Project-ed

It seems the one thing that husband and I are REALLY good at... is starting projects and not finishing them... Don't get me wrong, there are plenty of projects around our house that we HAVE completed and usually the hang-ups to completion are my two friends Time and Money.

However... if there's one thing we've got going for us it is elbow grease. We are both hard workers, just easily distracted (i.e. overwhelmed) by the busy-ness of life.

If there's one more thing we've got going for us, it's that having a third kiddo in our house in the next month (MONTH!!!!?!) will not take long to pose some space issues and the reality that we need to find an affordable home with more space is looming before us.... thus having this house prepared to be sold is going to be taking more of our attention...

Since I managed pretty well with my new year's resolution (one sewing project per month... I know I at least averaged out to that even if there wasn't one project completed each month) I thought I'd write a list of projects I'd like to see us work on. Obviously those time & money fools will play a part in how much of this list gets completed, but seeing us work through this list will also provide more motivation to complete the rest of it...

without further ado (i.e. blabbering)... and in no particular order...

1)finish master bath (counter & shower were tiled over Christmas break, need to do floors, walls, figure out mirror situation, install vent, paint woodwork, accesorize)

2)guest bath (new tub, tear out wood paneling, repaint walls, new vanity, new floor)

3)countertops in kitchen (just replace with something neutral, decent looking and affordable)

4)PUT UP SHED (this one has been a thorn in my side b/c we purchased this shed 19 months ago and it has been sitting in boxes in our garage ever since. meanwhile our lawn mower is currently sitting outside w/6 inches of snow on top of it. how does this make any sense?)

5)flooring (we replaced the carpet in the house about 2 years ago, but it is looking B-A-D. would LOVE to put some sort of wood- even fake- down through the kitchen, dining, living, & hallway. bedrooms will be fine as-is)

6)paint woodwork (this is one of those pie in the sky dreams for me. i think it would be time consuming but would go a long way in updating the look of the house.)

7)new garage doors... enough said

8)put up a screen door w/our backdoor (while it would be amazing too replace the sliding doors with french doors, it just isn't something i'm interested in putting money on)

9)make curtains (mistreatments) for living/dining room. the blinds are necessary but ugly. let's bring on the pretty

10)replace living room furniture (we've had handmedowns since we got married and it is time to be grown ups and buy some stinking furniture. one couch and one recliner. that's all i'm asking for... and maybe an entertainment center of some kind)

whew! that's it. that's my list. only 10 things... not too shabby. of course, some of those are pretty expensive projects and it is going to take some thinking on how we're going to be able to afford some of those projects BUT the goodnews is that we can do a lot of the work ourselves (along with help from knowledgeable family) and our goal with all of this is not to have a high dollar makeover but just to update our house so that it really is ready to sell.

... let's see where this list is in 2011!

Goals or Resolutions

My online mommy group decided to do a list of goals/resolutions. I'm not sure which category my list falls under (I'm thinking goals)

either way, here's my list

Get back on track with our budget
Pay off our credit card and husband's student loan (that would leave only medical bills and mortgage for debt!)
Lose 20 (maybe 25) pounds
Complete one sewing project every month (did I tell you all I got a sewing machine for Christmas)
Buy husband a truck
Keep up with the house more
Get oldest daughter fully potty trained by the start of the summer

stuff

Well, I couldn't find my camera (its since been found... figures) when it was time to go 'do' husband's classroom. Let me just say when I left it looked 100 X better than it did when I got there, but it still has a long way to go.

In the mean time this is on my mind. We have a family member who is a hoarder, and I want desperately to learn to live without so much stuff. The 3-post blog on decluttering is right up my alley right now...

starting out

Well, I don't know what is leading me to blog, other than the fact that I've become addicted to reading other blogs lately. It seems like such a safe and healthy outlet although I'm sure I'll need some pointers as I go along if I plan to be anonymous and whatnot, which would probably be good b/c I'll probably want to gripe about my real life from time to time.

I figure that the main theme for the blog will be my life and how I find myself learning about how to be a wife/mom/employee/friend/daughter/sister etc.... hence the title 'its a slow learning curve'.

So, for my first offical blog, I will talk about my housekeeping skills (or lack thereof)... I am a terrible housekeeper. I have big dreams of having a really pretty- neat- organized- etc. house but I find myself getting too caught up in 1)the enormity of how far I need to come and 2)the enormity of how far my decorating/organizing budget still has to come. See, my dh and I, we are not big money makers. We do both work outside the home mostly for the sake of our sanity and for the 1 perk that comes from our jobs- amazing benefits. In the meantime, we are dave ramsey-ing (is that a verb? it is now!) our way to better finances, which finds me wanting to constantly start thousands of super cute projects (like The Nester- totally love her blog!) but always trying to figure out how I can do so super affordably.

Anywho- back to housekeeping. My number one least favorite task is laundry. I just had a 30 minute discussion with my cowoker where she told me (for the thousandth time- well, not the thousandth time from her, but the thousandth time that someone has told me this): just do a load of laundry every day. HA! Yeah, as soon as my dh doesn't have to work at night, and I'm not bf'ing, and trying desperately to potty train our 2 year old (I would seriously consider paying big money for someone to take said 2 year old and return her to me fully potty trained... any takers? no? that's what I figured.) on top of cooking nearly-healthy meals, do dishes, relax for a minute or two, pay bills, do some gardening, etc. Dh and I did a ton of laundry this weekend and we are down to only.... get this... 3 loads to go! That's pretty close to a personal best for us. So, YAY!

We'll keep on trying!