Barely Keeping Up!

Wow! Life is going by at break neck speed right now and I am barely keeping up! Even as I sit here typing this post I can think of about a million things I should be doing, but hey, a girl needs to relax sometimes!

We are so happy! We are starting to settle into our house and while many things are still in progress, today I just stood at the front window and thought "It's ours." Well, sort of ours..."one mortgage payment down" ours. We love it so far! Things that I really love about being a homeowner thus far:

• The huge backyard! We take Rusty out there all of the time. I love getting home from running errands, walking into the backyard, and playing ball with him until we both get tired and decide it is time to go inside. He loves the yard, I think it is one of his favorite places and it was also one of the biggest selling points for us. I look forward to many hours spent out there, and so far the weather has been cooperating for us to be out there now! It's like spring here, which isn't so great for the upcoming Olympics, but as a woman that loves my sunshine it has been AMAZING!
• I love the room Rusty has to run inside as well! The layout of the house is just perfect for us, and as we get more boxes unpacked and things put away more zones of the house are becoming "Rusty Safe." He loves to toddle around and around the dining room table and make laps around the living room. The laminate we put in especially makes him happy because he likes the sound of his feet on the floor. I must have chased him around the room twenty times last night!
• We like having two bathrooms! Kevin has laid claim on the ensuite bathroom as his-except for the middle of the night-which is fine by me! I have the main bathroom as mine and Rusty's and Kevin gets that one. He is thrilled that he can "leave the seat up," again, except in the evening. His final act of the night before going to bed is to put the seat down. After years of "putting the seat down" oppression, he has regained his freedom! Ha!
  
• We love living in a quiet little neighborhood. We have to still meet many of our neighbors, but this neighborhood is perfect for us! It's a very quiet street, yet it is close to many amenities! Yesterday Rusty and I took a walk and ended up at Starbucks-surprise there, although I FINALLY got my coffee maker set up this morning hurray!-and our local grocery store. We bought things for a nice dinner, had a fun walk, and enjoyed the fresh air. We are also within walking distance of a HUGE green area and park. It is perfect! Rusty will also be within easy walking distance of his elementary school someday, which I think is great. Every single morning I have heard birds chirping, there are so many trees and it is so quiet around here. I can hear them even now!
• We love the location!! It is central to almost everything we need to get to, which has been really great for us. Kev's commute to work was cut down considerably, and it is nice that he can get there so quickly-it means more time with us in the morning! YAHOO!

• I love all of the paint colors I picked out! This is a big one, because I sort of agonized over those colors. Now, I know it's not that big of a deal and let me just preface this by saying how truly grateful we are to even have a home at all, but it IS nice to know that I really love the paint colors we chose. I will be happy with them for a long time. The kitchen is even coming along nicely, thanks to the amazing efforts of Kev's dad. Those cupboards will be painted in no time at all!
• I really like my stove! Although it is not ceramic top, which is my ultimate dream, it is practically brand new and works GREAT! It bakes perfectly and I really enjoy using it. I think I will really like it throughout the years and I am so happy that it is something we don't have to put money into any time soon. I know the rage is stainless steel right now, but I happen to really like the fresh brightness of the white, and we got a white dishwasher anyway, so they all match!
  

Things we are still working on:

• As I mentioned above, the kitchen. We are painting all of the cabinets, as well as the walls, so most of my kitchen stuff still resides in boxes on the floor. It has been a challenge, but I am figuring it out! Thankfully we have a big eat in area of the kitchen that is serving as the box wasteland, and I can access or find most things I need there!
• We are working on getting a dishwasher installed. I am not the best dishwasher around-in fact it is one of my top LEAST favorite chores-but I am keeping up nicely! It helps that my hubby is motivated each night after dinner and we tag team it. This morning though, I got several "I love you, honeys" and I couldn't figure out why. Finally I asked why I was so loved this morning! Turns out it was the fact that I had done all of the dishes last night! Who knew! I guess he just enjoyed playing ball with the munchkin while I did the dishes. I guess we will have to work out that kind of a schedule more often!
• We are still working on getting things we need like area rugs, curtains, etc. My husband has promised me that the curtains in our bedroom will go up before Sunday night. I am ready for that! The light has been coming in each night and while it isn't bad, I'm a "pitch black sleeping" kind of gal!
• Our refridgerator! We are figuring it out. Initially we thought it was brand new and although it was quite a bit smaller than our old one we figured we could make it work. Since then Kevin has figured out by a sticker on it that it was purchased in 2001. Again, not OLD, but there are a few things we are discovering about it. The drawer that holds the dairy stuff is missing its cover, so every time I open the door the cheese falls out on the floor. This morning I was putting my coffee creamer back into its section on the side door and the entire bar that holds everything in place fell off and everything fell to the floor. I realized when looking at it that apparently it had broken some time before and they had tried to glue it. I'm not sure how long that glue held, but it didn't hold today! I'm going to have to buy some duct tape to keep it all in place. Speaking of duct tape, the same door holder thing in the freezer is ALSO being held in place by duct tape! We aren't sure what we are going to do, but I know my hubby plans to hit up Home Depot for some duct tape to hold it all in place soon. Hey, things are still frozen and the milk is still cold, so it's doing great!
• Our basement. It is pretty much unusable right now, which is fine! We don't really have any need for it at the moment. Some day it will be our guest room and our family room. They will have some work to do, but we will get to it eventually! Right now the upstairs is MORE than enough room for us! We set up the extra bedroom as Caden's playroom, which he loves and so do we! I especially loved simply closing the door on that room last night instead of picking up all of the toys!
• We are still working on our closet. As is standard in houses of the time period, it isn't a walk-in closet, but it is pretty good sized and with the proper organizational gear from IKEA we should have it set up soon enough!

We are SO thrilled with our new home. In the middle of all of this we have had some crazy times. We had some medical stuff go down that wasn't fantastic, but friends and family helped out in phenomenal ways. I started a new job teaching Spanish 12 online, which is hectic, but actually a dream come true for me! I can still teach and be a mom at home! It's awesome!

Rusty is amazing! He settled into the new home pretty quickly and he seems very happy! Yesterday I received so many hugs and kisses. I think he was really happy to spend time with me and also to be in an area with so much space. He is the love of our little lives, and we realize every day what a miracle he is. He has been an especial blessing to us in the last week or so.

Hope you are all doing well! I haven't forgotten you, life is just busy!