Bittersweet farewell to our first home

It's official.  We have left our first house.  We still own it, we're renting it but it's not REALLY ours any longer.  Of course it took deciding to rent it out to finish off our projects.  Its stats: 1640 sq ft, 4 bedrooms, 2.5 bath.

We bought our house in July of 2005, I believe it closed on the 10th.  We decided on this house because we could renovate it and earn sweat equity, it was intended to be a starter home. 

Here is the general layout.  I didn't take the time to make it to scale.

This is the front of the house.  There were pyramedalis trees all along the front of the bedrooms and along the side of the driveway.  There were junipers in front of the walkway and a whole mess of evergreen bushes all crowded in together with a lace leaf Japanese maple.  There was also an evergreen tree between the porch and the garage, surrounded by concrete.  Of course you can't see any of this because if you took a picture of the whole house you would've only seen all those bushes. 

This is the front of the house now.  We tore out all those trees (and had great fun doing it).  The only one we kept was the maple tree you see and the Japanese maple you can KIND of see on the right.  We hauled in a ton of dirt to make these tiered gardens, we also put one on the other side of the driveway and we broke out the concrete and tore out the tree next to the porch.  That area has yet to be finished.  We also painted the house, replaced the roof and all the windows, oh and added a garage door opener.  We installed rain barrels in order to get the water away from our house.  It would come down the downspouts and create huge puddles of water along the sides of the house which are concrete.

The back yard was a mess.  The yard was pitted like crazy, there was a whole pile of black berry bushes and the trees were out of control. 

We trimmed up the rhododendrons and the lilac bush, pulled out a dying azalea, ripped out the mass of blackberry bushes (under which we found several old christmas trees, a desk chair, and some pvc for a canopy and a still living rhododendron - which has been transferred to the front yard).  Daddy even wheel barrowed in 7 yards of dirt to level it out as best as possible.  Then he reseeded the whole thing so the grass was brand new.

Front entry/living room. 

The first thing we did was tear down the lowered ceiling and raised it to the standard 8 ft, we added can lights too.  The ceiling was lowered from the front door, down the hallway and through the kitchen.  We tore out the linoleum and carpet, put down engineered hard wood, new baseboards, crown molding, a new front door and painted.  I found that I LOVE the richer colors with the white trim.  Definitely planning to do that in our next house.  HATE this fireplace still... wanted to paint it but the renters said not to worry about it because they like it.

The dining room.

We tore out the columns and took out the railings, changed the chandelier and obviously painted nad did the floor. 

The family room.

New carpet, paint, an OPENING window, added track lighting and a ceiling fan/light.  In this picture the fireplace has yet to be painted dark brown (which looks MUCH better).

Laundry area and the garage door.  Unfortunately I didn't get a new picture.  We tiled it and painted, and put in a new garage door. 

The half bath.  This thing was NASTY...

 

Tiled it, painted, new toilet, new sink, new cupboard and mirrors.

This picture is from before we painted it the final time, we decided to stick with grey.

The kitchen pass through.

We took out everything in order to raise the ceiling.  The cabinets were in the garage waiting to be painted and put back up when Grandma G discovered that they STUNK!

New cabinets, painted, new stove, microwave hood, fridge, added lights, new sink, tore out the "pass through" wall.  Tiled the floors and the counters.

Master bedroom.

 

Carpet, paint, molding, doors...

Master bathroom, isn't that little mini burn beautiful???

The tub/shower are behind us in this picture.  New cabinets, tiled, new toilet, sink, mirror, medicine cabinet, cabinet...

The hall from the master to the other bedrooms.

LOVE the crown molding.  Eventually we'll finish it in the dining room, master bedroom, kitchen and family room.

 Kids bathroom... the floor was SATURATED with urine... yuck.

Raised the ceiling where it dropped down for the light, new cabinets, sink, toilet, subfloor, tile, tub walls, medicine cabinet...

 The nursery to be

 

The nursery in step one when we were expecting Kayda.  This is the way this room stayed for Dillon too.  It got to it's final appearance in July, before Carson was born.

 The end result for the nursery.  Carpet, blinds, doors, paint...

 

 The "den to be" which ended up being Dillon's room.

 Again carpet, paint, doors, blinds...  This will be much easier to summarize at the end.

 The "guest bedroom" which ended up being Kayda's room.  One of the renters had locked their two big dogs in this room so the subfloor had to be replaced.

 

 Carpet, paint, doors, blinds...

 

We did so much work on this house.  All the doors are new, blinds in the bedrooms, ALL the floors are new, the cabinets, sinks, toilets... geez it'll be easier to list what we didn't do. 

I need to express just how nasty this house was.  The pictures don't do it justice.  The carpet that was there was unusable, it literally looked like camoflauge.  All of the bathroom floors, the kitchen and the laundry room had particle board underneath that crumbled because it had gotten so wet, with some NASTY things in the bathrooms especially.  The doors had holes punched in them, the toilets were all cracked and leaking.  When we bleached the walls prior to painting the bleach water ran down black.  Daddy scraped all the popcorn ceiling off, it was nasty brown too. 

This house was a fixer upper for sure, it just ended up being more of a project than we expected.  It took us 6.5 years and we're still not done with everything.  These are the things left to do.  Finish the front garden, put the trim up outside around the windows, someday we'll put up new siding, finish the crown molding inside. 

These are the things we didn't replace, and this is being nitpicky.  The dishwasher (it was new when we moved in), the bathroom fan/light combos, the bathtubs (redid the surround)... and that's all folks.  Even the furnace and water heater were replaced. 

We bought the house in July 2005, didn't move in until October 2005 and even then we used my parents old carpets just randomly laid around as flooring.  We lived there with just the hardy backer on the counters because we hadn't finished the tile yet.   It was insane. 

 



I'm glad we bought this house, and I think it's a beautiful home now but it's time to move on.  We're living at Grandma and Papa G's now in order to build a rental history and down payment to buy a new house that will fit our family a little better.  It's sad to leave the house, we lived there for 6 years and had 3 children while living there but I am excited to be working towards the house we want our children to FINISH growing up in.  We found a nice family to rent it, they love it and are REALLY excited about living there.  It was a great learning experience.  We know how to do SO many things now!  Thank you to all of our family who helped us.  Especially Papa G, he has put in an insane amount of time both when we bought it and these last few weeks when we were getting ready to rent it.  Other people helped a lot too but he was ALWAYS there when we needed help.

Winter Ice and Power Outage

So far it has been a VERY busy month.  Right after Dillon's birthday we found somebody to rent the house so the craziness began.  I spent the first week over at Grandma and Papa G's trying to get the basement cleared out for us.  Then it was time to start moving in, in the middle of this phase the snow and ice hit.  Now we're in the process of finishing all of our projects throughout the house to get it ready for the renters.  The power went out Wednesday morning, came back on that afternoon.  Then it went out again Thursday morning and just came back on today, 4.5 days later.  It was bad timing for a move, between the ice on the roads and the power outage it made it all pretty difficult. 

In more detail, the first of the snow started on Saturday and came and went throughout the week, until Thursday.  Wednesday was the heaviest snow day, at 6 inches.  Then Thursday it turned into freezing rain.  It created a sheet of ice on top of the snow and coated all the tree branches in half an inch of ice. 

 

 Normally snow doesn't reflect this much!!!

 This tree is litarally bent in half from the weight of the ice.

 Check out those pretty icicles.

We spent a lot of time huddled around the fire to stay warm.  Of course the basement was nice and warm with the gas fireplace.  I was a second too late to catch Kayda and Dillon playing blocks with Carson. 

 He can sit REALLY well now.  He only really falls over when he gets excited about something (He tends to smile with his whole body).

Carson is quite the roller.  He doesn't need to crawl.  He rolls everywhere he wants to go.  He went from being in front of daddy to being by the diaper bag in about 30 seconds. 

Dillon's FOURTH Birthday!

Today my sweet Dillon turned four.  I have no idea how he managed to grow up so fast, it doesn't seem like that long ago I was holding a very round, laid back little baby in my arms. 

We had a pretty laid back day with him today.  He got to choose his breakfast, pancakes (the kids have decided they like to eat them with sugar just like me, which I of course learned from my mom).  Then he played with Kayda for a while, I made his cupcakes for that evening, he got to open a present from the family, he played with said present and Kayda for a good long while. (Daddy decided to do a little work on the house so his day wasn't quite as relaxing).  A little later in the day he came back and had some good Mommy, snuggle, tickle time before it was time to get ready to go to dinner.  I only point this out because it's not often that I don't have Carson with me and I LOVE the time I get with just my older kids.  Dillon is a snuggle bug to the core so it is definitely some high quality time.

We LOVE to go out to dinner so whenever we have any kind of excuse we will definitely be taking it.  Dillon chose Red Robin and waited until an hour before it was time to decide that he wanted his grandparents there.  Fortunately, despite the late invite both sets were able to make it. 
Dillon thought since it was his birthday and people kept giving him "punches" or "spankings" he could do the same; so when the waitress came and we told her it was his birthday he told her he was four and then proceeded to "punch" her.  She was very good about it and said "It's your birthday so shouldn't you be getting the punches?"  Then she went back into the kitchen and was telling the other employees about it.  He had a great time being sung to and was even willing to share his ice cream with Kayda!

After dinner all the grandparents and Baba came to have cupcakes and sing to him.  This time his wish was to "Stay at the beach and play with everything"

I think it's wonderful that Baba is so close by and that she can come to these things.  I was trying to get a picture of Carson with her and just happened to catch the split second she took to give him a kiss.  Carson's starting to get too wiggly to stay in her lap for very long.  I think if she could Baba would want snuggle time with even her older grandkids.  Makes me wish my grandma was closer.

I think it's funny how kids can bring out totally different sides of people.  If I went up to someone and pretended to punch them they'll either get really offended, think I'm nuts or if it was someone I knew they MAY pretend to punch me back.  If a kid does it any adult will act like it was the hardest hit they've ever received and that said kid should be proud because they're so tough.  Demonstrated spectacularly by Papa H. 

I feel grateful every holiday, every birthday, goodness everyday that my children get to grow up with two sets of grandparents, a great grandma and a whole bunch of aunts, uncles and cousins so close by.  And that it is obvious to my children that all of these people care about them.

Dillon's "friend" birthday party!

  Last year at an auction Aunt Sarah and Uncle Pat got a "fire station birthday".  They offered it to us for Dillon's birthday and despite it being expired the fire station was kind enough to do it!  We'll have to figure out something to do for everybody to say thank you. The fire station did EVERYTHING, literally all I had to do was send out invitations!
 

  Here are the kids lining up to go inside.

 They gave the kids a tour, here they are in one of the bedrooms, they had dispatch set off the "alarm" while the kids pretended to sleep. They snored and everything!

 Ambulance!!!  Dillon got the seat of honor in each vehicle they went into.

 Carson did excellent passing around between people.  He didn't fuss at all and fell asleep with Daddy at the end.

They made the probation fireman put on the gear and then they let the kids feel the air coming from the tank.

 They loaded all the kids into the ladder truck (with the driver in the very back as well as the main driver) and drove them to the training tower.  If you look close you can see Dillon's eyes between the mirror and the windshield.  He got to ride in the officer chair.

 Each kid got a turn on the hose, knock over a cone and turn it off again.

 They put the ladder up and dropped parachutes for the kids to catch!

 Dillon closed his eyes and wished "that we could stay at the beach" it sounded like he was wishing for peace.  Then he thought he needed to keep his eyes closed to blow out the candles!

The kids were so excited to have Dillon open their gifts that they slowly but surely backed Dillon up into the corner!!!  It was a great party!  Even better I didn't have to do ANYTHING, they did the cake they did goody bags, they did activities!!!  Maybe I should do this again next year!!!  Tomorrow we'll have cupcakes with the grandparents on his actual birthday, I think he's enjoying it all so far!

A little craziness

There has been a lot going on since Christmas.  We've decided that we're going to rent our house and go live at Grandma and Papa G's so we can a) build up a down payment, b) get a rental history.  All in the quest to get into our "20+" year home.  This house was supposed to be our starter home, we bought a fixer upper, have spent the last 6 years fixing it up and now the economy has crashed.  On the plus side the houses we want to end up in are actually within our grasp, the down side is that our house no longer has any equity, not even sweat equity.  We figure this is the fastest way to get into a new home.  So the kids and I have been spending a lot of time over at Grandma and Papa's house helping them sort through the stuff they've collected over the last 20+ years.  We've also been trying to go through our things.  We're making pretty good progress actually.  Now we just need to get somebody in our house! 

New year's eve this year we decided to let the kids stay up to watch the fireworks on TV.  We had "giant sandwiches" (Kayda's favorite thing) and played until midnight.  Carson even decided to stay awake (despite my efforts to get him to sleep).  The kids had a great time and actually went to bed pretty well when it was time. 

Carson is loving "solid" food.  We've done rice and we just started with oatmeal, he doesn't seem to like it as much but he eats it anyway!  We're trying to figure out how to get him on the bottle, I'm ready to be done nursing.  I think it's going to come down to not nursing him at all during the day and just forcing him to take the bottle, only problem with that is that he will be a really crabby baby.  Not sure that I want to try that by myself.  He seems to be growing so fast!  He's got two teeth already and the top ones are getting close too.  Forget crawling, this kid isn't going to need to, he can roll himself all around the floor and he's FAST.  He's got great control of his hands, LOVES people and babbles up a storm.  He has even figured out how to play peek-a-boo!  I've played it with him a few times but now he has decided HE wants to do it.  He'll cuddle down into me, I'll say "Where's Carson?" and he'll pop himself up and grin at me when I say "peek-a-boo" or "there he is!" and then he'll repeat it, again, and again, and again.  He just keeps going!  He is getting pretty good at sitting on his own!  I wouldn't be surprised if he can sit unaided in the next week or so.  He ADORES his big brother and sister.  He just smiles and smiles at them.  He loves it when they get down on the floor and play with him, he even likes to just sit there and watch them play. 

Kayda and Dillon started preschool again on Wednesday.  They're having a hard time switching back to "early" mornings.  They tend to wake up at around 9:30 on their own, for preschool we have to switch to 8:15 wake-ups.  It doesn't help that we're trying to get away from the bed time pull ups.  We're following the doctor's orders: no drinks 2 hours before bed, wake them up about 2 hours after they go to bed and make them go sit on the toilet, and the worst part.... NO more pull ups.  Which means we're changing sheets in the middle of the night.  It's working great for Dillon, he woke himself up in the middle of the night and went potty last night!!!  (For the first time) AND he woke up dry.  Kayda is a little less willing and boy does she get MAD when you wake her up to go to the bathroom.  She spends most of the time screaming at us!  It sucks for her, and I feel guilty but I find it quite funny. 

We're gearing up for Dillon's birthday on Sunday, his birthday party is Saturday.  As always it's a very busy holiday season for us and it looks like we're going to be busy for at least another month trying to deal with the housing situation. 

 Dillon was "teaching" Carson to play with his new toy.

 I set Carson on the floor in his room while I ran to grab something, when I came back I found Kayda and Dillon squished into the rocking chair, they were counting off when to rock!

 ...and Carson was perfectly happy on the floor, as long as there's someone close by to keep him company.

Apparently when Daddy was little he would sit in this "pocket"  and watch tv with his Dad, so he is always trying to get Kayda or Dillon to sit there which they usually won't because they want to be in your arms.  Much to Daddy's delight we have discovered that Carson LOVES to sit there and play with his toys.  He sat there for a good half hour one day, perfectly content!  Notice his SOAKED onesie?  He is quite the drooler, I try to keep a bib on him but he'll even soak through those!  That and sometimes he gets frustrated because he catches the bib on top of the toys he's trying to get to his mouth or he'll flip the bib up in front of his face.