Back to Life

I'm feeling good today. We got the front and back of the house painted this week and the house is officially on the market. We even had a person that wanted to look at it but had to cancel because of a sick kid.

Saturday we went to the library. Wow, it was a great feeling! Yes, it's a little thing but huge for us. It has been forever since I have been out of the house. It is nice to be back.

I am very excited to see my friends for more than the minute it takes to drop off and pick up my kids. I have the most amazing friends. It has been so humbling. People have gone out of their way to help these last few weeks. Not only taking my kids but even providing a meal. Thank you SOOOOOO much to everyone. I really could never thank you all enough.

I am most excited to be a mom again. My poor kids have suffered the most through this whole thing. They have been troopers through it all.

So here are the before and after of the exterior of our house.

BEFORE

We had a major peeling problem.

DURING

Here is part of the house scraped. Painting was very time consuming because of trying to get up to the second level of the house and maneuvering around windows, columns, and bushes. I was often painting on ladders that were almost completely vertical.

AFTER

In the home stretch

I can't even begin to tell you how excited I am to almost be done. We still need to clean out the garage and paint the outside. I know this sounds like a lot but it should be easier because Ken has Thursday and Friday off (FINALLY a day off) and will actually be able to help me with these projects (or at least we are praying that no chief stuff comes up).

So we will officially list our house this Friday. I am excited and nervous. Let me take you down memory lane, to see where we have been and where we are today.

The "before" pictures were taken the day we bought the house.

The "after" we took tonight. They don't have great lighting because they were taken late at night.

EXTERIOR

Before

The paint is peeling like crazy. It was peeling even in this picture although you can't see it. There is no after yet.

Here is the rotting roof that we had to replace. It was covered with THREE layers of shingles. And no tar paper in spots...no wonder it was leaking.

ENTRY

Before

After

I'll be honest I don't necessarily think this is a huge improvement. This is the one part of the house that was not bad. We did replace the flooring, they had carpet here and it was horrible from their huge dog and it being by the front door.

KITCHEN

Before

After

Before

After

See the oven on the right? It used to be a 70's brown. Thanks to the miracle of appliance paint it is now white.

LIVINGROOM

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

BEDROOM #1

Before

After

BEDROOM #2

Before

After

I sanded and painted all of the closet doors.

MASTER BEDROOM

Before

After

Before (this was taken once we moved in)

After

UPSTAIRS BATHROOM

Before

Notice there is no sink or toilet.

After

I should have gotten a picture of the other side but I didn't. If you can't tell there is now wainscoating all around the bottom.

DOWNSTAIRS BATHROOM

Before

After

If you remember this bathroom had a leak in the roof and had mold. We had to completely gut it. Also, the paint color looks blue but it is actually a sage green.

I can't believe what a horrible month and half this has been. I never got to bed before midnight, and was up before dawn thanks to Chase who is a very early riser. I was up at night thanks to painting, projects, packing, lesson for Caden's preschool, lesson for Jordan's preschool, sick kids, primary stuff, trying to find housing near Ken's new job etc. I also had the worst insomnia. It made it so much harder. I couldn't sleep because of the stress of all the things I needed to do and then it was hard to be as effective because I wasn't sleeping. A vicous cycle. I am just so happy we are finally in the home stretch. I just hope it sells super fast (I am not holding my breath).

My Burden Has Been Lightened

I need to take a moment to thank all of the amazing women who helped me out a couple days ago.

How it came about...

I am still trying to get our house ready to sell. It has been a long process. Things are slow going with 4 little kids, my church calling, Jordan's preschool, Caden's preschool, Kailyn's school projects, etc. Unfortunately, Ken has not been able to help very much this last month. He is on a busy schedule where he has been working 30 hour shifts at the hospital. He seems to be a "black cloud" (every night, he gets at least 2-3 times more people than anyone else gets when they are on call). This means he returns from 30 hours of working without even making it to his room, let alone getting any sleep. When he wasn't at work, he was sleeping, studying for a test, getting paperwork ready so he can work at his new job, and making enemies trying to put together an impossible schedule for work (trying to grant 13 people their vacations in a month that only had room for 7 peoples' vacations).

Anyway, one day I had a particularly hard day (see below if you want to read the details). The next day at preschool Beth asked how I was doing. Who knows--maybe she saw me choking back tears (literally), but at any rate, it was very obvious that things were not going well. So, she quickly did something amazing. She talked to some other friends and organized a day when everyone could come over and help. On the arranged day (just a couple days ago), six women came over to my house to help me tackle my mile long list. We worked from 9am to 1pm. While we worked, five others were the real troopers who watched all of the kids so we could work uninterrupted. This was no small feat with the mass of kids they had to watch! We: painted the entryway, vacuumed and shampooed the living room, painted the entryway closet, primed the upstairs bedroom and closet, painted the ceiling of the upstairs bedroom and closet, primed the doors to the bedrooms, put finishing touches on the painting job in the master bedroom, cleared off the back porch, took down the shelving on the back porch, and loaded boxes into the car. It was amazing!

A simple (though heartfelt) "Thank you" just doesn't adequately express my gratitude to all of you. You have no idea how much you have helped. I feel like my burden has been eased and that means so much.

So a HUGE thank you to:

Beth

Lindsay

Jenny

Alison

Brittani

Jill

Leisy

Sherri

Cyndi

Jeanette

Liora

Alisha (thanks for the pizza. yum. yum.)

Ranae (watched my kids the day before, so I could get things ready)

You guys are amazing!!! I feel so incredibly blessed right now to have such amazing friends.

***So here is a summary of that particularly bad day, the day before my conversation with Beth. I wrote this summary the night that it happened because Ken was not around and I needed to let it out somehow. I was not going to share it, but I decided it does a better job of summing up what has been going on and might just help everyone understand how much help you truly were.*****

This week just started out bad, with something happening earlier in the week that just totally threw me a curve ball. On top of that I have been working on the house nonstop for the last 3 weeks (maybe you noticed--I haven't posted for awhile). 3 WEEKS NONSTOP!! I'm not exaggerating! The kids have been pretty good up to this point. I think their lack of supervision has made them much more mischievous and things seem to be going downhill. Yesterday, as the kids were supposed to be getting ready for bed, Jordan and Caden came down to show me the stamps (permant ink pad) that Kailyn had put all over their faces. Today I found my nice new towel covered in red ink. Kailyn had used it to wipe off the ink from her stamp. Then, as I was packing stuff up, I found my favorite necklace...broken. The kids thought it would be fun to play with. Later in the day Jordan comes down to tell me she and Caden had broken a drawer in my bedroom (it is beyond repair). I must admit I am impressed that she actually came and told me that it happened.

Then this afternoon I was working on painting the backsplash in the kitchen. It turned into a total disaster. I hated the original color I chose. Then the new color made fumes that got everywhere. I noticed when I felt stickiness on the floor. I also discovered it had gotten under the covering I had put over the countertop, which I had just painted a few days earlier. I frantically worked to clean it up before it ruined everything. (I was not able to get it all off the counter). On top of that it had gotten up my nose (Yes I should have used a mask) and had completely coated the inside. As I was frantically srubbing the countertop I hear a crash and rush into the livingroom to see Jordan standing over my nice decorative bowl. I loved loved loved this bowl. There are only a few items of decor in my house that I absolutely love, and this was one of them. Tears involuntarily started flowing from my eyes, and I sent all the kids to another room so I could clean up the glass. Between the tears, I notice new red marks all over the carpet. I could only wonder, "WHAT NOW!?!?" I had no idea what it was and was worried that the carpet might be stained. Then I realized I had cut my finger on the glass and didn't even realize it. It had just been such a draining day.

PS Did I mention our car got broken into. They got cash and Ken's wedding band.

THAT is only one day's worth of stress and frustration, and that is why it meant soooooo much to me that so many people were willing and able to help me out. Thank you again, everyone!!