Flash Flood

Last Wednesday night we had an insane thunderstorm. The pets and I stayed up in the front room waiting for Zach to make it home on the flooded streets admist an insane lightning storm with 45+ mph gusting winds. FINALLY after about 20 extra minutes of drive time he gets home only to discover that our back room ( the converted garage) was entirely flooded with at least an inch of water.

We spent the remainder of the night moving stuff out of that room. Putting the furniture up on wood chunks and shop vac-ing the carpet. After dumping the full shop vac out at least 4 times we decided the floor was as dry as we would get it at that point. At least there were no puddles. The next day our friend Kyle brought us a dehumidifier and we had 3 fans set up. The carpet is just now mostly dry however it is now crusty and our house smells extremely of mildew. So sad to say that hideous brown and now crunchy shag carpet has to go.

We decided home depot was our best bet since we still have some gift cards from the wedding. I am kind of bummed we have to use them because we had been saving them for my new countertops. Sadly that is now pushed back in to the way distant future. The carpet is an absolute necessity though and I think the room will look way better with fresh new carpet. We went with a pretty basic patterned carpet and got a pretty good price for it. I am pretty excited about it now although it will probably be almost three weeks before we can actually get it installed. They are coming to measure on Thursday, then it will take about another two weeks for the install.
Here is the sample of the carpet in the color we chose. Skyline Steel.

Zach also spent a lot of time the past few days digging a trench and filling it with rock in the back yard as well as doing the whole flower bed next to the back door with rock. So hopefully we have enough drainage back there now and our room will not flood again!

Fall Nails

Well I managed to spend all of my birthday money in one day! I knew otherwise it would get spent on food or something.

I got a new mermaid at the neptune festival to add to our collection in the kitchen. I will add a picture once it is hung.

I also got some MAC makeup. I desperately needed to replace my All that Glitters eye shadow and my Painterly Paint Pot. Which were entirely used up. Considering I got the old ones right before my wedding though I would say they definitely lasted. I also got a new shadow Quarry. However when I got home I discovered they had given me a bright purple instead. So now I have to go exchange that.

I also got new OPI nail polish of course. Including French Quarter for Your Thoughts, and three others which I can't think of the names off the top of my head... however I did a french with two of them, and my toes in the other.

I love it. So fall. It is kind of a mocha brown color with a more mauve sparkly tip.

My parents are taking Zach and I out tonight for my birthday. I still haven't decided where I want to go to eat. It will be fun no matter where we go I am sure. The birthday card Zach got me was really funny. I love it, so I must share.

Past Due

Well I guess I am about past due for a blog entry.  I have really been slacking but it is about time I post about being pregnant now that the word is out and all! Ultimately for the past few months I haven't had anything going on since I was super tired and queasy most of the time. I pretty much just went to work and  hung out on the couch reading. But I have to say it wasn't that bad. I am very thankful I did not really have morning sickness. Now that I have hit my second trimester I am feeling like I have way more energy. I've got a definite baby bump now rather than simply always looking fat. My back is already bothering me though and I have a hard time getting comfortable in bed. Zach said he would get me a body pillow as the rest of my birthday present. I am pretty excited about that. I mean how comfy does this look!

Now the only thing I have really done to document being pregnant at all is take a few pics. Three so far to be exact. I saw this on Pinterest and loved it. So I have been attempting to create my own.

Once I have the pictures some what edited I will start posting so you can see the progress!

Camera Woes

Well my old timey Nikon D100 has been out of service for a while. I think there may be a problem with the lens and or camera because it really doesn't like to get in focus and there is dirt inside the lens. I just called to see how much it would cost to get it serviced and the quote was $415. Holy crap! I would be better off getting a brand new Nikon D 3100 for $650. Which sadly I can't afford either option. I would hate to buy a new lens and then discover it is the camera that is the problem. Guess I am stuck without a nice camera to take pretty pictures. Boohoo!

Nail Painting

If you know me then you already know I am semi- obsessed with nail polish and nail painting. I probably paint my nails once every 3 days since they chip so quickly. Plus once my nail polish chips I sit there and peel all the rest of the polish off. I use OPI's Chip Skip, so usually it comes off in almost one whole chunk.

Here are some of my recent nail polish adventures.

First up Marblizing. I got this idea on Pinterest when I saw this:

I followed the steps on this blog. I actually did them once and wasn't satisfied: Here is my first attempt.

So I took that polish off and started over then I got this result:

Yes this process was extremely messy, time consuming and uses a lot of polish. I think overall with both attempts I spent a good 3 1/2 hours on my nails. The water has to be room temp or it will not work. By the end I had a pretty good method down. But still all that work and it only lasted a few days! Note that this picture was taken before I got to clean my nails up and that was what it looked like with me taping around my nails. Here is a shot with the tape still on....

Here is a kind of close up shot. Definitely not clean around the edges.

I have some matte polish from Essie that I love. You use it as top coat and it turns your polish matte. It took a while to get used to not having glossy nails but I really like it. I think it works best with dark jewel toned nail polish.  Sorry that all these pictures were taken on my cellphone. And in weird places...like my car! HA

I did my toes attempting the glitter fade. I think it turned out pretty cool. I liked it so much I did my nails the exact same though I did not get a picture of that.

The lighting on this next picture is awful so I apologize in advance. I used a very light silvery purple with a graphite grey metallic polish on the tips.

This last one is another attempt on an idea I got on pinterest. It uses one of my favorite polishes Essie's Chinchilly with a gold glitter fade.

I think it looks pretty cool. I am currently still sporting this look. I think next I am going to try a french with just clear polish or a very very transparent color with glittery tips. Yes I am slightly obsessed with glitter.

Here is my inspiration:

Too bad I do not sport an iphone to take nice pictures with instagram.

I do have to say I am getting VERY good at painting my nails even with my bad hand!

Uly sleepy cat

This little guy is a huge trouble maker but its impossible to stay mad at a little guy that cute!

New Dunny Shelves

I spray painted the shelves I got from the thrift store white and hung them in the den. Finally I have almost all of my dunny's back on display!

I love it!

The Den is Done!

FINALLY! I have rid our house of the most uncomfortable futon on the planet for some fabulously comfy leather couches. Thanks Mom and Dad! I have also finally painted the hall and den. Did I mention the paint was FREE and in an ultra fabulous color? Janet likes to pick up the bargain gallons of paint from Home Depot and Lowes. You can get gallons of nice paint for $5 just because the color match wasn't right or someone returned it for some reason. She had this blueish grey which she called "Prison Grey" We mixed it with a light tan and another tan that was almost white and our cheap-o paint concoction turned out almost an exact match to Benjamin Moore's Pebble Beach. (I had to use my paint decks to see if I could find a match to my homemade color).

The room looks so much better, it is crazy how big of a difference paint can make. It turned out very coastal looking and goes well with the rest of my house, rather than looking like a mismatched hodgepodge of everything that didn't have a home anywhere else in the house.

Here are pictures from before:

And here is the room now:

Can you see my violets in the window? One is blooming really well and The leaf that I pulled off to clone is ready for planting!

This is Kathy in her favorite corner. She is ALWAYS laying there and usually looks mopey.

There are still a few things that still need to be done, like painting the side tables and adding some more art to the wall with the TV. My charcoal grey curtains are coming back from my Nana's old house too so I think I will put those up back here and take down the green curtains. However, the big things are done!

Here is the hallway back by the bedrooms that we also painted...

I think I may turn all the walls in the hall into gallery walls. Thoughts?

Thrifting Goodies

Janet and I went thrifting on Tuesday and I found some goodies!

This was actually a lamp, but I dismantled it and just kept the jug.

These were all taped together smallest to largest and it wasn't until after we got home that we discovered they attached together! Best surprise. I am currently in the process of painting them white. These are dunny shelves at their best.

I saw this brass crane and had to have it. I wanted to spray paint it but Zach really likes it being brass. Not sure if I will paint it or not yet...

I got four of these little glass plates. I may hang them on the wall I just am not sure where. But they have a really cool iridescent coloring to them, plus they've never been used!

I also found a pair of grey overall shorts that were from American Eagle that I thought would make the perfect summer paint clothes. However they were priced at $15. I mean come on! Who pays that for used clothes at the thrift store. American Eagle or not. I am still wishing I had them because they were perfect however I will not pay that much for used clothes that will just get covered in paint.

New Paintings

Finally painted again. I got Kyle's other painting done. It is a 20 " x 20"

This painting is from about a year ago, it is in the office. Not sure that I ever put a good picture of it up.

I did this 36" x 48" painting for our bedroom.