We are moving!

Wow, it has been awhile since I've done an update on my parents' flip house.  A lot has been happening - although chances are you will be thinking.  "Man, what is taking them so long?!?!" Well, the reason it is taking so long is because my dad has to do 90% of the work and he already has a full-time job and his own business, which is a part-time job so he only gets to work on the house on weekends. 

We are suddenly in a time crunch as something is finally happening with the sale of our house and the people buying it are moving in the end of February.  Our move out date is February 23rd.  So yeah,  the Boston house needs to be liveable in less than one month which equals 4 work days.

As I mentioned previously, the kitchen ceiling was very very low so we wanted to raise it up to average people height. 

So, down the old ceiling came, along with a bunch of insulation, and a couple of dead birds.  But it is important to note that throughout all of this demolition, we have not seen even one scorpion, dead or alive.

There were huge electrical wiring issues and my dad rerouted the water heater pipes so much to my and my mom's dismay, some wall repair was in our future.

Look how nice and high the ceiling is now!

Oh my word, what a ton of work this room was, patching and scraping and sanding and texturing.  Seriously it took 5 weekends.  Plus many weekdays of my mom going out by herself and working on it.

 

My mom is a pro at texturing.

The cabinets are all in now (not quite in this picture)  they still need doors and shelves though.  We are super excited because this week, the entire house is being tiled and the granite counter tops will be going in next week along with the appliances.  Then the kitchen will be done! (Except for cosmetic things like backsplash tiling and that sort of thing.  That will get done after we move in)

The whole house got new windows.  The play room had a major window remodel.

Before:  See how the windows covered with the curtain ( there are two side by side for some dumb reason) are shorter than the other ones?  Ugh! I hated that, it looked so weird.  So my dad made it so there is one window on one wall and one window on the other wall - and they are both the same height.

After:  Well... in progress.

 Sigh, that was a lot of wall repair too.  

It's pretty much done now,  I just don't have a picture.

The sliding glass door has been replaced with french doors.

 

In the backyard, Bryan started cutting down the palm trees to remove them,  

However, we have been unsuccessful at getting the stumps/roots out and because of our new deadline we have left them as they are not important right now.  We are leaving the backyard alone and will work on it sometime before it gets too hot.

The block wall surrounding the backyard needed repairs and we wanted to raise it up one more block so it would be a normal sized wall.  (we had professionals do this) then they stuccoed over the wall and we decided to have them stucco the house as well.  What a pain it would have been to have to sand and patch every little hole in the house siding and then paint it!  The crew is coming back this week so put the final coat on both the wall and the house.  The final coat will have the color we chose actually mixed into the stucco so it will never need to be painted and if it chips or anything it is all one color so gray won't show through.  It should last forever.

 I am excited to see how it looks finished with the color. The color we chose and the existing green trim will clash terribly until we have a chance to repaint the trim.

Josh had to dig out the former dog run before the guys could finish the wall.

 

 Joy was a big helper.

Before we move in we will have one bathroom functioning.  My mom just finished tiling the tub surround in the girl's bathroom.  The day that I was able to help, we got the ceiling and almost the back wall done. 

Not bad! 

As you can see we have a ways to go to get the house ready.  Thankfully the major things, carpet, tile, countertops and stucco will all be done by someone else and everything we have left to do is small stuff.  We mostly have to work on a little more painting, installing doors, ceiling fans/lights, electrical outlets, switches etc.  Luxuries like baseboards, window trim and a second bathroom will have to come after we move in.

I am so excited about our move!  I have so much work to do in our house though, it is a little overwhelming.  I need to start packing.  We have so much more stuff now that we have kids than we did when just Josh and I moved into this house.

 The next 24 days are sure to be a whirlwind!

Our Snow Day

 The month of January is quickly coming to a close and I realize I haven't made a post yet this year! Yikes! We are preparing for many exciting and big changes coming up VERY soon so free time has been a little harder to find lately.  I will post hopefully in the next day or two about our big move in less than a month. (Yes! We are finally moving to the Boston house!)  But I'll get to that later.  

Right after the new year, Josh went out of town with a group to build homes in Mexico so I went to my parents' house as usual.   While I was there, we all drove up to their house in Flagstaff to play in the snow.  It's a good thing we did too, seeing as it was the only weekend of snow this winter. 

Ugh,  I hate the snow, I hate it with a burning passion.  I can not stand to be cold and have an extremely low tolerance to it.  I decided this happened to me when I went on a Magic Mountain trip one year with our homsechool group.   It was one of those turn around trips and it rained the entire day with temperatures in the low 50's.  All of the rides were closed and there was no where to go to get out of it.  Yep,  ever since then my body shuts down and I am incapacitated at any temperature below 70 degrees. 

 Luckily for me, my older brother Steve came up with us.  Phew, I knew Uncle Didi would play with the girls in the snow. 

 

Claire doesn't remember snow since the only time we took her, she was Joy's age.  She LOVED it.

 

 Joy was not a big fan and wanted to be carried everywhere.

While we were there, my dad needed to cut down a large, dead pine tree before it fell down on the house.

So that kept him and Buddy busy for quite a while, but they finished and no one got killed.

After many warm up breaks in the warm, cozy house (where I resided most of the day) and lunch by the fire, we took a walk to the park.  It was interesting to play on the playground while it was covered in snow.

Didi built Claire a snow fortress,

there were snow ball fights,

sledding,

snow angels,

and more sledding.

No snowmen though, the snow was so loose and powdery it wouldn't stick together.

We had a good time in the snow and I am glad it is only a once a year ordeal.

 

December at a Glance

I had every intention of blogging MORE during December since we actually did fun things worth sharing but the busyness of the season got the best of me so here are a few snap shots of some of the things we did. 

The day we got home from the Polar Express, we got our Christmas Tree. 

 

 It helped soften the blow of having to leave for Claire.  Our children are still completely helpless when it comes to decorating a tree.  There is no understanding of ornament weight versus tree branch strength.

Claire and I made a gingerbread house the cheater way - out of the Wilton Pre-baked, pre-cut gingerbread kit.   I got it last year for $2.50 when it was 75% off. 

It came with candy and everything so it was cheaper and MUCH less frustrating than making one from scratch. 

 I hate gingerbread anyway so I was glad to not have to deal with it and Claire got to do the fun part.

 

We had 3 different fundraisers to attend to help raise money for the Mexico mission trip next week,  the first one was at the one and only Scooptacular,  

the next week there was one at Jersey Mike's and just before Christmas was the "bash".

Mid December Josh went to Oklahoma for a couple of days to drive home with one of his former youth so I went to my mom's where the girls enjoyed the fall leaves (finally)

 And had leaf wars with Uncle Buddy.

 Uncle Buddy took them for walks around the neighborhood at night to look at Christmas lights.

 A couple of days before Christmas we finally had our chance to see Santa.  We weren't going to even try putting Joy on his lap but when she saw sister with Santa she wanted to go too.  We were shocked.  She is getting more sociable in her old age.

Earlier this month my Grandpa passed away due to lung cancer.  His lovely wife, Grandma Sheila, came out to spend Christmas with us.  Claire didn't remember her since she was 1 year old last time we were together but Claire instantly became her best friend. 

As usual Christmas Eve was spent at our house with my family. 

We had our Mexican tamale feast, Josh preached at our church's candlelight service and then we came back to our house to open gifts.

 Cousins!   T.J. Is a little concerned when Claire is holding him.

 Sisters.

 In his spare time, Uncle Buddy crochets hat for people.  He made one for Claire and one for Joy.  Very cute.

Santa came and brought the girls each there own puppy that I don't have to clean up after and doesn't mind getting forgotten in the corner for days at a time.  They are quite popular right now.

 We spent Christmas morning at home with just our family and then went to Josh's parents' house for the rest of the day.  We ate, opened gifts.... the favorite was this pretend camping set.  It kept them busy all day holding plastic food over the fabric flickering flame.

 

That night we had a real fire to roast smores and just hung out.  It was a fun relaxing time.

The day after, Josh had to work and get ready for his upcoming Mexico trip so we went back to my mom's house to spend the day with Sheila before she went back home to Nevada.

By the time we got home that night the girls were exhausted and in dire need of a good night's sleep and a day at home with nothing to do. 

Claire is pretty sad that Christmas is over (and so am I) but now onto the New Year and the exciting changes that will hopefully take place for our family in 2013.