I Was So There

This time when I received the call from the Storehouse Outlet I sprang into action. I happened to be outside chopping down a bush when Emma, my sales person, called with the good news. They had my dresser in and it was in good shape. I called her back and told her I'd be leaving in 15 minutes. In 15 minutes I called her and told her I was leaving and it would take me an hour to get there (i.e. Please don't sell it!)

I rushed to Baltimore to find my beautiful new dresser with just a small, insignificant nick and all ready for me to purchase. Kevin was not reachable by phone, so I made an executive decision. We're buying it. Hooray! Our bedroom suite is now complete at least for now (but don't tell Kevin I said that - he thinks we're done.)

I dragged Kevin back to the store and we picked up our new prize. When we arrived home we just had to bring it inside. Easier said than done. This involved me screaming at Kevin that he was trying to knock me down and he playing the more dignified role of being "the calm one" as he put it. We barely got it inside, as it weighs more than Jared before the subway diet. Fortunately my brother is coming by on Sunday...

Case of the Mysterious Stain

Ok, maybe the stain isn't that mysterious. It's obvious that the previous owner spilled a couple of things in our pantry. And being as anal as I am, I want to paint absolutely everything in this house and that includes the pantry and its miscellaneous stains.

The problem is that no matter how many times I paint over the stains with my "Ultra Pure White" (there are many stories about this crappy paint) they pop back out the next day. I'm bringing out the big guns today. I'm going to try covering them with Kilz Stain Blocker, which I hope will cover as well as block. We shall see.

Caveat Emptor

I've been looking for nightstands for our bedroom for over a month. I nixed the matching ones from the Storehouse a long time ago as paying over $300/piece seems absolutely outrageous to me. I've been searching every store that I could think of that would carry anything remotely like a nightstand. Got an end table? I'm there. A phone table? I'll take a look at it. A small table in general? Give me a call!

Well, I finally found something that I thought looked reasonably decent and it was only $30! I also had a 20% off coupon at Bed, Bath & Beyond, so how could I resist? I figured Kevin and I are going to beat the heck out of them anyway, and finally a piece of furniture that we don't have to worry about. As usual, that is not the case.

I put them together last week and I somehow ended up covered in black soot (that would be the black finish wearing off onto me.) I went to wipe them down with a damp rag and they started to bubble. Hmmm. I persevered and putting little paper squares under each foot (in case the black paint decided to rub off onto the new carpet) I moved them upstairs.

Our bedroom is already an oven, because of its location in the house, but now it became a toxic oven thanks to the fumes from the nightstands. My great buy is currently exiled to the master bathroom, which we're not using yet, so they can release their deadly fumes - alone.

High Hopes

I have high hopes for this pantry today. My plan is to empty it onto the dining room table and paint the pantry...twice. I hope I'm not being a little too ambitious. I know how long it takes to paint an ordinary closet. One with this many shelves might just take a lot longer than I anticipate.

I also plan to start painting the trim in the 1st floor bathroom and I hope it'll tone down the Oppressive....er I mean, 'Whispering Pines.' Kevin still likes it, so we're sticking to it. Someone recommended Crown Molding and I'm going to put a large mirror with a white frame in there to lighten it up. Hopefully then it'll seem more 'Whispering' and less 'Oppressive' to me!

Hanging Ledges

Everyone says that you buy your first place to 'learn' how to fix things and we are definitely no exception. I had a long list of things to hang, replace and fix this weekend in 3 of our 4 bathrooms. I thought I had carefully calculated that it would take us 3 times longer than anticipated to do everything, so I figured I had a practical list for our alloted time.

I didn't anticipate the disaster that would be our attempt to hang the first ledge in the guest bathroom. I ended up with no ledge and two giant holes to spackle, sand and paint, which I'm still not done with.

Fortunately, Project 2, which was hanging cubes in the master bathroom went a little bit smoother. I had arranged sheets of paper on the wall the same size as the cubes in the arrnagement I wanted them (something Kevin had read about to help you visualize the layout). That was fine, except that after we had placed the first cube (the one on the bottom left in this photo), we discovered that hanging a cube below this would not allow someone in the Jacuzzi tub to put their head back. After moving the cube around the bathroom, we came up with the idea of hanging it sideways. We are brilliant!

Kevin managed to not hit any of the wires in the wall either, which is a miracle, because all of the switches for the bathroom are on the other side of this wall.