Fax Fun

About a week after we moved into our house, we started getting calls from a fax machine. And not just one call a day...no... they have it set to auto-redial something like 5 times. Just about every week. It drives. me. NUTS!!! So when it's a fax day I turn off my ringer. We didn't have Caller ID so I had no way to know who was trying to send us a fax.

A couple months ago I talked Nathan into upgrading our phone service to include Caller ID. It was only a dollar more! I was very happy when the next fax day rolled around to be able to get the number so I could do something about it. Unfortunately, it's unlisted so I have no way to find a phone number to talk to a human.

Today is another fax day. And I suddenly realized, I don't have a phone number for them to tell them to stop calling, but I could send them a fax back. Yes, I know you're all saying "du-uhh," but it was a moment of insight for me. I asked Nathan send them a fax from work. He just IM'ed me and said he sent the fax, but no answer. So he set it to auto-redial 15 times. Take that!!! Mua-hahah!

Super Troopers

This morning we participated in a 5K for Lengthen Your Stride, a service project throughout the Southeast that also involved a food and clothing drive. I walked with the boys in the stroller, but they got out and walked at the end. Daniel got an award for the youngest participant! There were other little ones in strollers, but I guess he's the only one who walked part of the way--or at least the youngest one the awards committee saw. :P The boys were troopers and fairly patient, although their enthusiasm waned considerably by the end. But we finished!! Yay! 

Muchos Gracias to my friend Christy for sending me the above photo.  We had all kinds of cameras pointed at us this morning, but none were my own!  I'm told event photos will be posted on the web. I'll post them when I see some.

More Paint & Carpet pictures

Fireplace with its accoutrements.  :)  This painting completely influenced our choice of green paint.  It had to work with the mat.

We had the painter repaint the built-in cabinets, too, so they matched the rest of the trim.  Before they were kind of grayish-white and started to look rather green with the green walls.

Nathan's cousin Ben and family were on Spring Break from OSU and stayed the night on their way home from Myrtle Beach (we had so much fun!!).  The kids quickly discovered our stairs were a fantastic perch from which to watch the carpet installation without being in the way.

Dining room with new paint and new carpet.  I'm still debating if I like this new orientation of the table, though.  To its credit, it saves our walls from all the dinks of kids knocking chairs backwards. :)  Now to figure out what to hang in here...

Since I couldn't get a picture of the "during painting" process for the dining room, and since many have said they can't see a difference, here's a picture of the old and new paint cans.  Can you see how the old paint (left) looks faded, or even pink, compared to the new paint?

David showcasing the new living room!  He really likes the new recliners.  So do I, hehe.  I'm still trying to decide how I want to dress the windows.  I don't want anything too frou-frou, but I do want to soften them up.  Maybe just some sheer swags?  Eventually I'd love to replace the mini-blinds with faux wood ones.  Or perhaps kill two birds with one stone and do roman shades, except then I couldn't control light and privacy as easily.  Ponder, ponder, ponder.  With limitless funds, I'd replace the windows with those fancy Pella windows that have blinds built in between the panes ($$$!!!).  Riiiiight...

Old vs. new carpet.  We liked the basic shade of the old, obviously, minus the stains we inherited.  Old carpet (top left) is short looped pile, new (bottom right) is softer, deeper frieze (sp?) pile, plus you can see that it's speckled in order to better hide dirt and stains.

Next on the agenda: replace ivory switches and outlets with white ones, and replace brass light fixtures with brushed nickel.  Hoping that will help update the home. My sister-in-law informed me that in their recent house hunt, she observed all the new homes have oil-rubbed bronze fixtures now.  A great tip. I think that would be very pretty with what I've got, but it's too pricey for my dwindling reno budget.  I guess my "update" will just have to be passé from the start. :)