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Monday, February 28, 2011

Our House


We bought our house in November, and so far all I've shown you are somewhat scary construction pictures. I've been waiting until the house was clean and it was sunny out, but I settled for no sun and clean house! We are still working on so much, but we've come a long way from the super dirty and neglected house we bought a few months ago.


It's so gray and dreary looking! We've hardly done any yard work, so in 6 months, this should look totally different. The landscaping is so overgrown, we really just tried to get enough done that our house wouldn't look completely terrible all winter long.







We have a nice deep front porch, here's the view:



There's hooks for a porch swing. Oh and that bush, on the lower left? Bushes like that line the front and one side of the house. They're infested with poison ivy. Those'll be fun to work with!


You walk into the living room from the front porch. This room is pretty much done-we scraped the popcorn from the ceilings, painted the ceiling and repaired/painted the walls. I can't wait to get a comfy sectional in here, the room is so big we can fit one easily.


We hung our Christmas cards up on the door frame in between the living room and the kitchen. Hey Emily! Still need to take these down....


Another view of the living room. We spend lots of time on this couch. We got the blinds at Penney's during a day after Thanksgiving sale for a killer price. I cannot believe they fit our weird-sized windows. I wasn't super pumped about them initally-I thought they'd look kind of naked and such, but they are so easy to clean, and I think the molding at the top makes up for no curtains. That's what my sister Alli said and I'm going with it.


When I moved out of the house my sister and I shared, she let me take this console with me. We bought it in a local antique store a couple years ago for $20. I need to decorate this-that cake stand was used at our wedding! This is also where our wedding album lives.


Wedding album! I wanted to be cheap and do a MyPublisher book, but Ryan talked me into this, and I am so glad he did.


I literally sent the poor photographer over 50 edits. She probably hates me.



I love our kitchen. It's so big and bright, and the table in the middle acts as an island when needed. Ryan is painting the cabinets white for me....they are huge pains. Like 2-3 coats of oil based paint with curing times, obnoxious brush clean ups and lots of sanding. He is amazing.



Cabinet close up.




More kitchen. There are 41 doors poor Ryan has to paint. I'm happy to not have doors....saves time.






Our house was built in 1924, and some genius before us added a main floor laundry right off the kitchen. LOVE. I have always had basement laundry, and now I can't go back. This room needs lots of work-we want to tile the floors and add way more shelving. I'd like to store cleaning stuff here as well as kitchen stuff we don't use that often, like some appliances.




The master is right off the kitchen. It's kind of weird placement but I really like it. And its so close to the laundry room that putting clothes away is easy. I really like our bedding. We pretty much just need furniture/accessories in here.






The door to the master bath used to go outside, but another genius added a master bathroom. I hate the blue panes in the door, I really want to switch them out eventually. The transom over the door actually works! I just love old houses.





The genius who added the master bath unfortunately wasn't smart enough to insulate. So this bathroom is super chilly.


When you walk into the bathroom and turn right, you see this.




When you turn left, there's the closet. Very handy for getting ready in the morning, everything is right there.




The office is right off of the living room. It's our current dumping ground. Eventually this will be Ryan's spot-he has some really cool baseball memorabilia that he can showcase here. This room had carpet that we ripped up just to find holes and 3 different finishes on the wood floors. We'll get these floors refinished and add a piece of trim to the baseboards to hide the gap created when we ripped out the carpet. You solve one problem (gross carpet) just to create another one (hole in floor)!


This full bathroom is also right off the living room. We replaced the light fixture (the one you see will also go in the other 2 full bathrooms, we bought 3), the shower head, the towel bar, and we need to replace the toilet. And we ripped out the old oak medicine cabinet and Ryan installed a simple mirror with beveled edges.









The dark wood on these stairs kind of sucks to keep clean. Every speck of dust shows!




This is the future reading nook-Ryan is going to build bookshelves and he bought me this awesome chaise for Christmas!




On Sunday mornings I like to bring my coffee up here and read. It feels like a vacation.


There are 2 bedrooms and a full bath off of the foyer, here's the unfinished one:




And here's the finished one. We had our first house guest this weekend! The hotel is open for business.


That's my little sewing spot, with a new quilt draped all over the place. Eventually my sewing room will be in the unfinished bedroom, but its in here until we get the other space together.


The storage space kicks *ss.





We have a deck that looks out over the fenced in part of the yard....just ready and waiting for a puppy!



Whew. We are so, so fortunate to be able to live in such a great home. I've always wanted an old house, and thanks to my handy husband I have one!

I'll post on decorating ideas later, I have TONS.

So in our first 4 months of marriage, we both got new jobs and bought/renovated a house. We aren't good at taking things slow!

Did you take on lots of stuff right after your wedding?

Thursday, February 17, 2011

Milk Glass Out and About

Part of my marketing plan for my job was to increase my medical practice's involvement with community outreach. So, I volunteer at several area senior center's during lunch time-handing out drinks, collecting trays, etc. 2 of the 3 senior centers I volunteer at (by the way, I LOVE grassroots marketing like this...and I LOVE that my bosses let me do it. It is by far the most smart marketing move my practice is making right now, IT WORKS) have milk glass centerpieces, like the ones Ryan and I had at our wedding!


So I just went through and looked for a picture of our centerpieces....and couldn't find but one. Um. Probably because I did lots of this....



One was for Ryan. Really. Who is now saying that he didn't drink it. I could've sworn I got this for him...


I'm sure I could find pictures of our centerpieces via our photographer's CD we have with pictures, but...that's upstairs. But yeah, every time I go to one of those senior centers and see that milk glass, I think about our reception and how much fun we had, and how much fun Ryan and I had picking that milk glass out at thrift stores and garage sales.


Go milk glass!


Do you see reminders or your wedding at odd places?

Monday, February 14, 2011

I just finished reading....

Lake with No Name, by Diane Wei Lang.


I didn't like the protagonist very much at all. Does that make a book hard to read for you? It does for me. The author of this book lived through some pro-democracy protests in China in 1989 (Tiananmen Square), which I was really looking forward to reading about. Unfortunately the book was mostly about her dumb relationships. I just couldn't like the girl...she kept making such idiotic choices. The parts of this book that talked about what it was like to be a University student in China at that point in time were really interesting, and I'm glad I read the book, but I won't read it again or recommend it due to the needless/dumb relationship stuff. If I want that I'll watch the Real Housewives.

What are you reading right now?

Thursday, February 3, 2011

Humph

WHY NOT A YEAR AGO VERA, WHY?

David's Bridal has an incredibly affordable and lovely collection of bridal gowns courtesy of Vera Wang herself. I LOVE high end stuff brought down to a level of affordability that makes it more accessible. But why, oh why, could this not have happened last year, when I was wedding dress shopping?


That one on the far right? I for sure would've rushed in to try that on, sans the belt.

Seriously though, it makes me so happy to see such a high end, unique designer make lovely gowns available to a much wider price point-the gowns range from $500-$1500.

Do you see things that you wish you would've had access to/known about when you were wedding planning?