Catholic Schools Week

Clearly I am so behind on this blog, but will try to catch up before the paint fumes wear off. The end of January was Catholic Schools Week so the kids had lots of special days and lots of special things for me to remember....

Emily so proud to wear her bathrobe to school on pajama day. She aspires to be me one day and have a daytime bathrobe of her own.

 Mass with the Bishop, he's there somewhere. Love all the uniforms as always!

 This must have been wacky Wednesday. Even Anna got into it this year for the first time ever.

 I mean, really into it. I guess this was back when we had a mild winter. Not so mild lately but seeing these shorts and tank tops in January is a nice memory.

 At the pep rally on Thursday all the classes get to compete in some games. Patrick's class did the shoe race where each kid takes their shoes off and puts them in a pile at the end of the gym. Then they race down there, find their shoes, and race back. So, pretty much what Patrick does every morning in our laundry room. The training paid off, and I say this as a parent whose children have never won a single thing: he smoked them all. It was kind of ridiculous and I'm so sorry that I didn't think to video it. Poor Sean showed up moments later but I filled him in and he got to give Patrick some high fives at least.

 (These are obviously iPhone photos, in case there was any question about why the quality is so terrible). Here is Anna doing the balloon popping race for her class. Hilarious as always.

 Here is Megan sitting with her class before they did a basketball shoot out game. I am so sure that she was delighted we showed up. Cramping her style.

 Ah, the perfect end to CSW, Patrick misspelling Catholic on his spelling test. So proud.

Family fun night on Friday where Sean and I worked the bingo game. Emily won at the end of the night finally and picked out a lovely princess bath set.

 Thankfully we had another parent helping with the bingo so neither of us had to work the microphone.

The culinary highlight of the week: sending Emily to win the Radina's cake at the cake walk first thing. Then we sat with the other parents and snorked it down while the kids played games. Or ran around, whatever, I didn't care much. Met some family there checking out the school as we were leaving... oh boy, what a night to come see us all in action. Come on back now!

To end Catholic Schools Week the 5th grade (the ones who were healthy) sang in the church choir. And the week after CSW was sick week, followed by another sick week, followed by a 4 day weekend. Out of 300 students, 50 would be out each day. Patrick missed a few and so did Megan but that was stomach flu, not the respiratory stuff a lot of others had.

I will put all the painting updates in another post. 192 hours down. Phase one almost complete, I am so close.

More January

 The kids managed to make a sad little snowman at some point. Then it was 70 degrees and he was no longer with us. But now it's back to two degrees and a dusting of snow. Our gas bill was half the usual price for this time of year so I think overall it was a much milder January. I also just found out that I don't have to run the pool pump 24/7, so that will save us some electricity I think. Too bad it took us over a year to find that out.

 Amelia and Megan headed to the country themed junior high dance. I chaperoned, much to Megan's disgust. Too dark and loud for me to know what was going on anyway.

I won a bread making class from the MCS auction and finally scheduled it. No small task to find a date that worked for everyone. Sean wasn't as interested in the hands on stuff and Tracey had to put her post-surgery foot up, so Mark and I did all the work. It was definitely a working class, I'm tired just thinking about it.

 Here Wade is showing me how to roll the baguettes.

 Small hands not so helpful.

 Then we had to transfer them to this gurney thing to get them into the oven.

 Here I am cutting the dough to make them epi bread instead of regular baguettes. Fancy stuff.

 There may have been a mishap getting some into the oven. I don't think Wade is looking to hire us.

 We even got to help with the clean up. I could have used a glass of wine by this point.

 Our finished product! Took home quite a few and passed them out to friends. Not as pretty as the ones they usually sell but still delicious.

 Then we ended with a meal for the families and Patrick found some boys to sit with.

 Love these grainy paparazzi style shots. Anna and Emily love talking to Ella, who is a good sport. Megan and Amelia went off and found their own table and the adults hid on the other side with that much earned wine.

 Emily has been having sleepovers with Megan lately which is fine since those two tend to not get much time together.

And here is my little copy cat. I have really cut back on the computer lately, so this isn't as common of a scene as it used to be. Just focusing on painting instead of getting sucked into email, Facebook, pinterest, etc etc. 100+ hours of painting done, realistically there is another 400 to go... I will probably take a long break after another 100 though, after that it's the stuff that isn't as noticeable. I took today off, part of not working on the Sabbath. I went to a retreat last weekend and now I am trying to implement a few changes. So instead of painting I ended up cooking and cleaning the kitchen for hours instead, for a meal the kids didn't really appreciate. Sigh. Sean and I liked it! Sean picked up an extra shift today since we didn't have Superbowl plans (and never want any, I hate Sunday night parties in general) so we are hoping to use that money to pay for some spring break fun. Just haven't figured out what yet. I have more photos, they just aren't showing up on the computer yet. Perhaps later... but I just had to get a few updates out before we get sucked into February.

January catch up-- Megan's birthday

 We've been trying to cut back on eating out but took them out for Megan's birthday lunch a few weeks ago, to "hou-hans" as Emily calls it.

 Then Megan had all the girls in the class over for a pool party. Sean was working and I just couldn't deal with a sleepover all on my own, so we just had them for the afternoon.

 Pool full

 Hot tub full

 Lots of volleyball and basketball going on, so glad we got the hoop.

 One of the six cakes we won from Four Cakes at the Pilot Club auction. Emily loved the frosting, which everyone else kind of picked off, it's the pretty kind, not the fluffy kind.

 Nice hair, ladies.

 They did all pick off some flowers to eat.

 Emily cleaned up the pool for me. She was eager to hang out with the 7th graders.

Here is her frosting removed cake.

Break day, update time

79 hours and counting. Progress is being made. I do stop to cook and pay attention to the children but Sean has done most the driving kids around up until today since he wasn't working. I even took a day off to go to a baking class which will be another post someday. But now for some photos!

 Okay, pick one!! That is my test black door that turned out well enough that I will do a few more.

 First coat in the front hall. I have press and seal on the white trim to protect it and it mostly worked.

 I did end up taping for part of this job, did make it easier.

 The people at the paint store said that they haven't seen that stuff you paint on the glass to protect it for a long time, so I suffered through without it. (ps what color for those shelves??)

Small brush is key.

 For when a tiny swatch just won't do. 8 shades of gray (4 from a friend who also obsessed over this lately). In the end, we both picked the same shade. Great minds.

 The hearth room is so dark so I'm going to try and lighten it up with Agreeable Gray every where, even up high some day when I find someone to hire to finish the job.

 Here are all the choices on the wall. Sean said he is glad that he's not expected to have an opinion. No bickering here about decorating taste!

When I talked to our remodelers about the overall job it was pointed out to me that there are lots of cracks and gaps, normal after 20 years I would think. But, I was told all that would be fixed by the painting team so I know when I bring them back in to give us a bid on the kitchen they will be judging my skills. I spent two hours making Durham's water putty from a large can that came with the old house and then I filled every possible crack and hole I could find. Now I need the small brush to paint over it all. Detail work is rather tedious but I'm saving cash. Taking care of kids for thirteen years has gotten me in the mode of doing tedious tasks too, this is nothing...

 The finished entryway for now. Definitely changes the look in there. I haven't done the crown moulding yet and Sean said he wouldn't have noticed that it was still cream if I hadn't pointed it out. Then later when it was darker in there he said you can't tell the difference at all. Shortly after that Patrick walks in and asks when I'm going to paint up high. Yes, the seven year old boy immediately noticed how bad it looks. Sigh. Ladder day some day soon... but not today. Today I need to cook and prep for the weekend when I will be at a retreat at church and Sean will be working. Not sure why I thought this was a good idea except that I'm on parish council now and I feel like I should know what is going on and I will meet a lot of people. And Jesus thinks I should take a break, ha!

Close up of the door, a few brush strokes that I can sand down and redo if I am feeling crazy. Anyway, not sure what the next project is, so many to choose from. Kid vanities are painted, just need knobs. I'd like new faucets and mirrors but not sure when. I also want to tackle all the trim and doors on the upstairs hall but that involves 8 doors, plus 10 more if I go into the bedrooms. Let's not discuss the girls' wing, that may never get done. Basement either. UGH, sorry Sean. The blue living room is at least cream which means it will go faster than the oak rooms. Then I need to decide on the color for the built in cabinets in the hearth room and a color for the library bookshelves. New wall color in the powder room too and new lighting and mirror and and and and. Hosting an event for the school in late spring so I do have that to motivate me. Until then just taking it day by day. I will say the best part about this project is that it requires so little paint so isn't costing much more than my time and sanity!

Epic Painting

Oh, stop rolling your eyes at the overuse of the word epic because this actually is appropriately used. I've logged 38 hours already and have barely started. I decided to do this project for many reasons and I also have many alternate titles for this post. Yes, lots of paint fumes going on these days and lots of time to think of blog post titles. I could also call this, "We can do hard things" which is a phrase from Momastery. I think it's supposed to be applied to hard life situations but whatever. A good reminder that as daunting as this task looks, it's nothing like what other people face and accomplish.

Another way to remind myself of that is to listen to Epic Soundtracks on Songza. This is a good suggestion for anyone who wants to make their day seem more significant, just listen to one of those scores. We do have fun trying to guess which movies they are from. Anyway, suddenly my menial tasks seem essential and important. No matter how tedious it is sanding and wiping and priming and painting is, I am accomplishing GREAT THINGS.

So when people ask what I am painting, I respond, "portraits". Impressive? No, more impressive than portraits (to me today) is painting OAK TRIM AND DOORS AND CABINETS. (The native men of Kansas weep at the thought). It is game on here. I have logged many many hours contemplating this project, when in fact I should have just started it. I was intimidated though by the questionable job done painting the oak vanities in two of the bathrooms. I read many instructional blogs on the internet but still worried about the finished product. I'm not messing around here, I plan to live here a long time and didn't want to be irritated with ugly painted trim. This project was originally rolled into the kitchen remodel, the elusive kitchen remodel. The price kept going up and up as the project kept growing and growing. I was beginning to think it would never happen and not only would I have to live with falling apart cabinets (seriously, another one fell off the hinges this week) but I'd have to live with oak trim forever. No more. No more!

So I stopped at Sherwin Williams and the kind salesperson explained to me that it's not hard to paint oak, it is just tedious and time consuming. I suspect it isn't a job that painters are eager to take on. So I bought the right products and I just started. And it's not hard, really, it's simple, just time consuming. I am excited to do it though, the payoff is enormous. I am taking some risks, going bolder than usual but why not? I can always change it. So let's have some photos:

 First, some of the items to use-- very fine sanding sponge. Hmm, now I see that I should be wearing gloves to do this. Interesting. Also, the press and seal on the carpet is better than taping, which I don't bother with. I suppose I shouldn't trash the carpet in case it takes a while before we put in the hardwoods and refinish the whole first floor.

 Yes, good bye oak doors. The rest of the doors in the entryway area are cream (now white), except for these. Just primed here, finished product later when I get to it. Right now I am mostly just priming every surface I see. I am considering going bold with the paint choice in the library... that's right, I'm painting the cabinetry in there. Men faint. Sorry, I hate it. Much too country for me and for this house. I suppose it looked fine back in 1991.

 Patrick's vanity, the one that scared me off painting for a long time. I finally realized that perhaps this project just wasn't done correctly.

 Here's a close up. They must have just put one thin coat of paint on. Wrong. Sand. Wipe. Prime. Paint. Paint.

 Just a coat of primer on the top there and already looks immensely better. Most satisfying job I've ever had.

 This sums up everything I hate about the paint in this house. Obviously the miles of oak trim, but also the yellow and gray together. I know some professional picked it out and yes, gray and yellow were THE colors a couple years ago but it looks terrible like this. I still don't know what I will do color wise on the walls as the yellow goes up really really high. It's not that I don't like yellow it's just that I've done yellow in my past three houses. I am over it. Done. Time for something new. I don't mind the gray, except with the oak so perhaps it will all go gray after the trim is white.

And here it is... my test doors. No one ever sees them so I figured it would be a good place to experiment. I can't wait to see the final product, I should do that today. 

Okay, my first project, photos out of order here. I figured that if I screwed up the vanity in the powder room, no big deal because I planned to replace it anyway. Well, saving money is my game while we wait for the tax bill.... 

 Ta-da! Not the best photo but you get the idea. I put another coat on after this and it is nice and smooth and shiny and best of all, not oak and dated.

 I tried out painting one corner so far to see if I like the white I picked out. I feared it was "too white", but that is just in contrast to the cream that I am painting over.  (By the way, I learned that the best way to pick a white is on the computer where they have all their white choices in a page together and then you can see the undertones in them). As I am doing this project I just can't believe what bad shape it was in. Clearly a project long overdue. Now that I have primed everything I can get a feel for how it will look after I paint it. Figured I would just keep up with the priming to force me to do the entire project, rather than finishing a room and then giving up on the rest.

Also, I think it was very prophetic that we had a pile of these dropped on our front porch. We are definitely experiencing greatness now. Also, my knees are loving this. Time to get back to it today. Miles of trim to tackle. Go big or go home. The kids live in fear that I will pick them up from school in these jeans...