The hallway

Well, it's definitely not perfect – but it's an improvement.

Before:
Carpet removed:
After:
I stuck with the Minwax brand again, but this time again I tried the stain and poly combo. It was definitely less time consuming, but I still find staining to be the most annoying process ever and hope to never do it again.

My only issue with the floor is that I don't like the way it looks when coming up in the stairs. I like the floors from every other direction, but for whatever reason – the glare from the hallway light makes them look super shiny in random places from the angle. I'm hoping once they get walked on enough, this won't be an issue anymore.

Happy Birthday Chip!

My little guy turned 4 today. I can't believe it's been more than 3 years since we rescued him.

One Month

The beer-tasting party is a month away. Time to get serious.

Wine cork madness

The 500 wine corks I ordered all arrived in the mail yesterday.


Two hours into my latest project, I realized I didn't order enough. Awesome. Looks like I will be hitting up eBay for another 500 or so.

The wet bar project

Brent and I love the wet bar in the man cave, but there is one issue – it's kind of ugly.


The countertops, the cabinets, the mirror – it's all blah. Especially, considering this eyesore is 5 feet away from the bar.

So what's the plan? To make it match the bar, of course. The cabinets will be going black and the countertop will be replaced to match the bar's (it's hard to tell from the photo, but that countertop is currently green). And don't worry, that terrible mirror will be replaced as well.

Look what Brent and I bought over the weekend:
And I'm so happy we bought it when we did, because we discovered this pre-made pattern is being discontinued. (This is why we had to buy this large of a countertop – it was the only thing left). If we had waited another week – bad things might have happened. We picked this countertop for the bar based on the fact alone that Home Depot sold pre-mades in this style that we could use for the wet bar.

Luckily though, karma was on our side and not only did we get what we needed, but it was 50% off. Yay!

So another project to have done before the beer-tasting party gets added to the list. Ummm, yay?

(We used to have a mini fridge in the wet bar gap, but Brent sacrificed that to the keg box. We're debating between a wine fridge and a beverage cooler for the space. While it would be nice to have this for the party, we are in no rush – especially considering I'd rather spend money on other things).

Penguins in July

When I think about Hallmark, I don’t think of cards or gift wrap – I think ornaments. And I love ornaments…especially those with penguins on them.

Hallmark’s ornament premiere is this weekend, and I’m sure Brent will be thrilled to learn my penguin tree will be growing by at least 4 ornaments this year.


While I'm not planning on going to the premiere, I do plan on hitting Hallmark up before long. I waited too long last year and didn’t get several ornaments on my list – that mistake will not be made again.

If you are a penguin ornament lover like myself, you have to check out the blog My Penguin Tree. Donald puts all other penguin trees to shame, with the amount of ornaments in his stash. So how many does he have? Enough to dedicate an entire blog to them.

Paper Fun

I love planning parties for the paper aspect alone. Sure, setting the menu and figuring out the decorations is fun – but the save the dates, invitations, napkins, place cards, etc., is where it's at for me. This is why I'm a graphic designer, because I know I'll always have the love of making paper pretty.

It's this reason alone, that Brent's beer-tasting party had a save the date:
I love the simplicity of the pint-glass theme, so I decided to stick with it.

The invites that are going out next week:

Since the purpose of the beer-tasting party is to try new beers, and hopefully find a few keepers – I want to have paper at each station so tipsy people can write beer names down to remember later. But why have blank paper, when you can do personalized notepads at Vistaprint? (Especially when said notepads are dirt cheap).

The notepads:
Yes, I know I am having way too much fun, but I really don't care.