Before/After Part III

Want to see more pictures of our home remodel?

Okay.

I did not finish showing you the house, I just got side tracked. 

The bedrooms had green carpet. 

Like this...

*big grimace*

 And looked something like this after all of the drapes were removed. 

They eventually looked like this

Now one of them looks like this

And our bedroom looks like this

There are soon to be changes in our bedroom.  

Do you see the broken piece on our footboard?

It was what my children referred to as 'the step.'

Well, the step eventually gave way to the stepper.

It just needs to be nailed back on, but I have postponed that due to inclinations of future stepping. 

This is the only picture on my computer of Noah's room. I am sure that he was napping when I took the other pictures.  I know you can't really see anything so I will take another.  Someday.

  

Kayt's room is about to get a big girl overhaul. 

It will include the armoire pictured above in our room.
Ah......
I cannot wait to show you after pictures of her room.
Because after pictures mean the work is finished.
I like finished work!

Before/After: Part II

The living room.  

Also known as the couch laying, television watching, toy playing, diaper changing, wrestling rink, piano playing room. 

This room was ALL paneling. It also had avocado green carpet. Eck. 

I don't have a picture of it with full paneling, but you can imagine how dark it must have been since it had NO lighting? Oh, I forgot to mention that it had no lighting? Well then, it had NO lights. 

This wall with a window...

...became these doors that lead to the sun room. 

This outdated bookshelf...

...blends in nicely now.

Actually, reworking the items on this built-in is on my project list for the coming months. I put up random items to fill space and have never been happy with it. 

I want a more 'together,' yet 'fun' look.  I'm open to suggestions. 

Look at the sweet swinging baby. 

This was obviously post paneling and after the carpet was removed. 

This was post taping the seems, but mid-texturing. 

You can see that we are working by lamp light. 

And PRAISE JESUS, we had the popcorn ceilings scraped. 

ta-da!

Now, we can see one another clearly with our lovely canned lighting that functions on a dimmer switch. Fancy stuff!

Before/After: Part I

 I started this post with the intentions of showing you pictures our entire house before/after, but after I began I realize that I would be dealing with a lot of pictures.  For the sake of ease I am going to break it into a few posts. 

I am glad that someone asked to see pictures of our home. Now that we have been here for several months, I forget how much work that we actually have done so it was fun to reflect. 

The before pictures of our home are not actually from the very beginning. I think we were so anxious to start working and disassembling that I forgot to take pictures.  The pictures I do have should give an pretty good idea how far we've come.

This is our breakfast nook/dining room. It had floral wall paper, paneling, yellow linoleum, old windows, and bad light fixtures.   

And we replaced the door on the left side of this picture.

In the kitchen we scraped the ceiling, installed canned lighting, painted the cabinets, and replaced: the appliances, sink, countertops, back splash, flooring, & knobs. 

...after the cabinets were painted...

...and now...

And that folks, is our kitchen and dining room! 

A work in progress

We closed on our old house the beginning of June and moved in with my in-laws to begin working on our new house.  Projects always take longer than planned, but we are hoping to start moving into our house this weekend.  We still have work to do, but I am getting anxious to see my furniture and dishes again.  

Thus far we have: 

taken up flooring

scraped ceilings

removed wallpaper

put up bead board

textured

painted

taken out a wall and added doors

replaced doors

painted a bit more

tiled

replaced appliances

had countertops installed

We still have to:

paint the utility room, master bedroom and master bathroom

have flooring installed and carpet laid... in progress

replace light fixtures

install canned lighting

paint the outside

trim trees and bushes

replace windows

We are on the homestretch.  

The home is slowly beginning to have appeal and we are really excited to move in and make it our own.  It's been a fun, busy, encouraging, discouraging, crazy project.  

...summing up the summer of 09'.

Can you believe...

this is the last full week of June? Where is the summer going? Please slow down and stay awhile, Mr. Warm Weather. 

Noah started his first Vacation Bible School this week.  It is only three days, but he has had a great time.  When I took him into the room with all of the big kids, he was so nervous.  I was fighting the lump in my throat the entire time.  I looked at all of the other moms chatting and appearing to be so light hearted about the entire thing and forced myself not to cry until I got to my car.  Noah was so brave and it made me realize how much he reminds me of myself in new settings.  He would never let me know how hard it was for him, but his face told it all.  He tries so hard to protect me by being brave and happy.  

Brad has been off all week and this is how he and Kayt have spent their mornings.  She is such a daddy's girl! He has also been really busy working on our house.  As I type, he is there tiling one of the bathrooms.  He has been so helpful and I've loved not having to meet all of the random people at the house throughout the day.  I am hoping we can spend a day or two enjoying his week off, free of work.  But we are also getting really anxious to get settled in our new home, so we are working hard.  We are staying with my wonderful in-laws right now. They have been so great to let us bombard their schedules and space.  

And here is the baby bump at 15 weeks.  It's a funny angle, but I promise it is there.  I am beginning to feel better and have a bit more energy.  It came at a great time since we spent all of last weekend painting our house. If I could only make it to the gym, I would be a happy camper.  

The 4-1-1

on the baby news.

I am twelve weeks along (and some change) and due mid-ish December.  Our very own early Christmas gift!

I'm not feeling too hot. I mean, some days are better than others. Heck, some hours are better than others, but I'm sure that having two little ones, packing, moving, re-doing a house and preparing to be at high school camp next week may also have something to do with the sleepy, nauseated feeling that keeps coming over me.  I've found a new friend in Zophran.   

We were not planning this pregnancy. In fact, we were planning to not have a pregnancy for at least another year, but here we are.  God knows us and we are really excited to expand our family tree again.  It's amazing how a little life begins to stir so much excitement inside of you so quickly.  

Due to early 'issues' (we will call them) that God healed, I have had several sonograms and there is ONE baby. Yes, one.  And not that I am biased, but it's a cute little freak (please hear my sincere love and affection when I say 'freak'). It flails his/her arms and waves like mad each time I look at the screen. I love that little nugget. 

Every time we have bought a new house I have been pregnant. I DO know that there are better ways of getting out of painting, but why change what's worked, ya know? Kidding.  

This will more than likely be our last baby. Not 100% guaranteed since we've yet to control that aspect of our life, but again... more than likely.  With that said, you may get more baby pictures/tracking/progress than you would like.  Just roll your eyes, click the red X on the top left corner of your screen and carry on with your day.  Kidding again.  Just humor me for six more months.

Now....

I need your help.

I have to come up with a good color for our den by THIS weekend. I need help finding a good, neutral color. It doesn't have to be beige, I'm open to other colors, but it needs to be fairly light. The room has no natural lighting (yuck) and I want to keep it as open and fresh as possible.  

So lemme have em'. Please give me the color name and brand. 

My brain is working a bit slower than normal and I just cannot seem to find anything that catches my attention.  Hence, I need YOU!

Is it me?

If we move, I am planning to re-do our bedroom. We have had the same comforter for three years. I'm over it.  

I don't really have anything particular in mind, but I found this and I think I like it. Granted, I do NOT like the sheets it is paired with nor the shape of the bed. I would do white sheets, fold them back further and lots of big pillows. You could do so many colors; orange, white monogrammed, brown...

This is not something that I would normally pick, but that is one reason that I like it. With light walls, it could add so much color to a room. 

Also, the reviews say that it washes beautifully (music to my ears).  Reason for liking it number two. And it's super reasonable. Number three. Something about knowing that little feet will be jumping on it and snotty noses will be rolling around on it makes me not want to spend lots of mullah. 

What are your thoughts?  I am NOT sold on this. At all. I just started looking. Have you found any great bedding lately? 

Room to Run

I am not usually one to make things known until the details are worked out and everything is finalized, but I am going to let you in on a little secret. 

We are putting our house on the market Monday and if things go as planned, we are MOVING! 

I'm a looker. I usually have an idea of what is on the market, but we were not planning to actually move anytime soon. I mean, come on, we are busy enough without moving and re-doing another house. But the Lord worked some things out and if He finishes what he has begun, and I'm sure He will, we will be moving soon.

It's exciting and overwhelming all at the same time. The house is great! It's in a great neighborhood, has an amazing yard and will give us much more room. But... it needs a lot of cosmetic work. The work always seems more fun in theory than when it actually comes down to doing it, ya know?

Pray our house sells fast, please. 

Today I cleaned seven trash bags full of clothes out of my closet. That's pathetic. Sometimes I disgust myself with the things that I think I need.

I would rather have been searching the pages of magazines looking at home ideas. It's fun dreaming up ideas for a new house! I'm open for suggestions...