Let me save you the trouble.

Do you have a basement? Do you want to carpet it? Please, PLEASE read this post and let me save you the hassle that was our weekend. OH MY GOODNESS! what a chore it was (and still is since it’s not quite finished).
Just a little refresher: When I first moved in to this place we had to deconstruct the basement and put it back together (anchoring the house to the foundation piers, taking out walls, re-routing plumbing, etc.). Finishing it out was not in the budget. Neither was waterproofing it, but I had to do. They dug a big trench INSIDE my basement, all the way around. Took out the dirt and concrete they jack hammered up and replaced it with rock, perforated pipe, and more concrete on top. The only giveaway that I had it done are little ports in each corner so I can check on things, a giant sump pump with a back up battery, and the dimpled plastic you see sticking up around the edge.

Since I couldn’t afford anything else I decided just to paint the floor, with a special concrete primmer and paint. And I would have been totally find doing that. BUT later on when Tuesday started crawling I decided I needed carpet. I chose Flor tiles so I could do it myself. I put them directly on the painted concrete. I knew the backing of the tiles would react with the paint (it doesn’t like rubber). But I figured, who cares if the paint gets messed up under the carpet? Well that just made our job harder this weekend. We had to pull up all the tiles (because it turns out when you put them on concrete even if it is sealed you can still get moisture issues) and they stuck to the paint. We had to scrap up any that was loose. Then we had to pick it off the tiles. And we had to scrub both with soapy water and then do a bleach treatment to make sure all the mold was dead.

Bj and I were having one of those non-talking conversations where you are sure the other person is thinking the same thing as you; “I do not want to be doing this. How much longer do we have to do this. Can you believe we have to do this?” We are so bruised up and soar from crawling all over the basement.

That black stuff is our solution. I found a local (Salem, Oregon) blog that specializes in home inspections. He talks about everything that can be wrong with old houses (moss on roof? check! basement water issues? check!). I contacted him and he told me about this product and who to be weary of in the area. So greatful for his help because even though this was a pain with all the tools (mostly paint scraper blades) and supplies we had to get  it cost us under $400 to fix. South Salem Plumbing sold us the material (Superseal) so we could put it in ourselves and save the instillation costs. Installing that stuff was the easy part anyway. The membrane is dimpled so air can still move around under the carpet allowing the tiny bit of moisture that comes through the concrete to dissipate.
Now I am just waiting on my Flor order (had to get more dots to hold the tiles together). I still would recommend this kind of flooring. If we had originally installed regular wall to wall carpet with a pad it would have all gone to the dump because you can’t bleach the back of it and I would have been scared of mold. As you can see our mold issue was super minor, but we felt it would only get worse with time. Oh and an added bonus is this stuff keeping the floor warmer than before.
I am excited to get going on the fun stuff down there now. The house is a wreck with displaced basement piles everywhere. I didn’t realize we used our basement so much!

The lower level IS a basement

Oh my goodness my annoying yet awesome basement. I love the size, I love the extra space (I love that it has windows), but every time I work on something down there it turns into A FREAKING DISASTER. Ok maybe not that bad. But the last time I did a little work down there this did happen. And the time before that it was waterproofing the whole basement (where they came and tore up the inside perimeter to put in a drainage system). So I should have known that my simple basement remodel was going to have a few little hiccups.
You probably remember it like this, carpeted and full of ribbon and baby gear. Well when we moved the Ribbon Jar this is what we were left with:


This was right after a play date so it looks extra crazy beans. Those wood pieces on the walls are left over supports from the ribbon racks. My dad and I put them up with these special bolt things that expand into concrete. So we had a couple of choices; cover them up or try to saw through the bolts and take them off. We decided that I would use this area for three main things. 1. a preschool learning area with a Montessori vibe. 2. a sewing corner with the drafting table for projects and 3. a studio to meet with clients and showcase photos. Yes, this is going to looks so cool I will actually bring clients down (right now we meet in my main level craft studio, it works fine, but I’d love more room to showcase some of my work).

So clearing everything out and starting from scratch sounded like the best plan. And since I couldn’t talk Bj into framing up this whole side of the basement we decided on a giant box to go over the wood (plus a little one for my sewing area). It will make it easy to hang artwork and add some depth and warmth to the space. Lucky for me my brother agreed to do it (his company mostly does commercial work). He bid the job and then came in under budget and finished ahead of schedule (one day!!!). I should have known it was too good to be true.

Brent suggested painting the black dimpled plastic (there for waterproofing reasons) with a special for plastic spray paint so the wall was all white. I liked the idea but the prep was a bit of a pain. I pulled back all the Flor tiles from the edge and then had to scrub the plastic (After doing this I’m pretty sure I had not washed it in four years).

Oh my goodness have you guys used this Krylon Fusion stuff? Talk about a brain cell killer. It takes about 12-20 coats (yes really) and the recommended re-coat time starts at 30 seconds so it’s non stop fumes. I did get smart and wear a full on mask and open everything but still so so yucky!
I did it though. And I ordered furniture for the play side. Seriously things we going so perfectly! Now, look back up in the picture of the cleaned out basement. You see those mis-colored tiles and an area with no tiles? A year and a half ago when I put this in I calculated wrong. So I had to order another set of tiles. Well I waited a while to put those in, since most of the floor was covered anyway (and I had a crawling non-napping baby). When I got around to it I realized one box was off colored…. and that I had miscalculated again!! Of course by this time they had discontinued the color (La La Lime in Toy Poodle, anyone have some to spare?). So I said, “forget it!” and left a hole. Of course that doesn’t look so nice so this last weekend Bj and I moved all the heavy furniture to hide the mis matched tiles underneath. Simple. Easy. The last step… but then…
MOLD!!!! Barely noticeable (and Bj swore it wasn’t even there). But I saw it and I could detect a faint mold oder and I knew I could not put those tiles back down there. I had a little bit of a panic attack when I realized the solution was probably NOT going to be cheap. Well, it’s not going to be free, but it’s not going to be as much as I thought. After stumbling upon this great blog I knew what to ask for and found someone who had the right supplies for $330 (Superseal for the floor). He asked me if I put in the carpet myself. I said yes, and he told me I could do the under mat myself too (80 cents a square foot vs. $2 installed). It’s basically the same thing as that bumpy plastic against the walls, but for floors. It allows the concrete to breath and air to move around so no moisture is trapped.
Now I get to pull up all of the tiles. Scrap as much paint off the floor as I can. Scrub and bleach the floor. Scrub each floor tile. Lay down the under mat. Re-lay all of the Flor tiles.
Oh, and that furniture I ordered that was supposed to take three weeks or more? Two weeks early. And I have no where to put it.
And GO!

Ribbon rings

A super easy project for you today.

I read about a project like this in my Toddler Busy Book. I made it a bit more modern and fun by using giant binder rings, upgrading the ribbon, and adding bells.

For these short toddler sized rings I used ribbon in one yard pieces. I simply made a loop and pulled it through to tighten. It was coming loose so a dot of glue helped hold the ribbon in place. I used this tacky glue, but I think super glue would have been easier.

All of the ribbons I used are from the ribbon jar, and one was a wired ribbon from a special collection jar. I didn’t need it to be wired so I pulled it out and used the really soft copper wire that was inside to attach the bells. This stuff is so flexible I don’t think any end is going to come undone and poke Tuesday. I pulled the edges of the wire tight with craft tweezers.

Of course the bells are optional. Here my silly girl is also holding the bell-less version I made my god-daughter (she’s taller so I used two yard pieces for hers).

They were a hit (and so were those 75 cent pants from my thrifting score I posted about yesterday).
I used a bunch of different ribbon including ric-rac (3mm and 6mm), double faced satin (6mm, 9mm, and 15mm), and dupioni silk.

Thrifting goals

So I’m slowly going back through all my old posts. If I mention this more than once (or more than a hundred times) it’s because I’m still doing it and it takes forever! I really want my new site to be functional though and for links to work and pictures to be in the right places. One thing I am doing is updating my categories and adding tags. One category that was smoking hot for a while and has almost fallen off the map is New to Me – Thrifting Adventures. There are a couple of reasons.
When I first got his house I thought to myself, “1,100 square feet, how will I ever fill that up? Plus a basement? I’ll be thrifting for years before I even have to shove stuff under the bed!” Well my friends I even added a second story and I still managed to fill the house up nicely (and garage, ahem…). So there’s the space issue, and there’s the lovely husband who doesn’t think we need another chair that I might get to in the next three years (but probably not since I haven’t in the last three) and there’s Tuesday. The way I tend to thrift shop (early mornings at estate and garage sales, popping in and out of the car as I notice one) doesn’t work well with a toddler. I have become annoyed with myself lately at the things I am buying brand new and paying full price for. Things I used to just wait to come around while thrifting.
But tonight I sit here in my $2 Columbia fleece as cozy as can be ready to change my ways.

Observe my $20 shopping spree: a reversible ironing board for hems and cuffs I’m guessing (plan: set up for Tuesday with a play iron, and use myself when needed), tiny hand rake, a couple pairs of pants for Tuesday (when did she start growing like this?), a jersey stripped boat neck shirt (plan: cute skirt for Tuesday), the above mentioned fleece (was this ever worn?!?!), ugly horse thing (plan: let Tuesday get her $1.95 of kicks out of it and send it back to the thrift store), small tool boxes, funnel (I finally remembered we needed one of these!), nice little shovel, $1 double CD set of annoying kids music, 2 bars of Fels-Naptha (I keep reading things that say to use this stuff, I figure it will come in handy some day), Tuesday sized butter knife, little thing to learn to use chopsticks, and a Dover activity book (I always have one in my purse).
I know how quickly these things will get incorporated into our lives and I’ll forget exactly when I got them. I know this because I stumbled upon this post and realized I used four things from that thrifting trip just today! I love that, using old things, things people don’t want. So I’m making a better effort. With my mom and (almost) sister in law Kat helping wrangle Tuesday I’m planning on thrifting every Friday morning. So I’ve set up a nice little list of goals.

Some inspiration from Flickr (these are also on my newly made Flickr gallery: Things I want to find thrifting). 1. Vintage Wood Tray, 2. Vintage Children’s Sewing or Lacing Cards, 3. FP Record Player 2, 4. DSC_0014, 5. vintage doll highchair, 6. coming soon to the store – old fruit crates!
-vintage wire baskets (I’m doubtful I’ll ever have enough of these)
-wooden crates to turn into a shelf thing for Tuesday
-small trays for Tuesday’s projects
-doll highchair (I was thinking wooden, but that blue one is pretty cute!)
-interesting things for Tuesday to sort
-Lacing cards
-Fisher Price record player. They have ones with little plastic records and ones that take actual little records.
-photo holder, I’m thinking a flower frog maybe?
-cute container for my business cards, they are 4×4 so they don’t fit in a standard case
-books, books, books! I still need hardback Harry Potters 1 & 3, Tuesday loves I Spy books, and I collect a vintage children’s series about a girl named Maida (the books are Maida’s little house, Maida’s little zoo, etc.)

-And my dishes: Johnson Brothers Ironstone plates, bowls, etc. I love them. I still remember when I got them (ah yes, and the basement surprise… guess what we’re dealing with round two on that. Details after I told to the waterproofing expert tomorrow). I’ve had some luck on eBay, but shipping prices and breakage in transit never make it worth it (I admit I’m putting all these photos up in the hopes someone says, “hey I live down the street and I have a whole box of these I don’t need!”).
Of course the things I stumble upon that are not on my list are just as fun (like this fleece!). And there are more things in the back of my head if the deal is just too insane. Like the time my mom found a silver tea set for something like $20. If I could get Bj a scroll saw for that I’d be all over it (I’m obsessed with Made by Joel and have determined that toy making should be Bj’s new hobby).
So what are you hoping to find this thrifting season? What is the best thing you’ve ever found? Give us all hope with your astonishing finds!

Part of my bow pair.

I know you long time readers have heard me mention my “crew girls” many times. I’ve heard from some of you that you thought that meant my crew, as in posse. I call them crew girls because we rowed together at Oregon State. The summer between my Freshman and Sophomore years was my first as a counselor at an all girls camp in Maine. I had a co-counselor who mentioned that she thought I would make a good coxswain, and I should see if my school had a crew program. Little did I know that simple statement would lead to life long friends ships and some of the best experiences of my life.

Tracy and I were in the same class of novice rowers that went on to row for three more years together. She was often in my bow pair, actually closer to the front of the boat than me, and I was steering! Almost three years ago now she called me up and told me that she was pregnant, but only six weeks pregnant. I said, so high and with such a squeal that she didn’t hear me right, “I’m six weeks pregnant!” So she said, “yes, I’m six weeks pregnant.” I said, “No, Tracy, I am six weeks pregnant too!” Our babies ended up having the exact same due date. Oh did we have fun telling the crew girls. We made little cards with January 2nd typed on both sides and passed them out at a crew girl BBQ. We told them not to look. Then we said in unison, “We’re pregnant!” and told them to look on one side for my due date and the other for hers. It was a great happy shock all around. Lachlan and Tuesday were born two days apart. And this month she’ll have her second little boy.




One of my favorite photos ever. That silly little dog. When I talked to Tracy about doing their shoot in their home I said a project or activity would be good and she came up with cooking biscuits (added bonus? They let me stay for the biscuits and gravy).



This shaving idea was another one of Tracy’s. Tiny bathroom, so Tracy and I were in the shower while I was shooting!


Her first son is so sweet and beautiful (and all boy as you can see by the little marks from the tumble he took right before this shot). I can’t wait to meet the second one. Tracy and I were so excited to have each other to talk to during pregnancy. We didn’t think much about the fact that our kids would be the same age… like forever. It’s so handy and so cool to have someone like Tracy to call up. I couldn’t be happier to have captured her family. After the viewing session she said, “Am I supposed to be tearing up when I see these? Because I am.” If I’m doing my job I thought. And I guess I was.

The winners! And recent layouts

Thanks to everyone for entering the giveaway! I counted up the number of entries for each giveaway and let random.org choose the winners.

Giveaway #1, the photo shoot and $300 credit to Life in Color Photography goes to Jen!

Giveaway #2, the first ever Life in Color scrapbook kit (hehehe) goes to Marin!
If I haven’t heard from these two lovely ladies in a week I’ll redraw.
And now something of interest to everyone (I hope!). Some of my most recent layouts. A few weekends ago Sarah and I had a craft day and I’m just now getting these up because they had a few little details I wanted to finish.

Ah camp, how I loved thee. Carefree summer days, no connection to the outside world, just fun and sun. I took this photo out of a frame a while ago and never did anything with it. It’s an odd size since it was printed right in the darkroom at camp, the white boarder is on the photo.

Most of this stuff is from a recent Studio Calico kit. The heart embellishment is punched with a new little punch I got at our awesome old school office supply place called Cooke’s. It’s Fiskers, but I haven’t seen it online.

I almost didn’t want to scrap these pictures of Tuesday upset, since she is always so smiley. But I found these two post-its with my handwriting from when I was nursing Tuesday pretty much non-stop and she wasn’t sleeping. When I went to find a photo from those days these were there. I thought it went perfect with the story I wanted to tell. That I was trying so hard to get everything right.

“everything is going to be okay.” Is a business card. I sort of blacked out the web address of the company with thread.

I had this one done with out a title for a while and finally decided it needed a little something. This really isn’t my style at all, wavy lines and an inset photo. But I was feeling inspired by the organic line Sciarrino came up with and used a little fingertip knife to make the edges wobbly.

Sarah had borrowed this hex punch from a friend and had a whole little jar of hex’s she’d punched. I love that she shares stuff like that with me. Oh I should mention all my titles are from the Silhouette (oh no I went to get that link and saw it can cut fabric now. Kill me, that is too awesome). I think if you get one just to do titles with you’d be happy. I know I am, the thing is genius! Please don’t send me to any more font sites because I’m addicted!
I have a new big order of prints to file away, and I want to scrapbook right now. But the basement beckons…

The indestructible mini

This year for Christmas I wasn’t really focused on making a list. I mean I did make lists, but they were more on what I wanted to get for Tuesday rather than what I wanted for myself. That may sound selfless, but don’t worry I play with her toys too 🙂 So Bj was left flying a little blind and I was quite surprised to open a laminator one night. In fact I said, “This isn’t what’s in the box… is it?” Classy, right? It WAS what was in the box. I asked him why he got it for me; racking my brain to think if I had hinted I wanted one. He replied, “Think of all the things you could laminate!” The truth came out that it was a gold box deal on Amazon and cost him $11 (retail price $80.49, but it looks like it’s still on sale for $26.31). Of course once I knew I had a laminator (and lots of little laminating pouches) I did start thinking of things I needed to laminate.

One of them was this book. I stayed up until 2 am the night before we left for California because I was certain Tuesday needed this book for the plane. I had made a little spiral book for her friend for his birthday and she freaked out over the pictures and postcards I stuck in there. I went through my extensive postcard collection, photos we had on hand, and bits I collected at Crafty Wonderland with a mini book in mind. Take a look.


You can see one of the little envelopes I stuck in. Also notice how there are some bubbles. I really don’t think this laminator is meant for postcard + photo + stickers. Eventually I figured out that feeding a still warm freshly laminated page through again immediately did help to get a nicer finished product.




I decided not to laminate everything, so that their would be a variety of textures for her to experience. I used a Zutter binding machine that I basically stole from Sarah. I didn’t have the right coils for this so these are ripped from an old calendar and cut with wire snips.

So, did she like it? Oh yes she did my friends, oh yes she did. She still likes it nearly a month later (!). I put it in the backpack thing I made her for a cross country trip and we only get it out for longer car rides. I think that’s helped to maintain it’s appeal. This is the second mini I’ve made her (first here) and I want to make more, she is even looking at the first one more now. I think she’s really starting to make connections to things she knows. With this new book she’ll pick a page and babble about if for a while, asking questions and wanting to talk about it. So cool. Added bonus? Less guilt about my postcard obsession.
And a reminder that today is the last day to enter the giveaway! I’ll announce the winners tomorrow.