I can honestly say I am as tired as I ever remember being. I am going to share 3 photos that should explain at least part. Once we get things cleaned up I will get better pictures to share.
Friday night
Saturday
Sunday
Okay so I am sharing this picture to show the new dishwasher and what Matt accomplished on Friday… Excuse the mess
The weather has been warm and sunny the last week. This has made Saving a little bit easier for us. We decided to turn off the heat and air around 2 weeks ago and managed a solid 10 days without the use of either until today. I am hopefully that we can again turn it off next weekend. My goal is always to go an entire month without use either which will reduce our electric bill by approximately $100 for the month.
The warmer weather has also got me thinking about our garden. I purchased some new netting and some lawn fabric to use. The netting is specific to square foot garden but is also much cheaper than wire so I am hoping that it will last for several years. I am also trying something new this year. We still have sweet potatoes from our harvest in the fall, so I am trying to start a new crop from the ones we have. The kids enjoying helping with this project. I am not sure if this will give us enough but I am thinking that once I see it working I may start a second batch as well to equal the amount we planted last year.
I read last month that you could grow romaine lettuce using a similar water method. The red cup you see is out second head we have attempted. Last week, Zach and I planted the first one in the garden.
I realize that we may not be able to have a continual harvest and most like will only get a few extra leaves from this but as I have said before, every little bit helps.
Other areas of saving is our grocery budget, so far we have managed to spend $125 out of pocket for the month of March in addition to less than $1000 for the entire year so far. This has been the best and most controlled my grocery budget has ever been. I will admit that monthly meal planning helps but we also are buying on a rotating schedule. Our March spending should remain well below $200 however I will need to purchase meat in April so the budget will again be higher.
Finally, I am attempting to save money by using Swagbucks. My goal for each month is to earn one $25 gift card.
What are your saving secrets?
We are traveling for cheerleading this weekend, so we decided to throw in some fun! We started with lunch at one of my absolute favorite resturants, PF Changs . Excuse the blurry picture cleaned the lens after see it.
We also stopped for some desert at Diary Queen. Most of the afternoon was spent playing in the pool at our hotel.
We ended by eating chips, wraps and cookies while watching a movie!
This week has been about painting and cleaning. I am so excited because it appears that we once again have a functional kitchen. This is most like the last time this month that a visual difference will be seen. Next up is installing the cabinets and working on moving plumbing. But this week huge changes have occurred. The play room/dinning room is finished except for painting of the cabinets that have been relocated.
This is the “old front door” which now is a closet. I LOVE the gray color!
Looking from our bedroom door, we have the keyboard and kids television.
View from standing in the door of kitchen, you can see where the wall was.
View from door from Living room.
We also were able to hang pictures
If you want to see just how far our progress has come check out these post:
This week has been so busy and stressful, I was not sure we would have any progress to show but I am THRILLED to post this update. I am not including any pictures of the dinning/playroom because with only one coat of paint it looks worse than when we started. Hopefully a second coat will go on Monday and we can get most of it back together as well. I have always said that the hardest part of remodeling is living around it. So first up Matt designed and built both a shelf for the microwave but also a shelf to hold the Keurig. I LOVE this shelf and it actually not only adds space but let us move the Keurig back to the kitchen from Matt’s office.
He was also able to finish out the trim for the window and door that faces the living room.
I know the next couple of weeks will be slow as far as progress goes because a lot of the next steps are adding the plumbing that is needed to move the sink. But we are moving along!
Here is the other post to show just how far we have come.
Quite honestly, this has been one of the most stressful week in the past two or three years. Today, I am going to share a little of that stress both financial and personal with you.
I talked last week about the fact we discovered a nail in our new vans tire on Saturday. Matt took the van in on Monday morning and discovered that not only was the tire not fixable but we actually needed to replace all four tires.
Amanda’s car, which we are still responsible for major repairs on, was not working properly. Amanda said she did not have any heat. This ended up being a minor repair of less than $150 but still a unexpected expense.
Kendal is scheduled to compete in her first cheer competition on Saturday, so they have had practice 3 of the 5 nights this week. Lily also has had practices on these nights but at later times, which means we are playing taxi a lot.
Zach and Kendall both are not feeling at 100%. I took Zach to the doctor this afternoon and he has a double ear infections. I am so thankful that this is the first real sickness for him since starting school in August.
On a more positive note, both Lily and Kendall had orthodontic appointments this morning. Lily will be in braces most likely at age 11 or so. Kendall unfortunately is going to require several phases of brace and some other really expensive work. The good news is that it is felt that waiting another 6 months to a year before starting this process is our best options.
Matt has a doctor’s appointment in the morning and with the multiple trips this week we have accomplished very little in the way of remodeling this week. I hope to share at least some progress this weekend.
Matt has continued to work on the kitchen this past week and I managed to help a couple of times. One of the huge visible changes this week was us re-framing the window.
Before
During
Finished…. which I LOVE!
Matt also painted all the walls in the current kitchen white. We were given antique white but after looking at it, we decided it was not bright and clean looking enough so we decided on “high vee white” I actually like it. Matt also added trim around the top of the ceiling to replace the crown molding.
Today was a huge day for us. We decided to make it a shopping day. I wanted to check out several different stores to see if we could find/decided on cabinets and countertops. Our overall decision is to go with a “farm/ simple” kitchen feel. My one standing rule was that it either had to be on an awesome sale or both of us had to agree this is what we wanted.
Our first stop was Home Depot. They did have a sale but we could not get things to work out. I did make a list of the items we found and prices so we would be able to compare with the other stores.
Next kitchen stop was IKEA. I did a little research last night but was not anticipating the additional choices offered in the store. Our first decision was that we definitely would not be purchasing cabinet from here as they only have “plastic” cabinets. Yes, the have a wood grain appearance but still are plastic. We did find the “perfect” sink and pick out a counter top for the new sink area that we both agreed on. Of course, we picked up several other items that will be used in the kitchen but the kids and Matt are most excited that we purchased reading lights for each of the kids and one for Matt’s art desk.
Our final physical stop was the local Lowes store. We found our great sale here. Cabinets were an additional 20% off after purchasing $400. I was also able to find a “drawer” cabinet that I really wanted. So we ended up purchasing new bottom cabinets including ones for the new sink area. We also purchased a new faucet that fit both of our “wants”. I am still not certain if it is the right one but it at least is a place holder until I find a better one. I was disappointed when we discovered that the tile, I had chosen several weeks ago was no longer available in our local store. So after arrive home, Matt went on-line and order us enough tile for the back splash as I am afraid this is being discontinued.
I joked and posted on Facebook that we had enough supplies to keep us busy several week but in actually I think these purchases today will keep us busy a month or more.
Goals for the week are :
1. Patch and paint the walls in the new dining/ play room.
2. Build 2 shelves one is for the microwave and the second for Keurig. I want a third for holding bottles but this is low on the list so I may save for another week.
3. Finish staining and hang up remaining trim around door and window in the kitchen.
Items we have supplies to work on
1. new sink cabinet- assembled, painted and new plumbing ran. When this is complete we will need to purchase the new dishwasher.
2. installing of new dishwasher along with moving of instant hot
3. Cutting countertop and cabinets and installing stove in it’s permanent home.
4. Removing old cabinets, painting and installing new cabinets.
5. Stripping and repainting old top cabinets
6. Installing new tile backsplash.
I know progress is slow but it is progress and we should not need to spend a great deal in the next month except for purchasing the new dishwasher.
I am so excited to say that we have finished our first stage in updating our kitchen. You can read our plan if you would like. We started tearing down the wall that once separated the kitchen and living room two weeks ago. Pictures of the fun are on a Wordless Wednesday post. Today, Matt finished install the “beam and capping off the wall. It turned out great
It feels awesome to actually be at a point where we can stop for a couple of weeks. The current plan is to “wait out the weather” as we are anticipating snow both tomorrow and next Monday. If this occurs, we do not want to start anything with the kids out of school for several days. So once that is settled we will paint next. We have been given antique white paint which is perfect for our “farm house” theme..
Even better news is that I have been keeping track of everything we have spent, so far that is $694! I know that we need some painting supplies and will have to purchase the materials for the back splash but my goal is that we spend less than $1000 before the new appliances, cabinets and floor!
