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.

Mason Jar Sconces

We have a lot of mason jars, so when I saw this craft on Pinterest I knew we needed to make it. It was fun, and I love how they turned out. We’re selling them and would love for you to make a purchase!

Large mason jar on a 10.5" x 6" x 1" piece of wood, $20, 3 available

Standard size mason jar on a 9.25" x 6" x 1" piece of wood, $15, 3 available

Two small mason jars (not pictured but similar to the three jar piece pictured) on a 10.5" x 6" x 1" piece of wood, $20, only 1 available!

All wood has a "Dark Walnut" stain and a bracket on the back to hang it on your wall.  These would be great for decorations like fresh cut flowers or candles.  I think they'd also be cute with battery operated twinkle lights in them. They can be used for practical things like holding pens and pencils, or the triple would be great for toiletry items in a bathroom.

Large jar

Medium jar

Three small jars

House Project Dreams

We've owned our house for over two years now.  When we first moved in we did some major things right away: painted the ceiling and walls, installed new flooring, and fixed several small things that the home inspector noticed.  Over the last year we've worked on the yard a lot.  We created some flower beds, planted bushes, removed one tree and planted another, and are working on growing grass.  Our list is almost done other than one things that I don't feel confident about and another thing that is pretty costly.

Unsure - Painting our garage door.  Currently, it matches our window frames perfectly as well as the small portion of vinyl siding that's right above the garage door.  I don't totally love the color.  I would like a richer brown instead of a gray-ish tan, but I like that it matches the windows and vinyl.  So do I just re-paint it the same color.  How do you even find the exact same color 24 years after something was painted?  It needs to be painted.  It's faded and worn.  Any suggestions? Have you ever painted your garage door a new color?

Expensive - Kitchen.  Enough said, right?  When we moved in we had to get our own fridge, and we also needed a microwave, so we decided to mount a micro-hood over the stove.  The previous owners had put in a new dishwasher right before moving, so all of the appliances but the stove were new.  The stove is definitely original to the house.  I think when the house was built it was probably a top of the line, custom type stove.  The counter is built around it, if that makes sense.  There is counter on each of the sides as well as behind the stove, and there's a little lip that goes around the front edge of the stove as well.

When we moved in we noticed that under the drip pans it's totally rusty, and the oven also doesn't heat evenly.  It isn't self-cleaning.  The knobs on the front were tempting for Sarah during her beginning walking stage.  Those are all negatives, but the oven isn't technically broken, so we're definitely hanging on and doing just fine as long as it still works because the replacement of this stove will most likely prompt a major kitchen overhaul.  I forget all the exact types of stoves like drop in, slide in, and free standing, but I do know that the kind that we currently have is seriously twice as much as a normal stove.  However, if we get a normal stove then we would need to remove the back part of the counter in order to slide in the stove all the way back to the back wall.  So then why not get new counters? :)  Then the stove would be pushed back more than it currently is so the floor would have about two inches that is newly exposed, so you'd need new flooring.  And if you're doing a new stove, counter, and flooring, why not go ahead and get a new back splash since we don't like a current one?  See what I mean?  It'd be a a big kitchen remodel.  We really do like our current cabinets and lighting, and they're in good shape.  And then we'd thought that if we're getting new counters in the kitchen we might as well put the same counters in the two bathrooms.  Sounds fun, right? :)

What would you do regarding the stove when it comes time to replace it?

Anybody else like dreaming about house plans? Kinda fun. :)

Handmade candle holders

Robert and I are making and selling these candle holders. The smaller candle holder holds one tea light candle and has been stained and stamped in this version. We have three stamps options: leaf, snowflake, hearts (see picture), but I could also paint it with chalkboard paint as well. The larger candle holder has been cut to hold three tea light candles or three candlesticks. It has been painted with chalkboard paint on one side so you can write a seasonal greeting or message and easily erase it with a rag and just a touch of water. These pieces are made from our very own red maple tree in Missouri.

Prices for local orders/deliveries:
Candle holder, $10
Triple candle holder, $20

If you don't personally know us or need your order shipped you can order through our Etsy shop (prices are just a bit higher to accommodate for the Etsy seller fees).

https://www.etsy.com/shop/TheThreeVsShop

Let me know if you're interested

More House Updates, Winter 2017

When we bought our house so many people told us that our to-do list would be neverending.  I can agree with that, but I will say that the to-do list we made when we bought the house is so close to being finished.  The only thing left to do is for Robert to paint the ceiling in Sarah's bedroom, the guest room, and the kitchen, and we have this scheduled to happen on Saturday.  Then we'll finally just have to-do list items that pop up occasionally, but the big list will be finished.  There's still the "some day" list that would include kitchen and bathroom updates:

• Kitchen
• Stove
• Flooring
• Counters
• Backsplash
• Bathrooms
• Counters (matching with kitchen)
• Tub/tiling for shower

But for now we're so excited to really feel settled in our home.  We're very thankful for our house, and we've truly enjoyed making it our own.  It's so fun to dream about things we could do to it in the future, too!

Like I wrote about several weeks ago, Robert and Pepaw built me an upholstered headboard which we love!

We ordered a new washer and dryer, and it arrived yesterday!  Our old washer and dryer were free hand me downs which we have been very thankful to have for the first five years of our marriage, but the washer stopped spinning very well and would wring out all of the water, and it would shake forward about a foot during the spinning process and was super loud.  Because the dryer wasn't super strong and the laundry was dripping wet the drying process would take 3-4 hours, so I would just end up hanging up as much laundry as I could to let it air dry.  When we started the search for a new washer and dryer Robert asked me what I was looking for in a W/D.  Pretty simple - bigger, faster, quieter.  Bigger so I can stuff in more laundry in a load, faster to save time, and quieter because we can hear the machines quite a bit since they're in a closet in the hallway near our bedrooms.  Besides that, I knew I wanted a traditional top loading washing machine.  We went to Sears and got an incredibly pushy salesperson.  I understand that they need to make commission, but we just weren't connecting with this guy.  We told him the washer and dryer we were interested in from our online research, and he wouldn't show it to us because he didn't think it was great.  Instead he showed us a W/D that was $400 more expensive, and then he said that if we were going to spend that much that we might as well spend another $400 to get this other super duper one, so he was trying to push us to spend $800 more than we had come in to spend.  That's a huge difference!  Then he was really pushing the warranty plan which was $40/year per appliance with a 5 year minimum.  That's another $400!  It was just crazy.  Thankfully, he had to leave for a meal break shortly after we got there so we got to look around and ask questions with another sales person who was more our style, and we ended up purchasing the W/D that we had come in planning to purchase.  Robert got them installed yesterday, and I did one load yesterday. It went great! 

The previous owners had put a very large shower head on our bathroom shower.  I understand the idea was to provide a spa effect, but this was the kind of shower head you should use in a large standalone shower, not a standard shower/tub combo.  It sprayed everywhere, used the hot water too faster, and made a lot of weird noises in the pipes.  Robert was afraid that it would be a huge project, but I suggested we just buy a more standard shower head and see if it improved the situation at all.  It totally did the trick!  It took 30 seconds to replace, and now the water doesn't spray, the hot water lasts for the whole shower, and it doesn't make any unusual noises.  Why didn't we do this sooner???

We also replaced a couple of window screens that were torn up. I'm guessing the old owners' dogs did it.

Finally, we replaced our attic ladder.  When we moved in, the wooden attic ladder was broken.  It had been too long for the ceiling height, but the old owners had used it anyway.  We trimmed several inches off, but the damage was done.  I think they also exceeded the weight limit.  Every time Robert had to go up to the attic he dreaded it.  We got an aluminum attic ladder with a 385 pound limit, so it should last us a long time.  The box said "3 easy steps" for installation.  Uh...no.  Robert and I did it on a weeknight, and Robert ended the project by saying, "I'm only going to say it once, but that's why I don't like doing house projects on weeknights."  So that about sums up our experience, but the more detailed version is that I thought we could totally do it one night after we put Sarah to sleep, he seemed up for it, so he got up in the attic and dismantled the old ladder, and then he came down using a regular ladder.  We got the new attic ladder out of the box, and Robert went back up into the attic.  He attached it to a furniture strap and pulled it up while I pushed it up.  He put in the temporary supports, but the whole time I was thinking that the trim work around the opening was going to be too tight for the ladder to come down, but Robert thought it looked okay from the inside.  It came time for me to pull down the ladder, and sure enough, the trim was in the way.  Robert was stuck in the ladder.  I had to rip off the trim, but it was really secure.  I finally got it off with a crowbar and rescued Robert! :)  We needed to trim off several inches of the ladder since it's made for ceilings between 8-10', and our garage ceiling is 9.5'.  The directions said you could just use a wood saw to cut it off, but it seriously took about half an hour of screeching and sawing to cut them off.  Overall, I think it took about three hours.  Ugh.  Glad it's over and done.

Yard Updates, Winter 2017

In the fall we just didn't have the time or money to do much to our yard, so we got around to it in late February/early March.  We had an unusually warm winter here in Missouri, and I think a lot of the country experienced it.  Because of that, our yard never really went dormant all winter.  It was actually kind of a bummer for us because we wanted some weeds to die.  You guys know our yard was in rough shape last winter when we moved in.  In the last year we've learned that rehabbing your lawn is a multi-year process.  There aren't instant results, and you just have to stick with it.  Last winter/spring we took care of raking years' worth of lives, de-thatching, removing a stump, removing gravel and replacing it with mulch, and getting rid of the gravel around our river birch tree in the back yard.  We were pleased with all of the results except for the gravel removal around the tree.

So here's what our yard looked like a year ago:

And here's what our yard looked like at the same time this year.  It's nowhere near perfect, but it really does look better than last year.

So in late February we rented an aerator and a tiller.  This was our first aerator experience, and it was kind of comical.  I had anticipated helping Robert, but after that machine nearly took him down it became obvious that I wouldn't be helping.  It was very powerful!  Robert when through the yard horizontally and vertically.  We hope to aerate again in the fall.

Since grass still wasn't growing around the river birch tree where we dug out gravel we decided that there must still be more gravel there.  Last year Robert dug out as much as he could, but this year he rented a tiller that went down 10", and it got out so much more gravel.  It was still reaching gravel down at 10" so who knows how deep it actually goes.  We're just hoping that going down 10" is enough to grow some grass.  The tiller loosened up the soil and gravel, and then it was time to sift out the gravel from the good soil.  This was another difficult task.  Robert and I agree that we won't be volunteering to sift dirt for anyone any time soon.  Robert built his own soil sifter based on Home Depot's tutorial, and it held up for our project and could be used again.  Basically, we put the sifter over the wheel barrow, shoveled dirt into it, shook it back and forth to sift out the dirt from the gravel, dumped the gravel in a pile, and dumped the wheel barrow when it got full.  When we were finally finished we raked out the soil to level it some.  Robert planted shade-friendly grass and has been watering it every day.  We know the grass won't be perfect since it's under a tree, but if we don't get at least some grass Robert says he will cry, and I say we should just plant ivy or turn it into a concrete slab with a patio or a shed.

After tilling and aerating we wanted to put down a fertilizer and a pre-emergent.  It's kind of frustrating because since we didn't have a cold winter we already had weeds, so I don't know how much the pre-emergent will do.  We've gained most of our knowledge through The Lawn Care Nut and his YouTube videos.  He's entertaining, and he's full of good information, but I also just wanted a spreadsheet that told me what to do and when to do it, so I just made my own.

Like I said, this winter was super warm so we bumped up the tasks that would usually be done in early April to early March, and then we mowed for the first time two weeks later in mid March.  As The Lawn Care Nut suggests, we used Lesco Starter Fertilizer.  We really couldn't find it anywhere locally so we ordered it on Amazon with free shipping.  This fert is kind of expensive, but thankfully our 8,000 square foot yard only needed half a bag, and we will be able to use the other half of the bag in late August.  The LCN wants you to put down the fert with sharp angular sand.  We found a big bag at Home Depot for about $4 which is great, but it was sold outside at Home Depot, and it had rained recently so it was wet and couldn't flick out of the spreader, so I ended up putting it out by hand which was miserable, and I'm not sure how effective it was.  Oh well.  Then we put down a liquid pre-emergent called Prodiamine which is the generic form of Barricade.  Again, we bought this on Amazon because it wasn't sold locally.

Within two weeks our yard was much greener and thicker.  Now, it's still about 50% weeds, but I'm trusting the process and believe that this fall when we spot spray the weeds, aerate, and seed it'll give us great results next spring.  Robert mowed at 2.75" in mid March, and now the rest of the season we will mow at 3.75".  I think this is going to be really hard for me because our yard is going to look really weedy.  To the eye, the yard would look less full of weeds if we cut it shorter, but by cutting it longer the root system will get longer, deeper, and stronger.  The root length is directly proportionate to the grass length, so by cutting the grass longer our roots will get stronger and give us better grass next year.

We got one random day of some flurries over spring break.  Go figure.

Around Easter we will do our next treatment.  That time we will use Prodiamine again, but our fertilizer will be Ringer Lawn Restore.  We aren't going to spot spray for weeds because that would kill half of our yard.  We will spot spray in the fall when things are about to go dormant.

Upholstered Headboard

About a year ago I mentioned that Robert had built us a platform bed.  Since then we knew that we wanted an upholstered headboard to go with it.  Since we have a California King bed it's not as easy to find things for it compared to having a queen bed.  Looking online it was hard to find CF as an option, and when I did it was $500+ which was more than we wanted to spend.  I knew we'd need to just make our own.  I talked to my aunt Pam who has made a few different varieties of upholstered headboards and felt like we were up for the project.

Pepaw came over, and Robert and I discussed designs with him.  We decided on a camel back design.  Pepaw was in charge of cutting out the wood backing.  I wasn't involved in this, but of course he made it seem easy.  Miraculously the wood fit into my SUV so we were able to move it easily from his house to ours.

We made a trip to JoAnn Fabrics to purchase 2" thick foam and quilt batting.  We used an entire roll of the foam, so if you have a smaller bed you could ask them to measure out how much you need without having to purchase the whole roll.  One bag of quilt batting was more than enough.  Thankfully, both items were 50% off, plus we had a coupon for an additional 20% off.  Our JoAnn's doesn't have much upholstery fabric, and it all seemed pretty expensive, so we went to a local fabric store call FM.  It had so many options!  I went with a woven gray material that was only $6.99/yard, and I got 2.5 yards.  I wanted something pretty plain since our bedspread is very colorful.

When we got home we laid the foam on the wood and cut it out to fit the wood by using an electric kitchen knife.  It cut very easily.  We left the foam 1/2" wider than the wood all the way around since the foam would squish some as we upholstered it.  Then we put the quilt batting over it and stapled it down.  We trimmed the excess.  Finally, we upholstered it with the fabric, pulling, stapling, and trimming as we went.  The whole foam, batting, and upholstering process took about two hours with the two of us working, so I didn't think it was too bad.  It's important to note that, as you'll see in the pictures, we didn't take the foam, batting, and fabric all the way down the board.  We just took it down as far as the bed, and then the rest of the board goes down behind the bed onto the floor.  We stapled the batting and fabric underneath the bottom of the foam.

Robert mounted the headboard to our wall.  The main frustrating part about this is that our bed is between two windows, and it was really hard to find a stud.  Obviously, this might not be the case for you.  We're really please with how it turned out, and I would recommend this DIY project to anyone considering it.

Outdoor Home Projects

We have had outdoor projects galore since we bought our house.  Because we bought our house in December, there wasn't much curb appeal with the trees lacking leaves and the grass being dormant.  Here you go:

Before:

After:

With it being December, we couldn't do a ton in the grass department, but we did plant some seed and raked up old leaves and grass.  It's frustrating, but this is definitely going to be a multi-year process.  I wish we could afford it and had the time to blitz it and do it all at once, but there's no rush, I suppose.  It's just that so many families in our neighborhood have gorgeous yards, that I get envious, but that's a personal problem that I need to work on.  We still need to grade the backyard.  There's a low spot in the middle from where the previous owners had an above ground pool.  It stays really damp there and makes the grass grow incredibly thick.  Robert removed an old stump in our backyard several months ago, and this weekend he removed the gravel that had been around it.  Maybe next year we can aerate the yard, kill out the weeds, and put down seed.

We have a couple of quick and low cost/free projects coming up in the coming weeks.  Pepaw came over to replace the weather stripping on our garage door this week.  We might do a bit of trimming/pruning soon.  I also have some flower bulbs to plant.  I'm excited to see them pop up next spring!

When we were buying the house and got it inspected the inspector said that the gutters needed to be cleaned out, and he was very right.  The previous owners got a new roof a couple of years ago, and we needed to remove a lot of the sandy grains that had come off of the shingles.  The two maple trees had also dropped seeds that were sprouting up all over the place in the gutters.  Our down spouts were incredibly clogged so the water just flowed over the gutters.  Thanks to Robert, they're now in tip top shape and draining properly.

The previous owners also had satellite TV.  We don't, and so we didn't need the satellite on our roof.  Robert removed it and sealed up the holes with tar caulking, and it looks so nice to have it gone.

Two other small projects were re-caulking around the windows and doors and removing some wood scraps that were in the crawl space.

Robert has gotten a bit of experience with electrical work thanks to our new house, and one of his projects was to replace the light on the deck.  The picture doesn't do it justice, but the old light was too tall for the space and was pushing upward into the awning.

Before:

After:

So at some point, a previous owner or builder was obsessed with gravel.  Our River Birch had gravel all around it.  I'm sure it looked good at one point many years ago, but the gravel had gotten spread up and the weed barrier was very ratty, so Robert dug it up in the spring.  It was such back-breaking work, and I don't envy him.  Unfortunately, there is our tree as well as three neighbors' trees that prevent grass from growing well here.  We planted seed, but it really didn't take, so we'll have to try something else.  Like I said, it's a multi-year thing.

So this is what our backyard looked like at the beginning.  The darker soil is where we graded the yard a bit to take care of the low spot from the old pool.

One weekend Robert and my dad power washed the deck, fence, swing, and table.  We didn't stain the fence since it belongs to our three neighbors, but I did stain the swing, table, and deck, and they look so much better now!

Swing - Half power washed, half dirty - Such a big difference even before the new stain!

Clean deck!

Continuing with the theme of tons of gravel, the front bed was full of it.  Robert removed the gravel, we put down some fresh soil, and mulched it.  Some hostas, irises, and a hydrangea randomly popped up which was pretty fun.  We also added a crepe myrtle, viburnum, three fire bushes, three azalea bushes, and two lilies.  See the oxidized pot below?  The former owner was a band director, and that's a timpani drum.  Memaw and Pepaw cleaned it up for us, and now it's shiny copper.  There's one in the front and one in the back.

Stained the table and swing.  Robert moved these pavers from the back to the front to create a bit of a front porch swing feel.

Stained our part of the fence.  Also pulled out this mulberry tree that had started growing right up next to the house.

I don't seem to have an after picture yet, but here's a before for you.  There was a hole in the garage wall that Pepaw helped us patched up.  I'm sure you can imagine what it looks like now that it's been patched.

These zinnias did so well after we planted them from seeds!

We made a little flower bed by our deck, and Memaw gave us some of her daisies.  They ended up doing really well!

Rose of Sharon in the backyard

The door was forest green to begin with, but I wanted it to be brighter, so we used Mom and Dad's leftover paint from their front door and painted ours and put on new hardware.  Robert also made shutters from the front window and used the same paint.

I'm so pleased with this little arrangement!

So like I said, the grass didn't do well back here, but at least we have a nice pot of flowers.  Better luck next year.