Weekend Happenings: SOLD

In a crazy and somewhat unexpected turn of events, we accepted a contract on our house last Friday. The back story. A few months back, we priced out a complete gut/renovation/addition to our house. Both neighbors had recently gone through a similar process and had renovated, so we expected the same. WRONG. Prices have sky rocketed over the past year or so and it just didn't seem feasible for us to renovate at this time.

So then there was the big dilemma. We could...

1) Wait out the high prices and re-price the renovation in a year or so and cross our fingers we could afford it then.

2) Continue living in the house for a few more years, knowing that we'd have to sell once we start a family.

3) Or go ahead and sell.

We hemmed and hawed for a few weeks. Almost tore down a wall separating the kitchen and dining room to make it feel more open. (We were already pricing out a face lift for the kitchen before we started thinking about selling). And then the realtor that actually helped us buy the house a few years ago, reached out to me needing a brochure for one of his listings. So I mentioned that we were contemplating selling and after discussing our options with him we decided to sell. So we kicked our butts in high gear to get the house ready. Painted a few walls. Accomplished some things we had been putting off for 2.5 years (if you're a home owner you understand this) and got the house in tip top shape.

We put the house quietly on the market and picked up a few showings. Put a sign in the yard with a coming soon sign and got a lot more showings. Officially listed the house in the MLS on Wednesday, requested offers be sent in on Friday, received multiple offers and subsequently negotiated/accepted an offer Friday evening. So the whole process of thinking about selling, getting in contact with our realtor and actually accepting an offer was about a month-long process. We are scheduled to close next week at the end of the month. And will move a few weeks later.

We feel so blessed to have made such a great investment for our first house and are excited to find our next home. Although moving day will likely see some tears. We originally planned on living in this home for many more years. Sometimes you just have to have faith and move forward. Finding a new home may prove to be a little a lot more challenging. The market for selling is fantastic, buying...ehhh not so much. Fingers crossed.

Weekend Happenings: 4th of July Fun

A couple of weekends ago we packed up and headed to Virginia for a long holiday weekend. My brother is joining the Navy and heads off to boot camp in a few months, so we thought the 4th of July would be the perfect weekend to gather as a family and celebrate his commitment to serving our country.

We come from a family with a long line of military service, and couldn't be more proud that he is going to carry on the tradition. Here are a few pics from the weekend.

Family, holidays, long weekends and fun by the water was just what the doctor ordered.

Our favorite squid.

My mom's side of the family.

My dad's side of the family.

My in-laws.

The fireworks we may or may not of smuggled in from Tennessee.

The awesome fireworks crew. They all left with all 10 fingers and toes.

Weekend Happenings: Kitchen Decisions & "Shopping"

The chalkboard wall still needed to be primed at this point.

This weekend Gilbert and I had planned to start demo'ing the wall that separates our kitchen and dining room. We were going to tear down the sheetrock on the dining room side to at least expose what ever is lurking behind the wall. Now we already knew that this was a load bearing wall and after many hours of discussions and phone calls to a local lumber yard, had decided that we would need to purchase a couple of engineered beams to support the load instead of just using regular ol' lumber. So with that settled we thought we were ready to at least start some part of this daunting project.

Well Saturday came and went. We just weren't quite ready to take the plunge and make the mess. The logistics of emptying cabinets, unscrewing said cabinets, taping off the dining room so dust wouldn't fly all over our new chalkboard wall, dealing with electrical wires that needed to be re-located, etc just seemed like too much to tackle at the time. So we stood up, brushed ourselves off, and the hubs went out for his weekly yard duty.

I, on the other hand, had to get over my disappointment of not starting this particular task and turned my focus to something else. The chalkboard wall in the dining room. I decided to go "shopping" around the house looking for items to style the buffet. I did have to briefly call the hubs back in from the yard to hang some shelves from Ikea that we've had sitting in our basement for literally almost a year. And I love how it turned out!

Items left to add: an orchid to replace the cloth flowers, maybe a new lamp and a wood serving board - I've got my eye on this one made by A Sunny Afternoon Co.

The second quick and easy task for the weekend was replacing the light fixture in the kitchen. We were so blessed that the previous owner had really great taste when it came to light fixtures, and was willing to leave the fixtures when she sold the house to us. We have re-arranged the fixtures around in the house and had a few sitting in our basement just begging to be put up. While I loved the current fixture, it just didn't put out much light so we once again decided to "shop" in our basement and put up another fixture that we had just sitting down there. There is so much more light now!

I love that we turned a disappointing (at least for me - the one who just wants to take a sledge hammer to everything....maybe not so much to my neat freak, but oh so loving husband that really just didn't want the mess) weekend into a successful, light stress, easy DIY weekend that made such a dramatic difference in both of these rooms. Now to challenge my inner artist and put the chalkboard wall to good use.

Weekend Happenings: Baseball Getaway

We headed South this weekend for a little baseball action and visit with my in-laws to celebrate Father's Day. The only snafu in the trip was actually getting down to Atlanta. It took us 7 hours...7 hours people. We could have almost driven to the beach in 7 hours! There was a tractor trailer accident that had the interstate literally stopped on Friday evening. We even turned our own truck off at one point and were just sitting. Oh well we made it safe and sound. And that's what matters.

Luckily it was a night game and was perfect weather once the sun went down.

Saturday started off with a little home shopping at one of my favorite stores, Ikea. When are we getting one in Nashville? Soon, please?!?!?!? We picked up some fun serving-ware to go in our new buffet that we recently ordered for the dining room (pictures of that to come soon).

The hubs and I.

And then we made our way to Turner Field for a little Braves-Angels action. The game was pretty slow for the first 7 innings so we decided to leave after the 7th inning stretch and beat the traffic. Bad Braves fans! Well we beat the traffic and missed the best part of the game. The Braves were down 4-0 when we left and ended up tying the game at 5-5 in the bottom of the 9th. We got home and finished watching the game on TV. It went to 13 innings. And was the longest game either team had played all season. Braves ended up losing 11-6, but what a game. Lesson learned. Stick around.

Overall we had a great little weekend getaway. It's always so fun to travel on the weekends, but puts you behind for the week. We were scrambling for breakfast this morning. Must hit the grocery store tonight. Oh well. Definitely worth it.

P.S. We made it home in time for dinner with my dad and family. Bonus Father's Day treat.