The disgrace of the neighborhood

In our front yard we have waist high weeds and unfortunately we can't blame this on the previous owners, this is all our own doing. When the inspector came to assist Jen with the irrigation system he noted "hmm I don't remember there being weeds like this a month ago". We've also been handed a couple of landscaper cards and our neighbor mentioned how he took the liberty of knocking down some of the weeds in our yard with his lawn mower one day. It's time to take care of these guys. This is just one of our many projects we're going to tackle today, we've had 3 days off from renovations we're expecting it'll be difficult to get back into the swing of things.

Taking the evening off

Yesterday (on Levi's mom's birthday) Levi's Dad, Dave, experienced a severe heart attack while at home. Levi's older sister lives nearby and was able to get him to the hospital where Levi's younger sister and nurse identified the heart attack, they were able to stabilize him and then flew him via helicopter to Bremerton regional hospital where they put a stint in his artery. Living up to true form Dave is proving to be just as tough as every little kid imagines their dad to be and has moved out of the ICU and into a normal recovery room. The Washington Larsons are banded together in Bremerton for each other and their dad, every part of us wishes we could be there too. Right now every mile we are away from Washington state and our family is palpable.

This afternoon baby Tanner and Nicole left. Still reeling from last night's events Levi and Jen decided to take the evening off. We sat in our backyard, drank mexican beer, watched the sun go down and talked about last night's big scare, our feelings, all the scary what ifs, and how grateful we are to have such an amazing family.

Sunburns, tacos and the picturesque stove in the yard

Tanner isn't quite old enough to wear sunscreen and Jen hasn't quite learned what there is to do in Yuma so Nicole's visit was pretty low key, a lot of hanging out around the pool and talking which resulted in a rosy cheeked Nicole and a pretty significant sunglass tan line for Jen. We also had lunch at Jen's favorite Taco place, eating these tacos are a two handed job so sleeping baby Tanner was passed between us like a hot potato, you eat one taco and I'll hold tanner, back and forth 6 times over :) We made a fairly anti-climatic trip to a fruit stand and watched the movie Doubt (two thumbs down).

The only appliance left in the house when we moved in was this stove below, it used to be cream but we have sprayed it black with appliance enamel in hopes of refurbishing it. The next step if we choose to proceed would be new knobs, and a two pieces of stainless steel, one for the door and one for the top panel. Right now it's been chillin in the yard making the pool view less than picturesque.

Hide your daughters,Tanner Zobrist is coming to visit!

Look at this little flirt, before learning to sit or crawl this little guy has learned how to woo the ladies with a wink and big smile! Meet baby Tanner Zobrist, son of bffs Nicole and Caleb, unrelated by blood but apart of our family none-the-less. Nicole and Tanner are our first official overnight guests. Levi was proud to show off our hard work, drilling Nicole for her opinions and nearly every big decision we made on our remodel thus far.

Nicole and Tanner are staying for 2 nights and three days. We're looking forward to taking a break from our renovations and hanging out with our guests.

Christmas in February!

Today the military delivered and unpacked our storage unit that has been packed away since October. We were unpacking things we had completely forgotten we had, it was Christmas all over again. We have not slept in our own bed for 4 months and Levi hasn't slept in our bed for more than 3 consecutive days in the last YEAR! Jen spent the day installing our bedroom floors, attempting to organize the delivered items, and putting together furniture. We now have a couch, a chair and our bed set up! We had planned to go without furniture and our bed until we finished painting but with our guests coming we realized that is not possible. Painting will resume when everyone's gone and it's probably for the best as we were pretty burned out on the paint cans, brushes and roller gig.

Color correction Floors & Pull ups!

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Some days we spend any where from 12 - 16 hours working on the house, look around and have a tough time seeing the fruits of our labor, but today our projects served up a scrumptious plate of instant gratification. Our floors are down in the formal living room, the family room and the hall and they have transformed our house! The floors have somehow made our space feel larger, warmer and more welcoming. We love them!

Jen painted the non cabinet sides of the island to match the cabinets which is the worst decision we've made yet. The butcher block and near black paint combo is reminiscent of Halloween, we'll be repainting this soon to match the colors of our walls and tone down the new goth vibe we've got going in our kitchen.

There is a 10 x15 slab of cement sandwiched between the side of our house and the fence, we imagine this was once the location of a shed but now it's Levi's work out station. We have put down an interlocking gym pad and Levi built his pull up bar station. Every morning he heads out there for a quick morning work out and is quite excited about it. Later we'll add a mirror and some additional work out components.

Dining alfresco!

When it comes to remodeling weekends are the best, we accomplish so much and get to do it together! This weekend we finished installing the kitchen floors, and began installing the floors for the main living areas. So far we both LOVE our new floors, they are our favorite part of the house. Jen wrapped up the cabinet project, befriended an employee at Lucy's vet location, dabbled with her oven project. We made a trip to the yuma nursery and bought the initial items we need to tend to our lawn. We're killing the weeds, fertilizing our lawn and prepping the side of the house for a couple of citrus trees.

We also enjoyed our first meal in our home. We grilled chicken, steak, veggies and fresh pineapple kabobs with some Parmesan fingerling potatoes - yum! We ate on paper plates, had water in plastic cups, sat in outdoors in our only chairs (the ugly ducklings featured earlier in the blog) and ate on our microwave box on our back porch. It was your classic first meal in your first home set up- we loved it!

photos - just an fyi that red paint you see is just the primer coat, it really won't be this obnoxious of a red when we're done.

The painting that never ends...

We were looking forward to tackling the cabinet project but now it seems never ending. You don't really have a reason to count your drawers and cabinet doors until you need to remove them each from their hinges, sand each one, prime each one and then apply two coats of paint with a light sanding between each coat to each drawer and cabinet door. We have 26 - that's 78 coats of paint and 78 sanding sessions not including the cabinet base. We're almost done! We have to wait 24 hours between coats and on the doors we can only paint one side at a time, it's coming along slowly but surely. The second coat on the base is developing really nicely, the chocolate color we wanted is there, the grain is showing through, etc. The photo here depicts a shiny finish but that's just our camera, the finish is called low luster and is between a flat and a semi gloss.

The next morning Jen woke up and decided if she had to pick up a paint brush that day she might just find herself swerving into oncoming traffic later that afternoon. So instead she trouble shot the irrigation system with the help of our inspector and then later awesome landscaper. Hit up a few yard sales, met some new neighbors and learned about a string of brazen robberies in the our neighborhood :( She also bought and had the guest mattresses delivered (which we are now sleeping on, big improvement from the floor!), had our pool GFCI and pop-up cleaning system fixed, tested our pool water and learned so much about maintaining these foreign systems of our home. It was so refreshing to be outdoors today in the 77 degree sunny weather - ahhh, maybe Yuma isn't so bad.

Delivery Day

We are doing our part to support the economy! You know how they say people just aren't spending their money, well that's not us. We shop all three hardware stores in Yuma. Lowes has higher prices but better product selection with a 10% military discount, home depot has great prices plus a 5% military discount and True Value is slow enough to talk to a person in depth about your project and they have tool rentals, but primarily we shop at home depot and they have been great up until today.

Our mass delivery of appliances, back splash tiles, and flooring were to arrive today, we were assured multiple times and then reassured 4 days ago when we went in to clarify that our appliances would be installed if they were replacements - meaning the water pipes were already positioned behind the fridge, etc. When our delivery arrives it is lacking the back splash tiles, and the guy says he only connects refrigerators but he can't even do that because we didn't buy the necessary tube for it that no one at HD informed us we needed!

We gave HD a good ear chewing, I can't imagine how many other angry people like ourselves that (are already stressed out from remodel, that are sleeping on the floor and do not have an operating kitchen) they have to deal with, anyhow needless to say they had someone out two days later to do the installs but those people do not connect refrigerators and we still do not have our tube for the icemaker and water dispenser on the fridge so we're not quite done yet.

Here are some photos of our disaster of a space garage, the new fridge, etc.

Kitty Update

Several of you have asked how the kitties are adjusting. Both Lucy and Cloudy have lived in 7 different households over the last 12 months including a month stay with Carmen & Dave, 2 months at a cat sitter and 3 kitties in Rhode Island and 2 weeks with a set of weirdo cat sitters in Las Vegas. This doesn't include the 2 one week cross country trips they spent in the car and the 9 different hotel rooms we carted them in and out of.

Now they have a new climate to adapt to and a new household lacking all of their usual squishy comforts (couches, chairs, beds, etc). Since we have a fully 6 foot fenced backyard we have decided to allow them to be outside while we are home. It's amazing to watch these 7 year old kitties experience a whole new world for the first time. They were very suspicious of the grass for about a week, they would only walk on the cemented portions of the backyard, now they trot through it carefully with exageratted high steps as if it were cold snow. We've seen Cloudy move at speeds we were not aware she could reach, often while working in the house they will bolt into the house like a bat out of hell and bury themselves beneath their stuffed elephant (see photo of Lucy) or the blankets of our makeshift bed. We're sure they're spooked something truley scary like a gust of wind, a barking dog or our neighbor's loud diesel truck :)

While the empty house serves up various discomforts it also has proved to be an endless playground, the cats are jumping in and out of the cabinets, often sleep inside the rolls of the carpet out in the garage and find random things to snuggle with like this grouting sponge or a roll of paper towels.

We found a sizable growth on Lucy's leg the other day and need to bring her into the vet to have it lopped off. Hopefully it isn't cancerous, this poor diabetic kitty has already had a tough life. Keep your fingers crossed!

A kitchen update

Since our Phoenix trip our main effort has been applied to getting our kitchen ready for it's appliance delivery today - our fridge, dishwasher, microwave, grill, floors and kitchen accent back splash are arriving within hours! What about a stove you may ask? More on that later! In order to accommodate these items we needed to get the floors at least completed in the areas of installation and prime and paint our kitchen cabinets.

We have the kitchen floor mostly complete, the doors and drawers are primed but need their first and second coat of paint. The kitchen base and wall cabinets have been primed and painted with their first coat of paint. We're hoping the 2nd coat of paint on the cabinets makes the cabinets look more chocolately and less of an eggplant black color. We're hoping the eggplant purple is just the primer showing through the first coat.

Here is a good island before picture. Levi is chomping at the bit to set the butchar block on top just to see what it looks like, with each development concerning the island he has wanted break the huge and heavy butchar block out of it's box and carry it from the garage to the kitchen. Now we're only one day from being able to do just that and screw it on.

We're near completion of the kitchen, we still need to do the final coats of paint, add the butchar block, finish the floors, put the doors and drawers back in place, maybe add hardware, install the faucet, install the sink disposer, and do all the plumbing that all of that requires, tile the backsplash, add undercabinet lighting, and rewire the track light to position pendant lights over the island, install our chandelier and buy a table, chair and island stools. For now we're just looking forward to our first dinner in our house tonight, having ice come out of our fridge!

Phoenix in 24 hours

Our quick 24 hour trip to Phoenix was built around a set of clear goals. Jen made a neat and pretty plan with directions from place to place, contact numbers and an estimated time frame, she even called all of the merchants to confirm hours of operation and availability of our sought product - even with this much planning none of our goals were easily accomplished.

Our goals were these: 1) Buy our very specific Benjamin Moore Oil based Satin Impervo Bittersweet chocolate paint and primer for our cabinets (a paint not available within 100 miles of Yuma but recommended for cabinet painting on all of the home improvement forums) 2) Hit both the Sunday and Monday one day one item sales at Ikea paired with a yummy free Monday Ikea breakfast 3) Stop at the pool store to buy the Kool decking patch (also not sold anywhere near Yuma) 4) Rent a one way SUV (cheaper than a Uhaul) to haul one of the few remaining Kelsey couches from Costco home. 5) Give baby Kendall a big enough snuggle from her auntie and uncle to last until our next visit.

Our first stop was Ikea, we waded through the President Day Sale crowd to the center of the store to find the Sunday one item sale was no longer available, however we load up on all toys bizzare and unique for baby Kendall, including this rat she is so lovingly chewing on in the photo. Our next stop was the paint store where we were told that all oil based paints above a quart sized have been outlawed in Maricopa county (no other counties nearby) due to environmental reasons and that many companies choose not to carry the quart size due to the minimal sales. We were given the run around for paint alternatives, visited 5 different paint stores before we found our paint, however this took half of a day, we missed our second IKEA special sale and the free breakfast but managed to get most on our list - 3 carts full! Our next stop was the pool store which we discovered was no longer in business. When we attempted to rent our reserved vehicle we were rejected by 3 rental companies because both of our licenses lack a expiration dates, which is a funny little thing WA state does for active military. After a couple of hours and some harsh words along the lines of "military discrimination" we were able to get our vehicle and be on our way.

Our snuggle Kendall and costco goals were each a sucess. Check out the photos of Levi strapping our new precariously balanced couch into the back of the SUV. The focus and the rented Ford Escape made the 3 1/2 hour trip back to Yuma but not before it rained on our exposed portion of our couch - yes, Yuma, that little city that gets between 3 - 5 inches of rain per year decided to dump on us during our midnight trip home, at this point we had to laugh, how could we expect anything less than rain in the desert after the day we had?

Visitors - yay!

We are 16 days into our remodel and 9 days away from our 1st set of visitors Nicole and baby Tanner, then just 4 or 5 days later we may be getting a visit from Fred, then just days afterward Jen's mom, aunt, sister, brother-in-law and nephew Adrian will be arriving! Everyone has been forewarned about our current living conditions but we are determined to wrap up the basics of phase 1 and provide at least a safe environment for baby Tanner and Adrian. In the near future we are also expecting Luke, Kristen and baby Kendall, Jen's dad and our Seattle friends Drew and Laura with a few other tentatively planned guests. We couldn't be more thrilled! Not only does this light a fire beneath us to accomplish our goals in a timely manner but also were convinced our guest log would be very minimal over the 3 years we were here. In part we owe a big thanks to Washington State's nasty winter :)

Happy Valentine's Day

After 8 years together and nearly 3 years of marriage it's only fitting that such a practical arrangement was made - Jen asked Levi for just a long days worth of backbreaking renovation labor for her Valentine's day gift and in return she'd give him the same. And a long day it was! We spent a 14 hour day and accomplished so much. Jen primed the family room and the office and Levi finished off the island and installed a good portion of the kitchen floors each project was painstakingly tedious for different reasons.

Coincidentally the last room that needed to be primed was the formal room and the color going on the wall that day was red. As Jen was applying the red to the walls she thought back to her and Levi's first Valentine's Day, she was 18 and Levi was 19, Jen wore a dress and they had their hot date out at the mall chain restaurant Rainforest Cafe thinking it was one of the nicest restaurants they had ever eaten in yet. We bought each other big gifts with price tags we would still consider today to be too extravagant for Valentine's day. Levi says this was one of the first time's he thought he was falling in love with Jen.

With this memory at 10pm Jen decided they were too young to already not celebrate Valentine's day so we wrapped our projects up, attempted to wash most of the paint off our faces and arms and ventured out for a nice dinner, maybe at Chow Bella or Yuma's good steak house but each were closed, so the story comes full circle as we enjoyed our 8th Valentine's dinner together in a less than romantic mall established restaurant of Chili's :)

Knocking down a tier

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Our once two tiered island is on it's way to become one flat even counter space . We're getting rid of these laminate counter tops and replacing it with a clean lined butcher block top. This is the biggest project Levi has tackled yet. Jen previously thought she was the more handy out of the two but tonight Levi proved her wrong.

Check out those clean painting lines where the ceiling meets the walls! Be sure to compliment Jen on these lines when you come to visit as she risked life and limb achieving them. She was standing too high up on the ladder and was over reaching when we fell off the ladder hitting this very island on her way down - luckily it was only her pride that was injured in the incident.

A kitchen in progress

It's difficult to see the vision this early on but here's a glimpse at our new counter tops. They aren't much to look at now but we feel their light color will be a great contrast to the espresso color we're putting on the cabinets and that their unobtrusive quartz pattern will be calming against the more glitzy glass tile and stone tile back splash.

Our favorite room in the house

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We often find ourselves overwhelmed with our big empty house and all the projects we are tackling but then we go into our smallest room that is near complete and feel a sense of accomplishment and renewed optimism that it is all manageable. We still have grand plans for this room - definitely some paint on the walls, lift the washer and dryer up on a platform and hang some cabinets above the washer and dryer.