Home Reno

Because I have not been posting you have missed out on all the fun of us loosing our minds and deciding to move. Well unless you are my facebook friend, then you got every painful moment. Basically we decided we wanted to move because our house felt small. Also it's not on the water. Or historic. Basically it's boring. 

So we looked at some cool houses in Springfield. This is a neighborhood right near downtown. Every once in a while it tries to come up in property value. The houses there are AMAZING. Huge 100 year old historic charmers. That need work. The area is marginal. Some homes have the work done and people live in them and are happy. And the other half or so are vacant and barely livable. There is also a good bit of crime. Not terribly serious crime, but it's not really a play outside unsupervised area either. But it's so beautiful. Oh and the schools for that area are dreadful. But not the worst ones we saw... Anyhow the house we liked there needed a terrifying amount of work and we gave up on it. But it was beautiful and I still dream about it. 

Then we found one on the water. Real water, deep water. With access to the huge St. Johns River. The house was very large too. And the water! Oh and cheap. I mean really cheap. REALLY CHEAP. Of course there are reasons for that. It is about a mile from the MOST TERRIFYING NEIGHBORHOOD I HAVE EVER BEEN IN. Springfield felt economically depressed. Ken Knight felt like it wanted to rip me out of my car and kill me. In front of my baby. Then kick him down a gutter. I'm not kidding. I have never felt such hostility. But, like I said, it was a mile from there and on the WATER. So I bring Brian out to see the house too. And he loves it. It is Brian who wants water. We discussed for hours first the safety of the area and came to terms with it. The schools are absolutely not going to happen. Home school or Private. PERIOD. But I'm still game. Brian looks over it, there is some water damage, needs a new roof. Still cheap enough to justify that. So he goes in the attic. And there was an attic in the attic. I should have taken photos, you are not picturing it right. We figured out that they did an addition and instead of tieing it into the old roof, they just build an entirely new roof over the old one, using the roof rafters going into the top of the old, smaller roof. Like the old roof is the support for the new one. Is that even code? Anyhow it just decided it all for us. We decided not to put an offer. 

In the mean time I was collecting quotes on work we wanted to have done here. You know, if we were to stay. We wanted a huge super pool enclosure and covered patio. Do you have any idea how much money that was going to be? Like twenty thousand dollars. So I got quotes on just making our existing patio into a screen room. Bingo: 

 Nice right? And it's plenty big. We also got a brand new pool motor and filter. That was a disaster. It cost more at every single turn and I had to argue about the price and I don't think we will work with them again. But it's done, so that's good. The screen room, by the way, did not go over on price.

At the same time as the screen room we had our house pressure washed and painted. We did the garage door white, black trim and a bright red front door. I've always wanted one. Oh and we did the soffat (sp?) white. It looks amazing. Here is the door.

I can't seem to turn my photos right. They look right on my computer then are sideways on the net. Sorry about that.
Also I'm getting a new camera. Mine died. Stephen got one for Christmas and he loves it but I do not love it. So I bought a new one from Amazon, my favorite store.

Next up is doors. Brian works from home a good deal. In our totally open office/craft room/sports collection room. The problem is that I have several children, one of which is 2. So the no doors is hurting my marriage and sanity. I literally, several times a day, have to take the kids into my bedroom and hide so Brian can do his conference calls. So this week we are having EXTERIOR grade doors installed. We need a HUGE span for the one opening because it's 72 inches and the other opening is 32. Wide for interior, but standard exterior. So that works well. We are all hoping this provides a good buffer. Screaming children still will not be allowed, but we could talk or watch TV quietly I hope. Also it will look so much nicer than the baby gate and book cases that I'm currently blocking that off with. Yup, making a wall out of book cases. Sounds awesome, is terrible.

Calvin is in the TERRIBLE Two's. The other two didn't do this. They were horrid at 3 going on 4. But darling at 2. Calvin is darling, but also horrid. He throws stuff, and the kid has wicked aim and is strong. He bites and scratches. He says no. He thinks he can live on candy and fruit. He whines. He is super loud in sacrament. He breaks things. He climbs. He can get stuff off the top of my fridge. I have a knot on my forehead that is from him. He wakes up every day at 6:30am and will not consider going back to sleep. Also he ONLY wants me at that hour, no one else can give him breakfast and cuddle him. He is also a sweetheart. He can really play well now. He says, "I love you" and "Thank you" and "You're welcome" all the time. He suddenly doubled his vocabulary in the past few months. He makes funny faces. He has the best laugh. And we love him to pieces. But he is also driving us nuts.

Well that's what's up. I'll post good pics when I get a camera. :)