Category Archives: House Projects*

There are certain elements of supply teaching that I absolutely love.

Right now I’m sitting in the staff room of one of my favourite schools on my prep period. As everything has already been prepared for me, and I wasn’t needed elsewhere in the school, I now have 76 glorious minutes of absolute quiet to sit and relax.

There are many things that frustrate me that I could complain about, but for now, these quiet moments momentarily overshadow everything else and it’s enough.

Especially after the craziness of last week.

You see, it’s birthday week! My beautiful girl turns one on Thursday, and we are celebrating all week long. We had my family over yesterday and ended up with 20 people in my little house. It was loud and crazy but so fun. It was worth the hectic preparations that went on for days ahead.

As we knew our home would be busy for a while, we decided it was time to fix up our entrance way. When we moved in, the front hallway walls were two-toned with a greeny-grey paint on top and a hodge-podged blue wall paper on the bottom, with a skinny white trim separating them in the middle. The wallpaper was ripped and glued on in pieces, and we think they were trying to make the wall look like stone.

(It didn’t look like stone.)

We’ve just left it as it wasn’t a priority, and my motto has really just been: if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

It certainly wasn’t broken, it just wasn’t terribly attractive. But we finally bit the bullet and I spent every free moment last week stripping wallpaper and glue from the walls. It was a big job—especially with an extremely curious toddler who wanted to “help”—but I got it done and on Saturday we had someone come in to patch up our walls. Neither the Hubster or I are drywall experts, so we figured it was probably best to have someone come in and help us smooth them out.

We were hoping to have it all done and painted by yesterday, but the massive snowstorm that blew through set us back a day and the walls needed two coats of “mud” which was more than we figured.

So we we still rocked a two-tone entrance way at the party, it was just paint and drywall this time. (Which I still view as an improvement. ha) I decorated around it and honestly, I don’t think many people noticed or cared. We were up until after midnight the night before trying to get the house cleaned and decorated, and I learned that preparing food for 20+ people is no small task. But everything got done–my home was full, my heart is happy and Ruby had a blast.

And, she didn’t like the cake OR the icing. Part of me was so proud that she preferred her avocados to the cake, and the rest of me wondered how my kid didn’t like cake. haha

Painting starts this afternoon—ceilings first , then walls and trim. So excited!!

My lovelies, I’ve been busy.

We have a full couple of weeks coming up. The wee-bean has her first birthday a week from today, and we are having a get together with my family this weekend to celebrate. The Hubster’s mom flies in on her actual birthday (Feb 14th) and most of his extended family is coming the following weekend to party again! We also have tickets to see The Wizard of Oz in the city, and I’m hosting another get together with some couples we know at the end of the month.

Like I said, busy busy busy.

I enjoy it though. I love when my home is full! So, we’ve been busy trying to get things in order to make our home look the best it can.

For the past two years we’ve been primarily focused on the functionality of our home. I decorated a little here and there, but we were so busy just trying to get things completed–lawn, deck, garage, shed, basement, etc–that we haven’t done much cosmetically. To date, we have only painted one room: our main floor powder room.

So, we decided to tackle a myriad of projects that we’re hurrying to complete before our month of parties and company. I’ve been busy stripping wallpaper for the past few days, and we have someone coming to repair the walls and paint on the weekend.

In the meantime, I’ve also been trying to tackle a few smaller projects to add a little fun in my kitchen.

In my family, the kitchen as always been the hub of all activity. We have always loved sitting around the table or working together to make food and clean-up. As I know my family will be in and out of my cupboards and drawers as we prep for the party this weekend, I’m trying to get things cleaned up and organized.

My kitchen drawers have driven me nuts since we moved in. They are all white and I can’t ever seem to keep them looking clean. The interior of the drawers show every scuff and mark and it makes them look dirty even when they aren’t. So I had a little idea and decided to give it a whirl.

I found some fun contact paper at Dollarama before Christmas and used a tiny bit for a gift I made someone. I ended up with a ton left over, and I wasn’t sure what to do with it.

So, I got creative.

Earlier this week I emptied out each of my drawers and cleaned them from top to bottom. As I looked at the scuffs and marks on the white surface, I decided to try lining my drawers with the contact paper and I am so happy with how it turned out!!

As it’s just Dollarama contact paper, I found the adhesive wasn’t great. So, after I cut the paper to size, I added strips of double sided tape to the drawer to help the paper stay down.

 See? Boring old white.

After I removed the backing of the tape, I carefully laid down the contact paper.

And… voila! I love how it turned out. It’s a very subtle, light pattern, but it just adds a little something to my once boring, scuffed drawers!

I still have loads left over, so I have another idea that I want to try in a much more visible spot.

I’ll keep you posted!

Oh lovelies, I am so tired.

I’ve been up since 5:45am, and my book and my bed are screaming my name. However, I promised to give you another house update this week, and I will not disappoint!

A little while ago I told you all about our jungle backyard and shared with you The Story of the Sodcutter. We started out with this:

And a close up of our beautiful “grass”…

By the time that was all done and finished, I was pretty much ready to live happily with a backyard full of dirt.

Seriously.

However, the Hubster had different ideas…

On Monday he called a local nursery and ordered five yards of soil for our backyard. When I got home from work on Tuesday, there was a mountain of soil on my front lawn. He and a friend got right down to work.

Since our old lawn had already been disposed of, our palate this time was an uneven lawn of dry dirt with patches of weeds that had begun to grow again. Before we could put in our new soil, we needed to till the earth to loosen the soil and prepare it for seeding. The Hubster and BC (his incredibly handy friend) trekked over to our beloved Home Depot to rent a tiller.

It looked like it was a little easier to maneuver than the sodcutter was, but it was still a beast to push through the soil.

Tilling the backyard was no small job–it took the boys nearly three hours to complete it.

And what was I doing while they were playing with the tiller, you ask? (Besides taking fun photos, of course)

Shoveling, shoveling, then shoveling some more.

We had two wheelbarrows, and I stood next to our mountain of dirt and filled them as they emptied each one into our back yard over and over and over again…

By the time we finished on Tuesday night, we had gone through almost half of our soil. Needless to say, my shoulders and arms were a might sore the next day…

It was after 10pm by the time we finished and returned the tiller, so we decided to call it a night and finish the next day. BC offered to come over and work a bit during the day while the Hubster and I were at work, and we gratefully accepted.

I swear this man works miracles. When we got home from work the mountain of soil was gone. Our backyard was level and raked smoothly. Our mountain of crap and tree limbs from the trees the Hubster took out was safely deposited at the dump. I was so immensely grateful–I still don’t know how he managed to get it all done!

All that was left was seeding and watering our lovely level dirt yard. The Hubster seeded while BC and one of our neighbours followed behind to rake and water the lawn.

BC hard at work!

We are slave drivers and don’t believe in rest. Rest is for the weak! (And for me. ha)

Every day since we’ve been watering and watching, waiting for the first signs of our new lawn. I know it takes time, but I can’t help but run down the stairs each morning to see if there are any little buds yet.

It’s way more exciting than TV.

Tonight we fertilized the lawn and raked away the last remaining bits of our mountain of dirt. It was thrilling to was the soil off our entrance walk way, and I am longing for the day when I won’t have dirt tracked through my front hallway.

Maybe I’ll have grass tomorrow. :)