photo time

taking a quick break to post a few photos. no "real" house-type work was done this weekend. decided it was time for a nice break and enjoyed the weekend. friday night we had our first house guests over to watch a movie on the new lcd and had some tasty pad thai. saturday was kicked off with breakfast at pamelas, doing a little shopping in squirrel hill, then off to the south side. sat near the fountain in south side works for an italian ice break. ended up having a late lunch at fatheads which consisted mostly of a few beers and a basket of fries. i was still full from breakfast, i swear! we ended up going out to ikea again to pick up a few of the remaining items we needed for the kitchen and living room. here are a few photos of the progress.

new shelves installed in kitchen:


a few views of the living room:







finally received the cover for the couch and got that on this weekend. this week we need to pickup the wall mount for the tv and longer cables so it will definitely look nicer than it does now. the wall color isn't coming out too well the pics... its looking very white. its actually an oatmeal-ish type color. once the tv is set up, we're going to paint the fireplace so it blends in a little more with the surroundings. next step [which may not be for awhile... installing the new floors]

i think thats it for now. back to work on my sewing projects!

3 day weekend

its amazing what you can get done when you have an extra day in your weekend. this weekend was incredibly busy [as usual], but also very productive. not only did we get a LOT accomplished on the house, we managed to fit in a viewing of war of the worlds [pretty good], another great dinner at mad mex [i am loving their pomegranate margaritas], partied it up at gary + anns on saturday afternoon then at jeff + sam's that night. got some shopping at ikea in; still need to hang the shelves and kitchen accessories purchased there. ended up trying out the newly improved houlihans in the galleria as well. i must say, i was impressed. it had the ambiance of eleven, but at 1/2 the price. one of the great items on the menu were the 'mini' selections... you could get a margarita flight of 3 mini martinis for $6; mini desserts for 1.99 each, and mini espresso martinis for 1.99! you can't beat that.

anyways... here are 2 photos of the progress on the kitchen:





as you can see... still need to install the toe kicks, outlet covers and the door handles. still working on ideas for the floor... debating the slate tiles. once thats done, we'll need to clean it all up and starting putting everything away. as you can see, i've already started sorting thru spices. the one remaining "issue" in the kitchen is the fridge. next week kenmore is delivering new doors [including in the warranty!], so that the handles can be reversed and open the right way. its way too frustrating right now... hopefully it will be worked out soon.

photos will be posted in a few days of the new and improved dining room. walls have been painted, flat-screen is hooked up, new slipcover arrived yesterday... its gonna be nice. stay tuned...