Remodeling

Posted by Lisa Eirene

We’ve officially been in our new house for a year! What a rollercoaster of a year it’s been.

When we moved in last year, I did the bare minimum–I unpacked and decorated and we’ve been making it our house…but we didn’t do anything major. After spending so much time remodeling our old house to sell it, sell our house, buy this house, move…I was just burned out. And I did not want any more projects!

But…with the pandemic…we suddenly had time. So we started some projects that were on our list for “eventually.” The first was Logan’s room.

Our house is a 1920’s bungalow. Originally the house was a small, 2 bedroom, 1 bathroom house. But the original owners remodeled the attic to create a second story which is where the master bedroom suite is, plus another bedroom and a bonus area. Since it’s the “Attic” the ceilings are a little funky. Logan’s room is small with slanted ceilings. It’s ok for now. When he’s older and 6 feet tall, it won’t be his bedroom. πŸ˜‰

I didn’t take official “before” photos. But I have some before photos as we began prepping the room last weekend. Logan helped me take everything out of his room.

I did taping, prepping and primer on the walls. The walls were a very dark brown and then a light beige. The ceilings were cream colored. It was all very blah and dated.

I painted the ceiling white ceiling paint. It looks so much better!

Then I painted part of the closet a bright green and the rest blue. It looks SO nice! We love the colors!

I also got new dinosaur drapes and some dinosaur art to redecorate.

And the dinosaur decals he already had on his walls, are back up!

Logan loves it. I love it. I love the colors. The room looks much better. It’s brighter, lighter, happier, looks like a boy’s happy room instead of just drab brown. It’s so nice. I am super happy with it. The blue is “Honest Blue” and the green is “Heartland Frosty.” Definitely recommend both!

So the next big projects: paint the office and paint the master. The master bedroom is HUGE and it’s a very light brown/tan/beige. Kinda boring. The problem is that the room is humongous AND Michael and I cannot agree on a color. So we are waiting on that one. The issue with the office is that the colors are ATROCIOUS (think baby poop brown) and unfortunately the previous owner not only PAINTED THE ORIGINAL FLOORS (what were they thinking) so we have to fix the floors, but they never removed any of the previous layers of paint. So we have a lot of paint removal to do before we can do that room. Plus, the office has the original windows:

I got some product that is supposed to remove up to 15 layers of paint…we will see…but we may end up having to hire professionals. I’d like to keep the original windows. But they aren’t in great shape.

Weekend Walk in the Woods

Posted by Lisa Eirene

Last Friday ended up being an unexpected holiday. I am pretty impressed with my workplace, a lot of companies in Oregon and soon the state of Oregon will be recognizing Juneteenth as a holiday. I know it doesn’t undo a lot of the damage that has been done for so long, but it’s at least a step in the right direction.

It turned out to be a very nice day. 85 degrees in Portland. Logan was in daycare and Michael and I had the chance to have a kid-free day! We decided to go for a hike. Originally, I wanted to do Mirror Lake but we got a late start and if you want to do Mirror Lake, you must get there very early in the morning, or there is no parking. I assumed, even during pandemic times, the parking lot would be full. So…we did a hike near Vancouver, WA instead. It’s one we’ve never been to before.

LaCamas Lake Trail Hike

It’s a pretty easy hike, with side trails that are a little more steep. It’s a good kid-friendly hike. We’ll probably take Logan there someday this summer.

It was such a beautiful day! The hike ended up being kind of short.

We finished up and planned on doing another hike just down the street but when we got there, the gate was closed. Bummer! So it ended up being a short hike.

Which was ok. It was getting to be lunchtime anyways. So we drove to Vancouver, picked up taco salads to go and went to a park and had a picnic lunch.

It was a nice day. Sunny, warm, relaxing.

Then for Father’s Day, we went to this hike:

Hopkins Demonstration Forest

It was out in Oregon City, but in the country part of Oregon City. We drove through farms, ranches with horses and goats and sheep, etc, to get there. It was a really nice park!

Despite lack of funding, etc during pandemic times, the main trails were well maintained. The off-shoot trails were overgrown with nettles and blackberry bushes, so not very traversable (especially not with a toddler). But most of the hike was very nice.

There were bathrooms (open but not maintained right now), garbage cans throughout the hike (which is nice when you have a dog), poop bag dispensers, maps and clearly marked trails.

From the parking lot it was all downhill. Then there were various trails and roads you could take. Some were not finished yet. One went around a pond. Logan was very excited to look for frogs!

Bella was in heaven! And got VERY muddy (she got a bath when we got home!).

We did about 2 miles. The hike back to the car was all uphill! We were tired and sweaty. Home for lunch and showers and naps!! It was a good father’s day and a good day–a good couple days in the woods!