Posts made in July, 2009

Rookie moves…

Posted by Lindsay on Jul 30, 2009 in Uncategorized | 0 comments

I love DIY and crafty projects, there is no denying.  Who doesn’t?  But I do not claim to be super crafty myself.  I am learning, but I admit I am a total wannabe.  Spice Girl style.  I feel like I could be so crafty if I was taught some techniques, but on my own I’m way awkward.  That’s how I was through art school – as long as I have an assignment, I can do great work!  Work that passes me off for someone who knows what they are doing!  But I am not a ‘think-outside-of-the-box’ type of girl when it comes to creating things for myself.  Like I said, a wannabe.  This is usually how my projects turn out – glad to see the Petersiks are human!

(image via younghouselove’s flickr)

Thank goodness for my husband — he is so super handy.  He fixes a lot of my mistakes when I need it.    My adventures in crafting and DIY’ing usually seem to go like this; just this past week I’ve been painting everything I can get my hands on a nice glossy white for my daughter’s room.  So far I’ve painted her changing table, a magazine side table, today I finished painting a wall shelf, and my next project (before next Wednesday) is a dresser.  The changing table and side table went pretty good – I spray painted both of them because they had lots of turnings and carvings, and I knew a paintbrush wouldn’t be able to get it all evenly – so I was pleased with myself there, but then I attempted to tackle the shelf, paintbrush in hand.  A few things went majorly wrong (I can’t believe I’m revealing this, but maybe you can all give me some tips!!): first, it was about a million degrees outside when I did this.  I was covered by shade, but it was in the high 90′s.  Hot weather + wet paintbrush and open paint = clean paintbrushes for each coat, and lots of cleanup later.  I went back to put on the next coat (always later than I thought I would be able to — I have a busy 11 month old!), so the bristles were hard as a rock and you can’t clean that up without paint thinner.  Boo.  They’re soaking as we speak.  Second, one of the brackets on the shelf turned — somehow! — while it was drying, so it was stuck in a crooked position because of the paint.  I finally found one of Glenn’s razor blades and freed the bracket, and I had to re-paint where it was stuck, which was fine because that bracket needed another coat anyway.  But still — pain(t) in the butt!!  And third, and this is the biggest rookie move of all on my part, I painted the shelf and left it ON NEWSPAPER.  Paint loves to act like glue with newspaper, which means lots of newspaper stuck to the back of my shelf.  I knew this was going to happen, but it takes me 3 times as long to get back to something as I assume…razorblade bailed me out again, but it took almost an hour to get all of the paper shreds off.  I should have painted one side, while it was propped up on something, then flipped it over to paint the other side, leaving it elevated and away, far, far away from the Modoc Record archives. 

(image via pink loves brown’s flickr)

Be on the lookout for my next post on how it all turned out!!  I’m learning, so that’s okay.  And I have a good attitude and can admit my mistakes!  What a fun thing to learn by trial and error, right?  So…I would love to know your DIY/crafty tips so that I don’t run into problems like this again. I can hardly wait for Centsational Girl’s FAQ: In My Toolbox – Part 2!! I love seeing posts like this, so I can fuel my wannabe DIY soul!!  And a big thanks (again!) to Brooke at ohbrooke! for the link to the Centsational Girl site!!

So cute, and so easy to put together!

Posted by Lindsay on Jul 28, 2009 in Baby Stuff, Bedroom, Decor, DIY, Furniture, Likely Favorites, Organization, Sales | 6 comments

As my daughter’s first birthday is coming up, I’m in a hurry to try to finally finish her room!  She was born 6 weeks early, so I feel like I didn’t get a chance to properly put it all together like most nesting moms-to-be would.  It is a very cute room, but with a newborn I didn’t get to finish all of the projects that I had in mind!  The paint on the upper half of the room was all that was done when I left for the hospital, so it has been a slow project, but I finally got a few projects done this week so here I am to share what I’ve been up to!!

First of all, I am no way being compensated to promote this product.  I just found something that interested me and I wanted to share!  I discovered the company “Way Basics” a couple months ago, and have been going back to their site all the time ever since, but I haven’t bought anything until now.  They sell modular storage furniture, which is made of recycled paper in the form of “Z Boards” that you can put together how they intend, or you can be creative and have fun with them!  They are having an awesome Summer Sale, and I saw their Rectangle Plus 3 in pink on sale for 50% off (for $33!! As of today…), so I decided that it was such a bargain I would try it for Harper’s room.  I would love the white, or even the “Kraft” series for my office, but I wanted to try it before I make a bigger commitment.  The cool thing about Way Basics furniture, is that it is held together with peel-and-stick industrial strength tape!  No screws or nails, just peel the strip off and stick it together — sooo simple!!  And it is super strong, plus the way it is put together keeps it strong; it rests on the horizontal boards, and there is a backing board to keep it all together.  Anyway, I love Harper’s new shelf.

I taped a little video of me putting the shelf together so you can see how easy or difficult it would be, which took less than 10 minutes.  The video, though, is only 43 seconds long because I used Gawker, which is in timelapse.    Enjoy!!

And here is the shelf, put together and filled with some of Harper’s stuff, except when she decides to play with the toys I carefully placed on it. That is why the books and breakables are on the top 2 shelves!!

And there she goes…

By the way, Way Basics is holding a “Messy Room Contest” on Facebook, and I submitted a photo of my office/craft room — a room that I haven’t gotten to organizing yet — and guess what?!?!?! They picked me as one of the contestants!!!!!! Come to think of it, I don’t know if that is good or bad, ha! But anyway, I need lots more votes to win so I need your help! You have to become a fan of Way Basics, but as you can see from the video, they make some pretty cool products, and they don’t post a lot so come on, help a girl out!! The prize is $250, which I could put to really good use for shelving in my office…and by shopping at Way Basics, I could buy a ton of organizing products!!

I hope you enjoyed my video — have a good week!!!

Ah, the life of a fire wife…

Posted by Lindsay on Jul 23, 2009 in Blogging, Me | 1 comment

Us at the county fair, 2007.

I have been with my husband for 8 years now, and as the girlfriend and wife of a wildland firefighter (he is an Engine Operator for the BLM, so he drives, runs the engine and the crew), I am used to the summertime when he has to go off-district and can be gone for 2 weeks at a time. Well, it is a million times different this summer for me. I miss him terribly this time, and he has only been gone for 4 days!! This is because of a few reasons; 1) we live in Likely — small and isolated (although only 20 minutes from the “big” town, where many of my friends live) so it can get a little lonely! Thank you to my Twitter and Facebook friends for the chats! 2) I’m not working at my dayjob (I work part-time at a school so we’re out for summer), only from home right now so I rarely leave my house! 3) We have our baby Miss Harper for the first fire season, and without Glenn coming home at night it’s only the 2 of us 24/7 — which I love, but it’s nice to let daddy take over for a little while, and it’s nice to have visitors.

I’m writing this post for Melissa’s “A Beautiful Life” blog party at The Inspired Room, and so I just want to publicly shout out a big “thank you for all you do for us” to my husband, Glenn, and to let him know how much we miss him around here! He works very, very hard for us and me, and his entire family, are so proud of him. But his off-district fire is actually perfect timing as his birthday is coming up, as is Harper’s first birthday (I’m surrounded by Leos!!) so he will be home for his birthday, and her party!!

At my Grandma’s birthday party, 2007.

At my best friend’s son’s first birthday party, 2007.

He is the funniest guy I know (we laugh every day), we have a relationship that has grown amazingly (with our ups and downs, but it has all made us stronger), and it all gets better and better every day. I love you, honey!!! Be safe and come home soon!! Here are some of my favorite pictures of him and us.

Our wedding day, October 18th, 2003 (this is my favorite picture EVER!)

Mexico cruise, 2005 — the black hair phase. 

My 10 year high school reunion, 4th of July 2009

In Costa Rica, April 2009

At a friend’s wedding, 2007.

Camping at West Valley Reservoir — using our camp trailer for the 1st time, 2006.  It snowed a lot, good thing we had a trailer!

Wow, I’ve had a lot of hairstyles over the years…   Love ya’, babe!  Thank you for giving me our beautiful baby girl, and thank you for being my handy-man around here!  You are the best!!

Watching grass grow…

Posted by Lindsay on Jul 22, 2009 in backyard, Environmental, Exterior, gardening, Landscaping | 1 comment

Update: I’m linking this post to Julia’s Hooked on Fridays blog party at Hooked on Houses, and the Frugal Friday Linky Party at the Shabby Nest!  Thanks, ladies!!!!

We have finally gotten back to the backyard project — although the mountain of gravel is still there, ugh. We do have someone who is going to come get the rest, so hopefully they’ll come do that soon! Anyway, we’ve fenced off the sections that will be grass, planted, fertilized and watered, so now we’re waiting…and watching the grass grow! Yes, we have grass!!!

Here is what we’ve been up to:

I cannot wait to 1) get the gravel out of there, 2) have enough grass to take the fences down, and 3) actually like my backyard. It hasn’t happened yet, which is unfortunate during the summer!! Patience, Lindsay, patience…

This Is Why I Don't Have White Furniture…

Posted by Lindsay on Jul 14, 2009 in Blogging, Furniture, Pets | 8 comments

Because every home needs a pet, and every blog needs a dog, I thought I would take some time to introduce you to the rest of the Christensen family — meet Keno and Molly, our adopted mutts that we love so much and think of as our oldest children!

First is Keno, our eldest.  We adopted him from the local animal shelter when he was 4 months old. A small little puppy…if we would have only known HOW HUGE he was going to get! I kid…but he is really a big (GIANT) teddy bear.

He was born in January of 2002, and we adopted him in May of that year.  We told the animal shelter we wanted a puppy, so they brought us to where they kept the puppies.  There were 5 of them; 4 girls (all sisters) who were gorgeous gray hound-looking dogs, and then this little awkward male with big feet.  I was gawking at these shiny-coated sisters, who were huddling with eachother in the corner of the pen they were in, when I felt something on my leg.  I look down and this little black puppy with big feet and even bigger brown eyes was up on his hind legs with his front paws on my shins saying “Pick me, pick me!”  So we did.  We took him home and he immediately took over our bed and has been there ever since.  He is part lab, maybe part Rottweiler, and who knows what else, but he is a sweetheart who loves to spoon (seriously!) and loves to get his butt scratched.  He can eat chocolate and rat poison and live through it, and will eat anything else that you give him — can’t you tell?  Yes, he outweighs me at 140 pounds!

Next is our middle child, Molly.  By the way, these are not original names.  My husband has had 2 other Kenos and 1 other Molly.  We originally named them Rocky and Maggie, but it just didn’t fit, and I guess we’re not that original, ha!  Or at least his family isn’t.    Anyway, Molly’s birthday is October of 2002, and we adopted her over Superbowl weekend in 2003.  Nobody wanted Molly because she had a fungus on her face, but we saw through the skin spots to see what a sweetie she was, plus she was on medication and it was supposed to go away (which it did!).

We got her from the same animal shelter that we found Keno at, and when we arrived she had just gotten a bath because she had been rolling in cow manure.  She still likes to do that.  We told them we wanted a little dog that likes to play with big dogs, and the first time we saw her she was standing on a big sleepy dog and biting his ears.  Keno and Molly became instant best buddies and I am scared for them for the day either one of them goes because the other one might die of a broken heart.

Molly is part Sharpei, maybe part Border Collie and who knows what else!  She sleeps a foot away from the heater while panting like she’s going to pass out and she trims her own nails.  She will also lick you to death, so we have to watch her around Harper!  Especially because Harper will lean into the dogs, open her mouth and let Molly go to town.  Gross!  But a funny story to tell when Harper’s in high school.

And as the headline says, these two are the main reason that I cannot allow myself to buy white furniture, or even a white slipcover!  Especially now when it’s hot and they shed like crazy…you can tell by the discolored fur on Keno’s back leg.  Don’t get me wrong, I love the Young House Love and decor8 look, but I just CAN’T.  Between the mud and the fur and the drool, my furniture would look like a New York City sidewalk.  I need some colored camoflauge, people!

Here are some of my favorite pictures of the dogs, plus some for scale to see how giant he is!

We have this one framed in our “reading nook” in our living room.

And here we are circa Christmas 2005 in our old rental house, before Harper! Our original children.   There were a lot of funny outtakes trying to get this shot since we used a timer.  Pretty funny!!  And why did we leave the TV on in the background?? Haha!

I hope you enjoyed meeting the rest of the Christensen family!  They would love to meet you…and let you take them on a walk!