Making a House Our Home

Well, we finally got the keys to our new house at the beginning of September. I had only seen inside the house ONE time before (while the previous owner was still living there), and we knew that it was going to be a lot of work, but once the place was emptied, and we got a REALLY good look..well... maybe a little part of us died inside. It was so much worse than we had realized, and the previous owner had cleaned almost NOTHING. I mean, I am not exaggerating when I say that every surface of the entire house was revoltingly dirty. Even one swipe of a window was enough to bring you to your knees.

And we were planning to get rid of the carpets anyway, but they were so matted with dog and cat hair, and stained with cat pee, that it was quite shocking. When we started to rip them up, the smell was overwhelming. The cat pee was all the way down through the sub floor. Such a nightmare.

We just wanted to get right in and start painting, but there was so much extra work that we hadn't anticipated. On top of that, every single room in the upstairs (besides the bathrooms) was wired so that the light switches only turned on and off certain outlets (instead of actual lights), so that you could only use lamps - NO lights in the ceilings at all. We wanted to changed that, so Joe installed overhead lights with fans. He had never done that before, so he had to research it. Then he had to crawl up around the rafters, through the insulation, trying to get wiring to each room. It was a MUCH bigger job than we ever could have imagined, and took days longer than expected, but probably saved us thousands of dollars on labor. The next step was painting and flooring, but I had to clean every single wall before we could paint, and there was a TON of wall paper throughout the house that had to come down. As for flooring, after the carpets came up, we had to pull out staples (so many staples), pull out trim, and....I don't even remember what else. But it was a lot. We also did some tile work in the kitchen, on the stairs, and around the fireplace. We took great satisfaction in the completion of each step, and despaired at the amount of work that remained. But we pushed on and we pushed on, because we had a goal to have the house complete enough to be able to have guests by Thanksgiving. And gosh darn it, that's what we did! This was the family room before and after - we were so glad to see that bright yellow disappear.

I'm not going to show you people's bedrooms, and we haven't done the bathrooms yet, so that's everything upstairs, which is what we did first. Now for the downstairs. This was the kitchen before and after - they really liked apple decor, and no offense to anyone, but I don't.

It's funny that we ended up with blue cabinets, because we had blue cabinets in Nebraska and I hated them. I owe a LOT to my interior design friend, Sunshine. I consulted with her, and she really helped direct some of our decisions that made such a huge difference. At first Joe and I had picked out colors and flooring and counters, and I think it would have looked good, but there was a lot of gray, and not a lot of personality. So I told Sunshine that I wanted more color, but wasn't sure how to incorporate it, and she suggested we have colored cabinets. It really came down to the specific color of blue that made all the difference. We went through quite a few shades before I found the one that I knew was right.

Also, originally we picked out this tile for the kitchen.

I don't think the picture does it justice - it's a really pretty tile. We had them all bought, but I could not for the life of me figure out how to cut the mosaic tiles without them chipping and cracking in just the wrong way. I tried a wet tile saw, a tile scorer/cutter, and a grinder, but I just couldn't get it to work. We ended up taking them back and getting something different, which I'm really glad about. I've always loved Spanish tiles, and these were actually made in Spain, and ended up costing us less than the other tiles had.

We got those new countertops too, and Sunshine suggested the whitish color, as opposed to the darker color we were originally thinking. SO glad we went with what we did. One of the main things she suggested was doing a white oak flooring. Joe and I tend to be drawn more to darker floors, and it's what we've done before. But I am so glad we went with her flooring suggestion. It has brightened up the house in such a great way.

The great thing about working with an interior designer was that she wasn't telling us what to do, but she was helping us have a different perspective. Some of her suggestions we went with, and some we didn't, but she definitely helped us achieve the overall feel and look that we wanted. Here is the before and after of the living room.

If you look closely, you can see that we used the same tile around the fireplace that we used on our hearth in Nebraska. I guess we like what we like.

Our entryway has a vaulted ceiling, and when the previous owners had last painted, I guess they decided not to go all the way up, so it created this weird checkerboard on the wall. It was not easy, but we fixed that.

It's not easy feat to paint a vaulted ceiling without scaffolding. Anyway, now there is just an endless list of little things that need to be done/finished, but the house is livable. No, more than that. We are REALLY happy with the way things have turned out. We have made this house into our very own, and it already feels like home, both the house and Las Vegas. We are very blessed.

What Happens in Vegas...

We got a lot of different reactions when we talked about moving to Las Vegas. When most people think of Las Vegas they think of the desert. Everyone has a story about that one time that they visited here and it was hot as an oven. They're not lying. It's definitely a desert.

Or people think of the Las Vegas strip - Sin City. That's here too.

But Las Vegas is a huge city, and the strip is 25 minutes away from us, and we live in a suburb that feels like an oasis in the middle of the desert, and I can handle the heat.

My favorite part is that we are surrounded by mountains.

Added bonus, I'm loving all the palm trees.

So yes, we have found a place to call home, and it's even better than we were hoping for.

Overstaying Our Welcome

It's entirely possible that I've been busy lately. I still have so many things to do, but I'm finally to a point where I feel like I can take some time to sit down and catch up on this blog. The challenge will be to remember everything that has happened since my last update this summer. It's been a long time, and my mental energy has been depleted severely, so bare with me as I wade through my scrambled brain. At the beginning of August, I moved with Madelyn and Alex to Las Vegas, just in time for them to start school. We did not move right into the home we bought here, because we had agreed to do a 1 month lease back to the previous owner, to give her more time to get out of the house. Try as I might, I was not able to find a 1 month rental, so we did an Airbnb. Not exactly the cheapest thing, but that's what we got. Joseph stayed with his grandparents in Manti for the month of August so that he could keep the dogs there. We didn't want to worry about having dogs in an Airbnb, even though we could have. And Joe was finally able to move out of his dumpy little apartment downtown, and be with his family again. It was a really nice Airbnb, with everything that we needed, and the owner, who was this cute little old lady from Italy, was just lovely.

It was nice to have a place to stay, but we were all dying to get into our own house. We drove by it so many times, I'm sure the neighbors thought we were stalkers. A month is a long time to stay in someone else's home. So we just counted down the days.

While We Wait

July was spent in Utah, and these are a few of the things we did. Milky Falls, up Manti Canyon. I think 3 separate visits were made during the month, each time with a variety of people. Any and all climbing that was done, as well as putting heads under the falls, was instigated by Uncle Bert. No surprise there. The water was so cold, but what's not to love. While attempting to get the picture with the yellow flowers, my foot sunk into some quick-sand-like mud, and my shoe was a gonner (didn't get a picture of that) - it was maddening and hilarious at the same time.

Box Canyon. Unfortunately we didn't get all that far, because there were a TON of wasps. But it was still fun.

The 4th of July was spent in Manti with a LOT of people. Joe's mom had her way, and got one night alone with all the grandkids, while the adults got rooms a hotel. We enjoyed the local festivities, including a parade and fireworks. But mostly we were there for the family.

We were able to meet up with some dear friends from Germany (the Browns, Andersons, and Petersons) - and Cora got to spend some extra time with Ellie. Also, I got to have lunch with my trainer from my mission, Aleath, who I haven't seen in over a decade!

We got to go to the farewell for our niece Abi, and be there when our other niece Tessa opened her call. We haven't been able to do things like that for a VERY long time. I especially love how close Cora has been able to get to her cousins her age since she moved to Utah. Abi even talked about how important her relationship with Cora was in her talk. Tears may have been shed.

We tried a few new food places that we were told we HAD to try. I don't think we were disappointed by any of them.

And finally, I spent some quality time with my sisters, which included talking, eating, bowling, games, a personal fireworks show, and going down a roller slide in various positions, which made us laugh until we almost peed. Typical sister stuff.

I would say that it was a pretty successful month, even though Joe was in Las Vegas and missed a lot of it. Are we all ready to move on? Ready or not, here we come.