Old New House.

I thought I would give you a tour of the home that we have lived in for the last 9 months. I never got around to showing y'all the whole house and since the realtor sent over a photographer to take pictures for the website, I have some good pictures to show you. They are taken with a wide angled lens so they look a little different but I wanted y'all to see them.

I didn't live there long enough to finish decorating my office, the master bedroom, or the basement but you can see what the spaces looks like.

This is all we did to the outside since we thought that we might move again. We didn't want to spend any more money than we had to.

We added hardware to the garage doors and planted a few things at the walkway.

This is the dining room that y'all have already seen but I did change out the chandy because I loved it and wanted to take it with me;-) I am tired of leaving everything that I love in all of these houses and losing money at the same time.

This is a view of the dining room along with Gary's office. Most people would use it as a living room and that is what it was intended for.

This is a view of the family room while standing in the kitchen. I think that the room all came together in the end. It was a challenge to decorate since it has a two story ceiling and the double mantle. Had we have stayed there, I was going to paint the mantle black. Y'all know I love me some black:)

I will definitely miss my staircase. I love the wrought iron with the dark banister.

This view is from the bottom of the staircase looking back into the kitchen. See the 'not so eat in' kitchen area? I love my sitting area. I am going to do that in the new house too.

This view is one that I really love. It shows the staircase and the entryway. I will miss my hardwood floors too. I love the dark wood with the black areas in it. It really looks good with all the black furniture that I have.

And here is the whole room. Of course I will be using the same furniture and decor since a lot of it is new. Gary just bought a new recliner and he got a BIG one. It is going to be a challenge in the new house because the room is not as big and it is not a square room. I do believe it might be a headache for me.

And now for the kitchen.....I won't talk about each picture since I have already blogged about it but I will show all of them to you.

I never did spray paint the bench or do anything about the red cushion and I am glad now. I might use it in the family room at the new house.

And here is the laundry room that you have already seen.

Now we will head upstairs.

My play room:)

Caden's room.

The much talked about guest room. Iy yi yi, the painting that went on in that room.

Caden's bathroom.

And now for the master bedroom. I bought the rug at HomeGoods and that was going to be my starting point. I thought that it would anchor the room and it was a nice olive color. I was going to get a new comforter and buy something to go above the bed but I never had time. The bench at the foot of the bed was bought at Frontgate for $150.00! It was a deal. Half off! I was going to get it recovered but again, I never got that far. I will have it recovered for the new house.

The is the other side of the room. The chair is brand new but I didn't like the fabric once I got it in the house, so I just moved it upstairs. I bought the little table at Kirkland's (Melissa shout out:) and just decorated it so it wouldn't be bare. I needed something on that wall so it would show well.

The half finished bath.

Notice that there is nothing around the tub. The realtor wanted it to look neutral. Of course I like 'stuff' but realtors don't;-)

Now we will head to the basement. I forwarn you that there is not one thing hung on the walls. Our old furniture is down there and our exercise equipment. I will say that I am really going to miss the unfinished part of the basement because of the storage. It was really nice to just walk downstairs and get anything I needed instead of going up in a hot attic.

The boys will miss it because it was to be the man cave!

So that concludes our tour. I am going to really miss all the room that this house had but I will not miss the $5000.00 property taxes or the cold weather!

I look forward to decorating the new house and showing it to you soon. It has been a rough year with these two moves but God has truly blessed us and we can't complain.

Thank you to all of my sweet readers for stopping by. I have really enjoyed blogging and have enjoyed all the new friends that I have made through it. Hope everyone has a great week.

Melanie

Linking to

Met Monday Just a Girl My Romantic Home Chic on a Shoestring Thrifty Decor Chick

House of Thrifty Decor Southern in my Heart Chic on a Shoestring

Shabby Chic Cottage Brambleberry Cottage Tater Tots & Jello Funky Junk Interiors

San Francisco!

As most of you know, I love San Francisco. Gary surprised me when we celebrated our 5th anniversary with a trip to Monterey California. We changed our plans so that we could spend a full day in San Francisco and that is when I totally left my heart in that city.

We then returned in 2005 because we had had to live apart for a year while we tried to sell our home in Georgia and while Gary was going through school for the railroad. Since Caden was home schooled that year, my sweet sister in law kept him while we went for 12 days. It was my dream vacation. We drove the California Coast with stops along the way. We stayed in San Francisco for 3 days and it was lovely.

So when we decided to go to Yosemite & Lake Tahoe this year, Gary suggested that we fly into SF and show Caden the city that I love.

On our first morning there we headed out to Dottie's True Blue.

I had read a lot of great reviews about this place and it has been around forever. They say that if you don't get to the door when they open, you will be waiting outside in a line. And they were right. We were okay because we got there a few minutes after they opened and we didn't have to wait.

The menu was wonderful and they had specials of the day. I wish that I would have tried something other than the typical breakfast but it was delish.

Caden ordered hot chocolate and it was the real deal. It was yummy and pretty to look at:)

And guess who served it to us?

That's right, Obama! Just kidding but he really did look like him. If you knew me, you would know that this cracked me up;-)

I was amazed by what little space the cook had to work in. He was the only one cooking and he had some prep guys but other than that, it was all him. I would say that he was THE man.

This was Caden's breakfast. It was huge and we could have split it because we left a lot of food on the table.

Overall, it was a great place. Wonderful food and if you go, you can definitely split a plate. I regret not trying one of the daily specials but what we all got was really good.

Be sure to try it out if you ever go to San Francisco. It was a good start to the day because we were off to ride Segways.

Yep, Segways. That will be for the next vacation update.

I will say that they were a lot of fun.

Until next time, have a great weekend.

Melanie

Good Monday Morning.

Hello all my blogging friends. I have missed all of you so much. I have missed blogging, reading blogs, having internet service, having a 'normal' life.

But, right now our lives are not normal. We are moving again. Nine months after a really big move from the south to the north (and those of you up north, don't tell me that Cincinnati is not north;-) we are doing it all again.

I have a love/hate relationship with moving. It is stressful. It is hard. It is overwhelming.

I should be good at it by now but with each move brings a different set of issues. This move will make it the 8th move since 2000. That includes the moves to apartments and in with the in laws. Our move from Florida to Georgia was exciting. We had never lived anywhere else but Florida and we felt like it was an adventure. Turns out that Georgia is where we really felt at home. Caden made some great friends as did I and we were really happy there. The return to Florida was harder. We had to deal with Caden leaving all of his friends, leaving a school that he love, and us leaving a place that we loved. It was a rough few years but then we moved into our home in Florida. We knew for a couple of years that we would be transferred again, so we were prepared. What we weren't prepared for was the housing market. We lost a lot of money on a home that held my heart. It was tough. We left a home that we loved to go to a big house in the north.

We were not prepared. We thought we were but it turns out that it was a lot different up there than we were use to. Our new home was big, two stories with a finished basement, and it took about six months for it to feel like our home. I mourned our home in Florida. The boys didn't but I did. It also didn't help that two months after we moved there, we started hearing that Gary might get a promotion. It is hard to get settled when you know that you might move again so soon.

This move has had its own set of issues. Gary was called for the job on Friday, he worked the weekend, and left on Tuesday. We had to find Caden a school and fast. We got him enrolled in a private school because we didn't have time to research the area and they worked with us to get him set up. I had to get Caden down to SC within a week so that he could be there for the start of school. I stayed behind to get the house listed and meet with all the relocation people. This move has been stressful because well, it's another move. :-) We found a house within a few weeks of looking and bought it. Now we are waiting on our home in northern Kentucky to sell. I will be going back and forth from SC to OH until we sell our house or until the 90 days are up. That is when the relocation company takes the house over. We pray that it sells and I expect that it will. I just need it to sell NOW!

It's a busy time and that has kept me away from the computer. That, and no internet service. I have not had time or the energy to go to Starbucks and link up there. Blogging and reading blogs has taken a backseat to everything else. I do hope that I am back for good. I still won't have time to blog like I want to but when I do get back to my normal life, I have a lot to talk about.

There is our vacation that we took this past July, our old home, and our new home. I have a new town to discover and friends to make. I have 5 lbs. to lose and tv shows to talk about. My mind has a lot going on inside it and I want to get it all down.

I hope every one has been doing well and cooling off some. It has been a nice long hot summer and I don't want it to end but I feel fall in the air.

Right now I am enjoying my coffee before I take Caden to school, so I leave you with a picture. You know that no blog post for me is complete without a picture.

So here's to being back and raring to go!

Happy Monday!

Melanie