Our finished (almost) guest bedroom

So we have finished the majority of the work in our guest bedroom just in time for company to show up tomorrow. Next large scale project...I think granite counter tops in the kitchen and staining the cabinets darker. But that may be in the spring because I need a breather before another big one (Curt would probably say our checkbook needs a small breather also, because no matter how much I'm saving by doing everything myself, it's still a lot to get good materials).

(drum roll into a TA DA) Here is the finished product.....


Here is a better picture of the finished paint treatment.

Here I am at the very beginning, taking out a strip of carpet so we could build in bookshelves. Notice all of the stark white walls to accent the white berber carpet which looks ever so nice with the nasty veneer doors.


We went from whitest white to about the darkest you can go without being black. Curt helped me with this part by holding up the electronic level so the diamonds I was making with painters tape didn't start wandering. At this phase my family was having a hard time picturing the finished product and were saying things like "I know you've done good things in the past, but..." and "I don't know about this..."


The structural part of the shelves going in and the bead board going up.

More of the same.

Here is our new light fixture, it is very bright and we got the fluorescent bulbs so it is white light not yellow (even though it looks yellow in the picture).

Here's the old yucky, 8o's-esque light fixture that was up before.

All the finished bedding. I only broke one needle and went through over a whole spool of thread getting it done.

As the heading says, we are almost done with this room. Things left...1) finish white touch up paint on bookcases and take down tape 2) replace all doors with white doors 3) build window seat in section between bookcases 4) put in window so window seat actually is a window seat. Most of these will have to wait a bit until we recover some steam.

guest bedroom preview...

Well, the guest bedroom is not in a finished state so I won't post a picture of that. But here is the bedspread that I have finished sewing, and one of the decorative pillows. This gives you a preview of the colors the room is done in. I'll post a picture of the finished bedroom this weekend.

While we were gone...

While we were gone on vacation there were a couple things that happened...

1) Our grass was close to needing mowed before we left...well you can see what it did with an additional week. This garbage can was empty before Curt started putting in clippings.

2) Apparently it was stormy while we were gone, someone said up to 80 mile an hour winds. This is our neighbor's massive tree that had about 1/3 of it fall down.

These pictures have nothing to do with us being gone, Shaners had just gotten a hold of my camera and these pictures were just way too cute not to post. He turned an old 7 last month...he's growing way too fast.

Florida Trip...

We just got back in from a week long trip to Florida last night. I'll try to do a synopsis of what all we did (It was a packed week so I may not succeed in summarizing everything). Warning: This is the longest post I've ever written/am likely to write ever. For those of you who read Shauna's blog please forgive any repeated pictures.

We flew to Florida from Utah on a red-eye Wednesday night. Flying all night does not equal good sleep so here we are zonkered out on the couch the next day.


On Friday we all (minus the girls, they were in school) went jet skiing. Very very fun. It was the perfect day as we practically had the place to ourselves.

Shauna, Katherine, and Megan boating on Saturday.

Curt, Me, and Megan on the boat.


Curt and I on the boat.

We had some great game time on the trip. With the big group we played Trivial Pursuit. I'm afraid I may be the worst on the planet at this game (sorry teams that got stuck with me), I think I grew up very insulated from what was/has been popular knowledge. When the group was cut in half we played hand and foot, a card game that I love and am a lot better at! (although Shauna and I did get beat 2 to 1 by the guys)

Curt, the Klemas', and Jeffrey on Friday night


The whole group on Sunday. Megan got baptized on Friday night and confirmed on Sunday.
Jeff, Alison, Ron, Shauna, Grandma Hogie, Grandpa Hogie, Me, Curt and then Katherine and Megan up front.

We got to meet Alison for the first time. We like her a lot and wonder how Jeff convinced her to put up with him for the rest of forever.


Curt and I.

We went canoing in the everglades on Monday (sorry, no pics, I'm a slacker). It was very hot by the end so we had to take a dip in the pool to cool off when we got home.

On Tuesday Curt and I had planned on going to Cape Canaveral, but we were pooped and needed to rest before our trip back home. We went to Dubois Beach and vegged for a while. It was so beautiful.

Curt felt something crawling on his foot and it turned out to be this little white crab.

Funny story. So anyone who knows me knows I will never have a dog. They're fine for other people, but I don't really like them. So when Shauna and Ron were dog-sitting for the last night we were there I was the only one not petting/picking up/loving on/and anything else nice to this dog named Bubba. Well, to my surprise, apparently Bubba took a liking to me because I had a shadow who followed me anywhere throughout the house, sat at my feet all while I was reading, and got upset when I left. That's irony for you. At any rate he kind of grew on me and I have to say he's the cutest and most polite dog I've seen. (No Curt, we're not getting a dog)

Overall this was a great trip. Thanks so much Shauna and Ron for taking care of us and making sure we had a blast while we visited you!

Josh Groban Concert

Last night we went to the Josh Groban concert at the Delta..ahem...Energy Solutions Arena. It was a sold out show, but the owner of the company I work for had gotten a suite so that everyone could go. Dinner was provided, there were nice cushy seats, your own bathroom...I don't know if being that spoiled is good for me, now when I go the "normal" concert/sporting event route I may feel the lack.

At any rate it was completely awesome. I can't say that I had ever heard any of his music before, but I am a fan now. Man he has an incredible voice. All the supporting musicians were incredible too. I love the cello and the violin! It was so good that Curt, being the musical being that he is, couldn't keep his fingers from tapping the various beats.

It ended way too late (11:00 pm, that's way past my 9:00 bedtime), but maybe I will be tired enough to fall asleep on the flight to Florida tonight. (derisive laugh) Not likely, I'll probably just be ready to fall over when we get there.

Lagoon

We went to the Hoglund (Curt's mom was a Hoglund) Family Lagoon Day Friday afternoon. It was another first for Curt and it was pretty fun.

Curt in front of the Jet Star II.

Me after getting wet on Rattlesnake Rapids. We may have killed Curt's cell phone on this one, the display got wet and then he sat on it.

Wakeboarding at Jordanelle

On Friday morning a bunch of us from my work headed up to the lake. It was a perfect morning: smooth water and not many boats on the lake.

This is Duaine's boat, isn't it pretty?

Me and Curt while we were heading out of the "no wake" zone.

This is me wakeboarding. I haven't gone in two years, so needless to say I am out of shape and feeling it in my muscles today.

I was the flag person for most of the trip.

Here is one of Curt's attempts at getting up (this was his very first time wakeboarding), look at how close he got.

Me again. It was a very enjoyable morning.

Guest Bedroom

While Megan was here last week, she got to stay in our guest bedroom (formerly known as my office). Previously, when we have had guests, they have had to sleep on the floor on air mattresses and regular mattresses, but we haven't had a bed until recently. I hate to sound like an advertisement, but we got our new guest bed at IKEA, and we love it. IKEA has a lot of great things, and very good prices, and they just opened one here in Draper.

If you are coming to stay with us, I'm sure it come as no surprise that we are also doing some remodeling of the guest bedroom. Last night we ripped out a one foot section of carpet along the far wall and will be building a built-in bookshelf. Carmen is also painting the upper part of the wall and installing bead-board on the lower part. It's going to look great.

On a side note, I have determined that it is much easier to post to the blog when we don't include pictures from our camera. It really isn't that big of a hassle to take a picture and load it onto the computer, but for some reason we don't take very many pictures.

The Hogle Zoo

This morning we went to the Hogle Zoo with Megan and Shane (Megan is here visiting from Florida this week for her 8th Birthday). We arrived shortly after the opening hour of 9:00 am, which I've decided is the very best time as it is still cool, the animals overall are out and about and active, and the zoo is relatively uncrowded.

At the entrance we were greeted by a bald eagle...look at how huge this thing is!


The zoo had an exhibit called the Ghost of the Bayou that had a white alligator. This thing was huge and had these very blue eyes.


The classic "lion is eating my head" drinking fountain.

Some of the other highlights of the morning were the baby orangutan who was swinging around and having crashes every few minutes, a live demonstration on training a huge leopard in the new cat section of the zoo, and a rattle snake in the penguin cage. The last one was fun, we went to look at the penguins and they were all staying in one corner of their pen. When looking at the other side we found out why: there was a large rattlesnake settled there. Needless to say we didn't think that it belonged there, so Curt found a couple of girls who worked at the zoo and told them. When he told them they kind of did a double take, like they didn't hear him right, checked the enclosure to look for themselves, and then started scurrying around calling people on their radios...apparently they didn't think that the snake belonged with the penguins either.

Phoenix Trip...

We don't have a lot of pictures from the trip because we were relaxing and we're kind of slackers. It was very good to see my grandparents, and it was a much needed week long break from work. A lot of time was spent in the pool, reading, and going shopping.

Here's Shane getting in the pool, this is the first year he hasn't been afraid to go off the steps. Now he's a little fish and will even dive to the bottom of the 11 foot deep section to fetch dive toys.


Here's a picture from the bridge looking at Glen Canyon Dam and Lake Powell on the way driving home.