Kids with real paint

We decided to get the kids involved in their own room makeover as part of our a-room-a-month mission.

So this past public holiday we dressed them in old clothes and braved two kiddies with "real" paint and paintbrushes... they had so much fun!

 

 

 

 

 

Hopefully we'll be able to make our deadline for the end of the month... so much to do still!

A-room-A-month

Since the end of last year, the house and all renovations/redecorations that went with it were neglected.  Holidays & Birthday's took preference, and our time over the past few weekends were spent at parties!

This left us with an unfinished house, in a perpetual state of being "not-quite-done-yet".  From the time of moving in, to now, we've touched on each space in the house, trying to improve bits and pieces as we go along, sometimes a big reno, sometimes a quick fix... resulting in every space and room still needing "finishing".

Bradley and I have resolved to tackle all the loose ends over the next year, which brings us to the:

a-room-a-month challenge

It's simple really, each month we will try to complete one room/space/area in the house.  Not an easy task, but a necessary one.  This could include everything from painting skirtings, to fixing light fittings, to hanging curtains, refurbishing and decorating.

We haven't planned the order of which room we'll tackle in each month, as it will come down to time and finances available, so we'll decide after each room is complete which area get's our attention next.

First up: The kids bedroom

Amongst other things we have to:

Paint skirtings

Paint cupboard doors

Hang curtains properly

Put up pictures & hooks

Put window arms back on!

Organise soft toys

Make bunting flags

Clear out and repack clothing

(take out all clothes they've outgrown!)
Do something with the books that end up here instead of the playroom...

Hopefully I'll be able to report back on a finished room - the first in the house - by the end of this month.  Input, suggestions, ideas, feedback and encouragement is always welcome!

Have a happy weekend

PS many people have asked me about the floor in the kids bedroom.  

We "white-washed" it, during our previous renovation: sand floor, paint white, wipe off paint, apply water-based varnish.  I like the lighter floors compared to the dark wood look, and we'll probably end up doing the same for the kids playroom:

Almost FOUR!

My baby-boy can't understand why I'm giving him excessive hugs and kisses all week.  So precious are the minutes and seconds that we spend with our kids, it's out of pure disbelief of how quickly he's grown that I've gone into cuddling overload with him.

Today is his last day of being THREE, tomorrow he turns FOUR.  Whadda boytjie!

Just the other day he was 6 weeks old:

and then a few seconds later he was 3 months old:

and then I blinked my eyes and he was 5 weeks away from turning FOUR:

Monkey ONE and Monkey (me)TOO... Monkey-ing around!

Me and my Camera

So it's out there now.  In cyberspace, somewhere in the universe... my new photography business.

Holding my breathe to see what happens, wondering if it's good enough, if I could do more, if I could do better, if I've ticked all the boxes... waiting... and then... I got it!

Fan-mail.

 Seriously. I couldn't believe it, I'm awed and humbled by the amount of people that have taken time out of their day to actually write an email/comment/text about my renewed venture into the world of photography, just to say what they think of my website, my entrepreneurship, my courage and of course my photos.  Words of encouragement, praise and loads of luck.

And boy do I feel lucky...

...to have such awesome friends, family and random strangers in my life ;)

Thank you to everyone that's cheering for me and referring(!) my business.  I'll continue to blog in my personal capacity on this site, but for most of my photographic endeavours please see the new website (that has its own separate blog as well): 

www.joannejohansen.weebly.com

It's all still really a work in progress, so look out for updates!

Wishing everyone a happy weekend,

Getting my Awesome back

First post of the year... its taken a whole January for me to stop being unsure & anxious, and just start being Awesome.  

And of course, Happy!

It's a decision you make.  Simple.

Deciding to take on the beautiful world of photography full time was a natural one, albeit scary. Putting off to make that decision was what was causing all the trouble and stress!

I've been given some amazing gifts by Matty to launch into a professional career, and I'm about to complete an intensive one-on-one course with a renowned Cape Town Photographer.  With a little more equipment, I'll have the know-how and confidence to take on more & bigger projects!

Can't wait to share the details of my journey with you, but in the meantime, I'll do brief "catch-ups" and long overdue updates on what's been happening over the past few weeks with the kids and the holidays.

Yours in Awesomeness

Little People - Big Changes

The arrival of my daughter's second birthday, marked her official transition to toddler-hood (well in my eyes she'll always be my baby).  Along with this significant milestone, come significant changes - one of them being the transition from cot to bed... or as we call it "little-big-bed".

This had a domino affect on the sleeping arrangements in the house which resulted in a very excited Christopher graduating from "little-big-bed" to "big-big-bed" and while we talking about musical beds, let me at this stage mention that these bed assignments bear no weight to where they actually spend the early hours of the morning sleeping; namely in "mommy-and-daddy-big-big-bed".  Knowing the way from their beds to ours like a homing beacon, they can walk the path in their sleep... and often they do!

Actually this change was a bit overdue, Sophia had for the past few weeks already claimed Christopher's "little-big-bed" as her own, and climbed into it every night before we had to pry her out kicking and screaming and put her in the cot... and after the move, she has not once asked to go back to her old nest and is quite good at staying in her new bed and falling asleep in it by herself (one of my original concerns).  Christopher is just as proud of his upgrade and he was the one to insist on staying in the same room as Sophia; we had to put together during renovations, and now they refuse to stay apart.  So now they share a bedroom, and we're creating a Playroom (yay!).

A momentous occasion; my little people are growing up so fast I can barely catch my breath!

Last night in littler beds...

...first night in bigger beds!

Have a happy weekend!

Building a Bathroom... and Passage

I'm having a lets-procrastinate-some-more-today-because-nothing-seems-to-get-done-anyway-and-there's-way-too-much-to-do-before-Sophia's-party-next-week kinda day... generally feeling beat down about the state of my  house and not seeing the end of all this!


The best medicine for these moments are looking back at how far we've come, it helps seeing the change from this point of view and hopefully motivates me to keep going... so here are some more photo's on how the bathroom and passage progressed from concrete jungle to a semi-finished space:

Bath - check, Basin - check, Toilet - check!

Attractive wall space...

"Building-in and Bricking-up" the Bath and Basin

Tiling starts - Yay!

Slowly seeing progress...

At this stage I realise that the colour we decided on for the walls are the same as the tiles! Eeeeek, too much cream for me! (so I've repainted it in the meantime)

There's that monkey again :)

Passage pre-painting

Passage post-painting!

Feels like things are coming together, bit by bit! 
For now I can live with "semi-finished"




Happy Productive Friday!

Hello Yellow!

I fell in love with this yellow and grey colour scheme....(thanks Pinterest!)... simple yet happy, neutral -  with a significant pop, gentle and fresh.  Well...

...as you can clearly see, my inspiration board and actual room are miles apart... in fact they're in different time zones entirely!

The yellow is off-key, the temporary curtains with the "hello"-turquoise detail are severely hampering the effect... and the lack of artwork/accessories is dismal.

Except for the jumping monkey, I feel the space is lacking severely.  So back to the drawing-board:

 * Get new curtains

* Get storage!

* Get artwork

* Get side-tables to fit

* Get a door

* Get some rest!

Anybody got more ideas for me!?!?

What I am happy about is having a carpet installed and having the skirting boards put in immediately (and not waiting a year, like in our lounge) and redoing the yucky old steel window frame (more on that in another post) and of course I'm super-amped that the space and the whole house is taking shape. 

The next phase of bedroom renovation will hopefully see us knocking through another wall (the one that the tree was painted on) to the outside room to create a dressing space and en-suite bathroom - this I think, will happen in about a hundred years time. Not just from a financial perspective, but also from a disruptive-chaos point of view. 

Enough with the havoc! in with the calm, harmony and organisation ;)

Thoughts, feedback & advice most welcome!