year 5

I can hardly believe it's that time of year again. This weekend, September 29th will be me and my husband's 5th wedding anniversary. Man time flies. So, 2 years ago I wrote about how we met and how he is my best friend (both are still true, especially the first one) but this year all I can think about is how hard this past year has been and wonder why he'd want to stay married to me. It has really been a challenging one for us. This time last year we first saw the house we are now in the process of buying. Back then we never would have imagined purchasing a house would be so difficult. Typically it's selling your current house that is the struggle. Well we sold ours 3 months ago and are still waiting to close on our future one. 

As if that wouldn't put enough of a strain on a marriage we also had a baby in June. She has been a true blessing, but one more challenge for sure to work through in the midst of everything else. 

With my hormones being jacked up, a lack of sleep, and not being able to handle stress in the first place I'm sure that I've become unbearable to live with. There have been numerous times this year that I have broken down at the most random times. Times when I didn't know how in the world we were going to fix all the things the bank flagged in the appraisal because I was already exhausted just thinking about the work involved. Through it all Joel has tried so hard to keep not only his but my spirits up and remind me that it would all be worth it. At times he gave me tough love but I needed to hear it. I have not been very supportive or encouraging to him. 

When Joel gets home from work, tired and beaten down Harper always has the biggest grin on her face. She knows he is someone special. She tries to watch whatever he is doing while smiling the whole time just waiting to get his attention. 

I too know he is special. This year has not been easy but he has been by my side through it all. I know other people expect to have a perfect marriage, where nothing goes wrong ever, but it's during the rough patches that I realize he's in it for the long haul. He is faithful as a husband and father. I feel so blessed to have him in my life. I will choose to love him for as long as he will let me!

    

on mount vernon avenue

So as promised a while ago here is my first "before/after renovation on the house" post...like how I worded that? Where better to start than the front porch. The funny thing is that that is definitely not something we gave any thought to doing this summer, but thanks to the bank we had to basically paint anything that was chipping. Just what I wanted to spend lots of time and money on! So here is the true before picture...

The nice thing is the previous owner replaced the siding before an agreement to buy was in the works. It's gray like it was meant to be ours.

The new siding actually improved the look of the house greatly but it wasn't until we painted over the old dirty white paint on the trim and covered up the remaining green paint that we realized what a difference it would make.

While it was not going to be a priority I still think it was well worth all the hours and work our friends put in to make our house look fresh and new. 

My husband and I tend to gravitate towards grays as it is a safe color and goes with everything, but we thought the porch needed a pop of color. We painted the ceiling a coral color and I could not be happier with the outcome. It's not overwhelming and you don't always have to look at it if you don't want to...just don't look up. It's a little bit of Savannah in Cincinnati if you ask me.

 We also painted the back porch coral...

TO BE CONTINUED! 

home sweet home

Since the beginning of July we have been working nonstop trying to complete projects around the house. We started out with an FHA loan but then were able to switch to a conventional one hoping that meant the things that were flagged to be repaired in order for us to get our loan would then be overlooked...this was not the case. This has been the hardest, longest, and most challenging process I've ever experienced. The stuff we started out working on ended up not even being mentioned in the appraisal report so we put that on hold to begin painting the exterior. The hardest part was finding the time to get things done. When we finally got the appraisal report Joel was back in school so we only had nights and weekends to work. Having a baby created another obstacle to work around. One of us had to be caring for her or if we were lucky she'd take a short nap so that we both could frantically work before it got dark. As a result we left the house to come back to our friends', where we are temporarily staying feeling worn out, frustrated, and like there was no end in sight. 

Joel and I are aware of the gift we've been given, to be able to buy a home for half (if not more) of it's value, and in an area we thought it'd take years before we'd get to move to. We can tell the current owner is so ready to be done with all of this as well. He is still paying the bills, going over to turn lights on at night, and taking trash out so it appears as though someone lives there. I don't blame him. I too wish this could be over. Seeing our stuff in the house and completing projects is such a tease. I want so badly to just relax on our freshly painted porch at night. Lay on my couch and watch my tv that hasn't been turned on in three months...such stupid things, I know but when you leave your home every night to sleep somewhere else you begin to realize the kind of things that you take for granted. 

We realized we could not finish things by ourselves so a handful of our friends came over tonight to get it done. Many of them worked for six hours straight, painting trim along our roof and in places I wasn't about to go. I have never known people like this before. In the back of my mind I seriously doubted anyone would show and I began to break down (like I've been doing a lot lately). Why did they have to give up their week night with their family to come help us? They didn't. Thanks to them we got it done and the night before the final appraisal! 

I truly feel a weight has been lifted off of my shoulders. We could not have gotten all that work done by ourselves...we tried. I love our friends and now thanks to them we will someday soon be living within walking distance to them.

Good riddance summer!

I typically love the summertime-my husband is home from work and we get to travel to see family. We eat, stay up late, and tend to buy things we don't need just because. Well this summer was different. There were days when I looked forward to running to the store for formula just to have time to myself. I quickly tired of eating out because it turned into an everyday occurrence. Any extra money we had went towards gallons upon gallons of paint...

We are still living with our friends. We really thought we'd be in our house by now but the bank is being very particular about the hoops we must jump through to get our loan. While it has been nice completing jobs we would have eventually gotten to, they are definitely not the things we would have chosen to do right away. Although we are still homeless and may need to consider going with a different bank to complete this process there is hope in the air. The start of Fall has brought with it clean crisp air that makes me look forward to the time I will soon spend on our freshly painted front porch with my family. Hope that by the time we buy pumpkins and it's nice enough to keep the windows open and not need the air on anymore that we will be enjoying our home. Our place that we've already put plenty of blood, sweat, and lots of tears into.