Name Changes

I suppose there needs to be a small change made here in blog land. Boyfriend's title is no longer entirely accurate. The best way to describe him now is Fiance. That's right, after five years together, three states, a pup, and buying a house he and decided to make it official. We're pretty jazzed.

We'll be tying the knot (jumping the broom, getting hitched, and other assorted euphemisms) in Kansas City next summer. I'll have a brand new (easier for kiddos to pronounce) name just in time to be teacher all on my own. Hooray!

Green Thumbs?

So, when you buy a house in the fall and move in during the winter guess what remains a total mystery? The yard. The now-overgrown, not well maintained, chaotic mess of a yard.

Lest this get too rant-y, here are the things we really like about our outdoor space:

1. We have a nice deck. It's big enough to accommodate our patio furniture and grill with a little room to spare. It's in pretty decent condition too. A power-washing and re-staining should be all we need to do in the near future. 

2. The flower beds in our front yard. We have two well-established (albeit, overgrown) flower beds on either side of our front stoop (I have a love/hate relationship with that word, btw...stoop. stoop. stoop.) which are currently a disorderly mess of tiger lilies and crazed ground cover. What's great is that they're a good size, plenty of potential for changing up the layout in there and the boundaries are already well-established by pretty classic brick paving stones. 

3. We have a shed. We love our shed. Our shed loves us. Seriously though, we don't have to keep the lawn mower or the smoker or the grill in the garage. Win.

4. Lots of space! For a pretty typical neighborhood lot, we have plenty of open green space. For now, it's main purpose is as room for Arley to roam. We have dreams of a picnic table or even a fire pit, though.  

Here's what we're up against in our battle to achieve yard zen:

1. Random flowers everywhere. It's great that the previous owners planted a ton of perennials. It's not as awesome that they pop up next to the shed, along the fence, in the garden, next to the house, aaaaannnd in the flower beds. 

2. Weeds on weeds on weeds. No one was diligently keeping these rowdy little buggers in their place. We've been waging a weak uphill battle since the spring. It doesn't help that our opponents can grow about a foot overnight. 

3. Dead things. As far as we can tell we don't have zombies (whew). What we do have is a large dead bush in our front yard. I managed to hack the smaller limbs off so we can mow near it, but it still looms are gray and sad at the front of our yard. It's got a date with a chainsaw eventually. 

4. Bald patches. We're not yet old enough to experience these personally. Our yard is not as fortunate, though. Some of them seem to be of the long-term variety while others we acquired when someone else's movers may or may not have backed into our yard as they turned their truck around. Ugh.

This summer hasn't seen a lot of progress in the yard, but now we know what we're up to for next year! Any yard care secrets are very welcome : )

A List!

We're currently in Indianapolis for our annual weekend of Indy 500 festivities. Today, the rest of the crew is watching the greatest spectacle in racing while I get some veg time in the hotel giving the blog some much needed attention. First up, a little update on our new house.

So, we've lived in the new place for a few months now and of course, the ideas for making it our own are abundant. Right now changes have been limited to hanging our own pictures, replacing the kitchen appliances, and painting Eric's pale pink office a more studious blue. But what big plans (dream? delusions?) we have! Inspired by one of my favorite blogs, Young House Love, I've made my own personal list of things we'd like to do to this house of ours. Clearly, this is more for my reference than yours, but if you're looking for an explanation when I'm staring off into space. These are likely the things I'm plotting.

Without further ado, here is THE LIST:

Living room:
paint
find art/make something to hang above the couch
add curtains to windows
reface fireplace
add mantle to fireplace
replace light/fan fixture

Dining room:
change light fixture/add one with a ceiling fan
replace screens on windows

Kitchen:
repaint/stain cabinets
paint walls
replace laminate floors with ceramic tile
add an electrical outlet to the island
move the island back a few inches
revamp shelving in pantry cabinets

Hall Bath:
replace linoleum with ceramic tile
paint?
frame in mirror
replace light fixture

Entry:
paint
replace light fixture
paint/stain bannister
replace carpet on stairs

Guest Room:
replace window coverings
fix one window from slamming

Second Bath:
frame in mirror
change light fixture

Offices:
paint
add blinds

Master Bedroom:
paint
change window coverings

Master Bathroom:
take out shelving in closet
install towel hook rack in closet
paint
tile around shower
frame in mirror
replace light fixtures

There you have it. The list we may never finish! I hope to update this as we make progress.

New House Tour Part 2: Less Chaos

So...this is way overdue. Better super late than never? I hope so! Here is what our house is looking like these days. We've lived here a little over a month now and have managed to get a few little things done.

Our individual work areas are coming along. I think they say a lot about us. Here's mine:

Believe it or not, I find all that color and chaos comforting. I love having somewhere designated for all of my school stuff. When piles of binders are toppled over and my backpack's contents have spilled across the floor, I can shut the door and walk downstairs.

Boyfriend though, has a very professional dusty blue and dark wood office. It's sophisticated- even the Rage Against the Machine poster. He's got a menacing bookshelf, heavy with academic miscellany, baseball bobble heads and empty space. Something about not getting distracted, I guess. Huh.

Our guest bedroom is pretty bare, but the bed is made!

The dining room has taken on a multipurpose life much like it had at our old house. The dining room is where more bookshelves go (so many, so many) and where game nights happen, where Boyfriend works when his office won't do, where projects get laid out, and where dinner rarely happens. Here it is:

Our backyard, you ask? We haven't done a single thing...because it has looked like this since mid-January. I know, I know, it's pretty, right? Nope. Three weeks ago it was pretty. Now it's just
a sick joke. Melt.

And because I am that pet owner, here's a cute picture of Arley enjoying our new digs.

New House Tour Part 1: Chaos

We're officially moved! During finals week last semester we finished (...pretty much started) packing and moved everything to the new house across town. Moving+ finals week= we've had better ideas. Anyway, we survived the moving process with the help of some great friends and a lot of caffeine. We then fled town for the refuge of Kansas City and our families. Who knew that arriving home in an ice storm would be the least of our weather problems this holiday season?

Chapter 2: The Polar Vortex sabotaged our return to Bloomington!
Our original plan was to head back on Sunday but when we found out that I-70 was all snow-covered car accidents, we decided to wait. Tuesday morning we left Kansas City and made it as far as Vandalia, IL before the highway was so icy that we thought better of continuing. Boyfriend, Arley, and I spent the night at the Days Inn in Vandalia. Wednesday we took a little over 6 hours to get from the middle of Illinois to Bloomington. Along the way we saw dozens of cars off the road, overturned semis (one blocking our access back on to I-70 after a coffee stop), a train stopped in an intersection, and beautiful snowy southern Indiana.

But we made it! In the last few days we've made pretty decent progress but it's still pretty crazy around here. Have some evidence of the madness:

There are books on the floor in every room.

Yes, that's a box spring in the living room? Why?

Stay tuned for a more moved-in tour of our progress!

Home Resources Binder

This is one of a series of posts that mysteriously reverted to draft form. They were actually posted quite a while ago but they're here for now. Sorry about the craziness!


In an attempt to not let this whole homeownership thin go up in flames I am determined to begin organized and stay organized. Luckily, I have a deep, some might say troubling, love of labels, dividers, hole punches and the like. It's nothing to be concerned about, I swear. Really. Whatever.

Anyway, enter the Home Resources Binder (this great idea brought to you by the modern manifest-er of all great ideas, Pinterest!). This is one handy, tidy place to keep all important house-related things. Ours already has documentation about our furnace and water heater, garage door warranty, utility information and potential paint colors. Everything we want to know about our house to keep ourselves sane is kept in there. Want one? Neat. I want you to have one. Behold!

Get yourself a three-ring binder, a package of dividers and a bunch of sheet protectors. Impulse buy some pens or a notebook. You good? Excellent. 

Let's continue. Grab a piece of scrap paper and brainstorm somewhat categories make sense for you. Here are ours:

When you've got an exhaustive list, slip all the relevant documents into sheet protectors in the appropriate categories and bask in your organized glory. 

Mmm, labels. 

We're moving!

We bought a house! In just a few months we will (most likely) never pay rent again! The home search was much more brief than we anticipated. We spent a few days scouring listings online and managed to find two houses we found interesting enough to look at. We made a low ball offer and ba da bing, ba da boom. Homeowners!

The house is just on the other side of town which means this will be Boyfriend and I's first move that does not involve getting new driver's licenses. Since we're in school full-time we're giving ourselves plenty of time to get all of our things moved over. By the new year we will be in our new place! We'll have more space so each of us will have somewhere to put our desks. No more office/dining room!

The house does not have anything major that needs to be done but it hasn't had much updating since it was built in the late 80's. It is generally bland inside and out. This is exciting though because we can out our own mark on the place.

That brings me to some of the resources we will be consulting as we tweak and improve. My parents will be on speed dial, of course, because they have decades of experience taking on DIY projects of all sorts. They are experts at biting off more than they can chew and figuring out how to make it work. I have a sneaking suspicion this skill set will be helpful. Another great resource I will be finally be able to capitalize on is the blog Young House Love. It's a very popular home blog in case you haven't lost several hours to this fantastic family and their amazing taste.

We have plans for projects big and small. Of course we'll have to take silly things like time and budget into consideration. Psh!

Home is Where the Floors Creak

Having been home over the holidays made me think about how much my parents' tastes have shaped my own. I like to believe that I have made every single decision based only on my own brain power but anyone knows that isn't how it works. The people you grow up around sneak themselves into every nook and cranny of your thoughts no matter how much you fight it in surprising ways.

My dad used to quiz my brother and I on roof styles while running errands around town. Mansard, hip, gambrel, gable- just try to stump me. I'm even better with types of columns. Unsurprisingly, I developed an early interest in architecture. It also helps that I grew up in the coolest house ever. What's that? Your childhood home rocked? Cool. Mine was better.

Yeah, I'm in love with the house from the Wikipedia article on bungalows.

I grew up in a stone bungalow that was built in 1908 (allegedly by a chain gang!). It had a massive front porch held up by cement casts of tree trunks and when the mailbox needed to be replaced, my dad used an antique fire alarm box. As a kid I thought the place was huge. My parents will be quick to tell you that was not the case. Apparently with two small kids, a dog and at least one cat 1,700 square foot isn't exactly expansive. When you're nine years old though, the crawl-space-turned-closet in your already giant bedroom is the greatest secret hideout in the world (it had carpet and shelves!). The dining room had massive picture windows and a bench under those windows that ran the length of the room. At the center of the living room was an enormous stone fireplace, the backdrop of nearly all my childhood Christmas photos.

Now that I am learning to be a grown-up (so tough!) and have my own place, I find that I fall in love with houses for the same reason my parents fell in love with that bungalow. Hardwood floors are the single most charming thing ever, bonus points if they creak. A front porch of porch-sittin' size is a necessity. If the house has a particularly colorful history I want to hear about it. The little house we're renting now is pretty fantastic. It has the requisite wood floors, beautiful wood trim around all the doors and I got to choose the cozy color for the living room walls. It's called 'Bagel'. Wonderful, yes? The basement is accessed by a door in the floor rigged to a hand-made pulley system. I guess you could say it's part cute cottage, part pirate ship.

Behold! A crummy showcase of all the pretty wood!

While homeownership may still be a speck on the horizon, I know I'll rank quirky charm over granite countertops every time. New, luxury stuff is great, it's just not my style. Give me a weird, hundred-year-old house any day.