Saturday's Success!

I unfortunately had to work from 830-3pm on Saturday, but my awesome husband, sister and mother in law did some serious work on the house! I came home and all the carpet was pulled up. And, underneath the carpet was really old linoleum tiles, that they also took up.
Jeannie (mother in law) came up with a good point that we should probably rip up all of that before we paint the walls so they don't get all dirty again, brilliant! There were seriously 30 bags full of these tiles, that we stacked alongside the house. Once we start construction, we will get a dumpster.

We had to wear respirators, because we're pretty sure the tiles contain asbestos! I was telling my coworkers I wanted a pink one, but purple will do :)

After cleaning up all the floors, I worked on painting our bedroom while Erin finished changing all the locks. And he did buy a new facet for us too. So this is a before and after picture of our bedroom.

All in a days work! Thanks Amy and Jeannie for your help! We left the house about 9, 12 hours after Erin got there! Time for bed.

What are we doing?!?!

Wow this house is a fixer upper. I really understood that as I was standing in the house after I got the keys and just looked around. First, I realized it looks different when you really look closely, with the realtor not there and when you're not just doing a quick walk-through. It's pretty intimidating. So, that said, it's been 2 days and I feel like we're already behind! My sister helped me do some cleaning on Thursday. She swept the porch and steps and it made a huge difference.

This house has been vacant for a long time. One of the first things I did was clean up the bathroom a little bit. GAG. It was bad, and then I realized the kitchen facet it completely broken, like the water comes out at the base of the facet instead of the head haha. We are planning on getting a new countertop, sink, facet, and garbage disposal anyway, but in the meantime not sure what we're going to do! Probably buy the new facet and put it in. We spent all day Thursday washing our bedroom walls and part of the living room. It took forever! And it is tiring work. And there are still 2 more bedrooms, the kitchen, dining area, and bathroom to do. Because EVERYTHING needs to be re-painted. When I got off work on Friday, I also painted the ceiling in our bedroom, the crown molding, and started edging the baseboards and doors/windows. But then I ran out of light, lol because Colleen took off the light for us, but Erin and I had some trouble getting it back on lol. Plus I wasn't much of a help, I was saying "I can't hold it, my arms are too tired!" hehe.

Anyways, we will be working on this house for a long time, which is fun for me to think about. There are so many ideas that I want to do. For example, in the huge basement, there is a bathtub. One of the free standing ones that probably had claw feet and probably came with the house in the 30's. I want to throw it in the backyard and plant stuff inside it! Very shabby chic. And actually vintage. The basement will be Erin's man cave.

Before I forget to mention it, I was so excited when I got the keys, I parked right in front of the house and started unloading the car a little bit. Then my sister and parents came to check it out, and as we go outside, Colleen points out that I have a parking ticket on my windshield :( Boo. I forgot the check for street cleaning hehe. But it is the only parking ticket I have gotten and we have been in midtown for almost 8 months, not too bad. And I was completely excited to be in our house!

Here is a little video of Erin getting right to work on a wall we are getting rid of. He had to make his mark.

First Blog!

So blogging is something most of my friends are doing and I absolutely love reading up on how their lives are. Now it's my turn! It won't be anything too exciting, just updates on life. So, for starters, Erin and I have been married for almost 8 months. Time has been flying by and it has been amazing to be married to such an incredible MAN! He really is so manly, in the way that he loves the Lord, takes care of our family, and can just do manly things in general haha. I love it!

Also, we have officially bought ourselves our first home, after searching for 14 months and being in escrow on this specific house for roughly 80 days!! Finally!! However, this house is far from being a home, yet. We are planning on putting in some elbow grease, which I am very much looking forward too. Finally something to do besides sit in our tiny studio apartment. I will be a painting pro soon enough! I think there will be many new skills and words that I will be acquiring, such as tiling our floors and the word hardibacker, or possibly experimenting with dry walling and lath and plaster??? Sounds fun! Hopefully I will be closely monitored when it comes to doing these new things :)

 The home was built in the 1930's and is a duplex. Our plans consist of remodeling it from it's current stage as a tri-plex back into a duplex, live in one side and rent out the other! I am most looking forward to having an actual house, with 3 bedrooms, instead of our tiny, TINY apartment that technically doesn't even have 1 bedroom, haha.  I am not looking forward to becoming landlords, but we are trusting in the Lord and asking for help in the way we manage our home.Tomorrow we are getting the keys and getting straight to work!

Speaking of work, I am still at Starbucks and love my store I am at. I really like all of the people I work with and there is never a dull moment, between making drinks, having conversations with customers, calling the cops on customers (seriously, it's like everyday...and sometimes so crazy. I will post some stories in the future), joking with my partners, and seeing our regulars. Erin has been working with the Bureau of Reclamation for about a year and a half now. His job is about saving the fish in the San Juaquin River, or something like that...he's my waterologist ;)

So thats kinda a rough explanation to catch up/indroduce everyone to our oh so exciting lives!