Jupiter's main bath

This is the bathroom vanity that we found for the main bathroom for Jupiter Court. This is an IKEA vanity and sink. We are getting the sink, the cabinet under the sink and the three drawer unit next to the sink.

This picture is just half of the display, which had two three drawer units and two sinks -- we don't have that much room.

We also got the butcher block top, too. The kitchen will have a butcher block counter top and a white porcelain sink - so this will flow quite nicely with the updates we have in mind. The tub is white, the toilet is going to be white, too. We will probably put beadboard around the entire room, subway tiles in white surrounding the tub and I think we may put those small white octogon tiles on the floor - but that is still up in the air.

We picked up the cabinets and the countertop when we were at IKEA the other day, however the sink was not in stock. It should be in stock tomorrow & I'll have to run down to Orlando to pick it up.

So that's the main bathroom for the house. I think it is going to be lovely.

Have a great day!
Kristin

Planet Earth Video

This is a beautiful little video from The Secret. It is 3 minutes long and has a lovely soundtrack - although speakers are not absolutely necessary.




I adore The Secret. I have the video, two books now (I have used a highlighter in one & marked up nearly every page) and I just recently purchased the unabridged audio set to play in my car. I will be driving to Michigan in a few weeks and I am going to enjoy having the audio playing during my drive.

Enjoy the video & look around The Secret website if you get a chance.

Have a great day!
Kristin

WFMW - Water

This week Shannon over at Rocks in my Dryer is doing a themed version - What Doesn't Work for Me (and others.)

I have to tell you, I have struggled with this. I have complaints about things, but I forget what they are until someone brings it up and then I say -- Oh ya - I forgot about that!

Last night I finally came up with something that does not work for me.

The sound of running, babbling, crashing, or otherwise noisy water. In our previous home we had pool with a little hot tub(ish) area off to the side and water spilled from the hot tub area into the pool. The sound drove me crazy. When I could get away with it, I would turn off the pool pump. My favorite time of day outside by the pool was after dark when the pool pump retired for the evening.

We spent a week in Vieques in a lovely lovely home on the "rough" side of the island. (My In-Laws invited us to stay with them - What a treat!!!) The ocean crashed against the cliffs. Day in and day out. Crash Crash. I thought I was going to lose my mind. I was never so happy to go home.

Last night I spent the night in a hotel room - the faucet dripped. All Night. (Hence the inspiration for this topic!) I finally figured out how to silence it and reported it to the front desk in the morning.

I love a good shower, a nice bath, doing dishes (honest - I love to do dishes) - but the noise of water drives me batty.

Please go to Shannon's blog and read what others have posted and leave me a message so I can come visit you!

Have a great day!

Kristin

IKEA

I just knew I'd be awake in the middle of the night tonight. We are just a few miles from one of my favorite places, IKEA, and my head is just bursting with ideas. Most people come to Orlando, FL to see the mouse and all of his friends - I come because of Swedish furniture. The Grand Opening of this IKEA was Nov. 14th, 2007. I ha a post-it on my computer desk for months with that date on it. I wanted to come down here for the Grand Opening, but as the day approached, I decided to wait until I really had something to purchase.

Tom designed an IKEA kitchen for the Jupiter Ct. house, so we came down here hauling a trailer, to pick up the kitchen cabinets and find two nice bathroom vanities as well. The kitchen is going to have white cabinets with beadboard door inserts & butcherblock counter tops. The appliances will all be stainless steel and Tom found this cool modern looking hood of stainless steel and glass, that I think will look real good with everything else.

So, I'm awake at 4am. My husband is sound asleep and snoring up a storm. I keep mentally wandering through the IKEA stores that I have been to, looking at all of the fun kitchen stuff, lighting and furniture. My house needs nothing. I have more than enough. The flips on the other hand, are so lacking that it is hard to not furnish them. We aren't selling them furnished, but we are staging, so I want a few things...but in a store like IKEA it is hard to just buy a few things.

Mr. Ingvar Kamprad (& family) that owns IKEA is the 7th wealthiest person in the world, according to the latest Forbes list. So the fact that I have a hard time buying just a few things is not something that is unique - Lots of people purchase IKEA products.

I just looked this up on Wikipedia "The acronym IKEA is made up of the initials of his name (Ingvar Kamprad) plus those of Elmtaryd, the family farm where he was born; and the nearby village Agunnaryd." I did not know this. I'm not sure how the nearby village got figured into the name, maybe it was just because Mr. Kamprad didn't want his store to be called IKE. I figured IKEA was a swedish word for "put it together yourself" or "flat pack" or possibly "No words, just pictures."

I am going to head back to bed. I'm starting to yawn, so that is a great sign. Night all.

Have a great day!
Kristin

New stuff!

Now that we have started working on these flip houses, I see other things in my life that need to be spruced up. I have done something about a few of those things this past week. I bought new shoes and socks, that I mentioned recently but the other day I bought something even more exciting...

Bra's and underwear!

Ooooh the joys of new underthings.

The underwear, was in a smaller size, too. Gotta love that.

Oprah once had on a guest who said that bras should only be worn one day, then handwashed. So in order to go a full week, you'd need to have more than just two bras - smart huh? Well, I loved that suggestion and followed it for quite some time, until fairly recently.

OK, OK... I didn't handwash my bras, but I did buy a little bra holder for the washer. It is round and had a zipper and it holds two bras. I toss it into the regular cycle and then hang the bras up to dry. The reason why I had not been doing this as of late is because my bra supply had dwindled. I was down to just two bras. I don't do laundry that often anymore.

Now I have one bra for each day of the week, they all fit and I can do laundry once a week and have a nice clean bra to wear each day. It seems like such a little thing, but it wasn't. I'm so happy to have nice undergarments.

It is so much fun to get some new stuff every so often.

Have a great day!
Kristin

Write Zoom

Sometimes a song gets stuck in my brain - it can last a day or so...Most of the time, it's just a few minutes. Sometimes things get stuck in my brain for years and years.

Write Zoom
Zeee double O M
Box 35 0hhh
Boston Mass
Ohhh 2134
Send it to Zoom, yaaa

Now they have Zmail and other assorted ways to send stuff to Zoom, but I can still hear the jingle in my head...

Write Zoom
Zeee double O M
Box 35 0hhh
Boston Mass
Ohhh 2134
Send it to Zoom, yaaa

Mocha's cat bed

This is Mocha.

This is Mocha's cat bed.

Mocha's cat bed sits next to my computer chair.

Mocha likes it when I rest my hand on her back as I sit in the computer chair.

It is difficult to type with my hand on her back.

Normally Mocha is not sitting up, but rather laying flat out - but when I turned on the camera she hopped right up.

If Mocha is not in her cat bed, but still wants me to pay some attention to her, she will get behind my chair and poke me in the rear end. I think she could do that for hours - but I don't let her!

This cat bed was a gift from my sister, Hillary. Mocha loves Hillary.

Kristin

Master Bedroom

It's a Window! A window to the world - you can open the window and get fresh air, you can close the window. But unless you take off the screen, going through the window is not really an option.
It's a Door! In a few weeks there will be a patio outside that door. It is going to make that Master Bedroom feel just huge! Morning coffee can be had outside on the private patio, maybe even a late evening sunset watching or even just enjoying a cold glass of iced tea on a Sunday afternoon.

Crayons

I found this site, while I was Stumbling along the internet. Color + Design Blog It gives a brief little history of Crayola crayons and has some stunning pictures of crayons. I do love a nice new box of Crayola crayons! I'm over 40 years old and crayons are still such a joy.

I post on a website where you can insert color numbers into the HTML and the website above had a really cool chart of all of the Crayola colors with their HTML numbers - so I printed off a sheet - but the colors didn't print - only the names. So I took a captured the screen shot of the colors and made them into graphics. How fun!

Here they are folks - all 120 color names, colors and HTML numbers for those colors. (actually I don't think it is ALL of the color names because I don't see Indian Red or Flesh and I used to color with both of those)

Enjoy!!

Buddy & Beverly

Buddy and Beverly called me last year in March, I do believe, to ask if I had a place to rent. Buddy was going on the Lung transplant list in a few weeks and they were going to move from Okeechobee, FL for the few months it would take for him to get a Lung transplant. I showed them Avanti (my larger one bedroom unit) and chatted up a storm with them. I adored them. Buddy was quite tall and thin, but had a scruffy voice and a great laugh. Beverly was just sweet. She was my height (5'2" or so) and had a voice that was just like silk. They talked about Okeechobee and their grandkids and using the computer and movies they liked and about the transplant and how I got through it all.

I left town for a few days and that was the weekend that Buddy and Beverly needed to move in, of course, so Tom went and signed the lease with them and gave them the keys. Tom nicknamed them "The Puppies" because he thought Buddy and Beverly sounded like puppy names. So from then on we affectionately called them "The Puppies"

The Puppies called today. I dropped mail off at the puppies place today.

Before Buddy was even officially listed on the Mayo Transplant list, he was called. They had a lung for him. Oh goodness, that was great news. Buddy was so tall that it really had to be a certain size lung to suit his frame. He received the lung and his recovery began.

He was the perfect patient. He healed well, he recovered well, he did his exercises, took his medication, and had the highest spirit. The grandkids came to visit, they sent cards and letters and pictures when they weren't there. It was my idea of a really great transplant experience.

About a month ago I got a phone call that Buddy was in the hospital and did I have place for them to stay. The lung had become fragile and Buddy wasn't doing so well. He had been in the hospital now for a month already. I didn't have a place for them, but I would put them at the very top of my list. Tom had a doctors appointment at Mayo last week, so we both made a point to go up and see them. I arrived first and I didn't even recognize Buddy. He seemed small and Beverly just lit up when she saw me, that was so nice. She looked remarkably well. I don't know if I could have looked so good after spending over a month in the hospital with a sick husband. Buddy knew who I was immediately and the three of us chatted for about an hour before Tom arrived. Buddy said that the 6 months post transplant was just the greatest time. It was his first time in a long time that he was active and healthy, he got to play golf and run after his grandkids, he didn't have to worry about getting a breath. He said that no matter what happened it was worth every second of the waiting, the testing, the transplant and the recovery. He was so grateful to have been able to be a normal person again. Beverly even said that Buddy lived every one of those days to the fullest and that it was so exciting to see.

A few days ago I got a call from one of my other renters that they were going to be leaving in two weeks. Great News! I love it when my transplant patients are well enough to go home. I called Beverly to tell her that I had a condo for her. It was my smaller unit, but it was available and it wasn't a hotel room. She called back to say that Buddy was in a downhill fall and that the next 72 hours would determine his fate. She didn't sound hopeful.

Oh dear.

I got an email last night that Buddy died on April 30th. I don't know any other details at the moment.

I am so glad I got a chance to meet these wonderful people. I'm so glad that Buddy got 6 months of a fairly care-free life. I am so grateful for the Mayo Clinic.

Thanks Buddy and Beverly for allowing me to be a part of your lives. My prayers go out to you and your family.

Kristin

***Update. Beverly said that her kids were with her when Buddy died and that they made sure that she got home alright. I am so grateful that someone was with her and Buddy.

May Day

Today is May Day. I remember a few times when I was a kid I picked flowers and left them at the front door of my neighbors houses in little paper bags. The first day of May in Michigan is never constant and the flowers that are blooming May first is always an unknown. If we have an early spring, I can pick daffodils on my sisters birthday April 7th. That hasn't happened many times.

The past few years I've lived in Florida on May Day and the day comes and goes without much notice on my part. Spring is almost over by that time and I am not looking forward to the day as much as I did in Michigan.

Today however, I made a special trip to the store and I purchased two small "flower bowls" and gave them to Virginia & Sharon - two of my neighbors. The flower bowls were planted with several different plants but could sit on a table rather than being a hanging plant. The flower bowls will look nice on their patios.

I had fun - I placed the flowers in front of their doors. I put a little card in the foliage that just said Happy May Day - Love, Kristin

They both loved the flowers and enjoyed the thoughtfulness. I liked that just a little thing can connect you with your neighbors.

I hope you had a happy May Day.
Kristin

April links

WFMW - sleeping haven
Auctions
Rice Salad
The back steps
Before and During
Photo Fun!
Sparkle
First Class Postage
Happy Birthday Zora!!
My old room
WFMW - gmail
Big Give
New Shoes
Stella
Zora's Haircut
More Baby Pics!
She's Here!! She's here!!
The Patio Door
Electricians, Plumbers & Contractors
Boy or Girl???
Flipping saga
WFMW Pill Container
Flip Pics
Jupiter Day Three
Springfield Days 1 & 2
Juptier Day Three
Pics day two
Jupiter Day Two
Zora Mail
Pictures of Day One
Jupiter Court Day 1
Just funny
Us Girls
Cool, very cool
Nervous Nellie
WFMW - The Dishes
Milk for Kitties
Bye Bye Tiki stuff
Happy Birthday Alison
Funny
Springfield Ct.
Cool Building
Flipping Wonderful!
Caffeine
Spelling Alphabet
WFMW - Greatest Hits
I am grateful

WFMW - sleeping haven

Welcome to another edition of Works For Me Wednesday! Each week hundreds of people from around the world gather at Rocks in My Dryer for WFMW and share their tips. Please take a look when you have finished here. Thanks & I'll see you again next week.

My Tip this week is about creating a great sleeping and resting place in the Masterbedroom. When I was a kid, all I had was my bedroom. I will admit it was a disaster. I was a kid, though, and the pressures of the world weren't on me yet, but even then I never slept with anything else on my bed except for me and the comforter.

When I was on my own finally and figuring out life, I learned a valuable lesson - Never bring anything into the Masterbedroom. I expanded that to include NOT sleeping with the bed half full of junk. Have your bed, nightstands, clock, lamps and your one or two books, but that's it folks. Don't pile up your laundry, your stash and dash laundry baskets of clutter from other rooms, luggage, paperwork, childrens toys, etc. If your bedroom is for sleeping and relaxing, then make that room a haven by keeping all of the clutter of life out of it. Having piles of possessions hovering around you all night is distracting, even if you don't realize it. I have met people who do paperwork in their bed and then fall asleep with the paperwork still on their beds. Please don't do this to yourself. Get everything off the bed that doesn't belong. You deserve to have a peaceful place to sleep.


I have pack-rat-abilities and I have a few closets stuffed with STUFF! I have clutter and paper piled high in some places. I have a little storage closet that is so full, oh my, I may never find anything in there again this year, but I truly, honestly have a minimalist bedroom. It is easy to keep dusted, vacuumed and tidy. I don't trip on anything or stub my toes when making my way to bed. Keeping all of the drama of life out of the bedroom makes it a very peaceful place indeed.

It took me years to figure this out - "Don't bring anything into the Masterbedroom" and I am so happy to pass this tip along to you today.

Have a great day and thanks for stopping by,
Kristin

Auctions

I love a good auction.

Sofa Express and More! has been in bankruptcy for awhile now, but the countdown to closing their store has been going on for the past month. Yesterday was the LAST DAY - everything must go! Well, everything didn't go - so there was an auction tonight. It was a lot of fun. They had about 20 guys hauling the furniture up to the stage - some hauling, some holding, some moving stuff off the stage - it was like a dance, with large pieces of furniture. It was one of the fastest auctions I've ever been to.

One of our Flip houses is being occupied by one of our worker bees. So far he has a bed.

Just a bed. Plus: One pillow, two sets of sheets and a comforter.

Needless to say, he will have no problem lounging (when the house is finished) in the house on his new sofas. a chair or two, some lamps, quite a few pieces of fun artwork and an ottoman or two. I think I got a side table, too - Oh and a really cool white buffet, with silver door pulls. It was part of a set, but they decided to sell it separately and about 30 minutes after they sold the set, so I got a great price on it -- $50 maybe? Something like that. Awesome Price. Awesome piece.

I have to say - Tom bought the UGLIEST couch. We didn't even bring it home tonight, so no pictures yet, but I hate it. I turned around to look at a table and the next thing I know the woman next to me said - "I can't believe that guy you're with, just bought that!" I thought it was a joke. Seriously. It was truly ugly. I can't wait to see it in the daylight. I hope it improves. He has volunteered to put it up for sale on Craig's List - I just don't think I will be able to stage a house with it.

I just don't want to continue to say how awful I think it is, for fear that someone that reads this will think it is just lovely.

But.... ugh.

I had a really nice time, minus the couch incident. We got several awesome pieces that will work great as staging for Jupiter Court or Springfield. We got some really nice artwork, two floor lamps that match and a few side chairs that will be fun additions to the staging. Oh, I also got some fun bamboo sidetables (they are lightweight!!!) I was not going to get a single table that I couldn't move easily by myself - and those bamboo tables were perfect!! I can even paint them if need be.

I'll take pictures of everything tomorrow I hope. I have to go fix a TV over at one of the rental condo's -- or buy them a new one. So Tom and Robert will be moving all of the furniture tomorrow while I do TV duty. Hopefully I'll catch up with it all and get some photos before it's all piled into a shed.

Have a great day!
Kristin

Rice Salad

I've been trying to figure out how to get Rice Salad onto my blog. Thanks to Pioneer Woman, I have a great excuse! Pioneer Woman's call for a favorite recipe was just the excuse I needed. Actually, PW (Ree) is giving away a Shiny New KitchenAid 610 Stand Mixer and the qualifications to be a part of it, was to post your favorite recipe that you were willing to share. I posted Rice Salad. All of you 6WBMO friends of mine - turn away. This is not on plan. Probably none of the comments in Ree's give-away are on plan -- but I have a point here.

What was my point?

Oh right, the comments section - when I posted my Rice Salad recipe I was comment #3075 - right now, right at this moment there are 4400 comments. That means that there are probably 4000 recipes there that are family favorites of some kind. 4000 recipes that people make at least once a year and that they serve to their friends and families. If you are ever in a quandary as to what to make for breakfast, lunch, dinner, dessert and any other time, you now have a location.

There are now 4413 comments.

I'm assuming that some of the comments are blank, double posts, questions, comments without a recipe, etc. So that's how I came up with the 4000 recipes.

Here is my submission to PW's site. I had to post it. For one reason, it was the only recipe that I know off the top of my head. It is something that I truly believe should be in everyones recipe box. It is that good. It pretends to be healthy with rice, yogurt and some veggies. The mayo is the deal breaker -- I wonder what this would taste like with real homemade mayo?? Hmmmm, that's something I hadn't thought of... oh goodness. Here's the recipe.

Rice Salad

2 boxes Uncle Ben’s Long Grain and Wild Rice - original recipe (Fast cook is OK, but I prefer the 25 minute kind)
1/4c plain yogurt
1.c Hellman’s Real mayonnaise
1c. cucumber peeled and sliced (I like the English cucumber - just use the whole thing or two)
1c. tomatoes
a few sprigs of fresh parsley chopped

Cook the rice as directed, omitting the butter. After the rice has cooked, mix in yogurt, mayo, cucumber, tomatoes & parsley and serve warm or cold.

I have to admit, I almost always forget the parsley lol I also try real hard not to eat it all when it is freshly made and still warm — oooh lordy, it is wonderful. Rice Salad is a HUGE hit at potlucks and family reunions. It is a staple at nearly all summer family events & bbq’s. Enjoy!

This is the page where my comment is located on PW's site.

4481 comments now (so that's probably 4100 great recipes)

I gave this to my friend Bob and she now takes it to her neighborhood potluck dinners and BBQ's. She calls it the Corlett Michigan Salad. It is requested by friends of hers "...be sure and bring that rice salad." She lives in New Hampshire, so the Rice salad love is being spread across the United States. Who knows, maybe a few folks from the PW site will make the salad and start passing it on.

I made the rice part of this the morning of my wedding. I think I made 4 or 6 boxes. I thought about taking it to the reception, but as wedding mornings would be...I ran out of time. After our wedding and the reception people started coming over to our house. My mom noticed the GIANT pot of rice on the stove and asked if she could make up the salad. We spent the next few minutes chopping up the cucumbers and tomatoes and soon had a beautiful pot of Rice Salad. I don't recall if we actually got it into a serving dish, but I do know that there wasn't a single spoonful left after about an hour. It was literally inhaled by everyone.

It is that good!

Have a great day!
Kristin

The back steps

This is the floor of the kitchen. Or the lack of flooring. All of the hundreds of layers of flooring that was bad, warped, substandard and otherwise unusable is now gone. It also contained a million nails, as I mentioned in one of my other posts. The nail theme is a running joke now. It is found everywhere in this house - if one nail is good - 10 must be better!

This next picture is looking through the former kitchen floor, onto the crawlspace. See the set of concrete steps? Those are the original back steps into the house. The kitchen was an addition we believe and the original kitchen is what was the closet/storage area and the bathroom (which we have turned into two separate bathrooms, now.) I think it is so cool to find indicators of the past. I wish we could save some of these features, but the only thing we can really do is just to cover them back up again and not destroy them. So the steps are staying under the house.

Meet Les and Chip. Chip has a hat on. They tore up the rest of the flooring on this particular day. They have been a part of the construction crew and have been a lot of fun. I have truly enjoyed having these two gentlemen on the job.

Have a great day!
Kristin

Before and During

This is the House before -- before anything. We hadn't even closed on the house when I took this picture.

The next picture is a close up of the front door area. Lots of fixes are needed.

This last picture is how it looked on Friday. The main electrical service is now on the side of the house, the windows now have window sills, the awning is gone, the front attic vent will be replaced with a roof top vent. The house wrap is almost completed and the siding should be going up on Monday or Tuesday.

The Windows before and after

They still need work, but I like the window sills.

 The front windows are also going to get planter boxes. Dan says he is going to make them.

Photo Fun!

I really like Photobucket. I have several accounts, two of them are paid accounts (No ads & lots and lots of storage) and the other few are the free accounts. Those are really nice for sharing photos with friends, without having access to EVERYTHING. If I've taken a photo, chances are I've got it loaded into one of my PB accounts. Well, PB has been revamping the site for quite some time, adding new things, taking out things that didn't quite work, all the while I just ignored a lot of it because I just find graphics, I don't alter them.

Wellllll.... Let me tell you something. The newest edit feature that Photobucket has is FUN! I played with it a bit this evening. Here's what I did. I took an original photo - this one happens to be of the Sitting King - The Burger King logo from the late 50's through the middle 60's. This was one of the Burger Kings that was in one of our original family stores. It now hangs in my laundry room. (Isn't he great?!!)

OK, so here is the original picture, followed by the fun edits I found in the Edit section of my personal PB account. I have placed text on each of the alterations so you would know what I did.

Enjoy!!
Kristin

(10 July 2017 - edit
I am having to edit all my blog posts because photobucket has upped their fees so that in order to continue third party linking, like I have done with all of my photos on this blog, we are forced to pay $39.99 a month.  I am so mad I can hardly stand it, as well as a few thousand others.  So although I wrote this post praising PB, I no longer do.  sigh.)

Sparkle

I just have to say -- I've used this window cleaner since I was a small child. My mother bought it, so I bought it. Not very many stores carry it, but Meijer Stores in Michigan carried it and when I couldn't find it here in Florida I had my husband buy several bottles of it when he drove to Michigan a few years back. THEN, the most amazing thing happened. I was looking for floor cleaner at the local ACE Hardware store in Daytona Beach and there it was - sitting on the bottom shelf, in a gallon jug.

I could hear the choir

ahhhhhhhhhhhhh

I was almost out of the glass cleaner & had seriously been wondering what to do. But no more, no more!

I just recently went to one of the Ace Hardware stores here in Jacksonville, FL and the choir sang again.

ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh

It was there in all it's Sparkle beauty.

This window cleaner doesn't have ammonia in it, it is purple and it is de-ioninzed (whatever that means) and it is one of my favorite things - right next to the Magic Eraser, The Absorber and my dishtowels :0)

Have a great day!
Kristin

First Class Postage

Have you heard the news?

May 12th the new postal rates will be in effect.

You still have time to go to the post office and get the Liberty Bell Forever stamps for 41¢ - they will be available until the 11th of May at 41¢ after that, they will increase to the new postage rate. Remember though, you can use them forever, no matter what price you paid for them.


Here are the new rates...

First-Class Mail letter (1 oz.) $0.42
First-Class Mail letter (2 oz.) $0.59
Postcard $0.27
First-Class Mail large envelope (2 oz.) $1.00
Certified Mail $2.70
First-Class Mail International to Canada and Mexico (1 oz.) $0.72
First-Class Mail International to all other countries (1 oz.) $0.94

a 62¢ stamp will be available shortly after May 12 for 1-ounce nonmachinable First-Class Mail letters, such as square greeting cards.

Have you written a letter lately? One to a friend, a family member, a long lost high school friend. Did you have a pen pal when you were a kid? I haven't written to Ingrid in ages...I will do that. May 12th will be my deadline for getting that fun project finished.

Have a great day!
Kristin