favorite thing friday is... CAULK!!

the husband and I started hanging crown molding last weekend, which is a TOTAL TREAT if you've never done it. the weird angles, the imagining yourself looking down on the corners from above the ceiling and trying to envision the cuts before you make them (and realizing you did it backwards... again...)... seriously, everyone should play the molding game at least once in their lives. M actually got the hang of it and by the time we'd finished he completely understood the logic of it all. don't ask me, I was just the helper. one thing I do know - if you're going to undertake any kind of project like this, having the right tools makes it infinitely easier. we borrowed a great miter saw and pneumatic nail gun from M's co-worker, and the work was definitely better and faster thanks to these terribly handy apparatus.

oh, and I thought molding was spelled 'moulding'... turns out, I think it's one of those words that can actually go either way. but since 'moulding' looks sort of meady and Old English, I'll switch to the straightforward 'molding'... unless there are any vocabulary hall monitors out there who have a strong feeling either way...

so here's the difference molding makes. but not just molding, CAULKING after molding really finishes things off and makes everything looks so much nicer:







our house's foundation has some issues, as is evidenced by the wonky angles of the ceilings and walls. behold the magic of the molding/caulk combo under M's masterful care:

Exhibit A: large gap between the molding and the ceiling.

Exhibit B: gap is gone and, unless you're into scrutinizing ceilings, no one is the wiser!

here's what I ended up doing to the concrete floor in the skylight room... this was after it'd gotten one coat of sealer. we're planning on just continuing this treatment into the kitchen, unless we get the new countertop in and it all looks awful together. in which case, we can just paint over it again. :) this room is about to get it's baseboards painted and put back on, so it should be mostly done pretty soon.

a pretty cool iphone photo hubz took while I was working on it:

and now I have to go brush my teeth and head out to my work location for today. this week, I started moonlighting for Cricket wireless as a street-teamer for some extra bucks. I've known the woman I'm working for since I came to town years and years ago... oddly, she told me yesterday that she's planning to hand off the street-teaming stuff to someone else after April, but wanted to make sure I knew that she'd pass on my number and give me the new contact's information if I want to keep doing it. I'd looked at this as a temporary way to earn some extra money anyway and had very low expectations so it was no big deal, but I'm consistently intrigued at how God brings things in when you need them and then poof! they change and morph again. thanks for windows of opportunity, Father! here's me at the event yesterday:

today's a long day, so wish me luck. and a bit extra that I might get the laundry finished. oh, and baby's moving around a lot and doing fine... we've gained 3 lbs. woo-hoo!

-m.y.