Honey-Do List - One More Checkmark!!!

Braden and I have been wanting to have some built-in bookshelves in the corner of my studio in the basement and, just in time for first class tonight, they are almost completely finished!!! All they need to do is have the 2 doors on the bottom 2 shelves on either side - the middle will be open as it contains my rhythm instrument baskets. You can't see all the details, but didn't he do a great job!!! Yep - I'm keeping him forever and ever!!! I still need to find the perfect art piece for the middle, lighted area, but soon . . .

The wall as a whole - the art works with my studio as the saying is great ("How great would life be if we lived a little of it everyday" and also it is an airplane - and Amy drives an airplane you know . . . Amy the Anteater : ) The door goes into the furnace room where I have all my MYC storage (which is A LOT!) and the dots are what I have each child sit on - keeps them stuck in one place - yep - brilliant idea!!!

Kaleb saw the new studio and right away went to the keyboard and started playing. My mom sewed the keyboard on the wall (has grommets for hanging) my first year of teaching and it is invaluable as a teaching aid and also game when I take it onto the floor for the kids to jump on. The board at the end is my homework board - where I post the class homework and write any messages I need to let the parents know about.

This picture is taken from the door to the basement bathroom (although right now it just is a door to a construction mess - soon . . . )

My homework board - I found it at HomeSense and LOVE it!!! No longer is it the little white magnetic board, but a great piece. It's also nice to have a ledge on it to set the 6 pens for my parents to write their homework and I can keep my business cards on it!

I don't know if you saw in my shelves my little drawers. I purchased them my first year of teaching and use them all the time - but - I had painted each drawer a different color and I really didn't like it anymore. So . . . MODGE PODGE - it's my friend!!! Now look at the original before look and the new, improved look!!! I'm happy!!!

Before

After - It's all black and white - bad lighting inside my shelves at might - oops

A Long Time Ago in a Galaxy Far Far Away . . .

Pretty much everyone knows where that line comes from . . . and our kids have played Lego Star Wars on the Wii so many times that Kaleb actually calls Star Wars 'Lego Star Wars' as if Lego is the creator of it - hehehe!   Well, yesterday when we picked up Braden from work the kids' eyes lit up and huge smiles spread across their faces.  Daddy was walking to the van with  a Star Wars Clone Wars AT-TE Vehicle!   

Wow!!!  The kids were soooo excited to go home and play Star Wars with this.  It seems that Daddy's work place has done some work for Lucas Films and this was a prop that was used and just sitting around the office so Brade brought it home for the kids to have.  Yep, there are a few perks to working there :)

Brade and the kids have started watching Star Wars Clone Wars with the kids (cartoon version of Star Wars, with Anakin Skywalker) and they are having a lot of fun with it.  Many times you can hear voices in Kaleb's room now, "I'm going to capture General Grievious" "Watch out Obi-Wan Kenobi!"  "I'm Ahsoka" "Here comes the Separatist Army!" and the names go on and on.  Daddy loves it because he remembers when he was their age and playing Star Wars so this takes him back.  

It doesn't hurt that Kaleb got Obi-Wan Kenobi's lightsabre and a Clone Head/Mask for Christmas either!

Daddy is fighting off the Clone soldier with the Narnia sword - both the sword and lightsabre have sound effects so they love the "drama" that it brings to the "fights" :)

As an aside - notice the little girl on the ottaman . . .   I was getting supper ready and when I came out this is what I saw.  Navia was totally passed out while watching tv - sooooo cute!

Oh, and one more thing . . . We have a new addition in our house - an ice rink outside and an air hockey table downstairs!  The kids love it!  We took the big room downstairs, threw down some carpet, put sheets up to seperate it from the workshop area and ta-da - and air hockey area just for the kids! (okay, so Brade and I've been down there after they go to bed, but I have yet to win a game!)  They love it!  It was a great Christmas present!

Those two are pretty competitive - if I remember correctly I'm pretty sure they beat Daddy this game!

Almost there!!!

Yesterday I got the last coat of paint on the last couple of wall and we scraped all the drywall mud off the floor, sanded the trim in the stairwell and gave the stairwell trim the first coat at around 11pm and then I gave it another coat when my alarm clock woke me up at 2:30. (YUCK!)

(first thing the kids did when the carpet guy left was fall all over the floor - it was really cute!)

This morning the carpet guys came and "ta-da" the carpet is installed and we're at the finish line!!! YAY!!! Tonight we will paint the trim and this wknd Braden will trim up the 4 doors and do the baseboards (inbetween a BBQ and a photo shoot that Kaleb and Navia have for the Children's Wish Foundation - yep, we make our kids work for their school clothes - hehehe!) So it's almost over - which is a good thing because my first class is on Tuesday @ 4:15pm and I've been so busy doing the basement with Braden (okay, so painting - B's been doing everything else) that I haven't gotten to any lesson plans yet - oops!

The Basement Saga continues . . .

Well - there definitely is something to be said about viewing a house before you have purchased it - but if you can't you can't - and well - we couldn't. That leaves us where we are today...

You gotta love the trimmed wall and spray-painted ceilings/duct work/insulation!!!

We loved our house (the main floor and upstairs), but the basement - well - I'm pretty sure 'like' didn't even get brought up in our conversation when we first saw it (after we moved in!). It was horribly done, spray-painted black ceilings, door trim cut to fit electrical sockets, crooked walls - okay, so it was sold as an unfinished basement, but it would have been easier to finish it if it was a bit more "unfinished" than it truly was.

At first we thought that I'd be teaching Music for Young Children starting in January (2 weeks after we moved in) so we worked like crazy to at least paint the studio area and then buy a remenient piece of carpet that almost covered the entire area, bought a couple Billy bookcases from IKEA and then . . . no classes . . . oops! Well at least it gave the kids a place to play for the winter instead of just upstairs!

Note: the carpet doesn't reach the side wall - oops!!!

So, while I was away in Saskatchewan with the kids Braden now had to fix all the past-owners mistakes and drywall the studio room in, etc so that we could make it into a real studio for my teaching. By himself he pulled off all of the trim around the ceiling and floors (yep - they trimmed the ceiling!), did the electrical and gave me pot-lights in the ceiling now, framed in everything and then drywalled it all. When we got back from Saskatchewan he's now been working on the mudding and sanding of it all (YUCK!!!) I do not envy him at all!!!

So . . . I start teaching September 9th . . . which means . . . the entire basement needs to be finished mudding/sanding, primed, painted, carpeted, trimmed, electrical "details" finished and set up for a studio within 16 days - and that's not really giving me any time to set up. He will be also building me a built-in bookcase for one area, but we're going to wait until next month to even start that project. Emma's desk is before it (and it does feel nice to have a garage that I know I can do my trim painting, etc in - much better than the basement - oh and Brade can keep his saws out there so that the dust doesn't get into the house - YAY!!!) So now everyday after Braden does a full day at Fuel Industries he comes home, changes into his "yucky" clothes, goes downstairs and works until really late. Then on the weekend he gets to spend both his days off doing this - isn't he such a lucky guy!!! We definitely love him for all he does for us!!! Thanks Brade!!!

Doesn't he look impressed!!!