More Progress and Fun

On the 24th of January, Garrett and I had an appointment at his school to figure out his classes and take a tour. The assistant principal met with us first to talk about the school and answer any questions and then we met with the counselor to choose classes. We did find out that they only have 6 class periods, where Skyview had 8. They have all of their classes every day, where Skyview had an A/B schedule that did 4 on one day and 4 the next. Garrett is already ahead on credits because of that but it's going to make things difficult to get enough graduation credits for Jack. They need 24 credits to graduate and seminary does not count as a credit. At this school there is no early morning seminary as an option either. The principal did say that there are some classes that can be taken as a 7th period class either before school or after and some are done online. And some classes in middle school count towards high school credits, but it's a little late for Jack to be able to figure that out. Maybe the girls will be able to.

Anyway, one of the other students at the high school gave Garrett and me a tour of where his classes will be. Garrett was pretty nervous about starting school after we were done. The boys started on the 30th. I wasn't able to go get a tour with Jack at his school so I didn't get a picture of him in front of his school. His is called Chinook. It's practically across the street so maybe one of these days I'll make him get a picture.

I made Garrett get a picture in front of the school before we went in.

Last Saturday Curtis removed the "popcorn" ceiling in the boy's room. Yay! I can't wait to get rid of all of it! Things are going slower than we hoped and we've had some set backs but we're getting there a little at a time. After knocking down the ceiling, he applied some primer paint. 

Popcorn ceiling removed in Jack's room.

Primer paint applied to the ceiling.

After accomplishing that, we decided to have another date night and scratched off another card. It did not include food on this card, so we just decided to go out to Applebee's for an appetizer and dessert as well. We had trouble getting the one hour photo selected when ordering and ended up choosing to have it delivered, so it didn't show up until Thursday I think. But we finished it then! 

Curtis ordered the Triple Chocolate Meltdown but we shared our desserts. I didn't care for the chocolate cake very much but it was okay.

I ordered the Butter Pecan Blondie and it was good! I would definitely eat that again. I was not expecting it to come out on a sizzling hot pan. That's a first for a dessert.

We tweaked it a little and got a photo frame instead of album.

Charlotte brought home a book order form from school and was begging me to get her some Pokémon books because she has gotten excited about Pokémon since watching the shows on TV. I told her I didn't want to get her books that she wasn't going to read. I have been having a hard time getting her to read books that are more challenging and her grade level. My mother in law gave her the whole Spiderwick Chronicles book series the night before we moved (and Charlotte wanted them) and she read maybe a couple of pages of the first book and stopped. She came up with the idea that she would read the whole first Spiderwick book if I would get her some Pokémon books. I liked the idea but added to it. She's supposed to do 4 reading activities a month after reading a book. I told her she would have to read the whole book AND do an activity to go with it, then I would buy her two of the books. She read that book in two days and it was over 100 pages! Then she did the activity, "Book in a Box", the very next morning before school. I was super impressed with her and of course, I ordered those books after she got home from school that day. 

I gave her the idea to glue some grass and a tree branch into the box. I'm hoping that it will spark some more creativity with the next book and activity. The white papers are a white van and then a couple of goblins and the boy with the spy glass to see the magical creatures. She drew the house on the cardboard in the back.

Curtis was able to do the texture on Jack's ceiling during the week. Friday I went in to get my Washington driver's license and then Saturday we took Curtis to get his. It's nice they are open on Saturdays. Then we went across the street to take care of our license plates and title transfers. It was expensive, holy cow! We spent over $600 to do the van and truck. It was $80 each for the driver's licenses as well. Gee, welcome to Washington, pay up! After that, we found a bank to open a new account with since our current bank doesn't have a branch in Tri Cities. We were wanting to get away from that bank because of fees anyway.

After returning home we made a trip to Walmart to buy some last minute birthday stuff and Curtis wanted to get Alice a new bike since her tire was ruined on her old bike and she's been asking him to fix it so she can ride. She needed a bigger one anyway. Garrett had bought a Pokémon set for Jack for his birthday the night before. Then Jack went to Walmart with us and ended up buying himself the exact same thing Garrett picked out. Garrett was disappointed but decided to just keep it for himself, so they both had one. That left Charlotte feeling very sad that everyone else was getting something new and she really wanted some Pokémon stuff right now. We both caved and felt bad, so I took her back to the store to get something, but she had to ride bikes with Alice afterwards as part of the deal. 

The girls were going to ride out front by themselves but I ended up staying out there with them. Both of the girls needed to get used to riding their bikes and were struggling to do it on the sidewalk so I took them across the street to the school parking lot. That helped a lot. Pretty quick they were zooming all over the parking lot. Alice did fall down a few times but did not get seriously hurt. It was also really cute that Sage followed us over there and stayed with us until we headed back home and followed.

Finally, I was able to go help Curtis do some painting on Jack's bedroom. We did primer paint first on the ceiling and some spots on the walls. Then we did the regular paint. We're making progress again. Woo hoo!

Painting primer.

After we were done with the regular paint. It was still drying so you can see lines.

Again, we'll be able to see it better when we get new lights.

Work Rolls On

The day after my birthday was the girl's first day at their new school. I was told to bring them early around 8:15am so we could have a tour of the building and meet teachers before going to class. School starts at 8:40am. We couldn't believe how big their elementary school is! The vice principal gave us the tour and he's super nice. Alice's teacher is Mrs. Shay and Charlotte's teacher is Mr. Calderon. He's a big 49ers fan and you can see it in his classroom. Both teachers are very nice. Their school is called Sage Crest Elementary. That will be easy enough to remember since our cat's name is Sage. Ha ha! The girls were nervous and excited to go to school and they had a great first day. I drove them to and from school this day but they started on the bus the very next morning. I love that the bus stop is right in front of our house. I go out with them in the morning to wait for the bus and meet them out front after school. We thought they would be the only kids at this bus stop since they had just created it for our girls, but there is one other older boy, probably a 5th grader. He must have found out about this being a closer stop or maybe he just moved here also. I'm not sure. Our bus stop is first in the morning and last in the afternoon.

This is the biggest elementary school I have ever seen and with all the growth in this area they are already using portables for 4th and 5th grades. Crazy! They're going to have to build another new school soon or something.

Meanwhile, the boys and I have been busy getting the house torn apart and prepped for renovation.

Garrett removing the carpet from the lower stairs.

Garrett and Jack removing staples.

The two closets in Jack's room. The boys are painting primer on the brown wood, which are shelves.

Jack's room. You can see one of the boys over there working on the closets.

View from the other end.

The girl's room before painting.

The girls' room.

Garrett removing tile from the front landing by the stairs. We will be replacing it with vinyl flooring.

Painting the girl's room using our new paint spray gun. 

Garrett had the roller to get the drips or excess paint. We also had to buy a work light because we had to remove the ceiling fan/light. 

Curtis used the sprayer on the closet doors for Jack's room, but it turned out to be a mistake. It got way too much paint on them and kept dripping and dripping. It got to where the drips were drying. It looked so bad and we ended up sanding them down. Curtis bought us an electric sander. It was kind of fun to use actually. That ended up being a job I could do during the day.

The girl's room after being painted. It's not the best picture. When we get a new light hung in there it will be easier to see.

I did have the boys help a little with the sanding but you can see how thrilled they were to do it. Jack was excited at first but after a couple minutes he was done. I was fine doing most of it anyway because I wanted to make sure it got sanded down enough (or not too much). Although, I didn't do it perfectly either. We didn't sand the entire doors, just spots that were bumpy.

We found a vinyl floor color that we like. This will go in kitchen, the bathrooms, front landing, downstairs hallway, utility room and family room. We were going to put it on the stairs also but the Home Depot people said we can't put floating floors on stairs, so it will be carpet.

After painting the closet doors for the 2nd time, this time using a roller and brush. They look so much better, trust me!

Finally, a picture with me! That's right, I am working also. I ended up doing all of the painting of the closet doors the 2nd time around.

This was the carpet sample board we brought home. At first we thought we wanted the darkest one on the bottom right corner but we changed our minds and went with the other not as dark gray one on the right side, 2nd row down. It's called Cannon. I had a hard time deciding. I hate having to pick out colors and wish someone could just do it for me. The carpet will be in all of the bedrooms and on the stairs.

In between all of the work, we do have some fun. One Sunday after church, the boys wanted to play Garrett's new Clue game. It's a new version. Curtis and I played with them. It's fun because it's kind of a co-op game where we work together to solve different puzzles and at the end make our own accusations.

We're working hard and having fun!

My 40th Birthday

My 40th birthday was fairly uneventful and I didn't do much during the day. If I remember right, I think I slept in that morning because I didn't sleep well or something. Alice was the first one to tell me happy birthday in the morning. She's such a sweet heart. Curtis said he was first because he emailed me earlier. I said that didn't count. She beat him saying it in person. At the time, he was still working at home in the basement so I said there's no excuse. 😆

I did get a surprise delivery from my in-laws for some Crumbl Cookies in the morning also. It was my first time getting any of these cookies. I have only tasted it from when Jeanie had some for her birthday last year. I decided to save them for my birthday "cake" later that evening.

It says "Deedra we love you so much. Since your so busy I thought this could take place of your Birthday cake. Enjoy! You don't have to but you can share." 

They were delicious!

During the day, we put the boys to work on ripping off old trim in the basement. They love tearing things up and we're trying to keep them busy while they don't have school. Not to mention, we want to fix up our house as quickly as possible.

Curtis bought me date night challenge cards for one of my gifts. We don't know what the date will be until we scratch it off to see what's under. We used the first one for our dinner date that night. The first card said to go to your favorite fast food restaurant and order everything off of the dollar menu. Our first thought was, who has dollar menus anymore??? After some searching online we found that Taco Bell was probably our best bet. Things were over a dollar on their dollar menu but they were still inexpensive. 

The card gives you an idea of what it's about. This one says "Travel" and "Grub". So we know we'll have to go somewhere for food. It also says we'll spend about $20-$30 and 1-2 hours of time.

That's a lot of food!

We only ordered one of each thing and split it. We even shared our drink.

Whew, about halfway through all that food!

We ate all of it except the last bag of cinnamon twists. (There were two)

It said we would spend between $20-$30 and that's exactly right! Not too bad. Of course, the more expensive things did taste better.

After stuffing ourselves, we went back home to celebrate my birthday with the kids. It was the first birthday celebration in our new house.

I was able to use my phone tripod I received from Christmas to take our family picture.

I got some chocolates (with nuts) and a Dominoes game.

Alice wanted to give me something, so she went to her room and found puppets she made at school to give to me.

I'm wearing my new necklace and bracelet set. (Given to me the previous week from Laverne and Dad)

The Dominoes game came with 4 trains but was technically for a different type of game. We used them to play Mexican Train since we already knew how to play it.

It might not have been the 40th birthday I had thought I might get (thinking about it the last couple of years). No black balloons or "Over the Hill" banners and no friends or big surprises but it was a good birthday, just our little family (minus Nikki). I do consider all of the open houses we had before our move as part of my birthday party, they just didn't know it. 😉

There was one present that Curtis had ordered and it came after my birthday. We just finished putting it together last night.

Curtis took this picture on our Oregon Coast trip last summer. There is a lighthouse in the background.

It was obviously a custom ordered puzzle. Curtis wanted me to have a picture of my grandma to remember her by since we live farther away now. He also knows I love to do puzzles. It didn't say how big it was but we calculated it afterwards to be 300 pieces. The pieces are made out of wood, so that was nice but I did have to glue one piece back together that broke. This puzzle was more difficult to put together than I thought it would be but we did it and it was fun! Here's to many more birthdays in this house!