Okay, so obviously I need a better camera, but at least you get the gist of it. Got a couple clean coats on the bathroom walls (and thankfully didn't splatter all over the place either!). I really love how it looks: very soothing.

I also stopped over at Bed, Bath & Beyond - aka the devil - to drool over some over-priced home decor. The only thing I found that I cannot live without are these awesome little sparrow-shaped stick-on mirrors. I think they'll look freakin' sweet around the medicine cabinet. Plus, at only 10 bucks for a pack of six, I can live with the price.

In other news, I finally found a stove today. Some guy was selling a practically new one for $100 bucks on Craigslist. I checked it out and forked over the cash, so now we just have to get it home.

Tomorrow after I'm done with work, I'm going to be borrowing the company van and hauling as much as I can: which means not only picking up that stove, but also anything I can move. The one catch right now to being completely over at the new place is that there is no hot water: the pilot light in the boiler keeps going out. Dusty's not sure why, so hopefully once he's done with his long weekend at work (14 hr. shifts both Sat. & Sun.) he'll have time to figure it out.

Until then, I'm snarfing down some chips and salsa for dinner and waiting for this Icy Hot to kick in. I jacked up my right shoulder doing derby last weekend, and bowling three games followed by painting for an hour certainly didn't help matters. The house is a mess and there's a lot of shit I could be doing, but for now, I think it's time to relax while I can.

Well, we officially have water in the house. The plan was to paint, but after some car shuffling and errands, I came to the conclusion that it might be more important at this time to have water rather than fancy walls. It's amazing how nice it will be to use the toilet in the house instead of riding down to the Shell station.

Tomorrow is a half day at work for me, so I'm going to try and cram as much as I can into moving, unpacking and starting over again. The search for a stove continues: you would think finding a used electric stove with coil burners wouldn't be this difficult. The Habitat Restore had a bunch of gas stoves, plus those glass-top stoves that just suck: I'll try again and just keep watching the Argus and Craigslist. Tis the season: something ought to show up soon. Otherwise I guess we'll just put the microwave in the void.

In other news, the neighborhood is gearing up for the annual project NICE: basically the city-run junk curb program. Officially, the city won't be coming by until Monday to pick up any of the rubbish, so right now it's like white trash Christmas in my neighborhood as the piles of broken couches, old tvs and non-functioning exercise equipment randomly appear in front of homes. Cars creep up and down the streets to check out these magical trash heaps, trucks full of scrap metal aren't too far behind. I've been tempted to stop - the scavenger in me is hard to quell - but I've resisted thus far. Besides, none of the good stuff is out there yet.

Since I've got to have any of my own large junk to the curb by Monday, my supreme goal for the weekend is to get anything I don't want out there this weekend, like my old desk, some rusty bikes and broken chairs. Is is bad that a part of me wants to put it out there one piece at a time and just wait for someone to slow down and pick it up? Ah: I'm gonna miss this neighborhood.

Well here is the happy new home! Dusty spent most of the weekend raking pine needles and leaves: evidently the folks who lived here previous had never heard of a rake before. Our hope is that we might be able to eventually break through to soil under all the leaves and have grass this summer. I'll keep you posted as this excitement develops.

I have decided that the only way to tackle this place without going A) broke and B) insane, is to take things one room at a time. And the first room that will be getting an extreme make-over is the bathroom (see lovely pic at right). Believe it or not, that ugly green bath tub is my favorite part of the bathroom! I have a funky green shower curtain and when I saw this Dr. Seuss-esque tub, I knew this was the place for us!

I went ahead and cleaned the walls and taped the trip to paint tomorrow: I'm going to go with a deeper olive green (you can't tell in this picture, but the green tub is actually a light cucumber color). I'm a big fan of monochromatic, and I think if we do the floor in basic black and white tile for contrast it will look pretty nice. I'll be sure to update with pics as soon as I get the painting done.

At left is the next project I want to tackle: the kitchen. Surprisingly, the cabinets are in great shape and have a neat, blue-wash over the hardwood that's pretty unique. The flooring needs to be replaced, but I can live with it until I figure out what I want to do. You can't see it in this picture, but there are these big beams overhead and a tall ceiling that makes this little kitchen feel really open and spacious. As small as my kitchen is now, this looks like sooooo much counter space to me! Soon as I track down a stove, I'll be set.

At right is probably the room I love the best and probably will change the least: the living room. I love the hardwood floors and archways. I really hate blue walls, but I have to admit they're kind of growing on me. This picture doesn't do this room much justice because you can't see the five big windows on the westside of the room: it's great in the afternoon. I can tell this will be the perfect place to park with a book on the couch when the suns going down.

Lots of exciting projects: Dusty is off tomorrow, so I've got some things for him to get done while I'm at work. Most importantly, I'm hoping he gets the plumbing hooked up: it was a pain in the butt to work on the house and have to drive down to the gas station for bathroom breaks!