I Have Been A Busy Woman

So, I took a few days off last week to get some stuff done at home. It spilled over into every evening last week and this past weekend, but after numerous trips to Lowe's and Wal-Mart, here is what I accomplished:

Put some plants & mulch in the front flower bed. Also "transplanted" some mum plants I've coveted from my neighbors. I know, I know...sounds like stealing, but in my defense the new tenants aren't taking care of them and their landlords didn't plant them and I KNOW Lynn (the lady that did plant them) would want me to have them...and it's not like I took all of them, I just took a few small sprigs.

I finally put border around where my tulips are and added a few new plants that you can't see yet because I started them in the house and the still aren't very big. I still need to add mulch to the big flower bed, but I want to plant a few more things before I do.

End table that I painted black.

Coffee table that I also painted black. I still plan to frost the glass, but that will probably have to wait a few weeks.

Some of you will be glad to know I FINALLY finished painting the stairwell. That lamp is so dang ugly, but it is staying for now.

Now for the biggest project of the last 9 days. My neighbor/friend down the street and I had been talking about taking the carpet off our stairs. Her husband said I had to go first. So I did. And for once, I have full before, during, and after photos:

This carpet looks so much better in the pictures. It was was horrible in real life.

After the carpet was removed (mid-tack removal).

I cannot believe I'm posting this, but it was too funny of a sight not to share (Facebook Profile Pic? I don't think so). The mask was to help with allergies and the goggles were for the tack removal process. I didn't have time for a trip the the ER because some wood chip or tack flew into my eye...I am accident prone (and I'm going to spare you the photos to prove it this time around).

This was the results of my gap-filling mishap. It spray in gap filler SAID it wouldn't over expand. So I sprayed it in, cleaned up the foam that did expand, waited an hour before I went to bed to make sure it didn't expand out any more, and when I got up the next morning that stuff was all over the place. This picture is after I had trimmed it down and sanded some of the mess.

The stairs after a day of sanding.

After the painting.

And the "almost" finished project. I have a college student moving in with me today and so I was trying to get it stained and polyurethaned before she moved in because you can't walk much on the polyurethane for 24 hours after. But the stain bled through the tape onto the white (what I get for not using the Frog Tape on all the stairs. The two I did use it on didn't have this problem). So since I now had trim work to do and because there were some flaws that need to be fixed better, I'm holding off finishing them until the college student moves out at the end of the summer. They at least "look" finished for now.