Writer’s Workshop – My childhood neighborhood

First just let me say that I had every intention of lightening up around here, but Mama Kat sucked me in with this one.  Sorry Jen – but I have a plan for next week!

The neighborhood I grew up in.  A tiny little village of about 200, not even big enough to warrant a dot on a map.  My house was perched on the edge of a cliff, the front looking down on the river below.

Dated clothing distracting you from river view behind us

The backyard was home to the peach tree I grew myself, planted from a peach pit, which eventually bore so much fruit my dad had to brace the limbs with 2x4s so they wouldn’t break off.

Old school slip-n-slide with small glimpse of young peach tree

There was just enough room to run around the side of the house, which is where my sisters and I tried every summer to catch a bunny in a box.  If you didn’t run carefully, you might fall off into the jagger bushes like our neighbor Tony did.  I’ll never forget the sight of his bloody face, and his assurance that it was fine because his mom wouldn’t notice.

We lived at the end of a dead end street which was perfect for bike riding.  I learned on a glorious 70s banana seat bike, which I’m pretty sure was also decked out with bicentennial streamers.

Rockin' 70s bike

Just down the road lived the Walkos, my dearest friends and second family.  They had 5 children and their house was always a blissful, happy mess.  They reminded me of The Family Circus, and more than anything I wanted to grow up and be just like Chris Walko, the most laid-back mom I have ever known.  My dad was convinced that if she were absolutely furious she’d say something like ‘Oh dear!’.  Her policy was that if it didn’t cause death or dismemberment it was fine with her, so you can see why this would be a most appealing place for a child to spend her time.

I lived at the Walko’s, in the summer especially.  We spent hours climbing trees, swinging on ropes, playing baseball on the hill, traipsing through the woods in search of broken glass… They were my friends, my brothers, my loves.  It was great playing with them, but really I wanted to be one of them.  My sisters were much older and I was lonely – at the Walko’s house I was never lonely.  We played Commodore 64 and melted crayons in the oven and ate break-apart twin pops till our hearts content.  I have not a single memory of my hometown that isn’t entwined with their family, who seemed like an extension of my own.

Me with two of my 'adopted' brothers

Pumpkin Run Park was down the side of the cliff, a long walk in the woods away.  This was where we snuck off to fish or swim or play in the old jail, and scare each other with stories about Stovepipe, all the while pretending to laugh it off.  We were young and brave and fearless and stupid, and it was beautiful.

Entrance to Pumpkin Run

We went to the lockwall and jumped foolishly off of the highest swing set I’ve ever seen, and it was glorious.

It was an idyllic, picture-perfect childhood.

Fabulous metal swing set perched on cliff's edge

And then I got older.

Suddenly the small town that had kept me safe and sheltered seemed smothering.  You couldn’t do anything without everyone knowing your business, and this is not something that a teenager particularly enjoys.

At the same time I felt very isolated.  We had nothing to do.  No fast food, no real [respectable] hangouts.  The mall or the movies were 45 minutes away.  There was no culture.  No diversity.  Differences weren’t valued in a town full of old white people.

I started counting the days until I could escape.

I began writing, and even worked for a newspaper in that big town 45 minutes away.  I rocked out to loud, angst-y music that no one else I knew listened to, and I cried at night, wondering why I was stuck in a place where no one understood me.  The neighborhood that was once so perfect and full of possibility in my eyes became a place I scorned.

And finally, finally, we left.  We moved 3 states away and I found what I had been missing.  I found diversity.  Acceptance.  People like me.

I could wear black and combat boots and dye my hair crazy colors…and still be a part of the FCA and morning prayer around the flag pole.  I could listen to the Violent Femmes and Stephen Curtis Chapman, and I could find myself – whoever that was – without being pigeonholed into a clique.  I was part of it all – the good kids, the bad kids, the outcasts, the in crowd.  I was just me, for the first time in my life.

Me and my future college roomie

And then I cried at night, overwhelmed with gratitude that I had made it out.

————————————————————————————————————————————————————

All these years later, my view of the neighborhood I grew up in is conflicted.  I still feel my heart swell when I think of the Walkos.  I remember people like Mr. Hartley, who did everything in sweet, slow motion.  I think of things like my high school bedroom ode to the Chicago Bulls, and I miss long winter days spent sled-riding on the steep hill of the firehall.

Steelers fan from birth

This is the place that brought me my first love and my first broken heart.

The house that built me.

And I can’t help but feel a twinge of sad nostalgia for it all.

A simpler time, a simpler place.  The kind of childhood I took for granted.  The kind of childhood my children will never know.

When I think about it in those terms, I’m ready to move back.

[And with a quick Google search showing me that I can buy a 3 bedroom house on 2 lots with a guest house for under $100k, that sounds even more tempting]

My childhood neighborhood now feels to me like so many other things in an adult life.

Complicated.

Depressing.

Bittersweet.

And beautiful – I can’t forget beautiful.

Monongehala River as seen from Rices Landing, PA river walk

I wouldn’t change a thing – except maybe the move.

The neighborhood gang

Maybe it was a good place to grow up, after all.

More Writer’s Workshop works can be found here.

What I learned this week – Flooding. Not cool.

This week, I learned a lot about my backyard.  For example, there is an 8 inch fall in elevation from my walkout basement door to the back of our fence.  And there is, on an average day, about 2 feet of bank above the creek that flows behind that fence.

This weekend, though, all of that ‘bank to spare’ sort of, well, vanished.  Flooded away.

I woke Sunday morning to heavy downpour and water just starting to overtake the main ground.  Not a pretty sight.

This was the last picture I took – after that it was all ‘hauling stuff in the rain’.  Our basement is a walkout, so there was some concern about exactly how much more water it would take before it came into our home – hence all the measuring.

Sandbags seemed to be the answer – well, actually bags of topsoil, since they are considerably cheaper, and we could actually use them for something else later.  A trip to Lowe’s, $16, and a few hours of hauling and stacking later, and all was well.  And very, very wet.

And it’s possible that some idiot did all of this without considering the white shirt she was wearing.

We’re under a flood watch until Friday and expecting more rain later this week, but I feel confident that we will be fine.  My friends in Nashville aren’t faring quite as well.  If you can, please take a moment to pray for Jenn and her daughter.  Their home is under water and they have left to stay with friends who live on higher ground, but unfortunately their neighborhood is so badly flooded that they can’t get out to go anywhere else.  Jenn’s daughter has Down’s Syndrome and she is very confused and upset by what is going on, so she needs all the love you can send her way.

On the upside, the girls and I had lots of fun singing the ‘Arky, Arky’ song.  [Does it have a real name?] 

Stay dry my friends!

What I’ve Learned This Week

This is what we call beating a dead horse.

Remember the meanie that Annie was dealing with?

I talked to her father yesterday.  It is worth noting that her father is also the coach of this team.

Call me crazy, but I think the coach should be setting a higher standard for behavior, starting with himself and his child.  But this is not the case.

Phone call.

Me: Annie and [your daughter] are not getting along. I know that Annie is sensitive, but she’s been crying before every practice and game for the past 2 weeks.  I’ve tried to help her find ways to avoid or change the situation, but it is not working out.  [Your daughter] is calling her names and telling her to shut up.  I cannot keep sending her back to an environment like that, so unless something changes, we will no longer be playing.

Him: I’m really sorry to hear that she doesn’t like [this sport] anymore.  I hate that.

Me:  It is not [the sport].  She still loves [the sport].

Him: I hate that.  I really want every kid to love the game, and I hope that she will get over that and change her mind someday.

Me: Again, this is not about the game.  She loves the game, but she does not like to be bullied.

Him: I was afraid this would happen. 

{here is where I foolishly thought he was starting to see my point}

Him: About 3 weeks ago she was crying in practice.  The problem is that she is younger and smaller than the other girls, and she can’t keep up.

Me: She is the same age as [two teammates] and she is older than [two other girls].  She has always been small, and she has always excelled at [this sport].  Her age and her size are not the problem here. 

Him: Well I do hate to hear that.  I want every kid to love [the sport].  If there is anything I can do in the future…

Me: I keep telling you, she loves the game.  She does not love being called names.  This is not a game issue, this is a personality issue.  She is getting nowhere trying to be nice to [your daughter] and now I am getting no where trying to be civil to you.  We will try again with a different coach in the fall.

-click-

Is it just me, or was he really, really obtuse there?  Like, if burying your head in the sand were an Olympic Sport, he would be Apolo Ohno.   Or if ignoring a parent’s complaint was an amusement park, he would be Disney World.  Or if blaming other people for your child’s mistakes was an evil movie franchise, he would be Twilight. 

What the heck, dude?

I hung up the phone so angry I was shaking…and then I cried.  I always cry when I’m angry, and I hate that.  It seems so weak.  Because actually, I wasn’t feeling weak at all.  I was feeling like “Hey buddy, I know where you are going to be in 20 minutes, and I just might show up and whap you over the head with a frying pan.  Don’t mess with my kid.”

For the record, I did not do this.

I did, however, talk to 2 other parents with daughters on that team, and both are having the same issue.  In fact, one of the mothers ran a practice last week when he wasn’t there, and she said the girl was mean to everyone, her included. 

My beef isn’t that our kids don’t get along.  Believe me, as much as I hate it, I know that will happen.  And I know Annie will have to toughen up.  But at the same time, when you are in a position of authority over young children - i.e. coaching a team of 7/8 year old girls - I think you need to take responsibility for their behavior, and not allow name calling or bullying behavior.  Especially when it is your own child. 

I’m thinking of filing a complaint with the board.  Is that out of line?

So in summary, this week I learned that I don’t want my girls to be on a winning team.  Sometimes, a losing team is a good thing.  A team that knows that winning isn’t everything, and that having fun and being kind are more important than any scoreboard.  I want my girls to keep proper perspective about what matters in life.

Here’s a hint, coach man – it isn’t that undefeated record.

We’ve played with ‘the best’ – now we’re ready for the rest.

To see what others have learned, hop over to my friend Julie’s place!

What I learned this week – Facebook edition

I joined Facebook over a year ago, and I did so very reluctantly.  Even after signing up, I didn’t use the account for months.  I just didn’t see the point.

I readily admit now that I was wrong, and I’m very glad that I did finally start using it.  It’s been fun.  I’ve moved a lot, so I was able to reconnect with old friends, talk to people who live all over the world, and do a little networking as well.  (Gosh I hate that word. Blech.)

I’ve also learned a lot from Facebook.

~For example, it seems to be a popular place for one to out oneself.  You know - out.  Like, exiting the closet.  At least among 414 of my closest friends and acquaintances, this isn’t an uncommon practice.

~I’ve learned of countless marriages, divorces, and births through Facebook.  Because of this, I strongly feel maiden names should be a requirement.  I have no idea who married whom and I’m easily confused by profile pictures of cats.  Give me your maiden name or a picture of your actual person, please.  My brain is tired.

~I’ve seen hundreds of pictures of my friends, from way back when we had big hair up ’til now, when we’re generally sporting mom ponytails.

Tell me who rocked the Aqua Net. Yeah baby. I know it.

~I’ve been able to share pictures and trade instant letters with one of my oldest and dearest friends, despite the fact that she lives almost 5,000 miles away in Finland. (Love you Nella!)

~I’ve seen photos from the past that, despite their unflattering nature, make me smile with nostalgia every time.

[That's me in the middle, between Big Hair and Scarlett O'Hara. The pasty white Irish girl, smack in the middle of my black-with-combat-boots phase. Awesome.]

~The jerk I dated in high school/college?  Looks exactly the same.  And what I learned from him (besides the fact that I should always trust my parents’ opinion of the guys I date, because despite my reluctance to admit it, they actually do know better than me)…where was I?  Oh yeah.  What I learned from him on Facebook is that there is a block feature, whereby you can completely hide yourself from certain people.  How totally awesome is that?  Thanks, Mr. Wrong-Wrong-Oh-So-Unspeakably-Wrong for making me find that handy feature, which further helps me to pretend those years never even happened.  You need to not exist in my world anymore.

I’m tempted to include a picture here, but I won’t. I don’t want to have to look at him again.

~On the other end of the spectrum, that boy I pined over in junior high and for several years after that?  Even more dreamy now.  Some of you us age better than others.

Even more tempted to include a picture here.  But again, showing restraint.

I’m so mature.

~I’ve learned that I know way too many people with way too much time on their hands. Hello Farmville friends! Yes, I’m talking to you. I just don’t get it.  And that goes for you Mafia Wars and Pet Land and Cafe World folks, too. 

~I also learned that you can block those annoying games and applications. Score again! Thanks for all of the block features, Facebook. Much obliged.

~Last year, I learned that I was once someone’s ‘bad girl.’  The girl he shouldn’t have dated but did.  The one you wouldn’t take home to mother, unless you want to tick mother off.  This was rather amusing to me, since rebellious me never did anything more shocking than wear the aforementioned combat boots and experiment with wild colors of temporary hair color.  And that was before he even knew me!  As it turned out, the reason I was so wild was my ethnicity.  Specifically, my lack of being Korean.  ‘Cause Korean I am not, I’ll give you that.

He and I dated briefly in our 20′s.  We were each other’s rebound person – he came after The One Who No Longer Exists for me, and I came after The One That Got Away for him.  We discussed this openly at the time, and we had a few laughs while making the best of a lousy few months.  After that, I started dating my now-husband, and he got another job so we no longer worked together.  I didn’t really see him much after that, and we just lost touch.  Until Facebook, of course. 

Last year we had a great laugh over the notion of me being a wild child.  But honestly, I have to admit, it somehow delighted me a little, too.  To get to be ‘bad’ without actually having anything bad to show for it – that works for me.  I do ‘bad’ like a monkey…well, nevermind.

~And this week, also thanks to Facebook, I learned that possibly the only person to ever think of me as a bad girl died.  Killed himself.  He was 37 years old.  He never married – never got over The One. 

She did marry, has 2 little girls, and had no idea that he still carried a torch for her.  Apparently no one did.

I’m haunted by a song he used to love.  I remember him playing it over and over.  I guess it meant more than I realized – he was still playing it a decade+ later.

I’m so sorry, my friend.  I wish I had known.  I wish I’d done something differently.  I wish I had been there for you, loving you, praying for you, carrying your burden.  I’m so, so sorry. 

And in a case like this, I don’t know what else I can say.  Rest in peace doesn’t exactly seem appropriate.  He couldn’t find peace while living, and somehow I don’t believe he has found it now.  My heart is heavy.

Goodbye Hyo.

What I Learned This Week

Yey for bullet lists!

• I learned that you should not count on a transmission.  Or rather, a second transmission.  A second transmission that you have because the first transmission was not to be relied on, either. 
• You should also never utter the words “It’s worth spending more than we want because it’s a Honda!  It will run forever!”  Guess what?  It won’t.  Quite possibly it will have a transmission failure.  Or two.
• Also quite possibly, American Honda will refuse to pay for the second transmission.  Because they suck.  Sorry, but it’s true.  If by some miracle they read this and reverse their position and recognize that since they issued a huge recall and paid for replacement transmissions, they should step up when those replacement transmissions fail as well (and fail within the original warranty period, too, I might add) then I will issue a retraction and an apology, and I will sing their praises from the rooftop.  But until then, you suck, American Honda. 
• I learned that I feel kinship with people who love a good run-on sentence as much as I do.
• I learned that if you’re in the market for a new minivan right now, you’re facing quite a dilemma.  I mean, Honda and Toyota were always ranked tops.  Yet now we’re dealing with multiple transmission failures and American Honda not taking responsibility for them (yup, I’m bitter) OR Toyota possibly accelerating the heck out of my crazy brood against our will.  Neither sound so appealing.  So whaddaya buy?
• I learned that sending your children to a different school – one where bus service is not an option – is extremely inconvenient when your car is in the shop.
• Moving on…I learned that children who wake in the middle of the night are hysterical.  They say such random things, I wish I had a recorder running at all times so that I never missed a moment.
• I learned that I can only take a very small amount of chewing with one’s mouth open before I’m forced to fight the urge to succumb to physical violence.  Close. Your. Mouth.
• I learned that despite Webkinz being quite possibly the dumbest most pointless toy imaginable, they are extremely interesting to 7-year-olds.  Particularly right after you’ve gotten rid of their Webkinz because they never ever played with it and because it’s dumb. 
• And, I learned that I suffer from Delayed Sleep Phase Syndrome.  And here I thought it was just insomnia.  Of course the bad news is that since I still have to get up with the kids every morning, more than 3-4 hours of sleep a night won’t ever be possible for me.  But yey! for the diagnosis, huh?

If you’d like to read more, or share what YOU learned this week, hop on over to Musings of a Housewife!

Writer’s Workshop – What I hate about you

I’m going with Prompt #1.

10 Reasons why you’re better off without him….or her….or it.

1. You don’t love me the way that I love you.
2. You’re empty inside.
3. The good moments we spend together are fleeting at best.
4. You look good on the outside, but looks are deceiving.
5. You take more than you give.
6. You’re never around. You think once a year you can sweep me off my feet, but I require more than that.
7. I can’t afford you!  Good grief, you burn through my money in the blink of an eye.
8. After we’re together, I feel bad about myself.
9. You don’t care about making me feel bad, either. You just sit there and mock me, relentlessly.
10. You’re not loyal.  You cozy up with women all over the place and I’m supposed to just take it.

Wow.  I was planning on writing about someone something else entirely, but when I got going something else entirely just poured out.  I’m guessing some of you can relate.

photo credit: this is a thing

Die, Girl Scout Cookies. 

I need you dead and gone.

I literally ate 3 thin mints while on the treadmill today. 

My judgement has been compromised.

And I am ‘supposedly’ training for a half-marathon and participating in not one, but two fitness challenges as well.

Not. Looking. Good.

But my frozen Samoas only come around once a year, so how can I say no to that?

Clearly, I cannot.

And this, my friends, is the tale of why I will never again wear a 2-piece bathing suit.  Because I have the willpower of a…dang.  What’s the rest of that sentence?  A person with no willpower?

I’ll have to have a cookie while I think about that for a minute.

Don’t be obnoxious

This week is a blogging theme, and we’re supposed to share our best blogging tips.  As I write this there are 163 people already linked up, and though I haven’t read them all, I’m guessing many contain the same tips.  Very good tips, mind you.  I, too, feel that you should use WordPress, be a good commenter, and focus on keywords if you want to build a bloggy empire.  But I’m thinking you don’t need to hear that dittoed a 164th time. 

So instead I’m going to share with you a very un-PC tip.

Don’t be obnoxious.

Sounds simple, right?  It’s not.  Most obnoxious people are so self-involved they haven’t even noticed they are being obnoxious.  Don’t be one of them.

Yes, it’s your blog, but please don’t make it all about you.

It’s not that we don’t like hearing your family stories – we all like to share them from time to time.  It’s just that when the content is all deeply personal, we can’t always relate.  If you want your blog to be successful, you need to have a conversation with your readers, not just a platform to shout from.  Work hard to balance what you are passionate about with what matters to your readers.  You may be the president of your child’s PTO, but if you always write about Jefferson Elementary then you’ll lose me.  Write about the challenges of fostering parent involvement in schools, and readers worldwide will be able to relate.

This is a common problem I’ve observed among ‘big’ bloggers.  It’s all about them.  They are so busy writing to amuse themselves, they forget about their followers.  Sometimes it seems as if they’ve completely lost touch with reality, and view themselves as a celeb whose lunch selection, playground activities, and personal philosophy on skin care are absolutely intriguing to the world at large.

I actually follow several well-known bloggers that fall into this category and they bug the heck out of me.

[Um, then why are you following them?]

Glad you asked.  I check in with them from time to time to remind myself what I do not want to be.  I follow them on Twitter so I have a concrete example in front of me, reminding me of my goals.

Don’t tweet only to make myself look good.

Don’t tweet like a stand-up comedian trying out a new routine.

Don’t tweet every mundane detail of my mommy life like it’s fascinating.  It isn’t.

It does not foster a connection with your readers.  It doesn’t make you seem cool or smart or funny.  It just makes you seems self-absorbed and, well, obnoxious.

Don’t do it.

*If you’d like to read more Blogging tips that are possibly less bossy than mine, hop over to We Are THAT Family.

Wordful Wednesday – Lilly Wussell

My little Lilly Pie turned 3 a couple of weeks ago, and I didn’t blog about it yet.  Shame on me, I know.

Anyway, Catie is in preschool 3 hours a day now so I have had more time to spend with Lilly all alone, and it’s been amazing watching her grow and develop into such a unique little person.  She’s so spunky and funny and smart, and just a delightful little girl.  And she entertains herself exceedingly well, which is a quality any mother will tell you is a blessing beyond measure.

Her given name is Lillian Russell (after my great-grandmother, my great-grandfather, and my father – not the actress) but she prefers to talk about Lilly Wussell and Pappap Wussell.  They are very good buddies.

Last spring when we went to Disney she got sick.  Very sick.  Barfed in line at Toy Story Mania – barfed pretty much everywhere actually.  Among other things.  She was so sick, in fact, that she was hospitalized the day we returned home.  Poor dolly. 

But when she first got sick, I packed her up and left the park to take her back to the resort to rest.  She had other ideas though; as soon as we got back to the Polynesian she felt strongly that we needed to eat.  I guess having an empty stomach and all…  So my girlie and I hit the Kona Cafe, and had a lovely little lunch together.  Which as you might guess, didn’t stay down for long.  But it was good while it lasted.

And in that brief interlude, between episodes of vomiting, she turned on the charm as she always does.  I sat laughing and in awe of her, wondering where the sick little girl I’d seen an hour ago had vanished to, and hoping that she’d stay well.  And I couldn’t resist snapping this picture, which in retrospect is not only a cute memory, but the the very essence of Lilly.

Adorable - check.  Ornery grin - check.  Food nearby - check.  Mommy’s heart in her hand - check.

Love you, Silly Lilly.  Thanks for completing me.

*This post is part of the Wordful Wednesday carnival.  If you have a moment, swing by and check out more pictures with a story over at Seven Clown Circus.

Makeover Monday: the kids bathroom

We left off upstairs, with the only room left (that got a makeover, at least) being the kids’ bathroom.  Of course this would be more interesting had I remembered to take before pictures, but I’m just not that kind of girl.  What I do have is a picture of the junk I took out of the room, all piled up and ready to go to Craigslist.  That’s almost as good right?

So yeah, it was a fish theme.  The builder had painted the room sage green.  A lovely color, but oddly formal in a kids bathroom and it didn’t at all match the fish stuff.  And the fish stuff was really on my nerves.  I bought it all years ago and saved it in a Rubbermaid tub forever, because I just knew that I would decorate my children’s bathroom in fish one day.  I know you’re not surprised that when they came along, I was already over the fish.  But of course I couldn’t admit that, so I had to use them for a little while first.  You know, just to be polite and all.

So I knew I wanted their bathroom to be something else, I just didn’t know what that else was exactly.  And how it came to be is rather odd, really.

In doing all of these makeovers I cleaned out a lot of junk, and I just can’t bear to throw anything away.  I know someone could use this stuff, right?!?!  Enter Freecycle, a truly beautiful concept.  I listed tons of the kids clothes, toys, baby gear, furniture, and even our old treadmill, and then people came to my house and took it away!  I know, I know, we could get a tax deduction for donating it to charity, and often I do just that, but sometimes (and especially with the big stuff) it’s nice to just have someone come and take it all away so I don’t have to deal.  That is not without value of its own, my friends.  So one day as I listed Lilly’s baby gear someone else posted that they had tried 3 times to get the perfect shade of aqua/teal/turquoise paint and the shade was never quite right, so they were giving away the ‘imperfect’ gallons.  ‘What the heck?’ I figured – I didn’t have a vision in mind anyway, so I picked up a gallon of surprise! paint and a vision started to take shape.

The end result?

(Waiting for the return of beautiful black-and-white pictures of the girls to go in the frames.)

I think it’s sort of girly-chic.  I like that it’s feminine in a more sophisticated way, and I feel that it will last them for years since it doesn’t have a ‘little girl’ look.  I couldn’t be more pleased with the way this room turned out.  I think it’s actually my favorite makeover so far!  Which is a good thing, since it was also one of the most expensive.  I bought all new towels, carpets, etc. I bought all of the fabric to embellish said towels, and I made the shower curtain and the valance myself.  I painted it all and replaced the light fixtures myself, and I spent hours on the embroidery and embellishments.  I love the way it came together, but it really does not reflect the amount of time spent on it.  I’d sort of like to hang little tags on everything so it’s fully appreciated.  ’30 minute handtowel’ or ’4 and a 1/2 hour shower curtain’  But I digress.

So there you have it, the grand tour of my kids’ living space.  I’m not making any promises about what you’ll see next week, because I’m really not sure just yet.  It will be a surprise for all of us.

Play along?

Makeover Monday – Lilly’s room

Finally, the saga continues.  We’re still upstairs in solid kid territory and Lilly’s room was next to get a facelift.  It was painted a nice golden camel color which I really like in our living room, but not so much in the kids rooms – it looked so dull and dreary.  You might recall that I had already done one lovely lime green room, and as luck would have it there was a whole gallon of paint left over (huge shout-out to Wal-Mart for their one-coat coverage paint which actually does cover in one coat!)  So guess what color Lilly got?

I timed her new paint job to coincide with the switchover from nursery to big girl-room, so it was very easy to pull out the crib, changing table, etc and paint in an empty room.  Definitely made the project go faster (which is awesome since I do these things all by myself) and felt like a more dramatic change.  I also replaced the basic light fixture in her room with a ceiling fan.  I know they aren’t the most attractive things in the world, but they are functional, and I’m a practical kinda gal.

If you knew me 20-odd years ago, then you have probably seen this daybed before!  It used to be back satin (wow – what a look) and fit in perfectly with my Chicago Bulls themed room.  When I moved out my mom recovered the bed with this tone-on-tone stripe.  Looks pretty good for its age, doesn’t it?  I like it because it sits nice and high so there’s plenty of storage underneath.  Though we’ve actually kept it empty because it’s a pretty cool place to play, too.

The bounce and spin zebra has been re-homed now as well.  See that huge Mickey over there?  He’s sitting in a high chair that belonged to my great-grandfather when he was a baby.  How cool is that?  I only regret not taking a picture of each of the girls in it when they were still small enough to fit.  I’m terrible about remembering things like that.

I really hate these ugly stuffed animal nets.  My kids don’t even like stuffed animals and never, ever play with them.  Unfortunately though, people keep on giving them to us, and I feel rude immediately chucking them.  I think there must be a polite waiting period before you get rid of a gift, right?

And this is the room entrance/closet door.  As you can tell from the pictures, it’s still not done.  The problem is that I can’t figure out what to hang on those bare walls!  I can’t find anything that matches the bedding nicely, so I’d love to hear your suggestions!  My sister offered to paint a mural while she was here this summer but I felt bad having her do that on her vacation.  I now wish I hadn’t been so polite.

That’s it for this edition of Makeover Monday.  Stop by next week for the girly chic makeover I did on the kids’ bathroom.  I think it might be my favorite new room upstairs!

And of course, if you’d like to play along I’d love to see what you’ve been up to!