The countdown begins!!

We have power!!! While I am super excited about having power and the electrician turning on our heat strips (needless to say, I'm learning A LOT about the mechanics of a house!) I am MORE EXCITED about the fact that we are going to talk to a loan officer about locking in a home loan rate, which means we are approxiametly 60 days away from being complete!!! 60 DAYS!!! We are going to the bank Thursday January 29th at 4:00, meaning that 60 days away... March 30, 2009 we should be COMPLETE!! Please keep us in your prayers as we embark on the last days, making sure everything gets completed and done correctly! We ordered our hardwood flooring on Monday, it should be here next Tuesday. We went with an Asian Walnut flooring- I can't wait to see it throughout the house!! We have also purchased all interior door knobs and door stops! I will post more pictures soon!!

FINALLY!!

The brick really is done!! Along with the window sills! The electrician was also there working this morning, he has all the light switches in ready for the power to be turned on, which is supposed to be done Jan. 30th. He also hung 3 new lights! The kitchen, breakfast area light, the dinning room light and the light in the masterbath!! Seth and his father worked hard today, too, hanging window casings, door casing and base molding. We have very few rooms left to go before all the base molding is complete. Here are some pictures for your enjoyment! 

The brick is...

DONE!! Seth and I pulled up at the house yesterday to see that the whole front of our house was completely bricked! We were more than excited that they had finally finished, I honestly never thought this day would come..... ...then we pulled up to the side of the house to see THIS:
REALLY!? You leave this much of the house unbricked?! I couldn't believe it- it was still warm and sunny out and they left this much of my house unbricked!! AH!!

I talked to the bricker later that night and he promised me that they would be done with the brick and window seals TODAY, Friday the 23rd. We will see... Seth has the 6th grade dance tonight so we won't be going to check it out until tomorrow. So watch for new pictures of my fully bricked house!!

We have interior doors!

Over the weekend we had the WONDERFUL painter, David, come back and give us a quote on painting all the door and window facings. Needless to say, all the doors are up and waiting for him to begin painting!! Seth and his dad worked hard, with me and my dad just getting in the way! :) Here are the doors and some of the baseboard/door opening casing.

Update!

The house is coming right along! Seth and his dad have been working for about a 1.5 weeks to paint all the molding, and last Sunday they put up some door casings, and today Seth put up the base molding in the living room, dinning room, and partial hall/kitchen. It looks GREAT! The electrician hung a few lights, he hung the 1/2 bath, foyer, living room fan, and one of the bedroom fans. Seth got to use his new nail gun and air compressor (his Christmas/birthday present) and he did a great job! Mr. Steve Watts came by and measured everywhere we are going to lay hardwood and Monday Seth and I will be shopping for hardwood/tile. Mr. Watts is going to install the flooring for us the week of Feb. 6-12th!! The brick masons are almost done with bricking the house, FINALLY! They were supposed to finish on Friday, but due to the COLD weather they were unable to work on Friday, so hopefully they will finish on Monday or Tuesday!! Once they are complete, I will post more pictures. 

Here are some pictures of the lighting that is hung! (Besides the bedroom fan, I didn't take a picture of it for some reason!!)

The 1/2 bath,  foyer light, and the entry into the living room fan:

The living room fan:

Seth hanging some casing in the dining room entry:

Lights and.... Holes?

Seth and I went into Daviston this weekend and stopped by the house to pick up the rest of the molding to paint. When we got there John Sims, the electrician, was there working putting in all the can lights!! He was supposed to be working on someones air conditioner, but due to the weather was unable so he wanted to get started on our house- I was happy to say the least, that is, until I went back the next day and a found a HOLE in my CEILING!! Needless to say, there is nothing we can do about it now, but wait for the sheetrock guy to come back and fix it, and wait for more holes to be made... yep, more holes... we have a red wire hanging down in the kitchen and so I called Mr. Sims about that and he thought it was for our alarm system, that we DON'T have! So, he is going to have to pull that back through the ceiling and figure out where it really needs to go, so that makes 2 holes and, I'm sure, many more to come! Otherwise, everything looks great! We are in the process of trying to pick out carpet/hardwood/tile and bedding for the master bedroom!! HELP!! We have found a couple different bedspreads that we like, but we are having trouble making a final decision, so once we narrow down our search I will post a poll for you to help us figure it out!!

OH!! Seth and his father also went on Sunday to the house and put up some door casings- I don't have a picture yet but as soon as I do, I will post it!! It's coming right along, hopefully by March we will be in, which will be right at 6 months!! :)

It's PAINTED!!

Yesterday Seth and I went home to check on the progress of the house. We were expecting the house to have one coat of paint on it, some rooms maybe more...but when we walked in we were SURPRISED by how GREAT everything looked!! The painter, David Dial, had completed everything except the garage, and he only has to do one more coat of paint on the ceiling and walls there!! Needless to say, as long as he is alive, I will NEVER, EVER paint my house myself!! He will be completely finished on Monday- and that is when things will slow down for us, :(. We are going to begin painting our doors, doors facings and molding and then we (Seth and Mr. Billy) will begin hanging it. Hopefully this next process won't slow us down too much, we want to lock in that low interest rate!! :)

The garage- needing one more coat!

The Master bedroom- it is a little bit lighter green than the picture. (This is also the color of the guest bathroom)Master bath- a shade darker than the bedroomThis is the kitchen- it's a dark brown, the picture makes it look a little gray. The living room- this is the color of the majority of the house (everything else not pictured here!)

The dining room- a shade darker than the living room and a shade lighter than the kitchen! This is the bonus room- look how well it is trimmed out! (If Seth and I were going to paint, we were going to paint it all one color! HA!)

EXHAUSTED!!!

That is how I feel after starting back to work! It will take a week or two to get back in the swing of things, but I would have to say that I'm doing better than Seth! He has taken a nap 2 out of 3 days, but me on the other hand- only 1 out of 3!! I know, no one is going to belive this, but it is true!!! Tomorrow we are going to the house- the painter is almost done, so I will post pictures of it soon!! 

Back to work...blah!

Well, today we had to go back to work. We did not have any students today, but were in meetings all day, so not a lot was accomplished! It was a VERY long day and I am extremely exhausted, but I have NOT taken a nap, unlike Seth, who is asleep right now (7:00)! I am currently trying to straighten the house, wash clothes and get back to "normal" life. I will update tomorrow on our first day back with kids...it should be interesting!!

Home Sweet Home and New Year Resolutions

Well, we are finally back in Alabama! Our flight home wasn’t as adventurous…we did get delayed in Memphis for over an hour, but the flight was not cancelled so all was well!! We had a GREAT time in LA, but we were ready to get back to our bed! Now, unfortunately, we have to go back to work tomorrowL, but ½ the year is over!!

When we got back into town we couldn’t wait to go see the house, the painter has been priming the whole week and painting the ceiling while we were gone, and I was VERY pleased to drive up and see that the brick layers had also been working hard! The whole house is primed and we dropped off 34 GALLONS of paint for him to continue with the actual paint colors (pictures to come soon!). After the painter is done, we will be that much closer to moving in! After paint comes the molding/doors, so this week and coming up weekend we will hopefully get to New Site a lot to paint the doors/frames and molding so that we can begin putting them up, then comes flooring, cabinets and counter tops- then move in!! (I’m sure more will come in-between, but I don’t like to think about that!) Hopefully tomorrow after our teacher work day, we will make it to Montgomery to pick out tile for our master bathroom and possibly the kitchen. Also, here is a link to our paint colors (Mom, Seth was correct- it was short-grass prairie for the master-bedroom! ) http://www.behr.com/ – I can’t link the actual colors due to the way the website is set up, but the colors are Harvest Brown (710D-4) which will be the majority of the house, Mississippi Mud (710D-5) which will be the dining room and garage, Butternut Wood (710D-6) will be the kitchen, Short-grass Prairie (760D-5) will be the master bedroom and the guest bathroom, and then Spanish Galleon (760D-6) will be the master bath. They are all in the brown family and I can’t wait to have all the paint on the walls to truly see what it looks like!!

I also wanted to post a little about my new year resolution…it WAS going to be giving up chocolate for an entire year, but truthfully I don’t eat it that much (or, at least that is what I told myself!), so instead of giving up something to eat, I’m going to try to eat healthier and begin walking daily (especially when we move into our house- I will walk to see my Pa-Paw daily!). I will keep you posted about how I do!

Happy New Year!!

Yesterday Seth, Paden and I went out to Santa Monica Pier during the day and then we went to Universal Citywalk with everyone for New Years Eve Celebrations! Below are some pictures from last night and Santa Monica Pier.

Seth in front of Hard Rock at Citywalk!Today JoQuese and Quentin met us at the house and took us up to Hollywood and Highlands to see the famous Hollywood sign- then we headed towards the Pacific Coast Highway, but the smog/fog was so bad that you could barely see the ocean from the Santa Monica Pier, so instead we ate a wonderful lunch at Jinky's Cafe and walked to a shopping center! Below are some pictures of the Hollywood sign- I didn't take any of the shopping center, but Paden has some, so hopefully I can get them from him!

It's not as big as I thought it would be, but still VERY impressive!