Christmas in August!!!

When I got home from work today there were 9 boxes from UPS and Fed Ex waiting on the door step! All our the fixtures we ordered from Home Depot came in today! Here is a picture of them piled up inside the house:

I immediately went to work opening each one to take a look. I had spent hours staring at them on the website, but since they were only available online, I had never seen any of them in real life. I was like a kid on Christmas morning! The dogs were very interested in what I was up to, and wanted to help by sniffing everything as much as possible. By the time Andrew got home from work, I pretty much had them all opened. This is what he saw when he came in the door:


I am happy to report nothing was broken, and everything looks just like I imagined it would! Now I can't wait to actually get them into the house!

I'm posting early tonight because we are getting ready to eat dinner and then we're off to a concert tonight! Merry Christmas everybody!!

Project Runway Night!!

How could I be in a bad mood on Wednesday?? It's Project Runway night!!! I'm in the female's equivalent of a Fantasy Football league, except with Project Runway. The point systems is kind of elaborate so I won't go into too much detail about it, but basically you pick your top three designers and then two alternates. It's organized by a friend back home in Virginia, and there are 20 people playing. It's a 10 dollar buy in, so the winner gets 200 bucks!! I don't think it will be me since my number one pick was eliminated tonight but it's still fun to watch and keep up with who is winning in our game. This is my first time to play, but last season a guy actually won, and right now a guy is in the lead. Andrew likes to watch the runway show so he can make fun of all the designs. I wouldn't be surprised if he was playing next season! Time will tell. Another reason for being in a good mood... we got a free dinner tonight! We met our friend Randy who is in Georgetown visiting his uncle, and his uncle bought dinner! Definitely made the drive to 35 & 290 worth it!

Well tonight I figured I post my ideas for our master bedroom. A lot of the pieces will carry over from what we have now in the rental house, but it will get a sprucing up. Before we moved down here and I left my job at Country Curtains, I bought basically a whole new bedding set for our bedroom. I bought it with the hope we would own a house soon and I would use it in our new house, but in the meantime I wanted to use it in the rental house as well. The print is a blue and white toile and the quilt and accent pillows are a solid blue. Here is a picture of it in our bedroom right now.


We are using the color Honey Bear on the walls, which is a soft gold color. I love the color combo of the blue, white and gold. I think having a color behind it instead of just white will change the look of the toile, so even though I've lived in this room with this print for a year already, the new bedroom will have a whole new look to it. We will also be doing a sitting area in the master bedroom since it's such a big space and we need to fill it up with something. We have a loveseat that is very comfortable but doesn't look great or match anything so we bought a slip cover to put on it for the master bedroom. The wall in front of the sitting area will be painted white as an accent wall, so Honey Bear will only be on three walls. Here is what the slipcover looks like.

Unfortunately we don't have a whole matching bedroom set to use in this room. A few years ago we got this sleigh bed, which I LOVE but our bedroom was so tiny at the time, we didn't have room for any other furniture. Now this style is discontinued so I can't get the matching pieces. I would love two matching nightstands and a big dresser. Of course those things aren't really in the budget right now, but someday I will find ones that match the wood color and when the time is right they will be ours. Here are pictures of the master bedroom, bathroom and some of the fixtures, some from the listing and some that I have taken.

In the bathroom we are going to rip up the yucky carpet on the floor and lay new tile. I haven't picked out the exact shade for the bathroom walls, but I think I'll just see if at Home Depot they can mix a lighter shade of Honey Bear. We have the matching shower curtain in the blue toile and white towels (shown to the left), so I think the effect would be very pretty. I think a shade slightly lighter would be nice though, since the bathroom is a smaller room. We will be replacing all of the towel bars, towel ring, and other fixtures with brushed nickel ones. This is the vanity lighting we will use, and the ceiling fan for the master bedroom!


























Today I ordered paint samples directly from the Behr website. They sell small 8 oz. samples for you to paint a patch on your walls to see how you like it. Since I spent so long picking out paint, I'm really excited about seeing what the colors actually look like on the wall. I think it will be fun to paint a little patch and experiment! I'm hoping they come in by next Wednesday, because as soon as I get the keys to the house I want to try the samples out! I'm not wasting any time! The one week countdown has officially begun!

The Slowest Week in History.... Until Next Week

Hello faithful blog readers. Tonight I'm feeling better and a little more cheery, although today was another day on the emotional rollercoaster called "Waiting to Close on Your House." I was feeling pretty productive this morning so I called the electrician who recently did an estimate for us at the new house, and scheduled a day for him to come do the work. During the inspection some electrical problems were discovered that required attention, luckily we were able to ask for some money back towards closing to cover those costs. I was very happy to be able to schedule him for the 28th, the day after we close, and felt relieved to have crossed at least one thing off my ever growing list. We also opted to have him to put in exhaust fans in the two upstairs bathrooms since they have poor ventilation. Apparently if a bathroom has a window in it, building codes don't require it to have a fan, but who wants to shower with the window open all the time? After talking to him on the phone I was quite happy to learn that doing this additional work would cost about half of what we thought it would. Score!

On his way home from work Andrew called me to let me know about his rollercoaster ride of the day. Our contact with the lender called him this afternoon and suddenly needed some documentation that we had not known we would need before. Some of this documentation required him calling back home to Virginia to get information from his parents. She called him at 4:30 our time, 5:30 eastern time, so it wasn't really the most convenient time to be dealing with this issue. By some stroke of luck he was able to get a hold of everyone he needed and get all the information and documentation but it definitely made for a stressful end of the day.

After getting a semi-decent night's rest I was feeling a little better about my conversation with the contractor last night, which was most of the cause of my anxiety in my last post. I don't like to bash people on the internet, especially people who I know USE the internet, but I doubt he will be reading my blog anytime soon. The contractor is a nice guy and I know he means well, but he has more opinions than I care to hear about. I'd like him to do the work I'm paying him to do and not have to hear his thoughts and professional opinion on EVERYTHING else in the house. I feel like I have to justify my decisions to him and it gets really tiresome. I know he will give us a good deal and do a good job so I'm willing to put up with it. Also, I'm not the only person he's like that with, which makes me feel better. Apparently he's like that with everyone. It was frustrating last night, but in the light of a new day it was not such a big deal.

I guess all these things are to be expected. We are going about our daily lives with these lumps in the back of our throats, like just waiting for something to go awry and find out the loan got screwed up, or the house was struck by lightening, or a sink hole opened up and swallowed all of South Austin... Ok I know that sounds ridiculous, but at this point it feels like everything is teeter tottering and we are just waiting for something to happen to blow the whole thing up. And it doesn't help that the days are crawling by. I can't believe it's only Tuesday; I feel like I've lived through two months already this week. All I can think about while I'm at work is house stuff, and I'm driving myself insane. Work hasn't been particularly busy lately either, there is always something to do, but I haven't been "busy."

I think the week will start picking up tomorrow. We had to break our meal schedule for the week because we got an unexpected call from a friend in town who wanted to do dinner tomorrow night. I guess this means I will be cooking on Friday night now. Anyway, Randy grew up at Falls Church and has known Andrew forever, he was in the youth group when I was an intern, and this summer he WAS the intern at Falls Church. It makes me feel old to think about that, but it will be good to see him for a little while tomorrow night. Thursday night we are going to a show at Antone's to see Homer Hiccolm and the Rocket Boys, a band that I love a lot, made up of all guys from ACU. Friday night is the weekend, finally, and then Saturday is Lindsey's birthday and all kind of fun wedding things! I just have to find things to keep myself occupied until next Wednesday!!

That's all for tonight! Completely unrelated to house stuff, here is a pic I took the other day of our "babies!" Aren't they cute???

Garfield's Favorite Food

I made lasagna for dinner tonight. For some reason during the day while thinking about the lasagna I was going to be making I was reminded of Garfield. I used to love watching the Garfield cartoon show when I was a kid. If you followed Garfield at all you will remember how much he loved lasagna. When I was a kid I never questioned this, but today I started wondering why he loved lasagna so much and couldn't really make sense of it. Besides his love of lasagna, some other themes of the comic strip/ show were laziness, naps and hatred of diets. He probably wouldn't like the lasagna I make; I use fat free ricotta cheese, fat free mozzarella, ground turkey and whole grain pasta. I think its quite delicious and there is no guilt involved in eating this lasagna. I got the recipe from a cook book that I love, if you are interested let me know and I can send it to you. This lasagna is one of the reasons I was able to have that infamous $81 dollar grocery store trip. We will eat this for several lunches and at least one more dinner this week. It's strategy.

That's all the humor I have for tonight.

In the next few days I'm going to get all the ideas for the master bedroom up here but tonight I don't have the mental energy to do it. I'm feeling kind of stressed tonight and not in the mood to gush. Obviously there is a lot of anxiety and anticipation that goes along with closing on a house. I am interested to see what it will actually be like since we have heard so many different stories. Some people say it was easy, piece of cake, no problem. Then I've heard stories of people showing up to their closings and the paperwork being all wrong, wrong interest rate, an ARM instead of a fixed, etc. Some people say don't bother reading every little line, some people say make sure you read everything. I guess in those kind of situations I count on Andrew to make sure everything is as it should be, because it's too much for me to take it all in. I'm obviously excited to get in the house and get all my decorating ideas started. But really come August 27th when we close, I will be most glad to have THIS process behind me.

I think most of my audience is made up of females so you will probably all understand when I say I think I need a good cry (any males reading will think I'm crazy). I kind of feel it coming on and I'm sure sometime in the next week leading up to or on our closing day it will happen. Sometimes you just have to get in a good cry and you feel so much better afterwards, its like a release of all the stress built up inside you. Here's hoping it happens soon!

A Good Grocery Trip and More Plans

In the past few months as we have tightened our budget and our belts in preparation for buying a house, we've gotten smarter about our grocery shopping strategies. You might not have thought there was much strategy involved in grocery shopping, but you were wrong. If you know either one of us very well, you know we love to eat out, (especially me at Freebirds about every 7-10 days) and eating out several times a week can really add up. That is one habit we are still working hard to change, but we have gotten it down to a minimum. Usually in the past we would be eating out as a result of a conversation like this:

"What do you feel like eating tonight?"

"I dunno, what do you want?"

"I don't know.... I don't really feel like cooking."

"Let's just go get something somewhere."

In order to curb this behavior, like I said, we came up with a strategy that helps us avoid being in this situation. We started planning out our meals for two weeks at a time before making a trip to the grocery store. This doesn't necessarily mean that I am going to cook every night for two solid weeks. We might schedule a night where we just eat leftovers, or make ourselves a sandwich, or eat the occasional bowl of cereal for dinner (don't deny it, you do it too). We also take into account anything we might have going on during the week, for example an evening we know we won't be at home but the occasion might include a meal. We usually schedule one night a week for ourselves to eat out, typically Friday night. I also try to make enough food that we will have leftovers to take for lunch, but we also buy groceries to pack our lunches for when we don't have leftovers. This systems has worked great for us because it takes the burden off of myself for deciding what to make for dinner that night and knowing if we have all the proper ingredients. It completely avoids a situation where you revert to eating out for lack of better options and knowing you will get to eat out on Friday night gives you something to look forward to.

This systems is also great because we found that when we make short, sporadic trips to the grocery store we end up spending a lot more than when we make one big trip. That's not to say that we still don't have to make the occasional trip to the store, but they are fewer and far between when we have done our planning right. So I am pleased to announced that tonight we went to HEB and spent EIGHTY ONE DOLLARS on two weeks worth of groceries for lunch and dinner!!!!!!! This is a world record!!! Ok, I have to admit some of the meals we planned involved foods we already had at home (i.e. frozen burger patties) but seriously, 81 dollars??? I'm pretty proud of ourselves. And as a reward we get to eat out the next two Friday nights. :)

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On to bigger and better things. Tonight I'd like to unveil to you all (drum roll please) my plans for our formal living/ dining room. While this room probably won't get as much use as the family room, I'm really glad to have an area where we can serve a larger meal and entertain as well. It may take a little longer than the family room for this room to come together, but when it does it will be a great space. Here are a few photos of the room, some from the real estate listing and some that I have taken.

















When we lived in Virginia some family friends gave us furniture they didn't want anymore because they were moving into a new house. This furniture was almost brand new and looked like it had come right from the store. At the time we didn't have any room for it but we didn't want to turn it down either. We have had it in storage at various places for the past 3 years so I am really excited to finally get to use it. They gave us a nice sofa and matching arm chair that are very attractive and formal looking. It's not the kind of sofa you could curl up on and watch a movie, but it's perfect for a nice formal sitting area. The sofa is being stored in our garage right now and has about a hundred boxes stacked up on it, but the chair is in our bedroom so I took a pic of it to show on here. You can get an idea of the styling of the sofa from the chair. We are using Castle Stone as the paint color in this room, which is pretty neutral and will compliment the blue very nicely I think. I am looking for some occasional tables to use in this sitting area. I need to find a coffee table, sofa table and console table (possibly just 2 of the same to use for both purposes) for this room. I'd like to find something with a darker maybe cherry colored finish to match the wood on the legs of this furniture. I have seen a group at Target that I actually like a lot and are a pretty good price so they are the number one choice. I want something that looks nice but I don't want to spend a lot of money. If anyone has any good suggestions on where to find tables let me know!

This room opens up to the kitchen and then onto the family room so I wanted to keep the pineapple theme going throughout the whole first level. The colors in the pineapple fabric really wouldn't work with the blue sofa and chair so I had to come up with a solution. Don't worry my friends, Country Curtains never dissapoints! They sell the cutest lace curtain with pineapples in the lace! I'm normally not a big lace fan, I think it looks kind of grandma-ish in a lot of cases, but this lace is SO not grandma! It's really whimsical and cute and the perfect way to carry the pineapples over into this room. They even sell a curtain rod in a pewter finish (it will be a close match with the brushed nickel fixtures) with pineapple finials! Here are the pics off the website.




















The pineapple lace shown in the picture is the "natural" color. Since the paint color in that room is going to be a beige-y color, we will be using the lace in white. It's really going to pop against the walls and look so cute! I can't wait to see it all done!

The formal dining area will be in front of the HUGE window shown in some of the other pictures. We have a dining table (also a hand-me-down) with a leaf that came with 6 chairs but 2 have since been broken! It is a nice table but sooner or later we are going to want something a little more modern and with 6 matching chairs! For now it will have to do with four chairs and maybe someday if I'm lucky we will get a new dining set.

Of course being the over-planner that I am, I had to design a layout for this room as well. Off to the right side of the room are the stairs leading to the second level. There is also a powder room and coat closet off of this room. I've added in the tables that I'd like to have in here, so hopefully we can find something that will work for what we are looking for!


Well that's all for tonight. Sometimes I wonder if anyone even reads all of my ramblings, but even if no one does, it sure is nice for me to get it all out of my head and onto paper... or screen... whatever. ;)

Goodnight!

Let There Be Light

If you have ever been to Home Depot on a Saturday you may have experienced a lack of available sales associates and long wait times for getting answers to your questions, like we usually do. I don't know if there was a full moon tonight, or if it was the fact that I was a female by myself, or what the case was, but my during my solo trip to Home Depot today I had the undivided attention of four different employees who were extremely helpful and answered all my questions. When I got home I told Andrew he should never go with me again.

Today I ordered all the new light fixtures for the house. Right now the house has shiny brass accents on all the chandeliers and ceiling fans and it looks quite like 1993... the year the house was built. But very soon the house will have brand new brushed nickel fixtures everywhere you look and the lighting will look very sharp. This will definitely give the house an updated look and bring it in to the new millennium. I had a lot of fun picking these out, but I also never imagined I would care so much about what ceiling fans looked like. It's funny how your priorities change when you are facing homeownership, and the ugly ceiling fans you've lived with your whole rental life suddenly become a non-negotiable in your own house. Here are some pics of the current fixtures and what we will be replacing them with!






The chandelier and ceiling fan are for the formal living and dining room combo.












The breakfast area in the kitchen will get this cute 3 light casual chandelier.






The vanity lighting in all of the bathrooms will look like this!








Well there is a glimpse into what all the new fixtures will look like. I love the look of brushed nickel and it will definitely give the house a modern face lift.


In my journeys today I also found some great pineapple accents to use around the house! I was so excited to find these, and for so cheap! I love a good bargain! I also discovered a new store today, Garden Ridge. I have driven by it a hundred times but never been inside. That place is a gold mine! I could spend a lot more money in there, but you practically need a whole day to go through the store. This place is like Hobby Lobby or Michael's on steroids. It's HUGE. So I will leave you with these pictures: the pack of pineapple towels I found for $7.99 (I bought 3 packs!) and the framed pineapple prints for $12.99 each! Nothing like a good deal!

Countdown till Closing!