Last Day of Summer. Sniff.

Today is my last real day of summer. Next week I have to start going into school to set up my classroom, lesson plan, and attend some meetings. Pardon me while I blow my nose and wipe my eyes.

As I was reminiscing about how beautiful it was to have a whole month off, I was reminded of a little post I did in the beginning of summer about the projects I had hoped to accomplish by this time.

Here's what was on my list and what I actually accomplished.

1. Paint the living room, dining room, kitchen, entry, and hallway. Update: Primed but not yet painted thanks to our crazy decision to retexture the walls in these 5 areas.
2. Install living room curtains, hang map, and other living room art. Update: Still pending wall texturing and painting.
3. Take out header cabinet in kitchen to open up kitchen/dining room. Update: We WILL do this THIS WEEKEND as we prepare for phase 2 of retexturing. (I am really starting to feel like a failure at this point...)
4. Get rid of all the boxes in the house. This will require setting up the guest room and office. DONE. Can I get an Amen? 
5. Do something about that hideous and awkward CD tower.  I did *something* (in the most literal interpretation of the word); I moved it to Ryan's office/guest bedroom.
6. Order and frame wedding pictures (by creating a gallery wall in the entry?). Update: Waiting until the entry is retextured and painted. 
7. Put up the house numbers that we already own. Update: This is really pathetic to admit because we already purchased them, but alas, no.
8. Find/make curtains for the master bedroom. Update: I found the fabric...I just have to save up to buy it.
9. Find a fiddle leaf fig.  We now are the proud owners of Figgy and Figgy Jr. thanks to my mother-in-law Pam and my Aunt Madeleine! 
10. Refinish coffee table and possibly other living room furniture. Update: Like everything else on this list, it's gonna have to wait till the walls are done. 
11. Sleep. Done and done.

Okay, so I really only accomplished 2.5 house related projects. But considering that we are in the throws of a major project (our biggest to date), I am going to cut myself some slack. And I have revised my timeline: I hope to have the walls done and painted by my birthday, which is two months away. Totally reasonable, right? 

Well I'm off to enjoy this last true day of freedom with my pooches at our favorite hiking spot. Have a great weekend! 

Summer Resolutions

I apologize for being MIA for a week. I was pretty much catatonic when school ended last Friday, and aside from cleaning my classroom on Monday, I have been vegetative all week. There are few times in life when you can enjoy doing absolutely nothing, having no responsibilities, and guiltlessly letting the day waste away, and this past week was one of them.

But summer school starts tomorrow, so it's time to motivate to do something. For today it will have to be thinking about what I want to accomplish this summer. And since summer is a time of seemingly endless promise for teachers (in reality it's only 9 weeks), it takes on a bit of a New Years quality. So what better time to make some summer resolutions?

I want to be realistic and not go overboard, so the following list seems do-able on weekends and long, lazy summer afternoons and evenings.

1. Paint living room, dining room, kitchen, entry, and hallway.  

Take it from this...

To this...

2. Install living room curtains, hang map and other living room art.

3. Take out the header cabinet in the kitchen to open up kitchen/dining room.

4. Get rid of all the boxes in the house. This will require setting up guest room and office. 

5. Do something about the hideous and awkward CD tower. 

6. Order and frame wedding pictures (by creating a gallery wall in the entry?).

7. Put up the house numbers (that we already own!).

8. Find/make curtains for the master bedroom.

9. Find a fiddle leaf fig.

10. Refinish coffee table and possibly other living room furniture.

11. Sleep. Oh wait, that's not house related at all.

What projects do you hope to accomplish this summer? 

New Years Resolutions

I'm back with some resolutions for 2011. In reality, they are more projects that I would like to accomplish before the dawn of 2012 than resolutions. Without further ado...

• Find our *dream* home (something with good bones that needs to be brought into this century would be ideal)
• Post 5 times a week to this baby! 
• Learn to refinish furniture...
• And then actually refinish our lovely mid-century modern furniture
• Purge (and then donate or sell) things that we don't use or need
• Re-learn how to sew

More personal resolutions are to find the ever-elusive work/life balance, buy produce and meats from our local farmer's market more regularly, make exercise a priority during the work week (notice that I am too wimpy to declare that I will exercise at 5 am before work, which would ensure this actually happening), and train for the 10.6 mile run that I signed up for in the late spring. 

I think the above should keep me busy this year! How about you? What do you hope to accomplish in 2011?