Variety Pack Day! Downspout Day! Woo hoo!

So I'm biding my time on the stair. What to do in the mean time. What to do.

Breathlessly in suspense to see if the shock of the new paint wears off on Mike. Waiting for the go ahead and keep it or the go ahead and get rid of it. Memory serves he didn't like the stripes initially either so I'm hoping hoping hoping the more he sees it....He did say the other day, "it's growing on me." So y'all keep your fingers crossed for me, ok?

I did proffer a variation of my plan to him today which involves keeping the grays, revamping the stair idea a smidge and painting the remaining walls a bright happy color. He asked me to sketch it out so I need to get right on that. I um, ahem, already exchanged the stair paint in anticipation. Ahem. Cough.

Heh, I did uh, happen upon a uh, hm. An issue, um. Though. Uh. Well ok, fine. Sigh. It appears I'm a paint chip hoarder. In my quest to present happy bright color options, rifling through my baggie of paint chips I paused, held up the bag and thought, uh, huh, um, I'm a freaky paint chip hoarder.

I counted for you. 331 individual paint chip cards. Yeah. I've clearly got a serious problem.

Anyway, I still owe you that post, how I accomplished the grays paint effect. I want to share how because I did it for less than $40. Jeez, the more I think about it, I could have done it for even less. Ah well.

But in the mean time, my brain is pretty project-scattered sans a major target. That's usually when I try to wrap up smaller nagging items.

Variety Pack time!

Like jamming a hook in the library ceiling and swagging over the swanky light fixture. But hey, small item checked off my list.

Ah, ceiling hooks!

Ah, swaggy light fixture! Yay!

I have not abandoned the DIY library rug, in case you were wondering. It's just a slow progression that I am not tending too often enough. I did start knotting in the pom poms! Finally! Heh. Sorta barely. Not checked off the list!

The other day I clicked on a Bob Vila pin over there on the Pinterests and came across a spiffy sounding product, Good Bye Cracks.* Huh. Interesting. So I look it up on my Menards app and ta-da, lo and behold, there it is in-store. I picked some up as we've got a long crack in the dining room plus the one over the master bathroom door is back.

Dining room crack by a window.

Master bedroom crack over bathroom door. OoOoh, wow.

Holy boring photos, huh? Wow.

That dining room crack is not just a crack though, I discovered. It's like a whole shift, an eighth inch plus change in plane. Yeah, I'm um, concerned. That's a big settle.

I only have the joint compound smeared on since these lovely photos were taken. Haven't tried the crack spray yet. Boy that sounds weird and awkward.

I'll keep you posted.

The biggie today, since it's a wondrously fantastic above 70 degree day here in the Windy City, whooooie wow spring!, was the downspout. Temps drop back to normal tonight so I figured today was the perfect day to tidy up this disaster area, especially since the three foot mountain of snow obscuring it is finally gone.

Ah yes, the downspout. Wheee. Freakin' rain barrel....

Seriously? Ugh. The status of the mess as discovered today.

Please, again, I am all for recycling, conserving, reduce, reuse, being mindful. But this rain barrel, ugh. Pfffft, done with it. Had it! *hands tossed into the air*

I dashed over to Menards (sans a coat! Holy happiness, no coat!) to pick up a piece o' downspout. Only comes in ten foot lengths. Hmph. Rather frustrating. I can only get eight foot lengths of things into my cutie Rabbit. Ah well, I'll figure it out, I say to myself as drag that thing around the store.

There is a solution to every problem, my friend.

Yeah, that's how I resolved that minor issue.

Don't panic, I only needed about 45" worth of spout. Which was why it was frustrating at the store. How come downspout people don't make four or five foot pieces? It was either a tenner or three pieces of 15". Then with all those multiple seams? Screw that.

I tried to move the barrel out of my way and uh, oops.

Biggest ice cube ever. Will be melted by November in time for next winter.

This is why these things should be disconnected for winter. Mmm hm. Doh. I can't be the only forgetful one, right?

Anywhoooo. A quick zip of the ol' grinder and I had my piece.

Woo hoo! Yeah baby!

So, handily there was a connection point just above where we cut last summer so I reused the existing strap and screw there. Plug the bendy straw white drain part onto the end, a few sheet metal screws so I don't have to fight with it falling off all summer, reconnect the black ten foot drain pipe.

extend downspout water foundation runoff

Bam, water runneth away. Rock for good measure weight. Yeah. Dammit.

Sure it's not ideal. Sure it's not the best solution. It's still temporary until we really give the yard some good thought and have a good plan. But. This is what worked for us before. So right back to it I went.

Mission accomplished and now I don't have that plaguing me which feels very very very good.

So yeah, all righty, I best head off to sketch up my stair idea for Mike.

Lest I forget though, as per usual my Variety Pack Day posts typically contain a recipe or several, so here's what I'm thinking for dinner: Barbecue Chicken Sandwiches. With such nice weather today, I've got lounging in the back yard itchies, BBQ and grilling and all that ridiculously nummy fun lolling in my head. Aw boy, I better hop on getting the new outdoor chair cushions all stitched up and ready too! Yay spring!

We will wistfully miss spring and summer with Hailey in the yard, oh sigh ugh, the yard we got for her. But we'll teach Finn all the joys.