It has begun.

The annual ritual begun by our friend Chance...

MAYSTACHE.
The rules?
Choose your stache.
Wear it in the month of May. The WHOLE month of May.
NO CHIN HAIR.
Embrace the stache.

Rick got ready by growing the full goatee last week...

And then shaved...


To reveal his Maystache...
The Hulk Hogan.

AAAAHAAHAHAHAA

I can't wait for him to be in a meeting with a board member... or the superintendent... this month!

Anyone wanna join Rick in Maystache?? Come on, Carl! Phil? You in??

My Team.

MY SANDWICH!!!!!!!!!!!

(dont forget to turn off the music on the right first --------->)

I can't stand it

I think this is the freaking cutest thing I have ever seen in my life.
(make sure you turn off my songs on the right first ----->)


(click above to see the video or go straight to YouTube to check it out here)

Vote for Carl.

My bro-in-law, Carl (check out his blog "Cool Stuff Happening" on the right) is a really talented designer, and most recently he came up with this t-shirt design.

He designed this pretty (ok awesomely) rad shirt for the T-Shirt Contest Sponsored by Metropark and Obey. And seriously compared to most of the stuff out there, his design kicks butt. I think he totally deserves to win.

Click on the picture or the contest link above and vote for Carl, if you are so inclined. He is a cool guy and I think he deserves to win. :)

This face...

makes me want more babies!

Seriously I have never before felt like I needed another baby until I got to spend time with my cousin's little sweetie. But let.me.just.say. SHE IS SOOOOO ADORABLE. Then Rick reminded me of diapers and babyproofing and carseats and strollers... and I was okay with not having more kids (well, my ovaries were burning just a bit! ha!). I just need to play with someone else's kids every once in awhile.

I need my sisters to have kids soon! LOL

Basketball Season

Riley joined the 5-6 year old basketball team at the local community center, and let me just say it's pretty hysterical to watch him play. When we went to his first game, he was a little nervous at first...
Rick was out of town and Riley was feeling a little shy. Coach had the kids go out and do a couple of drills, practicing shooting some hoops before the game. Riley took a shot...

And it went up....

And IN!! That got him feeling a little better about playing.

After the practice time, it was game time. Coach took Riley out to the middle of the court for the opening coin toss (no jump balls here! ha!). Riley picked heads but it was tails - so the green team got the ball first.

Before the game started, Coach reminded the kids which direction they were supposed to take the ball. Believe me, the little guy in the blue shorts needed all the reminders he could get!

Riley had a big break in the first half! He got the ball and dribbled down the court...

He even positioned himself under the basket...

And even in traffic with people all around him (including his own teammates) trying to take the ball,

Riley managed to get a great shot off! Look at that form!

He didn't make the basket, but we were still so proud of him - and he was PUMPED after being in the middle of all the action!

Coach told Riley his position on defense was right at the top of the key... so Riley defended it pretty seriously!

And he ended up getting the ball and taking it down the court, even passing it to a teammate!

The game ended and as you can see the score was REALLY CLOSE. We almost had them!!

Maybe next time...

Violet was pretty proud of her little brother and was right there at the end to congratulate him on a job well done!

Riley's games are Saturday mornings at 10 am for the next few weeks. Let us know if you can make any of them... I know he would love to have friends in the stands cheering him on :)

Riley's announcement

(in the car on the way home from school)

"Mom! Guess what I can do?"

What, honey?

"I can touch my tongue to my uvula!"

*insert my stifled uncontrollable giggles*

"But... my uvula tastes funny."

Really? What does it taste like?

"Well... it tastes like uvula juice."

*insert my uncontrollable giggles that cannot be stifled any longer*

Progress?

Hopefully.
Rick is on his way home (he was gone for the weekend at Camp Cedar Crest for our church's college camp) and he said he's rarin' to go on the floors. Also, of course, being the guy he is, he wants to do a custom design in the entryway. Why not? I mean, I am sure it's a piece of cake when you have never done wood floors in your life, right? LOL

So here are a few pieces we laid out as we tried to determine our course of action. Isn't it purrrrty? And hopefully by tonight I can report that there has been quite a bit of action and maybe, just maybe the possibility of seeing my dishwasher back in the house before midweek. There's always hope, right?

How to re-tile your fireplace

So of course because we were redoing the floors, we decided we might as well get the fireplace done, too. It had the same, ugly tile surrounding it as the floor we just ripped up, and I wanted it gone. I really feel like by doing all this we are officially removing any evidence of the previous owners of the house.

I decided that I wanted the fireplace to be my project... mainly cause I was a little jealous that Rick got to do all the fun demo work and I didn't get to do any yet. Oh and because I wanted nothing to do with the jackhammering out of the old floor tiles. I figured this way I would be occupied with a pretty substantial project, and Rick wouldn't ask me to help him on his tremendously boring, tedious, and difficult project. So I got myself a crowbar and went at it, ripping out the old tiles and drywall till we were down to the studs.

Rick and I had gone to Lowe's and found the perfect materials for the surround... tumbled marble tiles and slate mosaic sheets. This baby is going to look classy when it's all done.

I had to clean up the drywall after my demo work, so I used a utility knife to cut away at the jagged edges of drywall that were left so that we had nice, straight lines to work with.

I got a new sheet of drywall and cut the pieces to size, then drilled the pieces right into the studs.

Of course by now Rick can't stand it that I am working on a fun project without him, so he came over and spread a layer of thinset over the whole area to prepare it for the tile.

I insisted on doing the thinset on the floor, though :)

After spreading the thinset, I laid out the tiles in our cool design. As soon as everything was in place, I cleaned it up with the sponge. Then, once again, Rick had to get involved so he set the tile that went up the wall.

The next morning I couldn't believe how great it looked - and it wasn't even grouted yet! I really like that we extended it all the way to the bottom of the shelf. It makes the fireplace really stand out and appear more substantial.

Since Rick decided he wanted to take over by this point, I let him do all the grouting ;)

I totally love that moment when you start wiping off the grout and you can really see just how awesome the tile will look when it's all done...

And, really... it already looks great here and we don't even have floors yet! Once the wood butts up to the edge of the hearth, it's going to seriously kick some fireplace butt. And I am not just saying that because I helped set the tile. It's really going to look awesome!

My favorite part about it is just how classy it looks... while also retaining a handcrafted feel with the different types of stone. All that's left is a nice waterproofing sealer that will bring out the shine in the slate and it will be perfect!

How You Know

You are in the middle of a home renovation project...

your fridge is in the family room...

and the dishwasher is in the backyard. yaaaaaaaaay!