An Office Fit For a King and Queen!

This entry has been long overdue. Some of you may remember in one of my first few entries that I mentioned Paul was working on converting part of our laundry room into an office in our basement. It's finally done and I absolutely love it! It took awhile to get started but once Paul got the ball rolling it went surprisingly fast. The hardest part for Paul was that he had to redo all the electrical wiring and put a whole new breaker box in. What a challenge. And to find that some of our wires were not grounded was a little scary. I'm just glad Paul was able to fix it before we had a fire. A huge thank you to Rus Lawrence for helping point Paul in the right direction, letting him borrow tools, and helping him get this project started.


This is what the laundry room looked like before Paul started (sort of). Imagine a washer and dryer in the corner where all the wood is and the shelves filled with cans and boxes of food.


This is the other end of the room that is being transformed into an office. Look at the wonderful framing job Paul did. And the insulation makes a huge difference.

The framing job took a little while for Paul to get done because he had to use a nail gun and of course it made a loud noise. I only let Paul work on it when I wasn't around. If it wasn't for my fear of loud noises the framing would have been done in half the time. Sorry Paul.


This is a picture of the drywall that Paul put up in about 1 weekend, thanks to the help of a friend. Thanks Ben!


Carrying drywall down the stairs is not an easy task by yourself. Luckily Paul has strong muscles.


The drywall is done!


This is a picture of Paul while he was in the middle of sanding all the joint compound on the drywall. It smelled awful and made a huge mess.


For some reason I didn't take any pictures of Paul painting the walls. I think the smell was really bother some and I was always up stairs.


This is a picture of Paul putting in the Pergo floor. It was pretty easy to do and only took a day.


Here is the office almost done. At this point the walls were painted, the doors were hung, and the floor was finished. All that was left to do was paint and hang the trim.
Try to imagine behind the door you see in the picture our washer and dryer.

The office is finally done!

This is a picture of my side of the room. Look at this awesome scrapbook desk. It's like my own little corner of heaven! I love it!


This is Paul's side of the room. He has the computer desk and all his "gadgets" on his side.


This is a view looking toward the closet. The closet hides the stairs and other "junk" we didn't know where to store.

A special thank you to Paul for making this wonderful office for us. I can't say enough how impressed I am with all of his handy work. Having done this huge project, raising a child should be a piece of cake (I'm really wishing).

Now on to the baby's room. That story will have to wait until another day.

TAG Scattegories

TAG scattegories...{it's harder than it looks}use the first letter of your name to answer the following. they have to be real places, things, names...nothing made up! try to use different answers if the person who tagged you had the same first initial. you can't use your name for the boy/girl name question.

what is your name? Kelly

4 letter word: kick

sports team: Knicks (New York)

celebrity/band: Kate Voegele

vehicle: Kia

tv show: Kids in the Hall

city: Kansas City

boy name: Kim

girl name: Kylee

occupation: Kinesiology

something you wear: kilt

something you throw away: kelp (I hate seaweed)

food: Kidney Beans

something found in a bathroom: kaopectate

reason for being late: keys were lost

something you shout: Kill that spider!!

People I am tagging: Laura, Shannon, Sarah and Adam

Lucky Winner!

A few weeks ago I was spending way too much time on the internet looking at blogs. I've become a blog junkie. I love reading about all the fun things, new ideas and lately anything to do with babies. I came across this blog called "What's That Smell?"-the adventures in life and parenting of two accidental mommies. (see their blog button below on the right side). They are having this awesome contest called a virtual baby shower. They couldn't have done it at a more perfect time.

Each week they are having contest giveaways on many great baby products. Many of which you'd probably never buy for your self because they are so expensive. On one of the postings there was a giveaway link to a blog called Hip Mama Blog. The prize was for a DVD set about childbirth, newborn baby care and breastfeeding by Sheri Bayles. I thought this looked like a great DVD set, and being new parents Paul and I can use all the help we can get. For most of the contest all you have to do to enter is leave a comment on the blog entry and that's it. The winner of this particular contest was chosen using random.org. To my surprise I received a comment on my blog today that out of 33 entries I was the big winner!!! I can't believe this, me a winner! I hardly ever win anything. I am very unlucky when it comes to contests and winning prizes. An the fact that this was all a random winning was amazing. Thanks Hip Mama (or should I say random.org) for picking me as the winner. I guess being pregnant has changed my lucky streak.
Check out Hip Mama's blog and the virtual baby shower if you get a chance.

What is with those nicknames?

So I understand the nicknames that actually make sense like Pat for Patrick or Patricia, or Sam for Samuel. Growing up I've learned that Bill is short for William, Bob is short for Robert and Dick is short for Richard. I have yet to figure out why these are nicknames but they are and that's how it is.

So the other night, Paul was talking to his mom, giving her the weekly "Kelly Report" and she suggested the name, "Chip" for our currently unnamed child. Paul immediately responded with, "Well we could, but did you know that Chip is a nickname for Paul?" Now explain this nickname reasoning to me. Paul said that when he was in high school he new 2 guys named Paul that both went by Chip. Paul was quite serious that Chip is a nickname for Paul. As I was laughing hysterically at this, I told Paul that just because he new 2 guys named Chip, it doesn't make "Chip" an official nickname for Paul. If I had a nickle for every time I heard some one say "I knew a guy..." I'd be rich. Paul claims that neither guy had the middle name Chip. So I asked him why he doesn't go by Chip if it is a nickname for Paul. All he said was that no one's ever called him Chip. I told him it's because Chip is NOT a nickname for Paul. His mom had never heard of this concept either. We looked it up on the internet and had no such luck finding this a true fact. If Chip truly is a nickname for "Paul," why has Paul never mentioned this factoid before? After all, we have known each other for over 10 years. I can always count on Paul when I need a good laugh.

According to Yahoo Answers: "Chip is a preppy nickname that is not short for any particular name, but rather to indicate that one is named after another aka 'chip off the old block.' One finds that men named Chip usually have a roman numeral after their real names."

What is still so funny to me is the fact that all these years Paul has seriously believed that Chip was a nickname for Paul. I think I've finally convinced him otherwise. Maybe I'll just start calling him Chip anyway!


My "Chip"

What nicknames have you heard that just don't make any sense or you just don't understand?

I Did It All By Myself!

So this morning I bought something on Ebay. Surprisingly it was not lip gloss or hair products. It was a super cute baby boy scrapbook album. One particular seller on Ebay makes the cutest paper bag albums you've ever seen. I've been trying to get one for weeks but either get out bid or usually forget to bid (which happens more often). So anyway, I finally just decided to buy it now. It was too cute to pass up.

Now to the point of this blog entry. Paul and I have decided that when we make an internet purchase, instead of printing out the receipts like we used to, we would save them to the computer for easy access and less paper waist. Our receipts usually piled up on our desk so I thought this was a good idea. His idea was to make a copy of the web receipt into a pdf file so that it would look the same as if we had printed it. Since Paul was all the way upstairs probably busy, I decided to figure out how to do this myself. I've picked up a few things here and there about computers (how could I not, being married to a computer geek) and figured it couldn't be too hard. I know Paul has shown me once or more accurately two or three times how to do this but I never seem to remember. Many of you reading this may think, "come on, you don't know how to make a pdf file!". Well, I do now! And I figured it out all by myself! If you can't tell I've very proud of this fact and I hope Paul will be to. So just in case you don't know how to do this let me quickly and easily tell you how. After talking to Paul I found out that you need to have the program Professional Adobe Acrobat. This is not the free adobe acrobat you can download from the internet. I guess it's about $150. But apparently we have it because Paul uses it for work a lot to convert old files to pdf's. So if you do have this program loaded on your computer it will automatically set up a printer setting. All you need to do is open your file, web page or document and go to file, select print and then select Adobe PDF. It will then automatically convert your document, web page, or file to a PDF file that you can save and read any time. After reading this, if you still have no clue what I'm talking about, I'm sure Paul would be happy to come give you a fee lesson. So that's my story for this wonderfully lazy Monday morning.

My Secret Obsessions

Some women collect shoes while others collect purses. Here is my story. My secret was revealed a few weeks ago when I accidentally dropped a necklace pendant down the drain of the bathroom sink. I was on my way out to dance class and didn't have time to wait for Paul to find it. Luckily he is handy enough that I knew he wouldn't have trouble retrieving it. When I came home from dance class I happened to go into the bathroom and this is what I saw.



All of my hair products were spread across the counter-top. I was a little embarrassed. Paul, however was "shocked and dismayed" to find so many hair products hidden under our sink. He couldn't believe I had so many and never knew about them. Until then, it was my well kept little secret. What could I say? I certainly don't wake up looking like I walked out of the salon. I have very fine thin hair and I am easily influenced by infomercials. In my defense, I do use all of these products at one time or another. And to tell you the truth, that's not even all of my hair products. I have a few more hidden away in a drawer.

So the other day, Paul and I were at the store and he asked me if I had any ChapStick he could borrow. As I was looking through my purse I found 8 lip glosses but no ChapStick. Paul was amazed I had so many lip glosses in one purse. I obviously can't wear them all at once, so why did I have 8 in my purse. I explained it's because I never know what kind of mood I will be in when I want to put on lip gloss. Since each one is a different color or has sparkles and matches different outfits, I need to carry several "just in case". Now instead of 8, I only carry 4 and always make sure to have ChapStick so Paul won't be tempted to use one of my ever so sparkly lip glosses. Just as I am tempted by hair products on infomercials, the lip gloss gets to me as well. I have to say that I got a" super awesome" deal on Ebay: 12 lip glosses for $12. You can't find that in any store!

Below is a picture of all the lip glosses I own.



In my defense to all of these products, I never buy something unless it's on sale. And if it's not I try to find the best internet price, usually on Ebay.

So now that I've shared my secret obsessions, I challenge all of you to share one of yours.

Happy Anni-Birthary!

August 16th in our family is a festive day. We celebrate three events on one day: Paul's birthday, Paul's parents anniversary, and my dad's birthday. This year Paul's parents, sister April and Jabez the dog decided to come down to UT for the weekend to celebrate. It was a fun day. We went to the Ogden farmers market, went on a hike, played games, and best of all we got to eat ice cream cake. Yum, my favorite. I just barely finished the ice cream cake from my birthday last month. Paul picked a great flavor: praline ice cream with caramel topping.
Even though my dad wasn't able to celebrate with us we thought of him and wished him a happy birthday. Hope you had a great birthday dad! Here are some pictures from our day.




No dice! No fair!






Oh no I busted!


The dog gets all the water! No fair!!


Look at their strong muscles. Aren't they buff!