Pictures of the House

So I told you some of the things we did to the house before moving in (Paint and hardwood floors) and as promised now I'm just showing off.  I'm seriously in love with our house.  But to really appreciate some of it you have to see the before and after to grasp the transformation from just some house into OUR home. After all - everyone has their own sense of style and I know mine is not for everyone.  But it's now very "US".

One that I think would surprise people who know me well is how proud of I am of our dining room.  I don't think I come across as a "formal dining room" kind of person.  And I would agree that I'm not the stuffy type you normally see on like house hunters who insist on a formal dining room - BUT I have the antique set from my Great Grandmother whom I was named after.  And as a single woman I had picked the print that's now hanging above it (You can't tell but it's a photograph of the grand canyon so really ties in with the reds), and the wall sconces on either side (Have desert flowers pressed in the center that are tan leaves and burgundy flowers so it goes perfectly with the print), and dear friends and family have given us the various crystal pieces and they mean a lot to me so suddenly we have a very put together and elegant looking room!  And I'm just in love.  Admittedly this is the room where Jeff had no influence over.  It's all me.  I'm just happy he agreed and liked everything I said.

 

Then the room we obviously spend the most time in - the family room.

I wasn't so sure on Jeff's choice of "Amazon Mist" (aka a sage green) for the kitchen and family room but now I love it because it really picks up the colors of the print we have of the snake river.  Right now we have the ottoman in the corner just holding blankets and Chicago Pillow Pets (Tommy Hawk and South Paw) but I'd like to get two armless chairs from Target for either side of the entertainment center.  Mainly so that when either family comes to visit we have seats for every adult.  

Many believe the heart of the home is the kitchen.  I think I've said that I hate the counter tops (laminate) but if I have not said it yet - seriously I HATE them.  I think it was done poorly by a previous owner because the caulk line around the sink is globby and awful, the backsplash is nasty colors and around the window they got lazy and didn't even cut pieces to fit.  But aside from hopefully getting those replaces next year (and then new appliances to follow) it's a nice layout.  This picture is two weeks old because we've since unpacked more boxes, put the door back on the pantry and installed blinds on the windows.  What I am most thankful for is that the linoleum floor is gone YUCK.  Not that there can't be nice tile or even decent linoleum in a kitchen but seriously that screamed 80's to me.

  

That first door on the left (between family room and kitchen) is the powder room.  The "Windsor Haze" blue color I chose is beautiful in there and really plays well with the Claude Monet print Jeff's parents gave us a few years ago when they redid their master bathroom.  And I spent more time than I care to admit to pick out those towels so the collage pic had to have them when showing my mom how the room ended up.  

The Master Suite - this was a sticking point when looking for a house.  We wanted an en suite that had double sinks and separate tub and shower.  Call us spoiled, but the townhouse had this and once you've had it you really can't go back.  I am a bath lover.  I take 3-7 bathes a week so it needs to be heaven.  

It's hard to tell from the pic but that color is a light gray, our bedroom is a shade darker gray and accent colors of both rooms is khaki so things really flow well from one room to the other.

Now the rest of the house is just bedrooms and the one room you got a small glance of in the foreground of the dining room.  I don't really know what to call it.  In house hunting speak, it's the Living Room - but we don't need a formal living room with the family room just steps away.  So I've referred to it as the "front room" but that sounds so old fashion and southern.  I'm not receiving gentlemen callers there or something.  It's Jeff's desk and office stuff.  But also our bookcases so my parent's joke we should call it either the Library or the Study - either of which sound waaaay too stuffy and more sophisticated than what you should call a room with a hand-me-down La-Z-Boy amiright?  So I've been caught still calling it the front room and sometimes the office.

OK I think that is more than enough pictures.  Sorry to be such a show off but I am so seriously in love with our house.

The HOUSE :)

Many things to catch up on.

First let me say that our lawyer was awesome (what? Did I just say that?) Yeah.  His office found some document that said we got a $3,000 credit yet it wasn't in the contract.  We were like "huh? It's a short sale.  There was never any mention of a credit."  Selling agent said "Oh, yeah I put that in every short sale but the bank that needs to approve the short sale almost never ever approves it.  I hadn't noticed that they had."  So in order to get that three grand we had to scramble the day before closing to get things signed in order for it to go through.  We found out at 12:30 and I worked starting at 2:00 - but you can bet your sweet ass I hauled my butt off to our mortgage company in order to sign it (and fake Jeff's signature haha) to get the $3k.
Oh, and our closing had already been delayed a week because the stupid bank & VA forgot to calculate the entire year of taxes that we'd get as a credit.  They only calculated six months.

So suddenly it was closing day on Jan 15th and we didn't have to fork over $7,500 of what we'd been told way back in December when we had gotten the 401K loan for the down payment.  So since a 401K loan you can't give them a lump sum unless it's the total owed we had to keep that extra (darn) so that meant that we COULD afford the hardwood floors and having the entire house painted!!  And I literally mean the whole house - closets, ceilings, trim work - everything!  AND they did all the patch work and let me tell you, there was some areas where the people had knocked away the drywall bad enough it was down to the metal frame thing that goes on corners.  It was crazy.

And we really wanted high quality hard wood.  Something we may have skimped on before when we had a smaller budget but add an additional $7,500 and we got exactly what I would have wanted if we had an unlimited budget.  So now that house looks almost brand new!  Well, except for that kitchen...that's the dead giveaway on our house being older.  And OMG Ew!  The previous owners were disgusting!  It took me five hours to clean the kitchen (an additional two to clean the refrigerator we got from Jeff's Aunt...).  And another two hours to clean the master bathroom.  And five times vacuuming the upstairs carpets to feel I had got up enough pet hair to build my own dog and cat - this was before I felt it was clean enough to have Stanley Steemer come and professionally clean it.  I'm sensing a theme - am I a clean freak?  Ugh - and if this wasn't enough then I got to go spend several hours cleaning our townhouse in hopes of getting some of our security deposit back.  We'll find out next week how much we get.

And tonight we just had our first date night as home owners - we went to dinner and to Lowe's. $500 later and we headed home.  Oh and another $260 today at Target.com for furniture for the family room (Entertainment center and two end tables) and I'm starting to feel increadibly poor.  But hell that Target purchase check this shit out.  10% off for home items (check), 15% off of order of $75 or more (check) 10% employee discount, 5% red card discount and free shipping.  I saved over $200!

Next post I will show you before and after pics as I'm growing tired of typing.  But seriously - this place looks like a brand new house so yes, lots of money spent in the last three weeks but oh so worth it!