Clearing the Backyard, Pt 3

We're slowly working towards clearing the backyard and today I feel like I made a pretty decent dent. I decided my issue was that I wasn't focused enough when I was working. Instead of focusing on one specific section I would bounce around all over the backyard which meant that I wasn't really getting much done and what I did get done really wasn't that noticeable. So today I took a different approach. I decided to focus on the part of the yard that if you're looking out our backdoor is closest to our house on right.
Before I started to work it looked like this

As you can see, lots of leaves, little pine trees, holly trees and I don't know what type of trees but I'm guessing Oak because we have a lot of those in our yard. The hardest thing is the fact that the leaves prevent you from seeing what all is there and in need of clearing, but there are too many baby trees and dead branches to successfully just rake. So to clear it you have to alternate between trimming off the long branches, stacking those, digging up the trees that you can dig up, raking and then resorting to sawing some of the bigger "saplings" off. The sawing was done whenever the sapling was actually growing out of the roots of the bigger trees. Not the ideal situation but we're not going to be cutting down a bunch of the older trees- we like those, but the stumps were a hazard because they stuck up above the dirt line and I'm a clutz so they had to go. After working for 4-5 hours- with a small lunch break/oh hey I'm gonna put my audiobook on my phone and listen to that while working -- the end result for today was this :

I'll admit that while I was working in the back I really felt like I wasn't truly making a dent. I think that is largely due to the HUGE pile of leaves we have that need to get bagged and taken to the dump but....I just didn't feel like bagging all those leaves today. I bagged about 3 bags worth after I ate and went back to clearing. Since we bought our house I really do understand the appeal of leaf burning now because with all of our trees, raking and bagging it's a giant pain in the tukus. ANYWAY, there are still a few little saplings (more like twigs that look like they are sticking out of the ground) that need to be pulled up, and there are some of the bigger roots/trunks that we need to figure out how we're going to get them out of the ground, but all in all I think I made a pretty awesome sized dent in clearing the backyard. I really do need to bag up all the leaves though......

You can't tell by looking at it since I"m about 5 feet off the ground at our backdoor but the pile is ginormous... and a lot of the leaves are damp from the rain/snow mixture we got a few days ago. In fact the front of the pile still had snow on it since the pile was started last time I worked in the backyard.






We also now have more twigs and branches- excellent kindling-- that I will work on trimming to a usable size and stacking up. That will then go to my parents or be saved for when we get a fire pit type thing.
This is the one I want....

Anyhoo that is it for now. Hope everyone is enjoying their weekend!

~)O(~ Elfie ~)O(~

"Snowflakes are one of nature's most fragile things, but just look at what they can do when they stick together."

We have experienced our first snowfall at our house. Granted it wasn't much, but I'm counting it anyway.

 While we didn't get much snow, and honestly, what you see in these pictures quickly disappeared, we still got snow! I wanted to take a picture just in case this is the only snow we get this year, which, in VA, is entirely possible.

 Our bushes with snow...and Snickers on the porch desperately trying to get out of the snow while I took pictures. She only likes snow if it has stopped falling and if there are a couple inches that she can easily eat.

Bathroom Makeover, Pt 2: Hanging stuff up!

Yay! Bathroom makeover is mostly complete! Ok, well the painting and stuff is done, I'll be slowly working on adding stuff to hang on the walls as I get more to hang up. Problem is I haven't found things I'm willing to spend the money on at this point to hang on the walls, but the walls need...SOMETHING... but that will come in time. But yea, moving on. So, on Wednesday I came home armed with a teeny tiny paint brush, you know, the type that come with the kiddie paint kits and I cleaned up the edges. Our ceiling has texture on it and it meant the tape didn't lay quite flat so the edges were bumpy and that was just irritating me. So what did I do? I took a teeny tiny paint brush to it. So I was up there on my step-ladder listening to The Red Pyramid by Rick Riordan as I was fixing up the edges (To be fair I was also listening to it during the main painting.. and when painting the trim, it's freaking amazing. Seriously, go listen to it). So I did that. Then on Friday after Snickers got a bath so she no longer smells like a Basset Hound who possibly was rolling around in goose poop I taped up the bathroom again and painting the trim, and the inside of the doors. It looks like a whole different bathroom. There is one little issue we didn't think about. The shower and the bathtub are off white so it looks a little bit odd, but not enough to truly bother us.

So today we hung up the new mirror. We were a little worried it might be too small but I think it is JUST right. I think it would look nice with some small (and I mean really small-possibly just seashells) around it. I also put the storage baskets back up. I got that idea off of pinterest and used the shower curtain hooks that I got from my Mother-In-Law to hang the baskets on the towel racks. You can't see what is on them, but they have penguins on them. The bathroom is now a penguin/beach theme. It works way better than one might think because these are surfer penguins. Think of the movie Surf's Up.

Last week Superman installed our new showerhead. We were far more excited about this then mid-twenty year olds should be. It was even more fun since the previous owners had used a type of plumbers' glue to get the old shower head on. So we had to make another run up to our home improvement store in order to get the right wrenches (instead of just pliers) to get the stupid thing off. But once we got that it took no time at all for him to install the new one. Doesn't it look nice? We also have sticky sea shells on the walls of the shower. Those were meant to help keep us from slipping in the shower but they won't stick to the shower floor. BUT they will stick to the walls so TA-DA! We have shells on our shower walls. Yeaaaa...don't judge us k?

I also was pretty excited to hang up this awesome carved wooden turtle we bought from a homeless man in the inner harbor up in Baltimore, Maryland. We were up there for a show, I don't remember which one, we've seen a lot in Baltimore, I'm leaning towards Phantom of the Opera but that might have been when we bought the painting from the homeless guy. Anyway that's not my point. The turtle was bought from a very talented homeless guy at the inner harbor and he's been migrating to different locations since we bought him with the intention that SOMEDAY I would hang him up and well, today was that day. I love the turtle! He's TOTALLY AWESOME MAN!







CHECK OUT THIS toothbrush cup. Ok, I'm not sure if it was actually MEANT to be a toothbrush cup, seeing as they had another shell with the holes that usually say "Hey, put your toothbrush here" but I liked this one better. I think I'm going to go back and get the soap dispenser that goes with this set. I resisted that day but I don't think I can for much longer. It's really quite a pretty set. Yay seashells!

I also got new bathmats because our old ones were blue and that would have been entirely too much blue. But now we have pretty shell ones as well as the surfer penguin one from my Mother-In-Law. Pretty awesome right?




So there you have it, these are the things I bought for our bathroom makeover, and the things we've gotten hung on the walls. We'll be getting new light-switch plates and a new plate for around the electrical outlet, I just haven't ordered them yet. We'll also get a new towel rack but meh, that also hasn't happened yet. For now we'll keep sticking the towels on the edge of the tub.
Here are a few more pictures of the bathroom though that aren't things bought or hung up for this project, but they show how pretty the bathroom now is. YAY for room makeovers! Next up....the bedroom....

These walls CLEARLY need something... possibly tentacles looking like they are coming out of the wall? WATCH OUT FOR THE KRAKEN! Also notice the awesomely big bag of seashells that my Mommy bought me, cuz I love seashells and the ocean. (Can't you tell?)














I'm happy this area turned out because when I was painting the area around the shower top had white splotches, but as it dried it evened out so it's all good now. Also notice how nice and even the paint at the ceiling looks.






~)O(~ Elfie ~)O(~ 

Superman here. First blog post by me. Personally, I don't feel my life is worth reading about. However, you're here so, obviously, you disagree. As you may have read in previous posts, I work in the IT Department of a moving company as the Helpdesk supervisor. Let me start by saying I love my job and owe my career to my boss. He hired me with no discernible IT experience and has given me great opportunities since. I learn something new pretty much everyday; it's awesome. Unfortunately, there are inherent suck factors in the IT field. Below is a pretty concise summary of, as the title states, Why It Sucks To Be The IT Guy. 


/* Infographic: Why it Sucks Being the IT Guy */

Upstairs bathroom makeover pt. 1

We decided to kick off 2013 with a makeover! Thanks to gifts cards from our very generous family we've been able to buy stuff for the house, including a bathroom makeover, and the first step was taken today. But first, the before pictures!

Now, one of the reasons we decided to start with the bathroom is.. well.. it's small. So it's easy and relatively inexpensive (in the grand scheme of things) to do. That and the previous owners tore the towel racks and toilet paper holder out of the wall and did a HORRIBLE job repairing it, and it bothered us. There is also the issue of the bathroom light switch- there are two sets, the one by the second door is on the outside of the bathroom door  instead of inside the bathroom. So we took off the big mirror so that eventually we'll be able to get the light switch put in the correct place. Below are the after painting pictures! However, the pictures DO NOT do the color justice at all! The color is more of a turquoise, robins egg blue- instead of the light blue it looks like here.