tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-91950957434791303862024-02-07T13:16:14.707-06:00five2eightKatiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04565930137769406927noreply@blogger.comBlogger397125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9195095743479130386.post-35844972444598267192015-02-23T11:59:00.001-06:002015-02-23T11:59:31.496-06:00Wesley's room 2.0The very first room that we worked on in the new house was Wesley's room. He did amazingly well with the transitions from St. Louis, to his temporary room at my parents' house, and finally to the new house. Even so, it was important to us to get him settled and "home" asap. <br />
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Wesley's nursery in St. Louis was one of my favorite rooms, and was one of the must difficult to leave. It was a small room, but it worked well for our baby, and he slept in it every night starting with the first night home from the hospital.<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/15133069525" title="IMG_2202 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="IMG_2202" height="427" src="https://farm6.staticflickr.com/5589/15133069525_abb5c1bd14_z.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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The above photo is from Wesley's room in St. Louis. More info can be found <a href="http://five2eight.blogspot.com/2013/08/wesleys-room.html">here</a>.<br />
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We had 2 rooms in the new house to consider for Wesley's room. One was longer and more narrow, and the other one was more square in shape. Both had 2 windows (one each a dormer), and good sized closets. We decided that we liked the long, narrow room for Wesley. It was closer to our room, plus we thought it would work well with his furniture. We had also been thinking about painting Wesley's room the same dark blue as his previous nursery, and I thought that this room would work better with the darker color.<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14855801615" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="DSC_0671 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0671" height="425" src="https://farm6.staticflickr.com/5583/14855801615_863f584b4e_z.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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The room had been painted green, and desperately needed a new paint job. The hardwood floors upstairs should be refinished at some point, but they are in decent enough shape. </div>
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14855487302" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="DSC_0670 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0670" height="640" src="https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3855/14855487302_0c78a557c5_z.jpg" width="425" /></a></div>
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I like the dormer window nook, and can imagine that Wesley will have fun in this little corner of his room as he gets older.</div>
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We tested a few different blues and went with one that was slightly darker and deeper than the color we used in St. Louis. The photo above is over-saturated, but it was still a little brighter than I wanted. We also painted the sloped ceilings white to help offset the dark wall color. The furniture is the same, although we swapped out his dresser for a larger one. The gray dresser had been ours previously, but it didn't really fit in our new room. </div>
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/16429361648" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="DSC_0351 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0351" height="640" src="https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8620/16429361648_01acd44057_z.jpg" width="425" /></a></div>
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This is the view from the hallway - we added a few prints that we found online - on for St. Louis, and one for Columbus.</div>
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/16616433015" title="DSC_0371 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0371" height="425" src="https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8627/16616433015_9a71ed0c14_z.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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My mom was able to remake the curtains to fit the two smaller windows. We made the curtain rods out of plumbing parts, spray painted black. We also replaced the metal blinds with simple white wood blinds to help block the light.<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/16615855182" title="DSC_0361 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0361" height="425" src="https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8588/16615855182_55cf9a5149_z.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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Here you can see the dresser. The door near the crib is the door to the hall. We are still using cloth diapers, so we hung the wet bag next to the changing pad, and keep the extra diapers in the top drawer. We hung his animal prints over the dresser. Now that he's starting talking, he likes to tell us about the bears and the lions :)<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/16429332258" title="DSC_0356 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0356" height="425" src="https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8609/16429332258_ed949d107c_z.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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The door to the left of the dresser is for the closet.<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/15994312204" title="DSC_0360 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0360" height="425" src="https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8584/15994312204_795e4c9082_z.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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Continuing the rest of the way around the room, we installed Wesley's bookshelves again, we liked how they worked in his old room.<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/16590513976" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="DSC_0364 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0364" height="640" src="https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8596/16590513976_293f298e59_z.jpg" width="425" /></a></div>
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We read in this chair every evening. The current favorites are Spot, and Curious George. </div>
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So that's Wesley's room, and also the most complete room in the house. We finished his room back in August or September, I just haven't had a chance to post about it. I'd like to eventually replace the overhead light fixture, and I'm sure we'll switch out things as he gets older, but it works for now.</div>
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/16430663709" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="DSC_0366 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0366" height="640" src="https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8663/16430663709_636e11688a_z.jpg" width="425" /></a></div>
Katiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04565930137769406927noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9195095743479130386.post-15888419786787939582015-01-02T14:33:00.004-06:002015-01-02T14:33:51.463-06:00a few new picturesI finally got around to take a few updated photos of the house a few weeks ago. We ended up hosting a family Thanksgiving at our house, which helped get us motivated to finish up a few lingering small projects.<br />
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This is the family room, and where we spend most of our time. As I've mentioned previously, we are waiting on doing anything with the red carpet until we decide if we are raising the floor or not. The blue chairs are to be recovered at some point as well. I am also still debating on what to hang on the walls. The walls are painted though, so we've made some progress. <br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/16148288486" title="DSC_0813 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0813" src="https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7529/16148288486_fba43757f2_b.jpg" width="680" /></a><br />
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This kitchen looks the same as it did when we moved in, but we have plans for the kitchen that we'll hopefully be able to start working on soon... Next up, the dining room:<br />
<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/16148250426" title="DSC_0821 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0821" src="https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8605/16148250426_0a6e639b3e_b.jpg" width="680" /></a><br />
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We've painted the walls in here, and managed to hang up a few things. Our table really isn't idea for the size of the room, but we're trying to make it work. It's an odd space that will likely change, but it's working for now. We'd like to update the light fixture soon though.<br />
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The living room received the same paint as the other rooms downstairs. We're still messing around with the furniture arrangement, we might even add on to the ikea sectional. We don't use this room as often as the family room, but it's nice to have the extra space. And it's nice to have a working fireplace! I have a feeling we'll use this room more as Wesley gets older.<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/15986631798" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="DSC_0817 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0817" src="https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7542/15986631798_2ca4df783b_b.jpg" width="680" /></a><a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/16173309562" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;" title="DSC_0819 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><br /></a><br />
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It's an difficult space to photograph, but we decided to paint the half bath a really dark, almost black, gray. I was hoping the dark color would help get your focus away from the overwhelming amount of "travertine" tile. At some point I'd like to remove all the tile in this bathroom and start over, but for now, we focused on easy (and inexpensive) updates. We got a new mirror on craigslist, and I've been shopping around for new lighting. We'll probably replace the faucet and accessories at some point too. I framed some vintage postcards from my grandparents to hang on the walls.<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/16173309562" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="DSC_0819 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0819" src="https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8590/16173309562_6709ec1a5f_b.jpg" width="500" /></a></div>
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That's all for now. Wesley's room is actually the most done, but he's always napping in there when I think to take photos. I'll try to get some updated photos of the bedrooms soon.</div>
Katiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04565930137769406927noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9195095743479130386.post-42412885576603435582014-12-08T11:02:00.003-06:002014-12-08T11:02:39.876-06:00family room floor (flor?) + chairsA few days after I wrote the <a href="http://five2eight.blogspot.com/2014/10/thoughts-on-family-room.html">last post</a> I came across several other bloggers who had recently used flor carpet tiles in their homes. I had briefly considered flor tiles, but I had never seen a style that I really liked, as they usually look like individual squares. But after seeing some photos of the Suit Yourself pattern, I started considering flor tiles again for our family room. Some of the pro's are that they would be an acceptable "temporary" solution because they could easily be reconfigured and reused as a smaller rug if we decided to do hardwood someday. The are also more pet/kid friendly in that we could replace a damaged tile or 2 without having to replace everything. On the negative side, it's not nearly as cushioned as rolled carpet, and the loop pile might be an issue with our dog claws (they tend to snag carpet). I was able to get some full size samples though, and we've been testing them out:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9ISd6hZgSSMdja67AqsnAjA3r7OzlpQFBCyTk7hSRcOtB0zZVgu20RBvTs4TkJzNObn2M1afcc7z4qnz6MWgCVI-PhDNg0geOfwtrywJVoe4kPx9b8vpGE60bD08_s08aFD0BvUJcNyBd/s1600/IMG_3292%5B1%5D.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9ISd6hZgSSMdja67AqsnAjA3r7OzlpQFBCyTk7hSRcOtB0zZVgu20RBvTs4TkJzNObn2M1afcc7z4qnz6MWgCVI-PhDNg0geOfwtrywJVoe4kPx9b8vpGE60bD08_s08aFD0BvUJcNyBd/s1600/IMG_3292%5B1%5D.JPG" height="640" width="480" /></a></div>
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The dogs would not leave me alone for the photo, sorry! We are leaning towards the lightest color, and they seem to be pretty durable. Now we just need to decide if we're ok with the lack of cushion. Here's a link to the same color installed over at <a href="http://www.chrislovesjulia.com/2014/10/flord.html">Chris loves Julia</a>. </div>
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The red carpet has got to go, it never looks clean and it's driving me a little crazy!</div>
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Speaking of crazy colors, in other news, I've been looking for a pair of chairs either for the family or living room, and I found these a few weeks ago on Craigslist: </div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOslXyChxpg0D8JKKVY7ksMfIB4Cx5ih_9cjs3J4YbPP_AzeRuNHaWcL3hKpT9UrK2jdeB2hglvUFaSrg8j1m8xEGtnVj3GLNFOkkC-hZBdBUwRvuHvXLc5NkX0CpHK_jJI6fOP7WBJqe5/s1600/IMG_3274%5B1%5D.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOslXyChxpg0D8JKKVY7ksMfIB4Cx5ih_9cjs3J4YbPP_AzeRuNHaWcL3hKpT9UrK2jdeB2hglvUFaSrg8j1m8xEGtnVj3GLNFOkkC-hZBdBUwRvuHvXLc5NkX0CpHK_jJI6fOP7WBJqe5/s1600/IMG_3274%5B1%5D.JPG" height="640" width="480" /></a></div>
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They are "his and hers", so same shape, just a different size. And apparently I cannot take photos without including a toddler and/or a dog... The blue fabric isn't a horrible color, but it is in really bad shape and faded. so we will be reupholstering them. We also need to adjust the springs at the same time. My mom has reupholstered things in the past, and has even helped me reupholster a few pieces as well. I'm hoping that we can tackle this project soon.</div>
Katiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04565930137769406927noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9195095743479130386.post-90274015455404541992014-10-20T12:27:00.002-05:002014-10-20T12:27:40.709-05:00thoughts on the family roomA few months ago I was given a renovation project at work. It's a big project, one that has a good amount of public attention and use. During one of the initial meetings, after walking the existing space and looking at the floor plan for only a few minutes, I was able to confidently state that I thought the client needed to rotate an entire set of restrooms 90* and move them 15' away from their current position. This opened up the flow of the space and solved some major circulation issues. It was a big move, it will be an expensive move, but it just seemed to make sense. The client loved the idea, and we moved forward with it.<br />
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I'm telling you this because you'd think, that given that this is my profession, that I'd be able to walk into our new house and make these same kind of assessments. Cause the new house has issues! Not as many, and not as obvious as our St. Louis house, but this house still needs some help to make it ours and to make it work for our family. What I am finding is that I'm really having a tough time coming up with a game plan for this "project". Can we work around any of the existing finishes to help offset costs? Or do we want to start fresh and go more modern this time around? How do work in the cape cod aesthetic? And because of all this, even a small detail like choosing a new light fixture for the hallway, starts to completely stress me out. </div>
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On the plus side, we have plenty of time to live with the space, to see how we use the space, and to decide what big changes we want to make. That's what we did in St. Louis and it worked out well for us. But in the meantime, we have a broken hallway light that reminds me every evening as I stumble up the stairs in the dark, that it might be helpful to start making some general design decisions.</div>
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Taking a step back for a moment, one of the biggest sticking points for me is the family room. As I mentioned in the last post, we haven't done much with the space because I cannot decide what to do. This is the space where we spend most of our time, where we watch tv, where Wesley plays, and where people tend to hang out when we entertain. I keep thinking that if I can figure out what to do with the family room, perhaps some of these other, small, details will start to fall into place.</div>
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As a reminder, this is the family room:<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14855637572" title="DSC_0622 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0622" height="425" src="https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3877/14855637572_0a88b2fe4d_z.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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A few other views:<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14875840853" title="DSC_0628 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0628" height="425" src="https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3900/14875840853_c6151c80c0_z.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14669346538" title="DSC_0627 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0627" height="425" src="https://farm6.staticflickr.com/5559/14669346538_c0527f8641_z.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14855629412" title="DSC_0625 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0625" height="425" src="https://farm6.staticflickr.com/5567/14855629412_e6fbb6b82d_z.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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I have not taken any new photos since we've moved in, but we have painted the walls a really light gray, and have tried out a few different furniture arrangements. Right now, we have our large, lounge sofa (it's medium gray in color) under the 3 windows. We have a larger upholstered chair on the opposite wall, near the step, by the basement door. Our tv is on the far wall, beside the single window, because that is where all of the outlets and speaker plugs are located (the house came wired for surround sound). We are still struggling with the arrangement, but the biggest issue is obviously the floor.<br />
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Not only is the carpet dark red, it is also seems to be a low quality carpet and despite the dark color, our dogs have already managed to find ways to stain it. It also shows all of the pet fur and never looks clean, even right after we vacuum. We've gone back and forth and think that we've identified all of our options:<br />
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1. Replace the carpet with hardwood floor to match the existing hardwood floor: This was our initial thought, and we actually already got some quotes on it. Since this is in the addition, we do not have hardwood under the carpet, so we'd need to start with new hardwood.<br />
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2. Raise the floor to be the same level as the rest of the house, and then add hardwood: This is where it gets complicated. I'm not sure why the previous owner decided to make this a step down from the rest of the house, but the line between the kitchen and the family room is just odd. It makes furniture placement limited, and really breaks up the space. We've already had a guest trip over the unexpected step. It's also awkward to step up into the office. We have not gotten a quote on raising the floor, but it wouldn't be cheap, and it makes the hardwood installation even more difficult as well since it will be against the existing floor. If price was no issue, and it could be done without complications, this would be my first choice.<br />
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With 1 and 2 - we'd need to buy an area rug. Those of you with larger spaces know how expensive big area rugs can be, and those of you with pets know how hard pets can be on rugs...<br />
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3. Replace the carpet with new carpet: We would probably be looking at this as a "temporary" solution. Ideally we'd really like hardwood throughout the first floor. But, given our current budget and the fact that we have a toddler playing on the floor, we're also considering just updating to a more neutral carpet for now, and then maybe doing the hardwood in a few years. With this, we'd try to find a carpet that could be bound into an area rug at a later point, to help offset some of the cost of a "temporary" solution. It should be noted that we have started looking at carpets and haven't found one that we like yet.<br />
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Help. <br />
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The adjacent office (the doorway with the step up that you can see above, it has a sliding door) does have hardwood under the carpet, so once we decide what we're doing on the family room, we're planning to remove the office carpet and refinish the floors underneath. Or maybe we'll be lucky and they'll be in great shape, ha... For some reason we just cannot make a decision on the family room floor, and I really feel like it's causing a road block in my mind, preventing us from making decisions on other things. If you all have any thoughts, please share...<br />
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And if you know of the perfect flush mount light fixture for my hallway, please pass that along as well :)Katiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04565930137769406927noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9195095743479130386.post-28547131932490757872014-09-25T12:58:00.001-05:002014-09-25T12:58:12.992-05:00slow progressAs you can see from the photos, our <a href="http://five2eight.blogspot.com/2014/08/our-new-house.html">new house</a> is very different from our <a href="http://five2eight.blogspot.com/2014/06/before-after.html">old house</a>. We now have much shorter ceilings, and more windows. We have a little more square footage, but a layout that is broken up. Our basement is much smaller, but we have a lot more closets and cabinets. The original features and "character" in this house is much more subtle. Not to mention that this house has an addition that is only 10-15 years old and includes some odd design decisions that were very specific to the previous owners' taste and lifestyle.<br />
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This house is in way better condition that our previous house was when we first bought it. Even though the style is not our preference, it technically doesn't "need" anything done right away. But of course we already have a wish list of things we'd like to change...<br />
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When we moved in to our stl house, we spent the first few weeks removing wallpaper and carpet, making repairs, and patching walls. We jumped right in to painting and replacing light fixtures. We lived out of boxes and ate microwave meals for the first 6 months. We were ok with that though because we felt like we were making progress, and enjoyed working on our home. Over time, we slowly unpacked the boxes. We acquired more furniture and started to fill the rooms. And eventually, 5 years later, we were settled in our home.<br />
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This time, we started with our furniture. Some of what worked in our old house just doesn't work in this house. The dining table is probably too big. The seating arrangement in the family room is odd. We need some kind of bookshelf in the office before we can unpack books. I miss the built-in hutch. All of the windows, while great for natural light, make it difficult to arrange furniture in the rooms. I'm sure that Mike wants to be done with the "lets just see how this sofa looks over there" game. I know that this will all get figured out over time, but it's a little chaotic right now.<br />
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As for house projects, we've been able to focus on a few things, but it's been a much slower process this time around. This house doesn't have the same sense of urgency because it is very livable as-is. We also weren't trying to work on the house with a 15 month old the last time, so there's that... nap times are precious moments :)<br />
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One of the first things we did when we bought the house was to start thinking about the flooring. The house has hardwood throughout, except for the dark red carpet in the family room and office, and the lavender carpet in the master bedroom. Not only are the colors horrible, the quality of the carpet is surprisingly bad. We've already had some issues with staining, and the pet fur just sticks to the carpet, making it difficult to clean. Mike and I decided that we were ok with keeping carpet in the bedroom since it's so expensive to install hardwood. Wesley helped me shop for new carpet.<br />
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Even though I likes some of the other styles of carpet, realistically we knew that we needed something super durable and pet friendly in the bedroom. That may seem odd, but all of our pets sleep in our room at night, and the cats tend to hang out there during the day as well. They all tend to be pretty rough on rugs, so we were willing to pay a little more to get the super pet resistant carpet. Notice that the carpet sample colors are a nice mix of gray cat and golden retriever fur :) </div>
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I found that the local carpet shops had much larger samples for you to take home, and am glad that we took the time to check the samples in our space. Although everything looked better than the purple carpet, ha!</div>
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Installation seemed easy enough and they were even able to work around our bed, which was nice. Mike sent me the above photo during the installation process. Did I mention that we got a new bed when we moved in? From our roof insurance repair in stl, we needed to replace our guest room bed so we decided to put that money towards upgrading our bed to a king instead. Although it's a little bit too wide for the windows, we are so happy we decided to upgrade.<br />
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We've also been able to start painting a few rooms. Wesley's room was the first priority. We thought about a few different options, but decided that we liked the dark navy of his previous room so much, that we went with it again. We picked a deeper color this time though. </div>
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The picture is mid-painting, we have his room more together at this point. Although we still need to hang things on the walls and remake his curtains to fit the two smaller windows.</div>
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We also started painting the downstairs. Similar to our stl house, we wanted to paint all of the main spaces downstairs the same color. We will continue the color in the hallway and up the stairs. We wanted a light warm gray. Even though the photo below is of Wesley, you can see just a few of the many samples on the wall behind him. Picking the right color was very difficult - we even had to remix 3 gallons after we thought we had picked the right color, and then it looked blue once we started painting!</div>
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We finally found the right color though and have been slowly working our way through the downstairs.<br />
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Sorry for the poor quality iphone pictures... that's the update for now. it's hard to believe we've been in the house for almost 2 months!</div>
Katiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04565930137769406927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9195095743479130386.post-66002240742720074382014-08-12T12:50:00.000-05:002014-08-12T12:50:11.579-05:00our new housewe are officially in our new house! we had a big moving day on friday, august 1. it took several full truck loads, much appreciated assistance from our family, plus we hired a couple of guys to help with the furniture - but we are in. of course we still have furniture sitting in random places, so much to unpack, and a pile of boxes at my parents house, but we're slowly getting settled. <br />
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the night before our moving day, we were able to have a little time in the empty house - walking around, talking about our plans, and taking pictures. i thought i would post a thorough house tour, so be prepared for tons of pictures below...<br />
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you've seen the exterior photo before, but here is another picture of our house from the street. you can barely see the sunroom behind the tree to the right. that is our driveway leading back to the garage behind the house.<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14875690663" title="DSC_0677 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0677" height="425" src="https://farm6.staticflickr.com/5563/14875690663_945165c1e8_z.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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the back of the house has a new(ish) 2 story addition, and a stamped concrete patio. that's the sunroom, now on the left side.<br />
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the yard is small but has some established landscaping and is fenced. the garage is to the right.<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14669104160" title="DSC_0681 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0681" height="425" src="https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3861/14669104160_1a21c61cda_z.jpg" width="640" /></a>
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moving on to the interior - this is the entry, the front door is to the left with a coat closet behind the door. the front half of the house is the original portion of the home.<br />
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standing at the entry and looking into the house, you see the living room. there is a working fireplace and a built-in shelf in the corner. the open door leads to the sunroom.</div>
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the sunroom...<br />
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standing near the sunroom door, this is the view back into the house. the front door is on the left, and the dining room is beyond. the walls that separate the dining/living room have a curved edge. the doorway just before the dining room leads to the hall, and the door off of the dining room is to the kitchen.<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14669393227" title="DSC_0640 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0640" height="425" src="https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3854/14669393227_036e0268fb_z.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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the dining room, kitchen to the right.<br />
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standing in the other corner of the dining room, you can see another built-in, and the curved wall.<br />
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looking into the living room from the dining room.</div>
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this view is standing at the doorway from the dining room into the kitchen. it's a galley style kitchen. straight ahead is the back door.<br />
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this photo is looking back towards the dining room. there is another doorway on the other side of the ovens that leads back into the hallway.</div>
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the kitchen connects the addition to the original house - this photo is taken near the end of the counter, looking into the family room. the back door is on the left of the photo. you can see the backyard and the garage through the windows.<br />
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the family room actually steps down so the carpeted area is one step lower than the rest of the first floor. the door on the right is for the first floor den / office (original to the house, and was probably a bedroom). <br />
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standing in the family room, you can now see the step and the end of the kitchen counter. there is another closet inside the back door.<br />
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another view from the family room - the office is through the door on the left (which is actually a pocket door). the door on the right leads to the basement. there is a full basement under the original part of the house, but only a crawl space under the addition.<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14875840853" title="DSC_0628 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0628" height="425" src="https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3900/14875840853_c6151c80c0_z.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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stepping up into the office, there is a built-in with shelves and drawers, another closet, and another door that leads back to the hallway (the door is open, the actual doorway is on the wall to the right in this photo).<br />
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walking through the office, you are now in the hallway - you can see how it circles back to the kitchen. outside of the photo but the the left is the doorway back to the front living room.</div>
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looking back the other direction you can see the office. there is a half bathroom at the bottom of the stairs.</div>
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the half bathroom...</div>
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moving on upstairs - at the top of the stairs, if you turn to the left you are in the master bedroom / addition. if you turn to the right, you see the view below. wesley's room is the door on the left at the end of the hall. there are 2 built-in cabinets in the upstairs hall.</div>
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turning the corner in the hallway, you see the third bedroom, which will be a guest room. there is a full bathroom at the end of the hall.</div>
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standing outside of wesley's room, looking towards the master. the stairs are on the left beyond the cabinet. the door to the right is a closet.</div>
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this is the master bedroom, which is part of the addition, and is over the family room at the back of the house.</div>
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looking back the other direction (the door to the room is just outside of the photo on the left), you can see the door to the attached bathroom and closet. the room has vaulted ceilings, and the space above the bathroom door was built for a tv.<br />
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once you pass through the doorway into the bathroom, the vanity is straight ahead, and shower/toilet/bath area is on the right.</div>
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to the left is a walk-in closet.</div>
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there is a second closet off of the bedroom, but it doesn't have any shelving or clothes rods.</div>
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wesley's room is at the front of the house and has a nice dormer window. </div>
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it's a good sized room for a little boy, and has a decent closet. it also has 2 windows and gets nice light. there is a mirror on the front of the door, which makes the photo below a little odd.</div>
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the guest room is the other room at the front of the house with a dormer. it also has 2 windows, and is a decent sized room.<br />
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lastly, there is a full bath at the end of the hall. behind the door is one more built-in cabinet.</div>
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so that's it! i'm sure that those of you who know me, know that there is already a running list of things that i'd like to eventually change or update. more immediately, we would like to starting painting the walls, and already have a date scheduled to replace the lavender carpet in the master bedroom. after much debate, we also decided that the best solution for our yard was to install a short section of electric fence across the driveway, making the yard fully secure for our dogs. </div>
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most importantly, wesley seems to really like the new house, and we are excited about turning it into a home for our family. </div>
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Katiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04565930137769406927noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9195095743479130386.post-53957383973955450272014-08-05T14:01:00.002-05:002014-08-05T14:01:48.874-05:00wesley's first birthdaywesley turned one at the end of june. i am still amazed at how quickly his first year went, but i guess that is to be expected. probably even more so when you also complete a home renovation, sell a house, move, start new jobs, and buy a house. it sure has been a busy year for us all!<br />
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wesley had his one year dr appointment on june 26. he weighed 21 lbs 3 oz, putting him at 47% for weight. i was happy to hear that he was gaining again, after his drop a few months ago. surprisingly he was in the middle percentage for height too - 29.75" and 43%, as he's always been near the top. i think he looks tall. his head was 18.5", and 75%. poor guy must have gotten his big head from me.<br />
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by the time he turned one, we had stopped be as cautious with introducing new foods and he was eating a wide variety of things. he didn't really eat sweets though until his cake on his first birthday (more on that later!) he seemed to prefer meats and veggies over fruits and cheese. he began to be really interested in playing with toys, and was "talking" more, although still hasn't said any formal words. he started using the "more" sign when he wanted more food though. one of his favorite activities was chasing after the dogs with one of his push toys. right after he turned one we started phasing out nursing - dropping first the morning session, and then the evening session. we mixed in whole milk, and he did great with the transition. since i no longer needed to wake him up in the mornings before work, we started letting him sleep in. he would typically sleep from about 8:00 or 8:30 a night, until 8:00 or so the next morning. he continued to take 2 naps a day - little man loves to sleep!<br />
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wesley's first birthday just happen to fall on a saturday, so we decided to have a little party for him at my parents house. we kept it simple, although i did make a fun birthday banner that i plan to use each year.<br />
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wesley and his friend had fun playing in the baby pool, that shovel is still a favorite toy.<br />
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i also made a second banner with all of his monthly photos from his first year. i think it turned out really cute, and i hope to hang it in his new room for a little while.<br />
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as for the food, we grilled a few kinds of mini burgers, and then just had a pasta salad, a cabbage salad, fruit and chips.<br />
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i made wesley his own funfetti cake. he was a little hesitant at first, but after a few bits, he started eating cake by the handful. in addition to pieces of birthday cake, we also made strawberry lemonade cupcakes for everyone else. <br />
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after cake, wesley opened his presents. he received some very nice gifts and enjoyed playing with the ribbon and paper - until he realized that the boxes had toys inside. then he just wanted to get down and play with his new toys.<br />
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it was a great day, and we were happy to celebrate with everyone. happy birthday little man!</div>
Katiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04565930137769406927noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9195095743479130386.post-91704650849088815432014-07-24T13:46:00.002-05:002014-07-24T13:46:46.003-05:00first family vacationwe were invited to a wedding in california in april. we really wanted to go to the wedding, but weren't sure what we would do with wesley. he was going to be about 10 months old, and the idea of flying that far away, plus a 2 hour time change, just for the weekend seemed a little crazy. (when we were planning this, we were assuming we'd be in st louis, so we ended up adding another hour to the time change, and a longer flight since we were actually in ohio in april). the wedding was just south of san francisco, so we decided to extend our trip and fly out the week before. we thought that breaking up the long flights would be good for wesley, plus that gave him some extra time to adjust to the time change. we were also excited to take our first family vacation.<br />
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our flight left ohio at 10 am on a tuesday morning. we purposely picked our flight times to try to work with wesley's sleep schedule. we had a layover in denver, and then continued on to san jose. we were lucky and neither flight was full, meaning we were able to take wesley's car seat on the plane, and he was able to have his own seat. he did fantastic on the plane. we brought a few toys, and some food to try to keep him entertained, but he really liked just looking around at all of the passengers, and playing with the seat tray. he also napped well, which really helped. i think that having the layover halfway through was perfect - it was quick, really just enough time for a diaper change and to grab some lunch, but wesley was also able to crawl around for a few mins while we waited to board the next plane.</div>
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we arrived in san jose at 1:30 local time, and picked up our rental car. after seeing how much stuff we had, we were talked into upgrading to a small suv. i'm glad we decided to get a slightly larger car. we tried to pack light, but traveling with an infant is difficult! we had his pack n play, stroller and car seat, plus all of our clothes and luggage. we headed south towards monterey - we rented an apartment through airbnb for the first few days of our trip. we arrived at the apartment late afternoon and were pleasantly surprised with how nice it was. it was a one bedroom, with a large living room, bathroom, and a little kitchen nook. it was ideal for our family because mike and i could put wesley's pack n play in the nook, and then we were able to hang out in the living room area without disturbing him. after unpacking, our entire family was hungry, so we decided to grab the stroller and walk to monterey to sight-see and find dinner.<br />
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tuesday night we purposely kept busy until about 8pm california time, and then we headed back to the apt to put wesley to bed. we had also tried to keep him up a little later each night in the few days leading up to the trip. even though it was a 3 hour time chance, he really had no issues adjusting to the time.<br />
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on wednesday we were all up and ready to go pretty early, so we got in the car to find breakfast. after a fantastic breakfast (with seafood!), it was back to the apt for a quick nap, before walking down to the monterey aquarium. wesley had never been to an aquarium before. the aquarium was one of the big reasons why we decided to visit monterey, so we were hoping he'd really like it. he loved it - he kept watching the fish swim around, and laughed at the otters playing. we were there for a large part of the day, and all had a a great time.<br />
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we left the aquarium later in the afternoon because wesley was starting to look pretty sleepy. we thought he'd fall asleep in his stroller while walking around, so we decided to visit some of the little stores in monterey. we ended up finding a winery that had a nice seating area overlooking the ocean. after tasting a few wines, we purchased a bottle and found a quiet seat near the windows. wesley finally fell asleep in his stroller, and mike and i enjoyed our wine with a few appetizers. it was a relaxing way to end our afternoon.</div>
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since we weren't sure how wesley would do with dinner out that evening since he had such an exciting day and shorter naps, we ended up ordering in sushi later that night (yum!!). </div>
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thursday morning, after enjoying coffee and pastries on our patio, we got in the car and headed south. we stopped at point lobos state reserve, and spent the rest of the morning hiking along the trails.</div>
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i was glad we brought the baby ergo (carrier), as the trails would have been difficult with our stroller. wesley seemed fine with hanging out in the carrier while we hiked around. after a few hours, we got back in the car and started driving south again towards big sur. we stopped along the way for lunch at hotel that overlooked the coast, it was really pretty.<br />
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at this point, wesley had fallen asleep in the car, so mike and i took turns getting out to look at the scenery along the various look-out points on our way to big sur. we drove around big sur for a little while, and then headed back north to carmel.<br />
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once we arrived in carmel, we walked around the various shops until we found a place that sounded good for dinner. it was a really nice place and we were a little nervous about taking wesley to such a fancy resturant. we shouldn't have worried, he quickly made friends with the couple at the table next to us, and was well behaved and happy the entire meal. while in carmel, we walked down to the beach to give wesley his first experience with sand. he hated it! he didn't like it on his feet, and refused to be put down. <br />
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hopefully he will learn to love the beach because we like to vacation near water. on the plus side, we actually ended up at a dog beach and since it was dusk, many families were there playing with their dogs. even though he didn't like the sand, wesley really liked watching all of the dogs play in the water.<br />
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on friday morning we cleaned up our apartment and packed up our car. we needed to be in palo alto that evening for the rehearsal dinner, but decided to take a long route to palo alto, doing 17 mile drive and stopping at pebble beach along the way.<br />
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we stopped again in carmel to grab lunch before heading on to palo alto. wesley really did well at all of the restaurants that we ate at on our trip. we were usually able to find something little on the menu for him to try, and we brought plenty of pouches and puffs for him to snack on.<br />
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once in palo alto, we met up with my family and we relaxed for a little bit in the afternoon before dressing for the rehearsal dinner. dinner that evening ended up being really late, but wesley stayed happy even though it was hours past his normal bedtime (not even including the time change!). he quickly charmed all of the guests.<br />
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on saturday morning we enjoyed a big breakfast with the family, and then let wesley nap for a little while before meeting up with everyone to head up to the wedding site. it was up in the mountains, so we all took a van to the location. the wedding venue was beautiful, and the food was fantastic. even though it was a long afternoon and evening, we had so much fun with wesley and our family and i was so impressed with how happy he was the entire time. we brought his car seat along, thinking he'd want to nap at some point in a quiet corner, but he didn't want to miss anything. he did fall fast asleep as soon as we got in the van to head back to our hotel though.<br />
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i just love these photos of mike and wesley. </div>
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after such a late night, everyone was glad to sleep in a little before we had one last family brunch. our plane left at 2 on sunday afternoon, so we left the brunch a little early to get to the airport on time. unfortunately, our luck ran out and the first flight to chicago (which was the longest of the entire trip) was fully booked, wesley had to sit on my lap the entire time. he did fine, but it was difficult for him to find a comfortable position to sleep in. the last flight from chicago to columbus wasn't full, so we were able to use his car seat again. except by then he just wanted to be held, i think he was ready to go home.<br />
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we didn't get home until after midnight and then mike and i had to get up for work the next day. it was a little rough for us, but wesley seemed to adjust quickly back to his normal schedule. i think that he was so tired from the trip, that helped him sleep longer the next morning. <br />
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we had a great vacation and were beyond impressed with how well wesley did with everything! hopefully he'll continue to be as adaptable and easy-going as he gets older...Katiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04565930137769406927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9195095743479130386.post-10470338530830127252014-07-14T12:22:00.004-05:002014-07-14T12:22:43.784-05:00our next housewe finally <a href="http://five2eight.blogspot.com/2014/06/finding-our-house.html">found a house</a> that we were interested in, and after many lengthy discussions, we decided to submit an offer. if you remember, the house was not yet listed for sale, so our process for purchasing the house was anything but normal. the owners of the house were retiring and moving out of state. prior to their move, one of them was having a major surgery that was going to require a substantial recovery period. because of this, they were interested in finalizing the sale of the house long before they would actually be able to move. we started talking to them at the beginning of april - making the entire process about 4 months until possession.<br />
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once we decided to move forward, mike and i prepared an offer (with the help of my realtor mother-in-law), and sat down with the owners to present our situation, and our number. we explained how we could be a benefit for them because we had the flexibility to wait until august to move, and that even though our house in st louis was not yet in contract, we were confident that it would sell within their longer time frame. they agreed with everything except for our price. we went back and forth a few times until we agreed on a final number, and we were in contract. we actually ended up signing the contract for the sale of our stl house the same day.<br />
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now would probably be a good time to explain a little more about the actual house. there are some of the things that we like, and the things that made us hesitate a little. this will probably be a little long, so feel free to skip. i mostly just wanted to get my initial thoughts down for future reference. here's what we initially liked:<br />
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- it has 3 bedrooms upstairs, and 1 downstairs, although the one downstairs is really set up more like an office space. this is exactly what we had hoped to find - at least 3 bedrooms, and the office on the first floor is a great bonus. mike's new job allows him to work from home on occasion, so having a dedicated office space will be nice.<br />
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- it has 2.5 baths. we really wanted to have a master bath, or the ability to add a master bath at some point, so this was a huge plus for us. the master bath has kind of an odd layout and we will eventually want to update the finishes (this goes for all of the bathrooms), but for now we are happy to have the extra space and not have to deal with expense of trying to add a bathroom.<br />
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- it had a "renovated" kitchen - unlike our first house where the kitchen was unusable until we did some updates, this kitchen is ready to go. it's also has upgraded appliances - gas cook top, double ovens, 42" fridge... again, the finishes are not our taste, but certainly livable.<br />
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- it had a sun porch. this was not something that we were necessarily looking for, but the little room off of the living room has great potential. it even has heating and cooling, so with some new windows, we should be able to use it year round.<br />
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- closets! our stl house had zero closets on the first floor. this house has several on the first floor, a closet in each bedroom (2 in the master!), plus an extra closet in the upstairs hall. and several built-ins!<br />
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- the yard is fully fenced except for the driveway, it has a nice patio area, and established landscaping. although the actual grass portion of the backyard is smaller than what we had before, the overall lot is about what we had in stl, and i think it will be fine for our family. it also has a nice 2 car garage.<br />
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- the house seems "solid". the original house was built in 1947, and the addition was constructed in the early 2000s. everything is in good shape...<br />
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- everything is also upgraded/new. the mechanical systems, while not all that new, were the top of the line when installed, and still are in good condition. the house has a newer roof, all new windows (except for the sun porch), refinished hardwood floors, and a dry basement. the appliances are all high end, and not that old. <br />
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- the location. at the end of the day, i think that the location was the biggest selling point. it's located in the more historic part of ua, and is walkable to both ua, and grandview. we will also be near the elementary school and middle school that wesley will eventually attend, so he will be able to walk to school. there is a nice library and a park just down the street. we are really excited about the neighborhood and are anxious to start exploring!<br />
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and here's what had us hesitating at first:<br />
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- the finishes throughout. while technically fairly new, the finishes just seem dated, and are not at all our style. lots of fake "stone" tile, white corian counters with white distressed country style cabinets in the kitchen, gold/chrome two tone fixtures... there is carpet in the master bedroom that is lavender, and the carpet in the family room is dark red. i know that these can all be updated and replace (we certainly worked with much worse in our first house!), but we won't have a lot of extra money in our budget after our new house payment, and it also seems a shame to me to take out new finishes just because i don't like them. <br />
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- the layout - this was the biggest issues for me. the original house was probably not very big - maybe 1200 sq ft total? the current size is 2240 sq ft. the house has a living room across the front, with a small dining room off to one side, and a sun porch on the other. the stairs are in the middle of the house. the kitchen is a galley style kitchen behind the dining room, and that connects the original part of the house to the addition. this is also the main passageway to the back of the house and the family room, which seems a little odd to me. you can also get to the family room through the office - i think that we will like having the office off of the family room, but i doubt guests will go through our office. keep in mind that our stl house had basically 4 connected spaces on the first floor, so that probably makes the layout of the house seem even more disjointed to us. upstairs, the layout seems to flow a little better, with the master bedroom at the back of the house as part of the addition, and the 2 other bedrooms at the front. <br />
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- it has 2 living spaces on the first floor. i don't know that this is necessary a bad thing, especially now that we have a kid, and all of the toys that come with a kid. but we are not "formal" living room people, so i hope that we figure out a way to actually use both spaces.<br />
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- the addition just has some odd things going on. for example, they decided to make the family room one step down from the adjoining kitchen area, and the office. there is an odd amount of extra space in the kitchen. in the master bedroom, the windows and doors were placed in a way that makes the furniture arrangement very limited - in fact, i think our bed will end up covering portions of the windows.<br />
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- the dining room is very small. so small, that i'm not even sure that our table will fit into the room. this is the only eating space (with is good, i like only having one area for a table), and i was really hoping to be able to fit our table since we are also hoping to be able to easily entertain.<br />
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- the basement is on the smaller size and the ceilings aren't very tall. there is only a basement under the original house - the addition is built over a crawl space. mike really wanted to be able to finish an area of the basement, so that we could have a true family room (with tv, surround sound, toy storage). i don't think we will need to the extra space, esp since we have both a living room and family room on the first floor. the laundry is in the basement, so we might want to eventually do something to make that area a little more inviting, but we don't have any immediate plans to do work in the basement.<br />
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i think that overall the house has many of the items we had our on wish list, and i really think it will be a good fit for our family. i think that the way we live in this house will be so different than how we lived in our stl house, because the houses are so very different. i think that's probably the reason why we hesitated for so long (well, that and the price!) i'm very interested to see what we think of the house after we've lived in it for a while. <br />
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since the previous owners are still living in the house for a few more weeks, i won't be sharing any photos of the interior until we have possession. here's the front thought - it's a brick cape cod. you can't see any of the addition, but it's in the back. the sun porch is off to the side, and the driveway is on the other side of the sun porch.<br />
<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/13903386560" title="32 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="32" src="https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7208/13903386560_e04d37bb06_o.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
i should also mention that we had our inspection and were told that our house was in fantastic shape. besides some chimney repairs, they couldn't find anything wrong with the house.<br />
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so now you're all caught up. we closed a week ago, and are now just patiently waiting for our move-in date.Katiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04565930137769406927noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9195095743479130386.post-37059457649874720892014-07-03T09:22:00.001-05:002014-07-03T09:22:08.264-05:00wesley's first year<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Katiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04565930137769406927noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9195095743479130386.post-34298260699657109122014-06-30T13:23:00.000-05:002014-06-30T13:24:04.049-05:00finding our housecontinuing on with our house search (see <a href="http://five2eight.blogspot.com/2014/06/beginning-our-house-search.html">here</a> for the beginning)<br />
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as we moved forward with our house search, we were mainly focused on one, high demand, area. we also looked in a few other parts of columbus, but were getting discouraged with what we were finding. houses that looked good online had weird floor plans with tiny rooms once we saw them in person. or the "updated addition" was in need of major structural repair. we continued to see houses that needed a lot of work, and were already at the very top of our price range. for those familiar with columbus, here are the main areas that we focused on:<br />
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<u>clintonville</u>: before moving, i was almost positive that clintonville would be where we ended up. we looked at several houses in clintonville, and spent a lot of time driving around the area. i think that the people in clintonville are probably "our people", but we were a little disappointed with the walkability of the neighborhoods, and we were having a difficult time finding a house that was the size and condition that we wanted, at a price that we felt comfortable with. we were in an awkward "in between" range - we were ready to move past some of the great starter homes that the area offered, but couldn't really afford the few larger options. it didn't help that there were really only 2 or 3 streets that we got excited about. we also were concerned about the school district, and knew that we'd either have to move or pay for private school once wesley was out of elementary school - we weren't sure that this was something that we wanted to have to deal with. this area stayed on our short list though.<br />
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<u>german village / italian village / etc</u>: there are some great urban neighborhoods in columbus, with some really fantastic older homes. but the houses can be extremely expensive, and aren't always in the best shape. we actually looked at a few houses in german village, because i wanted the "character". they had character, but we could only afford 2 bedroom homes with no yard, and realistically, that wasn't going to be a long term solution for our family. plus, again, schools.<br />
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<u>old worthington</u>: we loved the walkability of old worthington, and were excited about the restaurants, farmers market, and ice cream stores. we had a difficult time coming to terms with what you got for your money (price per sq ft), and also found that the inventory for the historic houses was really low. schools were not a concern, but we actually weren't even able to find a house to tour - the few that made our short list were in contract soon after listing. it was also just a little bit too far north - we were really hoping to be closer to the city.<br />
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<u>bexley</u>: bexley offered the character, good school distract, and walkability that we wanted. mike was even able to tour several homes in this area. we were a little concerned about the areas surrounding bexley (having come from a "pocket" situation in stl - a nice street surrounded by not-so-nice streets, we weren't sure we wanted to do that again). and, our families live on the north side of columbus - we were worried that the distance between bexley and our babysitters might become an issue, especially since right now they watch wesley while we are at work.<br />
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<u>grandview</u>: loved the location, good schools, nice character, expensive price per sq ft. again, we had a difficult time even finding houses to look at because of the fast moving / low inventory. also, some of the houses that we could afford were just too small.<br />
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<u>upper arlington</u>: the house that got away was in upper arlington. i honestly don't even know if i would have added this area to our search had it not been for that house. mostly i think that i would have just assumed that we would not be able to afford anything in ua. after touring the area, mike was convinced that ua should be the main focus of our house search. specifically, he liked the south side of ua - which is more historic and closer to grandview. there are some great mid-century homes on the northern side of ua, so i kept that in our search as well. unfortunately many of the mid-century homes that we liked did not have basements, and we really wanted to have a basement. as i mentioned in the last post, the area that we liked in ua had very low inventory and we knew that it would be a challenge to find something in our price range, even more so contingent on the sale of our stl house.<br />
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enter our realtor - mike's mom decided to take a more proactive approach in our house search, and instead of waiting for the houses to come onto the market, she decided to start seeking out the houses before they were listed. targeting the small area that we were most interested in, she crafted a mailer that explained a little about us, our desire to live in the neighborhood, and some details on what we were hoping to find. after these were distributed throughout the area, she had about a dozen calls from homeowners. some i think were just trying to see how much they could get out of their house (way over our price range), some had more long term plans and didn't work in our time frame, and some just weren't a good fit. but she found 2 that had potential, so we set up a time to visit:<br />
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house #1: strangely, we ended up knowing the seller of house #1. it was great to catch up with an old friend, but the house was giant. really just too large for mike and i and our family. the street was perfect, and the house had a great layout on the first floor, but it was a 3 story house with 5+ bedrooms. it was also over our price range. it needed work (long term), but was livable, and their time fame to sell matched well with our plan, so we keep it in consideration. if nothing else, after talking to our old friend and hearing his enthusiasm for the neighborhood, we were both even more convinced that we wanted to try to live in the area.<br />
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house #2: first impression - wow, this is a cute, but little house. the house was a brick cape cod, so from the street it didn't look very big, but we found out it had an newer addition on the back. it had nice curb appeal and a decent sized yard, and we loved the street. we were hopeful, but we continued to be disappointed by our house search, so i don't think either one of us was that optimistic going in. after we toured the house we were definitely interested - conflicted, but interested. on paper the house met almost all of our "must haves", and most of our "nice to haves". but there was something about it that held us both back at first. after thinking about it, we went back and did a second tour - this time bringing all of our parents. after our second tour, and a lengthy discussion, we decided to make an offer on the house. we are currently in contract on the house, and will close next week. we will not have possession until august 1. it's been a long and complicated process, but i will try to do a quick summery, and include some details on the actual house in the next post.Katiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04565930137769406927noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9195095743479130386.post-49810830102302871132014-06-27T12:13:00.004-05:002014-06-27T12:18:44.201-05:00beginning our house searcha few of you have asked about our new house - the story is long and complicated, but if you are interested, here's where we started:<br />
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both mike and i are from the columbus area. we grew up in a suburb north of the city. even before i had a job in columbus, i was 90% sure that i would be working near downtown, since architecture firms tend to be located in more urban areas. we also realized that one of the things that we really liked about our time in st louis was exploring the area, discovering new restaurants, and making it "ours". we wanted a similar experience with our return to columbus - meaning, we wanted to try to live in a different area than where we grew up. we also wanted to live closer to the city, and closer to our jobs. i do not like having a long commute.</div>
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our wish list for the area included:</div>
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- walkable, we wanted to be able to walk to restaurants, parks, stores, etc. along with this, we were hoping to find a neighborhood with sidewalks. </div>
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- close to things that are "local". while it is always nice to be able to get to target without too much issue, we tend to prefer local restaurants, coffee shops, and markets, and wanted to be near those types of places</div>
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- established neighborhood with older houses / interesting architecture / character</div>
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- mature landscaping and lots of trees, we loved all of the giant trees on our street in stl</div>
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- we wanted something safer than what we had in stl. our stl street wasn't horrible, but we were constantly worrying about things being taken from our garage, unwanted people hanging out in the alley, or something happening to our cars while parked on the street.</div>
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- a good public school district, although we were willing to compromise a little on this if there were other options for school </div>
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our list for the house included:</div>
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- must have 3+ bedrooms</div>
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- must have a garage, 2 car preferred</div>
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- must have nice outdoor space</div>
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- must have character</div>
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- must have curb appeal</div>
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- must have a good layout, or potential to have a good layout</div>
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- would prefer it to be around 1800 sq ft since that is what we had in stl, although willing to look smaller if the layout was right</div>
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- nice to have a 4th bedroom or office space</div>
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- nice to have a master bathroom or space to add a master bathroom</div>
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- nice to have more closet space and/or storage</div>
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- nice to have taller ceilings</div>
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- nice to have a basement that could be finished for a second living space </div>
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- nice if the yard was already fenced for our dogs</div>
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- nice if some of the big things had been updated (like hvac, roof, etc)</div>
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we actually wanted another project house because we wanted to be able to make it ours, and didn't want to have to pay for someone else's renovation. although mike and i had a very different idea of the type of "project" :)</div>
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mike's parents and brother are realtors. while we were still living in stl, we sent them our list and they starting sending us potential houses. we also kept looking online on our own. to be honest, i'd been looking at columbus real estate on and off for several years, so we already had an idea of the areas we needed to look in to get the "character" that we wanted. around this same time i found a house that was built in the 1920s, was actually in worse shape than our stl house (project!), and was a great buy for the area. it was a big investment opportunity, but it needed a lot of work right away. mike just happen to be in columbus for an interview around the same time, so he, along with his parents and my mom, went to see the house. i followed along through facetime. knowing that it wasn't going to be on the market much longer because it had just had a big price drop, we even talked about putting in an offer that day. we were both excited about the house, which is saying a lot since i hadn't even seen it in person, and mike is usually more hesitate about house projects. unfortunately, since we hadn't sold our house in stl yet, our offer would have been contingent on the sale of our house. we spoke to the seller (also a realtor) and after finding out that he had other offers coming, we knew that ours would not be a competitive offer because of our contingency requirements. we were bummed to miss out on the house. but, from that experience we were able to learn that:</div>
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1) we were going to have to greatly increase our budget. the houses in the areas that we wanted were more expensive, and we needed to come to terms with spending more on a house.</div>
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2) we needed to be realistic about how much of a project we really wanted. how much could we do with wesley? did we want to jump right back into spending all of our free time on the house? also, since we were going to have to increase our budget to purchase the house, we weren't going to have as much flex in our monthly budget to finance big projects, at least not right away.</div>
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3) we needed to be realistic about the school district. property taxes in columbus are high (at least compared to stl), which we knew from the beginning, but we were surprised to find that even in the areas within the not-so-great school districts, the taxes were still high. high enough that property taxes + tuition for private school would have actually cost us more than just trying to get into one of the few older neighborhoods near the city that also had highly ranked public schools. </div>
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4) we were most likely going to have to wait to even put an offer in on a house in columbus until our house in stl was in contract. the housing market in columbus was just too competitive and we knew that in order to make a solid offer, we needed to try to eliminate that contingency. this also meant that we would need to move in with my parents while we wait for our stl house to sell, and while we looked for our new house once we were in ohio.</div>
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5) we needed to be able to make a decision quickly. unlike our first home buying experience, where we were able to look at 40+ houses over several weeks before making a decision, there was just not that kind of inventory in columbus. we were only coming up with 1 or 2 houses at a time that were even a possibility. so if we found something that was a potential fit, we needed to be able to make a quick decision.</div>
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i was willing to continue to look in a wide variety of areas, but after seeing the house that got away, mike had fallen for that neighborhood. unfortunately, the area that he wanted to focus on seemed to be the worst for a buyer - it was a sellers market - so much so, that houses were gone the day that they were listed. we were afraid that we wouldn't even be able to get in to see a house before it would be gone. </div>
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up next, i will share our slightly unconventional strategy for finding our house...</div>
Katiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04565930137769406927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9195095743479130386.post-92196462553200397932014-06-24T12:13:00.000-05:002014-06-24T12:13:06.084-05:00wesley - 8-11 monthswesley turned 1 on saturday! i can't believe how quickly the last year has gone. i wanted to do a one year post, but realized that i should probably do a quick catch up post first. unfortunately, my phone decided to randomly delete the note that i was keeping with all of wesley's stats and milestones (note - do not keep important information only on your phone!). i'm hoping that i can remember the important ones...<br />
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8 months:<br />
the biggest milestone of wesley's 8th month was that he started crawling! he had been rocking back and forth for a little while, and then one evening, he just took off. shortly after he figured on the crawling thing, he also started pulling himself up on furniture. we continued to introduce new foods to wesley, and he continued to love everything we gave him. his favorite was bread - he loved to go out to eat at restaurants that had bread on the table. he was still doing well with sleeping, although he sometimes woke up in the middle of the night wanting his pacifier, or to be held for a little while. he was taking short morning naps at daycare, and a longer nap after lunch. this is also about the time when we decided to make the big move to ohio - so we started telling our friends and family about our plans.<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14475419433" title="DSC_0053 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0053" src="https://farm6.staticflickr.com/5489/14475419433_ebd189dae6_o.jpg" width="640" /></a><span style="text-align: center;">hanging out with murphy</span></div>
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standing by himself in his crib</div>
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9 months:<br />
at his 9 month dr appointment, wesley was 17 lbs 11 oz, and was 28" long. he was still on the higher end for height, and lower end for weight, he's always been a long skinny guy. the dr didn't seem as concerned about his weight since he was still eating well. wesley started getting a little more clingy this month, esp with me, and continued to wake up during the night a few times a week. we were busy getting the house ready to be listed, and frantically packing up our belongings. my mom came out to help us, and we moved to ohio at the end of his 9th month. new things that he started this month included clapping and waving, which were super cute. he liked to wave at random people - at the grocery store, restaurants, etc. he also started putting his hands up in the air when you said "yay wesley" - also super cute. his crawling skills improved, and he was starting to cruise along furniture. <br />
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before daddy's birthday dinner</div>
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one of our last dinners in stl - burgers with friends</div>
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10 months:<br />
when wesley was 10 months old, we had just started living in ohio with our family, so our entire routine had changed. the actual move to ohio with him was crazy - we didn't leave st louis with everything until early evening, and ended up driving well into the night. mom road in my car with wesley and all of our pets, and mike drove the uhaul, towing our car. on the plus side, wesley slept most of the drive. i was also super sick during all of this (strep throat, nasty cold, and pink eye, all at once!) but luckily wesley didn't catch any of my illness. leaving his daycare in st louis was difficult, but we were grateful to now have grandmas to help with his care. setting up wesley's "room" was our top priority after arriving in ohio. he has his own room at my parents house, and we made sure to set up his crib and his chair, trying to make it a little more comfortable and familiar for him. he did great with the transition. as part of my new job i had to work in the cincinnati office a few days a week for the first month. wesley was able to travel with me for the longer first week, and stayed at the hotel with my mom. after that i tried to only be gone a night at a time and left him with mike. the first few weeks we were in ohio he kept waking up once a night, maybe 3 or 4 times a week. he would usually fall back asleep after 15-30 mins of rocking. we started letting him fuss for a few mins before rushing in to soothe him, and he started waking up less and less. his typical day included getting up around 7:00 to nurse, then he would have breakfast (baby cereal with fruit) and play. he was taking about a 2 hour morning nap, followed by lunch (baby food), more play time, and another 2 hour afternoon nap. he continued to get 3 bottles a day and would nurse again at night before bed. during his 10th month we dropped his early evening nursing since he was eating more and more food with dinner. his bedtime was around 8:00. by the time he was 10 months old he really wanted to walk and was cruising on everything. crawling was still his main way of getting around, and he started "speed crawling", sometimes even putting his head down for faster speed! his cute new habit of the month was this really cheesy grin. mid-april we had to give wesley his first haircut! his hair was getting in his face, and we thought he needed a trim. in april we also went on our first big family vacation - flying to california. i'll post pictures of that trip in a separate post.<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14268436150" title="DSC_0100 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0100" src="https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3838/14268436150_991bae1026_b.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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easter sunday (long hair)</div>
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traveling with me for work</div>
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14273443347" title="DSC_0107 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0107" src="https://farm3.staticflickr.com/2930/14273443347_381acf86ec_b.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14479995913" title="DSC_0112 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0112" src="https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3904/14479995913_e62e3c0471_b.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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first hair cut!</div>
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lazy weekend morning (he doesn't normally sleep in our bed, he just went back to sleep!)</div>
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out to dinner in california!</div>
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the aquarium in califonia</div>
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11 months:<br />
wesley started walking while holding onto things - hands, furniture, and his new favorite toy - a red push wagon. on 6/4 he finally took his first unassisted steps! he loved walking, but would get really excited when he realized what he's doing, so he usually fell over after a few steps. although he still wasn't saying any clear words, he continued to "talk" more and more, and always seemed to have something to say. we also tried out his bike trailer this month, pulling him along as we went on bike rides. he didn't care for the helmet at all, but had no issues sitting in the trailer. one saturday we even took him on about a 15 mile ride, just stopping once for a lunch picnic. he was a fan. at this point wesley was eating a wide variety of foods - both the toddler baby foods, and small pieces of food that we were eating.<br />
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uncle jonathan's graduation from miami (in front of dad's fraternity house), he looks so big!</div>
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having fun on graduation weekend</div>
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showing off his miami gear</div>
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love this little guy</div>
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playing in the water park downtown after the arts festival, the water was cold</div>
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playing in the baby pool</div>
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i think we're pretty much caught up. i'm thinking that instead of doing monthly posts, since that obvs didn't work out, i might just try to do smaller posts on specific milestones or other events. it's hard to keep up with the monthly posts, plus it's a little difficult to divide things up by specific months.Katiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04565930137769406927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9195095743479130386.post-58599290424476843262014-06-13T11:51:00.006-05:002014-06-13T11:51:52.775-05:00before / afterso... here we are. non-home-owners. we are officially between houses - the closing on our st louis house went well, and we are (trying anyway) patiently waiting to close on our new columbus home. not having a mortgage (or rent!) is nice, except that i keep finding things that the new house "needs"... you know how it goes.<br />
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as we pulled away from our st louis home with our moving truck + trailer for the very last time, we both commented on the mixed emotions that we were feeling. while we were obviously sad to be leaving something that had been such a huge part of our lives, and free time, for the past 6 years, we also felt a sense of completeness. the multi-phased moving process somehow made it easier to leave. first we moved our clothes, our smaller possessions, our pets, and our baby. but the house was still ours, and was still filled with our furniture, so we didn't have to say goodbye just yet. we knew we'd be back. then we lived away from the house, getting settled in our temporary space with family in ohio. and we were busy. busy starting new jobs, busy catching up with old friends, busy looking for a new home, busy selling our old one... a few months had passed before we went back to pack up the rest of our belonging and our furniture. that time, it was just mike and i - our family (pets included) stayed behind in ohio. we frantically packed up our remaining things, helped the movers load up our uhaul, ran out of space in said uhaul, rented a trailer, and filled the trailer (with chairs... mostly chairs... i might have a problem). so when it came time to say that final goodbye, we knew that everything that was truly important was already gone - and we knew that the new homeowners were excited and anxiously waiting to start making our old house their new home. <br />
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before we move on to our next adventure, i thought that it would be fun to do a final before and after picture post. i'm so glad that we were able to see past the pink carpet, the crazy paint colors, and the wallpaper. thanks for the adventure 528!<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14113029050" title="front exterior by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="front exterior" height="800" src="https://farm3.staticflickr.com/2921/14113029050_74ddf35bbc_o.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14296310981" title="entry by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="entry" height="800" src="https://farm3.staticflickr.com/2940/14296310981_ab8df8437d_o.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14113013958" title="dining room by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="dining room" height="800" src="https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3708/14113013958_964720798d_o.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14113117677" title="living room by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="living room" height="800" src="https://farm3.staticflickr.com/2911/14113117677_1ba5d6acd0_o.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14113013758" title="kitchen by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="kitchen" height="800" src="https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3823/14113013758_64414aaf5f_o.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14113013788" title="half bath by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="half bath" height="800" src="https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3699/14113013788_d6203e46fa_o.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14319836513" title="nursery by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="nursery" height="800" src="https://farm3.staticflickr.com/2938/14319836513_ba859c1798_o.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14296310581" title="master bedroom by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="master bedroom" height="800" src="https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3807/14296310581_686317faa2_o.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14299097754" title="guest room by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="guest room" height="800" src="https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3686/14299097754_a0c71486f6_o.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14299667975" title="den office by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="den office" height="800" src="https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3820/14299667975_0367557f0e_o.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14299097784" title="full bath by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="full bath" height="800" src="https://farm3.staticflickr.com/2922/14299097784_70be28de36_o.jpg" width="640" /></a>
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<br />Katiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04565930137769406927noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9195095743479130386.post-3824226710837778872014-05-19T11:59:00.001-05:002014-05-20T09:53:59.175-05:00selling the housei'm not sure if i've mentioned this before, but at one point in his career, mike was a realtor. we had always kind of thought that we might try to list the house ourselves, and do a for-sale-by-owner, since we had mike's real estate background to help us. but, due to the quick timing of our move, we decided that it was probably best to go ahead and list with a realtor. <br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14110059003" title="Bellerive528FY by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="Bellerive528FY" src="https://farm3.staticflickr.com/2928/14110059003_07e6a59147_b.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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the first thing that we did was contact several realtors. we decided to talk with 3 different people - to be honest we also wanted to get an idea of listing price and must-do projects from several sources. we were very nervous about meeting with the realtors, the market was picking up but we weren't sure we'd be able to list the house for a fair price. we weren't looking to make a huge profit, but with all of the time and money we'd spent on renovating the house, we were at least hoping to walk away feeling like we were in the positive with the sale.<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14089980275" title="Bellerive528DR3 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="Bellerive528DR3" src="https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7184/14089980275_c9034ca9a6_b.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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realtor #1 was the person who helped us buy our house. we loved working with him 6 years ago, so it made sense to talk to him as a potential listing agent. after meeting with him, we walked away a little discouraged because he felt that our house had a max price (for the neighborhood), and it was a little lower than we had hoped. but, we also wanted to be realistic about the sale price because we did not want our house to sit for too long.<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/13903387460" title="Bellerive528DR2 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="Bellerive528DR2" src="https://farm3.staticflickr.com/2916/13903387460_10a89f08d2_b.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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realtor #2 was the person who actually listed our house when we bought it. he was a neighbor, and someone we had kept in touch over the last 6 years. he was much more optimistic about the list price, and had been having good luck with sales on our street recently. we liked the idea that he was on our street, not only because he could easily keep an eye on our house, but he also had extra motivation to push for a good price. he was very positive about our renovation too, since he had been so familiar with the "before".<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14066876286" title="Bellerive528LR by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="Bellerive528LR" src="https://farm6.staticflickr.com/5330/14066876286_e16eb91cc3_b.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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realtor #3 was a person that we found online, based on her company's website. the company offered many things that others did not - tons of professional photos, floor plans, tours, and a very impressive website. the company also seemed to be selective about the listings that they take on, so we knew that having our house listed with them would set us slightly above the rest. the realtor was very thorough with her questions and presentation, but did not want to give us a suggested price until we committed to listing with her.<br />
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after carefully reviewing all of the information and suggestions that the realtors provided, we decided to go with our neighbor, realtor #2. we were hopeful that his streak of recent sales on our street would continue with our house. we also liked that he was so familiar with our "before" house, since he would be able to thoroughly describe all of the changes that we had made to the house over the last 6 years, to hopefully justify the price.<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14066876366" title="Bellerive528KT by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="Bellerive528KT" src="https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7440/14066876366_6b8449b171_b.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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after we finished up our remaining projects, the realtor had his photographer come over to take the listing photos. since our timing was so tight, we decided to wait to formally list the house until a few days before we moved out, with no showings until after we left. we figured that showing the house full of half packed boxes probably wasn't ideal :) we packed up most of our belongings (except for staging decor and all of our furniture), super cleaned, and left on a friday. our first open house was scheduled for sunday. we wanted to leave the house staged, plus it didn't make sense to pay to keep our furniture in storage when we could just "store" it at the house.<br />
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our first open house had over 30 visitors, and the feedback was all positive. the realtor also had an agent open house the following tuesday, and again had a great crowd and great feedback. we had 5 or 6 showing requests in the week that followed, and we were feeling pretty good. at the beginning of week two, a few couples even came back for second showings. we were in the "top 3" on one couple's list. we also started to hear our first negative feedback - the yard was too small and needed some work, and the price was "a little high", but in general everyone was still saying good things. <br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/13903380457" title="Bellerive528XR by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="Bellerive528XR" src="https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7060/13903380457_43a7ab2f02_b.jpg" width="640" /></a>
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and then we had about a week or so with nothing - no showing requests, no calls. not that concerning really, but we wanted to keep the momentum up, so the saturday morning about 2.5 weeks after we originally listed, we dropped the price by $4k. just as we hit "send" on the formal price drop email, we received a showing request, go figure. that couple toured the house that afternoon, and that evening we received a phone call from our realtor saying that the couple was preparing an offer!!<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14086774691" title="Bellerive528BR3 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="Bellerive528BR3" src="https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7324/14086774691_cbfd44245c_b.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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we received their offer the next day, and after some negotiations, we were in contract. ahhh!!!<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14090441734" title="Bellerive528BR2 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="Bellerive528BR2" src="https://farm6.staticflickr.com/5181/14090441734_46f0eaf6da_b.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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while we were obviously hoping that our house would sell quickly, i don't think that either one of us actually thought we'd be in contract in less than 3 weeks. the new owners apparently really liked our kitchen and bathroom remodel, and the fact that the house still had all of it's original stained woodwork, stained glass windows, and character. <br />
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we hope that they love the house as much as we do.Katiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04565930137769406927noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9195095743479130386.post-33252049203406293652014-05-07T12:16:00.002-05:002014-05-07T12:24:35.268-05:00preparing to sell<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
once we realized that we were most likely <a href="http://five2eight.blogspot.com/2014/04/heres-thing.html">moving to ohio sooner than originally planned</a>, we made a list of all of things that we would need to do to our house before listing it... and then we panicked.</div>
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/13903392798" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="Bellerive528 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="Bellerive528" src="https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7039/13903392798_fed5d81dff_b.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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not only did we have a 2+ page list of "to-do" items, we also were also still dealing with the insurance <a href="http://five2eight.blogspot.com/2014/01/oh-yeah-house.html">roof repair</a> issue. plus we had/have a strong emotional attachment to our house and we were struggling with the idea of leaving it after all of the time, effort, and money that we had spent on the house over the last 5.5 years. we love that house, and deciding to sell was not easy.</div>
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the projects that we needed to do before we sold the house pretty much fit into one of three categories. we had 1) the roof issue, both exterior and interior, 2) projects that we had started but had not yet completed, and 3) things that we thought a building inspector might find and force us to repair later.</div>
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starting with the roof issue - as i mentioned way back in jaunary, the weather was preventing us from getting the roof replaced. once we knew we were going to sell, we set a listing date goal (end of march) and starting pushing the roofing company to make sure that they completed our project as soon as they could. we also decided to upgrade to a white tpo roof with a transferable warranty, thinking that it would be a good selling point. meanwhile, we were trying to line up a contractor to do the interior repair as soon as the new roof was complete, but we were not having much luck. due to the below average temperatures this past winter, the qualified contractors were very busy dealing with pipe burst repairs, and were either overbooked and unable to get to our project on time, or they were giving us quotes for outrageous amounts that were way above what insurance was willing to cover. it took us months to find a contractor who could do the repair within our budget. he was working up until the last minute before listing the house, which is why none of our listing photos show the guest room. he did a great job, and at the end of the day we were please with how everything turned out - we just couldn't believe how frustrating the process was along the way.</div>
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14090439174" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="Bellerive528BTH2 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="Bellerive528BTH2" src="https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7327/14090439174_c209f26532_b.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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moving on to the unfinished projects - the biggest things on our list were finishing the cabinet / closet in the upstairs bathroom, and finally finishing our entryway and stairs. our full bath had a linen closet located behind the door. when we moved in, we took the door off of the linen closet for easier access, and liked the way it functioned without the door. except that it looked a little odd - so when we renovated our bathroom last year, we decided to build a cabinet at the bottom of the closet with shelving above, making it look more like a storage alcove and less like a door-less closet. we ran out of time on the bathroom project before wesley was born, and hadn't gotten around to finishing it up. we were actually able to find a stock kitchen cabinet at lowes that fit in the space, and used that as a starting point. we had to modify it slightly, but it was much easier than having to custom build a cabinet. we added a wood countertop, and painted everything else, and were very pleased with how it turned out. unfortunately i must have forgotten to take a photo of the closet, so i will have to post one later.<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/14086857202" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="Bellerive528FY2 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="Bellerive528FY2" src="https://farm6.staticflickr.com/5489/14086857202_a11476d238_b.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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while we were pleasantly surprised with how quickly the bathroom came together, the entry was much more<br />
complicated. at the same time, we were also debating whether or not to replace our front door (with the original front door). the front door project had always been my #1 must do project for this house, and it killed me that we weren't able to make it happen. the original front door and sidelites were in our basement, and i always wanted to have the door restored and rebuilt. after much debate, we just couldn't justify the final cost, especially if we were getting ready to sell the house. perhaps the new owners will be able to complete that project. more importantly, we needed to rebuild the bottom flight of stairs, sand and seal the top flight of stairs, repair the baseboards along that entire wall, and we wanted to add molding around the front door since it had been previously removed. we ended up hiring a finish carpenter to help us with these projects, and i am so so glad that we did. it took them twice as long as they predicted and they do these types of things everyday - i can only imagine how much time it would have taken us! to save money, they did not do any of the sanding or finishing, so we still had some work to do to complete the space. we decided to at least paint the door and updated the door hardware, which you can barely see in the photo below. while time consuming, i wish that we would have done both of these projects earlier so that we could enjoy them! the stairs and entry especially made a huge difference.</div>
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/13903387590" title="Bellerive528DR by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="Bellerive528DR" src="https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7196/13903387590_3900faeab1_b.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
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the last big item that we did was tuckpointing the front of the house. tuckpointing is an expensive task, but one that we were worried would get flagged during inspections. the front of the house needed to be repaired, so we went ahead and had that done proactively, so that we could be in control of the process (vs waiting for a potential buyer to start making demands). the tuckpointing, along with the roof, were the last big items that the house needed. we felt good knowing that we would be listing a completely renovated and upgraded home.<br />
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other than that, we had some minor painting throughout and a few small touch up items. and then we had to deep clean the entire house...<br />
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up next - listing!Katiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04565930137769406927noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9195095743479130386.post-69138826853311997262014-04-18T08:31:00.000-05:002014-04-18T09:34:20.847-05:00here's the thing...the short version - we now are living and working in ohio.<br />
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the slightly longer version...<br />
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mike and i had always thought that "someday" we might return to the columbus area. we both grew up here, our families were still here, and many of our good friends lived here. when we found out we were pregnant with wesley, we decided to give st louis a few more years, and figure out how to do this whole parent thing before trying to change cities, jobs, houses, and everything else. we found a fantastic daycare, we had friends with young kids in st louis, and we were able to host many out of town guests. things were good.
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except... there was my job. i didn't talk about my job much on here, mostly because there wasn't much to say. it was fine. not great, but fine. my career has always been a big part of who i am, and i had lost a lot of my passion for the profession. last june i passed my final exam and became a registered architect, and i had hoped that the new position might give me new opportunities with my company. not so much. not wanting to deal with changing firms for only a few years, i decided to just wait and see what we decided to do about a move. i thought that i would have a difficult time finding a job that got me excited again, so i decided that in the meantime, i would start making connections with firms that i was interested in that were located in ohio. i thought it might help to have a few relationships in place if/when we did decided to move in the future.
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meanwhile, we experienced our first christmas with wesley, having to travel from st louis to columbus to be with our friends and family. on our (long) drive home, we discussed how difficult it was to travel for every big holiday, and how it would just get worse when wesley got older. we wanted santa to come to our house. we wanted to be able to enjoy leisurely visits with our friends and family instead of always having to cram it all in to a few days. we wanted to be able to save our vacation time for actual vacations and not just for the holidays. we also were realizing how difficult it was to find babysitter options, and we hadn't done much without wesley. having to basically rely on times when our family came to visit us before being able to leave wesley for a few hours was not ideal. we were doing fine on our own, but having other people around and available to help sometimes sounded really good.<br />
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a few weeks later, in early january, i can across a firm that was looking for an architect in the columbus area. i didn't think that i was really qualified for the open position, but when i ended up stuck at home for a few days because of the snow, i decided that i might as well update my resume and portfolio and send it to them. less than 24 hours after i sent my initial email, i had a phone interview set up. in the few weeks that followed, i had several more video interviews, and all conversations were leading towards potential employment... starting immediately... in columbus. i also began talking to a few other firms, just to make sure i was exploring all of my options. on valentines day i had my final interview with the first firm, and was offered the position.
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mike, realizing where all of this was headed before i even acknowledged that this could actually happen, decided to update his resume as well and started looking for a job in columbus. he had some interest, but was a few weeks behind me in the job search. we knew that realistically, we needed 2 of 3 things to fall into place before we could make a move. we each needed a job, and we needed to sell the house. we started having a serious conversation about how long we could live apart (since mike could keep his job in st louis until finding something new), and we also started talking about what we needed to do to sell the house.
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(selling the house - that's a long long story that i will write about in another post)<br />
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so we took a leap of faith and i accepted the position in columbus. luckily for me, the firm's "immediate" time frame was not as immediate as i had feared, and they allowed me to wait until the end of march before starting. 5 weeks sounds like a decent amount of time for a transition, until you start to realize how much you need to do to your house to prepare it to be listed, how much time it takes to pack all of your belongings, and your husband needs to find a job. and oh yeah, you have a 7 month old.<br />
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in the last few weeks before our big move, mike suddenly had multiple interview requests. he talked to a few companies, and things were going so well with his conversations that we both felt comfortable with him quitting his job in st louis even before things were finalized with a position in columbus. this allowed him to move back to columbus with me and wesley, and i was so grateful that we were able to come back here together. he finished up his interviews and accepted a position at an accounting firm, which he started about 1.5 weeks ago.<br />
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as for our house - the house in st louis was listed towards the end of march and (spoiler) we are currently in contract on the sale of the house. we are living with my parents until we get things finalized with the house(s). (spoiler #2, we also are in contract on a house in columbus)...<br />
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so that's what has been going on, and the reason why i have not posted anything for a few months. it's been a crazy ride, but we are so grateful with how everything has worked out, and we are looking forward to getting completely settled here in ohio.Katiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04565930137769406927noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9195095743479130386.post-8873382415279069922014-03-04T15:31:00.001-06:002014-03-04T15:33:12.348-06:00wesley - 7 months<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
i have written the 7 month post twice now, and blogger has lost the content both times. so this one might be short so i can get it published :) i have a lot of photos though - since wesley turned 7 months on jan 21, this post also includes the christmas photos.</div>
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stats: we took wesley in mid january for his 6 month appt (it got pushed back because of weather and office closings). he weighed 15 lbs, 7 oz and was 27" long. he seemed fine and healthy, but the dr was concerned that he had dropped on his weight percentage curve. he was at 75% at birth, and had been in the upper range for the first few months, and then started to drop. at his 6 month appt he was only on the 5% curve. she asked that we do some blood tests, just to make sure that everything was ok. wesley was a champ for the tests, he didn't even seen to notice the needle. thankfully, everything came back ok. we starting giving him more solid foods, and after a few weeks his weight was starting to pick back up again and he was 16 lbs 1 oz at 7 months. i think he's just an active little guy!! we started transitioning to 9 month clothes, although he was still able to wear some 6 month things.</div>
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eating/sleeping: wesley continues to get 3, 5 oz bottles at daycare and nurses 3 times a day. he loves all foods that we've given him. we've offered him both pureed food and some soft solids (avocado, bananas, cooked sweet potato wedges). he also started eating some puffs, and oatmeal in the mornings.<br />
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wesley had a few rough nights around 7 months when he was teething, but that only lasted about a week or so. i was impressed with how well he slept when we were in ohio for christmas, he had no issues with the pack n play. he started to have more of a nap "schedule" on the weekends, and seemed to prefer to go down for a longer nap around 10. </div>
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milestones: wesley continued to work on sitting unsupported and moving around on his tummy. he gave us his first big laugh this month - laughing at his dad. he also got his third tooth on the bottom. this month wesley also started being able to sit in highchairs at restaurants and in the cart when we went shopping. it was nice to not have to carry the big car seat everywhere!</div>
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misc.: we spent 10 days in ohio at christmas and wesley loved it all. i think his favorite part (besides all of the attention), was the wrapping paper and the boxes. he was spoiled and recieved plenty of toys and new clothes. <br />
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he continues to love all of the pets. murphy still gives him unlimited kisses, so we have to keep an eye on murph when he's around wesley. i'm pretty sure he would just keep licking wesley if we didn't make him stop :)<br />
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wesley's friend lana had a ball pit for her first birthday party, they were so cute playing in it together!!<br />
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i'm ending his 7 month post with a few photos from christmas. i was going to do a separate christmas post, but since it's already march... probably best to just insert them here :)<br />
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<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/11661123975/" title="DSC_0920 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0920" src="https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7322/11661123975_d71fe5bd61_b.jpg" width="680" /></a>
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<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/11661042793/" title="DSC_0971 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0971" src="https://farm3.staticflickr.com/2808/11661042793_3d600beb98_b.jpg" width="680" /></a>
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<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/11660771705/" title="DSC_0974 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0974" src="https://farm6.staticflickr.com/5485/11660771705_cb4c8daa14_b.jpg" width="680" /></a>
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<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/11660639103/" title="DSC_1030 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_1030" src="https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7373/11660639103_4c6e72d0b1_b.jpg" width="680" /></a>
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<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/11660358315/" title="DSC_1034 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_1034" src="https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7357/11660358315_caae1982fb_b.jpg" width="480" /></a>Katiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04565930137769406927noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9195095743479130386.post-54282216645870126452014-01-20T14:25:00.002-06:002014-01-20T14:25:24.176-06:00wesley - 6 monthswesley will be 7 months tomorrow, so i'm almost caught up... :)<br />
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stats: wesley ended up having a dr appointment a few days before he turned 6 months, and he weighed 14 lbs 11 oz - a skinny guy! he was still wearing 3-6 month clothes at 6 months, although we started switching out a few things like pjs with feet, because he was getting to be too tall. he's in 12-24 month socks, he has big feet!<br />
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eating/sleeping: wesley's bottles are still the same - 3, 5 oz bottles at daycare. we did start on some solids a week before he turned 6 months, he was so interested in what we were doing at meal time, we thought it was time for him to try it out. we started with some wedges of sweet potato, and i was impressed with how well he ate them. he also had some banana, and pureed apples. he likes everything we've given him so far.<br />
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we were finally able to get wesley to nap in his crib at home on the weekends, which has been really nice and i think he sleeps better when he's in his crib (instead of in our lap, or in his swing). he still doesn't take as long of a nap for us on the weekends as he does at daycare, but he seems happy and sleeps well at night, so we're ok with that.<br />
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milestones: wesley started sitting up for longer periods of time unsupported, and moves a ton! he has figured out how to get around by rotating on his stomach - he spins and spins until he's where he wants to be. he also figured out how to get up on his hands and knees and rocks, but hasn't moved yet. the biggest milestone of month 6 was probably his first teeth - he got 2 bottom teeth over thanksgiving. he seemed to be really uncomfortable and was very fussy, but went back to his normal self after the teeth finally came through.<br />
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misc.: wesley flew for his second time at thanksgiving, and did great on the plane. he also did great on our return drive from columbus to st louis. he's been so much fun lately, he's really interested in toys and loves to play. <br />
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we went to ted drewes to get wesley's first christmas tree. he really liked to look at the ornaments and the lights. <br />
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this was our christmas card photo, such a happy little guy!Katiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04565930137769406927noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9195095743479130386.post-35930269639947241502014-01-14T13:10:00.001-06:002014-01-14T13:10:06.997-06:00oh yeah, the house...<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
i thought it was probably time for a quick house update... here's what has been happening:</div>
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a few months ago stl had a big storm, and we noticed that our neighborhood had some wind damage - tree branches, power outages, etc. we also noticed some roof debris in our yard, briefly thought about our roof, but quickly moved on because we really didn't think that our flat roof had been damaged by the wind. we had 2 companies out to look at the roof semi-recently, and felt that our roof was in good enough condition to hold up to some wind.</div>
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fast forward to christmas - we left stl to spend time in ohio with family, and the first few days in ohio it just rained. and rained. and rained some more. we figured that it had also probably rained at our house, but had no reason to give that any additional thought.</div>
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until we drove back home a week later. we arrived late on a saturday night, and i kept noticing an odd smell in our house. i thought it was from the house being shut up for a week, and just went to bed without inspecting things. the next morning, we walked by the guest room and saw this:</div>
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well, this without the buckets. apparently the rain the week before had caused water to pour in to our guest room. the ceiling had significant damage, as well as the wood floor, and the exterior wall. the mattress was ruined. the good news - the mattress actually acted like a giant sponge, and as far as we could see, the water did not make its way down to the kitchen below. i couldn't even imagine trying to repair our basically new kitchen...</div>
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so guest room, lots of water, and at this point, just assuming we have a hole in the roofing material. you'd think that this would be something that insurance could quickly assist with, and we'd be well on our way to being fully repaired by now. you'd think that, except our initial insurance assessment, which was scheduled a few days after we first called, was then canceled because we had a few inches of snow. while annoying, i understand that the adjuster cannot get on the roof in the snow. so we reschedule, and carefully watched the guest room as the snow melted. the bucket contained the new water, we rescheduled our appointment, no big deal.</div>
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and then... stl gets the most amount of snow it has had since '82 (so the locals tell me!). we had over 12" of snow. and a hole in our roof. and a sponge/mattress that we couldn't move until the adjuster came out. but now there was more snow, so no adjuster...</div>
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(this photo was in the middle of the snow, we got probably another 6" on top of that. it was crazy, the city shut down, and we were stuck at home for 3 days.)</div>
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we waited, hoping that it would warm up slowly, and that the snow would melt over time. we thought we could deal with that. </div>
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but guess what? the temperatures went from -11* to 45 overnight. 45 with rain! yay, more water, just what we needed!</div>
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that was last friday - upon seeing the forecast in the morning, i put my bucket under the hole in the ceiling, and just prayed that would catch the water. it rained the entire day, i just watched it out my office window, the 12" of snow was melting quickly, and we were getting a lot more rain. i knew it would be bad. and sure enough, as soon as i opened the front door that evening, i could just hear the water pouring in. such a horrible sound inside your home.</div>
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the bucket had overflowed, but the mattress saved us yet again, catching most of the water. the already damaged areas were now worse, including the area around the window, but i don't think that friday's melt/rain caused any new damage.<br />
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the adjuster was finally able to come out yesterday and get up on the roof. apparently the roof membrane above our back porch had been blown back, and was sitting in the middle of our roof, exposing the porch and the roof above the guest room. everything should be covered by insurance (minus the deductible of course), we are just waiting to hear back with their estimate. besides the repairs to the roof/ceiling/floor, we also will have to replace the bed and the mattress, the rug, and everything that was stored under the bed, which includes the leaf for our dining table, an extra box of hardwood flooring, and the crib rail for wesley's crib. <br />
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while a pain to have to deal with all of this, we are very thankful that should all be covered by insurance, and that this happen to the guest room and not any of the other rooms in our house. <br />
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so that's the current house adventure, i'll keep you posted...<br />
Katiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04565930137769406927noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9195095743479130386.post-23443465247575454932013-12-31T09:49:00.000-06:002013-12-31T09:49:23.686-06:00wesley - 5 monthsi am behind on my monthly wesley posts, but hopefully i can catch up... funny how once you have a baby, you no longer seem to have time to blog about the baby (or anything else)!! wesley was 5 months old on november 21.<br />
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stats: we did not have a dr appointment this month, but we did end up taking him in early december for an ear infection, so based on that weight, i'm guessing he was around 14 lbs, 6 oz at 5 months. he's still long and skinny. he was still wearing his 3-6 month clothes.<br />
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eating/sleeping: wesley continues to take 3, 5 oz bottles to daycare, and is nursing 3x a day. he is still a good sleeper - although his love for rolling around in his crib means that we usually have to move him back to the center a few times a night. he also still loves his pacifier at night, and will start to get fussy if he wakes up and doesn't have it. overall he's doing great with sleeping, and always wakes up with a big smile in the mornings.</div>
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his daily schedule is very similar to what i wrote in his 4 month post, although he seems to have dropped his evening nap. he's still napping really well at daycare, and we're working on trying to make sure that he naps on the weekends.</div>
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milestones: wesley still loves to smile, and "talk" to you. this month he started being able to sit up unsupported for a few seconds, or longer when being held, so we start putting him at the table with us when we eat dinner. he really started reaching for toys, and playing with them. since he also likes to be upright, we bought him an exersaucer. that's been nice to have, because he can play in that in the kitchen when we make dinner, or try to get a few others things done.</div>
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misc: wesley dressed up as a skeleton for his first halloween. he wore his outfit to daycare, and then when we passed out candy that evening. he's also showing more interest in our pets. i think that our cat eze is his current favorite. she likes to sit next to him, and will tolerate him "petting" (pulling on) her fur.</div>
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my cute boys! mike decided wesley needed to wear his tie onesie so that they could match.<br />
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such a happy little guy!</div>
Katiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04565930137769406927noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9195095743479130386.post-91006213945940839072013-11-02T15:12:00.002-05:002013-11-02T15:12:45.749-05:00wesley - 4 monthsstats: at wesley's 4 month doctor appointment, he was 13 lbs 13 oz and 25.5" in length. he's still at 75% for height and head size, but dropped down to 20% for weight. the doctor didn't seemed concerned since he's eating well, i guess he's just a long skinny guy (obviously didn't get that from me!). he's still in 3-6 and 6 month clothing, he has a ton of outfits in this size so i hope he's able to wear them for a little while longer. <br />
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eating/sleeping: wesley continues to eat and sleep well. the daycare ladies thought that he seemed a little hungry after his 4 oz bottles, so we added an extra oz and have been sending 3, 5 oz bottles to daycare and he's been doing well with that. he's still a good sleeper, although he discovered how to roll over this month, so we usually have to get up a few times a night to roll him back because he'll get himself stuck against the side of the crib and start to be fussy. usually we can get him to fall back asleep by flipping him over, and giving him his pacifier. in the grand scheme of sleeping issues, i know that this is minor, but i am hoping that it ends soon, so that we can all sleep through the night again!<br />
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he seems to have a somewhat predictable schedule during the work week - we are still waking him up at 6:30, he nurses, we all finish getting ready, and leave the house at 7:15. typically he takes a short nap in the morning at daycare (about 45 mins), and then another longer nap in the afternoon (2.5 hours). he's drinking his 3 daycare bottles about 3 hours apart. i pick him up at 4:15, and we will play for a little while once we get home, and also wash diapers and bottles for the next day. he usually nurses again around 6 or 6:30. sometimes he takes another short nap in the evening, and sometimes he's awake and happy just hanging out with us. we are doing a bath every other night. he nurses again between 8 and 8:30, depending on when he seems like he's getting tired. mike takes him upstairs after he's done eating, puts him in his crib in his sleep sack with a pacifier, and he'll be out in a few mins.<br />
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the weekends never seem to follow the same schedule which is fine with me. he tends to sleep a little later (sometimes until 8, funny how i now think that is "late"), and doesn't seem to take as many or as long naps during the day. if we are out and about, he'll sleep in the car, but he's generally awake most of the day. our evening routine is similar, although sometimes he'll be up a little later depending on what we're doing. i haven't worried about trying to keep him on the same "schedule" - as long as he's happy, i prefer the flexibility! <br />
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milestones: he loves to smile! he hasn't given us a really big laugh yet, but he's come close and will giggle or do this laugh/snort thing. probably the biggest thing this month has been rolling over - he can roll back to front, and front to back. he still likes to "stand", and wants to be held upright most of the time. he also really likes to be vocal, and will become very chatty, esp when in the car. he now recognizes our voices and smiles when he sees us. that's probably my favorite development so far! he's reaching for toys now and can hold on to most things. the daycare ladies think he is teething, but i'm not so sure. he does drool a lot and puts things in his month, but i haven't felt any teeth yet. mike thinks that he felt some though, so we'll see.<br />
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misc.: this month we did a few new things. mike had to travel to chicago for work, so since he was gone for several nights and it was during the week, my mom came out to stay with me to help with wesley. it was nice to not have to worry about getting him to daycare and still getting to work on time! and of course we enjoyed having mom around. we did manage to find time to check out the new outlet mall too!</div>
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mike won tickets through work to go to one of the cards playoff games, since it was on a saturday during the day, we decided to take wesley. he did great!! i was impressed. he was awake the entire time, and made frieds with all of the people around us. </div>
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later in the month we drove over to illinois and went to a pumpkin/apple farm. we picked some apples, went through a corn field maze, and just enjoyed the fall day.</div>
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after we got back from the farm, mike was watching football and i noticed that wesley was watching the game with him, i thought that the photo was too cute not to share.<br />
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last weekend i had to go to chicago for a work event. my first night away from wesley went better than i thought - i missed him, but he did great at home with mike. mike sent me the picture below, such a happy little guy. went i got back from chicago i actually got to go to the 3rd world series game, which was amazing! the cards won, too bad they couldn't keep that up...<br />
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wesley continues to be a sweet and easy going baby and it's been fun to see more and more of his personality develop!</div>
Katiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04565930137769406927noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9195095743479130386.post-2627148233623114552013-10-08T13:12:00.001-05:002013-10-08T13:12:54.134-05:00wesley - 3 months<div style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
stats: no dr's appointment this month, so not sure on his weight or height. but he seems like he's just getting longer. he still is a skinny guy. right around 3 months we made the switch to 3-6 month clothing, mostly because he was getting too long for the smaller size. </div>
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eating/sleeping: wesley started daycare when he was 11 weeks old, and i was a little worried about how that transition would impact his eating and sleeping schedule. it took us a week or so to figure out how many bottles (and how much in each bottle) he needed for daycare, but we seem to be on a good schedule now. he is still sleeping through the night, although we had to stop using the swaddle because he was moving around too much. he still isn't really rolling, but he's all over the place in his crib, often 180* in the morning from where i put him the night before. we have a breathing/motion detector monitor, and while it is nice to have that reassurance that everything is ok with him, he tends to set it off at night because he moves so far away from the sensor pad. waking up to the alarm going off is not fun!</div>
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our schedule during the week has us waking wesley up at 6:30. he is usually still sound asleep, but is happy after he wakes up, so i try to not feel too bad about waking him. he will eat, and then just hang out while mike and i finish getting ready for work. he tends to drink 3, 4 oz bottles at daycare, spaced about 3 hours apart. sometimes he takes a few decent naps, sometimes not. he's never had a predictable nap schedule. he seems to really like daycare, his teachers are so nice and he's always happy when we drop him off or pick him up. wesley will eat again when we get home from daycare, and then still is awake most of the evening. it's nice to be able to spend time with him playing before he goes to bed. he usually eats again around 8:30, and then we put him to bed.</div>
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<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/9864488243/" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="DSC_0660 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0660" src="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7308/9864488243_b89f449c19_b.jpg" width="480" /></a></div>
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milestones: probably the biggest milestone this month is smiling! wesley loves to smile and we love to see him smile. he also has started to take extra interest in his hands, and is beginning to hold on to small toys, blankets, and our fingers. he has also started to coo and "talk" to us, which is fun. sometimes he has a lot to say!</div>
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misc.: the most exciting thing this month was our first trip to ohio! wesley and i flew to ohio a few days early for labor day weekend. as worried as i was about flying with a 9 week old, wesley did great on the plane. he smiled at everyone around us, and was happy the entire flight.<br />
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we got to see lots of friends and family while in ohio. wesley met his great-grandparents, and his uncles. we also got to spend time with a group of friends from high school, and meet their kids as well. it was a great weekend and i'm so glad we were able to make the trip. mike drove to ohio on friday to spend the weekend with us, and then all of us drove back on monday. wesley also was a champ with the 7 hour car ride, we only had to stop once to feed him!</div>
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wesley also got to go to his first rugby game this month. we showed our team support with the purple outfit (it is hard to find purple for boys!). wesley seems to like to be outside, so hopefully we will be able to continue to go to mike's rugby games throughout the fall.</div>
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on the day that wesley actually turned 3 months old, it was really nice outside so we went to the park to take some photos (with the good camera! really need to take more nice photos... i tend to take more with my phone). </div>
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Katiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04565930137769406927noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9195095743479130386.post-73548747250538623042013-09-17T08:52:00.000-05:002013-09-17T08:52:04.337-05:00wesley - 2 monthsplease ignore the fact that he will be 3 months old in just a few days... hopefully i will be more on top of things next month :)<br />
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stats: at his 2 month appointment he was 12 lbs 1 oz, and 23.5" in length. he was still in the 50% for weight, and 75% for length and head size. in his second month, wesley was still fitting in most 0-3 month size clothing, although a few things were starting to get a little short on him. </div>
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eating/sleeping: wesley stayed on pretty much the same schedule that he had put himself on during his first month, except that at about 6 weeks old he dropped his 4 am feeding, and started sleeping through the night. i know... we are lucky. he was getting up most mornings around 7am, eating, and then typically took a decent morning nap. he would eat again around 10 and 2, sometimes napping, but he really was awake most of the day. he would eat again right before dinner time, and then before bed we'd give him a bottle. he was going to bed around 9:30. so he was nursing 4 times a day, and then getting a bottle for his 5th feeding. and sleeping pretty much from 9:30pm-7:00am. our bedtime routine was pretty simple - swaddle, sleep sheep, pacifier, and then just let him fall asleep on his own in his crib. right at the end of the second month we had to start swaddling him with his arms free, because he was just moving too much and was starting to turn on his side when sleeping.</div>
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milestones: we really started to get into a routine the second month. wesley continued to be a relaxed and happy baby, which allowed us to start getting out of the house more, and just to be able to do more things while at home. he continued to do well with tummy time, although he was starting to get bored. during his second month he discovered that he liked to "stand", and prefered to be held upright instead of just doing tummy time. he also gave us his first real smile.</div>
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misc.: at the end of the month our friends made the drive out to visit us and meet wesley! we had such a good time catching up, and spending time with them. two of our friends have a little girl who was 9 months old (wesley's future girlfriend??) so it was fun to play with her, we don't get to see them nearly enough. <br />
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wesley's second month was a good one, it was exciting to see him start to do a few more things and really start to show off his personality. he's such a fun little guy.<br />
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(sorry for the weird picture format, something is wrong with blogger and i can't figure out how to fix it...)Katiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04565930137769406927noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9195095743479130386.post-27227776470974846982013-08-02T16:46:00.000-05:002013-08-02T16:46:13.814-05:00wesley's roomwe actually finished wesley's room back in may/june, but i never got a chance to post about it. better late than never? esp. since my last update was in <a href="http://five2eight.blogspot.com/2013/04/baby-room-part-2.html">april</a>! looking back over my recent posts i realized i am behind on several house updates... i'll work on that.<br />
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anyway, wesley's room. we didn't do a "theme", we just wanted to keep it simple, and make good use of the small space.<br />
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right inside the door we have his books, the chair, and a small bench for additional storage. i ended up putting the ikea cart beside the chair, but might remove it once he starts being more active. i am still looking for some kind of light to put in this area for middle of the night feeding so i don't have to turn on the overhead light. maybe a lamp behind the chair? i love all of the books, and i can't wait for wesley to be excited about reading them.</div>
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<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/9078134608/" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="DSC_0271 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0271" src="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7351/9078134608_d3ec81b5da_b.jpg" width="500" /></a></div>
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on the other side of the window, we have his crib, the animal prints, and a themis mobile. probably not a traditional choice for a baby mobile, but i liked the bright colors and shapes and hopefully wes will too. <br />
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<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/9078140570/" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="DSC_0269 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0269" src="http://farm6.staticflickr.com/5443/9078140570_d86d40f280_b.jpg" width="500" /></a></div>
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<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/9075910979/" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="DSC_0270 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0270" src="http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3719/9075910979_417f962938_b.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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next is the closet. i forgot to take a more recent photo, but it is full now! thanks to the grandmas, wesley has lots of clothes. the closet never fit adult sized hangers, but works perfectly for baby size hangers. we added the shelves for extra storage, there is also a shelf above the clothes rod, it must not have been installed when i took this photo. we added the bottom shelf to cover up the angled floor - the closet is over the stairs. it is difficult to tell in the photo, but the closet is painted gray, we used a sample paint left over from another project.<br />
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<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/8883968739/" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="DSC_0240 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0240" src="http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8407/8883968739_543fe43746_b.jpg" width="500" /></a></div>
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between the closet and the door, we have wesley's dresser, which we are also using as a changing table. i was excited when i found this dresser on craigslist, it is the perfect size to fit in the small space.
since we are cloth diapering, the hanging wet bag is for dirty diapers.
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<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/9424813620/" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="DSC_0469 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0469" src="http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3684/9424813620_85903f391b_b.jpg" width="500" /></a></div>
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the map above the dresser is actually made of cork, i thought it would be a fun way to add photos of friends and family.</div>
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<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/39156350@N02/9424811260/" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="DSC_0470 by kmeredith82, on Flickr"><img alt="DSC_0470" src="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7433/9424811260_5810c9b056_b.jpg" width="500" /></a></div>
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and that's it - the room is only about 10'x11', but it has everything that we need for wesley. i really love the wall color and am glad that we decided to keep it. i think that i've previously posted about some of the items in the room, but if you have any questions, let me know.Katiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04565930137769406927noreply@blogger.com8