Merry Christmas!

Well, another Christmas Day has come and gone! It was a lovely day, opening presents and stockings in the morning. Then Rob and I were fortunate to have a house full of family in the afternoon! Its nice to finally have some people over to "break in" our new home!

Look at all the presents!!

Nick and Elaine got me a GREAT Christmas present! A Gate! That's right- a Gate for the new (not yet put in) fence! Thanks guys!! Check it out:

Sunny got a special pair of slippers that mop the floor while you walk from my Mom. He wasn't too happy when I made him put them on:


He got back at us by plucking his new toy out of his stocking without asking permission: (You'll have to turn your head to watch this)

He's so sneaky!! Merry Christmas everyone! Hope you had a great day!

So thoughtful.

Last week Aunt Lorri and cousin Tammi stopped by. I wasn't here, but Rob was. The house was an absolute disaster!! Boxes and stuff everywhere! Rob gave them a quick tour of our new digs. Aunt Lorri left a lovely housewarming gift. I was so touched when we opened it. Look at what an awesome quilter she is!
She made us a beautiful Christmas table runner:

An adorable fall colored quilt:

And these awesome place mats, with apron and hot pads to match!! So Cute!!

We will treasure these for years to come!! Thanks Aunt Lorri and Uncle Rich!

Bye Bye Oleanders! and the Christmas Stocking Saga

Sorry its been so long since my last post. I've been running around getting ready for the holidays and settling in to my new job at work.The house has significantly less boxes these days. I'm trying to find a home for all of our things. A few pictures have made it on to the walls and its looking more like home everyday!

Our latest project was getting rid of the oleander stumps. If you remember, Nick took a chainsaw to all of the oleanders in our backyard, but in order to put in a new fence, we needed the stumps out, too. Sooooo, we rented a backhoe!! Nick happens to own a backhoe and he is really great with that thing! Check out how large those darn stumps were:

Look how much fun he's having!

Dan (Sr.) came over to give us a hand, and he lent us his dump trailer. Thanks Dan!!! I went to the dump with Rob, and all you have to do is push a button and the stumps slid right off!

This is the dump. Looks like a dump, huh? Some guy looked at me a little funny when I was taking pictures. Doesn't everyone take pictures at the dump?

So now our backyard has a lovely temporary fence and it looks so much bigger without those oleanders!!

side yard

Now, the Christmas Stocking Saga: I really love to decorate the house for Christmas. This year, I was especially excited to hang our Christmas stockings on our fireplace! I was able to put out a few decorations and as I went through my tubs of Christmas decorations I kept an eye out for those stockings. After going through ALL of the Christmas bins, NO stockings. I found the stocking holders, the ornaments, the lights, etc. I tore through all the bins again and NO stockings. Finally, this morning I was cleaning and wrapping presents. I went back to the storage area and I noticed that one of Rob's bins on the top shelf had red tissue paper in it. Hmmm. Sure enough, that wasn't one of Rob's bins- it was a Christmas bin!! Stockings have been located and hung!! We are ready for Santa!!!

I think I need to add some greenery or something, but I'm just so happy to have located our stockings!! Merry Christmas!

Very funny video!

If you have ever worked in an ER for any length of time, you've seen this patient at least once a day!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KCn70UYombc

"Kinda like a skateboard!"

So we are all moved in, but not totally unpacked. It feels so good to finally be living here. I feel a little exposed because the block fence is not up yet, but all of the oleanders are cut down. And adding to that is the fact that we haven't purchased window coverings yet! A few well placed sheets are serving as cover for now. Here's Rob on one of our first nights in in our new bathroom!

A large portion of our furniture had been in storage for almost a year. One piece I was really looking forward to having out again was my round pedestal table. I was really excited when Nick and Rob brought in the large pedestal and then placed the top on. And then..... I wasn't so excited. It seems that the table top has lost its moisture, which resulted in the sides curling up. In others words, the top of the table is curved like a friggin taco shell! Ok- its not that bad, its more like a skateboard, but it is noticeable, especially when you are sitting at the table.

In an effort to flatten out the table top we placed the top on the floor and the pedestal on top of it. Nick placed some heavy boxes on the edges, but its not working. A friend suggested a tarp and a humidifier, since the wood needs moisture. So we're going to try that. I'll let you know how it goes!

Its not very functional right now!! We are eating on the card table.

Happy Thanksgiving!

This Thanksgiving I have so much to be thankful for- a supportive and loving family, a great new house, boxes (and boxes and boxes) of possessions, food on my table, and a great job! In these lean economic times it is so important to focus on all of our blessings. Most of us are very fortunate and sometimes we take that for granted.

Have a Happy Thanksgiving! Say a prayer for our troops overseas, and another prayer for the families dining without them this Thanksgiving. God Bless the USA.

Packing Sucks.

Yep. I'm packing. Getting ready to make the big move. Did I mention packing is one of my least favorite things?

I was packing today, and Sunny was helping. By "helping" I mean every time I sat down on the floor to wrap things, he would come over and lay right down on the packing paper. Then I noticed he wasn't around and I went looking for him. Here's what I found:

It seems I dropped this Chik-Fil-A Cow toy on the ground and Sunny decided it must be for him. Elaine brought me that cow from Virginia when she went to visit Aunt Jan. I'm sure she won't mind that Sunny has adopted it. Its 9pm and the cow still has its head intact. A rare occurrence for Sunny.

"What? It was on the ground!"

In my last post I forgot to show you the awesome shelves and new light in the hall closet. Remember this closet looked like this when we bought the house:

It didn't even have a full door and that's an ironing board hanging on the door. Now it looks like this:

I know you can't see the door in this picture, but trust me its lovely!

What a weekend!

We are so close to moving in I can smell it! However, this weekend required a bunch of work to get to that point. Nick and Elaine came to help us again, and Don and Judy helped us out on Sunday. Thank God for family! A BIG Thank You to all!!

How exciting are the shelves Nick and Rob put in the pantry?!! I can sleep 4 small children in here:

This is what the pantry looked like when we bought the house:


Its so much better now- way more storage than before. And it has a much better light!

Today Nick brought out the chain saw and down came a TON of oleanders. We'll be putting in a new fence and the oleanders had to go. Check out the massacre:

Mom tidying up the front landscaping

Nick just getting started


Thanks for helping Dad!


Like Sherman marching through Atlanta!
You can actually see the fence!

Rob also finished the baseboard touch-ups which he just LOVED doing! See his happy smiling face?

And last but not least the carpet went in this week. Its called "Prada" and its made by a company called Moda carpets (http://www.modacarpets.com/products.htm) and I LOVE it! It looks so awesome and it feels so nice under your feet:

I can't wait until I wake up an plop my toes down on it! More oleanders come down next week and we'll be cleaning in preparation for moving day! WHoo Hoo!

On a happier note...

I was able to put the first coat of paint on the fireplace! Its a beautiful ivory color. I still haven't decided what I'll put in the inset, but I've got a few ideas! Remember, this is only the first coat and the painter's tape is still up:I need to say a HUGE Thank You to Nick and Elaine for spending the weekend helping us out. I don't know where we'd be without Nick's years of experience in construction, (not to mention a few remodels of his own). Thanks again guys!

Nick fixed the outlet in the pool bath for me! Unfortunately, Elaine was in there helping him and he "passed gas". Poor Lainey! Don't worry- she's recovered!

We are really close to actually getting to live in our house! How awesome is that??

Red Flag. Sooo Sad.

Good news and bad news. What's that you say? You want the good news first? OK. The good news is we got our Certificate of Occupancy from the city. The bad news is it has a BIG RED FLAG on it!! The red flag is for the water line leading from the street to the house. The city inspector says it needs to be bigger because we added a bathroom. ***Rant warning!*** Don't ya think they could have brought this sh*t up in their previous inspections? They've been out to the house several times before now and the final inspection is when they choose to say something?? Losers. Oh and by the way, Rob had to spend 4 hours and $700 dollars to get a permit for said water line. Hmmmm, sounds like a frickin' racket to me! Stupid city inspectors. You suck.

Ok- I'm done ranting now.

So needless to say, we spent our Saturday replacing the water line. We could have paid a plumber to do it, but they wanted WAY too much money. Rob and Nick were able to get most of the work done today and it was less than half the plumber's quote. and we need the extra moola for the stupid permit! Here's some pics from our day. This is the "old" water line:

This is Rob and Nick with the "Ditch Witch"- a handy little piece of equipment designed for trenching front yards for water lines. Its obviously BIG business, this water line thing.

This is what I call a group effort:

This is what Elaine and I were doing when we weren't watching Rob and Nick- painting. Those are the spare bedroom closet doors which turned out lovely. You'll see them up after the carpet goes in.

Sodering the last few pieces:

And finally- the new water line. Tomorrow we fill in the ditch. I guess they haven't made a fancy machine for that, yet. Unless you want to call "shovel" a fancy machine.

Stupid inspectors.

Paint, Doorknobs and shelves! oh my!

That's right folks! This past week my husband, Nick and Elaine have been very busy at the house. Rob and Nick did these awesome shelves in the laundry room:

storage galore!

Did you notice the room is also painted? The color is called "Golden Gate" and I love it. This is the living room. Notice the awesome baseboards my hubby spent all weekend doing!

And the cute new light fixture which is way better than the old one. Look at the same wall just a few weeks ago:

The new doorknobs are on the doors and they look so great! Nick did all of the doors for us! Thanks Nick!And a big shout out to Cousin P! P is living with us because she is the next tenant in the house we're living in! (We just happen to be taking a little longer than we thought to move out, so P moved in!) I have been working like crazy lately and P has been so awesome! She cleans, she helps out with laundry and she does this:

That's right. Sunny wants to adopt her permanently. I haven't told him that P will be staying behind when we move, so don't tell him!

Update and another Birthday for Nick!

What a weekend! We celebrated Nick's birthday and worked on the house! Check out Nick with his strawberry shortcake and one candle:

The house is coming along nicely. Rob and Nick worked on the spare bathroom. The had some issues with getting the wainscoting to adhere to the wall, so they came up with this nifty apparatus:

But it turned out great- see?

Ingenious! Here's what the bathroom looks like now:

We still need to remove those white things and get the sticker off the toilet. Check out the awesome dual flush toilet. One's for yellow and one's for brown and its all eco friendly!

We're getting close!!!