LaurenandLloyd.com

where our wasted time becomes your wasted time

house

Sam and Rachel

by 3 Comments

I don’t know if we’ve said this on the website already, but my cousin Sam and his family (Rachel, Anna & Gracen) are coming to Seward. Sam accepted a call to be the 6th grade home room and social studies teacher at St. John. They were up this week to look for a house.

I don’t know that we actually found a house for them, but there are definitely some possibilities. I went with them on most of the house hunting, because I was (a)voiding driving in to Lincoln to work on school stuff and (b)eginning to get some pain free motion back into my neck after the ocean slammed me into the beach in Maui.

It was interesting to look at houses with Sam and Rachel, because they were interested in having a nice sized yard for kids and dogs and I was thinking, “This yard is too big, look at all that mowing.” I don’t think they found their dream house, but they saw a few houses that would work for them.

The housing market in Seward is pretty good right now, so houses that are “desirable” (whatever that means) don’t stay on the market for very long. Sam and the realtor they chose seemed to hit it off, and by the end of the second day of looking they were sharing notes on what they thought various properties were really worth. It was surprising to me that they were pretty much in agreement after 2 days.

Claude (our realtor when we bought our house, may he rest in peace) were pretty much on the same wavelength too, but we had been looking for a house for a year and a half by that time. Claude showed us pretty much every house that was for sale in Seward over a 3 week period, figured out what we were looking for and then left us alone until there was a house that he thought we would be interested in. He was the perfect realtor for us.

After about 6 months I Claude and I were on the same wavelength too as far as what houses in Seward are generally going to sell for. Sam must be more of a real estate mogul than I am.

Vote!

by 13 Comments

It’s after 9 p.m., it’s been a long day for both of us, and I’m waiting for a load of laundry to finish.  Not having any good material to post, I leave you with this picture of the top of the stairs.  Vote for the weirdest thing in this picture.

If you picked the trees, you’re right. Towels are second.

P.S. I typed this all one-handed because I’m holding a bunch of hangers and am too lazy to just put them down. I can tpye surprisingly well. Rats.

Taming the wind

by 7 Comments

It was a very strange day, what with not talking and all.  Samith came over to borrow our truck, and I think I said five sentences.  Strange.

Anyway, it was a fairly productive day.  I worked on my accreditation stuff for school, did a little housework, and taped off the downstairs guestroom.  You heard me right – tape.

Ignore that strip of whatever that’s hanging down.

This house is seventy-five years old, and the windows (at least the ones that aren’t painted shut) are drafty.  This one faces north, and today was windy, so you could really feel the wind blowing. Last year I used that rope caulk, but I didn’t like it very much.  Tape seemed easier.  I taped the edges of the storm window, then the edges of the actual window.  It was funny, because when I got to the end, I had a little wind tunnel at the lock.

It’s really windy right there.

I taped that off, stuffed some cloth around it, then hung towels over the windows in there, shut the door, then stuffed a towel under the door.  (Lloyd says, nothing says White Trash like towels stuffed everywhere.)  Yessir, there’s a lot of dead air between me and the outside.

Laboring

by 10 Comments

In honor of Labor Day weekend, and since I have no good photo from today, and since this is probably a weekend where no one will check the internet anyway, I’m just going to make a list of stuff we have to do, and we’ll see how updated it gets. Maybe I’ll include photos of completed projects.

1.jpg
3.jpg
4.jpg
5.jpg
* Take that load of sticks to the dump.
* Take recycling in.
* Do some laundry
* Make a stab at cleaning the basement.
* Make a weaker stab at digging out the guest room.
* Work on getting documentation into accreditation folders, which will take forever.
* Shop for a dishwasher.
* If dishwasher purchased, think about installing it. Then laugh.
* Lloyd’s making lesson plans, but not me.
* Lloyd’s doing grading, but not me.
* Lloyd’s washing the car, but not me.

Bathroom Closet I

by 7 Comments

It’s 8:00 and I’m so tired I’m going to bed.  I’ve decided that when I’m stuck for a post I’m going to show you the inside of a closet or drawer without cleaning it. Speculate as you will!  This is the top of the downstairs bathroom closet.  (The bottom will be shown at a later stuck date.)  Is this the beginning of the end?  Will LloydandLauren.com die because I’ll be too tired or lazy to continue?  “Tune in next time”….. if there is a next time……

Not very bathroom-y, eh?

Done.

by 8 Comments

Hooray!!  I have successfully rid our house of all the evil wallpaper.   I believe the attack on the entryway ivy began back in May – again, in painfully small steps – but now it’s done.  I was telling Lloyd on the phone that I’d like to do some work on the downstairs bathroom while he was gone – maybe rip out some flooring, put in a steam shower or something – and he said (with a heavy sigh), “Why don’t you just finish the entry?”  That’s crazy talk, mister.  Who finishes a project before starting another?

I’m sure there’s some heart-tugging ballad about ivy, but I don’t know it.

It involved applying primer this time.  The old owners didn’t prime the walls before they put on the paper, so I did a little damage removing it.  We call that ‘character’ when you live in an old house.  Just ask Beth.

Looks pretty good. Could’a left it like that.

It’s not the best picture of the finished product because it’s not daytime.

What?!?

Now, on to that steam shower…..

In other news, Lloyd is home with his family, and they’re up to their dam tricks again.  (Really – they were building a dam.  Here’s proof.)
Is it the rapture?