Spring and a birthday!!!

That's right.  Not only is it the first day of spring (good-bye old man winter!), but more importantly, it's the big guy's birthday today.  18 years to be exact.  Wow - where have the years gone?  Our big, bold and beautiful Ladde is 18 years old today.  Never has there lived a cooler horse.  Seriously.  :)

I might be a teeney weeney bit partial, but still.  He's totally awesome!!!  Color me blessed...

It's been over a month since I've written anything on my blog.  I guess I just didn't have anything to say...you can stop laughing now!  I've been a wee bit preoccupied of late...to the point where I haven't been sleeping very well at all.  We (my hubby) have been working on our living room remodel project, and I'm very happy to report that it's almost finished.  Well, the hard part is finished.  The ceiling and walls are freshly painted.  The old, nasty carpet has been ripped out and the new wood flooring has been installed.  It looks beautiful, and I'm so pleased with the results.  My hubs did an amazing job!!

Our pellet stove was taken out and all the brick tile hearth work has been removed.  We still need to replace that with either a piece of granite or simply a wood stove pad, and then put the stove back in.  That's pretty easy and quick.  Next up is to purchase, paint and install all the base boards and trim around the doorways.  I've ordered bamboo roman shades in a pecan color (light chocolate), new curtain rods in cast iron finish and linen curtains in natural.  I ordered all that online, so I'm hoping it's what I'm expecting.  We'll see soon enough...

We bought 3 big area rugs, 2 are in the living room providing two different seating areas and one is in the kitchen under our dining table.  We've added two new overstuffed chairs, a recliner that doesn't look like a recliner, two more rocking chairs, an end table and a floor lamp.  Amazingly enough, even with the additions of all that, the room still seems bigger and much more open.  Go figure!  We got a new ceiling light that we still need to install too.  We have plenty of work left to do, but the major work part is finished.  I'm very pleased with the results so far, but am anxious to be done with this project.  And if I feel that way, I can only imagine how my hard-working husband must feel!  :)

We would really like to sell our piano that I've had since I was a child.  I don't play it anymore and it's just collecting dust.  Then eventually, I might get another end table and a different coffee table, but that will be later.  I'm really tired of spending so much of our hard earned savings and would like to see that grow up again before buying anything else.  The water meter went belly up and dear hubby had to replace that along with some water piping, cha-ching!!  And then, we had to replace our vacuum cleaner, the old one died unexpectedly and that was just one more thing.  When it rains, it pours right?  *sigh*

Thankfully, the horses and the dogs and us are all doing well.  We're fat and sassy, losing winter hair by the gobs (the horses, not us) and rejoicing in the fact that we've survived another long, cold winter.  :)  The trees are in bud, the grass is growing like crazy and I have daffodils and daphne blooming!!  Spring has sprung!!
We need to finish up these inside projects so we can get outside when it warms up.  I am so ready to soak up some sun and go camping, ride our horses, get the garden going and spend time on the deck barbecuing with friends.  Doesn't that sound wonderful?  Right now I think a good, long nap sounds pretty good too...but I digress.

Hope all is well with all of you, and that spring has arrived in your neighborhoods too.  I've been remiss in reading your blogs much lately, but hopefully things will get back to normal real soon.  Take care and celebrate with your someone special this first day of spring.  Whoohoo!!!

Blessings to all,
Lorie @ Cingspots