Sunday, November 22, 2009

Painting

From the moment we moved into the house I wanted to repaint. Of course, I had no real world knowledge how expensive it would be. After Tom did the math on our house vs the cost of paint we decided with all the other little changes we were having to make right now, we could only afford to paint half of the house. We decided to start with the common areas of the kitchen, dining room, living room, and hallway. We also decided to paint the wood trim (because it was horrible). When the previous owners had painted (which in my opinion they decided to do to see the house) they were not very careful and got paint on the wood and cupboards along the edges. It seems to have been done in a hurry even though the pain was in pretty good condition and I liked the color. After many trip to Lowe's looking at their paint displays and many conversations about the color we wanted the trim and the dining room we finally made a decision. I had to do a little convincing for the color I wanted the dining room, but it turned out gorgeous and Tom really likes it too! We're really happy with how it turned out and I'll post some before and after pictures later. In the mean time here are some pictures while we were painting and the disaster our house became for a little under a month. Needless to say, I'm very happy to get my kitchen back and our lives kind of back to normal. All we have left to do it tack the trim back up in the hallway. Yeah!

Monday, November 9, 2009

My Review on V

Most of you probably know that I've a sci-fi freak! I like almost anything that is related to science fiction or fantasy. I do have my restrictions though. Anything with vampires, x-file type stuff, alien invasions are pretty much guaranteed to be found in my Netflix queue or as a book on my bedside table.

For those of you that read my sister A's blog, know that we were raised in a Sci-fi household. It was common to have our family bonding around the TV watching StarTrek, Star Wars, or V. I guess this is kind of an inherited obsession (from my Mom's side of the family mostly).

When I heard they were going to remake V, I wasn't sure how I felt. The old version of course was a bit corny and old fashioned, but I love it because I loved it back then. Plus, regardless of the bad special effects, I like the story and the meaning behind it. It shows what a civilization will do when threatened. It brings out both the best and the worst in people.

The difference between the old and new versions to me was very suttle. Same basic story, much better special effects, and some swapping in the sex of the characters. What used to be a girl character is now a guy character and vice versa. I'm still waiting to see whos going to play the crazy Diana chick character. There is more depth to the characters and there are some additional characters that weren't in the original.

I look forward to seeing where the show will lead and how it will either shadow the original or branch out and become it's own entity. This show has the potential of being really great or a total bust. Only time will tell!


Tuesday, November 3, 2009

Finally....pictures of our new house!!


This was us right after we signed our papers. We are in the picture with our mortgage lady and our real estate guy. They were both amazing!

This is the front of the house. The truck belongs to a friend of ours that came to help T do some heavy lifting because I'm a wimp! Thanks to everyone that has done that over the past month!


This is a view of the back of our house from our back yard! We love the deck and the backyard has a lot of possibilities!


Our backyard! As you can probably see, the fence needs a little work. We're trying to figure out who exactly owns the fence. Jake loves the backyard. You can see in the lower left hand corner where he's dug a little bit. We're trying to kick that habit. That's where I want to put a little garden anyways!


Our cool new BBQ. Tom loves it! We got it on sale along with a family donation! Thanks for the help, we've already used it!


Here's the dining room. We were given the table about a year ago. We're on the lookout for a bigger one!

Here's the kitchen! I actually love it, but we're planning on updating it in a few years! I was pleasantly surprised how much cupboard space and counter space there was! All my kitchen stuff actually fits now! The door leads to the garage (I didn't take a picture of that...sorry).


This is part of the living room (from the dining room).


The living room from the other direction. I love the windows in this house! Plus there are a lot of strange angles that are really cool.


Living room again!



Bedroom #1


Bedroom #2


Bedroom #3


Master Bath. There is also a walk-in closet to the left.


Entrance way. Absolutely love this!



Hallway


2nd Bathroom


Office/Gym??? The blanket on the floor is where Jake hangs out when I am working out. This is still and work in progress but people were asking for pictures. There's also a third bedroom that I didn't take pictures of. It's kind of a staging area for everything we don't know what to do with yet (mostly decorations).


Office/Gym #2

Well, I hope you all enjoyed the pictures. We're in the middle of painting right now, so I'll post more pictures later!