Never DIY with renos unless you know what you're doing!

My bathroom is gutted. I cannot tell you the number of time we both looked at eachother and simulatenously said "WTF?!".

There is a huge hole in the ceiling. HUGE, like 4x4 feet. It was masked by some decorative plastic backsplash. WHY is there a hole in the ceiling??

Instead of making a hole large enough to pass an extension cord through, they cut the outlet end of the cord off, and taped it back together, inside our vanity, where any leak of the sink would surly have electrocuted us. It was wired in to a non GFI outlet. Lovely.

They covered half the shower in a waterproof membrane. It wasn't placed to drain into the shower basin like it was supposed to, it drained right into the drywall. Lovely.

The grout wasn't mixed properly. They used the wrong adhesive.

They didn't grout behind the toilet.

They didn't replace the toilet O-ring when they replaced the toilet.

There are three levels different levels of plywood on the floor.

It is a miracle the in-floor heating system didn't light our house on fire.

They glued the mirror to the wall using something that looks like tar.

Ah...

At least it's all out. We are letting the dust settle (literally), and then are going to wash it out, bring our plumber in to look at the plumbing (the shower is leaking, even though the water is off), and have DH's grandpa assess the damage to the woodwork. He'll do the carpentry, hopefully put our ceiling back together, spackle, we'll put the shower base back in, put the shower backing back together properly, finish the other walls, install the panelling, have our talented tiling friend come in for the shower tiling and flooring, put the glass back in for the shower, bring in the toilet, vanity, mirror, and hopefully be done.

Properly, this time.

Last piece of St. Honore!

Baking and Renos

Tonight we're celebrating two family members' birthdays, so I've been baking since 8am! I have just finished a St. Honore for my dad, and a tuxedo truffle cake for my brother. For the St. Honore, I used a slightly different version of the recipe I used a couple weeks ago, and this time I didn't burn the caramel (although I did burn myself - OUCH!)

My brother likes tuxedo cake. Heck, I LOVE tuxedo cake! It was what we had as our wedding cake, and I had no idea it would be easy to make. Marble cake slab, chocolate mousse, white chocolate mousse, and a chocolate ganache. Yum! What I didn't count on was for how HUGE it turned out. My word, it's a massive cake.

 

In other news, we discovered a leak from our upstairs bathroom, and so now we're in the throws of renovating a poorly done DIY that we inherited from the previous owners. We're taking the opportunity, in spite of wanting to sell this place, to do it right, and put in a nice looking, up to code bathroom.

This is our inspiration:

 We found the vanity they used at Home Depot:

 

This is the flooring we're using, it's from Rona:

Unsmoosh!

Breakfast Pizza

Yesterday, a wicked someone pointed me in the direction of punchfork.com an INCREDIBLE food/recipe resource. It took me about three nanoseconds to become completely hooked.

For tomorrow's breakfast, I am making Breakfast Pizza

(Apologies for the crappy photos. I was cooking in my dark kitchen, with only my iPod as a camera)

My mixer is in storage, so I used my KitchenAid food processor to make the dough. Following the recipe, it said make it the night before, so I did... in the future, I will just make my dough the day of. I have a great pizza dough recipe (actually, the pizza yeast container has a great recipe) which has never failed me. I'm not sure if it's because I wasn't using a conventional mixer, but dough was not forming when I followed the water/yeast/flour ratio provided. I added a couple tablespoons of olive oil, and some extra water.  I also don't have a pizza stone, and 500F in my oven would burn everything to a crisp. I preheated my oven to 425F, and baked the pizza(s) for 12-15 minutes until the crust was golden and the cheese was melted.

-

Yeast proofing

Mix, mix, mix

DOUGH!

Frying bacon and onions

Add mozza, parsley, salt and pepper. Top with bacon and onions, and crack three eggs on top!

Soooo good!

Another angel

Yesterday, one of Ellie's NICU friends passed away. The day before, her mom had posted about all the amazing progress that Erin was making. Just like that, a little life got snuffed out, much, much too soon. Her mom was one of the first people I met when Ellie was born. She was such an inspiration, and a testament to the dedication of  NICU parent, having been in the hospital for months, away from her other kids and family in their home town up north.

When I heard that Erin had been intubated, and was being rushed to Children's, my heart sank. When I saw that she passed away, I was absolutely devastated.

At Ellie's ENT appointment this week (where they determined she needs surgery on her ears in January), I saw a family that I recognized based only on the father's voice. They had been in the bed beside Ellie in the ICU, when their son was diagnosed with cancer. I wrote about them before, how inspiring it was to see parents put aside their own fear, their negative emotions, and just beam positivity at their child. The little boy was unrecognizable to me. He lost all his hair, he was puffy, he looked so tired being wheeled in his stroller.

This is something "normal" parents rarely experience; the loss of a friend's child. In the NICU, or in the ICU you make friends with parents whose children have rare conditions, brutal diseases, whose futures are unclear. In the past couple months two babies that were born around the same time as Ellie, kids I've seen for weeks upon weeks of shared hospital time, have passed away.  In the 18 months since Ellie was born, I know more children who have died than adults. It doesn't make sense. It isn't fair.

 I am thankful every single day that Ellie and Jakob are healthy. I am putting everything I can into hoping for a cure for Ellie's hunger, so that in the future, when she's mobile and food-seeking, it no longer looms as a life-threatening cloud hovering over her.

Sigh.

Rest in peace, sweet little Erin. You were such a fighter. I will always remember your little laugh.