The last year or so post 1

Kind of a boring title I know but I figure that a lot has happened in the last year. So, I am planning on doing an update for those who don't know and a walk down memory lane for those that do. I will do this in the order that I remember. So if something seems off, it is just my memory. :-)

First, as most of you know, I got engaged. If you didn't know that, you really haven't followed my blog very well because it has been on here for over a year. After getting engaged, Eric and I decided that we didn't want to live with family, despite their best intentions, and that living on our own would be better for everyone. So we started the long and awful process of finding somewhere to live. We didn't want to rent so we went house hunting. It was difficult. All the houses in our price range were places that we didn't want to live or were so trashed it was scary. We wanted a fixer-upper because Eric likes to do that but we also wanted something that we could live in while fixing up. We found something, made an offer, looked at it again, I decided it wouldn't work, offer was rejected, and we went looking again. About 2 months before we got married, I realized that if we didn't find a house we would need an apartment. I was set against living with others and buying a house takes time. I finally talked Eric into looking at apartments. So, for an entire day we went apartment hunting. We were both apalled. We could buy a house for not a whole lot more, but have a lot more space. Blahhh. Finally we found an apartment that would work. It was small but it had washer and dryer hookups (a must) and they didn't want to charge an arm and 2 legs for it. We left some information but didn't sign a contract. We kept looking at houses.

Finally! We found on that we liked, that we could afford, that was a fixer-upper, that was still liveable, that was in a nice neighborhood. It was perfect! So, one month almost to the day before we got married, we signed papers on our house. YAY!!!

Here are the before pictures. I will have you note that there has been some work done, but you wont get any of those pictures for a while. But it does look better in some places now. :-)

I was going to do this in a tour like order, but it is taking way too long. Here is the front of the house. It hasn't changed much but our yard looks a million times better. And yes the Christmas lights on the front of the house were a deciding factor in buying the house.

I'm struggling putting commentary next to or under each picture but here is a quick description. The rooms with the wood and fireplace is the basement, the purple and blue rooms are upstairs, extra rooms. The lighter room is the master. The small bathroom is at the end of the hallway on the main floor. The green and blue bathroom is upstairs. The little shutters seperate the kitchen and living room. There is a laundry room and a storage room downstairs but I didn't show those. If you want to see better you can come visit. :-)