This past monday and tuesday Byron and I were hard at work painting the outside trim of the house. I didn't get pictures of everything, but here are the basics. Sorry, the picture of the house on the upper left was taken a few months ago, but you see the ugly green that was peeling off the house and looking nasty. The upper right is the after picture. The lower right picture is of the back of the house as a before and lower left is the after picture. Notice the strip of darker paint. I also cleaned the outside and insided of the gutters, just giving it a clean look.

Byron and I really should be fired from picking paint colours! So, not looking hard at the siding, we figured a nice brown colour would be nice for the trim and shutters. So, off the shutters come, 2 or 4 have the second coat of paint on them, the front trim has a first coat of paint on it, and we pick up a shutter and bring it to the siding to see how the colours would match. Umm, they didn't. The colour we painted was a light brown, and the siding has a green tint to it. Uh oh! So, we called the lady who lives next to us to give her honest opinion, and she was like "Um, it'd definately different, but maybe when the shutters go on, it will tie in nicely." Hmm, that didn't sound good. So, Byron and I were standing there looking at it wondering what to do. Then Byron came up with a brilliant idea, really! to go and ask the lady across the street for help; as it turns out (we knew this, that's why we asked her) she's an interior decorator! She came over and made it clear the brown didn't work. She went home to get her paint swatches, and withing minutes, we picked out a new paint colour. Within a few minutes, we were in the car and got new paint. We finished the front completely that night thankfully! We really thank our neighbor for helping us out! I told Byron that I'm not painting the laundry room or bathroom (which REALLY need to be painted!) without our neighbors help! She offered to help me decorate our bedroom under the condition that I make her a cup of coffee. I think I can handle that! We're not, in any way, artsy.

Byron took the shutters off and fought off a few bees. More than a few, but didn't get stung at all, thankfully! These were all the nests that were under the shutters. Yuck! Glad that I didn't take on the task to take the shutters off!

The painting on the outside is pretty well done. I finished up the last little bit today, but all I want to paint yet is repainting the white around our door and the garage door. We're expecting rain until the weekend, so I don't see that happening at all. Let's hope that we'll get some decent weather in the next few weeks so I can get that done, most importantly the garage door as it looks terrible! Sorry, no picture of it. Will do sometime! It seems the last paintjob it had was regular wood paint. So, I have to scrape, prime, then paint. At least it's only one door and I already had help offered to me! I will take you up on that Tracey, you can count on that! Hope you like the sound of nails running along a chalkboard! That's what it's going to sound like scraping! I may get that part done on my own time here and there, but we'll see.

Well, it's now after 11 and I've been typing for an hour. Told ya I would write alot! That's what happens when you don't update your blog for a while! I pay the price, I know. Oh, I should write too that Sidney is officially weaned and on a sippy cup! Yippee! I still give her the odd bottle now and then for convenience sake, as the sippy cup can be a bit messy, especially for the nursery. AND, she's got one tooth on the bottom left that's coming up. It seems to have broken through, but she won't let me touch or she thows a hissy fit. I can only see it if she's smiling and her tongue is back. I want to get a picture, but no way she'd let me! Even if I pull back her bottom lip, her tongue thrusts over her gum. Any suggestions on how to get a picture mom's? I don't see the second tooth, but in time! She does wake up in the night for some cuddles when she's teething, so that's not so fun to go back to waking up. I'm refusing to give her any food so as not to have to break another bad habit! I should go and make Byron's lunch and head to bed. ZZZZzzzzzzz...goodnight!