River Rock

For the last month we have been working on getting rid of the river rock that is surrounding the house.  It's along side the driveway, around the garage, behind the back of the house, and underneath the pine trees in the back.  What a project!!!!  So far we've only finished the playset area and one little spot up front.

Here's the mess we have in the backyard!

 Before and during rock removal

After most removed

Now we are trying to figure out what we want to do for a patio and the rest of the yard.  It sure is a lot of work!!

Kitchen

I started changing the color of the cabinets in March.  It was a 4 step process, a kit I got from Home Depot. 

It took about 2 weeks to finish because of the different steps of the process and dry time in between.

Early April Mike put in the counter tops.

A few weeks later he put in the tile backsplash.  It's finally finished!

Moving the playset over

We moved the playset over in April.  Mike took down a pine tree in the corner of the backyard to make room.

We shoveled out a ton of river rock and put down mulch to clean up the area and have a nice area for the kids to play.

Garage

In March Mike made the 1 1/2 car garage into a 2 car.  The cement slab was poured for the entire 2 car, but a little less than half was not enclosed and was a little patio.

This was in the fall before we bought the house

Once he started tearing it apart

The patio is gone

The garage door is installed

After:

Mike resided the whole garage.  Now we just need to paint the service door and wrap the openings.  And of course organize the inside!  We also decided to put in some windows on the side and back so Mike can work in there and see the kids playing in the yard. 

Late in the summer Mike finished the wrap around the opening of the garage door: