Renovation Road

I think I can finally see the light at the end of the tunnel.  In fact, I think I can finally see the end result of these bathrooms.  We've had a couple of minor hiccups and I need to talk to the contractor again tomorrow about the painter......but it's coming together.  I'm excited......I think they are going to be done by Saturday.....yay!

Here's what's happened since you last saw me:

Upstairs bathroom has been painted

The downstairs bathroom has been painted

The upstairs vanity has been transformed into a beautiful dark brown

The upstairs linen closet has been painted.  I personally think this looks amazing!

 

And today the waterproof board was put up around the bathtub.

Tomorrow is tile day......it will be another major drastic addition and bringing us closer to the final product.  After seeing what we started with, I'd be lying if I said I'm not thrilled with the transformation.

Can't wait until we're done!

The disruption of our lives

Well we are 4 days down in the reconstruction of our bathrooms.

Our house is in turmoil.  We have only 1 toilet and it's upstairs.  Hopefully, this will all be over by the end of next week.  * crossing fingers *

This is as far as the remodel progress has gone as of today:

We have a bathtub installed upstairs.

We have smooth walls in the bathroom downstairs:

We tried a new recipe for leftover turkey last night:

Was quite good and took some of the boredom out of eating just plain old leftover turkey

It's been a couple of years, but I decided to decorate for Christmas and our company this year:

I ordered a complete set of new dishes for myself.  I've waited a long time for a complete and matching set for all my company.

The mess from construction is still around.  New towel cabinet for the upstairs got built by Cris when he was here for Turkey dinner.  Thank you Cris!

And the living room is throwing up Christmas decorations.  There is boxes every where!

Welcome to my crazy life.  I can't wait until all this mess is gone!

A lot of demo, but not much gobbling

Think of the end results.  Think of the end results.  Think of the end results.

This is my mantra for the next couple of weeks......think of the end results.

Demolition is in full swing here with the bathrooms getting done.  This has meant that our house is pretty much torn apart right now and there's only one working toilet in the house.....upstairs in our bedroom.  But......think of the end results.

The project began on Monday, so I've been stuck here at home making sure things run smoothly.  Being stuck at home has it's advantages.....I also scheduled the washing machine repairman and the dishwasher repairman come out and take care of a couple of items. 

However, this demo means we are scaling back our Thanksgiving festivities again this year (seriously, there hasn't been any Thanksgiving festivities here in years).  I've cut back the menu this year and it will just be Cris, Paul, and myself gorging out on turkey.  Cris doesn't know it yet......but I have a small list of things I need him to do for me while he's here.  Sure do miss not having my handy guy nearby to get things done around here.

Here's a few pictures of some of the activity around here this week:

After Day 1:

 Everything removed from the upstairs bathroom (except the floor didn't get done yet) that is supposed to be removed has been taken out.

Day 2:

 Wallpaper and everything removed from the downstairs bathroom

 This bathroom got totally gutted.......think of the end results

 Paul decided that since they had the exhaust fans opened up......we might as well buy new ones and replace these.  We've lived here 18 years and never changed them out......now seems like a good time.

 Looks like construction zones every where!

 

Day 3:

 No more popcorn on the bathroom ceilings.....love how they look with just the texture on it.

 They've got the floor up, medicine cabinet removed, and vanity primered in the upstairs bath

 Think of the end results........think of the end results

Having workers in the house has also necessitated having a doggy prison so that she can't chase them around all day and try to nip them.  As long as she's on the same side as I am.....she's happy.

While I was gathering the pictures for this fascinating story of the demolition at our house, I found this one.  This is faucet we picked for upstairs bathroom.  Although now that I see it again.....I'm having second thoughts.

Oh I hate having to make all these decisions!!!!!

Think of the end results......think of the end results....................

Is having a busy life a good thing?

We've been cranking it out day after day after day trying to get all things on our lists accomplished.  Can't wait for the day when all this is behind us and we can take a sigh of relief.  But.......as you all know, there is always something waiting to take it's place.

Here's our week in pictures.

We catered a wedding last Friday night, which included 70 pizzas and making 6 of my gorgeous Greek and Caesar salads.  I somehow always get stuck being the one to make these salads, but they are delicious looking......aren't they?

I also got to be the lucky one to deliver this order.  It not only filled the car up with steam from hot pizzas and yummy smells.....it also filled the entire vehicle up!

This week has also consumed a lot of time working on the plans for the new store and taking pictures:

We have to submit the floor plans and get approval from the Health Department before we can begin the build out.

Here's our spot from the outside

It's hard to visualize how you want things, so Paul decided to improvise a counter to see what it would look like and how it will work.  He gets an A+ for ingenuity and use of random items he found in the shop.

These are the final plans (almost).  It's an ever changing piece of work.  However, we have made some amazing changes that will hopefully make us be a smoother running operation.

We also visited 3 different auctions this week to try and get some things we need.  This is always fun because you never know what you're going to discover.  Then again, you often see some pretty disgusting things.

This auction begins in 2 weeks and we are going to try and grab those brown chairs for a cheap price

Planning your new space also means visiting other pizza shops and secretly taking pictures to try and figure out how you can make your place better.

Secret agent Paul took these photos and was trying to do it discreetly, thus the reason they are blurry.

But not only do we have PZ relocation things happening........we also have home remodeling happening.  This week we got the colors picked and had a meeting with the contractor yesterday to pick final things.  Looks like it's going to start next week (maybe) and take 2 weeks to finish.  I'm FINALLY going to get some new bathrooms.

Here's the color we picked for the upstairs bathroom:

And the new vanity for the downstairs bathroom:

It was a very difficult decision to pick all this stuff out......I just want it to be perfect and look nice and not regret my choices later.

And last, but not least......look at our Calamondin tree!  This tree has really reproduced for us this year.  It's even still sprouting some new fruit.

Hope I can keep it alive for another year.  We certainly got our money's worth from this little tree this year.

Time to start on my next project.

Indecision in making decisions

Well the secret is out......we're finally getting started on the inside of the house remodeling projects.  We've got company coming soon and we needed to get the upstairs guest bathroom done.  We decided to also get the downstairs guest bathroom done at the same time.  It's time to bring the interior of this old house into the 21st century instead of the 80's.

Some of you are going to find these next pictures funny.  Some will find them shocking.  But they are the true and actual photos of our "ready to be updated" bathrooms.

Here's the downstairs bathroom in all it's shiny wallpaper glory:

And here's the "what the hell was I thinking when I painted this bathroom" atomic green upstairs guest bathroom.  Hope you are wearing sunglasses.

Here's the proposed color palette for our brand new beautiful bathrooms.  Just having a hard time deciding what color should be in what bathroom.

The tile for the upstairs bathroom floor and tile around tub has been selected.  We picked the top left little tiles to be an accent row in the shower.

I was surprised at how quickly we made a unanimous decision on this. 

I thought it would take us hours!

 

We've agreed that all fixtures are going to be brushed bronze.  Paul wants this faucet in the downstairs bathroom after seeing at someone's house we've been to.

Actually, I think I like it.

After visiting a couple of stores we did manage to purchase a light fixture and mirror for the upstairs bath.....but still need to get some more stuff before next week.  Too many decisions to make for just one day.

We did, however, manage to snap a couple of pictures of kitchen designs we liked.......because that is the next major project on our agenda.  So excited to get my house finally done!

Let the progress begin!

It's me!

It's been so long since I've visited here that I had to dust the cobwebs off.

It's been busy, busy, busy for us.

Here's a snapshot of some of the things that we've been up to:

Someone must have been crabby having to wait in line at Sam's the other day and snapped this picture.  Hahaha.....that man has become dangerous with his camera phone!

If you have never done this......you need to:  onions, sliced mushrooms, butter, and cheddar cheese.  Throw it on top of the grill till mushrooms cooked.....and it's so amazing!

Those mushrooms especially taste good with steak & lobster.  What an amazing meal this was.  Now I'm hungry and want to have this for dinner.

Seriously, I don't know why we have a picture of this.

Cute dog pics always need to be taken.

This dog acts like a little princess.  I don't know how she got so spoiled.

I received this postcard in the mail from one of the customer's who won our Casino ticket giveaway.  This made my day!

Had to send this picture to Ms. Shaylene after passing the bow rack at the grocery store.  This is why she loves visiting Houston......she gets her bow fix at her favorite bow store.

This is where you'll find this man almost every night.  Slapping the dough and earning our dough.
This guy works so incredibly hard all the time.  It's hard to get him to slow down.  I feel so blessed to be the lucky person to share this life with him.

 
We were out looking for tile for the new location and we also are needing to start picking out tile for our house remodel.  We found this tile that was on clearance and we love it!  We are thinking of doing the whole downstairs with it.  What do you think......give me your opinion?

The big news this week is.........WE SIGNED THE LEASE on our new location.  Now we have a million things to get done over the next couple of months.  We are hoping to open at the new store on February 1st, 2017.  We'll keep you posted on the amazing progress we'll be making on our new dream store!

 (My husband is so handsome)

 

Someone went to the dog groomer yesterday and got all fancy!

 

 .......and that's what's happening in Gainor world. 

 

We really need to take a trip again so that the pictures will be more exciting!