Just a Blog About a Mom

My beautiful sister got married a few of days ago. I told them that I didn’t have any advice for them. I have only been married for 5 years, what could I possibly know? Well, although 5 years may not be a long time in the whole grand scheme of things. We have a lot more to learn about marriage, each other, parenting, communication, and basically everything. We DO have a lot to learn, but we also have learned a lot. In just 5 years we have moved 6 times, bought two vehicles, bought two homes and have had 3 boys. We have both learned so much about marriage in these 5 years and I DO have advice to give. So here it goes… Dear Collin & Emily, I am so happy that you guys are married. Welcome to the married club! I simply love marriage. I love living with my best friend. I love seeing him every single day and I love falling asleep next to him every single night. I love having somebody who will always listen and whom I can always talk with. I know it may sound cliché,...

My Fixer Upper Home When my husband and I were searching for homes we decided that we were going to have to buy a fixer upper. We wanted a home with a big yard and enough square footage to grow into, but with the soaring home prices we were no longer able to purchase what we thought we deserved. We had enough money to put 20% down on a $230,000 home, but we didn't have the monthly income to even come close to purchasing something like that.  We looked at several different homes, but none of them seemed right. One of them we loved and we even put $15,000 over the asking price and we were still out-bid. We finally found THIS home. And we LOVED the square footage and the yard. We knew it was a fixer upper, but we could do it, right? WOW! The moment I turned my husband and said, "could you see our family growing up in here?" and him saying, "yes" will echo in my brain forever. Now, that we are in the process of selling I don't regret for a moment buying th...

I don't have any before pictures of the spare bathroom or the bedrooms, but I do have the after pictures that I can share! Bathroom:  Bedroom 2: Bedroom #3: 

I did NOT want to go into this bathroom! How did the previous owners even think that they were getting cleaned! The first thing I had to do was scrub the crap out of this bathroom (literally). YUCK! I had to take a pumice stone and physically scrub the toilet! GROSS I painted the cupboards, replaced the mirrors, painted the walls and then painted the floors. I also replaced the shower head. 

The living room is where we spend most of our time. It is where all the toys are for the kiddos, the baby's swing, my hubby and my computer and the television. We spend our time playing, learning and having fun in this room. I wanted this room to be comfortable, cozy and inviting. When we looked at the home the living room was far from inviting. There was cobwebs in every corner, the carpet had stains on every inch, there was an awkward wood stove that took up most of the room. I didn't want to be in that room! The first thing I had to do was take out the wood stove. I wanted my television there, so I took down the wood stove and took down the brick on the wall and pulled up the brick on the floor. I then figured out that there was cement under the brick. So then we had a big patch of cement on the ground. I painted the wall teal, because I am an idiot and I thought it would look good. It didn't and our room looked like one big cave. We lived with this for awhile, but then ...

I wasn't planning on doing anything in the laundry room. BUT then our laundry room flooded, because something went wrong with our pipes. We had to fix the pipes AND we had to fix the entire laundry room. I figured then I should also paint the walls and paint the cupboards! After:

The kitchen was the FIRST thing that I tackled when I moved into the home. The kitchen had the most problems, so that is where I focused my energy.  When we first moved in the kitchen was red and the attached dining room was brown. The sink had a whole bunch of scratches, the garbage disposal didn't work and the sink leaked. The vent over the oven was broken and the dishwasher had a weird smell to it.  I took down cabinents, so I could place a microwave above the stove and put a large refridgerator. I painted cabinents. I put in all new appliances, we put in a garbage disposal, new sink and a new faucet. We also put in laminent flooring and painted every inch of the kitchen and dining room (except for the ceiling). I even painted the countertops (but realized that I hated that and stripped it). We replaced all of the outlets and the covers. Recently my husband and I put in a GFCI outlet (because we forgot that it needed one to be up to code...oops).

When we bought our home 2 1/2 years ago we knew that we had a lot of things that we needed to do to make it into a home. I WISH I would have known how much I would have to accomplish, because then I probably wouldn't have bought this home. It was just TOO MUCH WORK! But, all of the work will certainly pay off once we sell. The front room had an awkward book shelf right when you walked in that was attached to the ceiling with 60's spindles. Whoever the person was to convince people that spindles would look good has a true gift! I knew that the spindles just had to go. So I ripped away the spindles and the book shelf. I wasn't planning on ripping up the carpet, but my son somehow opened up the wood stain and spilled it all over himself and the carpet! So I ripped up the carpet and found myself staring at BEAUTIFUL original hardwood floor that didn't need any work done. I did, however, have to go around the entire room and pill up nails and wood that was holding...

The exterior of our home is probably the biggest heartache that I have with this home. I REALLY wanted to make the front and back yard beautiful and inviting. I had so many ideas. I wanted to make an oasis for adults and an amazing play spot for the children. It was going to be amazing! However, I just never had any time. I am always busy. Every Saturday since we have moved into this home I ALWAYS had something that I wanted to do instead. I always had a project that took precedence over landscapping. The only exterior thing that we did was take down an awful wood shed, cleaned the roof, painted the whole home, took down a tree and put up a new fence. That about sums up the amount of work that we did. Here are the before picture of the front: After: Before Picture of the Back:  After: