"Vacation"

Last week was a really crazy busy week, I am so glad it's over. I got the keys to the house on Friday the 23rd in the afternoon. Michael was at work so I did a walk through by myself to see what needed to be done and holy crap, it was overwhelming. The house looked really cute when they had all of their stuff in it and decorated but when it was empty it was just ugly and I realized I needed/wanted to paint pretty much everything. They also left the house really dirty which was dissapointing and just added more on my 'to-do' list. So the first three days of my vacation I cleaned and painted as much as possible. Kayte was a huge help and came over on Sunday and tackled the kitchen, it was so gross, the fridge was filthy, it honestly looked like it hadn't been cleaned ever. And we got to experience the joy of homeownership for real on Saturday when it was really windy and rainy and the sliding door started leaking- inside the house! Yeah, not cool. Luckily I know a contractor, he oversaw the addition/renovation of the hotel and he is a really cool guy. I called him and he came right over to check it out and hooked me up with a sub-contractor who is going to fix it as side work which means it will be a lot cheaper. Turns out they installed the sliding glass door wrong and the piece that is supposed to go behind the siding was put in front. Smart. So that was awesome, I will admit I panicked for a moment. I ended up getting the master bedroom, hallway and living room completely painted, but didn't touch the second bedroom, bathroom, kitchen or upstairs so there is still a lot to do. Tuesday was moving day and it went great, a lot better than I had expected. Michael asked a couple of his friends to come help and they were great. We got the biggest U-Haul truck they had and it took one full load and about another half to get everything moved. We started about 11am and were done by 5, so it worked out really well. Then on Wednesday we went back to the place we were renting and cleaned everything. It only took us a couple of hours and it was so nice to be completely done with that and not have it hanging over our heads. The rest of Wednesday and Thursday was spent cleaning, unpacking and running back and forth from Lowe's for supplies, I think they know me by name now. Friday was a shopping day, Kayte and I had decided earlier in the week to make a trip to Portland and hit up Ikea, Chipotle and the church book store. We left about 630am and got to Ikea about 915 only to find out that it doesn't open until 10. Oh well, they opened the doors about 930 so we started shopping, we got a lot of good stuff! I got a new dresser for the master bedroom, tv stand, new light fixtures, curtains, curtain rods, end table, silverware, hanging lights for the living room and a whole bunch of other smaller stuff and I only spent a little over $600, it was a good trip! We did take a little too long at Ikea, Kayte wanted to be home when the kids got out of school, so we hurried through lunch and the bookstore but still didn't get home until about 6. It was a long day but lots of fun! Saturday was spend at the last soccer games of the season (yay, it's over!) and more unpacking and Sunday was more of the same. I was so glad to come back to work on Monday, it was an exhausting week. I am so glad we are in the new house, we love it so far and the puppies love love love the backyard. We are unpacked for the most part, but there are a few more boxes to go through and some more organizing that needs to be done. I took some before/after pictures so I will post those eventually. I have a huge list of things I want to do and I have to keep reminding myself that its not going to all happen immediately. OH, we really want to replace the carpet (ugly blue) with Pergo (or Prego as Michael calls them) floors and were hoping to get the 8k first time homebuyer credit before we moved so that we could do that. I had amended my 2008 taxes so that I could get it now instead of waiting until tax time next year and I sent the paperwork in not long after we closed on the house. The check didn't come and didn't come and I had started to think I did the paperwork wrong, but then I checked the mail the morning of the move and of course, there it was. I asked Michael if he wanted to postpone the move and do the floors instead, but he didn't like that idea. So we are stuck with the blue carpet for now and eventually we'll move things around so we can get the new floors. I think we're a little tired of moving stuff for the time being, maybe next spring when it gets warm again.