Over Christmas break, Lauren's sister Anna and her family moved to Minot, North Dakota. They were kind enough to have a few things moved to our house with Kelly and Kirtsen at the wheel of a moving truck! Do parents get much better/kinder? I don't think so. We were welcomed back by our new (old but beautiful) piano and entertainment center along with a big, cozy rocking chair we can't wait to use. At the beginning of a new year when we often reflect on all the blessings we've been given and seek to improve ourselves and the lives of those around us, we feel great gratitude for Anna and Alex's kindness they've shown to us. Hopefully we can bless the life of some young couple down the road with simple gifts like the ones we've received.
Anyway, that is just a segue to what the title of this blog alludes to. Lauren and I decided we were going to spruce up the ol' entertainment center. We were thinking of getting rid of it, to be honest because we have an entertainment center of our own, but then Lauren had the great idea of repainting it. So that's what we did. Lauren ran up to Home Depot, did a little homework about painting, priming, and the process of it all and we went at it. It would've been pretty funny to be a fly on the wall and watch the whole thing. There we were in the living room, hunched over carrying the thing out the door and up our narrow basement stairs. Then waddling through the parking lot on a cool January afternoon in Provo to our desire painting ground. We set some old Smith's advertisements/coupons under it and went to work. When we first started it was a blast. Lauren had the big rollie brush and I had the touch up brush for the cracks and small places she couldn't get. From the start it was obvious that both of us didn't have much painting experience. especially me. I can remember Lauren saying, "Are you going to paint like that when we put the final coat on?" That is code for, "Hey, get your act together or I'm going to have to make this look good myself!" So I buckled down and tried to keep up with her pace/professional touch.
After we got the primer on and it had set for about 45 minutes, we applied the first coat of dark brown paint at around 5pm. For those of you who live in Provo or have lived in Provo during the winter, you know that it's starting to get dark around this time! We could barely see in the light of the sunset whether or not things looked good or bad. We applied the first coat in about 10-15 minutes, and started on the second with our fingers crossed. We both have a hard time being patient and didn't want to wait till the next morning to apply the last coat, so as we shivered and painted with cold pudding for paint and stiff arms, we finished at last. We waited until right before we went to bed to cover it with old sheets from the DI and went to bed with the hopes of a beautifully painted entertainment center in the morning...
...and not too bad!
This little project has inspired the both of us to be Mr. and Mrs. Fix-it. To be creative and innovative enough to see things that could be fixed up and redone rather than trashed. And it makes things mean more, after having put in time and effort into them. All in all, we did a fun project, made a happy memory and now have a new (kind of) entertainment center!
Way to go, guys! It's so fun to do a project together :)
ReplyDeleteHenry's been saying "son of a biscuit!" and i asked him tonight, "where did you pick that up, H?"
"From uncle ryan! I love uncle ryan, he's so cool!"
love you. miss you.
Very funny to read. I'm impatient about most fix-it projects, so I've had to learn to breathe a little so Alex can "do it right". Too bad you aren't around right now cuz I"m about to throw away my ENTIRE apartment because we can't fit.
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