Not a big difference, but still...lol

This is what we got done tonight, didn't have much time, but got a little done. So here are the pictures...

Before, entry view

Before, "old" living room view

After, well sorta lol it will be a wall eventually...lol

After...bigger view

Let The Fun Begin!!

Well I have LOTS of pictures to upload but I will do that in a bit, but we have started the next phase in our renovation of our house...its kinda complicated when I explain it...but I will try my best lol...ok in our house there is a front room, that was just being used as misc whatever room lol and then the middle room which is huge, and it was our living room and then the kitchen and the dining room. The only way to get to the kitchen was through a single doorway from the living room, and then the only way to get to the dining room was through a single doorway from the kitchen..ok still w/me? lol sooo we opened up the wall between the living room and the dining room to make a double doorway, and then we are going to close off the single doorway from the living room to the kitchen and then eventually make the single doorway from the dining room to the kitchen, pretty much completely open...oh and the single doorway from the entry way to the living room, thats going to be closed off too, there are french doors from the entry way to the front room and then pocket doors from the front room to the living room...ok...sooo...then in the middle room we are going to build in a bathroom and a new closet/entry to the basement stairs. Anyways, so we started ripping things out last night ,and we have the double doorway from the middle room to the dining room open now, we are going to close in the single doorways tonight hopefully. So on Sunday because we knew we were going to get started with this, Tom said we should move our living room into the front room temporarily, so we started putting the front room together, and now I LOVE it, and we have decided we are going to leave it this way :) so thats what these pictures are...well actually I will add the pictures in seperate blogs because there are a lot of pictures, so sorry this going to be kinda backwards...

Before and after....opening of the wall

BEFORE....

Dining Room Wall before...

"Old" Living Room Wall before...

"Old" Living Room during...

"Old" Living Room after...

Dining Room after...

New Living Room Set Up

What a day!!

Well i haven't blogged for awhile, I had planned on it, but it just gets pushed to the back burner...oh well i'm here now lol :)

The weather has been really nice lately, and yesterday, it poured rain, and then this morning, it was freezing cold and the high for the entire week is 65, but like its suppose to get down to 33 tonight, and 30 tomorrow night, w/a chance of snow flurries!!! serioulsy...i hope not!! well anyways, we woke up early and went to garage sales all day...I was really in need of some short sleeve shirts for this summer, and I got a whole bunch of clothes, which was really nice to find. Oh and then, our church has a yearly thing called Sharefest where people donate their stuff that they would take to goodwill, and then the church sells it and the procedes go to projects they partner w/the public schools here in the city for...well this year they did it a bit different and literly opened a store, called ShareStuff, have thier own carts, price tags, shoe size tags, everthing w/their logo on it, lol, which for some reason impresses me LOL anyways, so we wanted to go check out the store today, and its just a few doors down from church, so we decided to just stay and go to the early service tonight at church...so anyways, that was our day today lol...it was fun and relaxing, but still busy and got our exercise lol...if all that makes any sense :)

Well Friday was my technical weigh in day that i record it, and i am officially down 4.4 lbs from last Friday...and down 10 lbs from my highest weight....so just disregard any numbers I had previously mentioned cuz like I said my scale was on the fritz...but its good now lol...

As boring as this has been, lol I guess i should get going, but hopefully one of these days, I'll come up w/something really interesting to blog about lol...for now, off to watch a movie :)

80 degrees?! seriously!!

It's been a really nice WARM weekend! it was 80 degrees here today!! I'm quite frustrated...We have a swing thing on our deck...last year some branches fell from a tree nearby and ripped up the awning really bad, so we took that off, then this year Tom brought it out from the garage, wasn't there maybe a week and some animal shredded the seat cushion, must have been a possum or raccoon or maybe a fleet of ghetto squirrels lol...so now we are down to a bare swing, it looks pretty ridiculous, but we are trying to figure out if we want another swing or a table and chairs now...we'll see :)

Its going to take some time getting used to my hair, I like it, but I did it this morning and it looked nothing like it did yesterday LOL...grr, so I went back and redid it cuz I didn't like it...I almost need a picture taped on the mirror or something lol...I hope I figure it out soon, its hard to not lose my cool when I'm getting ready in the morning, I have to remind myself to breathe, and that I will figure it out soon...how ridiculous is that?! LOL anyways moving on....

Well as far as weight loss and dieting goes....I totally blew it this weekend...weekends are always the hardest for me...HAHA JUST KIDDING!! sorry I needed to add a bit of humor to my day :) No actually I did VERY well, still no mt. dew... I lost count of how many days its been, but its ok...I don't miss it one bit! On the weekends we tend to eat out more and first of all we cut that down, and we went to Subway or we did even go to McDonalds...but I only had a grilled chicken and ice tea, HUGE difference from normal LOL anyways...I'm down almost 10 lbs now...:)

I hope I can get a lot done this upcoming week...just as productive as last week, I would like to get my scrapbook stuff organized and sorted through, but I keep ending up cleaning the house instead lol oh well it makes it nice, and it will all get done in the long run...well I'm off to bed, good night! :)

I finally did it...

I chopped my hair...and I really like it a lot!! Its growing on me more and more, and its SOOO much cooler...I was going to color it, but decided not to, it will naturally get high lights in the sun this summer...but I did buy a thing at Wal-Mart, its like a color shine or something like that...its just a clear coat that makes your hair shine more I guess, I don't really know...lol, I hope it works...if not, oh well, it washes out w/in 6 weeks or so...So anyways, yeah, let me know what ya think...
Up close...

Farther Away...

the back...not the best picture of the back...but it shows the length...:)

A New Me...

It's Friday and for the first time that I can remember, I'm kinda bummed that the weekend is here...crazy huh? lol...I have just had a really great week, getting a ton of stuff done, and having a great attitude doing it! I will wait here, while you pick yourself up off the floor....ok, you back now?crazy huh?! lol...anyways...I hope this weekend and next week are just as great, if not better!! :)

So I guess this week w/the 2 fires, and stuff just got more interesting...I guess in Southern Illinois there was a 5.2 earthquake this morning, its all over the news, and I guess it was felt up here in Northern Illinois, but Tom and I slept right through it! lol oh well, probably didn't miss much...

As some of you know, I have been talking and thinking about chopping my hair really short and coloring it...well I'm kinda stuck right now, cuz I can't decide which length to go with, and which color to go with...lol...but on the other hand, I am also considering just doing it w/o thinking about it...but I don't know, I am just afraid I will regret the quick decision...but luckily, my hair grows back really fast!

Well I have gone almost a whole week w/o mt. dew, and eating healthy. I was even offered mt. dew at my in-laws house the other day and I said no thank you and got a glass of water...I know, thats pretty crazy too...I think a whole new me is emerging, with the eating healthy and stuff, and with my productiveness(idk if that is even a word..lol)...I also started some medication my dr. gave me yesterday, so that should help w/the weight loss too, but before I started the medication this morning, I have already lost 5 1/2 lbs...so I'm really excited...anyways, I'm rambling, and its time to switch the laundry...so bye for now! :)

Wonderful Day

Today has been wonderful! It was really warm outside, we ate lunch outside and sat on the swing for a bit...I got a bunch of cleaning done, and was able to open my windows...I am really loving all the free time I have lately, I've been able to get a lot done!

So talk about creepy...today, at roughly the same time, we hear sirens going down our street, so Tom looked outside, and saw them turn a block away, so a bit later we were going for a drive, and drove down that way, and a block and 3 houses away another house was on fire...well at first it was creepy but on the news they said that it was a unattended grill that caught fire, and it was out in a short time, but still caused $25,000 in damage!

Another great day of eating healthy, and another day w/no mt. dew :) which for those of you who know me, know that is a HUGE deal LOL :)

Ah man, I'm so sore!!

Ok, so it has been quite the day!! I started out this morning by exercising and been eating healthy today, no mt. dew today either! I also got some laundry done. I'm really loving this warm weather, and the exercising, but my thighs are sore now...oh well, it will pay off...

well so i was grilling on the deck for dinner, and I thought, "man that smoke doesn't smell like grill smoke, that smells like house fire smoke" and I was hearing a lot of sirens, but I didn't know where they were going, well I looked to my right, and noticed that about 8 houses down from ours, i saw flames coming from their deck...so we hurried up and ate dinner, and went down the street there were lots of people standing around, but actually it started at around 5:30 or 6pm and they are still down there at 10pm...it was really bad, we were w/o electricity for awhile, and our whole house smells like we have been at a campfire lol...thank the Lord, no one was home at the time, and it was a rental, and i think i heard some people talking about how the people had just moved out...but they still lost some of their stuff they still had in the house...also some people were thinking that it was arson, and possibly arson by the landlord! so who knows, but anyways, that was the excitement in our area tonight...we got to know quite a few neighbors :)

Well thats about all for today, tomorrow is suppose to be really warm, like 71 i think :) So I look forward to enjoying the warm day! Hopefully I can open my windows...that would be wonderful...I am also needing to sort through my scrapbook/rubber stamping stuff and get it sold, and then we are going to paint and redo our spare bedroom which also doubles as my scrapbook room...which will eventually be tom's office and my scrapbook room and what is now his office will be the spare room, its confusing i know lol :) well i'm off to bed...

Yay for Vacation planning!

Well its Monday, and the weather is wonderful, and the sun is out!!! YAY!! lol...nothing much new to report, just that we booked our cabin for vacation this year, last night...you can check it out at the link below, but vacation is still over a month away, so I need to be patient :) but we had fun looking through cabins and finding the one we liked...

http://www.sugarmaplecabins.com/cabin.asp?property_id=1720&group_id=&navmonth=52008&idBookmarkName=#booking

well nothing else is new right now...i'll add more later or maybe tomorrow :)

Gunner and his new cage

Ok here are the pictures I promised..lol...not the greatest pictures, but you get the idea :)

Gunner really enjoys his new cage...oh and the pillow that my mother in law gave him :)

Front of Gunner's cage

These are the side and back panels of the cage

We have had this rug since the first of the year, but have kept it rolled up in the corner until we got our chair and the cage made...well I unrolled it today, and needless to say, its Gunner's new favorite spot to lay...the dog is obsessed w/carpet! lol

3rd Anniversary

Today is Tom and my 3rd wedding anniversary, didn't do anything too exciting, but thats ok :) We have a wonderful marriage, I couldn't ask for a better man, seriously...I mean don't get me wrong, we have our moments, but its much better than I ever dreamed of when I was younger...but on the flip side of that, I can't ignore the fact that at almost 24 years old, this is not where I thought I would be in my life by now....If asked when I was younger, I would be a stay at home mom of a 2 kids by now, but oh how God reminds us that its His plan, not ours...so for the time being, I'm ok with it, but I'm sure reading this blog over time, you will notice that some days are harder than others...but for now...I'm ok. In the meantime of being patient on God's plan for us, we are having a blast living our life together, and building our foundation for our future. :)

As most of you know, we have a dog Gunner, I will try to get some more pictures posted soon, when I can figure out how to...lol...but Tom has been working on building a new wooden dog cage for Gunner that will also double as an end table in our "suppose to be" library, aka the front room :) so as soon as it is finished, I will post pictures, because it is really cool!

Well, as for today, just fun and calm...I woke up to roses waiting for me, which was an unexpected surprise...got my nails done, and bought a new cd...and we ordered pizza...see I told ya this blog thing could get boring LOL...

As I end this, we are watching a show on tv, and its called The Last Lecture: A Love Story for Your Life, very cool, but he says, " In life, you just have to decide if you want to be a Tigger or an Eyeore"...so very true...

First Attempts

Well, this is my first attempt at blogging. So here's the thing, I see my friends starting blogs and think, "hey, what a great idea" especially for my family that isn't myspace or facebook saavy...lol...but then now that I'm starting this blog I realize what do I have to blog about? laundry? the mail being late? my dog?! LOL But I'm just going to take the chance and go out on a limb and assume I'll find something to write about...