Eeeeeeee!

Look who's blogging at 11:00 at night! Normally, brain has totally turned off by now, but tonight I am so excited! We just got home from visiting the new house in its alllllllmost "after" state. Oooh boy am I excited to get in there! It is so pretty and so much more house than I thought I would ever wind up with! Is four exclamation points too many for one paragraph? Oh well, I am gushing! Make that 6!

Here are some photos I snapped. Yes, the continual refrain, there is still much to be done, but the house is now looking better than I've ever seen it.

This last picture of the dining room kinda makes it look like our house is in Wonderland, with the tiny table, crazy mural, and irregular checkerboard floor in the closet . . . like I said, still some things to do. But next on the agenda is moving in!

Playing

At the park near the new house. We are so close to living there we can taste it!

This morning we went over to meet with our contractor to talk about the last few (many) things to be done today and tomorrow. Tomorrow night, we are in! At least, allowed in. We will move this weekend. Whoopee!

There was just a flurry of activity there today. Probably 10 people working hard for us. So exciting. There will be some genuine "after" pictures coming down the pike before long.

Our local kids museum?

We dig it!

(Locals, be sure you know that the Museum of Life and Science is free for Durham County residents on Wednesday afternoons. Woo! Get diggin'!)

Getting close!

After our big adventure in Florida, the girls (including awesome Aunt Megan), headed back up to NC, where lots of good workers were scurrying along to finish what needs to be done on our house. Awesome Uncle David joined them and Paul to build the kitchen cabinets. We are so thankful for all the help we are getting from friends and family right now. We are in a slightly tough situation. However, it is entirely of our own making, not like someone is sick or something. (Please God can you keep us healthy for now, by the way!) But still folks have been so wonderful and willing to give us a shoulder to lean on. Thanks everyone. Really. It would  be such a treat to get to return the favors sometime too. But for now we will just do our best to receive grace well and allow others the joy of lending it.

Here is where we were as of Monday at the house:

 Aren't the floors beautiful? And with the cabinets up, you can see the skeleton of a kitchen in there right?

 More lovely floors

 Drywall! (and ladders, lots of ladders, see below. : ) )

 Penny tile, which I like even more in real life than in the magazines, it turns out.

And here is where we are today, it still looks more like a construction site than a home, but we are getting some serious progress.

 Look, it's a bathroom now!

Kitchen now includes faucet and dishwasher

 Drywall primed . . . I love white. Prepare for more white. Also notice the absence of ladders in all pictures.

We are getting really excited!

And here are some cute sisters goofing off just to round out the post:

Limbo!!!

Hi again friends! This post is coming to you straight from . . . . not the new house yet. Sighhhh. We are back in our home sweet home town and staying with our friends who are just so great and hospitable. I hope we will be in the new house very very soon. And let's just leave it at that for this post, because why moan about things you can't change right?


Let me show you some of the fun things we did down south. We had a fantastic time. It turns out the town where I grew up is a great place to entertain a toddler (and tote around a tiny sleeping angel). I did remember it being fun as a kid . . . Take a look.

Here we are

Dancing to Britney Spears playing while we walked to the drugstore near my parents house ( you gotta love the face on our little dancing queen ):

Running more laps, this time around a pool--fun!:

Goofing off with Granddaddy:

Swinging with Uncle "Doe" ("Doe" and "vroom vroom" were very frequently linked in Ella's conversation down there. He had just gotten a motorcycle. She was extremely impressed.):

Hanging our at Young at Art, an awesome kid's museum that is basically wonderland for someone Ella's age. (Her comment about this was "vroom vroom" too):

Nora enjoying Young at Art:

Visiting Butterfly World, where you walk through lots of butterfly atriums and enjoy gajillions of butterflies fluttering by:

Nora enjoying Butterfly World:

Playing at this AWESOME sprinkler playground. I was dying to get in and play too! (Ok, I did get in and play too a couple of times.) ; )

Nora enjoying the sprinkler playground:

Phew! It was a great time. It felt more like, everybody limbo!!!, than limbo. : )