Random Stuff

The very next day after Easter, Charlotte was so excited to build her bird house. She wanted to do it in the morning before school but we didn't have time and so I told her it would have to wait until after she got home. She had activity days right after school that day and I had to make dinner, but we did finally get to it later that evening. I had to help her hammer the nails halfway down and then she would take it from there. She loved building this and can't wait to fill it with bird seed and hang it up.

I have since bought the bird seed but we haven't had a chance to hang it up yet. Curtis got right to work on our downstairs bathtub when we got back from our Easter trip. The night that I helped Charlotte with her birdhouse, he was busy applying this red waterproof stuff to the shower walls. It's a rubbery substance that helps keep water from leaking through and needs to be applied before doing tile. I had never seen this stuff until I saw the pictures of my sister's shower installation and they had used the same stuff.

He did most of it on Monday and touched up on Tuesday.

I was so happy to see these purple flowers blooming out front in our yard. There are more every day!

This was early last week and of course there are more now. So pretty and so far the only flower I have seen in the front yard (other than dandelions).

Before our Easter trip, we went ahead and had the boys move all of their stuff out of the bedroom upstairs down to the basement so that we can start work on the upstairs as soon as the bathroom is finished. I tried to get a few things done in both bedrooms (where the girls were and where the boys were) but there wasn't much I could do. I managed to take down the blinds and pull out a few nails and screws from the walls.

This is the room the boys were in. It will eventually become Garrett's room. We're going to fix it up as much as we can before Curtis and I move our stuff into it when we're ready to demo our bedroom and start remodeling in there.

The girls were getting ready to start softball and t-ball so I decided to get out the baseball mitts last week. I was a bit surprised to find mold and mildew on most of them because they were in a plastic drawer outside where it has been rained on and obviously moisture got inside but did not air out quick enough. Fortunately, the girls' gloves were okay.

Covered in black spots on both sides.

My first thought was to throw them away but I'm hoping I can find a way to clean them off. There was one that didn't have much mildew (white spots) on it that I used a mixture of vinegar water on and it looks much better now. I will have to try it on the others also.

While I was out back that same day, I discovered that we have bleeding heart bushes, 3 of them! I'm so excited because I had one in our previous house and I love them! I also saw a few other flowers blooming. I am learning that we have a lot of tulips and daffodils. Yay!

Lots of tulips getting ready to bloom by these daffodils.

There are little purple flowers on these by the pool.

Speaking of flowers. I did finally take a picture of the painting Whitney had done for me on our trip. I have it on our fireplace right now.

It's so pretty!

It just looks too small in this spot. I can't hang stuff on the walls until we're done painting. If you look close, you can see Sage sitting on the couch in the TV reflection, ha ha. The cats love that spot because it's right where the sun comes through the window. Sage gets unhappy if Cocoa gets in her spot.

Nikki had called early in the week and asked if she could come visit for the weekend. I said "of course!" She drove down Thursday evening and I made some Zuppa Toscana (Italian soup) and homemade French bread for dinner. I didn't get a picture of the soup but the bread looked so good that I had to. This recipe is so easy I don't know why I don't make it more often. It's probably for the best though if we ever want to lose weight, ha ha. That night Nikki, Charlotte and I went on a walk because we had eaten too much. We got both cats to follow us for our entire walk, which was about 1/4 mile one direction, so 1/2 mile total. It was took dark to get a picture of them on the walk but was super cute when they both plopped down on the floor when we got back. It was also cute that Sage would continually look back for Cocoa while we were walking. Then a different cat had run across the street and started a cat fight with Cocoa. Sage went back to check on him. By then, the other cat walked away. It's like she's his mother or just a really good big sister.

Yummy French bread!

Charlotte approved!

I wanted to show Nikki the view we have just walking down the road a little ways. Love these girls! (Alice would have come but she fell asleep on the couch.)

Me and Nikki

Plopped down on the floor after our walk.

While we were walking, Curtis was working on the tile for the bath. It took some time to figure out how to mix the mortar to the right consistency and other things, so he didn't get much done, but at least it's started!

We liked the tile we saw in grandma's bathroom and this is very similar to it.

This post has gotten long so I will end it here. Lots of stuff going on!