Our Brick Ranch

What a week. I've always known that moving is hard. I had no idea what it would be like moving into a half finished house, with a sick toddler in tow. So, with all that in mind, I will not apologize for my lack of posting this week. I know you all understand.
But I finally have a moment before I take said toddler to the doctor. Sitting here in my office, which is currently a pile of boxes haphazardly strewn across the floor, sipping my coffee and finally posting. This post hopefully will catch us up. Hold on, it's going to be a bumpy ride. I took so many pictures this week!
Where to start?
I started unpacking onto my new shelves. This is a temporary arrangement. But on the top shelf you can see my goodwill finds, a new red fondue pot, and a new ceramic double boiler!
On the bottom shelf is my great grandmother's pink depression glass. I was given it on my wedding day, just like my mother was. I think we've all added a piece here or there to the collection. I recently re added a cake plate that was my favorite growing up, but somehow got lost or broken. I was able to find the exact one online and purchase it.


Our washer and dryer arrangement in this house is opposite of what it was in the old house making it difficult to get into the dryer. So Dan pulled the door off and made it open in the other direction.


And quite possibly the most noxious project this week has been expanding the hole for the double wall oven. It ended up being taller and wider than we had hoped, but Dan got on it and expanded the hole. First he knocked out the excess bottom bricks.

Then he took a grinder to the sides.

To do the other side easily, he had to crawl in the hole. I believe the cat helped him a little at this point by crawling into the hole with him.

He was cramped in there for quite a while, it was hilarious watching him trying to get out.

Doesn't he look proud? We still have to expand the width, but it'll have to wait until we have some more time.

We had an unfortunate involving our coffee pot, it also involved coffee everywhere... and purchasing a new one. Which I LOVE!

Have you ever imagined what it'd be like to live in a house with no kitchen? Well here ya go.

For cooking, I have a burner that screws onto a can of propane. This is how I boil water.

We've been eating a lot of easy comfort food.

I also picked up this cow teapot. Which I am in love with. Don't ask.. I have an obsession with cows. My mother asked my husband why in the world he allowed me to put barnyard animals in the kitchen. It's only a teapot mom. Not a collection of roosters.

Ahh the bathroom. Yes, it's a huge mess. But we have cabinet's! The countertops are getting ordered today!

And then there was the living room. This huge room had no lighting fixtures. Which is actually very common in the northwest. I have lived oh so many years in dingy apartments with one floor lamp that hardly lit the room. I swore that wouldn't happen again. After a few days of being in this house I told my husband and my dad I couldn't stand it any more! Let there be LIGHT!

What a good hubby. My dad is in the attic drilling, and Dan dutifully is keeping the dust vacuumed.

What a beautiful sight!

When they started tag teaming, I got very excited.

Then I realized, the chandelier was indeed to low to go in the living room. So I had Dan remove the shorter one from the family room and swap.

I helped.... sorta. Then... I realized the dome's that matched the chandelier didn't match the other chandelier.... and told Dan he had to remove all of the lights in the family room and transfer them to the living room. He stared at me for what felt like an hour... in silence... then said, "You suck."

But look how lovely they are now!!!!!! Wasn't it all worth it?

And the family room which is sunken, and therefore has more head room, looks beautiful too.

On to the outdoors! We've had some gorgeous weather. So I decided to take some outside photos. This is my tree.

This is the bird I can't identify... can you see him?

Here's another picture of him.

Every morning I wake up and look out and these little chickadees greet me.

Isn't he adorable!

And on to my favorite part of this week. I keep a notebook that I paste my favorite decorating ideas in. This was one of them. I am so excited to finally do it! It's a clock! I ordered the hands yesterday and started hanging the photos. Each photo replaces a number on the clock! I still have a couple of frames to purchase. But I think it's going to be so neat!

As I was doing some yard work, I started uncovering numerous bricks strewn all over the neglected lawn. I decided to try and salvage the good ones to see if we had enough to rebuild the sides of this knocked down planter. It's right outside my kitchen window. I want to dedicate it to fresh herbs.

My white crocuses budded just before we moved, so I dug them all up and popped them into a planter. I found these gorgeous pansies at bi-mart and had to have them.

I am so in love with these trees. They are directly across the street from my driveway, and just burst into bloom as if to welcome us home.

I have buds popping out everywhere.

This one lonely daffodil is my first bloom. What a cheery little face it has.

I can't wait to find out what this little bush/tree is.

And this one... I'm hoping it's a lilac... I'm dying to know if it's a lilac. Lilac's are by far my favorite flower in the whole entire big wide world. Especially the light purple ones.