down to the river

Last Wednesday,

after a squabble about what we should have for lunch,

I up and decided we were having a picnic at the river.

It had been waaaay too long since we'd been.

I've often thought it would be neat 

to return weekly to the same place

and observe changes in nature.

I've never planned it, though,

because

weekly

is a big commitment.

I decided that this might be the year.

And the river might be the place.

And even if we don't always make it to the river weekly,

if I at least make it a (soft) goal,

we'll make it occasionally.

And occasionally

is better 

than never.

Right?

We went back today

and I didn't bring my camera,

but my goodness, I wish I would have!! 

The river was sooo much lower than it was

just last week!

This is going to be fun.

😊

go to the river 𑂽 Check!

weary and worn

I'm feeling really worn out,

so I'm listening to this song on repeat

(I prefer it live in my LEM,

but listening to the original artist on youtube is okay too)

I thought maybe you might need to listen too.

This one is pretty great also

to help me regain perspective.

one way to fold a quilt

Remember the Pigeon quilt??

It sold!!

😀

I've been meaning to share how I fold quilts 

so that they don't get strong creases in them

with my new friend, Carolyn,

and figured I may as well share it here, too,

in case anybody else would like to know.

Since this one is going away soon,

well, it was a no-brainer to use it in my demo.

Obviously,

if you have a larger quilt, you'll just add a few more folds

in each direction.

The key is 

to fold diagonally,

and when you unfold your quilt

you won't have strong creases in it.

I have more of this fabric,

so if you felt great sadness in your heart

when you saw that the awesome pigeon quilt sold,

don't fret - I can make a similar one for you :-)

let there be light

Now that we actually have some progress to speak of,

I figured it was time for a house update.

As a reminder,

at the time of my last post

all ceilings and walls were primed 

and ceilings were painted,

but the only walls that were painted

were Brandon's.

Currently,

we've got color on the walls in the boys' room also

(PPG Tornado - same as in Brandon's room)

as well as in the playroom

(PPG color matched Sherwin William's Waterscape @ 60%)

and living room / dining room / kitchen,

and the pantry and mudroom

PPG color matched Valspar Clothesline Fresh @40%)

squeeeal!!!

We've got oh, probably 20-25% of the receptacles (outlets) installed 

and several light switches.

My dad came down Friday and Saturday

and finished up getting the breaker box set up,

and did the wiring of 3-way switches

which is much trickier than regular switches

and required more talking to himself than usual ;-)

and helped Tyler and Brandon install the final door.

Jeannie came with him on Saturday

and helped me paint the second coat in the playroom.

(My friend, Eva, had come earlier in the week 

and painted the first coat with me,

so that room's had a lot of love already :-)

The most exciting progress though,

aside from the fact that we

(obviously)

 finally picked our main color

(and painted it everywhere it goes except the entryway)

is lights!!

Tyler and I spent about 3 hours at Lowe's Friday night 

and came home with

lights for all of the closets,

two lights for the mudroom

(one of which I love so much, 

it makes me squeal and smile every time I see it!)

and all but one of the ceiling fans we still needed

(actually we still need 2 - we'd forgotten

 that we wired the office/music room for a fan too - oops)

We've installed several can lights over the past week;

the only ones left are the kitchen  and dining rooms

which weren't installed

because Miss Picky wasn't happy with the ceiling's paint job yet.

The 4th (or maybe it was the 5th?) coat 

(applied at 9:30 last night)

did the trick,

so we'll get those put in this week.

Friday night

Brandon and Tyler installed  the mudroom lights,

and Saturday

they installed

all of the closet lights,

the front porch fans and over the door light,

and the absolutely perfect living room ceiling fan/light

It's all very exciting!!

(Tyler and Brandon went out while I was finishing typing up this post 

and finished up the kitchen and dining room can lights!

I nixed the installation of the pendant lights, though,

for fear of bumping heads and breaking the lights

during the remainder of the construction

especially flooring installation

which should begin before long!!)