I took a sick day yesterday (though I really needed it today) to paint Kadie's room. We got her Disney pink and it's not as bad as it sounds. It's actually a very light pink and looks very nice against the white baseboards and soon-to-be painted white bookshelves. I had taped off the ceiling so that I wouldn't have to worry about that but, as I was pulling off the painter's tape, chunks of ceiling paint came with it (I hate contractor-grade flat paint) so I spent another 2 or 3 hours painting that. I didn't have any ceiling paint or any kind of white paint other than the semi-gloss I got for her bookshelves (which I certainly didn't want to put on the ceiling), so Kadie now lives in a pink box with carpet.
If I get the energy at a later date, I might go back in with actual white ceiling paint and redo that part but, for now, Kadie has her princess room.
Meanwhile, I'm downing Advil like candy and trying not to move. The wall painting is usually enough to make me achy, but the overhead work puts me on my butt.
To go back a few days...
The sister of one of Kadie's daycare friends had a birthday party this Saturday so Jeff and I took Kadie down for some sugar and play time. They had one of those moon bounce things that's just a recipe for disaster and it didn't take Kadie too long to figure out that it wasn't that much fun when the bigger kids started arriving, so she stuck to running around with her two little daycare pals and taking full advantage of the kid's play room in the house. I think I got her to eat 1/3 of a hot dog bun, but she was constantly getting her hands on sugar. She got her first taste of cotton candy. I had to show her what to do with it and she wasn't sure about it when I put a little on her lips. I think she liked the taste but she wasn't too keen on the texture. I wasn't upset when she decided to go on to other things and leave the cotton candy behind. After about 3 hours she was starting to melt, so we said our good-byes and headed home. It was a Cinco de Mayo celebration and, while they had hotdogs for the kids, they were grilled and Kadie eats her fresh out of the package, so we stopped at Chick-fil-A and got her some chicken for dinner. We all crashed pretty early that night as I recall.
We had planned on doing some front yard landscaping this weekend (I have 12 lilac bushes and a flowering almond to plant), but when we went to Home Depot to look at tillers, we were unhappy with the results. The dinkiest one there (one so small it would probably have been worthless in our clay soil) was about $250. The one Jeff was looking at was huge and cost more than $400. I didn't want to pay that much just to have something that big take up more garage space all in exchange for a couple of days' work. I think we've decided to build up rather than dig down. Jeff wants to get some of those blocks that he used with his dad to build that retaining wall at the old house and create some raised beds. It'll probably be just as expensive, or even more so, than buying the tiller, but at least the blocks will add a nice landscaping effect and we won't have to store them in the garage, never to be used again, after we're done. So far, the bushes are holding up really well in the bathtub as they wait for their planting.
We did run into a bit of a snag with the lilac bushes...I bought 6 bushes each of 2 kinds of lilacs. One lilac is purple and grows to 10-15 feet high with a similar spread. The other is pink and only grows to 6-8 feet high with a similar spread. When they were shipped to us, they each came in a little box type thing to keep them from getting crushed and they were labeled on the outside of the boxes. Only thinking that I needed to water them (and couldn't do so with the boxes surrounding them, I took them out of the boxes...do you see where this is heading?
Now we have 12 lilac plants that are impossible to tell apart (I even called the company to see if there was some distinguishing feature I wasn't seeing) and they have quite distinctive differences once fully grown. I guess we're just going to plant them where we want a lilac bush and then transplant them (if needed) once they've grown to the point where we can tell which one they're going to be.
I did get my blueberry bush planted (it's a potted plant) and we picked up some really nice pots for my strawberry plants that we're going to place on the far edges of the step leading up to the front porch.
Jeff put up the ceiling fan/lights in Kadie's room and the spare room on Sunday night so we now have official lighting in those areas. We were using the hallway light, natural daylight and a small table lamp up 'til now and I wanted a little more in time for the party. Besides, there have been a few days where I wanted to turn on a fan in her room and had to tote in the big floor tower. Now, with a flick of a switch (or two if you want both light and fan), you get the desired effect.
Other than that...
My plan is to get Kadie's bookshelves painted and her room put together (I need to go through her toys and do some "weeding") and, hopefully, get her a new bed. She's still in her toddler bed and I think it's time to move her up. I'm thinking a pretty white daybed will go well in her room and not take up too much space.
Kadie's at another birthday party today. It's the daycare provider's daughter's birthday this time and Ms. Tracy is just planning on a small party at lunch - no parents, extra kids, etc. She got a Princess party pack (all the plates, napkins, etc.) at Costco and everyone brought a Princess outfit for their own kid to dress up in. My kind of party!
Well, time for some work. I'm going to hobble my butt across my cubicle and see what I can accomplish for the day. Good luck to Lisa, btw, now that she's on her own and if Michael needs a kick in the pants, I'm sure that type of energy can be sent as well.
There's a birthday coming up tomorrow. I won't name any names, but she lives in Powers and she's not the one in elementary school.
