The time has come

After receiving some nearly life threatening threats, I've decided it's time to update the 'ol blog. I have thought about updating it about one million times, but I feel like I don't have anything to say so, I read a book instead. Speaking of books, I am trying to plow my through the Fablehaven series. The lady in my ward that said she loved them and gave them to me to read is a die hard fan of the books and their author, Brandon Mull. I honestly feel like the books are never going to end. I am finally on the fifth and last book. I was so happy to almost be done with them so I could return them to her and with a clear conscience, tell her that I had actually read them. I was at her house for some reason one day and she asked me how the reading was going. I told her that I was almost done with the fifth book. We talked a minute about the books and all the sudden she was handing me another series by Brandon Mull called, The Beyonders. I told her thank you and took the books but, truth be told I have zero desire to read said books. The problem is I judge books by their cover and the books look so so stupid. Not like, oh those look stupid but they might be good. Nope, they just look stupid. I have found out that I don't like books about dragons, fairies, unicorns, wizards and demons. I don't have the heart to tell this, stand in line for three hours at Comic Con to meet the author, owns every book Brandon Mull has written including character guides so you can see a picture of what every character in the Fablehaven series looks like, lady in our ward that I'm not a fan. Instead I will read the books and return them to her. I had to take the written driving test in this lovely state in order to get a driver's license here. I imagine I like Brandon Mull books about as much as I liked reading the driving handbook. It's not great is all I'm saying. Maybe if Fablehaven was one book I would like it. Five books about the same thing is just a little much. Trying to see the silver lining here, at least I now know that reading Harry Potter is totally out of the question. Eight books about wizards?! I think I would rather have toothpicks shoved under my fingernails. No thank you! Anyway, I didn't intend to blab on and on about books, I just get too easily distracted. Once I was in Hobby Lobby and I saw a sign that said, "If I had a dollar for every time I got distracted, hey! let's go for a bike ride!" Oh man how I wish I had spent the $10 and bought the sign. Anyway, let's see here. The last time I wrote I believe the time was upon us to get new floors installed. Some of you may not know this about my sweet little hubby but, he has a really hard time making decisions. When we went to pick out the flooring, he had to go back several times to look at the same flooring samples. And that's after we had already brought some home to see how they would look in our house. Picking the carpet was no different and even after he picked the kind he liked, we left the store and he still wasn't sure if he was happy with his choice. I told him maybe we should go back in so he could look at the other ones again just so he could make sure he was happy with his final choice. He said he felt stupid going in again because we had already gone back so many times. Instead he had me call them and tell them that we wanted to change our minds and go with the other carpet that we had looked at. When I called the guy and he found out who I was and that we were changing our minds, he just started laughing. If I remember right, the first time we went in to look at the flooring was last September. B finally picked the flooring he liked at the end of April. No lie. We set up the date for the carpet guys to come and start taking out the tile and the nasty old carpet. The guy that showed up brought his very young son to help him. I know that I'm old but, his son looked like he was about 12. I was surprised when the dad left his son to do all the work. Ok, not all the work, just most of it.

 Here is the young squire hard at work. I truly had no idea that taking up tile took so long and was so loud. We had asked if there was any way we could donate the tile to Habitat for Humanity and in a very nice way they told me there was no way. He said when you take out tile, it gets smashed to smithereens. Well, he didn't use the word smithereens but, he could have and it would have summed it up perfectly. It took them two days to take out this tile where the wet bar had been. Then it was time to lay the new carpet. 

Here's a reminder of the before picture. I wish I had gotten a better shot of the wet bar but, you get the idea.

Here's after. No wet bar, new paint and carpet. I think it looks awesome! B talks about getting a ping- pong table or one of those indoor basketball games like they have at Chuck E. Cheese but, I love that it's so open. That the offspring can run around acting like hooligans with no risk of falling and hitting their face on a ping-pong table or basketball hoop. We'll see what happens. Anyway, the carpet guys finished downstairs and moved upstairs.

It was so loud that little B and I tried to stay out of the house. We played at parks, went to Costco and played at the scooter park. If we were home, we hung out downstairs. I don't remember how many days it took this young fellow to break up the tile and then scrape off the backer board, but it felt like it took an eternity.

I know it looks like there's still tile down, but that's just the backer board. He broke up all the tile and then took a lunch break before he cleaned it up. The amount of dust that was covering every surface of our upstairs was truly amazing. It was even dusty inside the cabinets that had been closed the whole time they were working. It was crazy.

Laying the wood down. Wouldn't it have been so awesome if I had gotten a picture of them laying the carpet too? Too bad I thought of that tonight as I was typing. Rats! 

Here's a before shot. Don't judge the mess. I didn't think about getting a before shot until we had already started to move things to get ready to paint before the floor went in. 

Here's the after. New paint, carpet and wood makes a big difference. We have big dreams of redoing the cabinets and counter tops, but those will have to wait. We are so happy with our floors and if you ever want to see them in person, you're more than welcome to come!