off to the lake...

We're heading up to the lake for a couple of days this weekend, and then plan to be home on Monday through Wednesday to work on the house. We also heard about an estate sale this weekend down near Tyrone that has a mission sideboard for sale for $395! Argh...unfortunately we're still hanging onto our emergency condo mortgage money (which is probably more of a reality than a possible emergency--still no offers and we can't afford to keep paying if after next month, so renting it looks like our next step) so the sideboard probably won't be coming home with us. Unless it turns out to be real...like a Stickley or something. Here's hoping :)

spam!

Just FYI, if you comment on a post, you will now have to do that word verification thing that's so annoying when you try to buy tickets online, etc. ;) I got a comment in Portuguese from a total stranger about his blog for ordering custom printed t-shirts. At least, I'm assuming it was a stranger, since the only Rodrigo I know speaks Spanish, not Portuguese, and I think he'd at least say hi before he tried to sell me something :)

I don't want to have to moderate comments, so I'll try this first and see if it cuts out the spam.

Sorry!

more new photos...

the title says it all

Forgot to add that Brandon got the closet doors put up in our bedroom last Wednesday! Very exciting news (yes, we have no life...) although now it is very beige in there with the beige curtains, too (see, I was right!) but it looks a lot better than gaping closets. Of course, they don't line up with each other, the wall, or the floor (all three seem to be a little crooked), but that's not B's fault--it's just the house itself and little, if anything, in it, is plumb, level or square :)

more bargains...(now with photos)

Hoping to have more photos to post later today, but Brandon has the camera, so we'll just have to see ;) We haven't done a lot since the last post, but we did find a few more "bargains" ("this is so cheap we have to buy it even if we don't actually need it"). We went to Scott's Antique Market again on Sunday morning a week ago and found a very cool mission style rocking chair. It hadn't had the easiest life, so we bargained the guy down from $90 to $75. It's got a cool mission patterned back on it, and the original upholstery and springs were still there underneath all the layers of fabric. The springs are in okay shape, although the fabric is not usable anymore. It's a little wobbly, but B cleaned it up and tightened it and it's a lot better. Someone decided at some point, however, to make it a non-rocking rocking chair by cutting off the rockers at the back. The rockers are still in place, but shortened, with a little block of wood tacked on underneath them to keep it from actually rocking! Maybe someone was tired of it bumping the wall or rocking over the cat, we have no idea...but it's still lovely even with all the abuse it's suffered.

We also picked up an old wooden office chair for $5 (very cool, it revolves on pedestal base, but the whole base is wood, not metal) and a card catalog for $25 (bargained down from $35). The card catalog is just the middle section and similar to the one we already own. It's missing the legs/base as well as the top, so it was probably in the middle of a stacking unit and the other pieces are long gone. There was one drawer still full of cards, though--the "P" drawer, with cards for "Panama" and "Polar Bears" and such things. It was probably from a school, and most of the books are from the 1950s up until the early 1990s. I bought it with the intention of cleaning it up and passing it on to someone, so the bidding can start now, ha ha ;) We don't need another one, but I couldn't not buy a card catalog, you know? Especially for that price. Raylynn has dibs on it for the Center, but if they don't want it, it's available. It'd make a cool coffee table!

I had a wisdom tooth cut out last Thursday, so Patrice (MIL) came over to keep an eye on me. She said she couldn't sit still for the whole day, so she offered to paint our dining room! Yayy! It's gorgeous! Hope to have photos up soon. It's sort of a terra cotta kind of orange. It looks pretty 1970s in the photos, but in person it is really pretty. ;)

bargain hunting at ikea

We went to IKEA last night, to return the blue/brown/cream curtains. Yeah, I lost the vote, but we settled on some beige ones--ha ha--and I got some green ones for the dining room as well, and got all of those for the same cost as the blue/brown ones. So while I'm waiting in the return line, B calls and says he found one of the SAME curtains in the "As Is" section of the store for $5! By the time I get the return done ($129 back on my check card, thank you very much), he's also found a chandelier for $10! It was this one...interestingly enough called "Gospel":
It's really nothing like the one we love at Home Depot...


but it'll do for now. Turns out it's missing half it's little squiggly metal things, so it is really very simple. Guess that's why it was only $10, marked down from $60.

We also picked up a folding outdoor table made of acacia (?) for $20 because someone had put it together incorrectly and then apparently dropped it, chipping one corner. Oh, and turns out linens were on sale, so I got the single curtain for TWO BUCKS, and now I can make pillows for the bedroom. Woo hoo, compromise!

love the gas

Okay, so for some reason when they "renovated" our house, they removed all gas appliances (including the stove!) and replaced them with electric ones, except for the water heater. They even disconnected the gas logs, but left them in place. (Uh, thanks, guys.)

So our first gas bill (thanks, deregulation!) looks something like this:

From 05/02/07 to 05/28/07

AGLC May Base Charge...........$17.60
Catalyst Charge..........................5.95
Sales Tax....................................1.86
Gas Charges................................3.01
Turn On Fee.............................50.00
Total Charges...........................78.42

So we used a total of 3.075 therms ($3.01) but getting those 3.075 therms to our house cost us another $75! (Thanks again, deregulation!)

My dad has offered to come help put in a 220 line so we can get a new electric water heater, since over the course of a year, the gas bill would basically pay for a new one. Not sure how much it will raise our electric bill, but I can't imagine that it would be $30 a month more. Could it? I saw where Georgia Power is offering a big rebate if you buy one of those expensive energy efficient ones (guessing they cost close to $1000) that are all covered in foam and stuff, but unfortunately, we have city of E.P. power--which I believe is provided to them by Georgia Power, but minus the rebates.