Laundry Room

Have you ever heard of the Rust-O-Leum Cabinet Transformations?  They also make a countertop version.  One of the last things "oak" to go in our house was in the laundry room.  Here is what it looked like when we moved in:

 

Mid-Summer progress...laundry day.  In general, the state of this room 90% of the time!

I wanted some more detail on the flat cabinet so I got a sheet of beadboard at Lowes...they even cut it to the exact size right in the store!  It was incredibly easy to tack up and added a lot of character!

The Rust-O-Leum kit worked great! No sanding, it included everything (except the paintbrush).  The prep was the most time consuming, taping everything off and wiping down the cabinets. 

  The glazing part was the most nerve-wracking 

It came out ok though!

All clean until the piles come in...5, 4, 3, 2....Yup, that is precisely how much time I enjoyed this view...approximately five seconds. ;)

We will also be changing the countertop...the black/gray just isn't working

New hardware

The ironing board cabinet I left white...was thinking about glazing it, but glad I didn't!

Coat/shoe closet...open at your own risk ;)

New lights

 

 

 

That's it...I have to give props to my sister  who recently did her ENTIRE kitchen!  That makes this look like child's play.  Perhaps she will let me do a post on that!! :) 

Goat Cheese

Mmmmmm....goat cheese.  We like cheese in general.  My dear (ironically, slightly lactose intolerant) hubs will drool as we stroll the cheese isle at Costco.  I've been known to sneak a block or two back on the shelf!  Whenever we are eating out and he sees goat cheese as a listed ingredient he lets out a big "Mmmmm".  He hearts cheese.
I've been trying a few new recipes this week and last nights was a score so I thought I'd share it.

Ingredients:

2 TBS butter
4 TBS olive oil
3 onions, chopped
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp sugar
1 lb portobello mushrooms, cut in 1/4 " strips (or your favorite...I had Bella so we used those)
3 TBS chopped parsley (or 1 TBS dried)
1/4 tsp ground black pepper
3/4 lb ziti (I used penne - any pasta will do)
3 oz goat cheese, crumbled
3 TBS grated Parmesan cheese

In large frying pan, melt 1 TBS butter with 2 TBS oil over moderate heat.  Add onions, 1/2 tsp salt, and sugar.  Cook, stirring frequently until onions are well browned about 15-20 min.  Remove from pan.

In same pan, melt remaining 1 TBS butter with 1 TBS oil over moderate heat.  Add mushrooms,1/4 tsp. salt and cook.  Stir occasionally until brown (8 min).  Add reserved onions, parsley and salt and pepper.

In large pot of boiling, salted water, cook pasta until just done. Reserve 3/4 C of pasta water and drain.  Toss the pasta and 1/2 C of reserved pasta water with the mushroom mixture, the remaining 1 TBS oil, goat cheese and Parm.  If the pasta seems dry add more pasta water.

*I inevitably ALWAYS dump my pasta before reserving the water - it drives me nuts!  I used chicken stock instead and it turned out great.

Even Miss A tried a noodle!  She is changing so much lately.  She is currently napping in her OWN room, she got a new top tooth this week, she is "starting" to crawl (does more nose dives that hand/knee action), and she has started eating veggies. She is one happy baby!

After getting scared by the flash she kept making this hilarious squinting face and laughing...

 Oh mom you are going to blind me!!  Poor baby!

A Condron Boy??

Does that title make you curious?  We get asked ALL the time..."going to try for a boy?"  The answer is still emphatically the same - NO! :)  Unless God places a boy in our path we feel our family is very complete.  We are quite content with our little girls; however, we got a glimpse of what a Condron boy might look like.
One word. Scissors.

Yes.  I cried.  The other side looks the same.  Apparently this girl took - the 80's are back - a little too seriously.  A mullet? Seriously M?
About a month ago I gave her a darling new haircut:

I could see the wheels spinning as I was cutting her hair.  I debated in my mind, should I address the scissors or leave it alone?  I decided to address it that way if she chose to get into them she had been warned and I could parent accordingly (ya catch ma drift??).   So we had the whole "ONLY mommy cuts hair or Miss Leigh Ann the stylist...Megan, scissors are for paper, etc."  She seemed to get it, you know raise your hand, repeat after me, blah, blah, blah.
Well, when mom and dad went out for a date she gave herself a "bang trim".  I think she figured the babysitter wouldn't be able to punish her so she took advantage of the situation.  Regardless, after dealing with that episode I thought at least the scissor thing was behind us. 
Apparently I was dead wrong.  On the positive side she doesn't have much more hair that she CAN cut!  That is a very small positive, we are grasping at straws.  I probably should have seen this coming.  Her track record isn't in her favor:

I realize posting all these is going to make people think I never watch the kid...go ahead judge me.  ;)

I seriously thought we had a chipmunk in our vent because I heard this *ping, ping...nope just Megan losing some of her candy during a raid of her sisters stash.

 

This picture doesn't do the nail polish on the carpet justice.  I have family (right Ryan??) that can vouch for me on this one...we were eating Sunday dinner and she couldn't have been gone for more than ten minutes when I went to check on her...I think there is video footage of this doozy too.

 

 

Grape juice meet carpet. I realize kids spill, you just have to laugh at this point - or call the carpet cleaners.

Anyways, I figure I have documentation of what exactly put me in the funny farm when the time comes, because at this rate the time WILL come!! ;)
OH and what makes things even more ironic...guess what I scheduled the morning of this infamous hair day??  Yup, family pics. Sure did.  Bring on the headbands.
After a lot of gasping, everyone pawing at little Megan's head, and the "I can't believe its", we stopped and I saw this pathetic little girl who is so full of mischief, but yet she can warm our hearts in an instant.  I made everyone promise that we wouldn't talk about it anymore.  We love her in spite of her craziness.  Bald and all. ;)  I am sure she will laugh at this one day or at the least understand when she is crying over her little girl's new hair cut someday.  (Yes, I still remember the haircut I gave myself...I was in first grade).  This morning before she climbed up on her daddy's lap she put a little hat on and smiled with that great big smile of hers, like "now I am good?".  It broke my heart.  God doesn't require that we come to Him with a hat on when we've been naughty, He loves us in spite of us.  He is a forgiving Father and full of compassion.  I want my kids to feel the same with us.  We can deal with it, but then its done, its over.  We love you M&M!  Now quick, everyone go hide every single pair of scissors you can find!! ;) 

See...you can't help but love her!

Dresser Makeover

Favorite. Project. To. Date.  Those periods just seem to emphasize my excitement to share this with you. 
Dresser story:
We were on our way to piano lessons about a month ago and we spotted a yard sale right along the way.  We stopped afterwards and I found not only this dresser, but a headboard, night stand and little chair for a grand total of....drum roll please...$35. Yes, you read that correctly.  TOTAL.  I probably would not have looked twice at this a year ago, but what with pinterest and all, the wheels were spinning.  Wish I had some original pictures.  This is what it looked like after a couple days of stripping the five hundred layers of paint off of it.

It has great detail and I like the little wheeled legs.  I was going to paint it all, but a dear retired friend of ours happened to stop by as I was stripping it and he said "its a shame people just cover that nice wood up with paint." Great...now I have guilt!  :)  He is a wonderful wood worker as is my grandpa.  I came up with a compromise and actually became quite excited about it.  Wood on the top, paint on the bottom!  Its a win, win.  The children have a mother because I won't be in the garage for the next 5 years trying to get paint out of those crevices AND I can still have my dear retired friends in our home without feeling guilty!  I'm joking of course. ;)
It was hard enough getting the paint completely off the top. 

Just me and my octo-sander...that thing is the bomb.

Bareness!

 

 

 

 It was SO easy to stain the top...I did a dark walnut colored stain and some knobs at Hobby Lobby:

It matches the dining set perfectly!

Swingset Staining

Did I really miss ALL of May?!?!  Ugh.  I failed at my streak of posting once a month.  Here is a quick post about a project that has been on my mind ALL of May: The Swingset.  Every time I'd look out our back door I'd have a conversation in my head that went like this, "that would probably only take me 45 minutes to do, I have to buy stain the next time I'm in town."  Do you want to know how many times I'd forget to pick up stain??  I have come to realize that I am useless without a list.  My brain can only keep track of so much and so far keeping track of four kids seems to be my limit.  Thankfully I haven't left anyone at the hardware store (knock on wood).  I suppose this is success in my world.
I found this new version of stain at our little hardware store:

It. Was. Awesome.  It is really thick - almost like kids finger paint and it went on really well.  I highly recommend it.  I also liked that it came with its own little sponge/applicator...I am easily sold.  One less thing to have to track down.  It only cost $11 - not too shabby for a good sprucing up:

I really wish I had a "before", but I had two babies to get napping and time was of the essence!
It felt very good to cross this project off my To Do List.
*Update, I just found a before picture from Mother's Day and the guys were playing our favorite yard game "Kan Jam" (that could be a whole different post!). ;)  If you can see past Ben getting ready to make his killer shot, the swingset was pretty faded!

Pamper

Have you ever said a word so much it starts to sound funny?  This has happened to me during the past few days...I have been just beside myself with this giddy feeling of being pampered.  Not feeling at all like the stay-at-home, just had a baby, not getting a full nights sleep, chasing after a two-yr old mother that I am. I am feeling the MOST pampered I have ever felt before.  Here is Webster's definition of the word:

Pamper

1 archaic : to cram with rich food : glut

a : to treat with extreme or excessive care and attention <pampered their guests>

Both the above scenarios (unfortunate for #1 due to a bridesmaids dress that I must muster up courage to sport in less than two weeks) are an accurate description of the past few days.  My husband earned his way into something called "Presidents Club" in 2011 for his performance in his career.  I am very proud of my hard working man and feel extremely blessed to join him for this trip in recognizing his hard work.  We are in Toronto, CA and staying at the Ritz Carlton. Nuff said? 

I keep laughing because we are surrounded by opulence that we are not accustomed to!  I feel like chewing out dear housekeepers who curtsy at me...really?  I totally empathize with their job...I do it all day.  Maybe I should give my children a curtsy after picking up their dirty towels.  Forget "maybe", I am totally going to do that. 

It has been a special time with my man (it has been a big adjustment going from three to four kids) and we were able to bring our baby girl with us...two months old already.  We are loving the bonding time!  Eric and I have been traveling down memory lane and remembering our first baby - wondering "what was there to stress about with ONE child?!?!".  I know we felt like at the time like our lives "changed forever", but really after managing four, one seems like childs play (no pun intended). hehe

Our first day started with Tim Horton's and was followed by the Toronto Blue Jay's game.  Two Canadian staples.  Tim Horton's is the Canadian equivalent to Starbucks, but with better prices.  I guess Canada has got some things right...

 We came back to our room after the game to find this nice surprise:

Nice because I never take the time to plate my crackers and cut jam into perfect little squares for a mid-day snack.  I am usually grabbing a couple graham crackers and calling it good (string cheese on a good day). Pampered.

Our second day happened to be a Sunday and we took in God's beautiful creation on a walk along Lake Ontario:

Remember these guys? Yup, they're called "tele...." oh, never mind...

I also took advantage of the hotel spa and got a facial. Pampered times ten!!  Ahhh

We ended the day by finding a delightful little Italian restaurant and had the most romantical dinner (Abby cooperated lovely by sleeping).  We even got our OWN desserts, usually we share, hence the reference to #1 in Websters definition.

Tonight was the "black-tie" dinner, which unfortunately due to the nature of the event infants are not allowed.  Eric and his friend were going stag.  Man, did he look good!  Sure, I could have joined him if I wanted to pay a babysitting service $36 an hour.  Never mind the money, I could never leave my baby with a stranger, let alone in a foreign country.  I would not enjoy one bite of filet mignon or whatever delicacy they are enjoying as I type. 

This was my dinner (as I am apparently too cheap to pay $30 for a salad to be brought up to my room...don't even get me started on what actual food costs):

Yes...we had an espresso maker in our room.  We utilized this daily. ;)  I was tempted to go all "Macaulay Culkin" and order all kind of crazy things like in the Home Alone movie, but see, I do have SOME self control and that dress was ever present in my mind! :P

What a stud.  I think - no - I know he was getting a little annoyed with the picture taking, but can you blame me?!!?!  I love the ones of him and A...he is such a good daddy!

And this concludes our trip.  I am SO ready to get back to our other three.  We decided we are going to get up early so we can pick up the girls from school and surprise them.  While this trip was extremely wonderful, relaxing, rejuvenating, etc.  I am ready to get back to my "day job". ;)