Christmas Eve

Wow! What a Christmas! Derrick and I had a fabulous Christmas in Hickory with my family. We just got home and, while it's good to be home, I'm already missing the relaxed and unplugged atmosphere that comes with December 24, 25, and 26.

We missed seeing Derrick's family for Christmas but we love being able to facetime them and stay in touch that way. We'll be heading to Winston in January to celebrate with them.

Christmas eve was laid back with just the immediate family and my Aunt, Uncle, and cousin. We had a delicious meal, played games (codenames anyone? If you haven't heard of it, look it up and buy it!) and christmas carols where we struggled to remember the words and sing in tune.

We facetimed with Derrick's family and they let Ellie open the barn early while we were on facetime. She LOVED it and I was soo happy! It definitely made the 5 hours of shingling worth every minute.

Bonus perk, Elli fits inside.

I have so many pictures to sort through from Christmas morning. There was a lot of secret surprises happening so more posts to come! I hope you all had the best and merriest Christmas!

Wishing you a Golden Christmas!

Our Christmas cards should have arrived by now so it's outtake day! Our card last year was one of our best yet so it was pretty hard to think of something that would top a yoda Crosby. We had two options for big events this year...the Olympics and the election. 

We decided Crosby would look better in medals then she would in a toupee so here's where we landed!

Front

Back

We think Crosby just nailed it! Look at that golden smirk.

The props for this one were a little more intensive since I built the podium and made the medals but I think it was worth it.

My neighbors never have any idea what's going on in our garage so they couldn't have thought it was so weird when this popped up after a few hours of banging and sawing.

Derrick and I perched on our sides but it needed to be able to hold all of Crosby so she reluctantly tested it for me. She always gets this look in her eye when I finish a project and call her over.

Also..I'm not sure what it is about these screws but they are awesome! No pilot hole needed and they sink so they aren't sticking up all over the place.

I LOVE how Derrick got Morrisville and the Rio logo incorporated. I just transferred it to the podium and got to painting. Alison was in town that weekend so we spoiled the surprise so she could help me paint. She's very good at that type of stuff and I was happy to have the help.

Ok..Blooper time!

I could not get her to look at me. She was mad at me and didn't want to make eye contact.

Saddest olympian ever.

This next series is my favorite....Crosby is so over it and looks so embarrassed by us.

This one almost won because I think Derrick nailed his pose but Crosby ruined this one.

Happy to ambivalent to win gold, thrilled to win silver, and mad to win bronze.

Finished Barn

Ellie's barn is done and the biggest miracle of the season is it fit in the car to get to Florida!

Here's where we left off..I didn't have the roof one yet and I was preparing it for staining. Derrick and I decided the red stain with a black roof would look more playful which is what we were going for.

I'd never worked with this tinted wood stain before but I decided to give it a whirl. I liked that the wood grain would still show through the color.

Once the barn was stained, I added the roof. It's just 1/4" plywood cut to size. You can kind of see the woodgrain in this picture. I think it made it look a little more hand-made which I like.

 A lot of the versions of the barn just left the roof as plywood sheets but a few others used shims to create shingles for the roof. I loved that look so that's the route I went. It took forever....like probably 5 hours total to shingle the roof. So keep that in mind if you attempt this.

I just attached 6-7 shims at varying distances on top of each other and glued them into place with gorilla wood glue. The glue is strong...the shingles aren't going anywhere. When the shims got to be about 4 shims high I was able to shoot a nail into them for good measure but I only did about one nail per row of shingles.

Cutting the top of the shims off for the roof line was the hardest part.

One side done!

 Second side done!

This was about the time where I'd stared at the barn for too long and was thinking it wasn't looking good. Thankfully, once all the paper came off and I was done, I was happy with it. 

I only got one picture of it done and with doors on! I can't believe it....but I think I was so happy to be finished in time for Christmas that I wasn't thinking about anything else. Here is the final picture. 

The roof got a coat of stain and the entire thing got two coats of poly. The doors are on hinges so they open and close and I even added latches so the horses can be locked up safely for the night. 

This thing was huge! Larger than 2ft x 2 ft and I was so nervous it wasn't going to fit in the back of Derrick's grandma's civic but it did! And I'm so happy because shipping it was going to cost a fortune! Derrick and I hope Ellie loves it! 

Christmas Around the House

It's definitely feeling like Christmas around our house which is a good thing since it's only 9 days away! Crazy town. We had our fireplace repaired finally...it's been broken since move-ind day...so having the fire burning has definitely made it feel cozier downstairs. My mother-in-law also does this amazing 12 Days of Christmas for the women in the family so we have a crafted gift to open every day for the 12 days leading up to Christmas. It's amazingly thoughtful and I feel so spoiled!

Derrick and I have been so busy that I almost skipped out on decorating for Christmas but now that it's done I'm glad we did it. We pretty much just decorated the open living room area but it's nice to have the house feeling festive. 

The dresser in the foyer has my estate sale ceramic tree and my goodwill record case. 

This was my Grandma's nativity set and it's pretty mis-matched. The wisemen and shepherds must have been from a different set because they dwarf the cow and donkey but I love having this set up.

I've got some Christmas trees and Christmas gnomes on the dining room table. I think they are so adorable.

We finally have stockings! I always want to order them but forget until it's too late. This year I saw a sale and jumped all over it. They are hung on the banister because the fireplace gets hot and it's too crowded with the tree anyway.

When we got our tree I was able to take some extra branches from the burn pile and they've made the TV stand and mantle feel extra festive.

I especially love them with the twinkle lights.

 

I'll post another picture of the tree when the gifts are wrapped and the lights are on. It's currently a little chaotic looking and none of the gifts are wrapped so we'd give away all of our secrets. The barn is looking good and getting the last coats of poly today.

Building a Barn for Christmas!

So my niece is into horses and that's about the best news you can give an aunt like me. As a previous barn rat myself I will do whatever I can to foster and grow this love. Ellie's only two so the chances that she'll read this and find out what her present is early is pretty slim. Plus I want some input on the finish so I'm posting this now.

I found plans to build a play stable on Ana White's site. The plans are here if you're interested. It looked super doable so I jumped on in!

This is made almost entirely of 1x2s but there are a few miter cuts. It's my first project with miter cuts and Derrick was the nicest husband ever and bought me a miter saw to make this project possible. You guys...it's the most amazing thing ever!!

Look at this perfect stack of 1x2s! They are all the same length! The miter saw made it so easy!

He got me a fancy one with a laser! It's not actually that fancy...it's super affordable so you should just get one if you've been thinking about. It basically made my day today.

I find it easiest to get all of my cuts out of the way first. My work table is 3 feet by 4 feet so it fills up quickly. The miter saw takes up a lot of space so I got all my cuts done so I could get it out of the way.

Look at those pretty mitered corners! They fit so perfectly! I made the roof trusses first to make sure everything was lined up.

Then I drilled a bajillion pocket holes.

Crosby stood guard for me while I worked. She's pretty much the best.

The frames were pretty quick and easy although I did mess up a pocket hole and had to re-cut one side piece. Learning curve...

Then I sanded...and sanded....and sanded. The last thing I want is for Ellie to get a splinter while she's trying to play with her horses so I sanded it like crazy and I'm probably going to end up sanding some more. I'm going to have Derrick do a splinter test when he gets home tonight because my hands are currently vibrating involuntarily.

The next part was impossible to photograph because it took all hands on deck and both feet, elbows, and knees to keep everything in place. I ended up having to hand screw them in because I didn't have short enough kreg screws. Adding the base made it super secure and sturdy.

And that's where I'm at so far. I need to make another hardware store run so I can put on the doors and the roof. I mis-cut the first roof panel...womp womp.  But..what do you think about the color? A lot of people who posted their finished products kept it natural but I also saw a really cut one that was painted white everywhere except for a dark roof. I'm probably going to add shim shingles to the roof. I also think using a red wood stain for the sides and a dark stain for the roof would look kind of adorable and classic. What do you think? I need input!

Decorating, building, pickle balling, frisbee

I feel like there are a million things going on right now but nothing really bloggable. Mostly because they are secret until Christmas or until our cards come out. Derrick and I ordered our Christmas cards last night so the blooper post will be coming soon.

We've had a sudden surge of pickleball interest recently so it seems we're out playing that a few times a week, I had a closing last week and three closings this week so work is keeping us busy. We're currently playing in two frisbee leagues and we have high school tryouts coming up. So yeah...it's been busy. I'll post about our Christmas happenings soon but, for now, I'm just trying to get through this busy work week.

I will leave you with this photo. The quality of this photo accurately represents the quality of our christmas tree hunt and it was hilarious. I'll fill you in next time.