Hello everyone!

It’s been awhile since I have blogged.  We’ve had very slow progress on our built-in bookcases and living room remodel.  Partly because we only have the weekends to really work on them, and last weekend was a bust with church activities and The Super Bowl.  Then I came down with viral gastroenteritis on Tuesday, along with another person in my small group!  It’s not my idea of a good time let me tell you.  If you haven’t had it, my doctor compared it to having Influenza A with every tummy trouble you can possibly imagine.  It’s a 7-10 day virus and so far the body aches have gone away (yay!), but I still can’t taste anything I’m eating unless it is super sweet.  In fact I had coffee this morning and could barely taste it.  Major disappointment for me.  I was really looking forward to coffee again!  I am hoping this weekend will see the final days of this virus and I’ll be back to my old self in no time.  UPDATE:  I now have strep throat as well…wah…

So back to our progress:  The grasscloth wallpaper has been put up and it was actually easier than I anticipated.  I used this tutorial by Carmel at Our Fifth House.  I reached out on Instagram and she gave me a few pointers and I really appreciated it! We picked our paint colors and painted the upper half of the walls!  I want to give a big THANK YOU to everyone who gave me input through social media.  If you’re curious, we went with No. 5 (the lighter grey/blue) for the bookcases.  I was really leaning towards No. 7, but in certain lights of the day it just didn’t mesh well.  No. 5 ended up being as true to itself as it could be and I really do love the contrast.

If you follow me on Instagram theshelvedlifeblog, I was at Home Depot this morning with the entire family in tow.  We grabbed beadboard for the lower half of the walls, new cabinet pulls, and was still debating which white to go with.  Usually our go-to has been BEHR Antique White, but in the store today it looked so yellow it was actually kinda gross.  I took the sample home just to be sure it matched.  Sure enough it did, and it DID NOT look yellow at all.  thank you fluorescent store lighting… I will be going back to Home Depot later today/tomorrow to grab another gallon of Antique White.  Better to be safe than sorry.

Currently, the hubby has installed both base cabinets and is putting up the beadboard! Here are some pictures from today:

we will finish the trim work once the bookshelves are installed

And while he was busy using all the power tools on the planet, I was busy watching kiddos and painting cabinet doors.  Quick question for all those that have painted cabinets:  do you pre-sand your cabinets before painting, or wait until the first coat has dried?  Just curious.  I didn’t pre-sand and went straight to painting.  I HAD to sand them before the second coat went on for sure.  And I think I’ll sand them one more time before applying the third coat.  It really does make a huge difference.

 

The greatest thing I have grown in over the past two years is giving my kids space to play with other kids in the neighborhood.  Friends of mine have known that I struggled with even letting my kids play in our backyard without being able to see them 100% of the time.  And I AM NOT a helicopter parent by any means.  For some reason it’s the one thing I struggled with.  Slowly, the kids have made friends with others that are just around the corner, and we let the oldest two go play in their friends’ backyard when the weather is nice.  The good thing is I can hear them from our yard, and shout at them to come home when it’s time.  And sometimes their friends come over and play in our yard too!  And sometimes those friends come by your house at the end of the day, pulling a wagon full of Girl Scout Cookies, and you find yourself scrounging around the house for loose change so you can support them…caramel delights for the win people!

I hope your weekend was wonderful if you were in the KC area – I still cannot believe our weather.  What were ya’ll up to this weekend?  I’ll be back soon with more updates.  We should be purchasing wood boards and staining should commence asap so we can get the bookcases built!  But so far, we are happy with our progress.  Hope you all have a fabulous week!