Cold Weather Yummies

The weather has taken a turn and gotten a bit chilly around here. Not my favorite time of year. It is just inbetween the good stuff. It's not so fun for the kids without the snow on the ground when it is cold. Oh well, it will be here shortly. However, what I do love is bringing out the cold weather foods once again. It's back to the BBQ Beef Stew, Clam Chowder, and Sheppard's Pie. Yum. At least when you are using the oven and stove so much, you WANT the house warmer. Tonight's yummy is sheppard's pie. Wow, it's been awhile since I've made that. It sure smells good cooking right now. I also love this time of year because you have A LOT of excuses to make your holiday treats. So far, I've just made cookies and trying to keep things somewhat healthy around here. Jared and I are both trying to get in shape and with Jared's now high cholesterol levels we have to eat a bit healthier too. Jared's favorite, shrimp stir fry cooked in coconut oil. Yummy. Me, not such a seafood fan but him and kids love it. So I've been making a lot of shrimp, and salmon...I'll get used to cooking fish. I don't mind the smell, just not a fan of the taste. As long as he doesn't ask for octopus I'll be okay. :-)

First Plane Video

April bought me a small video recorder that I can attach to my planes to take aerial video while I am flying around for an anniversary gift. I think it takes some decent video and I am very excited about it. (We're talking 8 year old getting the coolest new superhero for Christmas excited!~April~)This video was taken using a class 6, 8 Gig memory card, so it does drop a few frames here and there. I have a class 10 memory card on the way that should fix that small problem. I recommend watching it without sound because all you hear is the air rushing by the camera and a bit of the electric motor from the plane. Hope you enjoy...this is the first of many videos I will be posting on here!

Unfortunately, I had to reduce the quality so the video didn't take forever to load. I'll be working with the future videos to make things look as good as possible on the blog.

8 is Great

Recently Devon had his birthday, the BIG 8! He has chosen to get baptized which will take place soon, but since we will be having something for that, he didn't have a big party but we had some fun!

Poor Devon this year got a birthday on a Sunday. So we celebrated on Saturday. He didn't mind. He had a two day birthday and LOVED it.

For his fun we hit Boondocks. The kid just wanted to drive the go-karts. He did great and had a blast but what a hot day!

So Devon, Jared and Ellie hit the bumper boats.

They had a blast and all got SOAKED! They loved it. Luckily I got some pictures. :-)

After we had some ice cream and they all wanted to go again. So this time we all hit the bumper boats and everyone got more wet than the first time!

After we hit the arcade for awhile, got their prizes and headed home for Devon's Birthday Dinner.

He again wanted a Spider-man cake so I did my best.

 Doesn't he take after his dad!?

Jared got him a new video game. As you can see, he was a little excited.

 We also got Devon a new bike. He had already out grown his old one. So to try to avoid having to get a new bike in two years, we got him a larger bike. We weren't sure how well he would take to it but he was a pro in no time. Now, he just wants to ride every chance that he gets!

My gift to Devon was his camp blanket. We saved Jared's old camo just for this purpose. Needless to say, Devon really liked his blanket and has tried sleeping with it. However, it just ended up too hot for him!

All in all, the kid had a great TWO days for his birthday.

Drab to Fab (Or good bye 1980s)

For those of you who haven’t been in our kitchen, it’s small. There’s only this small space to move around while doing dishes, cooking or whatever. Definitely tight. We loved all the counter space when we first saw the house.
(Ignore the cover missing on the dishwasher-had a leak we had to find. Found it and fixed it!)
Yes, it was lovely, until you started using it. You learn quickly that there’s not much room to move. While the dishwasher was open, you had to stand to the side and lean over to put the dishes away or load, or you had to stand in the little space that wasn’t covered by the door next to the oven. The oven and dishwasher couldn’t be open at the same time, nor could the cabinet under the sink be with either of the previously mentioned. You also couldn’t have someone doing dishes while another was cooking. And you know, when you are cooking, all the kids want to be in the kitchen! The cabinets are original from the build and while still very sturdy, they have seen their years and damage. What used to probably be a very lovely golden oak had turned into a orangey/yellow color. And let’s not even talk about the hardware! Oh my. Some brass, some silver, some with cream centers, some with white.
Needless to say, we got SICK of this kitchen quickly, years ago. And for years we’ve been trying to figure out/planning/hoping that we could make-over our kitchen. A few weeks ago, we finally got sick of it and Jared snapped and went crazy with the circular saw! (Kidding, he didn’t go crazy. We spent two weeks prior planning it out)
And the kitchen make-over began.
Of course, we aren’t rich so it had to be cheap. So with stain, hardware, blood, sweat, and tears the new kitchen came to be. And special thanks to friends for the borrowed tools and some supplies.
First step was getting rid of the protruding counter. Yes, you might think we were insane for getting rid of such a large counter space but we did and quite honestly, it really doesn’t feel like we lost any.

Next was removing the end cabinet and cutting it down from a 30” wide cabinet to a 12” one…and we did a fab job. We even managed to take the large door and make it small to fit. (It is the one on the end of the dishwasher) Floor repair being next. We aren’t thrilled with how that turned out but it will work until we can replace the floor. We also had to replace some countertop. Not new countertops now, but one day. The old stuff will work for now. All glued on and drying.
Then, the fun (and extremely scary part!) Cabinet staining! Oh yeah, this took some wild rides. The originally planned color didn’t happen. During the staining process I discovered a color that I thought looked just lovely. So I started doing that. It was this really nice dark brown with a hint of red in it. I didn’t really think about it at the time. Once I started doing that, I was committed and during the process there was a LOT of prayer that it would look okay in the ‘NEW’ kitchen.
Oh I was so pleased as everything came together. It looked better than I could have hoped!
We splurged and finally bought the above the range microwave we’ve been wanting for a few years. It was going to be in a couple months but once you start changing one thing, everything else follows. So we removed the old hood. It was hardwired into the wall. Oh well, no big deal. We read the installation directions on the OTR microwave and saw where the outlet needed to be (in the cabinet above it) so Jared figured that one out. His idea was to figure out where in the cabinet we wanted the outlet to sit, then cut the hole out of the cabinet, place the cabinet against the wall and mark where the hole in the wall will be. Worked great! Not the prettiest cut (and will look better when I clean the marks off around it) but it is in an overhead cabinet and few people if any will ever see it.
Sweet, worked perfect. Love how easy those are to install. Glad they make electrical boxes for existing walls. (As a side note, we did this TWICE. The first time, I didn’t like how high the microwave sat so we had to lower the cabinet and the wall outlet. No big deal. That went much faster than installing it in the first place.)

The final piece was my pot rack. My friend has this in her house and I’ve envied it for awhile now. Yes, we got rid of a cabinet (but really we have more open space in our cabinets then we did before!!) but the trade off was SO worth it. So while the kitchen had been ‘done’ for a few days, we still needed that trip to IKEA. Took that trip yesterday, installed our stuff (and the awesome knife rack by the stove. Jared really wanted that) And YAY, finished kitchen!
Now it is just little things. I need to get a new window covering and eventually we’ll be installing an in-sink soap dispenser. Until then, I’m in love with my new open kitchen. It turned out so well. If you didn’t know better, you would think the cabinets were always that way (layout and color). And I don’t think I’ve had to tell my kids once to get out of the kitchen while I’ve been cooking lately! They just run around it more now!

Does it look better? To Jared and I, YES! It wasn’t necessarily ugly before but definitely wasn’t functional. Some people will prefer the old color, some the new. Honestly, I think more than anything, it is about ‘different’. But who cares, we love it!!

Some little extras:
I wanted my cabinet hinges to match but they are this special kind of hinge that is so hard to find. When I did find them, they were around $5 or more a piece! and I needed 28! So we went cheap and bought Rustoleum's Metallic Satin Nickel primer and paint. $8 and new hinges that look great and match!
Also, when we pulled the cabinet off the wall, it had the old paint color behind it. We didn't have any extra paint for this room (I don't even know when the previous owner's painted it!) So I gave Home Depot's coloring matching a try and we got a perfect match! Can you tell where I put the new paint on?

New year----a little slow!

So my slow welcoming in of the new year is finally here. I know, 3 months of it is already over. Things have just been crazy busy around here. Jared is in his final semester with school. He's had to do some volunteering for his final project in that class as well. That keeps him pretty busy around here. Luckily, most weekends he is already done with his homework and spends time with the family.

Not too long ago our dishwasher broke as well. We knew it was coming (just hoped it would hold out longer). It has been making this grinding noise for several months now. When we checked on it, the first possible cause was something caught in the built-in disposal. After taking the dishwasher apart and cleaning out the disposal, the grinding continued. The next possible cause was the motor going out. (Isn't google great?!) So that is what we figured. Next was either going to be water leaking everywhere from the motor, or the motor going out. Lucky us, the motor went out first!! Jared tore it apart to see what was wrong with it and it wasn't repairable. We ordered a new part and Jared put everything back together and YAY, a dishwasher again. Oh I missed it. I figured it wouldn't be such a big deal washing by hand again. It was very hard to keep up with. But I have the dishwasher back now, working as good as ever and we saved a few hundred dollars over buying a new one!!

I have to say that Google and YouTube have become our best friends when it has come to home repair items. They helped us with the dishwasher, the lawn mower and many other repairs we've had to do in the last several years.....and many more to come I'm sure! More projects await and we are so excited. (You won't even recognize the place!) Super fun!! Love having our own place!! I'm really glad I married someone handy (even though I do most of it myself) It's great knowing I have someone to help me, or that I can help him or that either of us can take care of it.