School Room Reno: Install part 1

Well the weekend I have been waiting for finally came! Our friend got here on Friday afternoon, and after a brief planning session the men took off to the store to buy the supplies. Here's what we were looking at the night before we started building:

My spirits were SUPER high at this point…I could not wait for the boys to get started. It really was too late to start anything tho…and they were hoping to go see a movie together. So this was as far as we got on Friday night.

The next morning they were up and at 'em by 8 am though!

First thing they had to do was set up the tools and get all of the smaller cuts done. They had the guys at Home Depot cut a lot of the boards down for them so they could fit in our van, but there was still quite a bit of cutting to do

While our friend worked on getting the first cuts done, hubby set to the task of taking off the base board and getting the carpet pulled back. We are *eventually* going to replace the flooring in the entire downstairs, and we knew we didn't want a chunk of carpet sitting under these cabinets. so straight down to the slab we went!

Here they are getting the tacking strip up and vacuuming all of the concrete dust. Our friend had worked on getting part of the bases for the cabinets built while hubby was still working on the base boards. 

They made the bases to the cabinets in 2 pieces….the two large cabinets and the window seat was one big piece and then the cabinet on the right side had it's base contracted separately for ease in fitting together.

The first cabinet they attached was the small one for the window seat.

The they worked on attaching the two cabinets on the left of the window seat.

Once that was done, we flipped them over and they worked on getting the right cabinet fitted and then attaching them all to the wall.

At this point it was early evening and they needed to make another run for supplies that we had forgotten. With plans to head out and come back with a little time to hopefully finish constructing the window seat and get the counters on, they left. But the shopping trip that was only supposed to take an hour ended up taking three…partly because of traffic, and partly because my husband's ADD kicked in. They didn't make it back to the house until 10:30, and no more work was getting accomplished on Saturday. So that was where the day ended…and this is what my living room look like at the end of the night:

Awesome right? I love construction zones with little kids!

I'l be honest…I was starting to freak out a little bit. At this point in the project we had hoped to have the bulk of the construction done with the cabinets, possibly even start working on prepping the walls for the shelves if we were doing really good. Our friend only had a limited amount of hours to work on Sunday and then he had to head home…and that window seat was laughing at me, I could hear it.

My husband had warned me last week that he felt if they got the cabinets finished by the end of the weekend, then he would call the weekend a success. Which, sure…I get that. Projects like these always come with little surprises that make the timeline stretch out. But I'm a realist…I knew whatever they didn't get done on this weekend, I would be doing myself. And I preferred not to be putting those shelves up.

I didn't get as many pictures taken on Sunday in-between taking care of the kids and going to church. Here is a picture of hubby working on the window seat:

And here's what it looked like when our friend left to travel home again. It looks great huh?? I mean…I seriously love that window seat, and they did put in a full weekend of work. And we were SO grateful for our friend to take time away from his family and come up and help us.

But yeah…we still have a bit of work ahead of us. We'll get there though…this is a good learning experience for us!

School start is quickly approaching!! Are you ready? I'm not nervous at all…hehehe!

happy homeschooling!

School Room Reno: Paint

We made some more progress on the school room this week, so I'm fairly stoked about that!

 I wasn't actually planning on painting this week, but Oldest had a rough day early in the week, as we were carting Middle around to all of his various appointments. I feel for her…I really do. So much of what Middle has to do for therapy seems like 'play', mostly with things we don't have available to use at the house. And he gets individualized attention from an adult who goes out of their way to make things fun and interesting. I'm sure to her, it does seem really unfair at times. And it's hard to remember that she is young too…they are only 18-months apart. She doesn't understand that what would be play for her is really a whole lot of work for him.

So when she said to me "Mommy, I wish I could be like Middle." on Tuesday after OT, I knew we needed to do something out of the ordinary that day, and have a little mommy/ daughter time.

And why not seize the opportunity to check off a to-do at the same time?! Ha!

So there's Oldest. She's a fun kid, and thankfully not really afraid of hard work! She was excited to paint, she hadn't had an opportunity to do it again since we painted our formal dining room when we first moved in over 2 years ago.

I decided to paint the school room white. I was talking with my sister-in-law about this decision later in the week and she says " White? Really? You know in the Waldorf school we looked at they painted their walls purple, because purple is supposed to keep the children calm and help them focus."

I don't know much about how color effects people, but I agree with wanting the room to be a place where my children can focus. White seemed like the least distracting color possible! And there are going to be pops of color…I mean this is a school room, for goodness sake!

One thing I do have to say about painting a room white though….choose good paint. Or use a primer, even if you buy the "paint and primer in one" kind of paint like we did. This is what the room looked like after two coats of paint:

Ugh…another coat?? Seriously?? I'm not sure we bought enough paint…

Thankfully the 3rd coat rocked it! Phew! (And yes, there is Middle. Now you have met all of the kids!)

If you are wondering, the wall with the window didn't get painted because we have some very special plans for that wall in the upcoming weeks. Eeeeekk! I can't wait!

I've also been busy this week finishing up my lesson plans for the first 8 weeks, and working on some final touches for the school room. This week I worked up some box numbers for the kid's work boxes, and I thought I would share! There are enough labels for 8 work boxes.  Just click on the picture to grab them for yourself!

Oldest got Disney Princess because they're classic and timeless. Middle got Super Hero Lego Mini-figs…because we're all about super heroes and legos in this house!

Well that's all for this week!

happy homeschooling!

School Room Reno : Before

So we're planing to have the school room finished by mid-August, and I could not be MORE excited. Seriously.

We moved into this house 2.5 years ago, and I had GRAND dreams of everything I wanted to do to personalize every room. It hasn't quiet turned out like I expected, but when does it ever?

So far…we've painted the main rooms downstairs. and when I say main rooms I mean the formal dining, living, and foyer. The kitchen is still a nasty burnt orange... that is likely my next plan of attack after the school room..

That's it. I don't even have my pictures hung…pitiful. No wonder I've had a hard time adjusting here!

In my defense I did get pregnant within three months of moving here. And I was siiiiiiiiiiiick that whole 10 months. And then I had to survive the first year with three kids. Which brings us roughly to today!

So here's what the playroom/future school room looks like today…

It's cluttered. Clutter is my enemy. And we've actually pared down A LOT on what toys we have in here. I have just been so tired of the mess. The only reason it is as clean as it is in this picture is because the clutter is somewhat manageable now!

I love our kidney bean table. That was a craigslist find shortly after we moved here. Middle's therapists stressed the need for him to have a table short enough to put his feet on the floor. The man who sold it to me was so kind…I think he had another buyer who wanted it for a preschool but he felt we needed it more. And it has been well loved. We will continue to use this table for homeschool.

Those unfinished cabinets are going to be part of the reno. Another craigslist find. There is a guy in my area who does custom built utility sheds, but wants to branch out into custom cabinetry. In the real world these cabinets should have cost me upwards of 500$. But I was able to get all 4 of them for about 240$.

I've started to get things organized into these nifty clear shoeboxes from Michaels. Heavenly Father is pretty awesome…He inspired me to go check on a workbox cart I have been waiting to go on sale since January. Not only was the cart on sale, but ALL storage was on sale, with an additional 25% off coupon! So I picked up a couple of these boxed sets of 14 clear plastic boxes! Yay!

Annnnnnnnnd then there is this…

Who doesn't love a baby who tries to get in on the action when you're taking picture?

happy homeschooling!