The Final Stretch

We are 15 days out from our close date, and are in the final stretch!  In the last few days (since I posted about how much work was left at our house), I have seen a lot of progress, so that makes me happy!  I also received a schedule of planned work, so can see how everything will come together.  Matt made it out to the house today and snapped some pictures that I thought I would post here.  I probably won't be able to make it out until Saturday... well, maybe I can head out tomorrow night if the electrical switches are in!  We'll see.

Light fixtures are up in the bedrooms.

And in the bathrooms.

Pendants over the island and chandelier in the dining room, plus cabinet facing on the island and backsplash in the kitchen!  Oh, and counters along the perimeter in the kitchen.

Built-ins around the fireplace and prepped for the fireplace surround.

Counters, sinks, backsplash, and lighting in the master bath.

Ceiling fan and recessed lighting in the master bedroom.

Schedule Change

Matt has a job where he works four 12-hour shifts, rotating four on, four off.  He worked the day shift (7am-7pm) the entire time we were engaged, but the week we got married, his schedule shifted to nights (7pm-7am), and that's how his schedule remained for an entire year!  Last April, I blogged about the first day that Matt was able to "switch" his schedule back to days on his days off.  He tried several other times to switch to a "normal" schedule (sleeping at night, awake during the day) on his days off, but it typically didn't work very well.  That's gotta be hard on your body, so I tried not to push on this unless we had some important family event (like our honeymoon or my brother's wedding or my sister's graduation).  Needless to say, it was kind of a hard year for me!  I was often alone and felt like most of the household chores/errands/etc. fell to me even though I too had a full time job... and a second part-time job... and was often alone with caring for Kylee.  I didn't blame Matt (you're kind of limited on what you can do at 3am!) but it still felt like a lot.  And it was a bummer going to bed alone.  Every. Single. Night.

It goes without saying that I was super excited that Matt would finally be on days!  He switched the last week of January, and I have been thrilled!  It's still not ideal, but it's so much nicer than the alternative.  Matt now gets up around 4:45 am to leave for work and get a quick workout/shower in before he starts briefing at 6:48am.  This means that he is ready for bed around 9pm each night.  I decided, with Matt's change in schedule, to change my schedule too!  I've been going to bed with him and getting up around the same time as him each morning.  And I am happy to do it because I feel a little bit like a normal couple!  Also, I've found that I'm much more productive from 5-7am than I would have been from 9-11pm (where I typically would have just sat on the couch watching television or something after a long day of work).

Being on days also allows Matt to spend more quality time with Kylee.  Sometimes he would try to stay home with her on his days off, but he was so tired they didn't really do much.  Now they are able to spend all day together and can do fun things.  For example, they went to Jump Time twice in the last couple weeks, and Kylee has had a blast.  Kylee also had fun fixing the fence with daddy, helping him take down the Christmas lights (the snow finally melted off the roof!), and more.  I even came home one day this last week to dinner in the oven (pork roast and red potatoes) and a clean kitchen... how lovely!  I am looking forward to not taking the next six months for granted and spending as much time together as a family as we can!

Hit and Run

We had a super cold winter... and unfortunately before the perma-cold hit, it snowed, so we had snow and ice everywhere for weeks.  Living on a corner has its perks, but not when there's snow (lots of extra shoveling), and apparently not when it's icy either.  One freezing cold day as I was leaving for work, I noticed that someone had hit our fence!  My guess is that they took the corner too fast for the conditions, because I could see tire marks through the snow right up to the corner of our fence.  Two fence pickets fell down completely and one cracked in half.  Bummer.  I was especially irritated that they didn't even leave a note.  I did find their hide-a-key in our snow that I'm guessing fell off with the impact.... I thought about tracking down the make and model and then driving around looking for a car/truck with some front-end damage, but decided not to waste my time :-)  Anyway, this picture was taken after most of the snow had melted, just before Matt and Kylee re-attached the three pickets.

Will They Finish?

Okay, with less than three weeks to move in, I'm starting to get very antsy.  In my mind, there wasn't enough progress this week.  Here are the only updates I noticed this week:

They hung the cabinets in the laundry room.

They added cabinet doors in the tech room.

They made progress painting the trim on the exterior of the house.

They put in the kitchen island.

Neither Matt nor I have built a house before, so maybe this is standard, but there's still a LOT left to do.

• Sand/stain/seal the hardwood.
• Finish all the cabinetry.
• Put in the counters and backsplashes throughout the house.
• All the plumbing.
• Add carpet and finish the built-ins around the fireplace.
• Trim out the sound system throughout the house.
• All the lighting and electrical.
• All the landscaping.
• Install the appliances.
• Finish outdoor trim work, rock, and roofing.
• Let alone cleanup, walk-throughs, appraisal, etc.

Maybe I have nothing to worry about - I know things can come together quickly, but when the four pictures above are literally the only changes I noticed in an entire week, I'm nervous.  Especially since they initially told us the house would be done a couple weeks early so we could epoxy the garage floor!  I don't know if that's looking too promising right now... I have asked for a high-level schedule for the next few weeks, so I guess we'll see!

On that note, I have been packing and packing and packing some more.  I've been getting up early almost every morning and packing a couple boxes before work.  I'm almost to the point where I'm not sure what else I can pack.  We've got over 80 boxes packed and stacked around the house (my house feels messy constantly!), and most of what's left seems either too big to pack or we need it in the next three weeks.  Besides that, I'm practically out of boxes, so even if I had more to do, I'd have to round up more boxes first.

Needless to say, fingers crossed for a smooth couple weeks... and hope they go by quickly!

Be Mine

We had such a lovely Valentine's Day this year.  Well, actually couple of days!  Since we only have Kylee half of the week, we sometimes need to celebrate holidays on more than one day!

We started off the week with making Valentines for the party Kylee would be going to at my mom's house.  Kylee separated out the Starbursts into 10 piles, careful to give each pile the same number of each color of Starburst.  She also filled the little bags with the Starbursts, helped hole punch each card, and string the twine through the hole.  But the part I loved the most was that Kylee signed the back of each Valentine!  She is just starting to write her name... she thinks she needs help with the letter "K" (I think we have a good project for this next week!), so I put dots on the paper for her to trace, but she did the rest of the letters on her own.    Matt and I were proud parents :-)

When I got home from work Wednesday, Matt and Kylee presented me with a beautiful bouquet of flowers.  I love love LOVE fresh flowers, and these were perfect to brighten my day and make me feel loved.  On Valentine's Day, Matt and I shared a lovely dinner of salad, homemade macaroni and cheese (Matt's favorite food) and Gino's melt-in-your-mouth chocolate mousse for dessert.  We ended the day by cuddling on the couch watching The Office!  Perfect end to a lovely evening.

Starting to Come Together

I complained a bit last week that things seemed to be moving slowly in our house, but this week we were thrilled with the changes we saw.  Here are the highlights:

Cabinets!  They installed the cabinet bases in the kitchen, in the first floor bath, and in the second floor kids bath.

The kids bath - with the cabinet base and the laminate floors.

The master shower.  We love the gray tile walls and the small glass tile in the inset.

The master tub surround.  The tile is actually gray under all that dust :-)

They are making progress on the outside of the house too - painting, starting shingling, and prepping for the rock.

Packing

Packing an entire house sure is daunting... especially when I've lived here for 9 years and we combined households a year ago.  I just feel like we have so much "stuff"!  We started packing a box here or a box there a few weeks ago, but with just 4 weeks until our move, now is the time to kick it in gear.  I am trying to pack anything that we won't need for the next few weeks, and kind of taking the opportunity to purge things we don't need anymore (although I don't usually keep things we don't need, so I haven't really been getting rid of much).

I really like the paper boxes my dad has been bringing me each week - they are sturdy, the perfect size, and I don't need to do any taping!  I've been careful to label the side of each box with what room it needs to go to and what specifically is inside the box.

Matt is thinking we will move slowly... that we will move most of our stuff the weekend we close, but that we'll slowly move the rest of our belongings over the next couple weeks.  I am convinced (and determined!) that we will get it all done in the two days we have planned (moving what we can the first day on our own and letting the movers we hired take care of everything else, including the furniture, the next day).  I don't want to drag out the process, so I figure the more I prepare now, the better!  Fingers crossed for a smooth rest of this home building/financing/packing/moving process.

Hardwood!

We took Kylee over after church on Sunday to check out the house (she loves going to our new house).  She was so cute, pointing out things that were new, like the vents (that not even I had noticed!) and the tile in the bathrooms.  But we were most excited about the hardwood floors!  They must have worked Saturday to get them installed.  I think they might be staining/sealing them today because I heard our cabinets are going in on Wednesday.  We were almost giddy with this step.  We can't wait.

Kylee Look Alike

Kylee has a look alike out there.

This first picture was taken of Kylee last February.

This picture is one that is floating around Pinterest that links to a post about helping your children learn to be grateful.  It has an eerie resemblance to Kylee. 

One Year!

One year ago today, Matt and I emerged from the Twin Falls Idaho temple, sealed together and married for time and all eternity.  Saying yes that day was the best decision of my life.  The fact that our anniversary will always be on Groundhogs Day makes me think of the Bill Murray movie... and if I lived that day over and over and over again, I wouldn't change a thing.  It was perfect.  So here we are, one year later, and I love Matt more than ever.  He makes me so happy.  When I am with Matt I feel loved and comfortable and safe.  Here's to another year of love and adventure!

Slowly but Surely

I stopped by the house this afternoon.  I was hoping to see big changes, but no such luck.  There were a couple small ones though.

They finished the front of the house and are prepped for starting the roof.

The downstairs bath has tile.  Here's a shot inside the shower.

The floors in the downstairs bath.