Do It Yourself Barn Door

I knew I wanted a barn door the second I saw one.  

Two big problems...

1. Where to put it and 

2. they are so stinkin' expensive.

Problem number 1 was solved in all of 5 minutes.  Master room...done... decision made.

Problem 2 took about 1 year.  My honey who is somewhat of a home improvement magician was on the constant hunt of how to do it on the cheap and by cheap I mean free. 

It ended up costing about 30.00 because we ran out of paint and we bought the door handle and T straps on top.  That was it.  Lumber...free.  Track...free. Labor... free. The joy I have gotten out of it.... priceless. 

 I know that slogan is a tad over done but in this case there really is no other way to say it.  I actually pull up a chair and just stare at it like it is a television.  I actually ate my breakfast two days in a row just happily staring at it.  Now I totally realize for some this classifies as crazy but when it comes to house fix ups I just can't help myself.  

The before and after are just so. much. fun.

I am always late getting my before picture...always. So my before picture is way into the project.  I used to have  tie back curtains in the doorway just to try and give my bathroom a little more privacy and mostly just to break up the rooms.  Now I also get to see my french door that leads into my closet.  That used to be blocked by the curtains.  See there are just so many advantages to my barn door. 

 No wonder I eat my meals in front of it.

The sorta before but more just the during. 

 Our bathroom is next on the fix up list.  Ugh!

The door closed.  Now seriously I know that you are just as crazy for this door as I am.  :)

The handle.  My magician honey antiqued these himself.  They were that boring silver you see and he antiqued this and the t's above.  I love them so very much.

The track was all ready old so nothing needed to be done there but the t's Tom worked his magic.

Just a closer look at the antiquing job.

Now my honey was on a roll and so he finished the wainscot behind my bed.  It used to just go half way up. We have wanted to do it for awhile and on the heals of the door frenzy, he did the wall as well.  His energy level makes me tired.  I mean I just help him paint sometimes and I am totally worn out. Haha  

BTW take a good look at that disgusting carpet because I picked up some free parquet wood floor and we are actually going to paint the parquet in checks.  It is going to be the project from you know where, sooo we are gathering our strength to do it in the next couple of weeks... maybe.  I think I will paint it before we glue it down.  Just some logistics we have to figure out too.  What color for 1.  I am thinking a light grey and a darker grey? 

I got this desk and candelabra at a thrift store for serious beans.

 I think I saw the candelabra on" Downton Abby."  It is on the table of every dining room scene. It isn't as tall as mine but almost.

 Just a fun little tidbit.  

  

a lesson in patience

You must first have a lot of patience to learn to have patience.

Stanislaw J. Lec (1909 - 1966)

Teaching a child how to ride a bike can be right up there with an operation without anesthetic.

I am serious too...painful in every way.

The truth is my other kids just did though.  They were 3 and 4 and they wanted to learn to ride a bike so they did. End of story.

Charlie's story is sooo not that story and you would think after having kids for 19 years that my honey and I would have so much patience we would be loaning our patience to everyone who was lacking in that department.  

You want to freak out on your child? Let me help you we would say. 

But alas, sadly that is not so, and we are still learning the delicate art that is so desperately needed in every area of our lives.

So the beginning of this tale is that it was just time.  

I mean are you friggin kidding me? 

I was still pulling this huge child in a bike trailer.  I would get looks and stares and even Charlie knew it was bad. When we stopped he would practically fall out of the trailer trying to get out quickly and then he would slyly look around and bolt from the embarrassing contraption. 

So we informed him that we would buy him so much candy it would make Halloween look lame. (I know, I know our parenting is lacking in so many areas)

The day arrived and for all intense and purposes the poor kid just did not have the skills.  Certainly not something we were willing to overlook so we began the hideous endeavor.  

Hours and I mean hours, sweat, blood and some serious tears from everyone involved and we had ourselves another bike rider in the call family.  Yes he couldn't peddle straight and could only go in very tight circles and sure if it was the smallest upgrade (I am using that term very loosely here) his little spaghetti legs could no longer move. But I am going down in the books and saying Charlie can now ride a bike.  

It took the patience of Saul (Is that the right biblical character?) that we are still learning every day but this is the last time I ever have to teach a human being how to ride a 2 wheeler.  

But I can however, let you borrow some of my overflowing patience.  :)   

Just as an update I took Charlie on a bike ride to hone his skills and he only took out only one pedestrian.

I am so pleased that he only harmed one.

He came up from behind the unsuspecting girl and tried to dodge her but lost control and slammed into her from behind knocking her down. He and his bike went down with her in a tumbled up blob of legs, bike and mess. This story could go either way. That poor girl could have freaked out on my poor child and been a complete pill or been nice and concerned. 

I am pleased to tell you that she handled the situation with compassion and care. She was a lovely human being who had patience to spare. She dusted herself off and made sure Charlie was ok.

  

I love her.  I really, really love her. 

Maybe we will go on another bike ride.... just not quite yet.

   

My Dave....

I love my cat Dave. 

And no that wasn't always his name...it sorta evolved.

Started as Daisy 

(before the vet informed us we had the wrong gender for our sweet little kitty.)

Went to Davy 

(makes complete sense because we only had to change a couple letters but more importantly Dave never even knew we were calling him a different name.  We're sneaky like that)

And finally just to Dave.

(Ella was the first to christen that name. Picture my blonde piggy tailed three year old girl, yelling out our screen door at the top of her lungs, "Dave, Dave," I literally dropped to the floor dying laughing.  I will add here that I was not the only one that had a reaction to my cat's name. I mean he's a cat and his name is Dave.    Now that is seriously funny.

So back to the original point...

I really love my cat Dave.

He is special.

These are just some of the reasons why:

He let my kids do anything to the poor fellow.

i..e. Nicholas and his famous flips.  Nicholas and his tosses onto the roof or trees or furniture.  

Playing dress up and wheeling him around in the stroller.

Making him a bed in the living room and putting his head on a pillow and forcing him to take a cat nap.

the constant pool splashes ( I really can't believe he put up with this one)

Car rides and the attempted burly rides. 

Constant kid shananagins. 

He always slept with one of my kids.  

Although I have to add here that he mostly slept with Nicholas and when he left he never quite found his niche.  He drove Ben nuts because he would steel his pillow.  I can still hear Ben yelling about that one.  He drove Ella a little nutty because he would wake up meowing and she wouldn't be able to go back to sleep. Sometimes he would even do that cat scratch thing on her hair and she really disliked that too. I would shut my kids door their so they could get some great shut eye before Dave would pick the child that he would sleep with that night and meow endlessly until that child let him in.  (This particular Dave habit drove me nutty.)

He was always with me.

If I was on the computer he was on the computer.  If I was in the kitchen he was in the kitchen.  If I was watching tv or reading a book he was on my lap.  This particular Dave habit made my Tom mad because he had to share me because I didn't want to disturb Dave's comfortable position.

This was a reoccurring problem.  If Dave was cozy then you couldn't move. His comfort was numero uno and nobody would ever disturb his coziness.  Except Tom because quite simply he could care less about Dave's comfort.

He was too big for Charlie to pick him up but that didn't stop him from trying to.  He was constantly in someone's arms or flung over someones shoulder or cradled in someones arms like a baby. 

He was more like a dog then a cat.

He ran up to our car when we would drive in meowing his happiness at our arrival.

He was always drinking out of the pool.

He napped on top of our cars and we had some serious close calls with this one.  He napped in the driveway and in the neighbors driveway and in the middle of the street. Ok he napped anywhere that was warm and cozy.

He was just so darn nice

 Everybody loved Dave.  

He was more then just a cat. He was my friend and he died. I don't know how and there is a little hole in my heart at the moment.

I am pretty sure that there isn't a better animal in the whole world.

My Boy's room needed a serious update.

I guess I knew it was bad when Benjamin asked me if it was possible to take "three little bears" clock down. Yea OK I had to admit their room was still a little like a toddlers room with bear and toy animals too boot. 

Sooo Tom found this wood for their wall and we started in. 

 I think the total cost for everything would be somewhere around $30.00 for everything.  

I kept their bedding and that is hilarious because I got both the chambray comforter and quilts when the boys grew out of their cribs and got their big boy beds. Ha!

We had most everything else...  

including the wheel and sprocket we had thrown in our side yard from when Ben got hit by a car  last spring and mangled his bike. (Long story)

The willow street sign was left in our garage by the previous owners...score.

the antique soccer ball we got on one of our trips to London.

The Broadway sign is from San Francisco and was taken down in 1920 and it is a total treasure. 

 I did pay a little, OK a lot more for that but it doesn't count in my earlier redo price because I got it way after the room was done :)  

 the old  golf clubs (thrift store)

the old tennis rackets (thrift store)

The signs all were made by my honey from scraps of wood flung in my side yard.  

Yea I admit my side yard is sorta like a junk yard but when scraps of everything are going to be made into something ridiculously cute in the near future, we just simply can't help ourselves.

So there you have it my boys new room.....

I was so stinkin' tempted to leave the wall like this and I went back and forth until I wanted to fling myself.  In the end we painted it because...I can't remember.  I still really like it...Ugh!!

Tom painted this corner piece a while back because I was missing England....

I am going to tell a baseball bat story here....

Once upon a time Nicholas was about 12 years old  and he needed a new bat. 

Bats are expensive so Nicholas and his Dad researched and talked and saved for what seemed like years.  Finally, it was time to buy the long awaited bat.

Nicholas carefully puts his new and very nice bat in it's protective bag and heads to his first game of the season.  

My boy is up, he stands behind home plate with his beautiful new bat bent in position.  

The pitch is good and Nicholas swings with all his might...

He hits and shatters that beautiful new bat into two pieces on his very first swing

Are you friggin' kidding me?  The first swing, the first hit...broken.

Now if you know me you know that I throw everything away and let alone something that is broken.  But this bat has made the cut in my chucking binges over and over again. 

That memory is just so funny to me and when I see this bat I smile. I see the whole scene again again and again. 

So up it goes right on my boys wall....I really had no idea I would have such a great place for it someday..

The End

I can't make these words  go above Hilary and it is bugging me.  I am grateful that there are no more bears in my teenage boy room....

Bringing in 2013

Our New Years Eve celebration means another raclette meal. Yesss!!! 

 One problem we were out of the cheese from Christmas. 

Nothing that we can't remedy and having a fabulous time doing it. Tom had a business meeting in the city with a client at 8:00 a.m. and I gladly tagged along. I felt like such the local as I took my laptop into Starbucks, sat at the window and looked like I was totally busy doing something really important. (I so was, by the way, writing Nicholas a letter.) When Tom finished we headed right to the Ferry building on the Embacardero for our much needed supplies.

 Raclette cheese from The Cowgirl Creamery...check

Baguette bread from Acme Bread Company...check

  Add to that the mushrooms, asparagus, tomatoes and peppers from the local farmers market.

Yea, this was no doubt going to be the best, darn raclette dinner ever.

Then  to work off the 10 lbs of cheese we inhaled we played games by the fire...for a really long time.

Welcome 2013...Can't wait to celebrate!

Oh the places we see....

December 27th 2012

Day 1: Drive to Oregon

It all started when Tom said, "Hey, I found a great deal on a darling cabin in southern Oregon."  I thought, "Geez, I have never been to Oregon."
The driving fiasco started there.
.The trip was stunning especially since we had missed the storm of the century that had dumped like 7 feet of snow.

It took about 6 hours to get to the darling little cabin on the Rogue river in the town of Grants pass.

Hot cookies and hot cocoa served every night in the lodge

Day 2

Drove to the magical town of  Jacksonville. 

It was an old lumbering town built in the mid 1800's and we spent an hour in the cemetery alone. It was exactly like the towns back in New England with the covered bridge to boot.

Day Three

Drove to the redwood forest and down the coast a bit and stayed in another stunning little town on the ocean called Arcata.

I have wanted to see these giants since we moved to Cali almost 15 years ago.  That is along time to wait and they did not disappoint.  We hiked and explored the entire day among these majestic trees.   

Look at my little, tiny people  by that unbelievable tree? It looks like we are on some other planet in a sci fi film.

Day 4

Drove to see more redwoods including the Avenue of the Giants and continued down highway 1 along the coast.

Glass beach where instead of sand the beach is covered in beach glass.

treasures

Mendocino....can I picnic here everyday?  

Oh except I just remembered getting here was probably the worst drive....ever.  We drove on solid s curves for 2 hours.  Nobody in my car gets sick and that is a good thing because it would of no doubt been a full barfarama.  

So probably I will never go here again.  

Some other beach along the way because the sun was setting and we don't miss that for anything!!!!

I have no idea how many of thousands of miles we drove but the places we saw were even better then what I had pictured in my wildest dreams. It just doesn't get any better than that.