We Haven't Fallen Off the Face of the Earth...

Yes! We do still exist, and are still working on our home! I kid with the title of this post because we haven't fallen off of the face of the earth, we just have traveled quite a bit over the past several months! Thankfully, we have quite a bit that has actually been accomplished, and are in the process of getting some serious work done!

Since our last little chat, we enjoyed Thanksgiving and Christmas with our families, experienced a snowstorm in February, been to Albuquerque, LA, Taos, Bloomfield, NM and a few other places. My grandma also suffered a pretty serious car accident, and God has been so faithful and gracious to begin her long journey of healing. To say it has been a whirlwind would be an understatement, but God has been so faithful through all of it. We were so grateful to be able to go to every place!

Thankfully, we have also got quite a bit done on our house during that time. Thanks to the help of our family and several of our students, we have been moving gravel off of the side of our home to make room for grass, moved all of the shrubs off of the front of the house, dug up the planter beds on the front of the house, had a stump ground to make room for plants, and so many other major "victories" for our home! Tim has done some pretty serious man-handling on our home and some of the huge shrubs that we thought we would never see leave! More pictures of the changes on the outside will come in a later post.

We have also changed everything in our guest bathroom with the exception of the tile (That is our project for this weekend!), put ceiling lights in our dining room, hung curtains, finished all of our flooring with the exception of our bathroom and may other things! Obviously, I'm overdue several posts, but know that they are actually coming!

Hope to have more for you soon! Thanks for still keeping up with us!

Outside Help!

We've just been able to start turning our thoughts to what the outside of our home will look like some time next year. Thankfully, I have really creative family, from my husband to my brother-in-law. The exterior paint colors had already been picked out, and the more we see them, the more we love them! We are planning on using the sage-like green with a tinge of grey for the main exterior color (including covering the brick) of the house. The dark charcoal color will be the color for our trim, underside of the eaves, the garage, the siding on the peaks the house, the chimney, and our cinderblock fence (the previous owners had already painted over what looked like some graffiti). The red will be our front door and shutter color.

Tim and I had already decided that our house needed something to draw the eye to the front door, but weren't really firm on what that meant. We also knew we wanted to make some shutters for the outside windows and some beautiful window-boxes to add anther depth to the landscaping. The whole house was in need of some TLC for most of the eaves around our house, so Tim had the great idea of using bead-board over what already exists to add a little interest to what is otherwise a really simple feature. Chauncey added that we should make the exterior trim around the roofline thicker to give more prominence to our trim color.

After we talked about our plans for the outside and looked at what we really had going for us, Chauncey just "whipped up" this little something. He even drew in some landscaping for us! In addition to the shutters, bead-boarded eaves and thicker trim around the roofline, we will add clean-lined corbels across the front and side of the house to add some much needed architectural interest. Our house is currently a pretty plain-jane box that could use a little loving on the outside. This will definitely help! On the front of the house, larger beams will frame out the front entryway and provide an avenue for us to add lighting to our entryway. A tongue & groove ceiling will line the front porch to create a more defined and prominent front porch. They talked about a lot more stuff with the front porch, but I didn't necessarily understand all of it!

The side of the house will get a small arbor coming off the side of the peak to break up what is a REALLY LONG side of the house (the drawing makes up for where my words are lacking here). A small, slow-growing spruce will frame out the side of the house and really finish everything out. On top of this, we will plant more grasses, bushes and probably a tree in the front to really give our house some great curb appeal. I could not be more excited to see how this turns out in real life!

The front door actually got a little hint of the change that the rest of the outside of the house will get. Chauncey was gracious enough to spray it while he was out here, and a brand new door handle really tied it all together! We will replace the storm door next year so it doesn't hide our beautiful new door.Hope you enjoy our dreaming as much as we do!

A Little Bit of Fall!

Throughout this whole process, we really have been focusing all of our attention on getting the inside of our house finished. As a result of that, the outside of the house has gotten little attention. The extent of what we have done has been limited to taking out most of the old landscaping and simply cleaning up the appearance of the yard, and most of the clearing out is thanks to David Conklin! The exterior had a lot of well-established bushes and trees that, sadly, were just cluttering up the exterior of the house. All you could see was our HUGE bushes and trees!

When my parents came out, they helped us work on some of the huge New Mexico weeds that had grown in the gravel on the side of our yard and get some of our trees and hedges trimmed up and looking much better! As a result, I realized how much our yard needed a taste of fall! I usually love putting pumpkins on our front porch and planting some beautiful mums, but hadn't thought of it yet. Thankfully, our yard looks much better (and hopefully gives our neighbors hope that we will work on the outside extensively next year!).

We've been really brainstorming on what we can do to really change the curb appeal of our house, and hope to add some architectural as well as landscaping elements to really make our transformation on the outside as dramatic as the inside!

Living Room in Progress!

Not only did Jennifer and Chauncey help us get our kitchen back, they did so much that made headway for the other rooms to be finished. Tim had worked so hard on the house before our family came that it was a humongous blessing that he could have someone else who was skilled (a.k.a., not me!) come in with the right tools and experience to make some real headway. Chauncey helped us patch the rest of the sheetrock and tape and bed what was new. When they left to go back home, not only did they leave us with a beautiful kitchen, they left us with the tools to make some good progress on the other rooms.

It was such an exciting time when we actually got to sit in our own living room, on our own couch and watch TV. I know it sounds really shallow, but it was nice to be able to rest in what was such a work-zone! I was able to stain the mantle and woodwork on the fireplace and paint the brick a nice, crisp white! Tim continued the texture from the kitchen into the living room, dining room & hallway. We definitely didn't shy away from color in this room, and I LOVE how it turned out!

Thanks to more help from my mom & dad, we finished painting the rest of the woodwork in the room a nice, clean white to go with the feel of the room. Because the entire room is an add-on to the house, it was discovered that the room was on an entirely different level than the rest of the house. It will take some leveling to make the floors in the two rooms match up neatly, but it is well on its way, thanks to Tim's hard work and creativity. Our floors are a beautiful, hand-scraped laminate flooring, and are currently in a large pile in the corner of the living room! Our drapes are a beautiful, cinnamon colored velvet drapes with crisp, white sheers. I cannot wait to get them up; the sun is brutal out here! Contrary to what the white paint spots on the floor suggest, they are actually clean! We're hoping, with the help of some family, to have it finished by Christmas! Enjoy what's finished of our living room! You really have to see the old, wood-paneled pictures to appreciate what it is now!

Our New Kitchen!

I'm so grateful to share with you what our NEW kitchen looks like! I cannot emphasize how we wouldn't be at the place we are without the help from Jennifer, Chauncey, and even Khaki (Cohen just hung around for a good smile!). It's really incredible to look back at the old pictures and remember both what it was like at the beginning, and what it was during the process. Whew!

To say our kitchen is beautiful seems like an understatement to me. Where an old door used to be, a refrigerator sits. The carpet in the kitchen and the linoleum hidden underneath were both ripped up (thanks to Seth Ashley!) and the new tile was laid in its place. The lighting was totally changed out and replaced with beautiful can lights. I don't know if I can pick a favorite thing in there, but I LOVE the pull-out trash cabinet, the dishwasher panel that matches our cabinets, the deep drawers for pots and pans and all of the no-slam dampeners on our drawers and doors!

All of this was made possible because of Jennifer and Chauncey. They worked tirelessly to help us clear things out, add insulation in the exterior wall from the kitchen, drywall, tape & bed and texture all of the walls. Chauncey designed the kitchen for us, putting together all of the small details that make us love our kitchen so much! We couldn't have done it without them, and it wouldn't be what it is without him.

I absolutely LOVE our paint color too. I don't think that the pictures do it justice, but you can get an idea! We still have some things to get finished in the kitchen, but we feel like normal, functioning people again having a kitchen. We still have to install the backsplash tile, a white subway tile, and finalize what we're going to put on the bar counter top. We're considering doing a custom, concrete countertop, but not really sure right now. I cannot tell you how much I LOVE our new kitchen. It is a breath of fresh air and a piece of normal life for us again!

The Journey to Our New Kitchen!

Tim and I have been so blessed over our short lifetime together with some pretty incredible things. The most important of these blessings has been the blessing of God making a way for us to have a relationship with Him through the death and resurrection of His Son. The next most important has been my wonderful husband. I couldn't imagine doing life without both of them! Well, God has given us another one of those amazing blessings through the help of our family. My sister, Jennifer, brother-in-law, Chauncey, Khaki and Cohen came out and helped us make some incredible head-way on our house. To say that it was one of the nicest things that someone has ever done for us feels like an understatement. On top of that, they are coming back out in about a week to help us finish a lot of the rooms that we have started.

This picture shows a glimpse of the work that Tim put into our home while we were waiting for Jennifer & Chauncey to come out. Tim closed off a door-way to the hallway, closed off a door-way leading to the back porch, tore out the furdown, replaced all of the sheet-rock, re-did a large portion of plumbing, and, with a lot of help from Lloyd Polk, grounded all of the plugs and added some new electricity! Nothing really stayed the same in the kitchen, including the flooring, but it was definitely worth it.

To say that this was an easy process would be a lie. There were times when we both really thought we would never get out of our insulation-exposed box we called a kitchen. However, God was so gracious to help us out. We had a temporary kitchen set up in the form of a microwave, grill and the ever-important coffee-maker (Thanks Mike & Pam!). It was definitely chaotic. Unfortunately, our computer went down and lost some of the really nitty-gritty pictures, but these give you a little glimpse of what we had. Next post shows how it was really worth it and all of the amazing ways that Jennifer & Chauncey helped us out! Here are some pictures to preview all that they did!

Sorry it's been so long...

For those of you that actually care, our computer has been down for some time. We are hoping to have it up and running again soon, as I'm starting to really miss my connection to the outside world! Much work has been done on the house, including tile in the dining/entry area, opening up the kitchen entrance to the dining room & living room, as well as many electrical items. We hope to have pictures up to you soon when I have more time.

In addition to all of this excitement, my sister, brother-in-law, niece and nephew are coming out next week. Chauncey is graciously helping us install our kitchen and get a piece of life back to normal again, and we are so grateful for his help and expertise! We are also so excited to be able to hang out with them. Can't wait to see the transformation and have some great family time with Jennifer, Chauncey, Khaki & Cohen! What a blessing to love and spend time with our family!

Hope to post soon and have some pictures for you!

Utility Room/Pantry in Progress & Sneak Peak!

Call me crazy, but we are so excited to be making progress on our utility room/pantry area. Tim and I spent our 4th of July weekend working tirelessly on getting our utility room finished. After much sanding, painting, cutting, and Aleve, we decided to call it a night. We are probably a day or so away from the final product and that obviously includes cutting in on all of the paint, but progress is being made!

We have painted the wood paneling that was all over our living room and put it down as a "bead board" look in the utility room. New base board has been put down, the wood work is being painted a crisp white, and the color is really coming together on the walls! There is no sign of the hideous pastel teal that was all over the walls, and it is slowly becoming our space. The pantry cabinet is almost done being painted, then the doors can be put back on, and the beautiful new handles can be added. I

cannot wait to post pictures when it is all done!

In addition to this, we got to meet my sister, brother-in-law and little nephew in Dallas to pick up our kitchen from Ikea. We had a great time with Jennifer, Chauncey & Cohen, and were energized to keep working so that they can come out and help put our kitchen back in order. We met rain pretty much the whole way back, and some leaked into the trailer. We had to open the boxes to make sure there was no water damage. Thankfully, no damage was done, and now we get to see what our beautiful kitchen is going to look like. I could not be more grateful for Chauncey helping design/layout our kitchen and for being willing to help us come install it! These doors are certainly motivating. We have some electrical work, duct work, sheet rock patching, wall demolition and tiling to do before they can come out, but we have a fresh wind of energy to get the work done. Hope to have new updates for you soon!

In All Labor There is Profit...

Proverbs 14:23 "In all labor there is profit, but mere talk leads only to poverty." I keep on thinking of this verse over and over again while working on the house. There are many times while we are working on the house that requires much prep-work that doesn't really energize you or make you think that much is being accomplished. So many times, the work that is done just demolishes things and makes it more messy. I have kept on reminding myself that this work is profitable! Thankfully, this past week, we got to see some very large examples that this is true. In our pictures, pleas keep in mind that we are a work in progress. Our home isn't as "put away" as I prefer it, but it is a working zone. I also keep having to remind myself that "Where no oxen are, the trough is clean; but much increase comes with the strength of the ox." Proverbs 14:4

We were so blessed that my parents got to come out this past week, and boy were they ever a help! Boxes have actually been unpacked, all of the popcorn ceiling in the living room is gone, and you can actually see through the kitchen again! The old, grease-covered stove is gone (looks much cooler in picture than in reality), and we sold the old refrigerator. They installed new shelves in the multitude of closets in our home (which we are so grateful for!), and things are actually moving into their homes. New baseboards were painted and put in the bedrooms, and things are looking like sane people actually live here now! All of these words don't even begin to capture how hard they worked while they were out here. We love you guys so much, and thank you for helping our house become our home!

The wonderful job of texturing, sanding and painting that Tim has done (along with help from the Ashley family!) finally got to the point where we could see some light in the midst of the tunnel. We have carpet, beautiful paint and furniture in our bedrooms! Though I am still in the process of finding our decorative accessories for the bedrooms and putting those in place, it was an awesome reminder that we are sane people who will have a great home at the end of this process! It's like Christmas getting to unpack our artwork and decorative acessories! I got to do laundry in our own washer & dryer again, and some paint is actually getting on the walls in there!

On top of all of this, we had an experience with our plumbing this week. My parents were such troopers as we hit the inevitable vacant house wall...our showers stopped draining the day after the new carpet was installed. We were so grateful that none of the water from our Master shower leaked out onto the new carpet, and that we could take a shower at the TLC at the Church in the meantime. Two days later and many conversations with our home warranty providers (Thanks Emily!) later, we have beautifully draining plumbing again!

This weekend was a reminder that we need to actually take a break from time to time on working in our house. We were able to sleep in on Saturday, and get some much-needed rest. I really do believe that this has been the first time we have stopped and relaxed since April of this year. I was reminded that God gave us a Sabbath for a reason. We need to make sure we use what He has put in place for us!

Though much has been accomplished, much is still yet to be done! Thankfully, with the money we made off the refrigerator, I get to purchase curtains for one of the guest room windows. Our next steps are to finish putting all of our clothes in the correct closets, putting the final paint coats in the laundry room and installing the paneling in there, and starting to texture in the living room. All of the rest of the flooring in the house is still to be replaced, but it is coming! We get to go pick up our kitchen cabinets & appliances from Ikea this weekend, and spend a few days with Jennifer, Chauncey & Cohen (sister, brother-in-law & nephew) as an added bonus. We could not be more excited to get more stuff going, and I hope to have more progress pictures for you soon!

Our Place of Retreat.

Throughout our crazy journey of demolition, we have found a place that we LOVE...our back yard. Moving from the land of humidity in Fort Smith, we didn't fully appreciate how much we would love our covered back porch. It is the place that we find ourselves when all is chaos and we need a quiet break. It is a great place to cool off in the shade on a hot day's work. It is a sanctuary!

We are so fortunate to have not only a covered back patio, but also a huge pecan tree that gives tons of shade. It is a beautiful place to sit and read my Bible with a cup of coffee in the mornings while the doves are out cooing. I wish you could all enjoy that with me. While most of the work on the outside of the house is limited to next year, we do have a few things we get to do soon.

We plan on giving the back gate some TLC with a little paint and planting trumpet vine on the wall the gate is on to give a little appeal. We also plan on placing an arbor in front of the gate and training the vine to grow above it. In the land where "the wind comes sweeping down the plain" is so much more real than in Oklahoma (we hadn't really understood what real wind was until we moved here and experienced the occasional dust storm), we are so grateful to have a cinderblock fence. We just want to hide it a bit! We are also grateful that our new dog Zeke will have a good, fenced-in backyard where he can be safe!

In addition, we plan on greening up the grass (already on the way to that!), painting the iron supports on the back porch, and planting a white jasmine vine to cover the iron and bring some of the garden to the patio. A ceiling fan will be added to the porch to give breeze on the hot summer days when there is none. We have great flower beds already in place, but that is at the bottom of our priority list right now. We are so grateful that God gave us this place of retreat and sanctuary where I can get my mind together while our house is torn apart!

Before Pictures: Bedrooms & Bathrooms.

We are finally back from camp, and I wanted to continue taking you on a journey through our crazy house. Thankfully, with the help of many different people, much has changed already!

The bathrooms are going to take a little creativity on our part. The main bathroom in the house is currently decked out in pink. Though it could be really cool in the right person's house, we aren't those people! The pink curtains and shower curtain are in a donation box where someone might appreciate them. We have already torn out all of the carpet and will replace the flooring with tile. I must stop and pose the question...who puts carpet in bathrooms!?! Anyhow, it is gone now, and will be replaced with beautiful ceramic tile.

The space in both bathrooms is very limited, so Tim is going to build some custom cabinetry to create storage in there. The vanity in here will stay, but only with a good coat of espresso-colored paint. The medicine cabinet above the mirror will go to leave room for a custom-built mirror & frame will hang above the vanity. A custom upper cabinet will also be hung above the toilet for storage. At the bottom of the mirror, Tim is giving me a small wooden ledge where I can put something decorative. Bamboo blinds will go on the window, and a shower curtain will have to cover the pink tile until next year's budget :)

When we do get to replace it, we plan on using white subway tile with an accent tile (yet to be chosen) throughout. When tile happens in both bathrooms, the plumbing will be raised to accommodate anyone over 5 feet tall. Our shower head comes out of the wall right now in about the middle of MY forehead. To survive until that time, we have bought shower head extenders. Though you can barely see it, the pink tile is also on the wall. It will come out soon and simply be patched with drywall. We will replace the outdated wall light with can lights from Ikea and add a new plug since there wasn't one in the room. Tim will also be adding a vent in the bathroom to pull out moisture since none currently exists. Whew! I'm already sleepy just thinking about this. Thankfully, all of our tile is in really good, clean condition, so we can live with it for a while.

The other 3/4 bathroom has very similar needs. The tile has to go, both on the wall and in the shower, and the carpet has been torn out. The same custom cabinetry will go in here, but Tim will also be building a vanity to fit in our little two-feet slot while still having room to place my straightener and hairdryer when I get ready in the morning. We will also tile the floors in here, and haven't decided on what type of tile we will do in this shower.

All three of our bedrooms were decked out in some shade of pastel (yellow, pink and blue), baseboards and trim included! Since Tim & I don't share their love for pastels, we have textured all of the walls, painted the woodwork white and painted the walls. The drapes throughout the bedrooms are gone, and we will eventually get around to putting up new ones! In addition, new carpet goes in on Monday! I cannot tell you how nice it will be to actually be able to put a room together like it will be long-term.

This is our crazy before! Hope to have a new post up soon to show what has been accomplished!

Before Pictures: Outside, Dining Room, Kitchen, Utility Room & Living Room.

In order to fully appreciate what we are doing to turn our house into our home, you really have to understand what it was like before us. We are so grateful that God has provided this wonderful, sturdy home for us, but it will definitely need some updating to reflect our style and really become our home. Hope you can get the full effect of the house from these!

When you hear that a home has established landscaping, usually that is a good thing. Well, in our case, we really didn't like most of the well established trees & bushes that came with our home. Thankfully, we are already well on our way to being able to see the actual house again instead of the bushes & trees! We also plan on removing all of our "zero-scaping" from the side of the house and growing some grass. In addition to this, we plan on painting the entire house, adding shudders and possibly some planter boxes under the windows in front. Unfortunately, the outside of the house will probably wait until next year, both for energy and budget's sake. We're just glad to have the yard mowed for now!

All of the house has carpeting throughout, even the bathrooms, and the carpet definitely reflects the 70's. We will be replacing the carpet in the living room with laminate wood flooring, placing carpet in the bedrooms, and putting tile throughout the rest of the house. The outdated texture on all of the walls will be replaced with new texture and paint to give the house some new life. Unfortunately, the baseboards and trim are all painted the same color as the walls (which in some rooms means pink, peach or blue). All of the woodwork will be painted a crisp white after we sand everything down. My arms already hurt from the little bit we've gotten done! We will be adding new lighting throughout the house using can lights, a chandelier in the dining room (directly above where our table will be placed), and ceiling fans in the bedrooms and living room. I know they're not the most glamorous fixtures, but it gets hot out here!

What was formerly the original living room (the room with the blue curtains) in the house will become our entryway/dining room. The house came with an eat-in kitchen, but it was so small that we could barely fit our little table in there. It also greatly blocked off the flow of traffic to the living room. This change will provide much more entertaining space for us!

The front room (now dining room) leads right into the kitchen, and it is also a reflection of the 70's. The gold kitchen will be gutted, and the cabinets will be re-purposed throughout Tim's workshop on the back of the house and in the utility room/pantry for extra storage. In addition, we will be closing off a door to the back patio from the kitchen (the door sits directly opposite from the stove) as well as the opening to the kitchen from the hall to make room for more cabinets and re-position some of the appliances. The current location of the refrigerator will be moved to where the door currently lives, and that portion of the wall (where the fridge is in the picture) will be torn out to create a more open feel to the room. Since we're tearing out some portions of walls, we figured we'd open up the flow to the living room a bit more and tear out part of the walls dividing the entry to these two rooms. The furdown (sp?) will be torn down to open up the space after the vent work is moved into the ceiling to create a more open feel to the kitchen. We will also be creating a little bar area at the end of the cabinets on the wall with the door, and thankfully, there will be NO cabinet above it!

If you turn around in our kitchen, you look directly into our utility room. This furnished the washer, dryer, hot water heater & water softener for the whole home. Tim has been working his incredible plumbing skills to move the hot water heater & water softener to the garage (just on the other side of the wall). In addition to all of this, he is changing out our water heater to a tankless system and installing a whole house water filter. This will allow us to turn the other side of the room into a pantry by moving the existing storage to the adjacent wall. I'm really excited about this! Much change has already taken place, and I'll try to post pictures later. Tim has been doing some pretty incredible work in there already!

The last room you walk into in this section will be my favorite in the house once it is done...the living room. We have removed all of the wood paneling from the room, taken out the brass fireplace insert, will be scraping all of the popcorn ceiling off, and will give some updates to the window treatments. We are so fortunate to have a HUGE window in the living room that makes quite a statement. However, we're going to have to replace it because it has a crack in some of the glass and isn't energy efficient at all (only one pane of glass...yikes!). We obviously are living in denial about this until we absolutely have to because it is a big window to replace! In addition, Tim has already removed a gas wall heating unit, capped the gas line and patched the hole. The mantle will be sanded and stained a rich espresso color, and the door fronts on the cabinets will be removed to create more of a bookshelf/built-in feel. We haven't figured out if we will stain or paint the shelves, but it will change! I cannot wait for us to get more progress on this room already!

For more pictures, you can check out the album on my facebook page. Hope you enjoy!

Here We Go...

Tim and I have been on a whirlwind adventure of moving to Artesia, NM from Fort Smith, AR where we have worked with students. We are slowly getting settled into the town, and are loving it. In addition to all of this life change, we are working on remodeling our very first home. It definitely has come straight from the 70's, but we are so excited about the great potential for our home. More important than anything, we want our home to be a tool for ministry. We pray that as we work on this home, it will be a safe place for people to stay, a welcoming environment for people to come, and a place of connection, both with students and with the people we meet out here. What a blessing that we just get to add to the group of people we love out here! Join us on this crazy journey as we turn our lives upside-down!