Some pictures

Grandpa's favorite girl!
Eva's hair looks like this all the time. Always.
Eva's favorite "look". This get's a reaction out of everybody!

Eva's favorite new activity is climbing onto the kitchen table. I'm not so sure it's my favorite.
After
After. Yes, I know. The chandelier is horrendous. Am planning on changing after Christmas is paid off.
Before.
This is when Declan is at his best.
Spaghetti!

I am getting so bad at blogging lately. I am out of ideas and nothing blog worthy has been happening lately. I need some inspiration. In the meantime, here are some pics of the kids and our "almost" new dining room.

The Long Goodbye?

This week has been filled with so many highs and very low, lows that I have been on an emotional roller-coaster. The good news first.

We've received all the necessary approvals to buy the house and are set to close next Thursday. We are so excited!! We also got the appraisal back yesterday and the house appraised for $40k over what we are paying for it. Which makes me feel much better about the whole deal! Now if only we could sell our house in Colorado and not have to worry about that any longer.

The bad news.

My dog, Kaya, is very, very sick. I fear we have reached the beginning of the end and I am having a really tough time facing that. God has placed in me the ultimate responsibility of deciding when it's time to let her go and I fear, actually I know, I am completely incapable of being objective about it. I know all the arguments. She's suffering and can no longer be the dog she once was. Her quality of life has significantly diminished, she's in pain and she'll go to a better place, etc. etc. But it's not quite so cut and dried when it's your pet and that pet has been the anchor in your life for 10 years. Kaya was with me when I was still a young, naive, single girl. She traveled with me to my new life in California. She was with me when I met my husband, she was my rock while Thomas was deployed to Iraq, and there when we moved and started another new life in Colorado. She was there when we bought our first home and filled it with children. I don't remember what life was like without her and I don't want to envision a future without her.

Whatever it is that is making her sick came on really suddenly. One day she's fine, the next she can't stand up and is whining in pain. She screamed last night when we tried to move her. The vet has recommended several tests to determine what's going on. They cost a lot of money. So far we've done 2 and we are currently awaiting the results from the 2nd test. I don't know that we should continue to run test after test. Especially sinceI am still holding on to hope that this is something treatable and I won't have to make any end-of-life decisions for Kaya. I am praying for some conclusion to this so I can move forward and know which route to take and be at peace with it.

Home Sweet New Home

It's official. We are buying a house. After nearly 3 months of waiting, we got the official word on Friday. We had a chance to go back and check it out Friday afternoon and I guess I forgot how much TLC this house is going to need. I am feeling overwhelmed right now with the amount of work in store for us. I am going to have to learn the valuable lesson that is "prioritizing"!

Here is project #1. Since the previous owners have already moved out most of their stuff, we got a good glimpse of the carpeting. And all I can say is "Eww!". We had originally hoped we could get a few more years out of it but it is obvious that it will need to be replaced ASAP. At least on the main level where I will spend the most time looking at it. So, I have spent the last few days frantically learning everything I can about carpeting. And holy sheet, I had no idea how expensive carpeting is. Yikes. I want some opinions from anyone who has good decorating skills! I am really loving the brown carpeting that has taupe-y, grayish undertones. Not a rich chocolate color but a bit lighter. Does that make sense? I have espresso colored furniture and a cream colored couch. What do you think? Or, do I stick with the light beige carpeting??

Project #2 is painting. Every single room in the house needs to be repainted. And most rooms have wallpaper that needs to be removed. Ugh.

From there I'll move on to updating light fixtures and hardware as the money comes available. Which will be in about 20 years when we finish paying off the carpeting and the deck that has to go in next spring.

In the meantime, here are the "Before" pictures. Please excuse the hot mess known as Andrea in some of the pictures. I can't be bothered to dress up on most days.