House Projects

Well I felt especially handy today.  I have had a couple of house projects lingering and today I finally finished them.  One was our entryway bench with a shelf and hooks to hang bags, coats, and even the dog leash.  There really was no room for my bags and other items in our hallway so I'm so glad I finally added the hooks today.  I was inspired by this pinterest picture.  I have so many other house projects for the future, but I never have the time or resources to do all of them.  Everyone always told Danny and I that the house projects would never end when we moved into our house and now I find it very true.  I'm hoping to install a kitty door for the basement, update/remodel our half bath, and replace/update all of the inside doors in our house.  I love the idea of updating the house to make it a more useful and creative space and I can't wait to see the finish products, if it ever gets "finished".

Raindrops on Roses

So I have to be honest.  It's been raining a lot this summer and I can't really be mad about it. Although I can't enjoy my evenings swimming in the pool or laying in the hammock because of the rain, it does have its perks.  Because of the rain, I can enjoy my beautiful garden on nights like this.  Being a first time home owner, I am still developing my green thumb and all this rain, helps me do it!  I am usually notorious for killing off my plants by July, but I'm happy to say that this year, I made it!!! Thanks, of course, to the rain.

Flowers from my garden

Weekend Recap: 3 reasons I felt like an adult this weekend

This weekend was filled with a bunch of things that reminded me more and more that I am growing up and becoming an adult.  Just last week, Danny and I moved out of our 1 bedroom apartment in Willoughby.  I had been living there the past three years and Danny moved in almost a year ago.  When we bought our house in April, we still had a few months of overlap between the house and the apartment.  At first, we thought this was nice since we could move things out of our apartment at our own pace, but it really just increased our procrastination to the point of no return.  After finally getting everything moved to the house, living and non living, we piled the boxes in our new garage for us to go over at a later date.  This weekend was our later date.  After investing time, money, and energy into just the house this weekend, I officially feel like a home owning adult.  Below are the threes reasons I felt like an adult this weekend:

1.  Everything we bought this weekend, was for the house. This included a patio set, pool cleaner, and even a hammock for our backyard! BTW, the hammock purchase was my favorite purchase for the house yet.  Since our backyard is a mini forest, it is the perfect accessory to our outdoor living space!

Our backyard with the hammock.

Yogi wasn't so sure of the hammock, he's showing his baby teeth!

2. We are now Sam's Club members.  So we bit the bullet and are now members of Sam's Club.  After shopping in bulk this weekend, I'm trying to figure out how to eat all of this food.  Future plans include planning meals entirely so I don't waste any food we buy.

Sam's Club Member

3. Saturday night consisted of catching up on my reality TV shows and making homemade popcorn.  So although I work the next day, I can tell I am an adult because of how I spend my weekend nights.  I love staying in and watching some of my favorite shows/movies with my husband.  This past Saturday we caught up on some of my reality TV shows like Catfish (its back for another season!) and Pregnant & Dating which follows the lives of several women that are pregnant, but still trying to find Mr. Right (very intriguing and obviously addicting).  We also made homemade popcorn! Danny received an old time popcorn machine as a Christmas gift last year and we finally got it out and used it!

Yogi was very intrigued!

Our new home

Since I haven't blogged in awhile, I wanted to catch everyone up on what's been going on in our lives.  One of the more exciting things that is different in our life is our new house.  Ever since Danny and I moved into our small apartment last year, we have been dreaming of the day we could upgrade to our own house.  We knew we would be in Cleveland long term, so it was only a matter of time that we bought our first house.  We had to wait until the apartment lease was up before we could move since we couldn't get out of the lease terms, but that didn't stop us from looking.  We started seriously looking in February.  I remember I was tired of thinking about the wedding and I needed to focus my energy on something else.  At first I thought things were going to be crazy stressful, but it actually acted as the perfect distraction for me.  I was looking online one day and came across a Realtor named, Kayleen McDowell.  I decided to leave her a message and wait for her phone call since it was 8 o'clock at night, but to my surprise, she answered the phone.  She had such a fun, outgoing personality that I knew she was the perfect person to find our dream home. After telling her what we were looking for, she gave us a list of houses in our price range and in our ideal neighborhood.  That weekend, we took a tour of about 6 houses and found our dream home within those houses!! As soon as we walked in, we fell in love with the amazing exposed beams in the finished basement and kitchen.  It was colorfully decorated and had so much personality.  It had a large backyard with a pool (which just looked like a lot of work to me, but Danny admired it).  The house had everything we wanted and more.  That night, we put in an offer. 

The next day was one of the most nerve-wracking days of my life.  I had to work but I wanted so desperately to hear back from the home owners.  Everyone seemed to prepare me for a counter offer, but much to my surprise, they accepted!

This started the long drawn out process of applying for a mortgage.  Although it was tough, we signed and closed on the house on April 15th, and proceeded to move in the following day. 

Even though home owning is tough, as we have already figured out, I find myself more and more in love with the house each and every day.  We have made it our own from the man cave in the basement to the master bedroom upstairs.  I love our house and so glad we have some place to call home.

Our house on moving day!