Bittersweet and spooky

Today is a big day-- We're closing on our yellow house in an hour and a half.
I decided not to go back to the house last night to say goodbye.  I am unsteady in my emotions about it and I didn't want to make the kids think this is some tragic ending.  We went over there on Saturday to load more stuff from the house and I was a lot bit weepy and didn't really like feeling like we were making some crazy mistake by selling our sweet home.

This morning I talked to my mom and she said it is totally normal to have seller's remorse, just like buyers' remorse.  So at least it's okay to be all torn up about it.  And my nana says there's no use in looking back, so just look ahead and it will all be fine.  Looking ahead!  Hopefully tomorrow I don't feel a huge, gaping, yellow-house shaped void in my heart.  I'll let you know, duh.

Nick is still struggling with some regret with buying this house, which is totally understandable considering what we're up against here.  For example, last time he was in the crawl space, he found that under the kids' playroom is a stinking JACK literally holding up the room!  Awesome.  Surprises like that.  Surprises like reaching into my oven mitt drawer and discovering little mouse poopies in the drawer and INSIDE MY OVEN MITT!!!  Of course I'd probably enjoy a good snuggle in an oven glove if I were a precious little rodent too, but as a human I'd prefer if they didn't find their way into the cabinet, up the wall, and over the edge of the drawer to poop on my pot holders.  It's just unnecessary.  And if we're being honest... slightly unsanitary.

I'm also pretty darn certain I found a flea yesterday, which Nick was all paranoid would happen since we have acquired the outside cat along with our house.  I love Jack but I definitely don't want fleas.  And no, I'm not saying our dog is completely without fault because he has a much cozier coat of fur for building a flea-house than that cat does.  Either way, both animals got a flea treatment, Howdy got a VERY thorough and exciting bath, and our bedding etc got a nice bleachy, hot-watery, super agitation-y laundering.  It was a busy day here in "Mama's Celebrating!!" Land.

stuff to celebrate:
We brought over some of my favorite pieces of furniture on Saturday, and things are really getting sweeter looking in here!  Feels so nice to surround yourself with special pieces of furniture when you are trying to settle in.  When you're a furniture-junkie like moi, it's a perma-high.

We got this pie safe at an estate sale this past summer.  From my extensive research, I have determined that it was built in the 1860's.  Would you shoot me if I told you it was $4?  Four bucks.

It'll need help with the doors of course, and needs two new drawers built.

It actually doesn't make the blue walls look worse!  Excited to paint them though :)

I also brought this in, but it needed a major scrub-down so I'll explain more on that later.  This was at the same estate sale and it was also embarrassingly affordable.  A little (big) treasure hidden in that little sale.

I know... not the best shot amidst the unpacking craziness.

Yesterday the kids got up early and made me breakfast in bed.  See?  The picture proves it.

Naturally I was thrilled so I thought I better reward them by doing something unrelated to scrubbing and unpacking.  We went to the A-DORA-BLAY Heritage Square... It was a little Halloween carnival that we HAD to partake in.  We went with my friend Carly, who happens to be mother to Roo's favorite friend Joslyn.  They had a ball and stuff:

So spooky!!

 
 Better wrap this up.  Talk to you soon-like!

funny pit.

So, it's funny how one minute you're like ready to take on your new money pit shabby unchic house, and the next you're ready to list it for sale again.

Today my friend Brooke came over with Freedom, her son whose Tulah's age.  We have not seen them in forever.  It was the first time the kiddos hosted friends at their new spot.  I am thankful it was Brooke, who loves people as they are, since there is chaos all around.  Boxes everywhere, and lots of them are partially unpacked and strewn.  Markers everywhere.  Stuff all over any flat surface available for stuff to land upon.  It's precious around here.

I told myself that I would try real hard to not introduce our home to friends as, "This is our new house but it will soon look like this here, that there, and I'm planning on doing this over here."  I want it to be who it is and let our story unfold naturally, not wishing it was what it is not.  And what it is not is DONE.  And I know it never will be, so why show it off as if it's due for a makeover in a week or two.  I am excited about the journey, and after all, we purchased POTENTIAL.

I like potential.  I am comfortable with it.  I get excited when I get a first coat of paint on and I start snapping pictures like it's already complete.  I don't mind a gas leak (as long as it's on Xcel Energy's tab!!!) or dim lighting or a sloping floor.  Those things can change and I can dream as I manage.  So today, as we said goodbye to our friends, I actually patted myself on the back that I really did not mention one thing that we're planning on doing, and talked instead about what we have done and how we did it.  I was glad and she was excited that we were able to purchase the potential we've been wanting.

We've had our kitchen water shut off for a few days now.  We are lucky enough to have odd and weird sections of copper plumbing mixed in with tons of corroded galvanized in the back part of the house.  The worst is under the kitchen sink.  Nick turned off the water the other day and decided tonight after work that the stacks of dishes everywhere were a bit unfit and we should see about repairing the pipes in the crawlspace.  Well, it's a stinking mess.  There is water under there, an arachnid or more that eerily resemble a black widow, and odd pipes and fittings and mains that seem to lead to nowhere.  How is it that there is a main there, but we were able to shut off the water in the back part at the new part of the house?  Did they abandon the old plumbing but fail to at least fit in some new plumbing?  Nick decided he's not fixing it under there.  We have corroded pipe at the laundry room and the kitchen, and a 2' square access hole to a crawlspace that is 3 feet deep to work in under the house.  He'd be soldering piece after piece of copper, lying on his back.  Could we hire someone to do it after we close on the other house?  Would we have a sink to use til then?  Do you know Nick?  Do you know that once he sees this kind of stuff after a day at work, the Nick I know and love is going to be absent for a while til the storm settles?  Do you know that there will be no joy in the bumps in the road?  None??

And all this is at bedtime.  The kids are wanting our attention, though playing SO well and so cute together, and being so patient.  They don't know what's going on with the plumbing or what sometimes feels like everything else in the house.  They're awesome and they play and they laugh and they dress their little brother in tutus and dresses.  Which he looks absolutely lovely in.

I don't know what to do to keep them happy but just... try to make them happy.  I don't know how to make Nick feel okay.  If he's not okay, then nobody's okay.  I was so excited about the potential here, trying to laugh at the weird and unplanned stuff that has happened so far.   It's not that fun or easy to be excited enough for the both of us, for the four of us.  I can't celebrate each accomplishment if half of us are ready to count the place as a loss.  Please pray that we can work out some of these issues so that it can be a fun adventure and not a disaster.  Please God, let us just enjoy the ride and know that you're taking care of us!  Because I know that you are!!!

Tulah is sketching up a storm lately:

Truffula Tree

Dinosaur

Little Mermaid.  Shells included.

Caterpillar Etc.

I think I'll make it a snappy new day, ok?

Have you felt neglected, little blog page?
I understand.
I have things to show you!  Pretty things, fun things, snappy things!
But first, a word from my little sleepy sponsor:

We are officially moving on our new floors, and starting to move IN to our home!  Oh thank you dear Lord.

Now you know I wanted tons of contrast and character, and Nick really wanted floors just like what we have now.  I am celebrating that I can say I am happy with how they turned out, and happy that they're the perfect combo of Nick's tastes and mine.  I can compromise :)

Want to show you some of my favorite parts of the floors:

love the knot holes, so happy they stuck around.

a lot of the texture remained through the sanding, yay!

Nature, you so pretty.

The other night we had some super fussy winds blow through CO.  We were staying at our yellow house of course, just imagining the worst at the new house since it's further west.  Well the next morning everything was fine... The aspens in front are still standing, which means that our living and bedroom are still intact.  Great.  We did discover, however that it is definitely Fall INSIDE our house.  

Leaves blew through our not-so-trusty windows!  How did this happen?  

As I stood there, I realized that there was a breeze coming in that could blow my hair back.  We are going to need to replace those suckas the second we close on our yellow house!  

Speaking of which, our closing date got moved up by 10 days!  Whoa, wait, is that right??  We were excited but freaking out slightly at the news of all we had to do in the next four days.

     Then we found out we were right, that we were still closing on the 30th.  Pumping the brakes on the "what kind of projects can we tackle once we sell??!" excitement.  Like, new windows that will not allow a blizzard inside our home.  Please Lord, please let us make it to closing this time!!!

Knox and Roo have been having fun in the yard, setting up gardens and obstacles and bagging up dirt to give as presents.  Such generous children.

Knox is hauling a timber to use as a balance beam. 

They have been coloring, writing, drawing, pretending, playing soccer in our big-ish open and empty rooms, all week... I am so proud of them!  I have gotten so much done.  But what's better is that I've gotten so much done AND I've kept my wits.  Always an accomplishment.  Today I got their entire ceiling finished (just a minute and I'll show you pictures) while they played.  WHAT?!  Well it helped it was taped already but you know.  

Today especially was amazing.  Naturally it started off incredibly cranky (Knox.  Every single morning.) and I was not in the mood for it.  But what choice did I have but to DECIDE to be in the mood for it!  I said to myself when times got crank, "I think I'll make it a snappy new day!"  I'm not sure if I said that necessarily, or the Mister Roger's throwback cartoon theme song was just stuck on repeat in my head.  Have you seen Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood?  It's cute, really Super Why-esque (since it's created by the same people) but it's cute.  The beginning song was stuck in my head. Maybe the (unshakeable) mantra worked and I made it through the earliest morning hours with deep breaths and patience.  And lots of coffee, since I made a gallon of it AND breakfast at the new house as soon as we arrived there.  So far I've made mac-n-cheese and scrambled eggs but happy about the baby steps-- I'M COOKING IN OUR NEW HOME! 

After bfast we went to the dollar store nearby to get some masking tape to finish up one little thing in the kids' room, and I decided to go buck wild let them each pick out A toy.  Usually I don't spoil them in such a manner but I felt like dipping into my pockets a little today.  Roo picked out a little set of two tiny mermaids with tiny mermaid accessories.  Knox?  He spent 18 minutes deciding on a toy.  And then did not decide on a toy, but picked out a spray bottle so he could help me clean!  AND THIS $1 SPRAY BOTTLE KEPT HIM BUSY FOR AN HOUR.  Wow.  He sprayed water.  He scrubbed.  He wiped and dried.  He was a busy and productive young sir!  Those two got along the entire morning today, I could not have been a happier mommy.  

 

Munchiekins were busy, so I wrapped up some stuff.  See? 

Did a little of this...

 

 A little of that...

 

 Some tinkering...

 

 And we have a bedroom, people!

 

sorry, not the brightest photo!  No time to edit!  Also, the walls were already this seafoamymintyfresh color, and YES I was morally obligated to let it stick around, ESPECIALLY with red splashed in there.

 And we have a play room, also people!  Not very put together.  Don't rush me!  sheesh.

My bff put stripes on her baby boy's room last year, so I knew if she could do it, I could completely rip off her idea and do it too :)  I'll put up a picture of Hank's room when I find it, it is so stinking amazing.  

Pretty excited to finish up the rooms and get the baby bears settled in.  They have been such amazing little troopers and I'm just dying to slow down their schedule and give them some much-needed normalcy and attention.  We're getting closer!

Floors and stuff!

OH WE HAVE FLOORS.

And lights.  Ya'll.


Right now I'm live from The Mattress Under the Windows, since our bunks are disassembled and parked in the garage at the new house.  Knox is in his prime slumbering position, with his little hand right under my collar bone.  Not sure when he'll outgrow this, but I'm hoping it's sometime before he leaves for college.  Or prior, just to keep things uncreepy.  Stinker.

 Did you know that installing hardwood flooring is potentially more painful and miserable than giving birth?  Like childbirth, you hurt afterwards in places never before mentioned.  Possible you were never sure that part existed until the big event.  Same with this.  Five glorious days of labor.  But once it's over, it's over, and you forget all about how much it took to get through that final push.  Hooray for you!  I mean, me! 

Saturday morn Nick and our neighbor from Eaton St. installed recessed lighting in our very very very very very very dim living room.  Major and vast improvement!

Nick's mom took the kiddos overnight Saturday, awesome!  We got a ton done but still didn't wrap it up until Wednesday evening.  I think we put in approx. 900 square feet.  We've never done hardwoods before, so we learned lots and I would absolutely 100% hire someone to do it next time.  Well not really because I will never be able to afford it.  After wrapping up the upstairs, I got busy checking my bank account to see if I could pay someone to do the bottom floor.  Took several minutes to come to terms with the fact that nobody in this world would do it for $136.44.

This is our bedroom before/after. 

the final board upstairs!  Can we hire someone yet?

We worked on it all night Saturday, then all day Sunday and Monday. Now we were learning, and figuring out our best and most efficient method, but once we got going we did all right.  Plus we had our kiddos around a couple of the days, but we kept them busy:

Knox was catching hornets with his pliers.  Thanks, bud!

Roo was drawing on the boards and posing :)

 The biggest challenge was all the rifling through the boards to pick the best ones to install.  Now I'm not sure if I mentioned that we try to do everything within a super modest cash budget.  Did I?  Well, the hardwoods I found that fit the bill cost a MERE $.96 per SQUARE FOOT!  Schwinnnng!  I found them when we first went under contract on our sweet little house.  I figured I had better have an affordable plan if I was going to talk Nick into actually going through with our little Property O Potential.  I wanted rustic-looking, wide-planked, and REAL wood floors.  I found these at Lumber Liquidators online, and when we went in to check them out in person we fell in lubba-dub-dub.

 These got mixed and genuine reviews online.  This lumber was utility grade- all the cast-offs from the mill that might have missing tongues/grooves, saw burns (YES!!), burls (YEEEESSSSSS!!) and big ol' knot holes in it.  PERFECT, I'll take 900 sf. and my darling and able-bodied husband would be delighted to pick them up in three separate loads.  Each bundle has a mix of red and white oak, so some of the boards are super dark, knotty, super white, or red.  Most of the boards are short- we had only maybe 10% that were really long but we were okay with that because LOOK AT IT!! :

Utility grade 5" oak flooring from Lumber Liquidators... freshly installed, unfinished at this point.  Love the colors!!

 Buying this stuff, you have to be prepared for a lot of waste.  The dudes at the store say about 10%, but I think we had more than that.  Tulah and I organized all the extras so I can make some sweet table tops down the road.  See how much waste there was?  This was from basically just the living room.

All those nice rare, long boards on the left were too narrow or missing grooves, so bummed!  Until I put them to other good use!!  This was the waste pile, from installing appx 400-500 sf of usable planks.

Nickface was adamant about having our favorite floor guys, Brian and Victor, come to stain and poly the floors.  I personally wanted to experiment with other dyes or stains, after seeing my momsie post this on pinterest: http://www.moneypit.com/article/natural-non-toxic-wood-stain-coffee-berries-and-more
Seriously.  Can't you just picture some penny-vinegar stain streaking blue along some random boards, and coffee on the others?  I'm pretty sure my new hardwoods like coffee just as much as I do.   But I did not win him over in any way, he just wanted it DONE and done right.  And fast!!  To heck with the environment, he says!  So I lost.  I can admit defeat.  I can also probably still try to have a big fat say in how they turn out, Mr. GinnBoree.  You'll see.  And I'm sure the floor guys will love all of my creative input on how they finish them up.  Sorry, guys. As my bff  Ashleigh just told me, I would be a nightmare to work with, in the best possible way of course!

They came over today to fill and sand them.  Usually they sand quite a depth off, like they did here at our yellow house.  But I didn't want them super smoothed down, I want my socks to snag once in a while, you know?  I want grooves!  Knot holes!  I WANT SPLINTERS, OKAY?!!  Well no to the splinters, actually... But I don't want a super smooth floor.  Just uh, safe, I guess.  We opted for a very light stain color, and only to tone the yellowishness that oak tends to take on.  Also with a thin stain coat, we'll get the wood filler dark enough to look aged and repaired.  Important since there will be a lot of it! 

Right side is poly only, and left side is the stain.  Almost the same color, just less yellow.  Still lots of contrast.  I think in this photo the right side actually looks better, but in person the opposite was true.  The stuff on the right looks richer right now because it's the polyurethane, but once the left gets a coat of gloss it will look just as rich.  Can't wait!

May I also use this opportunity to demonstrate what is under your carpeting in your home?  This was the main walk way after we pulled out the carpeting and pad.  DIRT JUST LIVES UNDER THERE.  Well, some dirt, but probably mostly disintegrating carpet pad.  Yuck!!!  Literally there were little dirt paths under the padding through the main walk ways in the room.

I had a lot to say today!  I spent the whole nap time typing and resizing photos.  I need to get better at this if I am going to keep you up to date!   Knox is now awake, and so is my girl.  They are eating crumbly things in my bed next to me.  Too bad my shop-vac is at the other house.

I am just loving our new home!!  Even though I'm still pulling splinters out of my hands :)  Get 'em before the gangrene does, I guess.

Digging into the AMAZING apples from our tree!!

Roo drew our little family on a board.  Knox helped her by scribbling out half of her drawing.  SUCH a little brother.

Howdy is already pretty comfy on his new floors :)  Love this pup.