Never a Dull Moment!

Unless you are my mother, who I try to update on a regular basis, you are probably wondering what happened to the little house I'm supposed to have fixed up by now.  Well due to a string of rather unfortunate circumstances, we've been delayed from buying our house for about a month.  Most of the details are lost on me in technical bank jargon.  I do know that we are waiting on our contractor to be validated by the state (a process that can take up to two weeks!) before we get the green light to close.

After hearing that news, it became clear to Jared and I that living in a house under construction was to be an annoying reality.  However, we did not expect to be in our current situation!

With the end of our lease, we had expected to move into a mostly, if not completely renovated house.  After realizing that the delays would make it impossible to close on the house, we had to find somewhere to go.  As you may well imagine, finding a place to stay with our three pets and all of our belongings for a few weeks until the deal closed was next to impossible.  Ok it WAS impossible.  So after consulting with my madre, Jared and I decided to appeal the extremely understanding homeowners and see if they would let us move in, for a fee, before we closed with the bank.  Lucky for us, they agreed, and we had a matter of days to pack and move.  Now I'm sure you recall the fact that this house has no a/c.  It didn't escape my mind either.  But as per my mom's advice, we found a window air unit, so that problem, at least, was fixed!

Saturday was the big moving day, as well as the start of what would be one of the craziest weekends ever.  Thank goodness for helpful friends!  Other than some perfectly timed thunder storms, Saturday went as well as any moving day goes.  We sold our overstuffed couch and love seat that very morning, so we had two less things to move.  We also decided to leave our mattress at the apartment and spend the night there (this made for a very interesting occurrence on Sunday).  The next day we spent packing the random odds and ends that we didn't get around to taking care of.  We loaded up the car and truck, situating heavier items around the mattress in the bed of the truck.  However, Jared forgot to bring any tie-downs or straps to secure the cargo...  Let's just say that watching one's mattress fly out of a truck and into seventy mph traffic on the interstate is a very memorable moment...  We were fortunate in that no one got hurt, and our mattress was undamaged.  Still, scrambling to not get hit by cars and rescue our mattress was not a fun task.

After that, we still needed to get Ullr and Loki to the house.  To save space, we put Ullr in his kennel in the bed of the truck with Loki in the cab.  As luck would have it, we decided to move during one of the rainiest weekends ever.  Poor Ullr had to endure the truck ride in sheets of pouring rain!  But with that done, we were moved in to our house, yay!

Yesterday we actually got the water turned on, which some would see as a good thing.  I can only regard it with mixed feelings.  While we do have a working toilet (ok, that's a BIG plus), the kitchen sink isn't hooked up right and doesn't drain, and the rest of the pipes are a little leaky after being unused for so long.  To top off the water situation, we have no hot water.  Thankfully, Jared's work has showers, so we don't have to endure each others stinkyness for too long.

As the day wrapped up, I was thinking to myself, "At least I have a working stove."  After digging out the appropriate cookware, Jared and I discovered that just because the clock on the stove works, that doesn't mean the rest of it does.  In other words, we thought we would be able to use the smooth top range.  Well, that turned out to be a false assumption.  However, in the contrary way of our luck, Jared stumbled across a Craigslist add for a relatively new dishwasher, fridge, and smooth top range for a really great price.  After some adjustment of the budget, we picked up the set, which is now sitting in my kitchen.  We have a fridge!  We have a stove...that doesn't have the correct plug.  However, that's an easy fix.  Hopefully soon I'll be able to cook again soon....never thought I'd be saying that!

As ridiculously crazy as this week has been, I'm crossing my fingers and hoping we've already made it through the worst of it all.  At the end of the day, I'm just extremely grateful that God has provided for us, even though it hasn't been easy.  We have what we need, even though, spoiled as we are, we are used to so much more.  But we have a roof over our heads and a place to sleep in comfort and safety, and for that, I can't help but be thankful.

Sarah

Paint Chips 'O Plenty

Still no house...Bummer!  However, we're due to close this Friday.  If we don't, it's another round of extensions, and Jared and I will have to figure out where to live after vacating our apartment before the renovations are done on the house.  Hopefully (knock on wood, cross your fingers, throw salt over your left...or is it right?...shoulder) there won't be any more hiccups.  The reason for the delay, though unpleasant, is valid.  The mortgage broker we were getting turfed to unexpectedly quit and dumped all her current and potential clients on her ex coworkers.  Valid, yes.  Annoying, indeed.

Fortunately, I've been looking through numerous copies of Better Homes and Gardens and sorting through paint chips to keep my mind busy.  On a side note, I think naming paint colors would be a fun job.  So far, Jared and I have been able to come up with colors for the living room, kitchen/dining, and master bedroom.

The three greens for the majority of the kitchen/dining.
I'm leaning towards Parakeet Pete on the bottom right.
Also, it's getting continued into half of the living room.
Chair rail anyone?

In the living room, I'm thinking Parakeet Pete on the
bottom, Milk and Cookies on the top.  I love chair
rails, though not as much as I love wainscoting.

Colors for the bedroom.  Not too sure which one I like
more, though I'm leaning towards Swiss Coffee on the left.

Just for fun.  Possible front door colors!

Some of the laminate colors I liked paired up with Pete.
I'm not sure how I feel about any of them, to be honest.
Thoughts?

We're not getting it, but I found it amusing
that there was a textured glass that shares
my former last name.  Who knew?

Ok, so not exactly paint chip related, but I
like these!

We still haven't gotten around to picking out colors for the bathrooms, family room, or second bedroom, but we'll get there.  Also, I think I'd rather focus on just a few rooms at a time.  Still, I'm ready to get in there with paint roller in hand.  There's nothing like a fresh coat of paint to make a room something completely different!

Sarah

Hello July

You may have noticed that it's July already.  I certainly have.  Not much has changed since I last posted.  We're still waiting on the bank to close...so annoying.  We were supposed to be done with that part by now, but we are behind on that front.  Of course that also pushes the reno back as well.

Jared is off this week for block leave.  He was originally hoping to have started working on some major projects during his time off but has not been able because of our delayed closing.  We also have not had a chance to get back in the yard to do some work.  Maybe tomorrow will prove productive on that part!

That's about it, as far as updates go.  Just some more waiting in store.  Hopefully by the end of this week we will be homeowners!

Sarah