Did ya miss me?

I feel like I’ve been ignoring the blog. Life has been crazy and well, something’s gotta give. Between work, getting the house ready, family, outside activities and being sick, I’ve got no time left for thinking up witty blogs.

So here’s what’s been going on:

1. Operation Dream Home is moving at lightening speed! We’re nearing the home stretch of the first leg of the race and in a full out sprint. The realtors came over on Wednesday and think the house is ready so we’re filling out the paperwork tomorrow and it should be on the market by Monday! So excited and nervous at the same time. What if no one wants to buy and it’s on the market forever? Conversely, what if it sells really quickly and we don’t have a new house yet? We’ve started looking but I don’t think we’ve found “the one” yet. I keep telling myself it will all work out, and it will.

So every weekend in April has been filled with activity like this:

Painting or packing or cleaning or repairing or whatever. I’m ready for that phase to be over. Here’s what we have left from our big list:

• Get a storage unit rented
• Clean every room from top to bottom with a fine-tooth comb, including de-cluttering and organizing
  • Master Bedroom and bath
  • Isabella’s room
  • Samson’s room
  • Main Bathroom
  • Kitchen 
  • Dining Room
  • Living Room
  • Entryway (3/4 way done)
  • Basement (3/4 of the way done)
  • Utility Room
  • Garage
• Pack up all knick knacks and “personal” family type items (photos, etc)
• Re-arrange furniture in a few of the rooms
  • Samson’s Room
  • Dining room
  • Living Room
  • Basement
• Replace a sink or 2 and possibly a bathroom countertop
• Clean up the yard and plant flowers, lay down mulch, etc
• Put away all of Isabella’s toys and only keep out those that can fit in to a rubbermaid container
• Paint or restain all baseboards and woodwork (about 1/2 of the way done)
• Meet with a mortgage lender to see how much we can afford and how much of a loan we’ll get approved for
• Repaint Master Bedroom and bath
• Start looking for and buy a new house

2. Our household was hit with a plague and we’ve all been sick for a week now. Well, Isabella for a week. It started for her last Thursday. CJ got hit on Saturday and me on Monday. All week I’ve been feeling “blah” and have negative amounts of energy. Yet, there’s too much going on to allow me to lie around so I’m pushing myself to the max.

3. April and May are crazy busy months. Between birthdays, Easter, Mother’s Day, Memorial Day and graduations, we’ve been on the go every weekend. I’m ready for a break! We also had a wedding and a funeral within a week of each other – for the same guy. Depressing isn’t it?

4. The royal wedding occurred and I pretty much missed it all! I feel so out of touch!

5. A little old lady tried to hijack my car.

6. I totally missed this week’s You Capture because the day just flew by me. It was afternoon on Wednesday when I realized I’d missed it. *sigh* I had some cute ones this week too! So, I’m going to post them here for you all to see! The theme was “outside”. I shot all these one beautiful sunny afternoon, when Isabella, Samson and I were out playing (CJ was probably out front painting).

Splashing in the birdbath (don’t you just love her little sunglasses?)

Playing with the wheelbarrow

Our adventurer peeking through the trees

Two buddies, taking a break

7. I did manage to spend some time last night getting my craft on. I had 2 projects to complete: 1) make a mother’s day gift for my mom and 2) make a fake plant arrangement for our living room.

See, if we leave real plants anywhere within toddler reach, she gets in them. But the realtors wanted us to have some greenery in one corner of the living room, so I had to go with silk. I was surprised how expensive it is to buy already made fake plants. Something like this would have cost $40. Instead, I made it myself for about $20. I think it turned out great!

And here’s the mom’s gift I made. It’s a mosaic stepping stone for the new rock garden my parents are putting in. I was going to have Isabella put her handprint in the middle but she threw a big fit so instead I wrote “Grandma’s” and drew a little flower to represent her garden.

I think she’ll love it!

And with that, it’s time for me to end this break, clock back in and go upstairs to do some cleaning. The checkout lady at Target told me to use oven cleaner on shower doors to get the soap scum off so I’m giving it a try. I will let you know how it turns out…

If you like this, you might also like:

Op Dream Home Updates

Murphy’s Law

Look out Martha!