I Still Have Boxes to Unpack Three Months Later

I'm not sure I can actually call myself a blogger, as I post so infrequently. Honestly, I was never very good at keeping a diary, and this blog feels more like a diary to me most of the time. Who am I kidding, no one is reading this anyway, so I can write whatever I want. Or not. :)

 

Anyway. The reason for the blog absence since February is simple. We moved. That should be in all caps. WE MOVED. And this was my biggest, most adult move ever. Instead of loading up a UHaul or a friend's truck with stuff from a storage unit or apartment, we hired movers who spent nine hours over two days moving an entire houseload of furniture from our old home to our new home.

 

I didn't think it would be hard. Buying and selling the houses had been fairly simple. In January, we saw a new house we liked, put an offer on it, and had the offer accepted in about three days. Our closing date was March 6th. We debated moving to the new house before we listed our old house, but in the end, I panicked about having two mortgages for any amount of time, so we put our house on the market on Valentine's Day, had 11 showings and received three offers over the weekend, and accepted an offer on the 18th, with a closing date of March 18th. Done. Twelve days between closings seemed adequate. I took the week off to facilitate the move. Seemed easy enough.

 

I just didn't really understand how much stuff we had! When we moved into our first house in 2005, we bought new furniture that was delivered directly to the house. Then, we had a kid, and all of her furniture was delivered...directly to the house. When I contacted the moving company, I was all "1,800 square feet, three bedrooms, two sofas, a dining room set, and boxes." The day the movers came (three guys, one truck) I was all "Oh, yeah, all this stuff in the attic needs to go, and the garage, and the patio set..." and on and on. I didn't think we would ever get it all to the new house. I was like, "WHO BOUGHT ALL THIS STUFF?!"

 

Once the stuff was all IN the new house (nine hours of the movers' time, plus several additional trips to get clothes out of closets and such), what did I do? Immediately begin buying more stuff. Yeah, I know. I'm never moving again though, so I won't have to deal with moving all this stuff out! We actually needed some more stuff though, as our new house is bigger than our old one (3,000 square feet, five bedrooms, three full bathrooms, three living areas).

 

I was really looking for about 2400-2600 square feet and four bedrooms, but J and I both loved this house immediately. It was the only house we saw that we both agreed on. It felt like the right house, and we are so happy with it, although it is strange to have two bedrooms more than we have people in our family. With our previous house, the loft and two upstairs bedrooms overlooked the living room and our master bedroom was right off of that on the main floor, so it kind of felt like we were all in the same room, all the time. J works from home when he goes on call every few weeks and it was hard for him to get privacy, as Sophie would be playing in the loft right by his computer. Nothing says "professional" like a four-year-old informing 40 of your colleagues on a conference bridge that she has to go potty. Also, Sophie's bedroom was small, so her toys were in every room...the loft, the living room, our bedroom, both bathrooms. It drove me nuts.

 

In the new house, one bedroom is a playroom for Sophie's toys. One bedroom is an office/mancave where J can be on the computer and work in privacy. The only downstairs bedroom is the guest bedroom with a full bath next to it, which was fantastic when my mother-in-law visited in April. It will also be fantastic if my parents ever have to move in with us someday-the bathtub even has one of those bars in it to assist you getting in and out of it! Sophie has a bathroom that connects to her bedroom, which I think will be nice when she's a teenager. Our master has a separate sitting area that I'm making into a reading room for me.

 

Besides the move itself, we have been on a renovation streak in the new house...there has barely been a week without a contractor/workperson of some ilk in our house. We've replaced the water heater and put a water softener in. I had tile, crown moulding, and new lights put in the kitchen. Then, we had a plumbing problem and had to have some pipes fixed, which meant new drywall in our family room ceiling. This week, we are having all 28 windows in our house replaced (they are single pane and we live in the flight path to San Antonio International Airport, so we are upgrading them to block sound as well as help with energy efficiency hopefully). Sometime in the future, we also need to get our shower retiled and our showerhead raised as it currently is at the level of J's nose...the previous owners were shorter than we are. :)

 

Some of the best things about the new house have nothing to do with the house itself really. Sophie seems to have grown up a lot since we moved in. She is more independent and spends more time playing on her own than requiring us to entertain her. She was excited to visit the terrific elementary school she will start at in the fall and seems to harbor no longing for the old house at all. We are one subdivision over from one of my best friends, so she and I get to spend more time together casually. It seems easier to have people over as the house itself holds more people, has more places for people to sit, and has a bigger backyard. It's just so lovely and I'm really enjoying living in it.

 

It's still a work in progress, which is OK since I'm never moving again, but here's a house tour.

 

Starting with the outside.

 

Here's the formal living room, a nice place to sit and read. This is our old living room furniture with new pillows to spruce it up.

 

We didn't have a formal dining room in our last house, so it's nice to have my nice table and china cabinet together here instead of in the kitchen for all the entertaining I do-ha! That's a joke. I still love it though.

 

The family room is comfy with reclining couches. (These are new purchases.)

 

 

Here's the kitchen before the work we had done.

 

Here's what it looks like after. No more 80s lightbox, new tile, and crown!

 

The eat-in kitchen overlooks the deck in our backyard, which is one of my favorite parts of the house.

 

Guest bedroom and bath downstairs.

 

 

Upstairs, the playroom is the first room you find.

 

 

Sophie's bedroom is next and it connects to her bathroom.

 

 

Down the hall is a game room with a wet bar...currently, it just contains furniture we don't have a spot for...we don't know what we're doing with this room yet.

 

 

 

Off the game room is J's office.

 

Off the game room in the other direction is the master, starting with the sitting room. I need to buy bookshelves, a lamp, and a ladylike desk for this area.

 

Here's the main part of the master bedroom and the master bathroom.

 

 

 

Here's the house as seen from the backyard. There is a balcony off our master that I hope to get some lounge furniture for and the deck has built-in benches and a built-in picnic table, perfect for get-togethers.

Easter 2013

 

My 40th Birthday Party-that's another post

 

I'm so happy to have the move behind us and to be making the house a place we'll love to live in forever, because, again, I'm never moving again!

 

How have you survived buying, selling, and moving? Anyone else addicted to HGTV? I'll try to post a little more frequently once I get more boxes unpacked. :)