Moving Forward

Okay, it's time to get back in the swing of this blog thing. You're probably wondering what ever happened to that house that started this whole journey . . . well, let me tell you, it's been a journey. Getting used to living  in tight quarters has been a challenge. It'll really put you in the mind of canned sardines or all those clowns piling out of the cars . . . . thanks to the girls at work and our families (boyfriend's and mine) the house is packed with goodies. 

So I thought I would take a minute to show the progress . . . keep in mind that I said progress, this is by NO way the finished product. Still trying to convince boyfriend to help me hang some pictures and boards and things . . . As you know, I am an avid blog-reader. And while I appreciate the knowledge I gather from these blogs. I am insulted by the mansions they call their 'first homes.'

so don't expect a mansion for this blog (this is real life), drum roll please, here it is . . .

The House....this is what it looks like as you drive up...We haven't really attacked this area yet, except for trying to clear out the ivy.

The kitchen a hot second after move-in....note the swag air conditioner. 

The Kitchen today, not a whole lot has changed . . . but I think it's becoming pretty functional. 

The Fridge pre paint (that's on the to-do list) and my make-shift pantry. 

After move in, still had extra carpet down to protect the new floor. The boxes were full of books  :) 

NEW COUCH :) 

Living room today, right after a Saturday cleaning session...dog beds in the place of boxes....

Couch, the built in shelf got a little more love....still needs some love for the walls but I'm pretty happy with it. 

This was the Living Room before we moved in . . . after paint and before carpet

In case you were wondering what happened to this thing, Boyfriend, his brother and grandmother  painted it, still planning on  painting the handles black. 

This is what happened with all those books ... 

The dinning room after, and the awesome new vacuum cleaner 

Right after move in 

Bedroom before move in  

Bedroom today 

Bathroom before move in...it's tiny, so it's hard to get a good picture 

Day of move in bathroom ... the the paint did wonders... but it still needed love 

Bathroom today ... thinking vertical for storage 

This thing SAVES my life....the best idea anyone ever gave me 

That's the house, it's still in need of a few projects and I didn't show you the laundry room...but I think that's enough for today :)

It's all Greek to me . . .

Okay, I know it's been too long since my last post. I was going to blame it on moving into the new house, finishing summer classes and traveling out of the country however since it's been two weeks since I got back home almost three weeks ago I can't use that excuse anymore. Will you forgive me if I show you some pictures of Greece?

Pella Inn, Santorini 

Mykonos, Greece overlooking the port 

Parthenon, Greece 

Sunset over the Caldera, Santorini 

Athens, Greece

Oia, Santorini

The view from our hostel in Athens,Greece :)

Out with the old . . .

My great-grandmother had a wardrobe that she gave to my grandfather. It sat in his trailer for who knows how many years. The doors stick a bit, its a little scratched from the years, but it's cedar-lined and has lots of possibilities:

The handles are a little outdated, but that's an easy fix. Staining is not an option because I am not crazy about the layout of the wood grain. I've thought about painting it a solid color like this: 

But it's a lot of surface to cover without a lot of details. I'm worried it will look boring or too much of some color. I love the hutch in this laundry room: 

But sadly, this blog was about laundry rooms not how to paint furniture. I could add some ornaments to make the largeness seem less so: 

But it looked too country for me. I found a wonderful article on color washing. Applying a base coat, then a mixture of 30% paint and 70% water. Making a light, hint of color. But I didn't save to blog and cannot find it again to save my life.  

Then, there's always the crackle paint option. But again that still seems like too big of a space to cover. Let me know if you have any ideas for me. And stay tuned for the updates. 

Showering of LOVE

There are so many wonderful things happening so quickly that it's hard to know what to talk about. However, I would consider myself completely ungrateful if I did not dedicate some love to the household shower.

Friday when I went get lunch in the break room I was pleasantly surprised to find a fabulous display of love in the form of cleaning supplies, picnic set up, a small charcoal grill, a toaster oven, oodles of tupperware, and all the other wonderful things that will make life great.

This is only a 1/4 of all the goodies.  Since it was a surprise I was not camera ready (with this blog I have learned a camera is almost as important as a wallet). When boyfriend came to pick up the loot, it filled the entire bed of the truck! Now it spreads across boy's room which has become a storage shed for my boxes. 

I want to thank all the amazing people from work that came together for this shower. I am just so excited. The timing was perfect, I was just about to go out and buy some of these things for myself before the coupons expired. It feels like a weight has been lifted off my shoulders. 

The Happy Couple

The Happy Couple . . .

Finally, the home is complete.  I don’t know if I’ve mentioned this before last Friday my father, always the bargain hunter, came home and told us about two dryers for sale the Habitat Restore. Saturday brother, boyfriend and I went to the Habitat to pick up our new Kenmore dryer for $60! 

We were all excited that the laundry may needed to be washed by hand in the kitchen sink but no need for a clothes line. I honestly wasn’t anticipating a washer anytime soon. Monday when Bradley called around everyone had “just sold their last one.”

Then, all of a sudden, boyfriend’s mother found a washer for sale in the school ad. Then my father, always the hunter, got a call for two washers from a lady who goes to church with us. I decided to go with the people we know well and this afternoon Bradley graciously picked up a new washer for $125. He didn’t get a choice because they had already sold one. Word to wise, washers go fast on a budget.

So know there’s a happy couple in the new home:

They may seem like a fairly odd couple, but I think they will be happy together.

After I had all of this written, my sweet boyfriend informed me of the greatest part it’s a COMMERCIAL size washer!

This is the inside of the washer: 

It's difficult to appreciate the biggness from this picture but trust me, lots of towels will go in this thing. This is amazing considering I’m the type of person who waits until I only have one pair of underwear left. I may have to get a clothesline to dry all of our clothes.

I know it was a let down to all the people anxiously awaiting my dirty laundry but my cooking skills are still in need of help so I will be visiting you anyway.  

So far . . .

Let's begin our journey by getting you up to date on what's happened thus far.

1.  Picked the tiny blue house . . . pictures to follow

2. Recieved a fabulous gift of a twelve, 4 piece settings and 1 toaster oven from boyfriend's grandmother

3. Went through all the boxes of stuff I hadn't looked at since before college (now 5 years ago) and sorted into 'sell,' 'take,' and 'storage'

4. Talked with Momma about how we are going to divide things up in our dual moves (a story for another blog) 

5. Started packing up all my books (the stack of boxes marked 'take' is slowly but surely growing larger than the 'hold' boxes that will go into storage)

5. Found a Kenmore Dryer at Habitat House for $60 :) 

6. Have a couple of avenues open for couch and dinning room table (but still open to new ideas) 

7. Will hopefully have some new carpet thanks to boyfriend's grandfather.  

8. Started looking at magazines, DIY channels, and stumbling "Interior Design" like it's my job. 

9. And today I picked colors for the living room and the kitchen (the bed and bath will be antique white) 

We tried to pick colors that we're light and bright and would hopefully make the room look bigger.  It's difficult because I am not 100% sure what the furinture will look like, but they start painting this week so I had to make a decision if  a) I wanted to let professionals paint it for me and b) I wanted any color besides antique white. But my ever, so helpful and supportative boyfriend assures me that this is the right decision. 

These are the pictures from Valspar's website. When you're looking at the picture pay attention to the main color on the back wall. 

First is the livingroom, it's the biggest room in the house and covers the length of the house. It will serve as the dining room and living room so it needs to be versital without being too much of one color. 

And the winner is: Blue Whisper 

For the kitchen I wanted something to go well with all of my various pink things (except for the fabulous green and red apple settings). So I picked what, in the sotre looked green. However, when I checked online it was a little more yellow. 

And the winner is: Desert Seedling 

Hopefully it will be more green than yellow?

10. And for tomorrow, we will work on getting some of the money spent on paint taken off the rent considering they we're going to buy paint anyway. 

might as well dance . . .

After spending the last week stumbling through blog after blog of someone talking about how fabulous they are, I kept thinking “I’m fabulous, I could do this.” So here I am joining the blogging world because in reality we all know that a new house, growing relationship, full time job, grad school, dance classes, and new exercise plans just aren’t enough to keep a girl busy. 

For those of you who don’t know me already let me begin by saying that sarcasm is one of my super powers (plus Tiff told me she would only read my blog if it was laced with sarcasm). In actuality this blog started because writing was my first love. It came before dating and boys, it carried me through dances and parties, it kept me busy through college, and hopefully one day it will put me in my dream home.

For right now I am one month away from moving into my first rental home. One bedroom, one bath, zero closets. To put it in a little bit of perspective, the bathroom was an addition. Hopefully I will be able to turn this into a perfect little starter house (if not, at least there won’t be a lot to clean).  The process of creating a perfect niche in the world along with all the other obstacles that come with spreading my wings are documented here.