Miss Fusspot

For me, it's often the little things. Little things such as worn out and ugly looking cupboard shelves. This is an older home so it's well used and that's fine. But look just how easy it is to improve those worn out edges!

Voila! Very inexpensive edging from the local hardware store and now I can rest easy :) Some people would not even notice these things but I do. So be it!

Don't even get me started on the paint job in this house. I am a painter's daughter and the shoddy paint they used and the sloppy job they did is not sitting well with me.

FATHER!

BROTHER!

NEED HELP...STAT!

A Walk Around the Neighborhood

Not sure why I can't centre my photos today. Stupid blogger and it's never-ending glitches! Anyhow...here's the front of our new abode. Starting to feel like home a little bit.

I took Liam and Nathan out for a little walk last night. Liam had already walked all the way to MEI from our place this morning (no stroller!) to visit mum so we didn't go too far.

The slide at the local elementary school is fabulously slippery!

And the views are stunning. I just love looking at snow covered mountains. Soul therapy!

I may not have this view from my living room window anymore BUT I just have to walk a little ways down the street and there they are!

A Barrel of Rhubarb

One of my concerns upon leaving Chadsey Crescent was that I was leaving behind my beloved rhubarb plant. I do love rhubarb desserts and was finally getting a good crop from my plant. My thought was to dig it up and then transplant it to the new place. In all the frenzy of moving I forgot about this. When I explored my new backyard I found in one corner a wooden barrel just full of a good strong rhubarb plant! I was just so pleased! Sadly I did have to say good bye to my raspberries but perhaps I'll plant some again.

Keith has been doing one project after another to get this place just the way we want it. We are impatient and far from done. Last night he installed a new programmable thermostat. A 'must have' as far as I am concerned. We are adjusting to the new way of heating this house. We have the furnace running heat to the main floor and basement but the upstairs is all heated with baseboard heaters. We'll see what the heating bills are like next winter but maybe it's smart way of doing things...I'll keep you posted on that!

Looks like we'll be getting that new paint job sooner rather than later!

Washing & Drying

A good thing. I have a fantastic set of fancy shmancy laundry machines!

A bad thing. I have to go down two flights of stairs to get to them. Actually, since I need to move my butt more that is actually a good thing.

So....no bad thing about it.

Settling In

Liam is doing so awesome in his new room. He's sleeping well and is sleeping without his bed rail now. The only problem with his room is that his baseboard heater doesn't work. It's very cold in there! Just one more thing to add to the project list.

Since the TV is not hooked up yet the boys have had to resort to old fashioned play to entertain themselves. They got creative and made themselves into robots and have made forts with all the boxes.

A picture of our first sit down gourmet Costco pizza supper on Sunday night.

Slowly but surely we'll make this feel like our house. When I walked inside today after work it still smelled like someone else's house. I look forward to that changing...hopefully soon!

Not Too Tired to Blog....

...But really quite tired. Today was a success mostly in part to family and friends who put their lives on hold today to help us move. It was a BIG job (especially the hot tub) but it got done and well, all we can say is thank you very much. The weather was very spring-like with plenty of showers and one or two sunny breaks.

My head was in a fog today so I really have to give a special thanks to K & K who kinda took charge and told me what to do. I need friends like that :)

Brent and Jill were kind enough to take Chad's bed and give it a new home. Bye bye loft bed....you were good to my boys!

Dave and Roger are work horses. They really did a lot of heavy lifting. I should pay for them to both get some massage therapy. We aren't spring chickens anymore!

Feeding the hungry troops.

From the sounds of it, moving the hot tub was the challenge of the day. With a few resouceful ideas and strong backs the job was done. We'll have you all over for a soak once it's up and running again!

They successfully manouvered it around the gate. Good job guys!

Today was the first time I'd seen the house from the backyard. I like it! Dave gave me plenty of advice on how to spruce up that dead grass. I think they'd had a trampoline there.

One last farwell to Chadsey Crescent. We did enjoy our first home and it was a lovely home! We'll miss the neighbors, the views and the familiarity of it all. The great part is that the house is on our walking route so we'll be keeping our eye on it regularly! I hope the new owners enjoy it. As we left the house there was a very pretty rainbow to the northeast and it reminded us greatly of God's goodness in all this.

In the evening the neighbors came over and introduced themselves and brought us some lovely flowers! What a terrific welcome. She told us that everyone looks out for each other on this street which sounds wonderful to me.

Liam was reunited with his family after two days with Nana (LIFESAVER!) and was happy to have a bath in the new tub. He's taking this move all in stride. What a little trooper.

All in all things are going well. Time to rest these weary bones and get used to the new night sounds of this place. Yikes!

Making a House into a Home

A really spacious entry awaits.

The main bathroom is very up-to-date. The ensuite is another story!

Not sure why the grass is so patchy but we'll aim to improve that....or maybe just plunk a trampoline on top of it!

A spacious eating area...no more bumping elbows and scraping against the walls!

And the previous owners left a lovely card and chocolates. How thoughtful!

A Day Like No Other

A most pleasant surprise last night was that we received the keys to our new house one day early! This meant we could start moving stuff in all day today instead of just starting at 6 pm. Our plan was to work our tails off while the kids were at school and Liam was with my mom. But FIRST, we had to attend a very special school assembly with Chad being the recipient of THREE awards.

He received honour roll, effort roll AND Student of the Month (virtue: Responsibility)

It meant the world to Chad that we were there. It was a surprise for him and he had a perma-grin on his face the whole time. His love tank was filled up today. That child needs words of encouragement and lots of quality time. That speaks love to Chad! And for the record, Nathan received an honor roll certificate today as well. They just don't do it in an assembly at ATMS....too cool for that! Proud of both my boys!

We left for home and picked up the rental truck on the way. Keith reserved the biggest truck EVER and he had a heck of time getting it backed up our steep driveway.

The goal was to get all the boxes in the garage in the truck and brought to the new house today. And YES! We were able to do it. My dad came to help in the early afternoon ( and on his Birthday too!) and then once the boys got home from school they were extremely helpful. I drove three loads over in the car and did a bit of unpacking. Now we are packing up all the bits and pieces in the house for tomorrow. We don't have to be out by noon Sunday but we'd really like to be out of here tomorrow night at the latest. I know the new owners are from out of town and would rather be here than in a hotel. We have a good posse of friends and family coming for the heavy duty stuff tomorrow and are so very thankful for all their help! We don't plan to move again for a very very long while.

Thank You List

It hasn't been the most fun spring break on record but there are MANY things to be grateful for. I'm sharing them for posterity!

-friends and family willing to help us move

-finding the right house for us in a great neighborhood with with an affordable price tag

-family support that goes above and beyond

-a fairly healthy winter as far as colds and flues go

-a brother that has professionally patched up all the damage we did to our walls over the years!

-a certain husband's back that has healed up in time for the move

-jury duty cancellation emails (BIG sigh of relief)

-address changes that can be done online....yippee!

-Amazing Race was renewed for another season

-self cleaning ovens

-unlimited curbside recycling pick-up

-more boxes than we needed!

I'm sure there is more but these are the things that come to mind today.

Working Working

We (mostly Keith) got our storage room completely cleared out this weekend. The kids enjoyed playing on the shelves. A great alternative to beds, wouldn't you say? You could stack 'em three high in here!

The garage is slowly but surely getting filled with all our 'stuff'. We have purged quite a bit but it still seems like we have an awful lot of things.

Keith had to remove the closet door to the storage room under the stairs to get our patio furniture out. It's stayed in really nice shape these past five years since we take it in each winter out of the elements.

And much to my amazement Chad offered to make his dad a cup of coffee. Unbeknown to me, Keith taught him how to brew him a perfect cup of coffee. This means it's official that he's given up on me. We've been married 16 years and I still do not know how to make coffee. He's shown me many times but I forget. Chad brewed up that pot like he'd been a Starbucks barista for years. All pressure if off me completely now. Thanks Chad!

Success and Progress

I put Chad into swimming lessons this week. I liked the idea of him going everyday rather than spreading it out over 6 weeks. I'm not sure how smart I was thinking that I'd like to get up early on my week off and drive my child halfway across town every morning but it worked out for the best. Chad did so amazing this time and passed level two with flying colors! Gone (I hope) are the days of him taking 3-4 tries to pass a level. I think that now we're on a roll and we'll be going for level three in May. I've promised him that once he passes level four he can stop taking lessons. By that time the kids are pretty confident in the water and they are simply improving stroke development. My goal in all this was only to make Chad comfortable in the water and able to take care of himself in either shallow or deep waters.

On the home front, my crank-o-meter is rising steadily. I am tired of the clutter and mess of boxes. I have needed to rummage through boxes for things I have packed perhaps a bit too prematurely! I know moving day is so close now...I'm very anxious to get this show on the road!

I've completely given up on housework and as you can see my children are enjoying making designs in the dust. Gasp! I try not to even look at it.

The next big step is to get all the boxes down to the garage. That way on moving day things can hopefully go smoothly and all that's left to get down the stairs is the furniture.

It seems that Murphy's Law dictates that items in your home will fall into disrepair once the house is sold. We had to replace more light bulbs than I can count, replace the broiler element in the stove, repair the hoses in the washing machine and fix a leaky gas valve on the hot water tank. Seriously! I told Keith that from now on we are parking on the driveway because I have a sneaky suspicion our garage door openers will die any day now. It's just been that kind of month!

Going Underground

Today's special outing was a combination of spring break treat and a reward for excellent report cards.

We had so many options for a day out that were weather dependant and since it was raining all day it definitely narrowed down the choices. We chose to head to the BC Mining Museum at Britannia Beach. The boys REALLY enjoyed it. I was relieved because sometimes these things are hit or miss. Happily this was a definite HIT.

We hung out with the old guys.

They were kinda quiet.

It was so wet but that's west coast living. You must just get on with it.

Waiting for our trip into the depths of the earth.

Ready to roll!

A VERY loud demonstration in the mine. They also shut off all the lights so we could experience what it was like without electric lights in there like 1904!

Lots of artifacts and mining equipment on the site.

They have made many improvements at the museum since we were there last (1995!) and it's all first class. The admission prices reflect that :) Thankfully we had a 2 for 1 coupon which helped out a bit.

The boys enjoyed panning for gold very much. I ended up going back into the building to look more closely at the mementos and whatnot as it was a bit cold out there for me. They panned for almost an hour and came away with a few flakes of gold and some pretty stones.

The mine closed in 1974. One fact I remembered from the tour. The guide was a man who had actually worked at the mine for a long time. He was a wealth of information and you could tell he really loved his job. It makes tours so much more enjoyable when the guide is enthusiastic and not just quoting from a script.

On the way home we stopped for supper at East Side Mario's in Langley. Ever been there? Don't bother. I'd sum up the food as 'meh'. It was a nice treat to discover that kids eat free on Mondays so at least Chad's meal was on the house. Always a bonus.

All in all it was a great day. Now back to work for us. Guess what? More packing!