Walk Down Memory Lane!

On Saturday, March 26th we were having dinner with friends at their house in Bellevue. We had not gone that far north in quite awhile. I figured it would be so fun to take the extra time to drive the kids to a couple fun places. First we swung by my old house in Renton.

 I was driving and didn't think to ask Michael to take a picture. I just copied this one from Google. The house looks so different than it did when we lived there. First off they've painted it which isn't bad really, but the sad part is they removed the rod iron fence my Dad welded. It was really nice and help give the home a bit of privacy without blocking anything. My room was the window on the far right. I lived here from 1990 - 1999 when I got married to Michael. 

After that we decided to drive up to our old school in Newcastle. When we went to school here it was called Lake Boren Christian School. There was also a church. The school closed down the year I graduated in 1998. The church is thriving though and is called Seattle Revival Center. I went to school with the Senior Pastor and Michael graduated with his wife. I wasn't expecting the church to be open on a Saturday. I figured we'd just drive by and maybe get out and peek in the windows. Surprisingly there was a service of some kind going on. We didn't want to interrupt so we quietly just took a look around. The kids were hilarious and thought we were going to get in trouble. So much has changed since we went to school there...I wish I had taken more pictures! 

This was the main reason I wanted to go...this staircase. I walked up and down these stairs day after day. The classrooms were downstairs, but the gym was upstairs. I specifically remember needing to go to the church office upstairs towards the end of my high school career and slowly walking up these stairs...no one else was around because everyone was in class. I remember thinking to myself....my life is about to change. This is the end of part 1 of my life. I had gone to that school since 1st grade and now here I was in 12th grade and about to launch into the world. It was one of those surreal moments where I'm so happy that I had that time to look back and reflect. That school shaped me in so many ways. 

The other thing I remember about these stairs was in 1997....I remember walking up these stairs to go to gym and seeing this handsome guy in jeans and a backwards hat walking down. I was not outgoing with boys at all. I didn't say hi to random boys. But I said hi to this boy! I remember I was with my best friend and I turned to her and said...Who was that??? :) 2 years later I was married to that guy! We are coming up on 23 years of marriage! I love him more than I did then and we've had such an amazing time together in those 23 years. We've had joy and sorrow, good times and bad, and he's the only one I want to do this life with! 

Ella's Room Remodel!

We have 4 bedrooms in our house. Of course there's our huge master bedroom and then the boys room is the size of a standard master bedroom. The other two rooms are smaller. The smallest we use as a game/playroom. And then Ella is the slightly bigger one. At one point in time it was the other way around. Ella was in the smallest room and we used the slightly bigger one for the kids playroom. When that was the case Michael built this amazing clubhouse in the playroom. This is actually the post I wrote about the clubhouse being built back in 2015!

As Ella got older we realized that the smallest room wasn't cutting it for her anymore. The closet in that room is so small which does not work for a girl! So we moved her over to what was the playroom and she just had a clubhouse in her room. Over the years she has loved it. She would talk about how one day she would like to take down the clubhouse, but she would always say she wasn't ready yet. She knew that Michael had built it and she didn't want to hurt his feelings. Of course Michael told her if she wanted it down it was fine he would take it down, but she still wasn't ready yet. 

This last year, she really started talking about wanting a bigger girls room and how she was starting to consider taking the clubhouse down. I really let her be the one to decide...I never wanted her to regret removing it. As the months went on she became more and more certain that she was ready to move on. 

The week of her actual birthday we got down to business! 

On Monday, February 14th, we moved out everything that was under and inside the clubhouse. That was a lot of stuff! 

On Tuesday, February 15th we started deconstruction. I unscrewed all the screws I could find and then slowly started pulling things apart. I took off the roofing shingles. 

I couldn't get the walls to come apart even though I unscrewed them, but then I realized that Michael had caulked the seams so once I scored those I was able to break them apart. 

Ella was such a great help! I had to kick on a couple walls to get them to move so she would stand outside the clubhouse and get ready to catch. It was a little scary, but it worked! 

Heres' the underside of the platform. We had to cut a bunch of the Christmas lights, but it was fully covered at one point. When this was first put up we had a Papasan chair cushion under the clubhouse and the kids loved to lay on it and read books so I had Michael add the Christmas lights to brighten it up! 

I wasn't sure if she would get emotional at all, but she did great. I think it really helped having her help me and not just showing up and it being gone all of a sudden! 

Plus is was nice having all that help to move these heavy pieces out! 

Here we were at the end of Tuesday. I was so surprised how demo wasn't messy at all. I had to vacuum, but I'm so used to demo being a disaster...this was nice for a change. 

Ella's big present from Ga-Ga & Pa was my old teenage bed that was in their wedding room at their house. They were planning on bringing that over on Ella's actual Birthday so I needed to get Ella's old bed posted on OfferUP and sold. 

I ended up selling it for $25. I am a stickler for organization so the Ella and I took it apart so carefully and put all the hardware in a Ziplock bag and then taped all the parts together. It's actually a really simple design. 

On her actual birthday, February 16th, we had Family Night. I made Tuna Casserole for dinner and then Ella got to open her gifts. 

From her brothers she got a small LEGO friends set and 2 packs of these Sweet Tart ropes that don't have artificial dye. Papa & Ruth got Ella this adorable sweatshirt! 

I love my family! 

My plan was to have Ella's Family Party that night and then put her new bed up the next day. Well, Pa wasn't having any of that. The guys got right to work and got her bed up that night. 

The week before I had ordered her bed from Big Lots...that's where my mom bought all the kids twin beds. They are really reasonably priced. I paid an extra $30 to have it delivered and it was well worth it! 

Since I wasn't planning on putting her bed up until the next day I didn't have any of Ella's bedding washed. SO the boys and I missed out on youth group and Bible study that night so I could stay home and get everything washed and put on the bed. 

This bed used to be my daybed when I was growing up. When I was getting ready to turn 17 I asked my parents for new bed for my birthday. Mom and I looked everywhere, but I could not find the exact bed I wanted. My Dad asked what I was looking for and I explained it to him. He told me he could weld me one using my old bed. I had no idea how it was actually going to turn out, but it turned out better than I could ever imagine. I loved it then and I still love it now! It's so fun that Ella wanted it and she's so proud of it! :) 

The day after Ella's birthday we had to go to Walmart to buy new pillows for bed. Her pillow was smushed and now that she had a full bed she needed more than just 1 pillow. In fact she needed 4 since she has those lovely pillow shams. It cracks Michael up with how many pillows she has on her bed. When we were at Walmart I decided to go to the clearance section and we found these two gray curtain panels on sale for $9! 

For the next phase of her room remodel, Ella had to move out of her room and sleep on her old mattress on the playroom floor for about 2 weeks. I felt so bad for her. Happy birthday here's a new bed, but you can't actually sleep on it yet you have to sleep on your old bed on the floor! 

 

It was all for a good reason though. Her walls had so many holes in them from the clubhouse and other various things that had been hung on the walls over the years. It badly needed to have drywall repair done so Michael took care of that. Ella was the most excited about getting to help Daddy paint her room. She loves having special one on one time with him and I don't think she ever stopped talking the whole time they painted the room. 

It might look like the same color, but it's a bit different. The color we used before had more green undertones. This new one has more blue undertones....it's Spa from Sherwin Williams! 

When the kids were helping me get all the stuff out from the basement and put in the shed we took out my grandpa's dresser that was stored in there. This used to be Peepaw's! Peepaw and Ella share something very special....their birthday! Ella was born on what would have been Peepaw's 90th birthday. Sadly he passed away when he was 88 years old. I know he would have loved her to pieces and I know that one day he'll get to see her and he'll smile at her and say..."Sakes & Days!" 

Uncle Ry had wanted this dresser after Peepaw passed, but he didn't have anywhere to store it so we offered to keep it in the basement. Fast forward a few years and Uncle Ry decided he wasn't going to use it so we just held onto it. When Ella saw it she knew she wanted it in her new bedroom. It was so dusty! Zeke and I gave it a good scrub and shine and I installed new knobs since it was missing one. You can see on either side of the dresser the millwork. That's something we completely changed out downstairs last year so now as we are going room by room upstairs and installing new millwork too. Ella's room was the first one upstairs to get it. 

On this particular weekend Ella and Jack were staying at the Kuch's house for a sleepover so it was fun to get her room all put back together and surprise her when she came home. 

Ella's room remodel was our birthday present to her this year. That included, a mattress, sheets, comforter set, a bedskirt, pillows, curtains, a saucer chair, a nightstand and baskets for the nightstand, new paint and millwork. It was quite the present for our sweet girl! 

The best part of her room remodel has definitely been how much Charlie has loved it. He's in her room all the time now and she's over the moon about it. He even sleeps with her almost every night! 

Ella was so surprised that her room was all finished when she came home. The only thing we didn't want to do was hang anything on the wall yet. We wanted her to be apart of that. 

The very next day Ella and I figured out where she wanted to put things. I was so happy that she wanted to keep some pretty big areas blank with nothing on them. 

She loves having her chandelier over her chair. It used to be up in the playhouse, but it made it really hot up there so she barely used it. 

Her saucer chair was such a hit that we ended up buying another one for down in the living room. Her nightstand is the cutest thing. I knew we needed something smaller than the drawer nightstand she had before, but I didn't want to spend $100. I ended up finding this on Amazon for $18. It's basic, sturdy and was easy to put together. I bought the baskets separately on Amazon for more than the nightstand, but it makes it more functional. 

Ella loved the gallery wall that was in her bedroom before so we recreated it on the other side of the room above Peepaw's dresser. 

She also still has the vanity that my Aunt Maria gave her. It was built by her Great-Great Grandpa. My Dad's, Mom's Dad! 

This is the view you see from the hall as you walk in her room. 

The last thing Ella got for her birthday was a new afghan. The previous one I crocheted was for a twin size bed and the colors didn't go with her new room. Ella and I took one of her pillow cases to Joann's and picked out the yarn. It took me about 2 weeks to crochet her new one. It's beautiful! I love all the colors together. You can catch a glimpse in the lower right-hand corner of the above picture. 

It was so fun to do something extra special just for our sweet girl!

New Shed / The Start Of The Basement Remodel!

Oh man am I behind on blogging or what!?!?! So much has happened since I last really blogged about life back in August! Homeschool has definitely made blogging take a backseat and.....that's okay! I'm focusing on my kids right now and I'm loving it. I do love this online journal of mine though so when I get an opportunity to update it I will. So here we go! 

Last year at the end of summer, I was talking to friend who was doing a Home Equity Loan in order to get a shop and horse barn built at her property. That got me thinking! Michael and I have always wanted to remodel our "crawlspace" into living space, but trying to save up that kind of money just never seemed to happen. Also by the time you do end up saving up the money, the cost of the project would be astronomically more expensive than when you first started saving. So I mentioned it to Michael and he said he'd look into it and see if a Home Equity Loan would be a good idea or if would be better to refinance the house. After doing the research he found out it would actually be better for us to just refinance our house. The interest rates were so low it was a good time to take advantage of that and get some money out of the house that way. 

We actually ended up meeting with our original loan officer who helped us when we purchased our condo back when we were only 21. It was so nice to see Norm after all these years. He's the sweetest guy....he still sends Michael and I handwritten birthday cards every year. Michael had already looked around so he knew the general range of where interest rates should be, but unfortunately the company that Norm was working for couldn't get us those lower rates. It was so sad to not get to do business with him again, but we had to do what was right for our family 

So in September, actually on the first night of our big road trip we signed all the paperwork for the refinance at our Airbnb in Nampa, ID! 

We had also already met with our contractor to discuss the upcoming remodel and find out an idea of how much he thought it would cost so we could get the appropriate amount of money out of the house. 

With knowing that we would eventually be losing out on all the storage space in our unfinished basement, we knew we'd need to build a shed. 

At first we thought we'd put the shed at the end of the easement and build it on an elevated platform so water could go down the easement and flow under it, but there were two trees we'd most likely have to remove and we didn't want to lose out on anymore privacy in our backyard. So we decided to use an area that's always been a sore spot in our backyard. An area where we've never know what to do with it and it usually ended up as a catch-all dump heap.

Under our deck! 

This area is usually a storage area anyways....bikes, outside toys, power wheels, lawn chairs and construction materials...you name it. It has always looked hideous so I was ready to turn it into something that could store stuff and actually look nice. I'm honestly not sure why we hadn't thought of this before. 

The first thing on the list of to do's was to clear it out and that meant getting rid of this monstrosity! This HUGE storage unit was left by the previous owners in our garage. It's seriously massive. Michael moved it down to the backyard by himself years ago using PVC pipes to roll it down the easement. I posted it on OfferUP and asked $50 for it. Michael told me he wouldn't pay $10 for it. He despised this cabinet, but someone else wanted for $50! Yay!!! 

The next thing to say goodbye to was all the kids Power Wheels. It had honestly been years since any of them had ridden in them, but I was sure they would still fit inside. Maybe not comfortably, but at least be able to sit inside for a picture. 

There was NO WAY Ella was going to fit in her Barbie Jeep. It's actually really sad! Like a chapter in these kids' lives that's now closed. I remember Ella's birthday party when she got her Jeep. She had so much fun being driven around it in by her brother. 

Zeke was the only one that could still fit in his Ram, but honestly in a few month it would have started to be uncomfortable for him too. 

Owen had to sit on the trunk area of McQueen. 

Jackson's Harley Davidson Power Wheel we gave away a couple years earlier to Jaymes.

The best part of selling the Power Wheels was seeing how excited the parents were for their kids. They were going on to another family to make happy memories!

Here's the area cleared out and ready to go. It really helped that this area already had a foundation to work off of and it's never wet under there. The area above it is our deck and our deck has a roof over it. It has to be really blowing for moisture to get under there. 

We did a little remodel down here a couple years ago. There used to be a wall where those cinder blocks were. I took that out and then built that little risen area to be where we kept our firewood. 

We weren't able to bring the shed all the way across because we need an entrance to the basement. In this above picture you can see the piece of pilewood leaning up against the house right behind that on the right side is where the entrance door to the basement is going to be. We have another door that's at the bottom of the deck stairs, but that's going to be turned into a sliding glass door.

Michael and I removed the first couple of rows of cinders blocks in order to reach the very edge of the concrete pad. 

He borrowed a tool from work so he was able to drill right into the foundation to attach the framing. 

We were planning on having the wall come right to the red post, but then we would have only encased part of that vent on back wall. We thought that would look silly, but we didn't want to encroach too much on the door to the basement and make it feel cramped. So the solution was to slope the wall back at a 45 degree angle. 

Attaching supports to the house. 

We got this roll of foam that we put under the floor supports and also behind the supports attached to the wall. I think it was to make sure it was a tight fit since most everything it's perfectly level you don't want any chance of moisture getting in. 

First wall framed and in! 

Owen got in on the action! 

Michael built the walls in yard and then we moved them into place.

Front wall with the hole for the door and the window! 

Moving it into place! 

45 degree wall! 

Here's the inside view of the last two wall sections! 

Bracing the corner pieces together! 

Front view from the yard! 

Side view from the yard! 

Inside view of the bracing for the shed roof! 

All the joists in! 

Pilewood on and starting to wrap! 

It's like a cute little house under our house! 

Inside view of the pilewood. 

Those deck post were a pain to work around at some points! 

We wanted to make the deck as big as we possibly could, but we didn't really think through the whole roof thing quite as much as we should have. We knew it needed to slope down so if we hosed off the deck the water would run down the roof and away from the house. But Michael built it so high that the roof was at the highest point just inches below the decking. So poor Michael had to do this to put tar paper on! 

He was able to get the pilewood sheets up there and the tar paper just maneuvering around on his stomach. His poor stomach was tore up a bit from this! 

It's also hard to measure distance in regards to holding your hand out and hammering in a confined space so he hit his fingers pretty good a few times. 

You do what you've got to do right! 

All wrapped up! 

Now for the roof shingles....this is even more comical! 

We had to take our deck apart to put those on! Row by row. I removed a few boards and then put a few back on. Where there's a will there's a way right!?!?! 

That's a nice looking roof! 

As for the window, we already had it! When we had all that construction done on our house to get new siding after the wind damage, we also go new windows. The contractor's ordered a window in the wrong size and just left it for us. It was nice to be able to put it somewhere useful! 

We have a window! 

The start of siding! 

While Michael and Owen were working on the siding together it was my job to go through and figure out what in the basement we needed to keep and what to give away or just plain throw away. 

When I organized the basement a couple years ago we went through all Zeke's Disney Cars that I made for his 2nd birthday party. We got rid of some of them that were in rough shape, but he couldn't part with all of them. This was the time to completely part with them. So we had a photo session to say goodbye! I love that Owen's saluting because he's sitting in Sarge! 

The fact that Zeke can still basically smoosh himself small enough to "fit" inside McQueen is so hilarious! 

By this point in the build it was November and the backyard was turning into mush so Michael ripped down was pilewood so we wouldn't ruin the grass walking back and forth with stuff from the basement to the shed. The kids had a great time riding back and forth on their scooters. You can see the different piles of stuff in the background. 

Michael's rudimentary set up for cutting the siding! 

Looking so good! 

Before Michael was even finished with siding it the kids and I were already piling stuff into the new storage shed! 

There is a ton of space in there! 

Here's the view of the basement from what will be the front door. It was almost cleared out, but not quite! The kitchen will be off to the left, the middle area will be for the kitchen table / living room and the far wall will be the bedroom. 

Here's looking back from the other side. Where the door is will be a sliding glass door right off the living room. I'm standing in what will be the bedroom. 

This back area that is right off the bedroom will be the bathroom & closet area. 

The basement will be a studio apartment, but we aren't going to rent it out. For the time being it will be where we move the kids toys and Xbox. It will also serve as a guest space when needed. We'd love to see it used by missionary families that need a place to stay or when family from out of town is here. Eventually when Owen and/or Jack are old enough and working if they'd like to rent it so they feel like they'll have more privacy they can choose to do that. The housing market is so crazy right now I'm honestly not sure how our kids are to going to be able to afford a place of there own so it's is giving them an option! 

Fast forward to March....this is where we are right now! Not much has chanced his November hit. Michael got the door installed and we locked it up and walked away. We can't paint it until the weather decided to behave so hopefully that will happen soon. We are also in the waiting phase for the remodel since everything is so backlogged. It's all in God's timing!