|
| So, it has been, once again, an obscene amount of time since I last
posted. And so, I have decided, to make up for the lack of excitement
in my last post, I would post what I have promised in the past--before
and after pictures of our house. There are some huge differences. So here we go...
The Stairs
Before:
After: (Although this picture doesn't show it, we replaced the window at the bottom of the stairs as well)
The Den
Before:
After: (It's not the same shot, but you can at least see that it no longer has hideous orange carpet!)
Now, the two hugest changes...
The Kitchen
Before:
After:
And lastly, this one has no before picture because, well, it wasn't even here before...
The Deck
So as you can see, we've been pretty busy fixing up this little house. We're so thankful to our parents, who we never could've done it without. The only project we hired outside help to do is the carpeting in the den, hall, and stairs, just because it was faster and easier. Also, stairs are ridiculously difficult to carpet. Nick, his Dad, his brother, and one of his Dad's friends all built the deck on the back. My parents came out to visit for a week in June and my Dad and Nick completely remodeled the kitchen during that time. That included putting in completely new walls (our house is old, so the walls were plaster instead of drywall), taking out the drop ceiling and putting up a drywall ceiling, completely removing the huge windows that were there before (normally big kitchen windows would be nice, but the view from ours was the side of our neighbor's house and right into the window of their kitchen) and putting in a brand new, smaller window; putting in new cabinets, new countertops, new sink, new faucet, microwave hood over the stove, garbage disposal(didn't have one before), DISHWASHER (woohoo!!--we didn't have one before)new lighting and new outlets--there was only ONE in the old kitchen!!(which meant new electrical work), new flooring, and an unexpected replacement of our refridgerator, which decided to poop out on us. Whew! It was tons of work! During that whole week, my Mom and I put fresh coats of paint on our front porch, planted new flowers in the front flowerbed, and planted the potted flowers you see on the deck. Overall, it has been a lot of hard work. We have spent surprisingly little money (it sounds like we've spent a fortune when I describe everything we did!), mostly because we've done all the work ourselves. I would love to say we're done now, but unfortunately, a whole lot more work still awaits us! Anyway, this is WAY too long, so I'll end now. Have a great week!
| | |
| Blackbird singin' in the dead of night...
Take these broken wings and learn to fly...
all your life...
you were only waiting for this moment to arise.
~The Beatles
| | |
| Hey! It's me! Posting on xanga! Don't get too excited.  Well the day before my last entry was the first day of school, hence the reason for not posting in so long. School is crazy, especially with my 41 piano students (21 of my own independent students and 20 at the elementary school) and only a semester and a half until student teaching. My new job teaching piano at the school is fantastic! I love just being a piano teacher and not having to squeeze in days at Biaggi's on weekends. We've been doing tons of work on the house, which I am so excited about. Finally getting projects accomplished and seeing it turn into a house that is personalized and just what we pictured is amazing. As I type this, Nick is putting together a bookshelf here in the den, which, although it may seem small, has been something we've wanted to do for a long time, but haven't had the space or money to do. Now, though, we've cleaned the room up, put on a new coat of paint, and had new carpet laid and it looks like new. Soon I want to post some before and after pictures. Prepare to be amazed! I leave you all with a picture...
My boys...
 | | |
| Aaaaah, so much to say...so little motivation to type it all.
The last month has been pretty busy. My family came out and stayed with us for a week while we totally remodeled our kitchen! It was a lot of crazy work, but well worth it! I'll post before/after pictures when I get a chance. It is definitely amazing to finally have a dishwasher, though! During this crazy week, we finally recieved word from our insurance company (I was in a car accident on May 18th, I was not hurt at all, and it was the other person's fault--he didn't make a complete stop at a stop sign and hit me) that they were totaling my car. Which left Nick and I with one vehicle, and me driving him to and picking him up from work every day. Last week, our church had it's vacation Bible school program, and Nick and I ran the games. It was a lot of fun. The only downside was during an unfortunate game of Follow the Leader we played with the 3 and 4 year olds. One of them had the bright idea to crawl in the grass (we played games outside) and so, of course, I followed, and a few minutes later, to my dismay, found my knees and shins breaking out with a nice red rash and itching like crazy. Moral of the story: if you are allergic to grass, it is probably best if you do not crawl in it. Right after the last day of VBS (and I mean right, as in an hour later, at 9:30PM) Sarah and I were on the road to my parents house in PA and then to my aunt's house in NY to surprise my grandfather for his 70th birthday. Being the wonderful friend that she is, Sarah agreed to drive 3 hours to my house and then 8 1/2 hours to my parents house so that I wouldn't have to make the trip alone. Nick doesn't have vacation days for a year because of his new job, so he couldn't go with me. She also let Nick use her car while we were gone so he could actually get to work. Huge thanks to Sarah!!!! We had a relatively smooth trip, aside from getting lost in the ghetto of Columbus at 1AM while trying to find a gas station that was actually open and had public restrooms and then ending up at a giant hotel/indoor waterpark; and then driving on winding mountain roads in the pitch dark through blinding rain with semis racing past us and sending tidal waves onto our windshield. It was a fun, family filled trip, though. Quote of the trip: "Then get some chicken--you know what chicken is, right?" --my 10 year old cousin, Megan. Now I'm back at home and back to work and such. Anyway, I'll end this monstrous entry now...bravo to you if you made it to the end.
| | |
|
