We are in!

We have officially been living in the house for going on 3 weeks now.  Does that mean we are done, you may ask...?  ABSOLUTELY NOT.  We are living smack in the middle of Chaosville with Mayor Mess and Sheriff Shouldn'thavemovedinyet.  OK.  That was dumb.  But it gets the point across, right? 

Only the kitchen downstairs is painted.  There is flooring that needs to be finished.  Trim that isn't done being painted.  Nail holes and joints that need to be caulked.  There is no fireplace mantle or surround and a half-built hearth screaming for someone to hit their head on it and get sent straight to the ER-unconscious.  I have no washer and dryer, 2 pantries with no shelving so I can't use them and no window treatments in our bedroom or the whole downstairs.  The master bathroom sinks leak, the kids' sink isn't hooked up, their shower leaks and their toilet is currently clogged with no-one-on-earth-wants-to-know-what.  All the 30 year old windows are leaking cool, Midwestern Fall air, and after having broken it, I am having one of them repaired for $100 when I could get a completely new one for $150.  (We are good investors!!!)  Tim is currently down in the dining room ripping out the hardwood that was installed the other day because the last 2 boxes were crooked and left gaps so big you could see the underlayment.  But wait, there's more.  Of course I'm not going to tell you anymore lest you all covet this house that I have.  :-)

Here are a few pictures I can leave you with just to give you an idea of what we are doing to ourselves...just remember, it's what you CAN'T see that is the problem.  Oh, and in case you all were wondering, I am so entirely thankful for this house!

 Introducing The Boys UNDER the Sink.  That's for you Veggie Tales fans!

 The counter tops look wonderful!

These guys couldn't get the gas hose to lay right in order to push the stove in all the way.  It was a lot of fun watching them fiddle back and forth...and it was late at night, so they got a touch slap happy.  You could imagine!  Perhaps I will take pictures of the kids' rooms...they are pretty well put together...and then you can get somewhat of an idea of what our house will be like when the mayhem goes away!

Finally...

I am just now, after almost 3 weeks, taking the time to catch up on what's going on around here.  I am not blogging about the house, although that is definitely word worthy right now.  I am blogging about our first snow.  It happened November 6th.  Yes, it is the 20th and it is totally old "news" but it was a fun day for us and I don't want that to slip through the cracks!

 The trees were beautiful!

The lake was peaceful.

The children were ready.

 Micah didn't care what she had on.  Once they all found out there was snow on the ground, they were out the door, pajamas and all.  They were only on mom's deck, but Micah didn't even take time to put on shoes.

She was outside for over 10 minutes before she decided she wanted sleeves on.  Then she also changed into some shoes...but no socks.

Eden was sure to have plenty of sock...on her hands.  We didn't have any of our winter items out of storage so out came all the socks to keep all the hands toasty.

Titus has an undershirt and zip-up sweatshirt on and is quite content.

No matter how much there is, there is ALWAYS enough snow for a snow angel.

Making snowballs isn't near as easy when you don't have use of your thumbs.

Not too sure what the problem is here, but the picture was funny.  From what I remember, she was getting snow thrown in her face by Titus, who wouldn't let anyone throw snow in his face.

To top the whole morning off, the boys, in true boy fashion, built a fort.  Clearly their imagination far surpasses mine.  All I see is a sad pile of snow. 

We haven't had snow since that morning, though we did get a brief sleet/hail incident one day.  Perhaps that means that we are in for a doozie of a winter.  It's almost December and I still haven't really needed more than a sweatshirt.  Well, no matter what happens, the kids had a wonderful morning playing in the snow!  Thank you God for making kids so enamored by the wonder that is snow!

Carpet...at last!

Today was one of the longest days I have given to the house.  Practically everything on me hurts.  We have carpet coming for the upstairs tomorrow and as usual, I was optimistic on how much work would actually get done in time for this.  While I didn't get all the painting done that I wanted, we are ready for carpet nonetheless. 

The only room that needed to have carpet removed was the girls' room and I can't say as I'm sorry to see it go.  When all the carpet and the linoleum was finally out, all I can say is, "Holy pet pee, Batman!"  Someone had a pet who couldn't find the facilities on several occasions.  Yowzers!

I still had one section of ceiling to paint and, at the time, didn't have any scaffold to use, so when I'm in need, I improvise.

Because we are getting carpet in the morning, I have a mandatory day off, and let me tell you, I need one!  I have a hair appointment at Cori's (CJ Warren Salon in Crown Point) and then I need to hit some thrift stores for jeans for the boys.  I hope I get lucky...they are in dire straits for jeans right now!  After the brief intermission of carpet installation, we will get the POD dropped of and unloaded and then sometime next week, I will be starting the whole thing over again...downstairs.  Deep breath and a sigh.