Thursday, January 23, 2014

Laundry Room Changes - Paint and a Pedestal

For Christmas, Trent's dad had made me a pedestal for our washer and dryer to raise them about 12 inches. I was very excited to get them to our house and in place! No more getting down and crawling into the washer or dryer to retrieve any clothes that was stuck to the back or top... (First world problems, I know!)

Last weekend, Trent's parents came to visit and brought along the pedestal with their truck. We decided this would be a great time to paint the laundry room since it would probably be the last time the washer and dryer would be moved for a long time!

We decided to paint the room yellow and went with the color Whisper Yellow by Behr.


Painting and getting the pedestal in were just the first steps to making the laundry room into a better and prettier space! Before Pinterest and Houzz, I had no idea laundry rooms could be so pretty! My goal is to make the laundry room a little better looking, but also make it a space that works for us and stores all the stuff it's supposed to efficiently.

Here are some pictures of what the room looked like before. It was hard to take good pictures just because the room is so small, but I did what I could.



We took down all the shelving (and patched the gigantic holes they left in the wall) and took everything out of the room to paint. When it was done, it was like you needed sunglasses when you went in there. It was so much brighter and just seemed more clean!

Then when Trent's parents arrived, we got the washer and dryer out, put the pedestal down and then moved them back. And walah! I felt like a grown up with my taller washer and dryer! :)

Here's what the room looks like after the paint and getting the washer and dryer up on the platform.




I have plans for what I want to do with the room to improve the storage and to make it more pretty, but it will be a little while until we will make that all happen. I would love to have a counter over the washer and dryer and a few other "cool" things like that. Here's a few other things that I am thinking I want to incorporate into the room, though.

1. Elite Broom Cabinet 2. Stackable Mesh Drying Racks 
3. Stainless Steel Open-Top Trash Can 4. Small Rattan Bins
5. 
Oval Laundry Basket
I'm not sure how my mind will change by the time we actually get to making more improvements to the room, but it's a starting point. I also haven't decided what kind of shelves or cabinets, etc that I want directly over the washer and dryer, but I am sure we'll figure something out!

I'm happy with the small change we made so far, it's another thing checked off the list. I'm looking forward to making even more updates to the room!


Wednesday, January 22, 2014

Kock Christmas 2013

And finally, I have made it to my last Christmas update! So here's my last, picture overloaded post that has to do with our Christmas festivities. Now I can officially move into 2014!

On January 5, our family was finally able to all get together at Grandma Kock's to celebrate Christmas together. 

After church was over, we all made our way out to Grandma's for lunch and present opening. Now that I am writing this post, I realize that I was mistaken when I wrote about Christmas Day. I had said that we had lasagna and hot dogs on that day, but really we didn't. We had them on THIS day! How silly of me to mess up what we ate... my bad! Regardless of when it was, it was great!

Evidently our family is getting too big, or we are all growing up or something, but we didn't all fit around the table this year... So we had to have a kids table... Party of 1! Just Alex was there all by himself.

The kids table :)
Everyone but Grandpa and my mom (the picture taker)
Squeezing in a nap before it's time to open presents
After all the food was gone, it was time to open presents, so we all regrouped in the basement for the events to begin. This was another space that just didn't feel quite as big this year... I think we all must have gotten a tad bigger since last year or something!




Uncle Dan always has creative wrapping. This year, Jared got a present with Wes Stoelk's name on it... hmmm...










Grandma and Grandpa got a Keurig!

Wade got a picture of a shoe :)

My orange peeler and Trent's basting brush






Grandpa got this awesome custom carved wood box filled
with gifts and notes and other things from all of us.



I'd say we all hit the motherload again with all the gifts! And of course, it wouldn't be a family get together if we didn't take a bunch of pictures!




heehee
haha


Sleepy time for Uncle Dan again!
And we got some good pictures of the group as well!

Oh Jared and Alex... you certainly are related... Goofballs!
The Grandkids
The Grandkids and Significant Others
Our Family
I can hear Mattie -  "HEY! What about me, guys!?!"
Don't worry, though. She got in a picture!
Dan and the kids
And a few goofy pictures!





It was a great day, as I have always loved celebrating Christmas with my family, even when it happens 2 weeks after the actual day! Until next year... Merry Christmas, everyone!! :)