Gotta Love a Bargain!

So today was one of those days where I had a million errands to run and of course Sam didn't sleep really well last night, but we got up and going not too early nor too late and started our shopping and errands one stop at a time. I wasn't planning on doing any extra shopping, but as it would turn out, I got on the phone with someone and ended up browsing around Target a little bit and found this adorable little dress for $2!! Add that to the stop where I got: five 3 liter sodas for 79 cents each, five loaves of bread for 99 cents each, five cans of chili for 79 cents each and five boxes of Little Debbie snacks for 99 cents each and I came home a happy mommy! I just love when I can not only find a great deal, but work it in to the budget as well. Unfortunately, Sam is now not feeling good, but thanks to today's efforts we can stay home for a few days and just chill. Have a great week!

Just-Moved-In Pictures

Ok, so people have been begging for pictures of the house, but I am warning you - it is messy because we still aren't done moving in and we just brought the fridge home late last night, so the kitchen is an utter disaster area. Just keep that in mind. First is the master bedroom and bath.

Sam's bathroom. I loved that I finally settled on a shower curtain and that it turned out to match the rugs and Sam's step pretty well. I think eventually if I can find a cute green bathroom soap, toothbrush holder, cup set it would complete it.

Sam's room. The crib isn't set up yet (it will be against the far wall by the heater), but the baby clothes are out and hanging in the closet/stored in the dresser waiting for our little girl's arrival.

The office. We have alot more space now that all my craft/sewing stuff is downstairs in the bonus room. But that is probably a good thing because we probably need to get another bookshelf in the near future.

The hallway from the front room. Those boxes and baskets are mainly jars and food storage that I'm not allowed to carry downstairs, so they are waiting to find a new home. We are hoping to buy some good shelves and a rotating can rack to utilize the space (and organize!) in the cold storage room.

The front room from the front door. Coat closet on the left will be awesome and soon we will get the piano centered on this wall and then up will go my family wall. I have some black vinyl that says "Families Are Forever" and decending down we will have a family picture, then a wedding picture and a current picture of me and Robert, then 5X7 pictures of each of the kiddos. I'm thinking there will be plenty of space on this wall to also put a black shelf on either side for my Willow Tree figurines and Kaylie's hand and foot molds we had done before she passed away.

And to the right of the front door is the front room which has the tv for now until the family room gets finished. Once it is, these will all go downstairs and this will be the visiting teaching/home teaching room with a new living room set that I hope will be something like a couch and two really comfy chairs or a couch and loveseat with a chair. Something to that effect.

Looking on the dining area from the laundry room. See my big, beautiful front window? We got a double curtain rod and have sheer white curtains up for now, but whenever I get around to deciding what color scheme I want to go with, there will be heavy curtains on top to help with privacy and blocking out some of the bright sunlight.

The kitchen with all the wonderful appliances finally put in. Although, very sad thing happened last night and the handles on my fridge got severely dented, along with a good amount of scratches on the sides of the fridge. *Sad* but Robert promised to buy new handles, which made me really happy because he could see how much it bothered me to see my brand new fridge so dinged up already. It's really not the guys' fault and I don't blame them, but it still stings just a little.

My washer and dryer finally in the laundry room so we can wash all the skunk stink out of everything. Thankfully I had the presence of mind to do all the laundry on Friday even though my usual laundry day is Monday, so we have had enough clean clothes this week. And can I just say I love my pantry!! It has been a little tough figuring out how to manage my space with the pantry, kitchen and cold storage, but it will be great now that things are figured out.

And a quick picture of the front of the house. Yes, I cut off the end a little tiny bit, but when it is super bright outside with the snow, you can't really see the picture. I love the green siding and the stone detail - just changes things up a bit from the usual. And for those of you who are wondering, no, we aren't going with the shotgun shell mailbox. :)

So that's it - for now. I will take pictures once we get more fully moved in and I've had a chance to decorate a little. I just love my new stove and my kitchen is so wonderful to be in! Thanks to all of you who helped us move in so fast and also to those who helped watch Sam so we could get things done - we couldn't have done it without all of you!! We are looking forward to meeting our new ward on Sunday, although we are sad to have to go back to 1:00 church again and will dearly miss the Clark ward! Have a great weekend!

News of the Week

So no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't get a good picture of Sam's latest injury, so you will just have to imagine it with me. Yesterday I was cleaning the fridge in preparation of our moving and Sam was playing in the living room. As most of you can guess, this resulted in something happening and I will never know what, but Sam came to me crying and bleeding all over the place. He had fallen off something onto something else and cut his bottom lip. The bleeding stopped in no time and he was settled down with a movie until lunchtime. But as I was putting him down for his nap, I noticed that he not only cut his lip, but the gums above two of his top teeth were also cut, the poor kid! I ran him in to the dentist to make sure there wasn't anything we could do and was told to wait it out and see what happens.
Our other news for the week as you might assume has to do with the house. We got an e-mail last night saying we could do the final walk through with the builder this afternoon!! We don't know for sure when we will be closing, we will probably discuss it at the walk through today, but everything is in order at the bank, so hopefully Thursday or Friday. Our fridge doesn't come until next Thursday, so we won't be moving in until next weekend, but we will start bringing things over to make moving day less stressful. I will bring the camera and take more pictures and try to remember the things I forgot last time (like the front of the house and the front room)

Our New Mailbox?

So one of the many things I am looking forward to with buying a brand new house is we get to choose our own mailbox! After checking out Home Depot, I decided to hop online to see what is available that way (although I don't really care for shopping online because you never really know quite what you are getting, but I'm learning to like it) and found this one-of-a-kind! I couldn't stop laughing when I saw it! I mean, we've all seen the bass fish and little model houses or barns, but a shotgun shell?! I told Robert I had found his dream mailbox and when he came home and saw the picture, he started to go buy the dang thing! I'm not sure how I feel about this for our mailbox. On one hand, yes it would be funny and unique, but on the other hand....I just don't know if that is the first impression I want people to get when they come to our house. What do you all think??

Reassured

So things with the house have been progressing slowly, but surely. But we have bumped into a few things along the way - mainly the builder being hard to work with and it has been causing me some stress. That with being pregnant (meaning super emotional) and struggling with Sam (again!) got to me Tuesday night and we had a Sam-and-Daddy-leave-Mommy-alone kind of night.
When Robert got home last night, he told me the house was open and we could go walk through if we wanted and why don't we got out for dinner and then go looking at stuff for the house afterwards? After all the hassle I have been through the last week or so, it was so reassuring to walk through what will be MY home soon and to see again the rooms we will be filling and to talk about our plans for the different areas. It really helped me to know that even though all of this is tough right now, very soon it will all be over and it will all be VERY worth it!
I couldn't help but think of how this can relate to our life in some ways. At times it gets tough and we think it just isn't worth all the hassle anymore, but then we go to church, or the temple, or witness an event like a wedding or birth and we are reminded of what is waiting for us at the end and that it will all be worth it. Just some food for thought today, hope you enjoy yours!

FHE Treat

We all know how kids can get messy, especially if given a yummy treat. But Sam's ultimate devoring and smearing all over of our FHE treat last night just made me laugh and I thought I would share it with you!

And because one picture just isn't enough, here are a couple more. We haven't had alot of picture -worthy events lately and Sam kept asking me to take more and more pictures of him doing different things. Silly kid!

Scroll Down!

Ok, so don't know why, but I just posted a bunch of pictures of the house and the post went before the appliances post, so scroll down to see the pictures of our place!! Thanks!

Appliances

If you would like to see how completely spoiled I've been (besides getting a new house), check out the appliances we got for the house tonight:

Kenmore 24" dishwasher - Model # 13449

Kenmore french door, bottom freezer fridge - Model # 71609

And my favorite: the Kenmore dual fuel range - Model # 78509

*Note* if you go to the Sears website to look at these, don't judge us by the price listed; we didn't pay the listed price for every item. We also bought a Kenmore over-the-range microwave, but it wasn't anything fancy so I didn't list it, but my kitchen will definitely be a wonderful place for me to hang out now!!!

House Pictures

These are for those of you who missed the pictures on the listing. First off is the awesome kitchen that will be decked out with the black appliances already posted. I love the planter shelf (need ideas of how to decorate it, though!) that divides the kitchen from the front room while still allowing light from the big front window into the kitchen. The lighting in the kitchen is wonderful and there is a back door to the right with the laundry room behind the camera(wo)man. Sorry I didn't get a picture of the front room or hallway, but will get more soon!

Here's the laundry room which will seem quite spacious compared to my current laundry space (being preggo, I can't open the doors on my washer and dryer around my tummy) and has a wonderful linen closet (which I plan to use as a pantry) you can see to the right with great, deep shelves and a pocket door to save space and keep the noise down. I'm planning to have Robert build me a simple straight shelf across the space above the washer and dryer for laundry and cleaning supplies.

The first bedroom which will become the office because it is a little smaller and this closet will be great for extra storage with the shelves. Both this room and the other bedroom are on the front of the house with the master on the back and the second bathroom upstairs is at the end of the hallway. One thing I really love about this house is it was built for STORAGE! I get a small coat closet by the front door, a good sized closet in the hallway across from this bedroom and then closet organziers in every closet.

Here is the closet in the second bedroom. You can tell the shelves are a bit wider and the closet goes the whole length of the wall so it will be great for the kids! I plan to get a tension rod so Sam will be able to reach all of his clothes easily and get dressed himself now.

Kids bathroom at the end of the hall. The master and this bathroom are very similar with the master counter/sink space being just at little bit wider.

Inside the master looking at the walk-in closet and door to walk in (that is the office you can see across the hallway). I am so excited for the shelf on top that spans the entire right wall and half of the left. There is an outlet up there, so lights are definitely in the future for a romantic feel :) I would like to paint the wall space between the shelf and the ceiling a dramatic color like a dark red, but Robert is opposed. Any suggestions or ideas?

Inside the master bedroom looking at the master bath on the left and the master walk-in closet (with a pocket door) on the right. One thing that is a little wierd about the master is there are two windows, but the one by the bathroom is tall and really skinny and the other is on the opposite wall, opposite corner and is a typical sized window. Kind of funny, but I love the light it lets in the room, too.

The stairs are just inside the hallway and lead down and to the right to the family room. It takes up the entire lenth of the kitchen and front rooms. We are going to get a bid from the builder about possibly finishing just this space before we move in. The plan is to leave space for a pellet stove in the corner just outside the left side of the picture and put the TV and couches facing the far right wall and leaving the space in between as play space for kiddos.

The cold storage room - soo excited for this very rare feature!!

Inside the bonus room looking at the utility room and the under-the-stairs space with the family room on the right of the picture. The cold storage is just out of the picture to the right.

Looking from the bonus room to the two other bedrooms and bathroom. The triple stud near the right of the picture is where there will be a doorway to these other rooms. That's mostly it, folks! I do have to say, it is alot harder than it looks to take good pictures of a house. I would laugh at the pictures posted on listings for homes and wonder why people didn't take better pictures if they wanted to sell their home. Now I know why! Hope you enjoyed getting a peek at our new digs and we will be sure to post more pictures once we move in!