Recent House Projects

When we bought our house, the tub in our bathroom was cracked.  We patched it and bought some time, but last summer it was time to replace it.  We decided to install a large shower instead of a shower/tub combo, and we still have one of those in Sarah's bathroom.  Robert did it all by himself, and I'm so impressed! He ripped out the old one, and then, unfortunately, our new shower was back ordered, so we had to share a shower with Sarah for about a month, but it wasn't too bad.  We had to drive about 45 minutes to pick up the shower, so that was an adventure having it strapped to the top of my SUV!  Robert installed the shower, and it looks great!  We ended up painting the bathroom as well.  We couldn't afford a shower door right then, so we just used our old curtain.  For Christmas we got gift cards and money, and we were able to buy a shower door.  I apparently haven't taken any real after pictures, but the before was purple, and the after is green.  In the last picture you can see our new shower door behind the old curtain.

I'm so happy with our lawn this year!  We've worked hard on it, and I feel like this year we are really reaping the rewards.  Year one was the year of not knowing what we were doing, year two was the year of killing weeds, year three was the year of growing grass, and now year four is the year of fine-tuning.  Our mailman commented that he's seen such an improvement since we bought our house, and he asked us what our method was.  A stranger stopped me while she was on a walk and said our grass looked great.  That was such encouraging feedback!

Always good to remember where you came from...

And now!

In May, Robert's fell through our deck while sitting in a patio chair!  We knew it was time to do something about our deck.  He ripped it out and replaced it with a gravel patio.  I love it!  This was a super cheap project and very economical for anyone wanting a patio who can't afford a wood deck or concrete slab.  We bought one scoop of 1/2" limestone gravel for about $35.  We bought three 4"x6"x12' pre-treated boards and nailed them into the ground using nine 2' rebar stakes.  The old deck actually already had old brown gravel under it, so we covered it with weed barrier ($30 for way more than we actually needed), and then filled it up the rest of the way with the gravel.  We had to buy a new hammer because Robert broke ours!!! That was a cost that was unexpected. haha  We paid $20 to take the old wood to the landfill.  We also happened to have an extra concrete step, so we used that by our back door.  Overall, the project cost less than $200, but we had a $50 Lowe's gift card to use, and we also used some of Robert's lawn mowing money, and I sold a few things on Facebook Marketplace to help pay for it.  Where there's a will there's a way! We also bought some used patio furniture (table and six chairs).  Our previous hand me downs served us so well, but the table collapsed this spring after many years of enjoyment.