Saturday, September 5, 2015
The Money Pit is Finished!!!
After many long projects, long nights, and lots of blood, sweat, and tears, our money pit is finally on the market. Here are the "after" pictures (I'll be sure to do some before/after photos at a later date).
Wednesday, August 12, 2015
We're Moving!
We are a little busy around here because we're moving to a new state! We will be leaving Maryland by the end of the month for the Rochester, NY area. I don't have much time to sit around but I'll be sure to post a lot of pictures of all our progress (and FINAL before/after photos) when I get a chance. We'd appreciate your prayers during this stressful time!
Monday, August 3, 2015
Vacation and Hard Labor
We went on vacation this past week with Chris' family. We went to Kiawah Island - 28 people in 3 houses. It took us 14 hours to get down there on Saturday...with some mishaps including vomit and Chris helping to rescue a baby from a car accident in front of us. We were happy to be done driving after all that!
It was Josh's first time at the beach and he enjoyed it. He was tentative about the waves at first but grew to enjoy them.
Samantha's favorite thing (besides her cousin Jenna) was collecting shells along the beach with Nana. She tolerated the waves but did have some fun in the water with her aunts one night.
We didn't get to spend any time in Charleston (hard to tour with the kids) but we did spend a morning at one of the plantations. The kids enjoyed it - there was a zoo area with animals ranging from peacocks and deer to armadillo and tortoises.
They had an enormous garden that we walked around for hours. The kids enjoyed it a lot.
I was also able to successfully teach Josh how to "smell" flowers instead of pulling them off!
The kids were so exhausted from all the fun they were having that they both took naps each day.
Fortunately, the trip home was much better for us. We left a half day early by driving after lunch on Friday. We missed a lot of the traffic and were home in 11 hours.
Before we left for vacation, I painted the porch and sunroom floors. I wanted to give them a few days to cure before there would be any foot traffic on them. It's not much but it is a big improvement!
We have a lot of junk around our house - parts and materials left over from previous projects, tools that never found their way back to the workshop, and just random garbage. Two areas we cleaned up this weekend were there area behind the garage...
...and the inside of the garage.
Both are still ugly but they are major improvements over the "before" pictures (here's the behind the garage as an example).
Chris did a lot of yard work this weekend too. He did a lot of trimming, chopping, and burning to make everything look more intentional.
One last project was putting in some new landscaping in front of the privacy fence (even though the fence isn't fully primed or painted yet. Once that's complete, we'll need to add a lot of mulch to really make it look nice.
We have a lot of projects on the horizon - hopefully we'll have more pictures to share soon!
It was Josh's first time at the beach and he enjoyed it. He was tentative about the waves at first but grew to enjoy them.
Samantha's favorite thing (besides her cousin Jenna) was collecting shells along the beach with Nana. She tolerated the waves but did have some fun in the water with her aunts one night.
We didn't get to spend any time in Charleston (hard to tour with the kids) but we did spend a morning at one of the plantations. The kids enjoyed it - there was a zoo area with animals ranging from peacocks and deer to armadillo and tortoises.
I was also able to successfully teach Josh how to "smell" flowers instead of pulling them off!
The kids were so exhausted from all the fun they were having that they both took naps each day.
Fortunately, the trip home was much better for us. We left a half day early by driving after lunch on Friday. We missed a lot of the traffic and were home in 11 hours.
Before we left for vacation, I painted the porch and sunroom floors. I wanted to give them a few days to cure before there would be any foot traffic on them. It's not much but it is a big improvement!
We have a lot of junk around our house - parts and materials left over from previous projects, tools that never found their way back to the workshop, and just random garbage. Two areas we cleaned up this weekend were there area behind the garage...
...and the inside of the garage.
Both are still ugly but they are major improvements over the "before" pictures (here's the behind the garage as an example).
One last project was putting in some new landscaping in front of the privacy fence (even though the fence isn't fully primed or painted yet. Once that's complete, we'll need to add a lot of mulch to really make it look nice.
We have a lot of projects on the horizon - hopefully we'll have more pictures to share soon!
Monday, July 27, 2015
Sunroom, Porch, and Basement Progress
We've been working really hard each night after the kids go to sleep. One wonderful and fully finished project is the sunroom. The ugly wall is covered and painted, there is a new light fixture, and the floor has been painted. I'll post pictures next week of the finished room but here's a little trip down memory lane for the room when we bought the house (you must also imagine a VERY STRONG odor of dog urine to get the full effect).
Another project that is very close to finished is the front porch. There is one railing section to finish so I'll post pictures when it's complete.
We did a lot of drywall work this week in the basement. The drywall is installed in about half of the space and the first coat of compound is on. It's looking a lot better and hopefully soon we'll have it in much better shape.
The giant dirt pile next to the patio is no more. We hired a guy to come and move/remove it for us (in addition to some other work). What a difference! We keep saying that we should have done it a long time ago. A little bit of seed and straw and this space will look great!
We're exhausted! Hopefully we'll get to take a little break this week!
Another project that is very close to finished is the front porch. There is one railing section to finish so I'll post pictures when it's complete.
We did a lot of drywall work this week in the basement. The drywall is installed in about half of the space and the first coat of compound is on. It's looking a lot better and hopefully soon we'll have it in much better shape.
The giant dirt pile next to the patio is no more. We hired a guy to come and move/remove it for us (in addition to some other work). What a difference! We keep saying that we should have done it a long time ago. A little bit of seed and straw and this space will look great!
We're exhausted! Hopefully we'll get to take a little break this week!
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