Busy Week of Grandkids!

Whew! Sorry I haven't blogged, but this week done tuckered me out.

Last Sunday we had a special birthday party to go to.  Our oldest grandson Jameson turned 10 and his little sister Whitney turned 3.  Their birthdays are only 4 days apart, so they celebrate them together. 

Our daughter Heather and soninlaw Jesse live up in Oconto, just a half mile down the road from our old house.  We tease them that they waited to buy a house just up the road until AFTER we sold ours and moved away! hahaha   

The kids had blast and all of our kids and grandkids were there, along with Grandpa Pfundtner and some family friends as well.  They recently put up a swimming pool in their yard, so the party became a swimming party for the young ones. It was hot hot hot out, but we found shade under the trees in our lawn chairs with the other older folks.  

After a fun taco bar meal, 

and present openings....

It was time for BIRTHDAY CAKE!!!

(each got their own cake)

here a little You Tube of their song: 

Whitney                                       Jameson

I have no idea where these years have gone,

has it really been TEN years since our first grandchild was born?

~~~~~~~~~

Then on Monday, we had the chance to pick up grandkids Allegra and Mason from their summer school class, as their other auntie wasn't able to make it. These are the two that belong to our son Dan and daugherinlaw Heather. Their class happened to be held at Heritage Hill State Park in Green Bay.  They were sketching wildlife flowers and learning to volunteer and do chores for the park. That place is very special to us because that is where we got married 21 years ago!  

Yes, we were married in the Moravian Church on the historic grounds complete with carriage and horses and a wonderful family ceremony, surrounded by friends and relatives. 

The kids took pics of us on the steps, and then we peeked in all the windows, as the buildings had been closed up for the day.  It was so wonderful to kiss my husband all over again, 21 years later in the same place we had said our vows. 

After that, we had a couple hours to kill before their parents were coming home from work.  Soooo we took a little stop at Kastle Karts in Green Bay.  Mason was not old enough to drive alone, but he could ride along.  Allegra was able to drive, but preferred to let Grandpa drive her.  So Mason and I paired up in another cart. It was sure fun!  We weren't allowed to take a cell phone on the ride, so the workers snapped this pic for us before we took off. 

After that we went over to Bay Beach... It's a city owned amusement park with only 25 cent tickets for the rides!  Some rides take one ticket, some two, some three.  It was fun and we rode for a couple hours on only $10.  I made a video for them of the day.....

We finished off that visit with a stop at A and W for supper.... (we rarely do fast food) but brought them home all fed and full of sugar... there were FREE root beer floats on that day as well!  

~~~~~~~~~~

Then this weekend we just had the littlest grandkid, Claire, for an overnight.  Her parents, our oldest daughter Erin and soninlaw Waylen, went to a concert in Alpine Valley (country music.. ick!)  and we got to keep the wee one, not quite 2 years old yet.  She is such a quiet, inquisitive and gentle little girl.  Here she is playing with my blown glass paperweights.  I allow the grandkids to play with them because although they are glass, they are pretty much unbreakable. Unless they drop one on the foot.. ouch!  But they love the idea of getting to touch and handle GLASS.

She played and played so well with the toys and explored the toy closet now that she is old enough to play with the "big kid toys".  Last time she was here, we only took out the "baby toys" ... she sure is growing up fast too.

It was miserably hot outside, but we did manage a walk around the block with her pulled in the little red wagon by her Grandpa.  I followed with Finney and Binney on leash.  Only one block and we were tuckered out.  This heat and humidity are just too much this summer in Wisconsin.  Our central air is running nonstop to keep the house cool.

But that little stinker wasn't worn out yet... so we let her play in the Big Backyard for a while, fetching frisbee and playing ball.  Here is a cute you tube of her antics:

What fun! 

When I got her in the bathtub, she was slowing down --- and by 8 p.m. she was out like a light!  She even slept in this morning until 7:30 a.m.!  That is amazing, because she usually wakes up between 5 and 6 am.

We played around the house until her parents came to pick her up on their way home from Alpine Valley.  She was a sweetie and even helped to pick up all of her toys! Imagine that!

After hugs and waves, they headed on home, and now Steve and I had a shift to do at the Calumet County Historical Museum.  We volunteer there for Sunday during open hours from 1-4 and we also help with maintenance and serve on the board as well.  It was a hot hot humid icky afternoon again.  

http://www.calumetcountyhistoricalsociety.org/

I am glad we took along a fan and cooler of ice water, we sure needed it.  But even on a hot miserable day, we had 9 visitors. The buildings are not air conditioned and unless there is a breeze, *which there wasn't a lick of wind*  we do the best that we can.

It is a wonderful place with a collection of locally owned and cherished items... with as much provenance and stories attached as possible.  We love the people who come in and tell even more stories about things that their families did or items they owned as well. It is a fun task to help out, and we learn more and more each time we help out.

I was honestly happy to see 4pm roll around so we could lock up and stow the flag and take down the signs.  I had tossed a pork roast with sauerkraut in the slow cooker before we left, so supper was ready when we got home.  We are now spending the evening sitting on our butts in the livingroom, watching How The West Was Won and being two total slugs! 

I promise to write about PART THREE of It All Started with a Facebook Marketplace Ad....  I just haven't gotten around to it yet.  But it deals with some interesting light fixtures added to Our Old House. 

It All Started With a Facebook Marketplace Post - PART TWO

In my last blog, I started on all of the changes we had to make just because of a Marketplace ad from Facebook.

Now for one more change that we made, due to a Marketplace ad from Facebook:  last week I saw this very interesting ottoman. We needed a long low seat for additional seating in the living room that could go under the front window. Luckily, this one was only in Kaukauna, about 18 miles away. We made arrangements with the lady to pick it up off her front porch because she had to leave her house for an unexpected errand. She told us if we liked it, just put the money in an envelope and slide it underneath her front door mat. What a trusting soul! I sent her a selfie pic of myself and my husband in the car so she knew we were real people, just little old honest grandma and grandpa! We drove over and snapped it up for $65.

The top cover is really clean, the photograph of the velour just kind of made it look dirty due to the nap of the fabric. I wasn't so worried about the top cover anyhow because I was going to recover it. But the inside and lower portion was very clean as well and that's what counted...

After we left her house, we drove over to Jo-Ann's Fabrics. I had a coupon in my hand and a sale was ending that very day.

I picked up some additional matching fabric that I had used to cover my dining room chairs. It's a deep rich paisley tapestry type fabric with gold and black and brown accents and an underlying burgundy. I like it because it doesn't show the dirt and wears well.

The fabric was normally $39.99 per yard! Ouch! But it was on sale for half off for $19.99 a yard. Plus I had a coupon to get an additional 20% off so I ended up paying only $15.99 a yard. Much better. Got to love those coupons at Joanns!

I only needed one yard of the fabric. As soon as we got home, Steve removed the top lid and I got to work. I used chalk to mark the corners on the inside of the fabric. I sewed some box corner seams, then I spread it out over the cushion and flipped it over. Now all I had to do was fold under the edges all of the way around and staple them into place. Of course, I ran out of staples part way through. Isn't that the par for the course? We went to 3 local stores to look for these particular staples for a Sears PowerShot staple gun. Steve said I would have to wait for another trip up to Appleton to check some big stores for them. We came came home empty handed. But then we checked an old box in the garage that was left over from an old staple gun, long ago gone, and the staples fit! So I could finish my task at hand.

Voila!!!

Steve put the lid back on the base, as well as the safety hinges. Sometimes you just got to use your head when working on things, hey?

This ottoman will give us additional seating for one or two more people when we have visitors, because after moving out the couch to the other room, we only have a rocking chair besides our two mission recliner chairs.

The other benefit of it being a storage ottoman, it will work well for our folded up snuggly blankets that we use in the winter time.

~~~~~~~~~

Now I will digress for a moment and talk about some other little foot stools that I recovered with that same fabric a while back. Steve and I had been in the Habitat for Humanity ReStore and I found these two adorable little foot stools for $10 each. One was a very ugly large cabbage rose print, and the other one was a wine-colored burgundy. 

I finally got around to recovering them.
The one on the left was the ugly one, I did that first.

These footstools are set in the old Loom Room / Fiber Den on each side of my treadle sewing machine cabinet.. Hmmmmm do you wonder what these footstools are used for?

Of course!!! 

Doggie Perches 

to look out the window 

and keep an eye out for the 

mail lady, 

burglars, 

or our neighbor Diane!

~~~~~~~~~~

Now, back up to the living room and the newest storage ottoman:

I was a little concerned that if the dogs jumped up on this ottoman by the front window, they may scratch up the beautiful original woodwork of the windowsill in the living room.

The dogs had already sadly scratched up the windowsill in the Loom Room / Fiber Den room, but that is not original woodwork and I'm going to replace it someday with something else, so I didn't mind as much. I'm even considering lining the edge of that window sill in there with assorted painted Mexican tiles to protect its surface. That will be a future project?

But for now, I was thinking of protecting the front window sill.

I had an idea.

I took out some Modge Podge. When is the last time you ever used Modge Podge? They still sell it in the craft department. I coated some beautiful rocks we had taken from the beach when we were up in Canada last fall.  This is fun!  When they dried, they were clear and shiney and oh so pretty.

I placed them in these lovely delft blue ceramic planters that I had found at a thrift store. I used a hot glue gun to add a layer of felt to the bottom of each planter so it would not scratch. Whatever did we do before glue guns?

I put all three of them in a row across the windowsill, is a perfect deterrent from keeping the dogs from jumping up with their paws on the beautiful woodwork!

So far, so good. They have not even attempted to jump up there, nor look out the front window.  I think it will work.  The rocks are heavy enough to not get knocked down.

That is PART TWO of the changes we made in the house, all because of a Facebook Marketplace ad. I still have PART THREE coming in another blog.  Stay tuned!

It All Started With a Facebook Marketplace Post - PART ONE

A couple years ago I wrote a blog post entitled "It All Started With a Craigslist Post"  The blog post detailed all of the steps of what we undertook after Steve found a beautiful wool oriental rug on Craigslist. We ended up ripping up all of the wall to wall carpeting and restoring the original hardwood floors. Here is that blog post:

It All Started With a Craigslist Post

Fast forward to now...

This time:  It All Started With a Facebook Marketplace Post!

It seems that someone was selling a mission style leather recliner chair that matched the one we had bought six years ago for Steve. It's a very comfortable chair, so much so, that I never get to sit in it.   Steve hogs it and all I get is the couch.

Since then, the store we bought it from discontinued them. I kind of always regretted never buying two of them at that time. Although we really didn't have room for 2 in our small livingroom.

But there was that Marketplace ad on Facebook.  The guy was selling it for only $200 and it was in "like new" condition. Steve's chair was priced at $850 new when we bought his in 2012. So this was a good deal for $200.  And how often would we ever find a matching chair again?

I thought about it a little bit and we called the guy.  It was 8 pm at night. He said sure come on over. The only problem is "over" was 127 miles away!!!

We hopped in the Tracker and took off to the west. It was a fun journey, because as we drove, we were talking about all different alternatives of how to rearrange the furniture to make this chair fit. It's not just a mission style chair, it's a recliner as well. So we need some space behind it to recline. It can actually stretch out flat almost like a bed.

We got to the guy's home easily, even in the dark, using the GPS. The chair was just as he had described, the wood was absolutely beautiful and it was in perfect condition. He barely used it. Actually he had a different chair he wanted put in that spot. So once we loaded up this one into the back of the Tracker, Steve helped him carry his other chair from another location to where he wanted it put.

We headed on home, going another hundred and twenty-seven miles. And we didn't get home until almost midnight. But that's okay, Steve was off work the next day, so we planned to sleep in. Our dogs always have a different idea.  They had us up at 5:30 am.  Argghhh!  Soooooo in the early morning we decided to rearrange the living room. That's where I get this theme of  "It All Started With a Facebook Marketplace" thing.  This is only PART ONE.  There will be a PART TWO and THREE in future blog posts.
.
Putting the two chairs side by side in front of the fireplace was our best choice of space. Pulling them further into the room so there was room to recline behind them made the most sense. But now the couch was way too big and in the way...  Here are the chairs, my new one is on the left with the quilt on it. We each have our little laptops as well.

Sooo we moved the couch out of the room.  Ahhh that was better. More space!  We are now situated comfortably in our living room with the two chairs facing the fireplace which is the focal point of the room anyhow.  I put a lovely antique rocker that we had gotten from our neighbors in the corner by the fireplace. Our tv snugged into the other corner and we are all set with Steve's antique lamp between us.  Steve also wired in two sweet little tulip lamps on the mantle with wiring to hide behind the mirror and down to an outlet on the side of the fireplace. 

The room seems much wider now with the couch gone, and we can both sit in comfy reclining chairs to look out the window, watch the fireplace, or watch tv like a little theater seating group.

Binney decided her new spot would be

 between the rocker and the ottoman.

Finnegan found a good spot behind our chairs, 

by the treasure chest. 

Now, what to do about the couch?
and the endtables and lamps? 

The next step was to take the couch and put it into what is my Loom Room.  With two big rug looms in there, it was kind of crowded.  I do like weaving rugs, but do I really need two of them?  They are both identical and I had to make some choices now.

I decided that I wanted to move one of the looms upstairs--- and make a weaving room out of the smaller room that that I was using for fiber storage. It was originally the maid's room when our house was built 100 plus years ago.  Steve agreed to help me.

I not sure when this funky linoleum had been added to the little maid's room, probably in the 1950s. I love it and I think it's really cool and it will stay as the floor of my new weaving room.

We disassembled one of the big rug looms and brought it up stairs in pieces. 

We have done this many times before with various looms, so it was not too much of a task.

Then we easily reassembled it and Steve also helped me reorganize the fiber storage room, moved some shelving, and labeled some totes. Now my sweet little room is all ready for weaving.

I sorted through all of my fiber stash, and reorganized a lot of it.
It helps to condense down and combine items in the totes as well.

I hung some lace curtains up on the window. 

Steve mounted some other shelves for my tools. 

I am all set! 

Besides the big rug loom, I also have two table looms. One fits well on the top of a shelving unit and the other one is residing in my quilting/sewing room for the time being.  I can take the table looms out at any time and put them on a rolling bench that is kept out on the front porch. I often take them along camping in the motorhome or along to workshops and demonstrations.   Three looms is enough now, I think.

Back down to the loom room.... after moving out the one loom ---- I could put the other large rug loom into the center of the room. Now we could use the couch in there as a kind of a "Fiber Den" when I do my other fiber crafts, like cranking on my sock machine, or spinning yarn on my spinning wheels, I can sit on this couch in my Fiber Den! It will be great for naps as well.  I put the endtables on each side and added the stained glass lamps to balance it out.

The remaining loom is in the middle of the room, taking up a large amount of space. The cool old hutch, which is original to the home. It had been in the diningroom, but we moved it to this room when we bought the house.  My dining set has a matching hutch and buffet, so this hutch became extra fiber tool storage and does double duty as entertainment center as well with a tv.

I don't think keeping the large rug loom in the middle of the room would work for long.  I decided that three looms is enough. I posted an ad to sell it on the Facebook Marketplace. Within 15 minutes a gal from the next town over laid claim to it. She came to check it out on Sunday and will be back this upcoming Saturday morning to pick it up.

In the meantime I am weaving off a few more of my big heavy Birch Tree looper rugs using up some of the neutral warp that is on the loom. Don't worry, there will still be plenty of warp left on there for the new buyer to practice with and make more rugs of her own.

That's enough for tonight,

for PART ONE 

of 

It All Started With a Facebook Marketplace Post

Steve is all comfy in his chair----

I am going to join him in mine!