Thursday, January 19, 2012

One man's junk...

is another man's treasure...

  I have a thing for old weathered wood.  I think old barns and sheds have so much personality.  Our old shed, however, was just not meeting up to its potential.  Last summer when James was coming home from work he noticed a house that was in the process of getting new vinyl fencing.  They had piled all their old fence wood in their driveway and James happened to notice it and mention it to me.  I jumped in the car and drove over to their house and knocked on their door.  When I asked if I could have the wood the lady looked at me like I was a little crazy but she agreed.  So we hauled the wood back to our house with plans to use the wood to recover our shed.  (By the way, all of this happened during a spring rain storm, so yes, I probably am a little crazy.) 

January is normally a hard month for me because I miss being outside and get tired of all the cold weather.  But so far this January has been great.  Last week we had a run of warm days ending with temps in the 60's on Saturday.  So I decided to get started on my shed makeover.  After the third staple, my staple gun stopped working so I had to wait for James to get home from the store to fix it for me.  (Can I just say how much I appreciate having a husband who can fix everything!)  So after that little hickup, the project went really fast.  Dallin was so excited to work with me on it and that made me excited too.  We pounded out the side of the shed in just a couple of hours on Saturday, but it was getting late so we didn't have time to do the front that day.   

I was hoping the string of warm weather would carry over until Monday so I could do the front, but it didn't.  Monday was Martin Luther King Jr. Day so the kids and James were home.  I woke up that morning and my first thoughts were of how I was going to design the doors.  So I grabbed the ipad and browsed images of barn doors while cuddling in my warm bed with James.  After settling on a design I liked I decided to get started on it because I just wanted to finish the front so badly.  The temps were back in the normal January range (26-30) but we did it anyway.  The kids took turns helping me while the others were inside warming up.  Shelby helped staple a good portion of the front pieces on.  Then we took the doors inside the garage and Dallin helped me put them together. 

While we were finishing the doors my Mom came over with two glasses of green smoothies for us to drink for a little boost of energy.  I thought it was super nice of her to think of us and do that.  What a nice Mom I have!  Then we got back to work.  After I drank the smoothie I noticed that my throat felt a little itchy, which happes sometimes when I eat watermellon or canteloup.  So I figured there must have been something in the smoothie that I was a little alergic to.  But then my stomach started to feel upset and I really started feeling strange.  We finished the doors and I went inside to ask James a question about the hinges.  It wasn't long before my ears were itching, my scalp was super itchy, I started to break out in hives all over and I started wheezing.  I have to admit that it freaked me out a little.  I quickly took a bunch of Benadryl to counteract the allergic reaction and called Mom to find out what was in the smoothie.  The only ingredient that she included that I don't normally have is bee pollen.  So apparently I am highly allergic to injested bee pollen!  The Benadryl helped abate the symptoms but completely wiped me out and I slept most of the afternoon.  James took a break from wiring our basement and hung the doors by himself.  I'm still not sure how he managed that, but he did.  When I finally woke up and got a peak at the finished product I loved it!  We still have the other two sides to go, but the view from my kitchen is perfect. 

We need to move the wood pile that is on the other side of the shed before we can get started on that side, so Dallin and I have been splitting logs and transferring the wood pile to the finished side the past couple of days after school.  After the first day of working on it Dallin said, "Can I chop more wood when I get home from school tomorrow?"  I love his work ethic!  Yesterday at 3:30 pm I found myself thinking, "Only 20 more minutes until Dallin gets home and we can go outside and work together."  I really have fun working with my kids.   
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4 comments:

Melissa said...

That looks awesome! I love it!

January 19, 2012 at 11:03 AM
Kelli said...

Holy cow! You rock! I really love it! I didn't even know you were over there doing all that! I will have to come see it in person. Nice work! It was a much needed makeover :)

January 19, 2012 at 1:37 PM
Jamie said...

Wow, so cool tracy! I love that dallin is such a great worker, I hope my boys will be that great some day.
When i started to read about the allergic reaction my first thought was the bee pollen, crazy!
You are pretty amazing. I was just thinking the other day..."i wish i had some of that old wood tracy found." ha! glad you put it to good use!

January 20, 2012 at 2:24 PM
Sandra Nixon said...

oops, the jamie comment was from me.
Jamie is here visiting me!

January 20, 2012 at 2:26 PM

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Funny Quotes

  • Darcy came up to me the other day with a permanent marker and said, "Mom, is it okay if I use this pregnant marker to draw a picture?" January 2012
  • Darcy was in a bubble bath the other day having a great time. She made a beard out of bubbles and put bubbles on her head to make herself look like Santa. When it was time to clean off the bubbles I parted the bubbles to get down to the clear water and she said, "Oh, I didn't know there was water down there!" December 2011
  • Darcy calls hangnails or snags on her nails "Pinchies". She says "Mom, can you get this pinchie off my toe?"
  • Whenever we do something fun Darcy always says, "Lets to dat adain." I love her little voice when she says it.
  • Every morning Cody comes into my room while I'm still in bed and tells me, "Mom, it's light outside. It's time to get up." To which I reply, "Okay, let me get dressed." So now when Cody is getting dressed and I call to him his response is, "I'm getting my dressed on!" I love it. No more getting dressed at our house...its now know as "getting our dressed on".
  • I like to make fruit smoothies for breakfast sometimes. Cody calls them Smoot Moolies, so that has become the name for them at our house. The other day when I was making a smoot moolie Cody asked if he could help me make it. I said he could so he jumped up on the counter and picked up a banana. He proceed to peel it and then handed me the peel and said,"Here's the armpit mom." I wasn't sure if I heard him right so I asked him what it was called. He said, "The armpit...you know the thing that the banana is in." November 2009
  • This afternoon when we were driving to the store I had a funny conversation with Cody. “Does Matt have a house?” Cody asked. “Well, Matt is here to buy a new house.” I replied. “Ooooo, that sounds fun!”Cody said. About a minute passes and then he says “How is he going to carry it?” I’m trying my hardest not to laugh. “I think he needs a big rope.” Cody said, happy that he figured out a good solution to the problem. I just love Cody…he keeps me laughing all the time. January 21, 2010
  • I was really tired one afternoon so I flopped down on the couch and said, "I'm pooped out!" Cody came over and snuggled up to me on the couch and said, "I'm having poop time too!" July 2009
  • When I told the kids that James was going to be going to California, Cody sat up straight and excitedly said, "Like Lightening McQueen! He went to California!" October 2009
  • The other day James said to Cody, "How's my buddy?" Cody got a very serious look on his face and said, "Name's Tody!" (He still can't pronounce C's very well.) The only things he will let us call him, other than his name, is big boy or funny kid.
  • When we were first potty training Cody he said he needed to go to the bathroom during sacrament meeting at church. So I took him to the bathroom and sure enough he did his business in the toilet. This was one of the first times he ever did poops in the toilet so he was really excited. When we walked back into sacrament meeting (we were sitting near the front of the chapel) he loudly proclamed "Daddy, I did giant poops in the toilet!" December 2008
  • Cody comes up with cute names for things. Mostly because he has troubles prononcing some of his letters. Some of my favorite names are "Daddy's Toke-Toke" for Coke, "Dr. Seuse" for Dr. Pepper, the "lurnal" for urinal, and "peanutbutter jam" for peanutbutter mixed with honey in a bowl.
  • Shelby had a hard time saying her G's when she was little. So we were working with her on how to say Grandma. She could make a growling sound pretty well, so we we had her growl then say grandma, so she used her best growling voice to say "GRRRR AMA"
  • The sun was shining in Cody's eyes the other day and he pointed at it and said, "Mommy, that circle is burnin' my eyes!" January 2009
  • Heres a list of funny words our kids have come up with for things: Fwaps (Cody's word for patting Darcy's back), bednight snacks, square noodles (ramen noodles), peeps, giant poops, dishwasher (Cody says this is where we wash clothes), low-low (lawn mower), regular grandma (Shelby's way of describing the difference between Great Grandma and her (regular) Grandma, oopadaisy (Shelby)
  • When we were building our house Shelby and Dallin spent a lot of time here with me working on it. One day when I was putting up the finish trim I couldn't find the hammer. I was looking all over for it and just didn't have any luck finding it. Shelby (2 yrs old) made two fists with her little hands and said, "It's okay Mommy, you can use my bammers!" November 2005
  • When Dallin was 1 yr old, he used to love making car noises. His favorite noise to make was the sound of tires screeching and then a crash. So EVERY time we would apply the brakes in the car we would hear his little voice from the back seat..."errrr kshhhh"
  • When Dallin was about 3 years old, he always liked to sit between James and I on the couch. But his way of saying it was cute. He would say "Can I sit in the tween of you?"
  • When Dallin was about 4 years old, I let him and Shelby skip naps because we needed to go somewhere. As we were driving on the road Dallin said, "Wow, look at all these people who are skipping naps too!" I guess he thought everyone had naps during the afternoon! Summer 2005