Some Call It Nesting

If you have lived or do live in a small space, you understand.

You literally have a 1000% chance of losing your mind.

Or killing your spouse.

Or both.

And then when you add ministry into the mix, you are confronted with this life-long question...

"How do you set up a small living room to be conversational for the 10 high school girls that will be here for small groups and also have a space to write a paper on Barthonian Missiological Viewpoints on Evangelicalism ?"

Oh. You don't ask those questions? Weird.

We love where we live, with it's old charm and "city" living location. But we HATE that on any given day, the one big room in our apartment is our living, dining, office, library, conference room.

That is just straight stressful.

Especially for an "A-type" personality.

And if you are blessed with an incredible and amazing "B-type" husband whose passions and brainstorming sessions run much faster than his ability to clean up after himself...

Have you ever seen that movie called "The Perfect Storm"? Ya'll feel me?

With a Seminary-going husband, a home-based photography business, a High School Ministry and a second bedroom that will someday be for our sweet child, we started wondering if we could make our 700 square foot apartment work.

Insert IKEA...
and the small little genius rooms that they make in their showrooms to make you believe you could turn a hole in the backyard into luxury living. (That is our next project.)

So, with a few purchases and a lot of re-purposings...
We decided to stay put and see if we could make this ity-bity living space functional.

And so, without further adieu, I would like to share with you what some have called "nesting".
We like to call it "living wisely into your space".

And, Lord-willing, a few extra years added on to Erik's life.

Gearing Up

Oh my. What is the date? With the mixture of church fundraisers, photo sessions, mission trip planning, housesitting, and finishing up all of our last steps for our home study....

I have completely neglected this little blog. Poor guy.

But now that I have a some-what rainy day and nothing to do (for approximately 12 hours), I can confidently say that I am back!

And we are TOTALLY gearing up...for A LOT!
We have exactly 6 days until our last home study meeting and exactly 7 days until our Mini Session Fundraiser! Oh geez.

Last night, a few incredible ladies came over to help put together some of the backgrounds that we are making for the Mini Sessions. We got one background completed and parts of another...but mostly, we spent time laughing, talking life around a great spread of food, and enjoying each other's creativity and wisdom. It was soul filling at its finest!

And although I didn't get any pictures of the hotties working...I captured a few of what we did and a couple shots of my models showing off how awesome the background looks when you snap a photo!

Thanks ladies for your help!! I'm so excited for next weekend!

All Work and ALWAYS Play!

The Anderson's had an HGTV moment today.
Yup.
Calendars marked.
Time cleared.
Cell phones thrown in the trash...
Come on people! Not really! We had to use them for instructions!

All that to be said. WE GOT STUFF DONE!!
There were a few things around our apartment that most renters would call upon their landlord to fix. But we, being the people that don't like to do things the easy way, decided to take on the challenge of fixin' her up instead!
And so...our list looked something like this...
1. Replace back garage door.
2. Paint front door.
3. Replace handles on windows that had fallen off and/or needed Stone Cold Steve Austin to open.
4. Fix back screen door.
5. Rearrange living room for fall season (since we can only have our couch in one place during the summer due to the awesome window AC that we have pumpin' the cool air to keep us alive in this crazy place they call the Central Valley).

Check. Check. Check. Not so much check (but saved for another day). AND CHECK!!

Here are some pics from our "DIY Kinda Saturday"!

Naturally....as any sane DIY couple should...we started the day at the Farmers Market for a nice cup of coffee and...

Bacon on a stick. Yes folks...it is disgusting and life-alteringly amazing all at the same time!

From there...we got to business.

This was our old back garage door....please note the gapping empty whole in between the front and the back of the door. That is because it was hollow and basically made from construction paper. 

 Erik workin' real hard on our new beautiful door from the Habitat for Humanity ReStore!

Project 1...COMPLETE! Lookin' good!!

On to the window handles...what a hard workin' guy!

I was in charge of the "Red Door" project! 

 SOOOOO GREAT!!!

 Um seriously...how hot is that red door?! (and the guy behind it!)

 On to the living room "rearrange"! Here are some before and afters!

Before:

 After:

 Overall...I'd say one crazy awesome, super productive, and wonderful DIY Saturday! I think we are ALL a little tired.

Semi-Extreme Home Makeover: Anderson Style

So, if any of you read my post on "Spicin' Up the Laundry" then you know that we have been working on a plan to transform our EYESORE of a Laundry/Kitchen into something a bit more stylish! Well...I would like to announce that the last 24 hours have been known as "The Great Transformation" in the Anderson apartment! Yesterday, Erik and I headed to Home Depot for paint and the Habitat for Humanity ReStore for an old door to build an enclosure for our laundry that awkwardly sits at the end of our kitchen. After some prepping last night, recruiting of the troops today, and two visits to JoAnn...we spent today painting, building, sewing, and recreating our kitchen! Ever want to know what you can do to your house for less than $100? Check out our Semi-Extreme Home Makeover: Anderson Style!

BEFORE:

AFTER:

Pinning.

Ok...have we all experienced Pinterest? And have we all decided that it should be called "Pin-obsession"? I can't stop, people. I have a serious problem. I'm a board and a pin away from checking myself into rehab. Or should we say (insert cheesy catchphrase) "Pin-hab"?

If you haven't heard about it...I apologize in advance. You will probably need to check into "pin-hab" with me once you do. My friend, Katie, introduced me. It was like a REALLY good blind date. One of those ones where you show up at a friend's house thinking that you are going to just hang out, but secretly they have invited over another friend that you don't know as they cross their fingers and hope for fireworks and shooting stars at first meet.

Like that.

Only better.

So, my friends...may I give you another reason to spend way to much time on the internet obsessing over things you love... pinterest.com.

Pinning=Winning!

Not Yo Momma's Jam!

Mason jars are making a comeback, peeps! And the greatness is...most of the DIY ideas are cheap and easy! I even spray painted some of them white (using a paper star cutout taped to the front to leave a star-shaped impression). Here are some picture of our backyard and how I turned those suckas into mood lighting for the patio! :)

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