Grabbin' spring by the bulbs

Oh Spring! How I love you!




We spent the weekend outside, weeding and basking in the sun. It was nice. Jones and Mooch sat in sunny patches of grass and soaked up the sun, like tiny loaves of bread being baked to perfection. And who doesn't like fresh bread? Am I right??

But anyway, I also antiqued my vanity. I use the term "vanity" loosely. Its my entry table that I use as a vanity... because while I would just lerrrrrv to have this lil' beaut:



It costs a lot. I'd only spend that much money on wigs, booze, or strippers... and this is none of those things. (Mom, I'm just kidding. I really meant that I'd only spend that money at Seagull book. True story.) In any case, this vanity was super cheap. I think Laughter picked it up for like a nickel. Or $15. Same thing. And then I spray painted it. And thus began my new addiction to spray paint. Here is a picture of my vanity, as a baby, getting its first taste of paint.



So then I painted a bunch of antiquing glaze on it and wiped it off, and spilled a little all over the garage floor... and SHA-ZAM!





I think its slightly less barbie-chic now. And what a charming place to put on wigs before heading to the strip club!

Next, I'd like to spray paint a padded piano bench to go with it. That way, it could scoot right underneath the vanity, and I could keep my nail polish and spare Cadbury Creme eggs in the hidden compartment. Besides, look how charming this is:



Anyway, this post is pretty much all for one of my cyber-stalkees, Mandi Swinson? Swanson, Slippy, Slappy. Oh yeah, samsonite! I was way off! Or...Tremayne. Yes, thats it. This blog post was going to be an email to her, about how I made due with an entry way table instead of a vanity... but then I got excited about the new antiquing glaze. And Mandi, its not that impressive, I know. But all I'm saying, is that if you do some epic mirror, and have a sweet girly little stoop with it... then it could work.

Jones agrees. And he has spot on fashion sense:

Cadbury Creme Eggs

I couldn't think of a good title for this post, so I just my fingers glide across the keyboard and let my subconscious take over. Hmmmmmmmmm.


Credit

So anyway, I sure don't post very often, eh? Well shoot, I've been super busy. You know, picking my nose and watching reruns of Alias. But seriously, I really have been up to a few things lately... let me show you.

So we finally got to destroying the abomination that was our downstairs bathroom. I don't have many awesome "before" pictures because I was in a hot rush to rip it down... but let me highlight its finer points:

***Moldy Carpet (WHO puts carpet in the bathroom?!?!?! FOR SHAME.)
***Old cabinets that were impossible to open and smelled like old people.
***Powder blue sink/shower/countertop.
***Shower stall only large enough to comfortably bath KAREN CARPENTER. Yeah, I went there.

Small bathroom is small. Also, hard to photograph.



You can kind of see the whole linoleum/carpet thang below:





Also, speaking of the shower... it was the only one in the whole house when we moved in. The previous family had 8 people in it. EIGHT. And one tiny Karen Carpenter shower. Oh, and 5 towel bars in one bathroom. WHAT?? Yeah.

In the end, we learned that the reason for the carpet was the asbestos tiles hiding under it. I called and shot the sh...um, poop... with the Bountiful Health Dept, and they gave us all sorts of tips for the project. AND THEN I RELEASED THE BEAST!!



After demolishing, we rebuilt. We cut holes in walls and then patched them. Textured. Painted WHITE WHITE WHITE, but only because with the brown paint that was in there before made it feel like a dark, damp, lil hole. Then we put in the following cheap things:

Tile: left over from previous bathroom remodel, with the addition of some darling baby tiles.





Vanity: On sale at Lowes. The faucet is from The Restore. 5 Bucks. No, seriously.

(Yes, I know what white balance is. No, I don't know how to use it.)





Lighting: $10 yardsale wonder!





Pivoting mirror: $10 D.I. wonder!! ANNNND it reminds me of this Pottery Barn beauty that starts at $180. I love being a cheapskate.



Oh... and last picture... I made this cute curtain out of some ikea fabric.



Anyway, you aren't allowed to see the other side of the room yet. We haven't done anything with the shower yet. Its just nakey. But we are just excited to have a bathroom downstairs, on the same floor as our bedroom. Cuz needin' to pee at 4am and holding it because its cold and you are tired is BAD. REAL BAD.


OHHHHH MAN. I am super bored with my own post already, so I think that means I'm done now. I just like over-sharing, plus I have friends who don't live nearby, so I like for them to see the super awesome stuff that I never thought I'd have the skill or motivation to accomplish. I mean, I learned how to fix a running toilet this weekend, for crying out loud. Fo real.

Word to your mother.

For my valentine

Once upon a time, I married my best fren!





And we had all kinds of silly fun together. But mostly, I convinced him to dress up in really silly costumes, like ALL THE TIME!

... like matching footsie pajamas at Christmas. I mean, how cute is that?!


...and as my favorite pirate friend, Capt. Hipwarrrrr.

But one of my favorites is when we were Ladythugs:


After which I passed out on his sexy ladybug self(while he played some DS, naturally).



And we've had adventures of all kinds through the years:

(Whiskey Creek, Kentucky)



(BFE, Oregon)

But mostly... my greatest adventure was marrying Hippy. Every day just gets better <3

(Colter Bay, Wyoming)

Happy Valentines Day, Hippy. I love you.

And to all my friends reading this: I love you too. But in a less sexy way. xoxox

2011... already pretty bitchin'

You know, I always think that I live a pretty mundane life until I look at it in retrospect. In reality, this month was fairly eventful and overall, pretty satisfying. I hung out with fun friends, neighbors, and siblings and even had enough time to buy some new eyeballs! Who'd a thunk?!

So lets get some picture action going on. Lets start with January 1st, since it seems like a good place to begin our journey. Elba, Hippy and I went to Lava Hot Springs to ring in the new year. It was both random and awesome. I just love small towns. Silly phrases like "open container laws" and "being of age" just don't seem to exist!


Lava is lovely. But the air was so cold, that being in the warm spring was only semi-bearable. It was about 1 degree at all times (not joking) so even when your body was warm in the springs, your face was screaming "uncle." We hit some dive bars, and did some dancing, but my favorite pictures are from just hanging out. Like when we used the boob padding from my swimming suit as gas masks:



Or when we realized that our "hot pools" bracelet looked a whole lot like it said HOT POO.


And just for funsies, here is a picture of Hippy and I... looking all cute after eating a crapload of pizza.


Anyway, so after that... I came home and had my eyes replaced with fully functioning mechanical eye balls. Oh wait... thats a little lie. So the real story is that I had PRK. Its a surgery similar to LASIK, but instead of cutting a little flap in your eye, lasering, then replacing the flap... they put acid on your eye to dissolve the surface and then laser your eye, then leave you in writhing agony for days. Its not pretty. But totally awesome. Don't worry, I did my research and felt like PRK was healthier for my eye in the long run... but it was a crazy weird experience. I don't want to go on forever about it... so let me just give you a little feel for it.

For starters, I honestly thought they'd black out my vision, or at least shoot me with a tranque gun first. But NO. I was stone cold sober as they numb the surface of my eye, put crazy eye clamps in my eye, dissolve the surface of my eye, and prod at my eyeball endlessly. Its like being a fish in a tank as you watch this blurry action happening above you... and yet you can see everything and feel it (in a not painful, but very irritating way). Ugh... it was nuts. You just stare at this blinking light above you and pray that your eye won't flinch involunarily, because you know that if the laser misses its mark, you'll end up with an eyeball dangling helplessly from its optical nerve on your cheek. Okay, maybe thats a SLIGHT exaggeration, but it didn't feel like it at the time. It was a scary 10 minutes. But seriously, it really was only 10 minutes for both eyes. Crazy fast. Anyway, so I had a painful couple of days while my eyes healed, but after a week... I was feeling just fine. And my vision is getting better and better, every day.


Thats me with my awesome eye shields on. Not too crazy, eh?

And this is me now...

ITS A FREAKING CHRISTMAS MIRACLE:


I R THE BEST SEE-ER NOW EVER.


And anyway, since then I've been able to get all crafty and stuff. Its pretty awesome. For example, I refinished a glider/rocker. It was in rough shape when I got it for a whopping 5 bucks at a yardsale, so I painted it and made new cushions for it. Nice, right?


AND I saw THIS BLOG which made me feel all artsy, so I did this:



Pardon the glare, but its the cutest dandelion wall EVER. Well... unless you look at the woman who made the tutorial's wall, but lets just pretend. Its on my bedroom wall, next to our bed. I like to think of it as Hippy and I... standing strong in the winds of lameless...

Anyway, thats all I have to blog about for now. I am looking forward to February for 2 reasons: Valentines Day mushiness, and we started demolishing our basement bathroom, so I'm super excited to get that remodel going on. Anyway, thats all for now. I hope that all of you stalkers are having an equally awesome January. And if I don't talk to you within the next couple of weeks, WILL YOU BE MY BALENTIME?!?! <3

And they pooped happily ever after

The big reveal!

OMG!!

Okay, so this beautiful lighting was actually a gift from happychippyjunk (my sister Laughter's blog) and CSN. Exciting, no? Thanks, Laf!!

(And yes, my towel ring is in the shape of a cow's head)




Also, I was able to re-use the old mirrors after having a nice fella at Logan Glass cut them down to size for us. I just made some frames for them and WALLAH! Fun fact: The floorboard and mirror frames are made of a light weight, waterproof material that was so light that I was able to use the hot glue gun to put the frames together. Now tell me... HOW GHETTO FABULOUS am I?!?! WORD UP.

And the sign says, "I bathe once a year, whether I need it or not." How very true.




Oops, I forgot to warn you, I painted the bathroom a color so intense that it actually may induce an epileptic seizure. Look away and blink often to avoid any permanent brain damage. On an unrelated note: the paint only cost $5 for a gallon at the mis-tints table!



The T is for Terlet. FYI.





And here are some of the fine details. For example, lovely floor boards. Also, smooth caulk lines along the vanity top. And why yes, I did texture the walls myself. Why am I posting these pics? To prove that we were sober at times...





And lastly, the reason we sobered up: The ugliest ceiling line KNOWN TO MAN. Man, that thinset dries crazy hard! Also, Hippy was uninvited from caulking after this.



In closing, here is an inspirational message from Hippy (as seen on our neighbor's stone fence/wall):

The great bathroom douching of 2010

...So where were we?

Oh right... so we finished the bathroom and I was going to show you some real perdy pictures of it.

BUT FIRST!!

Lets remember where we started:






Ugly lights, ugly mirror thingys, ugly mauve and violet tile. No shower, only bath. Linoleum. It was the Steve Buscemi of bathrooms.

And then... we worked hard. I know I've already shown you a lot of the "during" pictures, but here are a few more, in no particular order. Because I need you to remember all the swearing and booze that was required to get through this stupid project. It'll help make the final reveal all the better:

So here I am tiling the shower walls. This task would take a normal person a day or two. I believe it took us about 2 months. We are really slow. Also, we are really into a little phenomenon called instantaneous satisfaction... so these two characteristics seemed to clash at times. No big deal.



Tiling the floor... and getting better and better at faking for the camera!!



And here is what it would look like if a member of 'Nsync were to grout your floor:



This next pictures makes me want to die a little. This is Hippy scraping the poopy toilet wax out of the sewer line after we removed the terlet (aka toilet) before we started tiling. It was gross.



But then we reinstalled the toilet, and it was less gross!




Right then. Its almost time for the big reveal (Yes, I know that a couple pics were already posted a little while ago, but lets pretend like you didn't see them, mmk?)!! Its time for the grand opening!! I wish I had a celebrity here to cut the red ribbon with some oversized scissors... but our local celebrity, Jones McBonbonson, will have to do:




But wait... I feel like this post is just too massive already... so I'm going to give the after pictures their own post. WOOOOOOOOO!! brb