Chickens

After months of planning, building and studying we finally did it! You can call us chicken farmers if you want, because we have our very own backyard coop set up and stocked with adorable little chicks. There are currently 11 of these little creatures running around, so many because they are too young to sex. Once we know which ones are hens and which are roosters we will bring the number down to 6.


Liam was extremely excited when we put them in the coop. He couldn't stop grinning, and pointing to them. We chose to do chicks because we want them to be hand tame, and used to having us around. They are already quite friendly, despite the fact that the farmer we got them from didn't exactly sit out in the coop and hand feed them.


We chose two different breeds, Americanas (which will be regular sized chickens that lay blue eggs) and Silkies, which are a bantam (smaller breed) that were recommended to me as a very friendly breed. So in an ideal situation we will end up with four Americana hens and two Silkie hens.


Here is a picture of the coop Jake made us. Its not quite finished yet, it needs the roof to be completed, and eventually we will paint the hardy board to match our house (when we paint the outside of our house). I'll will post more pictures of the coop when it is finished, but let me say that this picture does not do it justice. Jake did an amazing job on this thing, its all cedar with two nesting boxes and a good size run.

Summer...

Have I really not posted since August 8th? That is crazy. Especially since I still don't have the kitchen done (still waiting on two cupboard doors to be hung, and the crown on the cabinets) and the family room, which I take full responsibility for. I only have one of the pillows finished, and I bought the materials for the art work, but still have to actually put it together.

Even though not much really changes in the fall, I am still looking forward to September in an odd way. It's not like Liam goes to school or anything (thankfully) but I still feel like it will bring a bit of order to this place. Maybe once it starts to rain a bit I will actually get to my ever growing projects list. Maybe. In the mean time it just keeps growing and not much gets done.

The basement is coming along really nicely now too, as I type I can smell the primer wafting through the house. Which is not really a nice smell but it means progress!

Plus two friends with muscles happened to stop by this evening, and moved the chicken coop to the backyard with Jake. It only took a lot of grunting and literally chopping down a tree to get it there. Yup, that is right, chicken coop. I will post pictures soon, but Jake built this beauty a few months ago, and we just now have it in our backyard! Liam and I are pretty excited.

A little of this and that...

Here is a brief glimpse of what we have been up to lately:

Lots of big trucks have come to our place, which Liam gets very excited about. We have also been camping, to the fair, sushi picnics in the park (LOVE IT) and about a thousand other exciting things.

I also have a really long list of projects that I either have started, or am wanting to start really badly. We don't have a basement yet (that will be ready in the fall) so that makes it a little difficult. Jake isn't really a fan of my sewing stuff spread out all over the table (understandably so) but he is being very good about it. And my tools are all still buried in the garage, and its going to take a good week just to find them. But considering it is summer, I'm not getting as much time to work on my stuff as I normally would, and am really not complaining. Its just nice to be outside most of the time.

This week I hope to dig out my chalkboard paint, more fabric and (hopefully) find a working rotary dial telephone. (I have been looking for MONTHS now and it seems no one wants to drop theirs off at the thrift store. Seriously, if you know of one just sitting around calling my name I would love to hear from you). This is all just for the family room. I'll post with more details when I'm finished, until then sorry you'll just have to wonder what I could possibly be doing :) (okay your probably not as excited about it as I am)...

We're also making some good progress on the yard as well. By we I mean Jake, but I have every intention on starting some weeding tomorrow so I feel like I can count myself in on that. Intention is 90% of it anyway.

So that is the most recent update! Hopefully the kitchen will be completely finished this week so that I can post some pictures, it is 95% there, just a few little things left.

Master Bedroom

The master bedroom is now finished! I may eventually add some more art work to the walls, but for now I'm pretty happy with how it looks. This room basically received a giant face lift, new carpet, lighting, paint, base and trim and a new closet organizer and doors.

Here are the before pictures:


And the master now:
right now my favorite part of the whole room is the ceiling fan, it makes such a big difference in cooling the room down at night.

The back splash went on in the kitchen yesterday so now all it is waiting for is the crown around the top of the cabinets and two cabinet doors, and then it too shall be done! I'm still amazed at how quickly everything is coming together.

Bathroom!

I am really excited about this post. The bathroom and the kitchen were the most extensive parts of the renovation, and the bathroom is now finished! Jake promised me yesterday that he wouldn't shower until he had the shower curtain hung up, and he really likes his showers. Once that promise was made he was up at 6 this morning hanging the shower bar. (Sigh, isn't he great?).

So, to remind you of what we started with, here is the before pictures of the bathroom:




Gross. Besides being really outdated, it was really not a good layout with the massive counter taking up so much of the floor space.

And here is the bathroom today:




I love it, it turned out so perfect. And it feels so much bigger now, with that big useless counter gone.

Liam's play area

Things have been pretty busy around here lately, between the beautiful sunshine, working some shifts, camping, working on things around the house, Liam's four new molars and all the other many things that come up in a day it is never very dull around here. On top of that, there are guys working in the basement every day (yay!) but it happens to be right under Liam's bedroom so his naps have had to be elsewhere every week day. Between all that I haven't had too much time to sit down and think, much less blog.

I should also mention that I have a gorgeous washer and dryer sitting downstairs taunting me, they aren't hooked up yet so yesterday my mom so graciously let Liam and I crash her place for five hours to do laundry and nap. She even fed us dinner on top of all that! (thanks mom).


It feels like the only parts of the house I care about are the ones that have to do with Liam. That's not really true, but they do happen to be the areas that are all finished because those parts of the reno's only involved "face lift" type projects that were all done pretty quick! I am really eager to post the before and after pictures of the kitchen and bathroom because those are the most dramatic, but they are still waiting on a few things. I believe the kitchen backsplash is going in this week, we were just waiting on a few tiles, so once that is finished I will post pictures!

Here is the old stereo cabinet that was built in. With a fresh coat of paint, new shelves inside and new door knobs I think it looks so much better:

Before:and After:

And what would likely be considered the dining room area before:

And after:

And finally, Liam's favorite new thing, cuddling with the dog. He isn't much into cuddling with his momma, but when Henk is hanging out inside all Liam wants to do is lay down with him.

Moved in and Liam's bedroom finished!

We are all moved in now! Well, at least all our stuff is here and we are living in the house. Moving day went really smoothly, a huge thanks to all the people that came out to help! By eleven everything had been moved over and brought into the house, and by the early afternoon much of it was already unpacked. I am really excited to post some before and after pictures of each room of the house. I still am amazed at how quickly it all went, three weeks and the house was ready!

I don't want to share pictures of each room until they are all finished, and we seem to be waiting on just a few things for each room. The kitchen needs the backslash and two cupboard doors, the family room is waiting on one light, the master bedroom still needs a light, and the bathroom needs a few minor things like a shower curtain. The only room completely finished is Liam's bedroom, so I will share some pictures of that.


I didn't get a good before picture of Liam's room, but it was mainly a face lift that was needed. New paint, doors, base board, two of the walls had some 60's paneling that needed to come off, new carpet and a new light. I am really happy with the finished room, its perfect for a little boy, and he seems to like that he can go to it on his own to play. In our old place his bedroom was downstairs so it was really only used for sleeping in.

I will hopefully be finished another room soon and post again in a day or two with some good before and after pictures.