We're back!

To the land of the living that is!! I can't believe how fast all these pictures just uploaded! Very exciting :) We were supposed to get our Fios on June 1st, but there was a mix up and didn't get it till today. Although, I really wouldn't have had time to do anything on the computer the last week anyways, so I guess it doesn't matter in the end! We have been so busy painting and cleaning and unpacking. The previous owners of the house smoked, so we have painted every single room, including ceilings and closets and have removed all the carpet. The cleaning was so gross! There was yellow nicotine just running down the windows when we sprayed them. Yuck!! But, it is pretty much all clean now and we are living in it, even though every room isn't done. So, here is a tour of our new home!

When you walk up the front steps, we have a little fountain/pond. The girls bought fish for it last night and they go look at them every chance I give them.

We can actually fit our van in the garage! Yeah!

This is the front entrance. There used to be stinky carpet on the steps, and we of course painted. The door straight ahead leads to the laundry room and also access to the garage.

Up the steps leads to the living room. The picture didn't turn out too good, but we painted two shades of blue and removed the carpet. We are keeping the hardwood floors in here and just need to finish painting trim and clean up the floors. Oh, and buy furniture! Ashley loves watching the kids from the neighborhood (and barking at them) when they get off the school bus in front of our house.

Next is the dining room. This is yet to be finished as well. We painted the walls and ceiling and removed half the carpet.

The other half is still a wreck and has plywood underneath since it used to be the kitchen. So, we are most likely going to be putting down engineered wood in here.

Up the steps are the bedrooms. First on the right is the guest/kids bathroom.

And the guest room, where Brandon and I are sleeping for now is across the hall.

Sammi and Maddie's pink princess room!

And one of my favorites, Abby's room. I just love the yellow color we picked. And it is so much bigger than her old tiny room.

Eventually, this will be our room. We still have to finish painting and are getting new carpet. We also probably need to do some work on the bathroom that is in this room. And of course clean, clean, clean!

There is a built in vanity and you can see where the bathroom is in this picture.

And there is this built in dresser. I don't think we even need the dresser we do have!

Back down the steps and next to the dining room is the kitchen!! I'm still not used to how big this kitchen is! The girls just love to sit at the island :) Oh, and we bought a new dishwasher and stove/oven unit for the island. The old ones were very old (and ugly) and did not work too well at all.

This is the only room we didn't paint. We just cleaned and cleaned and cleaned it! Brandon's Mom spent a lot of time cleaning it just so we could put some things away and then my Mom spent another whole day cleaning more! We can't thank both our parents enough for all the help they did! Brandon's parents came for an entire weekend and helped clean and paint and my Mom spent all last week with me painting and cleaning!

Next, out onto the deck! We love having the woods behind our house and the neighborhood is so quiet and peaceful. All of our neighbors have been really friendly and nice too. One neighbor brought us fruit and another brought us cookies!

Here is looking at the house from the backyard.

And this is the lower part of the deck. The girls are excited to try out the campfire pit. And it is nice that the yard is completely fenced so the girls can go out and play whenever they want!

From the lower deck you can also get to the family room.


This is looking into the family room from the other side. The girls have tons of room to play. And I am really looking forward to when we move my piano from my Mom's house into this room.Then we are back to the entrance! There is a small (ugly) powder room to the right in this picture.
And that is our new house! It is starting to feel more like our home, but we still have a lot to do before it is done and life is completely back to normal. The kids really love the house though and having all the open space is great. It seems to make us all a little less on edge since we aren't stepping on each other's toes every second. We can spend more time together as a family and yet still have our own space. Our dog Ashley really loves it here too and doesn't spend all day barking and whining anymore to either go in or out. She just lounges in the sun most of the day and brings me her Frisbee whenever I go out. We feel very blessed to have this home and live in this neighborhood!