Aloha!

Aloha from Hawaii!

It is currently 8 am here and I've been up for two hours already. To say I'm struggling to adjust to the time change would be an understatement. :) Hence, the early (for me) morning blog. But really it's ok because it is beautiful here and the early wake up call each morning just gives me more time to soak up paradise! Which is exactly what I'm going to go do here in a minute! First I thought I would share a few photos from the trip so far though....



Sorry this next picture is a little dark. If I used flash you couldn't see the pretty background, and I don't have any editing software on my computer to brighten it up. This was from dinner the first night...we went out to celebrate Alan and Rob's (Rob's dad) birthdays.



At the restaurant...it had a great view overlooking the ocean. Coming from landlocked Kansas, I find that I could stare at the ocean all day long.



Since we are staying at the same hotel as the players, we see them all over the place. Yesterday I found myself a little starstruck riding in an elevator with the Danny Manning... I almost blurted out "Hi, I'm Charlie! One time I stood behind you in line at the Hutch movie theater...ROCK CHALK!" But I didn't....this time.

Yesterday we were reading on the beach when a bunch of the players (Tyshawn Taylor, Travis Releford, Justin Wesley among the ones I could recognize right off the bat) came sprinting from behind and in to the ocean. It was neat to see them all playing around and jumping in the waves, although all I could think was "Please, please don't hurt yourselves!"



I wore some KU gear to dinner last night...anytime you put on something KU you get a lot of "Rock Chalks!" "Let's go Jayhawks!"....that's fun. :)



Tonight is the first basketball game! I know a lot of you Kansan's may not stay up for it (it is a 7:00 game here, but 11:00 back home...yikes!) but if you do...look for us! They play in a really small gym, so hopefully you can pick us out of the crowd!



I'll try and post once more from Hawaii...if not it will probably be after the weekend considering we are going straight from the airport to the Hutch High State football game! Go Salthawks!!! :) Until then...

Quick and Easy Bathroom update!

I have lots of big plans for all of the rooms in our house and am finally starting to put them into action. The first big update will be our bedroom. I have already started sanding down some of the furniture and getting it all prepped for painting and/or staining. In the mean time, I decided to do a quick update to the upstairs hall bath.

All of the bathroom fixtures in our house are brassy gold and in need of updating. Replacing all the fixtures in the house could get a little pricey, so I took the advice of one of a great DIY blog and picked up some oil-rubbed bronze spray paint and got to work.

I realized I forgot to take pictures of the "before" while they were still up in the bathroom. Oops! But at least I took a picture before I spray painted it! Here is the before hand towel holder....



After I put on my safety gear (hi, mom! :) ) I got to painting.



I put all the pieces in a box and did coats every 30 minutes or so, rotating them in between coats.



Then Whitney and Ken came over for a bit so I took a little break and after they left I was feeling super energized (it was just SO great to see them...I think I was riding the high!) and so I decided to do something I had originally decided against....paint the light fixture. I wasn't really sure at first how I was going to do it, which is why I nixed it. However, I found myself just improvising and I think it turned out pretty great. I couldn't figure out how to get the light fixture down off the wall... there were no visible screws and the idea of lots of wires scared me so I didn't try all that hard. So I grabbed some painters tape and just decided to tape the whole thing off.





As you can see I brought a lamp in because during the painting process I couldn't have the big, hot light bulbs in the way. After I taped it off I thought it was looking pretty good, but was still nervous about the range of the spray paint so I decided to go one step further. We didn't have in newspaper around and I was a little nervous about it leaking through magazine pages, so I rummaged around in the kitchen and found some wax parchment paper that I thought would do the trick. Clearly...I didn't need quite as much as I used. Better safe than sorry. :)



And after the first coat...



You can see I had some drip marks but they looked better after a few coats, and honestly once I got the light bulbs back up you couldn't really tell so I wasn't too concerned with it.

And with all the paper removed...



I put the other fixtures back up and was very pleased with my quick and easy changes! I have found that the spray paint isn't super durable when subjected to repeated drops on the tiled floor, but besides that I think it will work great. As you can see in the picture below, I now I have a few touch-ups to do. Oops!



A few after pics of the fixtures...





I also picked up a nice white shower curtain at Bed, Bath, and Beyond over the summer. It was majorly marked down, and for $9 I thought I would be a nice replacement for the kind of dingy looking shower curtain left behind by the previous owners. What I didn't realize was how long this shower curtain was, so I had to raise up the shower rod a bit, but it works since there are such high ceilings in the bathroom.

Here is the original shower curtain...



And the new shower curtain....





I think the white shower curtain really brightens up the windowless room and with its simple pattern it just looks a lot cleaner than the previous curtain.



We still need to get a oil-rubbed bronze curtain rod and and shower curtain hooks. I thought about just spray painting that, but with the hooks hanging on it I know it would only be a matter of time before the wear and tear was too much, so I figure it best to get one. I actually put it on my Christmas list earlier today. :) I also want to find a new rug for the bathroom to bring a little pattern into the room.

And before I wrap it up I'm going to share a few pictures from Joe Henry's game last night. I just love being close enough to watch him play on a Friday night! After last night's game HHS was presented with the sectionals champion plaque and next week they will take on a rematch with Bishop Carroll for a trip to the state game! It will be a tough game, but I think Hutch has a great chance!

I love the way the ball boys jump in the player line and the end of the game. They are so stinking cute.



Sectional Winners!



Grandma and Grandpa braved the traffic and cold weather to watch Jujubee play!



Joe's girlfriend Savannah always nabs him a few leftover hotdogs from the concession stand. I think it is Joe's favorite part of the night. :)







Hopefully I'll squeeze in a few more blog posts before we take off for Hawaii next Friday! Until then... :)

Is this a sports photography blog?

If newcomers were to come peruse my blog, I'm sure they would think it was some sort of sports photography blog. Which I couldn't blame them for, considering about every other post this year has been about one of my brother's sporting events....the other half is all weddings. :) But I don't really mind, because the fact is I love spending my time going to my brothers games and cheering them on and I almost wish I had more pictures on the blog because that would mean that I got to see even more of my brothers' games! In the past week I have been lucky enough to see both of them play!

First up, I went to Tedder's soccer game at Sterling. I know I said it before, but I just love that he is at Sterling and surrounded by such a wonderful group of friends. While watching this game against a university that shall remain unnamed (unless you see it on their jerseys in the pic because I didn't block it out), there were some VERY rude fans sitting in front of us. A mother and sister of one of the players for the other team was what we were able to deduce from some of their comments. Anyways, they could were snapping at Sterling fans when we would cheer for the boys and question EVERY call made against their boys and chalk it up to "the Sterling players being terrible people," which was weird because most of the calls were unfairly going their way (I don't know soccer or refs, but I know that some of the calls were ridiculous). Anyways, it took all I had to not tap on their shoulder and tell them to quiet down because we weren't bashing their son/brother and they shouldn't bash mine/ours (they were mad at Ted because he is tall, strong, physical player....sorry...nothing he can really do about that). I don't have a problem with people cheering for their team, I don't even have a problem with them being quasi obnoxious about it, especially if it is a home game for them. What does get to me, is when people of the opposing team, sit on the home teams side and make snide remarks and judge our players. But, my folks and I just took the high road and continued to cheer for the boys while not giving in to their comments. Ok, sorry for that little rant but it made me really mad. Setting all that aside, it was so nice to see Tedder play! He is such a good player and clearly a great leader for the team and I could not be more proud of him. Seriously....SO proud of him. :)

They call him Ted "the Tower" Dower....can you see why?



Here is a closer shot...



And a lot few action shots....







For whatever reason people are always ripping Ted's jersey. This is the second year in a row this has happened....and this one happened during the alumni game! Yikes!



It stresses me out when he head butts shots....that is not what your noggin is intended for, Ted. Precious brain cells are at risk everytime you do that!



He's got ups. Big time.





It was really bright out, and my camera shutter speed was set too slow and I didn't realize until I was in the car. So sorry it is a little over exposed...I did what I could. :)



In other news, our neighborhood has some GORGEOUS fall trees. I couldn't help myself when it came to taking a picture of my neighbors tree. Every time I see a tree like this I think of my parents telling Betsy and I the story of when we were little girls and on a walk and I believe it was my sister who saw a tree so bright orange like this one and told my parents "That tree is on fire!" :)



Last Friday I got to go watch Joe Henry play at Bishop Carroll. I loved getting to watch him play and also getting to spend some time with my folks and grandma and a few friends from high school that had ventured to town to watch. It was an exciting game, although probably not Hutch's best. But if you are going to play bad...its best to get it out of your system before play-offs. Hutch ended up losing by a touchdown, but I still had a great time. Before the game started, they had the game ball HELICOPTERED in and dropped off at center field. It was pretty neat and one of the many reasons I love small-town Kansas football. :)





Now on to some cute pics of Beans during the game. He is number 82!









Now this is a good block!



After the loss they just went straight back to the locker room, so we weren't able to get a pic with Joe Henry. Drats.

In other news, I spent my weekend working a few projects...I'll be back with posts about those soon. I'll give you a few hints though....

....I updated these.....



...and I had to wear one of these....



...I'll post the completed project picture soons! Until then... :)