Updating our house

We received our keys on a Thursday (of Memorial Day weekend), so that evening when Dennis got off work, we arrived at our new home and Dennis started tearing up the carpets and pads. There were some placed in the hallway that the carpet pad was stuck to the subflooring because of pet messes. Dennis sent me into the garage to spray and wipe down the shelves in the garage - those shelves were covered in mold! 

We had written out a pretty tight timeline for getting things done in our new home and because our closing date moved farther back than originally thought - our timeline also got pushed back.

What we had hoped to accomplish by Thursday was tear up all the carpet and pads and sand the floors down. We worked really hard the first evening and when we both started getting grumpy, I knew we needed to stop. So, we went back to the house we were living in for the night. 

The next evening, Friday, we started sanding the floors and by Saturday, we had my parents, Dennis's parents, Dennis's co-worker and wife and some of our really good friends here helping! So much progress was made having 10 bodies in our house helping all day long! Someone brought by some food and when we turned on the oven to heat up the french bread - it didn't take too long to realize that the oven did not work! Ugh - we already needed to buy a refrigerator and now an oven too? 

At some point during this process, we bought a lot of unfinished rustic red oak hardwood floors. Those floors sat in our dining room for a couple of weeks to acclimate to our house. We purchased a lot of paint from Home Depot and painted the subflooring and put primer on the walls. We were just getting ready to paint the walls when we realized that the floors and walls would clash pretty badly. So, Dennis sent mom and I to the paint store to pick out a color of paint that would work. Someone was kind enough to lend us his paint sprayer and we were able to get the whole interior of our house painted in a couple of hours. We probably spent more time taping off the ceilings and baseboards that actually painting. 

Then came time to start on the hardwood floors. My mom came over the weekend we started laying the floors and we got a lot accomplished that first weekend. Our plan at the time was to put carpet in the bedrooms and hardwood everywhere else. Dennis's dad came out to help us finish laying the floors and then sand, varnish several times. Dennis was working swing shift - so he would leave for work around 3 and get home around midnight. We went to bed after midnight and then were up around 9ish, headed to our new home, worked on it until his work day started. His dad and I would stay at our new house trying to get as much accomplished as we could. 

After the last layer of varnish, we needed to stay off our floors for 2 weeks. 

Soon after those 2 weeks were up, we moved into our new home on Wednesday, July 4th! We had 2 big box vans and about 8 men and it took an hour and half to move all of our stuff. We immediately set up our bed and I made sure that Dennis has 2 work uniforms for the next 2 days. Our house was an absolute disaster and I was looking forward to putting things away and getting settled in ...

... Then ... Thursday, we were asked by our ministers if they could come and stay with us starting Sunday evening for a couple of days. WHAT? Freak out time! So, I called my parents and asked if they could come and help us get settled that weekend. We are still so grateful for their help! We bought a fridge, were given a stove/oven and were all set to have company. The evening they arrived, right before we went to bed, I reminded Dennis to put the bedroom doors back on. :) 

Since that time (almost 6 years ago), we now have landscaping in the front yard, raised beds built in the back, our patio is extended, we have hardwood in 2 bedrooms and carpet in one ... 

Owning a house is a process to make it completely your own and we are still working on that - but it is so nice to have a place to call our own and we are excited to bring children into this home too!