remodeling this life

My house is turned upside down and backwards right now because of the bedroom project. With hubby home hanging drywall, taping and sanding, cutting a new hole in my living room wall, it’s been quite exciting and messy. And somehow, when there is drywall dust flying, I can’t manage to do laundry. Why, if it’s a disaster on one side of the house, should I bother with the laundry on the other side of the house? That makes sense, right?

Hopefully things will be settling down soon. Paint today. Tile soon. Then cleaning.

In the meantime, some posts from my reader I enjoyed this week:

• Does Your Money Have a Job?
• I have bedrooms on the brain. I love this Before and After: A Brooklyn Limestone Bedroom
• Home Is…Beautiful Art and Photography
• For the Love of Simplicity

I hope you enjoy the long holiday weekend with ones you love!

What feels like eons ago, I posted about how we were starting on our master bedroom remodel- the last room  that needed to be ripped down to the slab (interior and exterior), and rebuilt. When we bought the house, an old garage had started to be converted into a master bedroom and bathroom. There were faux wood walls, framing, and a really ugly old bathtub/shower in a perfect color letting us know it was installed in the 70s and then the project went on a nearly 40 year vacation. Some days, a 40 year vacation sounds good to me. This was not good.

The exterior walls have been up for a while but the interior of the room has just sat and sat and sat. Hubby framed the master bathroom and my walk in closet and the closet was finished off with walls a couple weeks ago. Sloooooowly this room is moving along. Over the weekend, we emptied that room that had become storage and held a yard sale. Good times. Hubby took this week off work so he could work from dawn until dark on it. That’s a hubby worth keeping. He’ll take a vacation from work to do more work. Don’t worry, he’s taking a real vacation with us later this summer.

Early each morning, all day and every night this week, I have found the man of my dreams hanging drywall by himself. The night he was holding sheets of fireproof drywall over his head and putting them in on the ceiling while smiling, I fell in love with him all over again.

Enough with the mushy stuff.

Here’s how the room was a few days ago:

I'm a slave driver that pays in lollipops

And now there is a ceiling and 3 walls. And electricity! Talk about appreciating the little things.

If mudded drywall sheets aren’t the eye candy you were looking for, let’s step away from the construction zone for a moment and I’ll share the inspiration picture that I’ve had stored on my computer forever in anticipation of this project, shall we?

I have been in love with this room from the moment I laid my eyes on it when it was on the cover of a now extinct Cottage Style magazine. I even made hubby put that window there just so I could put my bed next to it just like this. Of course my reality is not found in a magazine so it won’t be *just* like this but I’ll happily tie in what I can.

And just because my reality is drywall dust, another pic of my reality. Can you say you hung drywall at age 3?

Me neither. But my son can.

More soon…

Now that we’re firmly entrenched in the growing season, I thought it would be fun to wander around the yard and snap some pics of what we have growing.

I’ll start with these lovlies that surprised me with a second chance after I inadvertently killed them last year.

Happy and thriving now – yay!

Last year’s mother’s day gift was a rose bush from my husband. Swoon. I love them.

My Daughter planted the sweetest little flower garden around our mailbox recently. Hubby was kind enough to run a water line out there for easy watering and the flowers are very happy.

We have 3 raised beds for herbs and  fruits and veggies this year, and as usual mixed in some flowers with them. Everything was started from seed so we are patiently waiting for most things to grow still. Here is a random sampling.

The strawberries have been coming in for a while. The kids love to pick them so I never get a chance to get a photo before they’re gone.

This time of year, I get fistfuls of Mexican Petunias from the kids to fill my vases with. Love.

We have lots and lots of coffee trees. I love when it gets warm enough that they can go back outside. I love the dark shiny leaves.

And last but not least, one of the most recent things we’ve added to our yard is some olive trees. Here, a couple olive branches.

I hope you enjoyed the little tour and don’t mind I had to zoom way in and only do close-ups because I haven’t weeded lately.