A Verry Productive Weekend

Thank  goodness for family and friends! 

Landon’s mom and stepdad, his cousin Marg, and her husband & son all came. Then, my parent and brother and sister came from Virginia to help!! We worked hard, but had so much fun!!! My mom brought be our first home-warming gift….a big planter in our wedding colors. :)

When everyone arrived, we got right to work. 

Matt and Keith worked on removing the half walls in the dining room, and then the strange built in wall that divided the living room and entry way. I was hesitant to remove them. I loooove built ins, and hated the idea of removing some that were already there. But....it was a great move. It ovens up the space, making the room seem lighter and bigger. 

G-Man was a huge help making sure everyone stayed  hydrated. Stephan was a hug help sanding the bedrooms pretty much the whole day!    Marg sweeped all the sawdust and sanded edges.  

            

My dad worked on removing two flower boxes on either side of the garage doors. They were continuing to the moister issues we had in the cellar. 

 

Matt spent a lot of time up on the roof, cleaning out gutters that may have never been cleaned before. How much does he look like John in this pic??

 

It was a double-fisting XS kind of day. Theresa did all kinds of things.....like spray paint all the registers a snazzy textured silver. 

Saturday Night - surveying our progress. This house is going to be so awesome!! This is the only pick we got of the whole fam....

I guess we'll need to get together again!  

 

I have the best family!!! Sunday they stayed past midnight to get everything done!

  

I love them. And they love me, too. :)

Let's go!!!

We are well into the renovation, so I thought I would post a few pictures of the work we have done so far. Day 1 we took our first load to the house....cleaning supplies! 

We ripped out all the carpets in the whole house....Here Landon is removing carpet from the Dining Room. We also removed it from the enter living room, the mudroom, and the master bedroom. 

 This poor floor. You can see the pet stains that we found under the carpet. 

I'm learning all sorts of things! Here I am using power tools. :) We took down parts of these half walls to open up the dining room. It will make the area feel bigger and less dated. 

Once the carpet was up, we had to remove hundreds of nails & staples from the floors. The previous owners really didn't want the carpet moving anywhere! Luckily, we had lots of help! It took days....

  
With help from Landon's Dad & uncle, we started working outside. Here is one of the huge bushes we had to rip out...this one was growing over the septic!

  

We sanded and sanded and sanded...

 Cleaned.....

And sanded some more. 

And found a Carpenter ant colony in the corner of the house. 

We'll be working on that. :)

Home!!

Finally...we got it!! It took forever....over 6 months to finally close on the house. We ran into lots of issues, but we were determined. SO EXCITING!!

Would you like to join me for the "Before" tour....It's pretty eye opening....not for the faint of heart. :)

From the front entry to the right was a solid wall...

the back of some built in bookshelves in the Living Room. 

View to the left....down the hallway to the 4 bedrooms. 

You can look into the spare room from the hall. 

 Also down the hall is the main bathroom. It had had a little work done to it, but we will still need to do some sprucing.  

The Master Bedroom....tiny and boring. It has the smallest closet in the whole house, and a super tiny second bathroom...but a pretty view of the back yard. 

From the front door, you turn to the right into the main living area. Icky....it was covered in moldy, stinky carpet full of pet stains. There was a sticky film over everything. ....shutter.....Lots of potential, though...ambig window, fireplace, and cook wood beam!

Another view from the door. You can see the corner of the dining room and the door to the mudroom and garage.

 From the Living room, you walk into the dining room 

(and Pantry & Laundry Closet)

And right into a tight kitchen with tons of storage.

 We will normally enter the house from the mudroom. The door didn't all the way....turns out it was just because they had stacked indoor/out door carpet instead of removing it! 

That leads right into a two car garage...it will take some demo to get both cars in, but it will be worth it. 

We are blessed to have tons of loving family and friends who are ready and willing to help......I can't wait to make this HOME!

Only Own Things You Love

What a roller coaster this whole home-buying process is. I thought we were in the clear with a chance to close tomorrow, but now there is another bump. So we wait. It is meant to be, it will be right?

Growing up I liked to go to thrift stores. It was fun finding one-of-a-kind things, and I always had a rather bizarre, eclectic style, which is suited for thrifting. However, I’m slowly realizing that if not kept in check, I could become thoroughly addicted to the whole business.  With the new house in mind, my hubby and I have been keeping our eyes open for good deals on things to make the house home. But with a combo of good local thrift stores, yard sale season, and easy access to Craigslist, I would be dangerous!

Craigslist scored me my newest fav….a reupholstered antique French chair done up in Zebra Print suede.  We also found a magnificent steamer chest in great condition to hold my mountains of blankets in the living room. 

Next came the town wide West Liberty Garage sale. Two day of garage sale-ing lead me to an ikat arm chair, a new lamp, a few pitchers, an oversized owl canvas, and a few containers I will turn into planters. 

My favorites were two framed prints by Giovanni Paolo Panini: The Interior of the Pantheon and St. Peter’s Basilica. He painted them in the 1700’s, so the people in the images are all dressed for that time period. They are amazing.

Even better….these two sites were places that Landon and I visited in Rome on the first day we met in person. Now that is worth $2 a pop!!

This past weekend we went to the Springfield Antique Show &Flea Market. We were only there for 2 hours, but managed for find perfect curtains for the living room, a lovely blue & while ceramic owl, and a two piece mustard colored storage hutch/buffet for the dining room.

Now I sit, happily contended, surrounded by things that make me smile and an empty wallet. ;) I’m starting to put things away, but only half-heartedly as I hope to be packing them soon instead!

All the amazing art at the flea market got me itching for a project, so after gathering some inspiration from Alisa Burke and Jenna via Pintrest, I set out to make a one of a kind art piece for the bedroom that I have had on my mind for a while now. I decided to use various shades of purple and orange, which were our wedding colors, and to write on it a few lines from the song from our first dance.

 I was really pleased with how it turned out. Patience + practice = perfect! 

So Close!

We are getting closer and closer to owning our own home! Since the end of January we have been pursuing ownership of a fixer-upper short sale 4 bedroom, 2 bath home near Dublin, OH. Finally, we have agreed on a price, the bank is processing our application, and the home inspection is done. Now we wait for the bank to do their appraisal so so can go to closing!!

Eeek!!

Now the fun part…packing and preparing!!  And lots of projects and hunting for good deals at thrift stores, yard sales, and Craigslist for wonderful things to make our home HOME. 

One Year Down

 Landon and I just celebrated our 1st Wedding Anniversary, and I wanted to something special for him. Traditionally, the first anniversary gift is paper, so I scoured Pintrest for ideas. I love this Valentine Gift Idea by Tran-craft-intental, so I put my own spin on it, and couldn't be happier. :)


I love the idea of 52 items, one for each of the playing cards. But I decided to use 52 Memories for our first year together. Coming up with memories was the easy part....I ended up with a much bigger list, and had to choose my favorites. A good problem to have. 

Next, I gathered supplies. A nice new deck of cards, a hole punch, 

and Quick Links...only about $2!

Next, shuffled the cards. Just because. I punched holes in all the cards, using one of the jokers as a model. I was careful that they lined up perfectly! 

Next, I trimmed down the  list of memories. A few of my most favorites I set aside to make sure they would be towards the end.I glued all the memories onto the cards and laid them out so they could dry. I added a cover on the back of a joker, and used another Joker as a back cover. I included a little love note. 

I'm really happy with how it turned out, and was very pleased with how much Landon liked it. He said the best part was realizing how much time I had put into remembering so many details....we've had such an awesome year!

We celebrated our Anniversary at Niagara Falls. I painted up a "1st" sign in orange an purple, our wedding colors, and we brought along our wedding photo. Next year, we'll hold this photo. I'm excited about watching us change together. Here's to an even better second year together! 

Finally!

My new passport arrived! I needed to update it with my married name, and have been impatiently waiting for it to arrive since I mailed my application away. My new name looks pretty steller in there!  Now the countdown to our 1st Anniversary trip to Niaragara Falls begins! It's so close!! :)

I can’t help but miss my old one with all the stamps. Morocco, England, Germany, Israel, Spain, Honduras, Italy, etc, etc. I have been so blessed to see so much of the world. And now…a brand new passport with empty pages. Time will tell what countries this passport will see.

You do know you are allowed to use your passport as often as you want, don’t you?



Compassion

Three years ago, I spent a year in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, doing mission work with the organization, Heart's Home USA. So many memories came flooding back as I remembers all the people that made such an impact of my life. It was such a challenging, rewarding experience. Honestly, I sometimes am surpriesed by how much I miss my time there. So many simple, beautiful memories. I have been blessed.  

For as long as I can remember,  I knew I had wanted to serve and live among the poor in another part of the world. It was Sr. Regine who found my profile on a Catholic volunteer networking site.  I clicked on the information video in her simple e-mail, and just a few minutes into it I knew I had found what I was supposed to do. Through my time of formation, I found a community that spoke to my heart. A place where we were taught to love others not for what they can do, but simple because they are. Formation taught me that I was everything I needed to make a difference in this world through this time of mission. My only goal was to love. And I knew I would do that whole heartily.

My time of mission in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, was difficult as I adjusted to so many differences. Our home in La Colonia Trinidad was simple, and I learned to wash clothes by hand, take cold showers, and eat the simple foods day after day, just like our neighbors. I struggled to learn Spanish, and repeatedly felt that I was not able to live my mission fully because I had no idea what was going on around me. Slowly, however, I found myself more engaged in my mission because of my struggles. So many of our neighbors were bitterly poor. They struggled to get by with little education and little opportunities.  They worked as hard as they could, but were not able to change their circumstances. I was able to relate to them in ways I would not have expected. I too did not have a voice. I too was not able to change my circumstances. They needed someone to recognize their significance in this life, as we all do. I found that my simpleness allowed me to connect with them more closely than I could have imagines. 

Coming home, I have found that so many people here in America are suffering from other forms of poverty. Loneliness. Poor self-esteem. Hopelessness. We may try to pretend that everything is all right, but on some level each of us is poor. I have found that my time with Heart’s Home has opened up my heart to see and respond to the hurt around me. To family members and friends who are dealing with the challenges that come with deployment. To women who cannot have children. To young people who have been laid off and cannot find work. To a co-worker whose husband passes away after a sudden, unexpected illness. So many people are hurting and desperately need someone to take the time to show them that they are loved and valued. I am thankful that my time of services has taught me how to do that.

I Knew I Could

Last month was amazing....everything we wanted to accomplish we did. Sometimes, things work out as they should. Your hard work pays off. I love this image by missjillmcdonald .....it sums up the month well. Wonderful.  


Here's to an even better month in March. 
We heard back from the bank...we've put in another offer. With any luck we can come to an agreement and close on our FIRST HOUSE soon! I'm so excited. :)  


Lent is going well, but should be going better. I'm forming new habits this Lent, and excited to be on this journey. God is good. 

Remember me?

Hmmm….almost a year later. So much has happened and I feel like I should be chronicling it a little better.  It has been a wonderful year. Our wedding was amazing, and I am so glad Contrast Images was there to caputure every moment! Check out their site for a few of our pictures. Married life suits me.Changes continue.

Our house is homey, but not quite home. We just placed a second bit on what we hope will turn into our first real home. I’m excited, and probably sending way too much time on Pintrest.com planning every detail.  Good thing our business is growing. I am going to need some dough to make it look just so. Can we start with this please…

Still working on lots of projects.  I just started a new blanket for my sister-in-laws new little one. I’m awefully slow with new patterns, but I’m feeling proud. I’ll post pictures eventually.

Happy Lent! I'm reading Rediscover Catholicism as part of my Lenten Prep. Amazing…If you are looking for a good faith read, please treat yourself to this $3 book available from DynamicCatholic.com.