The last week has been a blur of cleaning, vacuuming, moving, fixing, scrubbing, disassembling and reassembling things, plus a very hectic week at work. 

But somehow, we got everything to the new house and got the rental spic and span. Really, boyfriend did most of the work at the old house. I got stuck working late and/or super early several days and was not especially helpful in the deep cleaning department. 

The rental house was never a house I loved, but we are both overjoyed to be done with it and can now focus just on fixing up, renovating and making the new place our own. See ya rental house! 

This week also involved me deciding it had been too long since I'd been running, so I thought I'd try Insanity. Mark has the dvds and I could do it at home instead of having to drive into town for the trail. The first day included me just falling to the floor a few times while doing pushups. The second day was better, until I was getting ready for work.

I may not have mentioned this, but I'm sort of a klutz. I was looking for a pair of pants or something and moved the free weights that were on top of the bin. As I set the weights down right next to the bin, I thought to myself, 'I am so going to smash my foot on those, better not leave them there.' Not five seconds later, I smashed my foot against the weights. My toe may, or may not, be broken. Either way, it's absurd how much pain your second to smallest toe can cause you.

That night, we came back to the homestead to find that there had been a shark attack in the living room.

We were not amused. After I was done being mad at the dogs and took more motrin for my toe, I went to check on the plants. I found that dogzilla had broken lose too.

Hopefully the beans recover. I added herbs into that barrel yesterday morning. Pups stood on those, too, so we'll have to rearrange or block it somehow. He really just wants to look out the window, but I don't want the plants to get destroyed in the process. 

But they look so cute when they think every passing car is their papa.

This week, popcorn ceilings, some gardening, more cleaning, unpacking and settling is in store. I really want to get the bedroom ceiling done and the Swan Lake bathroom knocked out since those rooms have been "in progress" for too long now. So I have this mess to look forward too again. Wet popcorn sludge all over the floor is really fun. It's still on my shoes.

Just for fun, here's a few spotted shots. One is just down the hill from the homestead. One was parked on our old street, at our old neighbors house, today. For a minute I thought I was back in Alabama or certain parts of Virginia. 

Have a great week everyone! 

That's the view we started the weekend, and summer, with Friday night. 

Saturday, boyfriend let me sleep in while he got to work cleaning and moving things. The tractor broke last week and he got parts ordered, but then needed a certain kind of grease. We spent most of Sunday looking for the illusive special tractor grease and ended up ordering it online. 

Then the washer broke. I met a friend for drinks and in that time, boyfriend fixed it. Lint was the culprit. 

We moved maybe one load of things from the old house to the homestead on Saturday. I should clarify that with, "we" did maybe one load. Boyfriend did quite a few, including moving the mattresses himself. He's a beast. 

At some point, I noticed this new addition to the garden. I'm pretty excited to say we now have another one!

Here's what one room in the basement at the homestead looks like. This is a significant chunk of our stuff. In one room, with super sweet carpet. 

To move bookshelves and free up some bins for moving more stuff, boyfriend created a makeshift library for me. I added more to it. This might be the best use of a linen closet, ever. Have I mentioned I have a book problem? This isn't even half of my book collection.

Sunday night we were waiting on Super Moon. We were exhausted and trying to go to bed early. While waiting, we caught a pretty awesome sunset. 

Monday night involved deep cleaning the house we're leaving. I really hate deep cleaning, but I am overjoyed to be almost entirely done with this house. Here's how Grover feels about deep cleaning. It looks remarkably similar to how he feels about rearranging furniture.

I really love this. Dreams are a much better motivator. Credit goes to the DC Ladies for the find. And Emerson is my man.

My friends are awesome. We're all different but they bring so much to my life. I will love them forever. So, here's a little bit of link love for them.

Ah, things are busy and I can't keep up with my life! 

But, here's one of our latest projects. I started a few things from seeds, including snap peas, and they were needing a new home. 

So we bought this. 

And turned it into this. 

We'll probably add some herbs or something else to this barrel and we bought another one that we'll fill up this weekend. Some of my farmer's market acquisitions are in need of more space like these guys. 

This is pretty much my life mantra. And this week's Monday Motivation is dedicated to my dear friend Markeshia over at Too Thrifty Chicks who just "pulled a Jenn" and made a massive life change. I'm super proud of her and very excited to see what she comes up with! 

Our opinion editor was asking for someone to write about their dad for Father's Day. I jumped at the chance to go on and on about how awesome my dad is. Mostly, because he is, awesome. As usual, I'm behind in sending a card, but this is what I wrote in today's newspaper. 

It’s possible that every girl thinks her dad is a hero.

Mine didn’t go to the moon or cure cancer, but he has always been my hero and the standard I hold every man to.

He served 20-plus years in the Air Force and though I hated moving as a kid, I thought my dad was awesome. Whenever I was with my dad on base, I thought everyone should salute him. I’m pretty sure I told people to salute my dad.

Eventually I figured out how the whole rank and salute thing works, but not before I decided I would wear his flight suit and be my dad for Halloween one year.

When we were all young, Mom went back to nursing for awhile. It was my braided-hair phase, but Mom would do it. Dad filled in and tried his best to braid my hair. Even if it didn’t turn out quite right, I wore those braids proudly because my dad did it for me.

Dad worked hard, then came home and worked around the house and helped with homework. Quite honestly, now that I’m an adult, just thinking about how much he did exhausts me. I can’t count the nights he stayed up ridiculously late helping me with math homework or figuring out formulas in Excel documents for school projects.

He also managed to teach me the art of contingency planning. Maybe it was his military background, but Dad always told me to have back-up plans, though I can’t remember a time he ever said I couldn’t do something.

I told him one day I wanted to run for president. I started bringing home books about the Constitution and reading them. I was about 10. Dad told me that was a great dream, but I should also consider running for the House of Representatives or Senate first.

When I wrecked my car on my birthday while I was moving into my dorm for my first year of college, his first question was if I was OK and never yelled. He just recommended I not do that again.

The day I came home from college and announced that I had quit the student paper and was going to study abroad in New Zealand, my parents just stared at me. But Dad never said no. He signed all the paperwork, helped me pick a program, pack, gave me an international phone card and took me to the airport.

Somehow, Dad survived a house of girls. Even the dogs were girls, he jokes sometimes. He showed my sisters and I what a good man looks like.

Dad knows that I can take care of myself, but knowing he always has my back makes life a little less scary.

When he retired from the military, he teared up talking about his own parents. I’d never seen my dad cry and I started bawling.

If there’s ever a time I’m giving a similar speech, I know I’ll cry talking about my parents. I may never go to the moon or cure cancer, either, but if I come even close to being the person my dad is, it will be a life well-lived.

Turns out, getting popcorn ceilings wet makes this whole process a lot easier and less dusty, but still pretty messy.

I was halfway through this room last weekend, when boyfriend said:

"You know what we forgot to do? Spray it with water."

Me: "I asked you that and you said no!"

Boyfriend: "No you didn't."

Me: "Yes I did."

Boyfriend: "That conversation never happened."

Me: "I said, 'Do I need to get it wet or can I just scrape it.' And you said I didn't have to get it wet."

Boyfriend: "That's not the same question."

So today, we pulled out the spray bottle and the boyfriend decided it would be more efficient to use our new lawn and garden 3-liter sprayer. He was right. 

This time, we tag teamed it. He sprayed, I scraped. I still ended up a mess, but no popcorn in my hair this time. 

We finished the lace room then headed into the master bedroom thinking we'd knock that out so it would be ready for us to actually move in. The spraying/scraping didn't take longer than an hour, but we had a mushy gushy mess on the floor. 

We had laid out plastic and taped it to the walls to speed up cleaning and also taped over the tops and sills of windows and doors. 

Turns out, the previous owners had painted over wallpaper in the bedroom. I'm kind of sad about that, but so it goes.

After we'd scraped, I went back with a wet rag and wiped down the edges with wallpaper scraps and popcorn mush. The edge and wall cleaning part was more exhausting for me than the popcorn removal itself.

This is how Grover felt about us rearranging the house...again. He's over moving.

We're still going to wipe down the walls and ceiling with TSP and then possibly paint the ceiling, depending on how it looks. 

Really, a minor change with major impact. I'm liking everything much better without the popcorn ceilings.

A few hours later, I was exhausted and boyfriend was cleaning up the step stool and tools I had tossed in the bathtub, covered in popcorn mush. 

Then it was on to errands, laundry and wine for me. I've talked boyfriend into watching Oz the Great and Powerful tonight as our little treat for the day's accomplishments. But first, a look at the aftermath.

After spending most of Friday working, though it was supposed to be my day off, we headed back to The Homestead for a night of fun.

While on an errands run earlier in the day, I picked up one of these for the new house. Because, obviously, I need one at both houses. Though, drinking wine while climbing on step stools and the counter may not have been the most genius idea. I kept bashing my leg on the step stool and now have a huge bruise on my shin, on top of the bruise I got last year from falling in a creek while hiking. Mark thinks I'm crazy, but I swear there's still a bruise. And I may not be that tall, but I somehow managed to knock my head on the ceiling...repeatedly.

And then I went to town in the Swan Lake bathroom. It only took another three or so hours to steam clean the rest of the wallpaper glue off the walls. Mark mowed the lawn until it was too dark to see, and came in to help clean the walls with a little bit of TSP and warm water.  The top photo is the wall after steam and TSP. Looking much better right? 

I took a break Saturday morning to meet up with some lovely ladies at the local farmers market and picked up these great earrings. 

But there's no rest in home renovation, so we got back at it. 

We still need to wipe down the other bathroom walls with TSP and probably do another run with the steam cleaner, but we moved on to other things for awhile. Boyfriend got to mowing the lawn. And by lawn, I really mean field.

We also measured the area for fencing since we don't want the dogs disappearing into the wild, or stinkin' robbers coming back. I was getting very jumpy in the field since I'm paranoid as anything that I'll step on a rattlesnake. eventually, I might get over that. Maybe. 

I also added another sunburn to my collection. Then I got started on those ridiculously sparkly popcorn ceilings.

Here's the dining room in progress. So much better without the popcorn, right?! Here it is after all the popcorn is gone, though some glitter remains. We'll probably sand it or level it out somehow, then paint it.

See the living room through the door? Yeah, that entire room is popcorn ceiling. Lots more work to do. That wall is coming down soon anyway. ince we had stuff in that room and I was attempting not to get popcorn all over the carpet, I opted to move to the lace room.  But first, a quick look at how much of a mess I was. Remember when I said I didn't get any wallpaper glue in my hair? Well, that wasn't the case with the popcorn.

There's some sunburn in there too. In case you haven't seen the crazy room that I call the lace room, here's a before photo. You can't see the awful carpet that we're definitely ripping out. Since we're ditching the carpet, I didn't mind getting popcorn all over, though I did lay a sheet of plastic. I also took down the lace curtains for the popcorn removal. Mark took down the light fixture last week, so the room doesn't look quite as intense as it did at first.

I got about halfway through before we needed to go back to town to check on the dogs, do laundry and take care of some errands.

Without the popcorn, lace curtains, crazy light fixture and carpet, the wallpaper looks much better. It might stay. I haven't decided. It's pretty old wallpaper and fraying at the edges, but no decisions yet.

Such a great quote! Can't tell you how many times I've gone out of comfort zone, been all kinds of turned around and unsure, but always find my way. 

When I went to South America for the first time, friends and family thought I was nuts. 

When I arrived in Lima, not my favorite city, exhausted from the flights and not speaking the language, I went straight to my room at the hostel and cried for a bit. I was feeling like maybe I had bit off more than I could chew on this particular adventure.

Then I pulled myself together, thinking, "You can do this. You are not going to waste this trip hiding in your room. Spanish or no Spanish, you have got this."

Then I grabbed my cleverly disguised Lonely Planet guide and phrasebook and headed into the city. Though Lima remained my least favorite city in Peru, the trip was one of my favorites. 

It's also a wonderful thing to learn to rely on your intuition. It's harder to hear it and need it while hanging out in your comfort zone. Outside of that, you learn to trust yourself and how to make your way out there in the great big world.