ROAD TRIP UPDATES: We arrived in Seattle after another 14-hour drive in the car – refreshed by the mountainous and pine scenery, along with all of the incredibly diverse scenery in Idaho and Oregon – but once we finally all piled out of the car, we were ready to party! We get into town and catch up with family we hadn’t seen in over a year, since before the COVID-19 pandemic began; but once we finally all got together, we laughed until we cried.
Ever since mentioning the 4-week road trip to his parents, my husband’s mom had been preparing a small get together for anyone who might want to come and hang out with family again, post-vaccination. Of course, only a meager 30-40 people replied yes.
So, it’s safe to say the party grew in size and complexity from day 1. For starters, there would be an army of 3-8 year-old nieces and nephews to entertain, and plenty of food would be needed for the remaining adults at the party. Of course there was the added question of masking up or not, so it was decidedly held outdoors – which, for anyone who’s been to Seattle in July and August lately can tell you, it’s quite hot – in fact, it might even be reminiscent of Texas summers (see Climate Change) – which means we also needed to think about keeping everyone cool. Thus, all week long, Aaron and I were running around Seattle getting food, setting up the outdoor equipment and furniture (underneath the artistically placed shade awnings for the occasion), and scheming up the menu and planning for the event which would take place that Saturday.
HOME IMPROVEMENT PROJECT UPDATES: Finally the rain in Austin has stopped! This certainly has been a crazy summer in Texas with all of the rain we’ve been getting throughout June and July – check out what I mean here: https://www.climate.gov/news-features/understanding-climate/june-2021-us-climate-outlook-wetter-and-cooler-average-start, and honestly I couldn’t be more grateful for it. My garden has never looked better.
Alejandra and Jose are working more quickly than I could have anticipated, but now that it’s finally dry, it’s time to to finish up the exterior paint and install the windows.
When we first discussed this project, I had some slight idea in mind of which colors would go naturally with our exterior brick, however wasn’t quite ready to take the leap in painting over it. Plus, I had hoped to keep the materials looking as natural as possible, thus deciding to go with a green and tan exterior. While I didn’t anticipate him being so passionate about this part of the project, my husband and I had a lot of fun doing some reconnaissance in the area to see which colors looked the best on different homes, so we could test out our theories, and agreed on this palate. From there, it was simple, according to the SUNTEX Quick Guide steps below…
SUNTEX Quick Guide to Home Improvement Projects
The beauty of working with friends that you trust is that you can leave the creative problem solving completely in their capable hands, while sharing your inner-most dreams and goals for your home, because they genuinely want to know what you want to see in your home! Working with SUNTEX as a customer was a fun experience because I got to see our work first-hand, and feel the pride in knowing exactly what was happening along the way.
Alejandra, and the entire SUNTEX team, did an absolutely incredible job in setting aside time that was convenient for Aaron and I to meet (outside of working hours of course), and walked us through the project every step of the way – without the burden of too many meetings or being bombarded with emails. She understood that as someone with a busy schedule both in and outside of work-life, it was important to communicate in ways that were effective and insightful. For example, while choosing paint colors we hit a snag when learning that due to the winter storm, as well as a national shortage due to supply-chain delays related to the pandemic, there was a shortage of paint samples. Gone were the days when we could paint a few small squares on the outside of our house to test & see whether or not we liked the color.
To Sherwin Williams’s credit (sherwin-williams.com), they had some pretty cool work-arounds for this problem that Ally was happy to share with us:
- small stick-able squares that allowed you to see the color you wanted on your home, or
- you can upload a picture of your home online and test out random paint colors.
Note: If you have a couple of hours to kill and just want to have some fun, I highly recommend checking out the ColorSnap visualizer here: https://www.sherwin-williams.com/visualizer#/active/default.
We opted for solution #2, and were able to design a couple of simple renderings of what our house might look like with a splash of paint, specifically rosemary green (SW 6187) and netsuke (SW 6134) – check them out for fun (left, front of house; right, back of house). Alas, before even arriving, we had been able to detail online exactly which parts of the trim we’d like to paint tan, and which parts of the house we hoped would be green (of course, deferring to Ally & Jose’s discretion on site), and were able to come up with the perfect outline for them to follow when painting the house!
