Saturday, November 8, 2008

Home is where the heart is...

Cara and I have had our share of exciting times as we settle into our home together. Not all of these exciting times have been "good" per se, but you've got to take the good with the bad I guess. At the end of the day, it's been so much fun turning this house into a home with Cara!

At the end of last week, I was working from home on Thursday afternoon (10/30) and I was taking a quick work break so that I could get some wedding "to dos" checked off the list. I was on the phone with a potential DJ and the Photographer called (whom I was trying to connect with so I could get our deposit squared away). Just as I was getting ready to call the photographer back, I heard a dripping sound. Turns out, the dripping sound was water falling from our kitchen ceiling and cabinets and into our sink (see the photo to the left). Ugh! I guess water dripping from your toilet is a bit of a problem. Because, water will tackle anything in its path on its way to the sea. Next thing you know you've got a blown out ceiling in your kitchen, a nice plumbing bill, and some contracting work waiting to happen (new sheet rock in the kitchen ceiling). Yahoo.

Crazy plumbing mess aside, Cara and I decided we are going to get the condo painted to make it look a little bit more cozy inside. So, we picked out some paint colors - a good dark tan, crimson red, and a bright and cheery yellow. Picking out the colors was the easy part. First, we prepped -- no small task. Paint prepping involves sticking blue tape EVERYWHERE. I guess the rule of thumb is: 'tis better to paint blue tape than to paint things you don't want to paint. Next step, remove outlet and light switch covers. Cara took care of this - she's pretty handy with a flathead screwdriver! And finally, you've got to move furniture. We both took care of this task. With all the prep work done -- it was time to do some painting. Finally! All this work took some serious energy. So, we made sure we were appropriately caffeinated! We got energy drinks on the way home from a Lowe's run. Cara didn't like her Monster, so I took it (being the wonderful fiance that I am). Between the energy drinks and a little 80's music (gotta love Comcast music channels), we had plenty of energy to spare.
We started painting our living room/family room. It turns out, it's a SLOOOOWWWW process. In fact, we spent the entire last weekend painting two, count 'em, TWO rooms. We haven't even painted the closets yet - so, we still have our work cut out for us! The bad news...I don't do well with painting. I was an absolute brat for a good chunk of the weekend. Painting takes time. It's a mess. And it's exhausting. I just could not handle it. I don't know how Cara put up with me, but she did. The good news... the two rooms look absolutely awesome for our efforts! And we did manage to have some fun too! Below is a montage of photos of us prepping, painting, and our finished efforts. Oh, and I've got some video footage of Cara dancing as well...heh heh. You can't hear it...but it's 80's music..."Straight Up Now Tell Me," in fact. Love it!


Next up...we're painting a coffee table blue to round out the family room. Well...not totally rounding it out I guess. We still have the closet and then we'll have a finished room! We'll plan on wrapping up the closets and the upstairs hallway shortly and then turn our attention to downstairs. If we're lucky, we'll wrap up sometime before Christmas. Hard work...but well worth it. We'll make this house a Hoag home afterall!

5 comments:

  1. That's the EXACT color combo of our house (the same tan and the same red). Love it. I take that as a compliment. BTW, I hate taping!!!! But it's so great when it's complete and you'll never have to do it again if you don't want to. Congrats on the "new" home and sorry about the dripping incident.

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  2. Whoa ... that's quite a drip in the kitchen. Glad you got on top of it. As nice as it is to have indoor plumbing it sure can be a pain when you spring a leak. It still beats the alternative. BTW I too hate taping.

    Cara, glad to see you injecting some design and style ideas into the house.

    Love to both of you ...

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  3. Cara and I use to totally rock "Straight Up" that video clip doesn't do it our dance justice! Paiting sounds so much more fun that it really is- very deceptive. Looks like you did a nice job, look forward to seeing it in person someday. We want to paint our living room/hallway- you game? I can put you and Cara to work when you come visit- doesn't that sounds exciting?! J/K.

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  4. Megan, you'll have to refresh my memory...I obviously couldn't remember the dance moves to "Straight up."

    And you should all know that when Matt and I finally finish all the painting we want to do we will start bugging you all to come visit us!

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  5. It's so cool to see you guys creating a home!! I love the colors!! James and I can't wait to go visit you at some point! Love and hugs!!

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