Valinor's New Look

62% of those voting in the poll chose the braided tail, so here she is... I have some tweaking to do, and I may still twitch an ear, but you can get the general idea now. Let me know what you think. I'm open to breed and color suggestions. :)

Off with their heads (and tails)

It started with the little pony and the unicorn in the front. The pony is for my daughter and the unicorn is for another little girl . Then I thought I'd work on a couple Eberl ponies that I'd planned to give new hair-do's. Then I pulled some out that needed head transplants. And thus it goes. I always have more ideas than I have time.

If anyone would like to chime in... The Valinor resin had her muzzle redone and I will be braiding her mane - thinking about flipping an ear back, too. But I'm really on the fence about whether or not to lop off her tail and give her a mud knot? I really like the original tail, but want to make her different. Thoughts? Please vote in the poll to your left. (You can click on the picture to see it larger, than hit your browser's back button to return to this page).

The Sunroom Project

I am a very project-oriented person, I think that is partly why I was so drawn to our house in the first place. There were so many projects to be done. The latest was just completed today!



We had a 20-something year old hot tub in a vaulted sunroom right off the master bedroom. We had someone come out twice, but never timed it right so he could figure out why the GFI electrical safety was tripping. Basically, it never got hot enough to use before it shut itself off. Anyway, my husband made the big decision to have it removed when he found someone related to someone he worked with who was right for the task (and it saved us a little from having it "professionally" done by the spa people who we'd already paid plenty to just show up at our house twice and never solve anything, but I digress...).


Sunroom/Hot Tub Before:

After the tub came out, the real work (for me, anyway) began. There were cracks in the walls from the moisture over the years that I repaired first and gave the room a going over with paint. Then the old tile had to come out, especially since there wasn't any under the spa. So I rented a tile stripper. If you've never used one of these, consider yourself lucky. This was the worst part of the entire project. I guess we had thicker tile than usual, since it was non-slip and all. All I know is it took much longer than expected and I had the bruises to show for it when it was all said and done. Then of course, there is still thinset left behind, which is what secures the tiles to the concrete. So I rented a floor grinder. Not so bad after the tile stripper, but I did leave alot of swirl marks in the concrete. And of course, it doesn't go all the way to the wall, so I had to buy a little angle grinder. Nifty little tool, but even more swirl marks.





Once the floor was cleared and cleaned, I stained the concrete. There is this really cool semi-transparent stain I wanted to try that is supposed to help the finish look like natural stone. Unfortunately, the gallon I bought was more pink than tan, so I ended up getting a solid tan color instead. While I'm happy to have pink walls in my daughter's room, I don't think I'd like it so much on my floor... Oh, and I got to install a new fan, too! All sorts of firsts with this project.




Today everything came together and I moved in the furniture that Jonathan picked out and put in the new plants and pictures. Now, we can finally enjoy the view of our lake. (and I have to get back to studying Calculus...)