Hi friends!
Shew! We're home (well, we have been for over a week now, but have just now gotten around to putting the luggage away) And now that we're unpacked, the laundry washed, the kids fed (and loved on), it's back to reality.
Things flew back into high-gear once we arrived back home. John's job is both very demanding of his time and attention at the moment, so I've had to tackle a lot of the house stuff myself here recently. Unfortunately, a lot of it is just cleaning and nothing exciting. Boo. I could write posts about the mounds of laundry, the piles of pet hair, or the stack of pots and pans in the sink, but I didn't think you'd like to hear too much about that. Am I right?
But I wanted to take the time to talk about projects. The good, the bad, and the ugly. The good news about DIYing is that we get a lot done on a strict budget. The bad thing is it's all done on our own time (which we love doing) but it does take a while, and some projects take longer than others. And the ugly? Well, we've got plenty of ugly. Either things don't turn out the way we intended the first time, or they just don't get completely done. Our problem is the latter. We have a LOT of projects that we've started and just haven't gotten around to finishing.
We have full intentions to get the job 100% done, but we get side-tracked. We're both at fault. Take for instance, our floors. We started this project last April, and here it is nearly a year (wow!) later, and we've still got that last 4% left to finish.
Or the paint job in our master. I painted this room the first week we owned the house and never got around to finishing the last little crevice in the doorway.
Or how about the white doors downstairs? We prepped and primed two doors to get them ready for their white makeover, but that's as far as it got. We've been living with a modge podge of wood vs. white for over a year now.
It's not that we're lazy. We're not. But things get in the way of intentions. Like with the doors. Yes, we fully intend on painting ALL the doors in the house. But after priming 2 of them with spray paint (which gave us fabulous coverage) not only did our trigger fingers kill, but we decided it would save us much more money and time to buy a paint sprayer and do the rest of them all at one time. I look forward to the day we can have all our doors and hardware match.
But I'm guilty of another problem (and I know I'm not alone on this): After a while of looking at the same unfinished project, the thought of finishing it becomes a chore. It starts with wanting to complete it, but then the weather turns cold, the holidays arrive, and from there the excuses continue to build. And now, it's a chore to complete. It's more fun to start a whole new project with completely different results than it is to finish the one you started. I hate it, but it's the ugly truth. The DIY truth.
So with the ugly out there, for all you to see:
I vow, that by the end of this year, to wrap up all the unfinished projects around our house. I know, I just said it. I've now committed myself. But that's a good thing. It will keep me honest and (hopefully, let's keep our fingers crossed) make me get my butt in gear and back on track to our original vision for our home.
What do you have in your life that's incomplete (DIY or not)? I'd love to hear from you.
Shew! We're home (well, we have been for over a week now, but have just now gotten around to putting the luggage away) And now that we're unpacked, the laundry washed, the kids fed (and loved on), it's back to reality.
Things flew back into high-gear once we arrived back home. John's job is both very demanding of his time and attention at the moment, so I've had to tackle a lot of the house stuff myself here recently. Unfortunately, a lot of it is just cleaning and nothing exciting. Boo. I could write posts about the mounds of laundry, the piles of pet hair, or the stack of pots and pans in the sink, but I didn't think you'd like to hear too much about that. Am I right?
But I wanted to take the time to talk about projects. The good, the bad, and the ugly. The good news about DIYing is that we get a lot done on a strict budget. The bad thing is it's all done on our own time (which we love doing) but it does take a while, and some projects take longer than others. And the ugly? Well, we've got plenty of ugly. Either things don't turn out the way we intended the first time, or they just don't get completely done. Our problem is the latter. We have a LOT of projects that we've started and just haven't gotten around to finishing.
We have full intentions to get the job 100% done, but we get side-tracked. We're both at fault. Take for instance, our floors. We started this project last April, and here it is nearly a year (wow!) later, and we've still got that last 4% left to finish.
Or the paint job in our master. I painted this room the first week we owned the house and never got around to finishing the last little crevice in the doorway.
Or how about the white doors downstairs? We prepped and primed two doors to get them ready for their white makeover, but that's as far as it got. We've been living with a modge podge of wood vs. white for over a year now.
It's not that we're lazy. We're not. But things get in the way of intentions. Like with the doors. Yes, we fully intend on painting ALL the doors in the house. But after priming 2 of them with spray paint (which gave us fabulous coverage) not only did our trigger fingers kill, but we decided it would save us much more money and time to buy a paint sprayer and do the rest of them all at one time. I look forward to the day we can have all our doors and hardware match.
But I'm guilty of another problem (and I know I'm not alone on this): After a while of looking at the same unfinished project, the thought of finishing it becomes a chore. It starts with wanting to complete it, but then the weather turns cold, the holidays arrive, and from there the excuses continue to build. And now, it's a chore to complete. It's more fun to start a whole new project with completely different results than it is to finish the one you started. I hate it, but it's the ugly truth. The DIY truth.
So with the ugly out there, for all you to see:
I vow, that by the end of this year, to wrap up all the unfinished projects around our house. I know, I just said it. I've now committed myself. But that's a good thing. It will keep me honest and (hopefully, let's keep our fingers crossed) make me get my butt in gear and back on track to our original vision for our home.
What do you have in your life that's incomplete (DIY or not)? I'd love to hear from you.
I have my fingers crossed for you and I really know what you mean about trying to get excited about finishing an old project. We recovered 4 chairs for our breakfast nook once and I swear it took 4 months to do it (that's one chair per month if you're doing the math). Our real problem was a crappy staple gun. Once we bit the bullet and bought a great new one, wham bam, thank you ma'am, we finished right up. Good tools are so essential! I like your paint sprayer idea, especially for all those doors!!!
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