A month late and a dollar short... Pre-move-in VIDEO!!!

Isn't my husband awesome?!?  (on SO many levels).

LATE friday night, before we were to move on Saturday - and after he mopped the whole hours for hours... he took the time to take video of the place!  (and I didn't even ask him to!)

Anyways, enjoy :).  I'll take another video in a couple months - to compare it with furniture in the place.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AK10O8Ja9jo&feature=em-share_video_user

Weekend's work

Tom and his Dad are hanging the french doors to the living room - while I type!!  (haha, of course, I'm sitting on my bum, typing...)

David is getting the hardware (hinges, etc.) with Brasso (brass polishing compound).
Tom is placing the hinges.

Funny.  Tom is hanging the doors and just said, 'That's why people buy NEW houses!'.  I've also heard many comments this morning about renovating always is more difficult than it seems, etc.

They are working on misc. projects throughout the house.  Seems like there is ALWAYS something to do.  I hope/think/etc. that someday it will all calm down, right?

Ceiling fan hung!!

We had our first dinner party!  We had 'The Noble Crew' and their families over for dinner. .  I should have also taken a picture of the kids, but just didn't.  There were 20 of us total.  We also celebrate Tom's birthday!  What a fun day.

And, the kids all ate in the living room.  Made three pans of lasagna, brussel sprouts, salad and rolls.  Also some carrot cake!  The Chorizo and Polenta was a big hit, and actually so were the brussel sprouts (with the kids too!!).  And of course, Becky's infamous carrot cake was a HUGE hit.

 From left to right:  Mickey, Autumn, Josh, Rick, Steve,
Carol (our realtor), Danny, Dave, Dara, and Tom

And actually, during the dinner, it would have been GREAT to have those french doors hung.  (to sound proof the kids!)

I am starting to really love this house...

So yeah - it is difficult for me to do things lately.  I don't think I've mentioned the baby much lately - but he's 35 weeks along!!  Here's what I look like now-a-days.  

Makes it hard to do much of anything!  (+40 extra pounds isn't helping!)

Hope you are having a great Saturday!!

I will be posting video VERY soon!!   (tomorrow maybe?!)

Never ending...

Electrician AND plumber here today.  Electrician coming back tomorrow.  A different plumber coming in Tuesday.  AND, the plumber here today replaced some corroded, leaking galvanized pipe.  They showed me the other galvanized pipe we have, and I got to see how corroded it is.  That stuff is still in our basement, to be fixed one day!

Just to give you an idea, of how many more things there are to do...

I took all the following pictures standing in, quite literally, ONE spot in the foyer/ 1st floor hallway.  So, imagine this times what - 20?  For the rest of the house. 

1)  See the hole in the wall?  That's where the old handrail went, needs patched or put back up.
2)  Hand rail needs to and will be painted at some point.

2) Cont'd.  See that crappy looking paint on hand rail?
3)  Hold around light switch.  Seems like there are 500 of these.

4)  Brick needs painted.
5)  Holes patched.
6)  New mantle.
7)  Marble landing is chipped, needs replaced badly (can't see in this photo)
8)  Fireplace cleaned, inspected, ready to be operational

9)  Ceiling fan needs hung.

10)  Vents not secured.  Maybe replacing them?

11)  Threshold needed.  Funny looking transition.
   

12)  Needs threshold,

12)  Door needs stained/finished.

13)  Hard to see, but the insides of the windows up top have masking tape on them.  Its seriously glued on there now.

14)  French doors need glass and hung (from hallway to dining room)

We recently got a violation notice from the borough saying our sidewalks were not shoveled (we have, say, 400 feet of them?).  Tom was out of town.  He is out of town again tonight.  

Just got 2" of snow.  Off we go to shovel!!!  (wish I had a little baby shovel for my little lady!!)

What a crazy ride!!

My apologies for slacking on updating the blog...

More people read this than I know.  Please post comments - I'd love to hear what you think!  (and know you're reading)

Found out today that everyone in Crafton knows our house, and they all LOVE it! :)  Conversation normally goes like this:

    'Which street do you live on?

    'Corner of Noble and Alice.'

    'Oh. The red brick one?!?!'

        I nod.

    'Oh - I LOVE that house'

Picked up our washer and dryer yesterday!  WOOT WOOT!!  I'm 31 years old and took my laundry to my moms house last week.  Oh yeah, and her house is a 6 hour drive.  EEK!

 

We went to tour a preschool today and I think I'm going to sign Mary up for the fall (2 days a week).  She loved it - didn't want to leave.  It was very structured, kids were great and the two teachers seemed very patient and worked very well with the children.  Ran into another mom while we were leaving, and she has 4 children that all go to school there and did go through their preschool.  She raved about everything there.  

Just before 'going to school'

I think most of you know we've moved in already.  SOOOO - despite us being moved in, I'm still going to be updating the blog and sharing our stories because GUESS WHAT?!?  We still have TONS to get done here.  We are trying (wishfully thinking) that we can get the 4th bedroom done before we baby is born.  Gah!!  We have 6 weeks left, give or take some (hopefully give!).

The toilet on the 1st floor runs continuously after flushing if you don't push the valve in.  Still needs fixed.

I don't want to get started on what still needs fixed.  Oh boy.

But here is the 'guest bedroom' current condition - literally just went upstairs to take this picture.

Do you see the hole in the wall?  Doh.  
And the hole in the ceiling?  Double Doh.  
Apparently, all we need to do here is paint and put carpet in.  
Somehow I think that's harder than it sounds. 

This is the frame around the door from the hallway into the bedroom.
That hole there is the missing plinth (I've learned what this is through this process).
Not sure what we are going to do about that plaster above the stringer.  (more terminology I'm learning)

Since I just took those photos, I figured I'd take more around the house.

Baby boy's closet.  Unfinished.

Baby's bedroom. Mostly finished but would like to put blue stripes on the wall to make it 'his'.

Jack n Jill Bath.  Between kids bedrooms.  I AM LOVING this floor (although Tom secretly HATES it)

JUST got shower head installed today.
What's that mess in the bottom right corner?
Oh yeah, construction tools.  I hate messes!

Yes, I hate messes.  But I do let my daughter roam the house and play without always cleaning up.
Do you see what I see?  (other than disorganization and mess)
A ceiling fan missing.  Do you see where it is?  Right in front of the fireplace.
Fireplace.  Another project.  :/

Yup, that's my computer that I'm typing on right now.
Kitchen is looking great, but why do I think of everything that still needs to be done?!?

That's the refurbished, really old chandelier.
That's also Tom's great grandparents dining table and buffet back there.
Will be getting new chairs.  Maybe a new rug eventually.  (but we are running out of money honey!)

Also haven't mentioned one other fun thing (I hope you're still reading)!!

We had 3 people come to the house today to fix misc. issues.  One was the garage door guy.  We've been manually opening/closing the door.  It got all screwed up yesterday at 7:15am and it took the 8 month pregnant lady about 15 minutes to get it closed.  Boy, that was frustrating.

Then we had a new plumber here - a new guy because our old one has been frustrating us.  Turns out Matt Mertz, who we thought was great and did work back in Sept. for us, connected the blue (or cold) water line to the hot copper pipe.  SERIOUSLY!?!?!  Tom was pretty pissed when I told him that.  

Also had someone out here to fix our fridge, that was not giving us any water.  So, they fixed it.  And guess what?  Its connected to the same line as the line above, and hot water is coming out of our fridge.  Oh boy.  :/  Kind of excited to see how Tom handles this one with Matt Mertz.

These 3 people were at my house today AT THE SAME TIME.  Although they were scheduled for different times.  And of course, they all finished around the same time.  Doh.  

And then Mary falls on the ice covered snow and smacks her head into the tree.

BAH!

But its a HAPPY DAY!!  Things are looking up.  Finally!!  :)

Will be posting video in the next couple of days.  Much love to you!!

WE DID IT!!!

We MOVED in!  HURRAY!!!

Would you believe, the minute we move in - and I'm all excited to spend time with my husband... he has a week's worth of training in Ohio to do!??!  WT&#^!#R@#%?

Ha.  So, we don't have internet connect yet.  Our stuff is still everywhere.  Salt is still present on our brand-newly-refurbished hardwood floors (no time for me to mop this week)

(and yes, I'm updating this while at work... but shhhhh don't tell anyone...)

I just HAD to share that we moved in!!  IT WAS SO EXCITING!!!  And then so frustrating when my dishwasher doesn't work, my stove doesn't work, my microwave is still in the basement, internet is not working... shall I continue?  (and the man that knows how to fix it all is GONE!)

Bah!  Of course that would happen.

But on move day, I got us all some of the BEST donuts in the WORLD!!

Bah!  And all Mary is concerned with is Daddy coming home to fix our TV.  :)  Because yes, that is not up and running either.

Okay - back to work.  More details and pictures AND video to come soon!.

MUCH love to you all!!!!  MWAH!!!

So many choices... too many decisions!

I am so stinking excited for the tile wall in the kitchen!!

Made TWO trips to Lowe's today.  Its a 25 min. drive from our current house, about 15 from Noble.  That's a lot of time in commute.  I'm SO ready to be done with this.

But really.  I mean, really.  Must there be that many choices for a toilet seat?!?  These are only half of what was there!  (these are the oblong ones).  Geesh.

We also wiped out their entire inventory of Antique Brass Finish canopy kit for the top of some pendant lights/chandeliers.  :)  They even had two whole racks of them at once!  (bought 4 of them and got that last one down there)

So, Tom and I hung this AWESOME chandelier - I bought it back in July, maybe?  I did post a photo of it.  At any rate, its beautiful and very old.  (Its heavy!)  So, well, we hung it - turned the light on - it worked!  Turned the light off, secured it some more, turned the light back on - and saw a spark and it fried.  :(  Bummer.  Means we'll have to take it down and all (you every hung a chandelier?  That crap is not easy.  Not horribly hard either but not easy).

BTW - I'm loving the color in the dining room! :)

TALK SOON!

ANOTHER Late night at Noble

Tom and I are usually asleep by 10.  Its 11:30 and he is just hopping in shower.  Alarm set for 6:30 tomorrow.  Ick. 

Today we did LOADS of things:

- Mickey put more backsplash in.  Also put in a 'mosaic' behind the stove. I think it looks AWESOME!  Scroll down for pics
- Beth (Tom's mom) cleaned a BUNCH of light fixtures.  There is this really cool orange one by the back door entrance.  I'm lovin it!
- Josh stained the stairs.  Yahoo!  I think staining is almost done ;)
- Tom put in our master ceiling fan.  Caulked around jack and jill bath and installed that light.  Cleaned the master bath, boy was it dirty!  I know he did LOADS of other things but i wasnt there much today. 
- Tom and I put up the tape to paint Mary's purple stripes.

When I think about all that we've done and have been doing, its soooo much and we've worked sooo hard.  When I think about what else has to be done, I get a bit overwhelmed.   :/  Not one bedroom upstairs has a door to it yet.  Kitchen diswasher, stove, disposal, etc. all still need to be connected... and we are going to live in it in one week!!  Yikes.

Here are the pics I took tonight.  Enjoy! 

And HAPPY LAST SUNDAY OF WORKING 'AT' NOBLE to us!!  :)

Stripes in Mary's room (Time consuming!)

Tom cleaning the bathroom.  12 hours later it still smelled like bleach!

Sconces in living room.  They are neat.  I thought they were really old but turns out they're pretty new!

Light fixutre in 'mud room' area.  This has GOT to be original.

Another original sconce - in dining room.  These have also GOT to be original.  Right?

'Mosaic' Tile wall insert above stove.  YAHOO!!!

ITS ALL COMING TOGETHER!!