Job # 3 Getting all the carpet up

In a way to save money, we told our Carpet supplier that we would pull up our own carpet before they installed the fresh new clean smelling carpet. Mike did most of this work. We had ordered a No. 8 carpet pad and after taking off the old carpet, noticed that the pad underneath seemed to be in really good condition and a No. 8 pad. So in an effort to save even more money, we decided to keep the pad and just install the new carpet on top.

Here's the bonus room's cement floor. We had to put some KILZ on several "Dog" spots.We got a cool surprise when the carpet was installed. The existing pad ended up being a No. 10, better than what we were going to put in. We still had to replace the pad downstairs though, so that had a No 8, but we were pretty excited about that.

Then after all the carpet was laid, Mike started replacing the brown 1 1/2 inch baseboard with this white 3+ inch baseboard.

Next come the hardwoods....

Job #2 Paint, Paint and More Paint

We are painting the whole house and since we retextured the ceilings, means we're painting them too. That's a lot of paint. There was a sale at Home Depot a few weeks ago, so we bought 28 gallons of paint and primer and hopefully it will cover all the walls and ceilings...We thought we were going to have the painting all done before the carpets went in...hahahahahaha!

White Ceilings and Eggshell colored Walls

Taking a break....

Love the paint in the hair and on the face...

I didn't realize how time consuming and tiring painting is...I'm tired of painting and we still have the downstairs to do....did I say I'm tired of painting???

Anyways, while many times we worked late into the night with Decker there, we had to figure out a way to keep him off of wet walls, fingers out of paint, and put him to bed when he got tired.

We made a little bed for him in the hall closet with some extra blankets. He didn't seem to mind-- and was tired enough that he would lay down and go to sleep.

When he was awake and wanting to run around, we would put him in his saucer with lots of treats to keep him occupied. (Decker's room)

(Living room)(Master Bedroom)In all this painting, we even had a visitor....We caught Decker with the ceiling paint lid in his hands brought up to his tongue. We called 9-1-1 to be on the safe side, they got there in less than 2 minutes from our phone call and they called Poison Control and they said that it was a water based paint and he should be fine. Maybe we were a little over protective, but you never know....Decker loved hearing the sirens and seeing the big truck.. What fun!

And did I say? I'm tired of painting....

Job #1 Dry wall and Ceiling

So, first things first, Mike was determined to scrape all of the popcorn, (not infested with asbestos) off of the ceiling. I thought we could live with it and not incur an unnecessary expense that was so cosmetic, but it has really made a huge difference. We scraped the popcorn ourselves to save on a portion of the expense. We thought it was going to be a hard job, but it turned out to be a lot easier than we thought. The company http://woodinvilledrywall.com/ we chose was a huge blessing. Kim was great to work with and he let us borrow many of his tools to get our part of the job done so he could get his part done.

I was amazed at how dark and dirty the popcorn was and how fresh and clean a newly textured ceiling was.

These two pictures show where there used to be a wall separating the kitchen from the rest of the living space. We decided to get rid of the remnants and make it all one smooth transition.Here is the lovely laundry room without a ceiling and a sliding door that has a hole in it on the other side.Now it has a ceiling! Yeah! Good bye spiders and other creatures with more than 2 legs!Here Mike and Heath are framing a new door to our laundry room...and filling in a door space that made no sense going into the laundry room. It opened right smack into the water heater with barely enough room to get by.Some of the additional repairs, holes in the walls etc...this space is under the stairs. The previous owners dog spent some time in here..chewing and clawing..it's all gonna go. ;)

It's pretty exciting to see the changes and updates...can't wait till it's all ready to move in!

House news

I haven't written about this because of the uncertainty of it all, but it's now time....

Mike and I bought a new house..

Mike and I recieved an email on a house for sale in September 2009. Mike had been resistant to shopping for a new home, but when he saw the email with only 1 picture, (of the outside) he was ready to buy!

Short description:

• Built in 1981--Popcorn ceilings that gotta go
• Almost an acre of land --room for a dog to run, and multiple kids
• Split level style home--kids upstairs, parents downstairs....or vice versa ;)
• Deck off of the dining room for all the BBQs that we love to do!
• 3 bedrooms-tiny in size, but how much time do you really spend in your room?
• 2 bathrooms-disgustingly nasty and very outdated...think I'll be hiring someone to clean those
• Laundry room with no ceiling and cement floors...so that's where all the cobwebs and spiders are coming from...
• Bonus room downstairs, with a stripper pole and dance floor...sorry Mike, it's gotta go
• Converted garage: to nothing yet, mother-in-law-space? Master bedroom and huge bath?
• Detached garage/shop--Mike's "home away from home"

So we looked at the house...the first house we ever looked at together and Mike wanted to put an offer on it. So we did...and then I felt like we had to do a little shopping around so we could see and compare more that was out there and we did... but still didn't find anything we liked as much.

The house was a "short sale". Meaning the owner owed more on his loan than the house was currently worth and was going through this process instead of a foreclosure. This also meant that it could take months for a deal to go through and even then, a deal might not happen.

Our offer was accepted by the owner on September 22nd and then it had to get approval from the bank who owned the loan. They countered our offer and we accepted it, and then

The wait began....

We took these pictures when we first viewed the house:

This is the space that I loved about the house: Kitchen/dining/living room. It was all one open space:

Kitchen with new cabinets and island (without an outlet...yet)...Dining room..
Living room...This is what Mike fell in love with...the Detached Garage...

room for several cars, projects and toys... The bonus room: The dance floor with stripper pole...look to left...Loved all the high heel holes in the floor...
And the sitting room to watch....

On December 13th, our second day while in Hawaii, we heard the news from our realtor that the deal was going to go through and was scheduled to close on

January 25th, 2010! YIKES!!!

So it's been a long process and finally we hit our day and actually closed on the 22nd. Though we couldn't take possession of the house till the 25th since the current owner was still living there mortgage free...We finally walked into OUR home at 6:20 p.m. on Monday January 25th for the first time...

Now it's time to get to work!

18 months! Nursery Time! January 7th, 2010

So Decker turned 18 months. We were in transition living at Mike's mom's home and attending her ward for awhile. This was Decker's first visit to nursery by himself. (During the month of January, we attended our Redmond 1st ward till we moved and I was released from my Releif Society Secretary calling and called to work in the nursery for those short 4 weeks that we were still in the ward. It was great, because Decker just turned 18 months and would be a new class member. He was fine, like I thought. He enjoyed playing with the cars and the parking garage they had and he liked to play with the dolls and push them around in the little stroller or wear the back pack. He also loved the books. He adapted really well...or so I thought...



When we started attending Nickie's Novelty Hill ward and taking him to nursery. He wouldn't last 15 minutes in there! He would cling to me or Mike and then cry tears and sobs until the poor nursery leaders had had enough and brought him to us in our Sunday School class. --So different than what I thought his reaction would be. I always thought he was the social, adaptible, let's play and have fun little guy...which he is, but when it came to nursery...he really missed his parents and wanted to be with Mimi and Dada. So for the 6 weeks we lived with Nickie and attended her ward, he did not enjoy nursery on his own.


Once we moved into our own house and started attending our own Woodinville 2nd ward would he come to acclimate to the nursery.


Here we are April 19th, and Decker has now stayed in nursery with minimal crying for 2 weeks in a row, minus General Conference Sunday. Today, he only cried for the first minute or so that I initially left.--They have little peepholes in the doors, so you can check out your child without disturbing them. What a difference! It's nice to be firmly planted in a ward where it will be regular with the same teachers each week. All of the nursery leaders have been so kind and willing to work with Decker as he transitions to this new station in his life. His nursery teachers he has now are Michelle and Tamara.


It's also been great to actually go to class instead of being in the hall with a curious and toddling little child that doesn't want to sit still and listen. ;)
This is Decker in the Woodinville 2nd Nursery. They have a large room with lots of riding toys, play-do station--which Decker still likes to put in his mouth, a little kids cooking kitchen, puzzles, balls and more to keep the little ones entertained. He really likes this little rocking horse.
He had his 18 month check up and he has grown!


Weight= 22 lbs --this puts him into the 10th percentile for weight
Height= 32 1/2 inches --this puts him into the 50th percentile for height--I really noticed him growing since all his pants now seem to be highwaters. It seemed to happen over night too! It's just amazing!

Some of the words that I had jotted down at the time were the following: turtle, moon, temple, jesus, mom=mimi, dada, mama= grandma, baba= grandpa, he says "cheese" when we take pictures, "no"=nose, eye, belbo= elbow, don= Jon, moo= moon, I love how he blows when he's referring to something that is hot. Choo choo= train.
He says so many more than these now, it's hard to keep track, he's a little sponge soaking in new things every day.

Here's a video of him looking at one of his favorite books. It's his First year book, containing pictures of his family. I thought it'd be fun to get it on video how he says everyone's names. The video is about 8 minutes long. Here's the link for youtube. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X0uR2nLN0n0

Welcome to Alaska, Mom!...and Sarah Palin's house

This January, mom came to Anchorage with me and Decker. This is Lake Lucille... the same Lake Sarah Palin lives on. We spent the afternoon looking for her house and gathering up courage to meet her. We thought we would drive out onto the Lake to go in front of her house...until I heard some cracking noises and saw this crack..Made me a little nervous in our little rental car, so we decided to drive right up to her driveway.

Her home is a couple of doors down from this Best Western where we took pictures with this Grizzley.Yes, that's her house to the right of me and Decker...

And yes, it is way windy and cold!

If Sarah Palin reads this...my mom says, "Run for President in 2012!"

The hotel room became the playground for Decker this week...he's grown a lot since his first visit to Alaska....and no throwing up this time! :)

Decker's favorite spot..His little bridge between our two beds...

Thanks mom for coming and spending the week! We'll do it again during a sunnier time! ;)

Love you!