The Grand Basement Plan

I have been working on transforming my basement into usable living space, so I figured it would be a fun project to put up here. I already have my parent's room set-up and the laundry area is in much better condition (I'll try to post before/after pics of those soon) thanks to my sister's help over the last few Sunday afternoons. My goal is to get a hang-out room set up for Ariana by Easter. It won't be a bedroom for her to sleep in (since there are no egress windows), but a place for her to put her clothes, have a lot of her art stuff including her paint supplies and easel and her special fragile things that her siblings are so good at breaking - plus a place for her to be away from siblings when her friends visit.

Here is what I am starting with:

This room has been a storage room with holiday decor, sorted baby and kids clothes for growing into, and a collection of things to "go through". Part of my goal is to go through all the bags and bins of clothes and get rid of everything that doesn't fit in the bins I already have. Some of the bins can be seen in the picture above. That way I will have enough clothes for kids to grow into without having so many clothes that I get overwhelmed and end up with none of the clothes getting worn. I have already moved the holiday decor into my parent's room since that room is so large.

The next step for the room is to put in a floor, finish the walls, paint, add outlets and put in a door. Then we get to move Ariana's things down.

I Like His Style

I really like the way Stephen Crowder gets his point across. His post on global warming is pretty good too.

I'm It

Darcee tagged me, so here I go a-rambling...

1. I like to wander. Many times when I am driving somewhere with no time pressure, I will take a different road just to see where it goes. I used to take special trips - esp out where there are few people - just be out and about before the kids had classes to get me out of the house. The flip-side of this is not being a very good housekeeper because I dislike being home (and all the stuff that comes with the house) so much.

2. The wandering trait runs in my family and usually presents itself first in the form of 2-3 year olds who can amaze Houdini at their ability to get out of secure locations just so that they can wander the neighborhood (so far I have had only 1 child like that, but also a nephew, brother, uncle, grandfather and grandmother who all did the same thing as toddlers).

3. I have strong opinions on a lot of things, but I can be made to change my mind, frequently even, with logical and/or reasonable arguements. The only exception being that I don't question the Church's stand on issues (however the Church's stand has always been based upon reasonable and/or logical arguements that are only further bolstered with secular research, in my opinion anyway). My changing opinions make Jeff crazy because he likes to settle an issue and be done with it, fighting to defend his position "to the death" (or until he doesn't care anymore - which is how I won the homeschool battle). This could cause a real clash, but fortunately Jeff also tends to not care about much, and we avoid the few issues we clash on.

4. I love to learn and I look for opportunities to pick up something new regularly - knitting being the latest trick. I also tend to "file data" I pick up through observing the world around me. I remember doing this as young as 6 or 7 and being frustrated that others didn't make connections like I did because they missed things that were in the backround or happened over time.

5. If I could, I would pack up the family and travel across the US, visiting as many states as possible before we got too homesick. It would take a larger vehicle and a nice chunk of change for things like gas, food, lodging and souvenirs, plus a lot of vacation time for Jeff to accompany us. At this point the larger vehicle and uncertain economic times are the only things holding me back. The sense of adventure traveling like that would offer makes me want to throw caution to the wind and head out even if Jeff had to stay and work and we were crowded in the little van. On the other hand, the kids and I had a hard time when we went camping 2 days without Daddy, so I'm not so sure it would work out well for us, plus what fun is a family trip if we cannot share it as a family?

6. I could easily live without a TV, but not so easily without a computer and high-speed internet. Jeff is almost the opposite (I think he is equally attached to both), so I try to avoid complaining about the TV and watch shows with my husband to be a good wife.

7. I'm not very good at following rules, so I am going to break rules 4-5, at least until I can find 6 people I know with blogs who haven't already been tagged.

Here are the rules:
Rule #1 ~ Link to the person that tagged you.
Rule #2 ~ Post the rules on your Blog.
Rule #3 ~ Write 6 random things about yourself.
Rule #4 ~ Tag 6 people at the end of your post.
Rule #5 ~ Let each person know that they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their Blog.
Rule #6 ~ Let the tagger know your entry is up.