Wednesday, March 18, 2009

It's Starting to Come Together


The new marble shower

The new countertop

New paint and light fixture

We still are waiting on the floor to be installed, trim to be painted and reinstalled and then, I think we are pretty much done. We are waiting on hanging the mirror. Trying to decide if we want a different one or the same one we have. It really is going to be pretty (in my opinion) when it gets done. More pictures to follow.

Wednesday, March 11, 2009

Priming the Walls and Ceiling!


It's all finally coming together. The ceiling was sprayed on March 10th, so James began to prime it today. He is also priming the walls for paint. We are waiting right now for the guy to come measure the floor. Still no shower. It is expected to be put in on Tuesday of next week. So, we decided to go ahead and get the walls primed and painted and the ceiling primed and painted. I have this vision for this bathroom, but it may not turn out as I want it to...LOL. Nothing ever does. James is nervous as he is standing in the tub to prime the walls. Our contractor told us that dropping shampoo bottles or just standing (like he is in the tub) is enough to crack the acrylic. Believe me when I say these little cracks add up to big money.

More Bathroom Renovation Pics


Everything draped for the ceiling to be scraped.

Mud and tape on the new ceiling.

The same

Where the new shower is going to be. We have a new base and waterproof drywall at this time. Still no shower!

For about 5 days we were down to one bathroom. Everything was draped in the master bath so you couldn't even go in to use the toilet. I hated getting up at night and going across the house...LOL. It is not fun sharing one bath with 3 guys.

Landon

Landon at the district 3 office in Iva. This is his award for scoring Advanced in all areas of PACT.

Bathroom Renovation


I just hate this light bar.
The floor. Why did we pick white?

Here is the cause of most of our problems, the fan.

This is black mold. No, we aren't dirty, our fan had been improperly installed eleven years ago. This is what happens over time.

The shower before it was ripped out. I wish I had taken a picture of the crack that was in the base of the shower that James tried to fix. He did a pretty good job though seeing how we didn't have to get a new subfloor.


Tuesday, March 10, 2009

Recipe of the Week

Time for grilling out and here is a great recipe for baked potatoes. Got this from Food Network's Guy Fiere.

Bomb Bakers

Ingredients

  • 1 1/4 cups kosher salt
  • 6 medium russet potatoes, washed
  • 2 tablespoons garlic salt
  • 2 tablespoons seasoned salt
  • 1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
  • Horseradish Sour Cream, recipe follows

Directions

In large mixing bowl dissolve 1 cup kosher salt in 8 cups of water. Add potatoes. Insure that all potatoes are submerged, and brine for 2 to 8 hours.

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.

Remove the potatoes from brine and liberally coat with the remaining kosher salt, garlic salt, seasoned salt, and pepper.

Place the potatoes on a wire rack in the center of the oven and bake for 45 minutes. Do not puncture skin with tongs, fork, or tooth picks. Potatoes will be soft to the touch when done.

Let potatoes rest 5 minutes before cutting.

Friday, February 27, 2009

Overview of Recent Hewell Activity

This past Wednesday night, James and Logan attended the Motley Crue, Hinder, and Theory of a Deadman concert a the Bi Lo center. This was their first ever rock concert. James ended up loving it, which surprised me. Of course Logan loved it. He payed 35 bucks for a Crue t-shirt even though he loved Hinder more. They got home around midnight (I know, a school night) and they told me everything. I was proud of Logan because he told me all the groups were good, but the Crue, had some parts that made him uncomfortable and that if he ever went again, it would not be to see them. I was proud of him. People have asked how could I allow for him to go see this type of concert. It's easy. He is a good kid and he now has had the experience. He came away from it with a different look. Point made.

Because those two guys were gone out, Landon and I decided to go out on a date. He wanted to go to Osaka and then to church. We didn't make it to church because we had company and got a late start on going to eat. That should have been our first clue the night was going to turn out as we had hoped. We went to Osaka and sat with this woman who thought everything in the world was funny. We could have shown a movie of starving children in Africa and she would have laughed. Anyway, I found her rude. She wanted this particular chef because she thought he was so funny. Well, her sense of humor should have told me that this was not gonna be good. He comes to the table and calls Landy a girl. Continually. Landy gets his feelings hurt, and I get pissed. He does that whole bit of acting like he is going to spray you with ketchup, I was in the middle of reading a e-mail from my friend (who just found out that she has breast cancer) and he about causes me to drop my blackberry in my soup. He is rapidly decreasing his tip. Then he tries to scare Landy. The woman is laughing and me and Landon just look at her. The other couple there was celebrating a birthday with the guy's parents. This cook made the comment to the guy's date (she looked asian) about where she was from. Then he went on to say she shouldn't be with that guy because he is white. Then he made some sexual remarks to the guy about the girl. Meanwhile the lady with the stupid humor is laughing. The girl is dying and the boy is embarrassed and upset. He tries to smooth it over by flipping shrimp into the boys mouth, but he isn't into it. He does this to Landy as well. landon catches his shrimp but is still not happy with the guy. Finally, the chef, getting the picture that he is really upsetting everyone but this lady decides to be nice. He asks me if me and Landy are ok. I calmly say we are fine. Landon says it was said with the blank look on my face that means I am upset. He was proud that I didn't say something else to the man. Landon and I ate and then asked for our bill. Landon was really upset about how the guy acted (taking God's name in vain as well) and left the table a couple of times (I think he was about to cry). I told him I would speak to the manager and Landon said no, just let it go. He said the man knew we were upset and that was enough. We paid our bill, no tip. When we got in the car, Landon reached over and grabbed my hand and told me he was sorry our date didn't go well. But it did. I have such an amazing little man. He didn't give in to his anger and that made me proud. I told him all dates with him were awesome, even if people around us weren't the best.