting the room the ever-popular Monroe Bisque and hanging a (nice looking!) drop ceiling. We begrudgingly decided to go with a drop ceiling in the mudroom, as the second floor laundry will be directly above this space. You know, just in case. Mike got enough done for me to get these "sneak preview" pics in:

The true paint color kind of got lost in the rainy-day-8:00 AM light. In person, it looks nice and warm. We think the bead board is original to the house and Mike did a really great job patching it. And I have to admit, even I, the World's Biggest Drop Ceiling Hater, actually like the ceiling. Yep, things were lookin' pretty good!

Unfortunately, Mike has recently deemed himself "burnt out." He says he doesn't know why. Hmm, might have something to do with the renovating an entire house while working a full-time job while watching two dirt-secreting kids 32 hours a week. But I'm not a doctor.

Obviously, the important thing here is for Mike to rest and relax til he feels up to getting back to work. He doesn't seem to consider this an option and I gotta say, I get worried sometimes. Maybe some of you can talk some "take care of yourself!" sense into him?

Surely I can live in coat hell for another couple of weeks. It's a lot nicer than asbestos hell and lead paint hell.