B.C. (Before Carpet)

Here are a few photos of the Master Suite, just prior to the carpet being installed. Sorry a few of them are blurry, I was rushing to get these taken. We were a bit nervous about picking out the color of the carpet, it's a much bigger commitment than a few gallons of paint!

We kept the old wood flooring in the old part of the room, because it really is beautiful and we didn't want to cover it up.


We picked out the style, I guess you'd say, the fluffiness or shag if you will, but weren't too excited about the neutral color choices. We were drawn to a darker color, called Falcon. We decided since our room is larger, over 16 x 16 feet, we could get away with a darker carpet color. Even with the dark purple on two walls. We decided to go for it.


We carried the same color into Number One's closet, above, which is directly off the master bathroom. Falcon goes very well with Scone and dark green.


It will also go smashingly with my closet color, which happens to be pink. This picture is bad, but one day soon I will take a decent picture of my pink closet in all its glory and Falcon carpet.

This is the carpet on the truck, and apparently it is the last picture I took on Carpet Day. You'll just have to wait and see exactly what color "Falcon" is. This carpet was trucked down 60 miles to get to our house. A shorter distance than most of the rest of everything, actually.

Will "Falcon" be too dark?

Does the carpet overwhelm the room?

Or is it simply perfect?

Stay Tuned!

So That Happened...

I woke up the other day to see this:

A huge tree branch had fallen on top of the boys' swing set/club house some time during the night.

You can barely see the swing set, right in front of our house in this picture. We are thankful it didn't land on our house, as it easily could have!


H-Bomb was very sad that they couldn't play on the play set until the tree branch came off. It really would have made one heck of a "tree house" with the branch on there, but it goes without saying that wasn't going to be allowed!


Yes, Sawed Off, your swings are still in the jungle there, you just can't swing right now!

We weren't home when CG had Ranch Hand and Farmer use the tractor and a chain saw to remove the tree branch. I just get to rake up all the smaller branches that made a mess of the side yard!

Now we have to replace several of the main support posts on the play set, as well as the swing beam that were all cracked from the impact with the tree. So there is still no swinging allowed...because you all know how far Home Depot or any lumber stores are from here!

More Photo Shoot Pics!

Here are my favorites, so far:
(thanks Susan!!)

me

Number One

H-Bomb & Sawed Off

C.G.


All photos © Jim Krantz,
CG and I are wearing Adam Kimmel

Grace in Small Things: 5 of 365

I am forcing myself to do this today, because I am sad and concerned about four of my friends/relatives who are all going through serious health problems at the same time, and I am hoping they all come through okay. There isn't much I can do for any of them except send positive energy, so let's cultivate some of that, shall we?

Things I am appreciating today:

1. My health, both physical and mental, as well as the health of my boys, husband, and all of our parents.

2. The new swamp cooler that we installed along with the addition on our old house.

3. The knowledge that our days in this three-room bunkhouse are coming to an end.

4. Number One, who painted a second coat on the ceiling so I could paint the walls while he is on the mountain this weekend.

5. Our garden, which grows bigger by the day, and which very soon will have fresh, ripe tomatoes!

For this cowgirl's feelings about and inspiration for this, go here.
Here are all of this cowgirl's Grace in Small Things posts to date.
For more information, go here: Grace in Small Things: A Challenge for All of Us.

Grace in Small Things: 4 of 365

Man, it has been a long time, but I will keep my word and accomplish this. Eventually!

Things I am appreciating today:

1. My powerful, shiny orange lawn mower I got for my birthday last year.

2. My boys who are just old enough and quite responsible enough to play unattended and not get into trouble while I mow the lawn.

3. My father-in-law and step-mother-in-law who are wonderful and thoughtfully booked a trip for all of us to a luxury resort this weekend.

4. My husband who can make me laugh about things that bug me but really need to be laughed at.

5. A freshly-mowed, green oasis in the middle of the desert, and enough irrigation water to keep it that way.

For this cowgirl's feelings about and inspiration for this, go here.
Here are all of this cowgirl's Grace in Small Things posts to date.
For more information, go here: Grace in Small Things: A Challenge for All of Us.

Cowgirl Min, Fashion Model!

You may remember that this cowgirl was hired to model designer clothing for Adam Kimmel's 2010 Spring/Summer Collection. The photo shoot took place at our ranch, with photographer Jim Krantz. (you can see more of Jim's pictures of the shoot, but sadly not one of me, here)

Here is the first picture of myself that I have seen on the WWW, and likely the only actual picture of me that you may ever see on this blog:

photo © Jim Krantz for Adam Kimmel

The funny thing is, the only piece of Adam Kimmel clothing I am wearing in this picture is a sweater, which Sabina the wardrobe lady told me was "probably cashmere." I believe her, and I really don't want to know how much it would cost in a store. Plus, it wouldn't last one hour in a real cowboy workday. Anyway, the jeans, the chinks, the boots are mine; the hat is Jean-Claude's. And the red dirt is on our ranch. (If you go to Jim's website, you can see the spectacular ranch scenery BEHIND the white muslin sheet!)

So much fun! I will keep searching for pictures of myself (obsessively) and let you know if I find any more. In the meantime, you can check out the rest of Adam's collection, including a couple pictures of CG, here.

The Pantry (for Rene')

I realized the house is getting to the point where I can show you more and should explain a bit more, thanks to Rene's questions about the pantry. So if you will please ignore the construction debris and extra furniture, that is exactly where we will start our tour:

The Pantry

Just off the new dining room, the pantry door goes through our old exterior wall and into the former garage. I couldn't find the tape measure just now, so I'll have to add the measurements at a later date. I'm tempted to say it's about 7' x 13'. Off the top of my head, I could be wrong. (What? That's right, you heard me. But I'll deny it).


The door to the pantry is one from the original bunkhouses. I still need to put the old #6 back on it. We made our new doors pocket doors. I really don't know why everyone doesn't install pocket doors, we love them.

Let's go inside, shall we?

Through the door to the right is where we will put our extra freezer and extra refrigerator, side by side. Living 35 miles from town, you need to stock up. A cowgirl's gotta have a decent pantry. We used to have our extra fridge and freezer in the garage.


Through the door to the left is where we installed some of our old kitchen cabinets and part of the old bar, for storage and also to have a work surface. (Incidentally, this is exactly the size our bar, and thus our kitchen, used to be: the length of those cabinets. Can you believe it??) Anyway, this is where the microwave will live, where we can run a dehydrator or meat slicer, or whatever appliance we'd like to use, but without cluttering up the main kitchen counter top. Sort of like a butler's pantry, I guess, but without a sink or anything.

We'll probably store extra appliances, like mixers, ice cream makers, etc. here in the pantry, even if we end up using them in the big kitchen. The pantry cabinets will probably also house some of our serving dishes, table linens, and miscellaneous other things. There is also room above the counter top for a couple shelves that will run the length of the counter.


Starting at the end of the cabinets, we will have floor-to-ceiling shelving that will wrap around the wall across from the cabinets, and go as far as it can while still allowing us room to get into the fridge and freezer.


I'm so excited to have a nice, bright, walk-in space to store all of our food and extra appliances. Maybe someday before we move, I'll take a picture of our current Bunkhouse living situation. I'm not complaining, I'm just sayin' a family of four can't live in a total of 3 rooms forever.