The Reno: January

Master bath - removed garden tub with jets. We used it maybe two times in the last 14 years and it had become a place to store toilet paper.

 Re-configured the master bath and closet.

With the wall...

Wall is gone in the kitchen!

Fireplace tile torn out.

Front entry tile gone.

Living room carpet - gone. We won't get our wood floors installed until March.

Women's March

Mom and I marched in Women's March on Saturday. The political climate has been quite volatile and challenging the past few months. The march was about women's rights, and not about the current White House administration, but some women I know are disappointed by the current president's behavior and policies. There were marches all over the country and thousands of women showed up for them.

At the gathering spot near the Keeper of the Plains. There were women and men of all ages and backgrounds!

Some signs we saw...

Walking along the route...

At City Hall.

The Renovation

We started out needing to replace our kitchen hardwood floors and paint the ceiling in the kitchen.

We ended up renovating *almost* the entire house...the only rooms that didn't have anything done to them are our basement storage rooms. 😒

Here's what happened:

We wanted to replace our honey oak hardwood kitchen floors and repaint the kitchen ceiling.

We were told it might be hard to match the stain on the floor, so it might be better to replace the floor altogether.

OK - that's cool.

Well, if we're going to replace the floor, we might as well go darker and trendy with the new "hand scrapped" floors with boards of varying lengths.

But wait...if we go darker with the wood in the kitchen, then it won't match the rest of the honey oak throughout the house (trim, bathroom cabinets, etc).

OK - let's stain all the trim and cabinets!

Well, if we stain all the wood darker, it won't match the current bathroom tile floors or entryway.

OK - let's replace the bathroom floors and entryway with something that matches!

Oh wait...the fireplace tile won't match now.

OK - let's replace the fireplace tile!

If we are going to replace the bathrooms, we might as well re-configure the master bath to something more user friendly.

OK - let's gut the master bathroom!

But wait - the carpet in the living room is showing wear, even though we just replaced it five years ago.

OK - let's go wood in the living room too!

Oh wait - now the paint doesn't really match.

OK - let's repaint the entire house!

While we are at it, let's remove a wall in the kitchen to make it a more open space.

OK - knock down a wall!

We could add a bunch of cabinets to the blank wall in the kitchen too...

OK - let's add cabinets!

The Reno (and it should be capitalized because we lived and breathed the house renovation for a good four months) officially started today.

Christmas 2016

Hilgers, Hattebergs and Dyers for Christmas this year.

We saw the latest Star Wars movie, Rogue One. The angle on this photo makes the straw look like it's going up Matthew's nose! 😂

Christmas Eve dinner at Newport Grill!

Santa came!

Kitchen ping pong.

Ate food.

Saw pretty lights at Botanica.

Ate meat at Cy's Hoof and Horn Supper Club in Sedgwick, Kansas.

#HolidayBakingFail

"Get your s*** together!" ~my husband.

Oh. I had grand plans of holiday baking this year. I skipped last year, but I was going to Do. It. this year. 

On the baking menu:

• Harvest Pumpkin Apple Bread (really should be called cake because it has three cups of sugar in it)
• Peppermint Brownie Bites (my favorite, but a real pain to make)
• Pumpkin Cookies (because you can't have too much pumpkin...unless it's pie...not a fan)
• Frosted sugar cookies

This is down from what I did in 2009, 2010, 2011. 

I started with the bread. Peeled and chopped apples. The fifth ingredient was sugar. Ran out of sugar. Scott was at Target, so he was able to pick up some.

[6 minutes later]
Ran out of flour. Called Scott again. He had just checked out, but being the best husband ever, he went back and got the flour.

Since I have no flour or sugar, I move on to the brownie bites.

The recipe calls for making the brownies from scratch. Ain't nobody got time for that so I use a mix. And every year, they come out looking deformed because they stick to the bottom of the mini muffin pan. But they taste good, so that's all the matters, right?

The last batch of brownies were not cooking right. What the heck? Oh. I had turned the oven off. Turn the oven back on. *sigh*

My flour and sugar arrive. I make mini loaves of bread and had put the batter in about half of them when I realized I forgot to add the apples to the mix. 

Sprinkle a spoonful of apples into all non-apple batter in the mini loaf pans. Put remaining apples in the big bowl of batter. The bread (cake) turned out just fine.

On to the sugar cookies and the "mandatory fun time" begins. The boys are eager to help bake. 

I couldn't find my usual sugar cookie recipe so I used a new one. The boys helped measure ingredients...and some needed help reading a recipe (note: teach 14yo how to read a recipe). We have a dough tornado when using the beaters. The kitchen is a mess. Finish dough and chill for one hour.

Oldest is stumped on how to set the timer for one hour when the timer can only be set in minutes? [This is from a student with an "A" in advance math]. Wait for it...after prompting, he figures it out.

Then I realize I don't have red or green food coloring OR powdered sugar for the pumpkin cookie glaze. Facebook message my neighbors...one is at the store and says she will get them for me. Score!

Scott hears of all this: "What is your deal today? Get your s*** together!"

On to making pumpkin cookies. 

One hour later...

Roll out dough on kitchen table. It's sticky and cracks a lot. The boys use cookie cutters and argue over which bell to use ("We already used the big one, we haven't done a small one yet!"). The dough is hard to move from the table to the cookie sheet and we have a few "do-overs." 

Someone attempt this:

And then uses their fist to pound it down. Probably doesn't help the dough problem.

People are now responding to me like this: "Yes, Dungeon Master." 

It's fun to bake cookies together.

There is still some dough to roll out. The Dungeon Master lets the boys go "do their thing" while she finishes and bakes all the cookies.

The cookies are thick and crisp...and I like thick and chewy. On to frosting. Our cookies are not that pretty. And they don't even taste good. And the food coloring frosting is a mess. Now I remember why this is a pain in the neck.

Fun meters are pegged. I finish putting the glaze on the pumpkin cookies and the peppermint frosting on the brownies while Scott is trying to make dinner. There's no counter space and stuff is everywhere. The kitchen is a mess. 

Goodies are finally finished. Oldest says "we don't have much of a spread this year."

No...no we don't. And we probably won't next year either.