March Madness

This title might sound deceptive.  After all, in our household March madness has nothing to do with basketball.  We're not huge sports fans.  We're more of an artsy, musical family.  And part of our madness did have to do with me pulling out my paints and brushes, again.  I am inspired to get this house spruced up.  When we bought it I saw great potential for it.  I didn't mind that it was dated and needed painting.  That is something I actually enjoy doing.  However, it's been a little hard to tackle all of my projects, when I am homeschooling and working part-time, at the same time.  But, finally, I have finished all of the walls leading down the staircase.  If you read my earlier blog you know that I painted one accent wall a "celery sprig green" color.

Before…

After…

Then I decided to paint the door that was old, with dirty white, cracking paint.

Before…

After…

So, now it was time to tackle the tall walls which were beyond my reach.  It took me forever to start this project, because I wasn't sure, for a long time, as to how I was going to be able to reach the upper corners to get a nice line on the edges.  And I didn't really want to rig a ladder up on the steps, lest I should fall.  But, my problem was solved by going to Home Depot and asking if they had any kind of tool that could attach a regular paint brush to a long stick.  They did and it wasn't too expensive.  Only about $7!  So, with a new stick that could attach to either my new tool (called a "claw"), or to a regular roller brush I was ready to go!

I used a kitchen step stool and leaned through the spaces between the decorative wooden dowels separating the dining room from the staircase.  It was a good thing that I put aluminum foil down there, because I did drip!

You can see the start of my work on the edges in the above photo.  I wasn't going for a drastic change.  But, I wanted to cover up the dirty white walls, which had 70's orange paint peeking through.  I thought a nice neutral color that would just slightly warm up the atmosphere would be nice.  So, I went with the same color that Penny had requested in her bedroom, "sandstone".

The one thing I wanted to do right with this makeover, was to actually remove all of the hardware, including the railing that leads down the staircase.  Former owners had never removed it when they had painted.  Thus there is paint on the all of metal hardware supports and even on the underside of the railing, itself.  Here are photos of the ugly brass supports that were becoming tarnished with white and orange paint over them.  Some were even missing screws and had mismatched screws, that were halfway screwed in.

This one also had a hole in the wall next to it, for no known reason.  So, I got out my spaculing and filled in holes as prep work for this and over gouges in the dirty white wall.

Next, I took the brass supports outside, (yea! it was sunny and warmer and most of our snow had melted!).  And I spray painted them a sparkly silver.

So, here is the final completed staircase.  I'm sure it's hard to tell from the photos, but it looks so much nicer.  Now there is a nice, warm glow, rather than a dingy, ugly old look to our staircase.

And, you'll notice in this photo, that there are many birthday cards.  So, the other part of March madness, was that we celebrated my birthday.  Can you guess my age?  Let's just say that I have now entered my upper 40's.  It's hard to believe.  But, my eyes are telling me that I'm getting older.  I had a very nice birthday with little surprises from Penny and Jay.  Penny bought me a couple of my favorite snacks and gave me a nice card.

 Jay found a typical very nice, romantic card and gave me a beautiful necklace with both of our names and birthstones on it.

We went out to eat at Macaroni Grill, which Penny surprisingly ended up liking.  And then we came home to eat some yummy ice cream birthday cake that they bought for me, with strawberries inside!

The craziest, "mad" thing that happened on my birthday was that Jay made a tough decision to resign at the end of the school year from his present teaching position.  There were more and more signs and indications that his own style of teaching didn't line up with the administration's own ideas about education.  So, we are entering a new, unknown stage of life, once again.  But, we all seem to have a peace that our God will take care of us and show us the way into the unknown.

Meanwhile, Penny has been having more opportunities to get to know people.  We've been discovering over the past six years, that her personality is more introverted.  And, with moving to a whole new community about two and half years ago, it had been very hard for her to open up to make new friends.  But, this has been a very positive year for her, as she's been developing a new friendship with a girl who will also be graduating with Penny from Home School Etc.  Here is a picture of her with her new friend, along with her friend's sister, at a semi-formal dinner that HSE hosted.

And one more shot, just because proud mama had to embarrass her teenage daughter and take a picture of her pretty girl before her fancy dinner.

She also had the opportunity to meet with a Thai college student.  But, the girls mostly spoke in English together.  This was thanks to a couple from our church who help college students out a lot.  He has already taught this other Thai girl how to drive and now Penny is starting to think about having Ed teach her how to drive, too.  

Another family from our church recently asked her to join them, along with their college-aged niece, to visit the Denver Art Museum downtown.  She said she had a nice time, but seeing the big exhibit of expensive jewelry from around the world was quite overwhelming for her.

Well, that is a summary of our March Madness, so far.  What have you been up to, lately?!  Hope your March is filled with much mercy along with the madness!

During the Bleak Midwinter

I don't know about you, but I'm really looking forward to Spring!  And we were totally spoiled, compared to most of the folks in the U.S.  In fact, we hardly had winter, to speak of, until February.  In fact, Penny and I even went out playing tennis in short sleeves in late January.  But, we paid for it this past month.  Denver set a record for the snowiest Feb. on record with over 22 inches.  Here's a photo taken from our back sun porch.

So, what have we been up to during this bleak Midwinter season?  Well, sometimes we've been cooped up at home, when they've cancelled Sunday church, Wed. bible study, Penny's homeschool group, a singing gig for Jay,  my Ladies' Night Out, Penny's babysitting jobs, etc.  Jay got at least one snow day, while I had to work that day (after a foot of snow overnight).  And one of his concerts got postponed. On the Sunday when church was cancelled we all sat down at the computer and helped Penny to apply for going to a community college for the fall.  Now, we've also applied for her to try and get some financial aid, as well.  We just finished up the first half of her last semester of high school.  And I'm happy to see that she's been making a good friend this year with another girl from her home school group.  In fact, Penny has been over to her house, and now her friend came and hung out with us, too.  It's a REAL answer to this mama's prayers.  I've been praying for years that Penny's heart would heal enough to open up and trust to build friendships.  So, it's really exciting to see the answer to those prayers being fulfilled.

We've also spent more time just hanging out and watching movies, which we usually rent for free from the library.  Even our kitty likes to join us by settling in on our laps when we're watching movies.

This past month has been rough.  Jay has lost two more relatives and will be traveling with his mother to California for another memorial service at the end of March just shortly after the one month anniversary of losing his own dad this past March 15th.  It's not been fun going through the grieving process, especially now that we live a little farther away from his mom.  But, we still try to see her when we can.  The weather hasn't helped much in that regard.

One of the things that many of us like to do during a bleak season is to cook up some comfort food.  One night, this past week, I was craving some Japanese comfort food.  So, here is what I whipped up for supper….

Japanese Zesty Deep-Fried Chicken

Steamed Short-Grain Rice

Edamame (Soy Beans)

Japanese Potato Salad

Partly, I made it because I've been daydreaming about summer.  But, anyway, this meal was a real hit with all members of the family.  Even Jay kept commenting on how it tasted like comfort food to him.  And he doesn't always say that about the Asian food that I like to sometimes cook.

Finally, now, our snow is starting to melt and the forecast is calling for temps rising to 50's and 60's, possibly even 70 by next weekend.  Woo Hoo!  Should be a lot nicer for my birthday this week.  Yeah!  I'll officially be entering my late 40's.  Is that possible?  I'm hoping that with the coming of Spring, there will be a new spring in our steps and hope on the horizon, even as we face upcoming change that is inevitable, especially with our only child graduating soon.  Prayers would be much appreciated!  Thanks!  Hope you are all weathering this season well.  What have you been doing to pass the bleak Midwinter season?