Battlecreek Falls

We wanted to get out and enjoy some beautiful spring weather so we loaded the boys up in the packs and hiked up to Battlecreek Falls in Pleasant Grove.

It was a beautiful night and we had a great time!

Extreme Makeover-- Lindsey Edition

Once upon a time, there was a sad, boring and blah room.... (ok, most of the rooms in my house fall into this category.)

Exhibit A:

So, I decided that it would be fun to paint some stripes on the walls to liven things up a bit. Here is my dear husband helping tape everything off. We got started at about 9:30 p.m.

So we taped (which I think we finished around 12:30 a.m.) and since I'm crazy I stayed up to get the first coat of paint of paint on. I mean hey, if the boys are asleep, I gotta make the most of my time, right? So I think I finally made it to bed around 2:00 a.m.

Well, what was supposed to just be paint on the walls, ended up being a complete overhaul of the entire family room that would consume my every thought over the next couple of months. This led to many, many more late nights of work. But voila! Finally I am DONE! (for the most part)

See, those beautiful chairs above? It was love at first sight. I found them after I had painted the stripes on the walls. I had no idea how I was going to tie the two colors together, but I knew that I needed to own those chairs! So I just took off on my re-decorating adventure and I love the finished product!

So here we have some cheapy frames that I picked up from Walmart/ Hobby Lobby/ JoAnn. I just painted and glazed them to the colors I needed. I already had the clock.

These little beauties were given to us by Mark Bishop. I gave them several different paint jobs and ended up settling with boring old "divine white." I am still trying to find new hardware for them, but you can see a little peak of one in the picture above.

I got the paper mache "S" at JoAnn and wrapped it in Jute to give it some added texture. And, oh my, what darling boys I have!

Marc did all the manly stuff like building and installing a mount for his new tv, putting in surround sound, wiring everything through the cabinet, down to the crawl space, and out to the garage and getting all of the different devices hooked up so that they all work! He also installed two can lights above the sofa which I LOVE! So glad that he knows how to do all that handy stuff! What a stud! Check out the scary mess that my house was during the process of this project!

One of my favorite transformations were the bump-outs around the fireplace. They have driven me crazy ever since we moved in because I never knew what to put in them and I felt like no matter what I did, they looked like they were filled with knick knacky crap! I wanted to add bigger things to feel the space, texture and color. I ended up deciding to wallpaper a piece of masonite with paper that looks like old aluminum ceiling tiles. I love the texture and the wallpaper was WAY cheaper than buying actual tiles.

Then I just painted it with a metallic paint and, boo-yah!

This little beauty of an ottoman got a makeover too!

I really don't like reupholstering because it scares me and I'm no good at it, however, it is much cheaper than purchasing new furniture, so I gave it a try.

It sits nicely in the corner and we just pull it over in front of the chair when we need it. In fact I am sitting in the chair with my feet up on said ottoman as I type this!

Now, since I have absolutely no design background and I don't really know the difference between contemporary, traditional, modern, etc, I just went with what I like. This little bump out got a little touch of vintage. I found the vintage umbrella at a consignment store. I love the wooden handle. I found the old train cases at an antique store and the vintage polaroid camera belonged to my grandparents.

I made the little luggage tag. No matter how hard I try to not do crafty crap, I always end up sneaking it in. I guess it's part of my style?

I knew that we could not afford new sofa's, but I wanted to update what we had so I just made new pillows for them. The best part is that they are removable pillow covers that I can take off and throw in the wash. Boy friendly! Yay!

So, I also made new draperies for the window. I made them out of burlap because I love the texture, color and price ($2.40/ yard thank you very much). Well, just in case you were wondering the lady who cuts fabric at Hobby Lobby thinks that burlap for draperies is a BAD IDEA and she will try to talk you out of it for approximately 30 minutes after the store closes. She will tell you how burlap will shed and your children can ingest it and it will be bad for them. She will show you many other options that she thinks that you should use which are three or four times more expensive. But, in the end you should just go with the burlap because you will LOVE it!

Sorry, for the not so great photos. I had to take these at night because I couldn't get a good one during the day.

The table belonged to Heath and Steph. It has been outside on their patio for a long time and has been pretty beat up. This made it perfect for us (since Griff likes to beat up on whatever he can find, and Luke is following quickly in his footsteps). So we chopped the legs off and BAM- coffee table/foot rest/ race track for many a cars! Our sofa, chair and ottoman also belonged to Heath and Steph once upon a time. We have been the lucky recipients of lots of their gently used items! Donka!

Thank you Heath for helping me make major decisions for this room and teaching me about the "smell test" at the antique store. Thank you for spending 10 hours running around with me on your day off! Thank you for donating the table.

Thank you Mark Bishop for donating the end tables.

Thank you mom for helping me figure out how to go about doing the ottoman.

Thank you Marc for your obvious skills and for your patience with me over the last two months.

So, not too bad for a room done on the cheap, eh? P.S. I made 21 pillows and bought 5 for this project. Yeah, I like pillows, I guess.

Date Me!

We went on a couple of really fun dates last month. First off, we went to Snow Basin and went skiing with our friends Cort, Carlos, Whit, Dave, Jeff and Michelle. We had a blast! We average one ski day every other year so we always try to make the most of it! We love to ski on snow blades because they are super fun and easy. We get lots of funny looks with our tiny little short ski's. One snowboarder even said to me "Nice skis." Like he was totally making fun of me, but whatever! It's way better to go and have fun all day rather than spend the whole day getting the hang of skiing again since we don't go very often.

We also enjoyed the 1 1/2 hour drive to get up there because we got to just talk, or not talk, the entire time!

Man, I love this guy!

Cort, Me and Whit. I love these girls too!

It was really fun to go with these guys. I can't believe that we've never been together! This resort has mostly gondola lifts so we all got to chat in between runs. It was awesome! Another highlight was my vintage ski wear. I have had the same ski gear since I was in the eighth grade... These girls on the other hand were super cute, slope fashionista's, if you will.

Here is the our crew after lunch in one of the beautiful lodges. Food just tastes so much better after you've been working hard for it. Or was it the fact that my grilled cheese cost $7.00 that made it taste so good?

The Kugler girls love a good jumping picture. That's why they are so good at them... Marc and I, not so good.

This picture cracks me up because you can clearly see that we are all having a good time. Love the self timer multi shot option!

Seriously, such a great and memorable day! Love you guys!

The next weekend , we spent Friday night at the symphony. It was wonderful but I forgot to take my camera. It was fun to do something different that we have never done together.

Speaking of things that we've never done together... Marc surprised me with going to the Monster Trucks on Saturday. Well, here are a few pictures from that night.

This kid was definitely a highlight.

Oh, and here is "The Grave Digger"

I wish that I could have gotten more pictures of the awesome people that were there. And why, why, why, would you take a baby to a super loud monster truck show? Seriously, it really disturbed me how babies were there! Poor little things!

And here is a scary picture of me trying to rock on, but actually doing the owl hoot symbol... oops.

So, our dates were all very diverse. But, let's be real, any time I get to spend with Marc is a blast!