Monday, August 29, 2011

Catching Up

Hello, everyone! It has been a few days since I have posted anything on here. I've got some cool pictures though. :) Today was Joe's first day of school. He is attending Austin Peay (pronounced 'pee'). Believe me, we make LOTS of jokes. Haha! So, a couple things to tell you (and show you) all about. 

First, we have found what seems to be a house buried in our back yard. LOL Not kidding though. We found fence posts, concrete cylinders, and these cool items. :)
Some glass and tiles.

There are easily 6 boxes worth of tile here. Most of them are in great condition, just dirty.

Holy Crow! Glass! And a lot of it... plus more still in the ground. It is nice thick glass. I am going to see if I can find a place that will take it and make some recycled glass tiles for me. :)

Not bad looking... just dirty.

Here is where Joe (and Enrique) dug everything out of. See all of those bricks? Yup, you know we're gonna use them. :)

Another angle of the hole. We are thinking we should just fill it in before our backyard caves. Ha ha

Joe cleaning up some of the bricks he found

Dirty bricks

They clean up nicely though. :)

Such a nice little pile.... so neat :)
So, there are some of the cool finds so far. Joe also found a nice piece of stone countertop hidden in one of the walls beside the water heater. It does not look like it fits into this house anywhere. It's not very big but it is pretty. Maybe it could be used for a entryway table or something. I'm sure we will find a use for it. :)

Now, on with the pictures. :) I finally finished the pantry. Joe put in new shelves and I painted everything and put clear shelf paper on them. It turned out really nice. 
If you look to the left of the photo, this is our pantry. Yes, it's all dark inside and you can't really tell what it looks like. I just wanted to give you all a visual of where it is in the kitchen. :)

Joe is measuring the shelves. He fixed the ones behind him (those were the only shelves in there) They were not put in well. We couldn't put anything on them because they would fall to one side or the other. 

You know, he really does love to have his picture taken. :)

The finished shelved. I think they turned out really well. :)
That's the pantry after the shelves, before the paint job. Here it is painted. 

So happy that I can put food in here now :)

The shelves and trim are Bitter Chocolate brown and the walls are Rocky Mountain Blue. We are painting the kitchen the same colors (a little worried about the counter tops :/).

Now it makes the floor look REALLY bad. ha ha ha

Okay, so let's see. What else have I got for you all? Oh, here's a good story. We'll take a little break from the pictures. :) 
Enrique stayed the night at a friend's house for the first time since getting here. We, of course, were very happy that Enrique found someone to hang out with that lives right down the road. Well, I had gone to the store with Gabriella. On our way home we were coming up to the creek (which we have to cross to get to our house)... :) and we saw Enrique's friend out on a little bridge that crosses the creek. We asked if Enrique was over there, and he said he was.
Me: "Hey, Enrique!"
Enrique: "Yeah?"
Me: "What are you doing?"
Enrique: "mumble mumble mumble" (had no idea what he was saying. He was down in the creek and I was still in the car.)
Me: "What?"
Friend: "We're playin' Tribe"
Gabriella: "Playing what?"
Friend: "We're showin' him the country way."
Me: "The country way of what?"
Friend: "Well, the country-hillbilly way of doin' things. He says he's a city boy."
Me and Gabriella: "Ooookaaay." We laughed and went home.

It was very funny the way it happened. Enrique has experienced a lot over the past couple of days hanging out with his friend. He has seen a raccoon, a baby copperhead, and caught crawfish in the creek. His friend and his friend's family ate the crawfish for lunch, but Enrique chose to pass. Ha ha ha!!

Alright then, back to the pictures! So, yesterday a group of wild turkeys decided to hang out in our yard. There were a lot of them! And baby ones too... so cute! I went outside to get some pictures and Gabriella said, "Awwwww", and, of course, the turkeys started to take off. Ha ha! These are some of the pictures I got though. 

They are taking off! 

I wish I could have gotten a better picture of them

Run, turkey! Run!

Turkeys always make for an exciting morning. :) You have no idea how badly Enrique wants to hunt one for Thanksgiving this year. Might be a little gamey... I don't know. :)

Lastly, Joe cleaned up the loft and put some things up in the dining room. It looks good. The dining room has kind of become our "Europe" room. It seems everything that's up on the walls in there has come from our time in Italy. :)

Desk in the loft

No more stuff on the floor :)

Our new couch upstairs

Dining room

Our plates from around Italy and Europe. It is a little hard to see.  I will try to get a better pic up here soon. 

Our collection of fine Italian wine and our beautiful Italian artwork. :)

Well, I think that's all for now. I will try to get more up soon. I have been battling with our pool. Trying to fill it up so I can close it up for the winter months (no time really to swim right now anyway) and the water has been giving me some trouble. Hmmmm. I think it's because Joe turns the pump off to the well at night (or when it's not in use), so when we go to use it there's no water in the well. It will get done... it just may take a little longer. :) 
I will post again soon! As always, I love to read all of your comments! Get a Google account and follow my blog! :) Ciao!







Tuesday, August 23, 2011

A Clean House :)

So, we have pressure washed the house, repainted the foundation, removed the deck from the master bedroom, took down those wonderful red awnings, painted the deck, and painted the Arizona room. Here are some before and after pictures of it all. :) I didn't get a chance to get some fresh before pictures of the Arizona room or the outside of the house but I will put up some of the ones you have already seen. This way you can see the different without having to go between posts. :)

Here is the house before all the changes.







Now, here is the house after being washed, painted, and having things removed.









It's so nice to see it all clean and pretty. :)
So, here is the deck before and after being painted. I will put the similar before and after pictures together. :)



Before

After


Before
After

Before

After
After
I will have more pics up soon. Joe put some shelves in the pantry. They turned out really nice but I want to paint them and get some finished pictures before I put anything up here. :) I will also have some pictures of Joe's shed on here. He has fixed it up very nicely. Oh, and we have found (or Joe has found) some treasures around the house. I will post some pics of those too soon!! Very cool and crazy stuff!!

Well, I hope you enjoy the pics. As always, please feel free to post any comments and remarks. Also, if you would like to leave comments on here and join to follow the blog (which I would LOVE) you will have to get a Google account to sign in with and all that (if you don't already have one). :) Have a great night! It's time for dessert :)

Sunday, August 21, 2011

More Pictures (inside the house)

Here are some pictures of the inside of the house. Again, these are all before pictures. I hope you like them, and if you decide to leave a comment please do it on the blog. :) Ciao!!

Dining Room

Dining Room

Bay window in dining room

Kitchen

Kitchen

Kitchen

Kitchen

Stairway to lower level

Sunroom (goes to lower level rooms and carport)

Sunroom (on the wall you will see a black circle. This is a hookup for a wood stove. There are pipes running through the house to disperse heat from it. A good backup if we lose power in the winter.)

Sunroom



Master Bedroom

Master Bedroom

Bay window in the master bedroom

Cool little area in the room with some shelves 

Our closet

Master Bath

My super awesome jacuzzi tub :)

Master bath

Living Room (front door)

Living room (right door goes to the 'Arizona Room' and left door goes to lower level)

"Arizona Room"

Crappy old fans in the "Arizona Room"

Stairway to the loft

Loft windows and door to upper patio

Loft

Old dollhouse Joe found in the attic (kids want to finish it) :)

Gabriella's Room

Gabriella's Room

Gabriella's Room

Enrique's Room

Enrique's Room

Enrique's Room

Guest Room (exercise room for now)

Guest Room

Guest Room

Bath in guest room

Bath in guest room

Walls in guest bath

Ugly floor tiles in guest bath

Crazy hospital room tv in guest room (was left by previou owners)

Den (lower level)

Den/ second kitchen

Second kitchen
Kids' bathroom

Kids' bath

Kids' bath

Linen closet in kids' bathroom

Entry to utility room

Utility room

Utility room

My craft room

Craft room

Craft room

Craft room