First and last night, see you on the other side!

Yesterday we slept in our new home, for the very first time!
It was.., well, kind of weird. Nice, but it felt like we were camping, or staying in a hotel. And we kind of were. I mean, we have no lights yet, so if I wanted to go to the bathroom at night I had to use a flashlight. And because we don't have any curtains yet it felt as of the whole neighborhood was looking in (which I'm pretty sure they were, we've had so many comments!)
And it hit me, really hit me, for the first time. I am moving in with somebody else! I won't have a home of my own anymore! I won't be able to just spread out in bed (I love to take up the whole bed! I usually look like an X, with my arms and legs spread out!), or, you know, tell him to go home when we have a fight. It felt like a lot to take in. And it still feels kind of daunting. I'm sure it will be great, once we're settled, but for now it feels really quite strange..

Today we spend making room in our new home for all our (read: my) old stuff. Tomorrow (in 15 hours to be exact) a friend of mine, who has a van, is coming to help us move all the big stuff (sofa, wardrobe, fridge, washing-machine, you get the point) and we are no were near ready!
All the rooms are still so full of stuff that the sofa won't be able to get to the door! So right this minute, as I type, Joris (I love you so much, baby! I really do appreciate all that you do for me!) is packing a moving-box with some of my many, many books and dvd's.

Me? I do help, really, I do! It's just, right now I'm all worn out. I can't seem to find the trees through the forest anymore. It feels like, no matter how much stuff we take out, the rooms just don't seem to get any emptier... How does THAT work?!
But we're tired, and we need to get some sleep.

Tonight is going to be our last night in my old home (we're sleeping here tonight, because it's easier when we start moving stuff in the morning. And we still have a mattress on the floor here). It feels like I'm closing a chapter, and I won't ever be able to go back to it. I always get this way when I move, and I'm sure I'll be sobbing on the floor before I hand in the keys.

So, goodbye for now. I'm not sure if my internet connection here will continue for long. But Thursday (IEK!!! It's almost Thursday!!! Please, no! I just need a little more time, just give me two more days!) we will be done, that's when we hand in the keys of my old, single, home. at least, I hope so...

See you on the other side!

Final days..

Just a quick post because we have been very busy (and still are!).
We've been hard at work, and the new Home is getting there, slowly, but surely.
I have to leave my old house on Thursday July 7, and there is still sooo much tot do!
We hope to be moving next week, Friday or Saturday, if we can find someone with a van to help us that is!

But, before I go on, first some more pictures of our Home as it is/was in the 'Before'!
First up, is the bathroom! Well, what to say about it.. It's small. It has a shower, and no, the grout is not just dirty, it's been painted green by the previous occupants! Not to bad, but they, ahum, didn't actually do it very well. We tried to paint over it, using special grout paint, but, uhm.. it's mainly sticking to the tiles, and not really to the grout.. Yeah.. kind of sucks (more because it took up a lot of time and effort), but we'll deal with that once we live there!
I present to you: THE BATHROOM!



The washer and dryer are going to be in there as well, to the left of the sink. It's going to be a squeeze, but that's fine. Bathrooms can be changed, altered and remodelled. Right?

Next up.. The livingroom!!!
As these are the 'before' pictures, I can tell you, the living room does not look like this anymore..
For the moment it's being used as storage for the oven, dryer, dishwasher, paint, floors (that still need to go down in the other rooms that need to be painted first), etc..
But.. the biggest change are the garden doors! We now have double-doors!!! I promise I'll get some good pictures of the new doors, they are really quite lovely..

THE LIVINGROOM!


This side hasn't changed that much.. Love that view, if there isn't a van parked in front of our house (it's the neighbours van..) we have a lovely view of a pond with ducks! Love that!


This side looks very different now! It wasn't bad like this, but I/we wanted two doors we could open in summertime! It's going to be lovely!

Now, this post isn't over, but I am feeling a bit sorry for myself today, so be warned if you read on.. I guess it's because I'm tiered from working at the house for over six (6!) months, and it that time of year..

Tomorrow is my birthday, and (as usual) I have a bit of the Birthday-Blues.. It's not unusual for me to feel this way around my birthday (and I seem to get it around New years as well), but with all the work that has to be done it's not very helpful!
Because we are not nearly as far with all the work as we should be, my birthday will be spent painting. And maybe that's a good thing. I wouldn't be able to sit and enjoy "birthday-stuff" knowing that we still have so much work to do! And painting is definitely one of the more "fun" things to do! Well.., I actually do not enjoy the painting itself (it's ok for small stuff, but after a while everything just starts hurting, and we still have a lot of rooms to paint!), but it can be so gratifying to see the result! All the hours, days, weeks, months of hard work, and then to, finally, put on a beautiful coat of paint! After de paint come the floors, and then the room is ready! Then it can be filled with treasures and can be used to create beautiful memories!

To be honest I am both dreading July 7 and really looking forward to it.
I am somewhat worried that we won't make it in time, that we won't get the work done.
But if (and when) we do, it will be great! Then we can finally start living in this lovely Home! Love it the way it's supposed to be! Be able to actually see my friends again (I've missed you!!)!! To take some time off from working on the house, even if it's just for the night! I can't wait for fall, hopefully by that time we're settled in our new Home, and we might have even unpacked one or two things!

I can't wait!

Almost there!

So after a lot of interviews we found ourselfs a builder!
It wasn't an easy task, because we have a tight budget en limited time, but we finally found someone who could make us a staircase, new patiodoors, do some electricalwork and some plumming for us!
And so far, we are really happy about it!
He is making recordtime! We thought it might take somewhere between 3 to 6 weeks for him to be ready, but as it looks now, he will be done next week!!!
The stairs went in THIS week!!!!

This is great news!
This also means that my fiance and I will have to go back to work ourselfs!

We hope to get the last changes done ourself and then it's time for cleaning, filling holes, painting and putting in floors! Then: the move!

I love the idea of living there, but I am dredding The Move... I have a lot of stuff, and always start to panic a bit when I realise all that STUFF has to be packed, caried down 6 (six!) flights of stairs, put in a van and be placed and unpacked at the new house.
The fact that we don't own a car (I don't even have my licence!) makes me a bit scared. And totaly dependend on other people.
I don't like that.

But, I'll deal with it, I'll have to!
And it will be fine, so far it has always worked out.

Every now and then I get a bit house-tired. Then all I see are the things we have to do, have to sort, clean, pack, think about... To relax I sometimes take a day (or half a day) "off". I go to see someone (and beg then not to ask about the house!) or I go and look a wedding stuff!
Because, I am going to be a bride next year!

But, for now, I'll show you some more of our lovely home!



This is a picture of our bedroom (it even has a balcony!!!!).
It's no longer orange (I really do not like the colour orange).
People kept calling it the 'parents-bedroom' and I kept thinking: "Hu? this is not my parents bedroom! It's my bedro... ooh!"
It's not the biggest bedroom, so not officially the 'master-bedroom'.

The biggest bedroom is The Blue Room



You can get why we call it the blue room!

It is also no longer blue.. but we still call it 'the blue room', kind of confusing for people who haven't seen it in it's blue state!
This is going to be our guest room. And (maybe someday) a childs bedroom.
For now it's going to be my fiance's study, until we can finish the attic.

Still have to take pictures with my new camera!
I have taken it out of the house now!
I just bought a Banana Hammock for it, so now I can put it in my bag and go!
I just haven't dared to take any pictures af the house in it's current state.. Probably because I was scared to even walk around there... :p!

It's been a while...

Sooo. Yea, it's been a while...
Sorry about that.
I'll be better, really, I promise!

A lot has happened these days, weeks, months.
My boyfriend and I got the house! Jey!
And it's in a lot worse shape then I thought.. It was dirty (like really, really DIRTY... Not nice..) the day we bought the house the heating gave out.. So it was cold, like freezing cold...
But we cleaned and cleaned and cleaned and then we cleaned some more!
We got the heating fixed so we were no longer freezing while doing al this cleaning and we could just grab hot water from the tab (let me tell you, how spoiled I have been to always have heat and warm running water! And how much I missed it when I didn't have it.. And how exited I was when we got it fixed!!)

The boyfriend is also no longer my boyfriend...
He is now my fiance!!!
Oh my! I knew he was planning on "someday" asking me to marry him, but I never thought it would be this soon!
He gave me a promise ring on my mother's birthday (5th January) and we had talked about getting married before, but I never thought that on Saturday 29th January he would ask me to marry him!
He said he had planned to ask me this Valentines, but he couldn't hold it in any longer.
Aaaah, it was so sweet!
Oh, yeah, I said 'yes'!
So after remodeling, fixing up the home and moving we have a wedding to plan!
We plan to marry on Saturday June 16, 2012.
It seems like a long time away, but I already had a panic attack about the plates for dinner.. Yea.. I'm like that...

My brain is trying to come to grips with all this exiting news! And sometimes it's a bit overwhelming. But all in all really good!
My poor brain is also trying to come to terms with all the new STUFF I got!! Seriously, I don't want to come across as showing off, but I bought myself a new camera! (really, I love it so!! But the amount of money is a bit ridiculous! I'm still scared of taking it out of the house and breaking it..) and I got an actual KitchenAid Mixer! Seriously! This has been something I wanted, coveted, loved-from-a-far since I was like 14 years old! (I know, I was a strange kid, and I still am!)
It's even in my favorite colour, Ice blue!!!
This might sound really bad, but I'm still staring at it, after weeks... I only stared at my engagement ring for about a week! Almost in disbelieve...
I haven't used it, yet. I have no room in my current kitchen (it's so tiny) and it was a gift for our new home, so I have to be patient.. It's going to be difficult, but I have to be patient...

This is the part where I have to hang my head in shame.. I don't know (yet!) how to get pictures from my new camera on to my laptop... I know, I know... I'm really bad!!! But I promise I'll read the instructions and get some real pictures on here!

So for now I will leave you with some more pictures, not taken by me, of our new house, soon, our home...
I promise I'll be better and write more!


The kitchen!!!! Ooh, I how I love kitchens!

P.S. This is the "before" of the kitchen! We have worked/cleaned hard, and more, better pictures are coming soon!
Right, now I will go and try to take my new camera outside... Oh my...

Lucky 13!!! (Watch out; long post ahead!)

So, it's been a while, and a lot has happened!

We got the house!!!! Jay!!!!
Well, sort of...

I needed to get a life insurance in order to get a mortgage. For The Boyfriend this was no problem. But I got turned down by two insurance companies. To be honest, it made me very sad, and even angry! I can put your mind at ease, I'm not ill nor am I dying. But I am overweight and I have been ill. This was reason for them not to want to take a risk and insure me. It came as a unexpected blow! I even had blood-work done, and all was perfect, but still, they thought the risk was to high.
I felt miserable. We had been through a lot to try and get this house, and now we might still loose it, because of me.
But then, there was one insurance company that DID want to insure me. Ok, the rates are a bit higher, but still fine, ok, good!

And because everything else is in order, we now can say, we got the house!!!!

To be honest, I still have a 'I'll believe it when I see it' feeling. But I'm sure that will pass, especially when The Boyfriend and I have signed the papers and receive the keys to our new home!

And the date we will get the keys to our new home is... (drum roll please!): Monday 13th December 2010!!!
Who ever said 13 is an unlucky number? Not me!

Because The Boyfriend and I are buying a house together without being married (we're not against getting married, but we want to live together for a bit first.) we are going to sign a co-habiting contract. It states all sort of things. From pensions, to what to do (who gets the house, the stuff) if we separate, what we think can be paid for with our joined checking account, etc.
Figuring this out was a lot of work, and most of the time not a whole lot of fun! But I'm glad we did it. You never know if, when, or why things might go wrong. And it's good to have thought about these things before you have to deal with them.
So, we are signing this contract (probably) the Friday before we get the keys, so on December 10th.
Ok, it's not a wedding, I know this! But it is the closest I've ever been to something resembling a marriage. Neither The Boyfriend nor I have ever lived with someone, so we are both doing this for the first time.
We want to make it a special day. The Boyfriend will take the day off work and we plan to go out to dinner and make it a special day, for us anyway. We'll probably go and sit outside our, then very soon to be, home!
To symbolize this special day we are looking for a ring, for Moi! (I can be such a Girl sometimes!)!
I have a half a carat stone that we are trying to find an old ring/setting for. Something Art Deco or 1940's would be nice.
I love the idea of repairing an old, once loved, ring. So it can be loved once again. And of course, we have a budget to think about, we are buying a house, you know!
We did spot one, but I'm afraid it's going to be a bit too expensive for us...
So, if you know, see, or hear about one, let me know!

I'll try and post more often. Now that I know we might actually get this house I think I'll have more fun writing about it!

However, I don't want to just write about a house. I want to write about making a Home. And the things that I enjoy, and come across. Fun things, and sometimes, not so fun things.

The Boyfriend came home last night and he had bought me the sweetest present! Angel Chimes! We have the silver ones and I'm trying to restrain myself, to keep them in the box until we have the new house!

I'm also looking at bags... I want lot's and lot's of new bags!!! (I know I'm focusing on other things then the house, because I'm still scared it all might not happen.. But that's OK. I like bags!) First I want a small Dooney & Bourke bag, but a vintage one, like this one (but I can't afford that one..).
AND I want a bigger bag! I'm actually looking for a lovely, soft, leather one, in brown. I know of a Michael Kors one I love, but I can't find it, and if I could, I'm afraid I won't be able to afford it... But a girl can dream, can't she?
I want this perfect-bag to have a vintage feel to it. I love the 1940's, and I love vintage stuff, or things that have a vintage-feel to them.
I was thinking about this one, from Zara.
But it's a tad to expensive, and I've looked at it, and I'm afraid it won't be practical in my day-to-day life.
Then there is this one, from Sasha. What I really LOVE about this one is that the lining is of this lovely flower fabric! You can see some of it on the flower on the bag. I love that! And it's in my price range! Well, sort of.. I really can't afford to buy anything right now, let alone a bag.. But if I did (and knowing me, I will..) this would be more my price range.)
What I don't love about the bag, is that it's plastic, and shiny and maybe a bit too orange in real live.

I don't know... I might go back into town tomorrow and look at both bags again. I know I will not be buying any new bags, until this one action on eBay has ended... It's for a ring setting I really love... And, I'm sorry, but, no. I'm not going to tell you which one!

Take a look at our garden!



This is one of the things The Boyfriend and I LOVED about this house, the backyard!
It's bigger then the house is!

Here is a view towards the house..



Aaaah, lovely....

Physical and the pink rooms

So, I had my physical for the life-insurance we have to get in order to get the mortgage for the house.
I was really nervous, but it's out off my hands now and all we can do is wait for the results...

I'm secretly thinking about my (hopefully) to-be craft-room... It's tiny and pink.
Actually, there are two tiny pink (bed)rooms in the house. The Boyfriend and I are each making an office-type room.
I would love to have my own office/craft-room!!! I've been dreaming of one for years now! I don't care if it's tiny, as long as it fits at least a desk and a bookcase I'm happy!

For now I think I prefer the one with views of the front of the house..



Or maybe the backyard..?



Oh, choices!

What do you think?

The down side...

Buying a home with your partner should be fun, and it is, most of the time..
Today it is all getting to me a bit. And that's okay, I'll probably feel better tomorrow, but today I feel tired and tiny. (I hope I feel better tomorrow.. right? I'll feel better soon, right??)
Today it feels like it's never going to happen...
But I hope it will!

I'm trying not to think too much about house-stuff today.
Slept a lot, read some blogs about bikes and food, always a good thing!

Alright.. I can't resist.. one more picture of what I hope will be my future home...
When we enter the lovely blue/green door you step into the.. Horrible Hallway!



Sooo, yes, the house does need some work and a lot of TLC, but that is fine. I'd love to give it to her, him.., it? Well, you get the idea!

Love the stairs though!