Extreme Makeover Recap

Extreme Makeover - Home Edition rolled into town in the middle of August. Work officially begin with the "door-knock" on September 6th at 5:00 p.m. and for 7 straight days after that I put in 12-14 hour shifts as an on-site volunteer coordinator with 4 other lucky folks. I had a fantastic time and would do it all over again even though I saw my family about 30 minutes a day and I felt like I had been hit by a semi-truck by the time I drug myself home at 9 at night.

The Oregon State School for the Deaf was chosen as the site for Extreme Makeover and it received a brand new, green living, dormitory wing and a complete "over-haul" of it's haunted house, The Nightmare Factory, which is one of the school's main sources of revenue each year. The haunted house has always been super scary, but Extreme brought in Rob Zombie for this makeover and now it is truly over-the-top, shit your pants SCARY! I am going to wear a Depends when I go because I know I'm going to mess myself!!

All-in-all I had a great time and I was lucky enough to make some new friends, meet some incredible people, including Ty Pennington himself. And yes, he really is that crazy, energetic and nut-so in real life.

I vaguely remember saying in my last post that I would write during the week and post pictures and all, but I was completely oblivious to what laid ahead of me. It took every last ounce of strength I had just to get my teeth brushed at night so blogging was out of the question. But better late than never, here are a few pictures of my week. Be sure to check out the episode when it airs on Halloween night - it's going to be wicked good!

This is the beginning of the scene the show's producers call the "Brave Heart" scene, where all the blue shirts come marching in. On TV it looks like it happens just once, but of course we shot this scene three different times.










There were soooo many cool things being created in "Art World" that I could have went nuts taking pictures. They didn't really want a lot of pictures being taken of the haunted house stuff so I behaved myself and just nabbed these guys as they were "bringing out the dead". These are just a few of the beauties that will grace the haunted halls of The Nightmare Factory for years to come.
















Here's a group of firemen who came to add some additional "heat" to the work-site. Especially the two cuties on the left. Smokin!














I like to draw, especially on dusty patrol car windows. For some reason the cop didn't appreciate my work so much.














This is "Big Dave", one of the main behind-the-scenes guys with Extreme. I had to get an adjustment from the on-site chiropractor after this hug.















This is what a 12 hour shift will do to people. And he was just delivering pizza!



















And finally, this is Jeanette, my good friend with ridiculous connections. If it wasn't for you being who you are and knowing who you know I wouldn't have experienced all that I did. Thanks for asking me to be part of your team - you are a rock star!

A great weekend and a BIG BIG week!

Now that I am a full-time working stiff I treasure my weekends more than anything. Most all of the time they pass waaaay too quickly and most of the times they are pretty good.

But, once in a while I am treated to a weekend that is nearly perfect in every way - the boys behave for the most part and treat each other like brothers, we have some really cool adventures and no blood is shed. This weekend was one of those weekends.

It started out early, on Friday morning,(one of the reasons is was so great) with myself and the boys loading up the van and heading up to Neskowin, Oregon with my best friend and her son which is also Captain Crazy's best buddy. My husband's cousin owns a beach house there that is truly a little piece of heaven and we are lucky enough to get to stay there pretty much whenever we can.
The weekend ended with us pulling into the driveway late Sunday, very tired and still nice and sandy. In between Friday and Sunday our time was filled with lots of playing on three different beaches, long walks exploring new paths, ice cold Mike's Hard Lemonade, lots of sunshine and fresh air, and watching the boys play Star Wars on the deck overlooking the ocean. Our husbands got to go fishing and we even got to go shopping!

I wish I had taken pictures but our camera really sucks and we are in the market for a better one. And even though I am trying harder at remembering, I just get caught up in the moment and forget to snap a few shots. Hopefully I will get better as time goes on because this is the only shot I took on the whole weekend - Captain Crazy playing with his bubble gun after we got home.
Now that I have rambled on about my great weekend I guess I should let you in on the BIG BIG week I'm going to have, right?
Well, today I start work on the set of Extreme Makeover, Home Edition. I am one of the daytime volunteer coordinators. I report to the work-site today at 3 - about an hour after they have done the "door knock" and surprised the family.
For the next 10 days I will be working 10 hour shifts at the work-site - coordinating volunteers and making sure people are where they are supposed to be. That's why I guess it was so important to me that this weekend was a good one - I feel like I'm not going to see the boys at all until sometime next week - and I feel badly about that. But this is a once in a lifetime opportunity and I didn't want to pass it by. My husband has pledged to keep the boys alive and happy and the house relatively intact while I'm doing this so I guess I am set.
So for the next week or so I will try my best to post often, with pictures, about my experiences throughout the week.