We got some fun new decorations for the lake house.  Check out what we added and did this weekend. New bathroom shelving in the master bath. New signs that my wife and kiddos gave me for my birthday. New shelves put up in the living room.  They still need to be painted. Rearranged some things in the entry way.  Chelsea said she liked the fishes here.  I think I do too. Some more bead board put up in the kitchen.  Thank you for all your help Jim! More cabinet doors up.  New Sign on the left.  And more backsplash on the walls.  Kitchen is really starting to come together. And finally.  There was a ton of birds just hanging out, right off the dock in the water.  This picture doesn't do it justice, but it was pretty amazing. Anyway. Better get back to work see you guys next week.  Later.

 Great News Everybody!  The Quinlan Bypass - Hwy 276 is scheduled to open tomorrow.  See the details listed below. This should make the drive back and forth much easier and quicker.  It has been a long time coming and we cannot wait to try it out. Click below to see a youtube video Trophy Fish Outdoors took with their drone.  Pretty Cool! Special Thanks to Trophy Fish Outdoors for making this awesome video. UPDATE 7-25-2023 The entire bypass is now open and it is nice, plus it saves about 10 minutes.

We took all the ugly direct tv satellite dishes down off the roof this weekend and replaced one of them with a huge ugly tv antenna.  It is big, but it's not really all that ugly. And it's hidden on the backside of the house on the roof. I got so tired of missing the Cowboys play and not having a reliable source for local weather. It's like 65 miles to where the towers are located, near Cedar Hill.  I really didn't believe this would work, but this was the one that was recommended to us by a guy that does antenna installs full time. Sure enough. Every channel, clear as a bell.  Super excited.

  We decided on and have started installing some kitchen backsplash.  It will do for now until we can afford the full kitchen remodel. We finally got the front fence all painted.  Here is a photo of one of my helpers hard at work. Work is slowly progressing on the kitchen cabinets. Below you can see my assembly line process set up in the garage. Got the basketball goal up, so now the kids can get out and play. And with all the rain we have had lately, the lake is no longer below average, it is nice and full at about a foot over normal.  The water looks great.  Well better get back to work. See ya soon.

 Well, the nightstands we ordered almost a year ago for the master bedroom finally came in.  When they said everyone was having supply chain issues, that's no joke.  Good thing we are almost done furnishing the place.  Still want to get a few more big ticket items, but more on that later.  Here are some of the latest pics. Added a few more little touches here and there.  I especially like the little sailboat doorstop.  And here are some more of those fabulous sunset scenes we get there almost every night. It might be a little bit before I update again because the kids school activities have use running around like crazy.  But remember to drop us a line if you would like to stay out at the place. We will see ya soon.

While we aren't up on the AIRBNB website yet, we are taking reservations from both friends and family.  If it's on the weekend, you need to be aware that we might have already planned to be there doing updates and renovations that weekend.  But the place sleeps 12, so if you don't mind the company, any weekend will work.  Drop us a line and we can give you our schedule. The weekdays are almost always open for guests.  Just call or email either of us or leave us a comment below and let us know what days you would like to come over and we can make arrangements and give you the rundown.  Please no requests any further out than 3 months in advance. Here is a photo of last weekends stormy aftermath sunset. I need to get out there and trim up some branches, huh?  

I haven't posted in a bit.  We had some halloween fun in East Tawakoni over the holiday weekend.  It was a lot of fun.  Especially the cake walks.  We left the place with 4 cakes and a lot of candy.  Yum. We are still working on the kitchen cabinets.  Can you tell the freshly painted ones from the yucky old ones? I am still working on updating the cabinet doors to a more modern shaker style.  That sounds funny. Modern Shaker Style. I think they are coming along pretty good.  We should be able to hang some up soon and get a better idea of what the finished product will look like. And lastly, another beautiful sunset right out the back windows.  Fabulous!

 First off, if you don't know about freecycle.org or the nextdoor app, you definitely need to check those out.  That and the Habitat for Humanity Re-Store have been invaluable resources for free and super low cost items for almost any need that you might have. A neighbor up in Allen, his kids outgrew their basketball hoops goal.  We got it completely FREE.  The hardest part was transporting it down to the lake, but slowly and surely we managed. We hope to have lots of fun things to enjoy during your stays there.  Not only lake toys but basketball, volleyball, ladder golf, cornhole.  We have some big plans. Didn't get a ton done this weekend, but here is the short list of activity. We got the stairway ceiling painted.  It was just mudded and textured, but now it's painted too. Here is an updated picture of the living room coming together, with our kids hard at work, as you can tell. And then, ever so slowly we have been updating the wall decor.  Th...

 Well now that we got all the room doors done, it's time to move onto a new project.  We are trying to update the 70's style kitchen to something a little more modern.  But there are really only 2 problems there.  1) I don't have a clue what I am doing. 2) We don't have the money to hire someone that does.  So what do ya do?  Watch a bunch of youtube! Chelsea finished up with the wallpaper in the main bathroom, and it turned out pretty great. Also got the new cabinet draw pulls on. Now we just need to decide what color for the walls in there. New kitchen curtain tie backs installed.  Pretty sweet. New king size beds finally assembled and ready for use.  Still waiting on Nebraska Furniture Mart to deliver the stinking nightstands.  Almost 1 year worth of delivery chain issues? Sure. Now we got 2 kings.  2 queens. 2 bunkbeds. and we are considering putting in a trundle / daybed that was gifted to us from her excellent uncle. So now it slee...

IT REALLY TOOK FOREVER! But we finally got all the doors updated and installed. I like the way they turned out. This might seem kinda silly, but in other door related news, all the bedroom and bathroom doors that needed locks on them, now have locks on them. We finally got the King bed that we ordered in January in and have started getting it assembled.  But oddly enough, the night stands still have not arrived. We have also started assembling the king bed for the upstairs too. Started putting in the wallpaper in the main hallway bathroom. I got some poles, to start working on some new street signs for the neighborhood. And finally we were offered a boat for free.  But with the amount of work that we currently have, there is NO WAY that we are ready to undertake another project right now.  Anyone want a boat? Just let me know. Long weekend.  Better get back to it.  We will see you all real soon.  Take care!