The McPherson Chronicles

After getting settled in the house a bit we decided to move the girls to the larger room in the back of the house and use the smaller room for a guest room/office. It made more sense to give them the bigger space and larger closet so we got to work on the back room and got them all moved into their new space. They absolutely love it and the brighter, bigger room makes all the difference in the world. We’ve added some pictures and a rug since these photos but you get the general idea.

Soooo we bought a new house! We had been looking around for a while and really got serious about things at the beginning of the year. After seeing quite a few houses we finally felt like we found the perfect place and luckily everything worked out that it is actually ours! It's in the neighborhood we really wanted, with 4 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms (both of which are INSIDE the house - you understand if you know our Sunnyside house) and a pool and spa!! We are so excited and grateful that things worked out the way they did. Here are a few of the listing photos. We ended up moving during the hottest week of the year. We originally were going to move the weekend after 4th of July, but the weather was up to 115 degrees plus that weekend so we decided to just spend our 4th moving. It actually went pretty quickly and we were mostly in and spent our first night on the 4th. I'm so glad to be done moving. It is definitely not my favorite thing to do. Packing is tedious, m...

We've made some progress on the house, though I will admit it's a slow process and there's so much more we keep thinking "would be nice". We closed on the sale of our condo this past week so that's one less thing we have going on. The only room that is basically finished is the girls' room. I had been debating on what to use for art on the walls and was having a hard time coming up with something to fill the space above the bed that the girls wouldn't take down, rearrange or knock over. Auntie Katie and Cousin Lizzy came over with the perfect solution the other day. Disney princess wall decals!! Here are the final results, which completed the room. Kevin finished painting one of the bookcases white and we hung some curtains in the dining room (ignore the piles of stuff in the corner which go on the other bookcase).   We also got this small dining table for the kitchen from Katie (we bartered art for a table- everybody wins!) ...

We've been so busy at the new house that we haven't had time to meet the new neighbors yet. We had noticed there were lots of kids and families and loved seeing people out playing, walking their dogs and waving hello to each other. Coming from a place where we occassionally ran into our neighbors but never said more than a hello or goodbye, this was a welcome change. Last night the neighbors from across the street came over to say hi. It was a mom, Karen, and her 2 little girls- Anabelle and Julia. I'm not positive which kid is which yet, but I think the older one is Julia and she will be 7 on Friday. Anabelle is 3, only a few weeks younger than the girls (but much taller). They were very sweet and welcomed us to the neighborhood. The girls were sweet, polite and all seemed to get along right from the get go. Kids are so open with each other, I love it! They have lived in the neighborhood for 11 years and knew all about the history of our house. We decided to discuss th...

We're slowly but surely getting settled into our new house. Today was a big day since we finally got our TV and Internet installed and also got our new couch. Here are some pictures of everything as it is now. More once I get more settled, change things a bit or feel like posting an update.  Front door- closet to the left, nook/kitchen to the right   Girls room with the beds made  Bathroom- shower stall behind the door, tub across from toilet Toy room/guest room/office- currently more toy room than anything else  New couch (the girls decided they wanted to be in every picture from here on out)   Dining room (bookshelves and lamps still to be moved to living room)  Kitchen (refrigerator to move where ladder is on the right, nook table coming soon)  Girls room with the trundle bed out  Living/dining from the hallway- still to be rearranged/unpacked some Just realized I forgot the master and front/back yards. That will have to...

This is the first chance I've really had to stop and think about the whole move. We're done and mostly settled and unpacked. We started Friday night by moving over the refrigerator and some boxes with Sarah & Tim's help. On Saturday, everyone came over to help bright and early and we had everything moved to the new house by noon. Here's what we accomplished the first day, Saturday: - kitchen stuff mostly put away (thanks Katie & Sarah) - master bed put together - girls room completely unpacked and beds set up - all furniture and boxes moved out of condo and over to the new house - clothes unpacked and put away We did run into a few hiccups that we are still working around: - the refrigerator doesn't fit in its spot, so we're waiting on the landlord to raise the shelf so it can be moved out of the nook and to its proper place - our dressers didn't fit in the master bedroom so we had to reorganize to share one dresser and use it as a foot bo...

The girls got to come inside the house completely filthy for the first time on Sunday. It was great! They ran around outside playing soccer and baseball for quite awhile and when they were finished they were covered in dust and dirt. I had to give them a bath in the morning, which was unheard of before. It's been so fun getting used to our new, bigger house and yard. We're all really enjoying the change of space.

Things are about to get officially crazy for us. Long story short, we're in the midst of selling our condo and we just finalized things to rent a bigger house in the area. We're excited, overwhelmed, busy and sad all at the same time. It's been a roller coaster looking and securing a house in this ridiculously competitive rental market but we were fortunate enough to find something. So, in 2 weeks we'll be leaving our condo and moving on to something bigger and hopefully better. We've definitely outgrown the condo since Kevin and I bought it nearly 6 years ago (almost to the day, actually). It was our first home after we got married and it was the first place the girls ever lived. We're not sure what, if any, they will remember of it in the long run, so the plan is to make a video tour of the house to save for them down the road. We want to get it done before we start packing and turning the place completely upside down so hopefully they can see it somewhat cl...