Bathroom DIY

I have hated our bathroom since we moved into this house 5 years ago.  We ripped out the rotting linoleum shower liner and put in your basic white square tile, which was what we could afford at the time, and I am fine with that.  It looked like it had been painted with leftover paint, since it had a couple different colours that were very similar. It is a small bath, and has the washer and dryer in it as well, so it's a tight squeeze, and repainting just felt like a very big, annoying job.  The vanity and the "over the john" are oak, had no hardware and were stained an orangey shade.  The room really needed a do-over.

As usual, I forgot to take a before picture, but I found an-in progress pic from when we were doing the tile, so you can see the paint colour and the ugly oak.

The paint color wasn't terrible in and of itself, but it was not kitchen and bath paint, and there were lots of streaky lines in it from past condensation.  The back side of the door was also tan, as was all the trim.  Just before I got started, the accents were a mixture of nickel, oil rubbed bronze, and white.

So the plan was to paint the cabinets white, paint the walls, door, and trim, and replace or spray paint accents to make everything oil rubbed bronze.  Mid-project, I also decided to take down the ugly 3-door mirrored medicine cabinet and replace it with a mirror.

You can see in the above photo that the washer and dryer are immediately to the right of the door.  Our project for next week is to frame in a piece of drywall to hide the side of them.

 This is the finished product, less a few final adjustments. I'm thinking about replacing the shower curtain, but we'll see.  I am also considering replacing the light fixture above the mirror.  It is the only source of light in there other than the window in the shower (ugh, that's another post) and it doesn't produce enough light.  I'm probably just going to get a similar one, but with three lights instead of just one.

I am in the process of spray painting a floating shelf white to install below the sink. We are also strongly considering replacing the sink and countertop, but we'll see if that actually materializes into a project.  The mason jar soap dispenser was a Pinterest project that took five minutes, and I got the votive candle holder at a garage sale for 25 cents.

So..what do you think?

Relocation Station

Hubs and I have resumed talks on relocating to our dream city, Victoria, BC.  We left Victoria five years ago to embark on an adventure in Northern BC and the winds of change are a-blowin once again.  I am so excited to live on the island! In the meantime though we have a lot to do around our house to get it ready for sale!  And Pinterest is only making my to-do list longer with all the amazing projects I see on there that I just have to try!

This weekend we tackled the first project that was not mainly cleaning/organizing.

We repainted two of our three exterior doors.  They were painted a charming shade of red when we moved in, but they have faded and chipped over time and needed a redo.  I don't have the chip or old paint can to colour match so I just decided to start fresh with a new, bold shade of red.

The "before" shot is of our front door, which we haven't painted yet. I plan to paint the trim white as well, and touch up the green trim around the frame.

The "after" shot is of the garage door. I'm so happy with how it turned out!

Hubs getting ready to put our back door back on.

This is the original front door.  It looks cute still, but up close it is really rough. I will be painting the window trim white as well, instead of the icky yellow colour.

This is the finished garage door! It looks so much better in real life. The flawless door also makes the trim in the door frame look like absolute garbage. I will be painting that dark green very soon.

I will post an after picture of the front door as soon as it's done. Probably not until next weekend though. In the meantime I have lots of work to do in the bathroom!

A tragedy, but at least now something has been done.

This is my corner of the internet. I may not have any readers, but today, I'm using my little corner to ask that people with information about Ira Parmenter and his behaviour when he was the pastor of Colwood Church, to please talk to the RCMP.  This situation stirs up a lot of anger in me, and a lot of sadness, because an entire community was damaged due to the actions of a deeply trusted, even beloved, leader and role model.

I have close friends whose lives were drastically altered when they found out what Ira was doing, and have never been the same.  He hurt and took advantage of their friend, while posing as a godly leader and faithful husband. It's sickening.  I can't even imagine what the victim herself (and other victims who have not yet come forward) is going through.

To the person who wrote this Anonymous Blog Post: ya, you are right. HUNDREDS of people were affected. And not just members of Colwood.  It was everybody, the whole community, everyone who is friends or family with members of that church.  It's like a ripple in a pond - oh wait, except that it's a goddam tidal wave.

CTV News Video

CBC News Story

Ten Months!

Claire is ten months old!  The weather was agreeable enough that we were able to do photos on the front lawn, and we even let our dog, Sierra, in on the fun.  More surprising though, for me, is that she wanted in on it.  She was very uneasy and aloof when we brought Claire home from the hospital and I watched them very carefully (I still do) during the early months, since Sierra really didn't seem to like having a baby around.

Everything changed though, when Claire started on solids and subsequently began feeding Sierra from the high chair.  Now they are best friends. :D

What Does a Year and a Half get you?

So it's been a while.

This little personal project has been waiting for me on the internet all this time, just sitting here, unchanged like a little time capsule.

Let's briefly bring this place up to speed and then I will try and discover what I want to use my little corner of the internet for.

May 26th of 2011, Dave and I welcomed our daughter Claire into the world.  She is now a very adorable and charming 9 month old, crawling, cruising, giggling baby.  Being a mom is just as terrifying as I thought it would be, but ten millions times as awesome.

This is Claire at 8 months old, enjoying a massive snowbank in our front yard.

Although it has been a year and a half since I last updated this site, that's really the only update worthy of mention.  I found out I was pregnant shortly after my last post, and it's been 'baby stuff' ever since. And probably from here on out.

I have some ideas about the direction this page will take, and I will be exploring those thoughts over the next while. We'll see where this goes, but in any event, I don't want to let this just disappear.  More to come.

Too Funny Not to Share

The story is here is that my mom got married the day this video was taken.  My whole family was in Calgary to celebrate and Tony had DD'd for us when we went to the bar two nights previous.  He had endured a lot from my family that night, but that's a story for another day.  So, when the wedding day came, we all resolved to get Tony tanked, and clearly we succeeded.  We all had an awesome time, especially Tony, and I hope he forgives me for plastering this video all over the net.

4 Years Today

Today is the day that I miss Dave the most.  Today is our 4th anniversary and the first one we have spent apart. (And hopefully the last!) I don't know how it went by so quickly, but thanks Dave for 4 fantastic years, and here's to many more!

#2 - Wide Sargasso Sea

'Wide Sargasso Sea' by Jean Rhys is book number two in  my quest to read 100 classic books before I die. (Clarification so that I don't look like an ignoramus: I've read lots and lots of classic books but I've made a formal commitment to myself to read 100 more.) 

Laura Fish said it best:

"Wide Sargasso Sea speaks of the history of cruelty and suffering that lies behind some of the West's accumulated wealth, a history which in Jane Eyre is secret and mysterious, and only appears in brief glimpses. This is a book that gives voice to neglected, silenced and unacknowledged stories, exploring different inflections of marginality – gender, class, race and madness. Where historical events, recorded in written discourse, have shaped the opinions of many of the people of the former British colonies and education is exclusively from a Eurocentric perspective, the recovery of "lost" histories has a crucial role to play in allowing access to events and experiences which have not previously been recorded. This idea of "writing back" by breaking down explanations for events and favouring more localised narratives and perspectives has informed my own work, especially in the voices of the former slaves in my latest novel. Wide Sargasso Sea is an inspiration. Certainly, before the phrase was coined, Jean Rhys was a post-colonial writer whose work reminds us that "there is always another side, always"."

For sage advice

I am a college student, and have been for 4 years. What's that you say? It doesn't take four years to get through a two-year program? Allow me to explain. I have a job, I own a house, I have a spouse who is also a student. So things have taken a little longer for me. I have been working part-time on two completely separate programs, both of which I will be finishing in the next year, after which I will move on to university in pursuit of a BA. Majoring in? Don't ask, I don't know.

For those of you who are or have been students, you know as well as I do that it takes a great deal of work, time, and savvy to navigate the complex inner workings of the educational system. Majors, minors, which school, how much money, electives, funding, scholarships, GPA, transferring, and eventually The Job Market. It's downright exhausting.

I have done my best to work out some of these questions, often learning the hard way. Read: Taken advice from college career counsellors only to find it's about as useful as asking a garden gnome. (With the notable exception of Holly at NWCC - thanks for all your help!)

Over my years of digging for clues about my educational path, I stumbled upon an e-book-made blog called Give Me Scholarships . Don't be fooled by the title, he delves into all subject academic and responds to the questions posed to him by actual students. The downside: it's an American guy writing a blog about the American post-secondary world, so occasionally the answers don't apply to us Canucks. Anyway, if you read this blog, and you go to school, or have a kid in school, you should check out the site.

Josh, I would say you're welcome, but the thing is, no one reads this blog, so don't expect a flood of traffic. :)

Purple and Pink and Yellow

Pretty!!!