Bones to Beauty

I would love to say diamonds – but nope, literally ice as in ice cubes. We celebrated our family Christmas on Saturday in San Antonio visiting the ICE! exhibit. We always did this event when we were in the Dallas area, and since moving to Victoria our tradition came to an end. Naturally we were all excited when San Antonio was listed as a new location this year. This was Dylan’s first year to ever experience the event, and I think all of us would agree it was a blast! If you want to check out ICE! go to this website: https://www.jwhillcountrychristmas.com/ice

Every year the event has a different theme and this year it was the Grinch. Everything is made out of ice and you are provided a parka to wear. This is my only time I brave the cold and each year reminds me why I have zero desire to move back to that weather…. fun for the 30 minutes, but my toes were getting frozen, so that was enough. Hope you all enjoy the pictures.

Oh the holiday time is frightful, but remodeling is so delightful…. LOL – Happy holiday season everyone! We decided to build a shed over the Thanksgiving Holiday. Dylan and Ciera were here so Friday, Dylan helped Chad assemble the shed walls while Ciera helped me decorate the house for Christmas. Saturday and Sunday, Chad and I set the roof, got it shingled and windows installed. We need to put the trim on and paint it yet, which will probably be a couple weeks out as we have plans the next 2 weekends. However, if we can sneak anything in, we definitely will. Chad is super excited as once this is done, then he knows we will get to remodel the garage (for him that is like me building an office).

The above is hilarious as Chad took the pic with his work phone and it automatically adds the address, this is the address of our neighbors on the left side …. guess GPS thought we were putting this up in their back yard!

We had our annual Halloween party on Saturday and we had a good turn out with about 25 people. We always enjoy our neighbors and friends! We added karaoke this time and we had 2 that definitely loved to sing. I don’t post pictures of the guests as I really believe in gaining permission, but here are couple pictures of the food, drinks, voting table and our costumes.

Ciera and Dylan as Gail Weathers and Ghost Face of Scream

Chad and myself as Voodoo King and Queen

I promised last week that this week’s post would be the inside Halloween photos. I’m disappointed as the iPhone auto adjusts and I’m to tech dumb to get the pictures to look like they do in real life. The photos of the living room with the lights on are really orange, but they don’t look like it in the photos. I turned the lights off and it still didn’t capture things right. Then the atrium area that is in blue, doesn’t matter how still I am, they come out a little blurred – I’m just gonna say a spirit is in that part of the house messing with me. Enjoy!

We have all of the outside Halloween decorations up so this post is just about our decorations. Most of the inside is done, but will share those photos next week. Due to the month of all things scary, not much with the house will be done, we have a few outside projects, but not sure if we will get to those. I’ll keep you all posted. I tried to take the same photos in the day and then at night.

We have only one side of trim to put up and naturally paint. Then we will put up the railing and the atrium will be done! The painting of the ceiling/walls are done and the flooring is in. Remember off of the one atrium landing we will put in a door so we can walk into the attic above the garage. I want that done before next weekend, but I think Chad is on call, so that probably won’t happen as it will most likely be late nights for him. My “hope” was that it was done so we had an easier time to get all of the outside Halloween decorations down (as well as when we go to put them away) as we will not be doing ANY inside work once I have the inside Halloween decorations up. October is the only month that it is all outside stuff or very minimal inside work.

We will also put a ‘bridge’ between the two landings as Gamora likes to lay between them (found that out last year at Halloween as we put a drunken sailor skeleton on the bridge), now we have a prettier bridge to put up and then Gamora and the sailor can be happy.

This picture above is just showing the trim that we need to paint….

We have had a lot of life events happen, which has caused our delays. I guess since it is football season, school is back in session, we can now get back to the house. Our life events at lease are exciting: Ciera got engaged to Dylan, Ciera and Dylan bought a house (which included a weekend move in there), I’m ending my job with Optum and taking on a new opportunity. The only constant is Chad hasn’t changed a thing. That is really a good thing! So let me get you updated on where we are at. The last post I showed you how we put in the door to the extra bedroom for the landing. We have now put a temporary floor that connects the landing out of Ciera’s bedroom and the extra bedroom so we could get the popcorn ceiling sanded and get things retextured. Chad did get it all sanded, mudded, sanded again, so we are ready for painting. We should be able to get that done this week or definitely next weekend.

We will be putting a door off of the extra bedroom landing into the garage, but need some “man” help to get new plywood into the attic, so that will be the Oct 12 as Dylan is going to let us borrow his muscles (teaser for what is to come). This way we can close off the access to the attic from the garage making getting all of my Halloween decorations in/out of the house much, much easier!

Temporary floor connecting the two landings

Before – need to sand the ceiling and enclose where the vent is. We put in the mini-splits, so that duct work isn’t being used.

Looking towards Ciera’s room as I’m sure I’ll have an “after” picture when we are done.

Sanded and starting to mud

Sanding and mudding

I know you all have heard me say this house really does dictate what we do next. This time, it was Hurricane Beryl! We planned to put up a shed this weekend but with the impending hurricane, we opted to postpone that for a different weekend. Instead we did one thing that was driving me crazy and also started to complete the opposite landing in the atrium.

The driving me crazy item was the only carpet left in the house – the carpet in the master bedroom and what is currently the closet. I’d rather walk on concrete (I am getting a couple carpet runners – once Amazon makes their appearance next week) but that carpet was just GROSS and I was done with it. Plus this will allow me to start to map out where I want to move walls with the master makeover.

We had the landing/balconies completed in the atrium, but still needed to put in the door from the extra bedroom to the landing. Plus we need this finished so we can remove the popcorn ceiling in the atrium and paint – meaning if we are pulling out the texture gun then we need everything completed so we make that mess one time in that area.

I’m happy to say (for anyone wondering) so far no activity from Beryl. It is suppose to hit land late tonight/early tomorrow and right now going north of us so we will just have the typical rain/wind. I may change my mind in the morning, but as of this minute, not panicking at all.

closet with the carpet

closet no carpet – believe it or not, one day this will be a vanity…

Looking from Ciera’s balcony over to the extra room

Door is in!

From the extra bedroom looking out to what will be the balcony.

I am happy to say the front of the house is complete! The brown cedar shingles were all re-stained (meaning no more white on them). I’m just going to call that a win. Everything we wanted to do last week, didn’t happen. We knew we wouldn’t have our full weekend as we went to look at a house with Ciera and Dylan. Some rain came through, which was much needed, but no painting then. Plus this year is the first that we have had to experience these invasive caterpillars. I know they have a name, but I just call them damn annoying! They were/are EVERYWHERE and they have decided they really like my daisies, which has not made me happy. Needless to say, these little buggers will make webs in trees. The plus, they DO NOT like my trees (just the daisies) but that doesn’t mean they don’t think they should invade the lawn, the house, sidewalks, etc. We spent a lot of $$ on bug killers and I made sure Chad had all of that stuff down.

This weekend, then we did get back at it – slowly. Chad’s hand is really hurting so we didn’t go a full speed as normal. He does get his shot this upcoming Friday and so we will be taking next weekend off. He may show me how to run the power washer (can’t be that hard) so I can wash down the front patio and sidewalk coming up to the house – it has some overspray on it, but that should be about it. We are going up to Dallas to see Ryan’s new house (Friday after his shot) and making a quick stop at NFM for the new sectional. I am saving ~$1000 by driving up there rather than getting local and that includes the u-haul, hotel, food and gas. CRAZY!!! I am SUPER excited that NFM announced they are opening another location in Austin in 2026…then it will only be a 2 hour drive rather than 5.

See you all in a couple of weeks!

We are spending our Memorial day painting (as I believe I had already mentioned). Surprisingly, it is going very well. We have had a few people drive by and stop and say they think it is looking good as well as a couple neighbors. I’m sure they were all curious of my hodge-podge look prior to this weekend, but glad to say it is all coming together. We still have the bricks in the flower bed to prime/paint and the bricks on the east side of the house (and I keep forgetting about the chimney) and the day is not done, but I knew I would not want to do the blog this evening. We do have to touch up some of the brown on the cedar shingles, but that is to be expected.

One thing that we tried and we weren’t sure how it would work out is a window mask/peel. You paint a clear coat over the windows, then you paint like normal and peel it off at the end. This actually worked!!!! Plus, we were then able to paint the window trims, so now instead of brown, they are the same cream color as the house. I’m super happy when things like this really work plus that means the new windows can remain a lower priority still.

Front before

Side (before) with the column getting primed (yes we are painting the brick).

Front entry before

Here is what the Mask and Peel looks like on the window

In case you are curious, this is what we used, both Lowes and Home Depot have this (if you ever get brave to try it out).

Notice the windows are all painted and this is where I peeled off one section.

After

After (notice touch up needed on the brown cedar shingles)