My Summer DIY List

Spontaneously selling Josiah's bed and replacing it with a full now has my brain rolling. It's time to revisit Pinterest so I can slowly redesign and redecorate a few things. Think I can figure out and master Jim's power tools? We definitely don't have a shortage of wood downstairs, but the trick will be trying to use mostly what we have along with excess flooring.

Potential projects: Josiah's headboard, coffee table, cubbies for the back door, fabric covered canvas for above our bed, throw pillows for living room and both bedrooms, a new (much larger) top for the kitchen table, and if I get really good a corner desk unit for the office.

Reality? I probably won't get more than one building project done. Sewing, though, no problem! After a good night's sleep my enthusiasm for a full summer is finally appearing!

And just like that it's summer...

Where did this school year go?! At times it seemed like it was flying by faster than I wanted, and at other times the end couldn't come fast enough. And so it goes with teaching, I suppose. But summer is really, truly, finally here, and the reality still hasn't quite sunk in. Could be due to sheer exhaustion, or could also be due to the number of things running through my head. I've been asked what big plans I have for my summer, and to be honest I'm not really sure how to answer. Usually I have grand plans, but I haven't even started to consider what this summer might include. Here are a few things I've randomly mulled over in the last few months. Hopefully jotting them here will both get the ideas flowing and keep me from forgetting!

• School: Read bag full of 10ish teacher books
• House: paint master bedroom and sew some super fun and very loud curtains with fabric from Modern Textiles; spring clean (yes, I realize it's summer, but if you've met a teacher you know that doesn't happen in the last month of school!); catch up on office paperwork; clean out the basement and sell everything on a garage sale!
• Yard: figure out how to make the lawn look like the golf course, plant a few pots, add a few plants to the back, add a little secondary bed by the green fence
• Sew: too many projects to list...
• Catch up on digital scrapbooking and make family yearbooks
• Mary Kay: continue building and encouraging my team and customers on the road to directorship!!! 

And, of course, there are all those FUN non-listy things that I get to just do whenever while Josiah and I take full advantage of getting to be together ALL SUMMER: sit in a lawn chair and read a book A LOT, go to the lake, take advantage of the CSA harvest events and figure out how to freeze veggies, go to the pool, ride bike, take naps, head out to Buffalo River State Park for Prairie Preschool (I might secretly be just as excited to take Josiah as he will be to go), meet friends for coffee, go garage sale-ing (yep, I don't think that's spelled right, but Blogger said my options are sailing or saling, which don't look right either...), visit family, update and revise my cookbook (yep, I "wrote" one!), and relax (what's that again?)!

My goal is to not go into my classroom until August. Should we start a pool and everyone can put their money on how long I make it before I head in?

Oh, and I should probably predetermine bedtime regulations for both Josiah AND me. I could have gone to sleep at about 8:00, and now it's 12:19 and here I am sitting at my computer. Will someone please knock some sense into me and send me to bed?! That might also help accomplish my reading goals for the summer...