Family HOme Evening

Now the fam is waiting for me to join them for FHE "Remodel Style" The kids are hoping this never ends!

Days 2, 3, 4 & 5

I haven't blogged the last couple of days for several reasons
1) I have been DEAD TIRED at the end of the day and haven't felt like it
2) My computer is acting like the family television while ours is in the garage so it hasn't been available much
3) For as much work as we have done, you can't really tell int he pictures so what is the point?

Okay...so we got the carpet padding out, pulled up all the carpet tacks (which Kelsie and Ty hated because it was so loud!) and found a guy to put the texture on for mot too much. All that was accomplished Friday (Day 2).

Day 3: I cleaned up the ceiling in the Family Room by scraping all the little stuff we missed in our original scraping of the popcorn. It was a very dusty job, but I suceeded. Ty and Kelsie grabbed whatever toys they could find to put over their heads so they could stand under whereever I was scraping. Good family fun! We then had a birthday party to go to and it was Valentines Day so we called it a day!



Day 4 was the Sabbath so we took it easy watching movies on the computer. My little family is now getting too big for us all to fit into our queen-sized-bed comfortably. Did you know you can watch Karate Kid online? It is great!

Day 5: The rain comtinued to pour down so Ty had to splash around a little bit outside. He loves to get out the rubber boots and umbrella. what a cutie!

Today we finished cleaning up the ceiling and filled in all the imperfections in preparation for the texture to come. Dal is ready to quit his day job and become a drywaller. The texture won't be happening until Thursday so we are going to tak eit easy for a couple of days...doing little jobs here and there...making our daily trips to Home Depot...you know...the usual!

Day One

Okay...so we hit the ground running on day one of the remodel. We tried to sleep in (Dal woke me up at 6:45 because he couldn't sleep in). We had a nice waffle breakfast and started working at 9:00.

The popcorn came off great and we were pretty much done with the major scraping in the Living Room by 10:00. Not too shabby! Here's Dal at 10:00 this morning:



Next the carpet got hauled out to the side of the house. Good-bye forever!

And finally...at 9:30 tonight this is where we are. Our goal for the day was to scrape all hte ceilings and get all the carpet out. Check! We did it. Day One was a success!



I know it looks like there is still carpet in these pictures, but that is just the foam underneath. We didn't take it all out because we wanted a little cushioning for the other work to come.

Oh yeah...sorry if you tried to call us today...I took down the computer which happens to also be our telephone. It is now back up and running, though, so feel free to call once again.

And I just wanted to say thanks to Shannon for taking the kids to the library and park today. They loved it. Kelsie kept telling me all afternoon that she got to go to the park with "kinzie." For those of you wondering what they did the rest of the day...they were banished to the garage to watch movies all day. Tyson has been looking forward to this since we started planning this remodel. I wonder how long that excitement will last for him. Kelsie is already over that.

I am dead tired and need to go to sleep now. Bring on Day Two!

The Before Pictures

So I started to take before pictures and somehow got distracted. So here are pictures of the Living Room once we got the furniture taken out and before we started any of the fun stuff. The Family Room looks just the same...same nasty carpet (probably worse), same popcorn ceiling, not same paint, etc.

Here goes nothing...

A New House for the Rigbys!

Okay...so we don't really get a new house, but we are fixing this one up. Starting tomorrow, we are changing a few things around the place. (I guess the fact that our house is now worth next to nothing so we will not be going anywhere anytime soon as we originally thought has finally motivated us to make some home improvements!)

It all started with our nasty carpet. I have wanted to replace it pretty much since we moved in almost five years ago. (I will post pictures of its nastiness later) We decided that since we have small children who believe food tastes better off the floor than from a bowl, new carpet was never an option. Thus we are extending the Pergo from the kitchen into the living room, family room and down the hall. Since we have to clear the house out to pull up the carpet, we figured we might as well scrape off the oh-so-trendy popcorn ceiling while we are at it. And of course, once the popcorn is gone, I am finally going to be able to have the crown molding I have always wanted. Nobody in their right mind would put up crown molding without replacing the old mini-sized base boards that are original to our 50-year-old house. And while we are at it, there are a few rooms that could use a fresh coat of paint. You see how it goes! Who knows how many more projects will be added to the list before the couches come back into the house.

You may be thinking, "Why is Tiffany rambling on about all this in so much detail?" Because it is my blog and I can write what I want to! Just kidding. I just wanted to warn you that I would be offline for who knows how long. I know I don't blog all that much so you probably won't even notice my absence for the next few weeks, but I thought it polite to mention it anyway. So with that...I must go move all my furniture out of the house. Wish us luck (The before and after pictures will be forthcoming) If I find somewhere else in the thouse to set up the computer, I might even get around to posting some action shots of the process so you can all feel bad that you're not here helping us!

This Day Will Go Down in History

Yes...this is a day to be noted in the history books. We will forever more remember January 11th as the day that Kelsie had cute hair at church! It's true. She let me put pretties (a bunch) in her hair, asked for a bow, and left them in all through church.



You may be thinking, "That is a little gutsy, Tiff, to put that much effort into her hair when she has never before left anything in for the entire 3 hours of church. Why not start with something a little simpler?" Here at the Rigby house, we don't do anything half-way! It's all or nothing!

OK...really? I have been experimenting with pretties and bows over the last week. She really likes them, and I found that if I told her to keep it in to show Daddy when he got home, she could make it 2 out of 3 times. So, I will admit that this is not the first day her hair has been "done" but it is the first time we have attempted anything so fancy! It was pretty funny...everyone we saw at church (no that is not an exaggeration...everyone!) commented on her hair. Some people said they didn't recognize her at first...others were curious as to how it came to be (knowing the temperament of my adorable 2-year-old), most were just plain impressed.

Now I just have to work on getting my parts a little straighter and perfecting the use of gel and hairspray and I can see great things in our future. Wish me luck!

Side Note: This picture WAS taken after church...so the hair is a little fuzzy. It looked better in the morning...I promise!

Lookin' Good!

Okay...so I got Dal a suit for Christmas which ended up being two suits. I am not going to go into the long story of why there ended up being two. The short of it is that we might be keeping both, but are hoping to just keep one. The problem is, though, we can't decide which one we like better. I think Dal is just too good lookin' no matter what he has on.

Despite that, we need some input on which suit to keep. Here are the two choices, in no particular order. Make sure to answer our poll on the right to let us know which one you like best...we'll probably take your opinion into consideration!

Christmas Continued...

Santa came through with a stroller for Kelsie. Now if we could just get some clothes for her babies!

While with the fam over Thanksgiving, I made name signs for each of the kids' rooms. I think they turned out really well. They might not have been the favorite present this year, but they liked them and have already chosen where they want them hung in their rooms.

Tyson also got a Planet Heroes space ship from Santa. It was just what he wanted. We didn't get around to writing letters to Santa this year, so we had to call him on Christmas Eve. He was busy with the elves, making toys, so we left him a message. Apparently he got it in time since we each got what we asked for. What a great Santa!

Now that Kelsie has her bright neon orange purse and yellow heels (thanks to big brother, Tyson) she is ready for the world. She has been clomping around in those shoes since she got them. I am a little nervous she is going to break an ankle or something. The price we pay for beauty!

Since I was nervous to spend the holiday with just our little family (I am used to millions of people around on Christmas) I decided that we would have the missionaries over for dinner. That way I would be able to cook a big meal (and not waste it all) and keep my mind off of being away from family! It worked. It gave me plenty to do all day and we had a great time. The meal was excellent and the missionaries, as always, brought a great spirit into our home.

Most of our day was spent lounging around, playing with our new toys. In fact, none of us even got dressed until right before the missionaries showed up for dinner at 6:00. It was a great day. I hope you all had a great Christmas too.

It's HERE!!!

The anticipation for Christmas this year was more than I had ever imagined possible. All day Christmas eve, Ty was counting down until Daddy got home so that it would be almost Christmas day. We had a great Christmas Eve dinner at some friends' house, set out our doughnuts for the big guy and even got the kids to bed at a decent time. Thankfully, Ty let us sleep until around 7:00 before he couldn't stand it anymore. WE read Luke 2 in our bed and then ended up waking up Kelsie...I guess she didn't remember that it was CHRISTMAS!!!

In Rigby style, we hung the sheet to keep any sneaky eyes from seeing stuff they weren't supposed to. Dal explained to Tyson that the youngest family member gets to go into the Living Room first. He insisted that Kelsie was not the youngest and that he should go in first. It wasn't until he realized nobody was going to get to go in unless it was done that way, that he gave in.

Kelsie was just SO excited about the treats in her stocking that she couldn't have cared less about anything else...that was until we started opening presents. Her stocking treats were soon forgotten in a flurry of wrapping paper!

Dal was the present master this year. For some reason he REALLY likes to do that...does it have something to do with when he was growing up...a power thing? I don't know. He did a great job. We did it one at a time so that it would last as long as possible...still wasn't that long. I am going to have to get used to this small Christmas thing.

Note to self...the kids liked the presents from the dollar store AS MUCH IF NOT MORE than the more expensive gifts. Dal tries to remind me this every year, but for some reason I feel like I am jipping them if all the presents come from the Dollar Tree. This is going to have to be continued a little later...gotta run and make the house look like I have done something productive before Dal gets home from work. To be continued...

Ginger Bread House...Move Over!

Making Ginger Bread Houses is a great Christmas tradition...just not one for me. I love the idea. What's not to love...eatible houses covered in frosting and candy...Yum! The trouble is the ginger bread. Have you ever tried working with that stuff? First, you have to have the perfect recipe. Then you have to cut your house pieces EXACTLY right. Then bake them the right amount of time to get the correct firmness. Then comes the fun part...trying to get the pieces to stand up and stay standing up with all the decorations on top. I guess I just don't have the patience or talent for it. The last time I tried, at Enrichment several years ago, my roof pieces didn't quite meet at the top. I decided it would be a sun roof. The sister teaching the class was appalled that I would leave it that way. What can I say...I am not a perfectionist.

My parents had the right idea. We made Christmas trains out of graham crackers when we were kids. Same idea...glue it all together with frosting and decorate with candy. You just didn't have to deal with ginger bread...that was the key. Yeah, we had a lot of broken crackers, but who cares...it's a broken cracker!

Fast forward to 2008 and my attempt at starting fun Christmas traditions for my kids. I decided that I would take any chance out of the equation. We made rice crispy treat houses. I would say they can't fail, but you just have to look at the pictures to see that the roof presents a bit of a challenge. My friend, Eimile, and I got together with our kids last week to make houses. We made the kids' houses first, so we learned from our mistakes. The roofs were a bit heavy to withstand all the frosting and candy and eventually became flat. I think a flat roof is perfectly acceptable. After all, the house I grew up in had a flat roof.


Kelsie couldn't care less that her roof was flat. In fact, the only reason there is even any frosting on her house is because I helped her put a knife-full on. The rest went straight into her mouth. I think she finally got a few pieces of candy on the top too...the ones she didn't like very much.

Tyson, on the other hand, really struggled when his roof came down. He kept saying, "It's not perfect...it's not good enough." I tried to explain that it was my fault the roof fell down, not his, but he wouldn't listen. Once again, we have been traumatized by a Christmas tradition gone bad (Letter to Santa didn't go too well last year). I think this one can be remedied next year though with a little more stable construction.

I cheated a bit with my house after seeing all the roofs collapse on the kids' houses. My roof had a little cardboard and a couple of chop sticks to help it maintin its shape. Anyway, the point is...rice crispy treats are the way to go. If you want it to keep it even simpler, buy the ones from the store and cut them into bricks for your house. They are the perfect consistency for building. And they taste way better than stale ginger bread. We used a combination of homemade and store bought on ours. I think we have found a new tradition for the Rigby family. We will never do anything but Rice Crispy houses from now on!

Merry Christmas from the Rigbys

The Christmas Card Process went a lot smoother this year than last. We had one photo shoot and were able to get a decent picture. I am not sure if it is on-the-wall-for-the-next-four-years-quality, but it was cute enough for a card. And yes...it is still going on the wall so that Kelsie can finally be represented on the family wall in the living room.

I even got the cards sent out on time. Most of you reading this should have received it by now, but just in case something happened (freak act of nature, malicious post man, etc.) and you haven't received our card...here is the picture for all to enjoy!

We hope you all have a great Christmas and have fun over the holiday season. We miss seeing all of our friends and family, but love getting updates on what is happening in your lives. Merry Christmas!

We are still alive!

OK...so by now, you have probably noticed that I am not a very consistent blogger. I promised myself when I started this blog, that I would not let it consume me and take over all my time. I think I have done a pretty good job of that...maybe a little too good of job! Sorry! We have been busy (like everyone else) and this just hasn't made the list of things to do until now. So, like usual, you may get several posts today (depending on how long I can put off working out this morning) and then who knows when the next post will be. I apologize, but that is just how it has to be.

So anyway, we went to Idaho Falls for Thanksgiving and two weddings...my brother, John and one of my roommates from BYU, Lindsay. Dal, of course, had to be back to work the week after the holiday, but the kids and I stayed for another week and a half. It was great fun. I think we ended up going to temple square three times while we were there. It's funny how we never seemed to make it there when we lived in Salt Lake, but this trip I couldn't seem to stay away. Thanks to Jen, we actually got some pictures.




The weddings were both great. We got to hang out with family and to make everything even better, it didn't ever get that cold. It was great. I was extrememly nervous to come home for several reasons. First, I knew I had to do all the things I had been putting off for weeks when I got home. Second, I had to drive home by myself with the kids. It was the first time...Dal wouldn't ever let me before. With a lot of prayers, the drive went PREFECTLY. The kids were gems and we made record time. It makes me think I can go visit whenever I want (Dal doesn't agree). The icing on the cake was that I made the trip for less than $45 in gas. Can't beat that. Too bad gas is going up again. Merry Christmas to us!

It was fun spending time with friends and family...sorry if we missed you. Now that I know I can drive by myself, though, I can come more often and get to visit everyone on the list. See ya all soon!

Happy Halloween

Halloween has come and gone and we had a great time once again in the Rigby household.

Tyson was a knight in shining armor and Kelsie was a dragon so cute that no knight would even think of slaying her!

Kelsie staked herself out with her friend on the minature golf game at the ward activity and pigged out on candy. Luckily, Mackinsie didn't mind the fact that Kelsie was eating all the candy from her pumpkin!

Kelsie LOVES my friend, Becky. Dallan keeps asking if it makes me feel bad that she likes Becky more than me. I think it is great. I know my baby still loves me, but she loves to play with Becky. As Becky points out, she even says "Becky." OK...so it sounds more like Kee-Kee, but we know what she means. It was kind of funny today at church. Becky was home sick so when Kelsie went to sit with her (a weekly occurance), she was so sad not to see her there. In fact, she didn't believe her eyes and had to go back several times to make sure Becky still wasn't there.

Jack O Rigby

I know you have all done it already and it looked a lot like this, but nonetheless, here is our pumpkin carving 2008 experience!

Dal and Ty bought the pumpkin (yes...at Food Maxx...we ran out of time!), Ty drew the face all by himeself, Daddy did the carving and Mommy (with minimal help from the kids) cleaned out the gunk!