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.

Fall Festival 2010

We just got the kids home and tucked into bed...all full of sugar.  Yes, we are indeed responsible parents who give their kids candy before bed.  Well, let me change that.  Tim is the responsible parent in charge of giving the kids some of their newly acquired booty before bed.  I had NOTHING to do with that.

Tonight we had the Fall Festival/Trunk or Treat at church.  In the auditorium there were 6 or so gigantic inflatable things...Pirate Ship, Large slide, Obstacle course, 5yr old and under jump house, older kid jump house and a Train...and in the foyer there was face painting and balloon twisting/shaping and perhaps more, but I didn't look out there much.  It was all a lot of fun, but we were intending to get in, get candy, play and get out.  We did alright.

John Paul and Sarah had a trunk outside where they passed out candy.  "Confucius say, "Too cold for satin!"

I Didn't get what Sarah said about her costume except that it was too cold to put it all on.  It was FREEZING!!!!

I will have to be honest.  With all of the house stuff we have been doing, I didn't take any time for costumes this year, so I am very grateful that we have dress up clothes for all of them.  Sure we pulled repeats, but who cares...they got the candy they wanted and I didn't spend a dime on costumes.  I would like to, one day, do a family costume theme...One guy came in the church tonight as a wizard (or whatever) and had 6 kids all in the Harry Potter school uniform.  It was kind of fun seeing the whole group.  I should think about it now and start looking.

 The lines were quite long, but the kids were patient and fairly calm and I was quite pleased with them.

Eden found Abby and they ran around together feeling like such big girls!

 Levi found Jackson and they hung out.  All in all, we had a good time, but it was quickly time to go home to get everyone in bed.  After all, there is school tomorrow, so the fun must come to an end!

New facial treatments...or something like it

I was painting ceilings...and this is how beautiful I looked afterwards. 

Do I look as pooped as I feel?  I'm wondering, though...will all the "flat" paint make my skin look and feel younger and healthier? 

This is -obviously- the girls room.  I absolutely love how it turned out and once the green carpet is gone, I believe it is going to be such a cute room.

Carpet is now scheduled for Wednesday and I feel that we can actually have all the upstairs trim finished by then and perhaps even have the master bathroom painted.  Maybe I will even get to the hallway, but I am fairly positive I am going to paint my bedroom and the kids bathroom AFTER the accessories get unpacked from the POD so I can match the colors.  Not ideal, but I'd much rather match than guess.  I am praying for our Wednesday deadline to be met so I can finally start on the downstairs trim.  You all can pray too, please.  I know we are, in essence, bringing this all on ourselves, but we are tired and the kids are tired and I don't know how much longer I can keep my sanity with all that I have to do in a day.  I just want to be mommy and wife and not general contractor/laborer/mommy/wife any more.  Crazy, right?!?