June 30th

I thought that day would never come and finally it is almost here.  We have been working on selling our house and signed papers over 8 weeks ago.  We are set to close on the 30th.  

There has been screwy deal after screwy deal along the way and who knows if this whole process will even come to an end tomorrow.  We talked to the Realtor today and they said now it could even be the 1st of July.  Will this nightmare never end?  I just want to know where I'm going to be living for the rest of the summer....is that too much to ask?  We have not packed a thing (just worried the deal won't go through, then who wants to have to unpack everything) so it will be a full two weeks of packing before we get "kicked" out of our house.

Oh and not to mention we will be moving my salon during that time too.  Should be tons of fun if it all goes through, right? :)  

I'm not even going to start stressing about it until I have a check in hand from the bank.  

As always, I have tons of pictures of the salon that I haven't posted.  It is coming together perfectly and I only have Troy to thank for it.  He has been amazing to say the least.  Always keeping me on track, even when there were a thousand other things we both wanted to do then have to go up there and work.  I wish I could say there is a long vacation coming at the end of this process, but I don't think there is.

I'll get pictures posted soon!

Monday again

Alright...how is it Monday already again?  I swear I just posted on here, but it has already been a week.  Here is an update.

The salon is moving along.  Lets see....other than the rotting walls, the leaking walls, the wet floor, and the furnace that leaks gas and carbon monoxide we are doing really well.  

Oh and I forgot my horrid blue bathroom that I just can't get covered up.

Did I mention they painted the ceiling, door, pipes, and air duct blue too?  It really is wonderful.

The good news is we did get our new toilet and sink in.  They pulled the 1940's sink off the wall only to reveal a huge hole behind it.  Troy did some wonderful mud work and it looks better than any other part of the wall in that room.  

I don't know the guy who did the other patching in there, but I can only hope that construction was not his "real" job.  

I'm doing a little more painting in there today and little by little it is looking better.  I'll take some updated pictures tonight.  I always forget to take my camera when we go.

We pulled the carpet back in the "salon" area over the weekend only to reveal a big wet spot and the flooring underneath soaked.  We think there could possibly be a window leaking?!?!?  This is kinda a bummer because it holds us up from having our new flooring laid, which was supposed to happen this weekend.

I'll give you a few more progress photos.  I know you have seen this first photo.  But here it is again just to refresh.  So we cut an opening in that wall to go into the salon.  There is a door off to the left that we Troy filled in. 

  

This is the backside after he took the sheet rock off.

Here it is with the new opening cut in.

I will take some more pictures tonight when I go up so you can see how far we are now.  I have the whole salon area painted and the whole waiting area painted.  We need to get lights up, flooring in, trim done, and the plumbing in yet.  Those things should hopefully go pretty fast as soon as we find out about the wet floor.

Khloe got to spend a day at my parents awhile back and they pulled out my Big Bird that I had as a little girl.  They thought Khloe was just about the right age.

She had a ball on it!

10:00

It's 10:00 and as usual, lately, I am beat.  

But I am on the couch blogging and just stuck in the movie "Leap Year."  I'm really too tired to watch it and have way to many things to do, but I refuse to let Netflix get their money's worth out of me.  I am determined to watch my movie at least once a week or cancel it.  I know...so stupid...but still I have to get my money out of it.  By the way, we did rent "It's Complicated" last week.  Great flick.  Troy thought it was the first good one we have had from Netflix (he didn't watch "New Moon").  It's been awhile since I have heard him laugh really hard at a movie.  Pretty funny.

So here I am, thinking about the business cards that need to be designed and printed, the rice bags that need to be made (warm rice bags....for my clients to put over their weary eyes while they relax in the salon...I know....exciting....shhh it is supposed to be a surprise), the gift bags that need to be put together, the products that need to be priced, the promotions that need to be thought up, the blog that needs to be designed.....and trust me people, this is the tip of the iceberg.  But by gosh I am going to get my use out of Netflix, so here I lay watching "Leap Year."

I told Troy tonight I am so ready to get back to normalcy.  His reply to me "What exactly is normalcy?  Can you tell me the last time we had it?  Was it before we had a kid or before we got married?"  My normalcy is being able to clean my house, do laundry, pay bills, play with Khloe, scrapbook, sew, and maybe see some sun on my pasty arms.  Cooking a decent meal is right up at the top of that list too.  Instead of the usual Rice Krispies, watermelon, popcorn, or whatever else I can grab real quick before heading to the salon.  I'm just ready to have my life back.  I keep saying "By the 4th of July it should all quiet down."  I just keep repeating that in my head.

Alright are you all tired of hearing how busy I am now?  I hate when people do that, but since this is my blog and it is my place to rant sometimes....I guess this is what you get tonight! :)

Ok so on to some pictures.  These are all straight out of the camera, no photoshopping tonight so sorry if they aren't the greatest, but here goes.

Lets start in the waiting area tonight.  Here are some before pictures.  

All closed up.  A rather drab area.  Dark and gloomy.  Here are some photos of us making progress in this room.

our little helper

Troy working the texture gun.  I think by the end he actually was having fun.

Here is how we are looking today!  Much more open and airy.  The walls on the left have been textured and painted by now and this room, except for the flooring (which arrived today), shelving, and lights on the wall, is finished.  On to the actual salon! 

Hopefully by the end of the week I will have some progress pictures of the salon.  

In the next couple of days I will post some pictures of the other rooms.  Wait till you see the progress on the bathroom.  The sink that has hung on the wall for the last 60 years has been removed only to leave a huge whole in the wall.  Not to mention you could easily just peel the entire wall off because it is about all rotting away.  Troy is in the fix it stage right now before the plumbers come back tomorrow.  

It always ends up being a bigger project than you think, right?

By the way...the movie is going well.  I really like Amy Adams and I haven't seen Matthew Goode in anything since "Chasing Liberty."  I think that was about 10 years ago.  So far it gets my recommendation....but I'm only in about 30 minutes.

getting there

The salon is progressing!  Whoo hoo!  We feel like we have been there more than we have been at our house lately.  Just wanted to let you know I will be back with a big post tonight....along with some progress pictures!  The end is finally somewhat in sight!

wednesday already

Am I about the worst or what?

I cannot believe I haven't gotten pictures posted yet.  I swear every single spare minute we have has been spent at the salon or traveling to pick things up for the salon.  We are moving right along, but we need to get texture on the walls, new ceiling tiles, paint the ceiling, and finish painting the walls before the new flooring gets laid, which will probably happen next week.  No pressure, right?

So I think I am headed, yet again, to do some shopping tomorrow.  We are going to have a long, long, list of stuff to get.  So I am off to bed to get an early start!

Shelving

Went to Ikea yesterday and picked out new items for the salon!  I love that store and I think I could spend half a day there just looking.  Here is the new shelving I got for product...

I love it and can't wait to put it together in the salon.  We have a ways to go yet.  I will try to upload more pictures tonight.

where do I even begin

It has been quite awhile since I updated on happenings around here.

Things kind of got put on a stand still around here after Dave's accident.  I don't know if the full shock of it all has still even settled in on any of us.  I keep reminding myself that everything happens for a reason.  Even though right now things are a little cloudy, they have to get better.  I think it will be a hard summer for all of us, especially my sister.  I just hope for her that each day the pain lessens just a tiny tiny bit and she can be thankful for the short time she was able to spend with him.

We are moving forward on selling our house.  We have an appraisal this week and hopefully if everything checks out it is a done deal.  We are crossing our fingers.  We have a duplex rented on standby in case things go through and we have no where to go.

We have also begun work on the new salon.  It needs a total gut job, but we are trying to work with what we have and I think thing are coming together nicely.  We spent the ENTIRE Memorial Day weekend up there working.  Troy has been amazing...as always.  Never complaining about going up there and not letting up on getting the work done.  I tried a couple of times to take a half a day off this weekend, but he would hear nothing of it.  He is right though, we have a very short period of time to get it done.  If our house sells we have to be out by June 30th.  Eek!!!  I don't even want to think about trying to move all of our stuff and trying to finish and move the salon by then.  It's more than my brain can handle right now.

I'll be posting some pics of the salon as we go.  Here are all of the before pictures.  The pictures don't even do the building justice for how bad it is.  It is disgusting up there.  I've never touched so many bugs and spiders and who know what else in my life.  The bathroom looks like something I've never seen before.  We are having the toilet and sink replaced and who knows what we are going to do with the floor to ceiling blue paint.  They even painted the door blue and the paper towel and toilet paper holders blue.  Nice. 

My scrapbooking has been put on a back burner right now.  There is just no time.  I am hoping to start working on it again soon.

I am going to try and update some pictures on my other site.  Don't be surprised if some days are missing.  There were a couple of weeks there after the accident that I barely picked up my camera.

Alright well I think that covers everything for now.  I plan to get my blog back up and running regularly and keep you updated on the salon progress.  I have the end vision and I can only hope it turns out that good!