Getting Up Before The Sun (Way Before The Sun)

Good morning goooooood morning!

It is 6am and I have been up for about 30 minutes already. Surprisingly, it is not because my sweetie pie, little baby is up. She is still snoozing and that makes me very happy! I am up because I go to bed at 9pm. I like to act like I live with Dorothy, Blanch, and the girls (Yes, I figured that every other post needs a Golden Girls reference. Here was my last reference). And here is a photo of the gang because it makes me smile.

photo borrowed from here

Why do I go to bed at 9pm? It is not because I enjoying being a member of the Golden Girl Squad. Although, if that were an actual squad that I could join I would be all in. I go to bed at 9pm because my little, sweetie pie baby goes to bed at 7pm. Scott likes to make sure he gets some good, quality time with that little baby. He leaves for work by 5:30am in order to get home by 3 or 4. That way he gets a couple hours with Cora where she can do some of her favorite afternoon things.

I did warn you that Cora was going to get some serious post time.

A List Of Cora's Favorite Things To Do In The Afternoon:

• Jump on Big Bear. We have an ENORMOUS bear stuffed animal that we have cleverly named Big Bear. Cora thinks it is hilarious to run over and jump on him.

• Slap her belly. I'm not sure how she learned this trick but now when you say, "Cora, slap your belly" she will slap away and laugh and smile like it might be the funniest thing she has ever done.

• Find something just close enough to the counter's edge that she can grab and carry around the kitchen while acting very proud of her accomplishment. This usually means that Cora carries around a dish towel for most of the evening. She likes to put them on her head and walk around like she is hiding under it.

• Offer up her food while she is having dinner. Cora likes to try to feed me when I am giving her dinner  but she really likes to hold food out to people who are far away. She even likes to offer food to people on the phone or animals outside. 

• Take every single book out of her basket of books, examine each one for about 5 seconds then throw it on the floor.

• Zoom around in her "DJ Walker." She used to loveeeee that thing but now that she is a walking machine there is no longer any need for it. 

• Help me with the laundry. When she hears the dryer door open she comes a-running. Mainly because she is looking for a dish towel that she can grab and run around with for a while.

• Another sound that she goes wild for is the freezer door opening. Our freezer is on the bottom so it is just Cora's height. Exploring the freezer for the 5 seconds that the door is open is possibly Cora's favorite thing to do.

• Find some tupperware and take the lid on and off and see what she can fit in it.

• Put Kangy on our swivel chair and spin him around. Kangy is another cleverly named stuffed animal. I bet you couldn't guess... he is a kangaroo.

• Point to a glass of water on the table and clap (meaning she wants some). When she sees a smoothie on the table she goes wild. It becomes Clap City USA at the Ross-Spencer household. She does not take her eyes off it.

• Skype with Aunt Kelly or Grandmama. She doesn't get to do it all that often but when she does she is thrilled!!! We have found that the best time to Skype is while Cora is in her high chair. That way she cannot play "open and close" with the computer. She likes to blow nonstop kisses to them and they always get offered between one and a hundred peas.

• Head for bed. As I have said before sleeping is not Cora's favorite thing but for some reason when you say, "Cora, it is time for bed" she will stop what she's doing and go straight for the stairs. She does love to climb the stairs so that could be part of the fun. She also likes to take a quick detour to give Big Bear a little jump on before bed.

There is a little taste of Cora in the afternoon. Can you imagine if Scott missed out on all of that fun stuff. 

So, that is why we go to bed at 9pm and wake up at 5am (OK maybe one of us wakes up half an hour later at 5:30am claiming she is still trying to catch up from lots of night wakings when Cora was 6 months old and younger).

Decarpeting The House And Silencing The Stairs

It was Carpet City in our house when we moved in. It was in the bathrooms (I am not sure that toilets and carpet are supposed to mix), on the stairs, on the wall (it is on the wall part of a step from one room to another... I am calling it the wall) and it smelled like cat pee like you wouldn't believe.

Sorry. This is the best before photo I have of there being carpet all up in the toilet's face. Just trust me. It was there.

The carpet had to go. I KNOW THAT'S RIGHT!

• First, we ripped up all of the old carpet and vinyl.

• We paid to have someone put the new carpet down for us, but we saved money by ripping up the old stuff ourselves. I am not quite sure how much we saved and I would do the same thing again but that is because I am pretty darn cheap. It was a lot of work cutting that carpet into just the right sized pieces so our bulk trash pickup would take them. We also had to lug them up to the curb. And the best looking part of it all was that the area of my arm that was showing between my gloves and my short sleeve developed some gross, red spots from carrying yucky carpet. That's right people... I AM A FANCY LADY!

• We sprayed vinegar on every surface of the floor (lots of internet research told us that this would help combat the cat pee stench). That did not do the trick, so we tried it again and again. It smelled a little bit less each time, but it was still there. So, I called a pro... our old neighbor who is a professional painter. He suggested something called "Zinsser Bin Primer/ Sealer."  This is the holy grail of pungency. It smelled stronger than any paint or stain I have ever used. He told me that this is used after a fire to cover up fire damage and he has used it to cover bad smells.  It worked!!! Not the slightest hint of cat pee anywhere.

• After the smell was gone we could concentrate on our new flooring.

We had bamboo flooring put down in the living room and dining room.

We put beadboard on the little step in the living room where carpet was on the wall.  I tried to match the color of the bamboo when I painted the bead board.

Before Bamboo and Bead Board:

After Bamboo and Bead Board:

We had tile laid on a diagonal in the kitchen and bathroom (yay for no more toilet carpet).

The Floor Before The Tile:

The After Photos:

Now onto the stairs... I knew that I did not want carpet wrapped around what could be a pretty cool open staircase. So we ripped the carpet off and underneath was a builder-grade step. It wasn't pretty and there were nail heads popping up from both sides of the step.

Before Any Change To The Stairs:

As a temporary solution I painted the steps black. (Temporary turned into almost 4 years).

I also painted the railings from white to black to match the steps.

My father in law suggested that we not wrap the carpet around the wall near the railings like it had been.  So, we had the carpet people stop the carpet with some tacks and we put up some boards to cover the seam.

After Painting The Stairs and The Raling:

Fastforward 4 plus years. We now have a baby who is not the world's best sleeper... HUGE UNDERSTATEMENT.

You cannot believe how loud and squeaky our stairs are. It sounds like an elephant brought his entire circus squad to dance around on them when you walk down the steps.

We knew we wanted to upgrade the stairs eventually but we wanted to do some research... apparently four years worth of research to figure out what we wanted to replace the steps with.

After a few months of me making Scott go around the house instead of down the stairs so he would not wake the baby we decided new stairs were a necessity.

I called around a few places and got some quotes. Everyone was very helpful but I didn't love any of the ideas people had. Most everyone wanted to use a junky wood wrapped in a nice piece of wood to give it the appearance of one big piece of chunky wood.

Finally, someone referred me to "The Stair Master." Who knew... I should have just googled "stair master" in Charlotte to find what I wanted.

Mr. Stair Master suggested getting one big, honkin' piece of wood for each step and cutting each one to a different size so it would be a perfect fit. It turns out that I like a big, honkin' piece of wood! The only thing was the price was not right. I talked him down about $200. The price was still not right but the cost seemed worth it to help ease the stress of being crazy, new parents (maybe just crazy, new mom).

This is a photo that I sneakily took soon after he arrived. I was so excited to see the beautiful, new steps!

Here they are going in:

Check out those cute, little feet in the bouncy seat at the top of the steps. This is before she was anywhere near mobile. I promise she was safe!

I don't think Mr. Stair Master knew I was taking this photo.

Mr. Stair Master recommended we let the stairs dry out a bit more and also get some patina to them before we polyurethane or stain them. They have really darkened up quite a bit since they were installed.

I will be sure to post an updated photo of them when we get around to polying them.

I love my beautiful, SILENT as can be new stairs! In fact, the stairs are so quiet that Scott and I kept startling each other because we used to know as soon as one of us placed the first hint of a foot on the stairs.