Before and After

Hi, faithful readers!  I really appreciate those of you who take the time to stop by my Home On the Web.  It's so gratifying (and a bit surreal, and very humbling) to know that people actually read my words.

I'm hesitant to post these pictures because they might come across as a bit "braggy."  However, several people have asked for updates on our new house.  Personally, I love seeing before and after pictures of real houses, but if you don't, then feel free to stop reading now.  I'll never know.  :)

Our house is still very much a work in progress, but we have mostly completed the living area (it's all one big open space for the kitchen/dining/living, as you'll see) and the office/homeschool room.  Some of the pictures aren't the greatest.  I'm still trying to master taking good pics on my phone.

Kitchen before:

Kitchen after: 

(I'm still wanting to replace that rather hideous fluorescent light.)

Dining area before:
(The turquoise was along half of that wall, to the right of the fireplace.  I actually liked the color, but it didn't coordinate with anything else that we have.)

Dining area after:

Living area before (complete with TV on the floor):

Living area after:

(Remind me to do a post sometime about the cabinet under the TV.  David is particularly proud of that DIY project, and I'm very pleased with how it turned out.)

The verse above the window means a lot to me because of all our moving around.  It's very hard to see in this picture, but the pictures along the window are maps of the cities/areas where we have lived, roughly in chronological order.  (Sometimes we backtracked - for example, we lived in Knoxville, TN two separate times with two other places in between.)

Now on to the office/schoolroom.  Some of you may recall this picture that I posted on Facebook when I was choosing the paint color:

While the majority voted for either the third from the left or the large square, I confess that I stuck with my original opinion and went with the fourth one.  I love it!  I was afraid it might be too dark, but the color makes me happy, happy, happy!  (And since I spend A LOT of time in this room, that's a good thing.  :) )

Before:

After:

The cabinet to the left of the piano came from our last house and will likely be hung (horizontally) above the piano.

Pictures via Pinterest and Etsy.

Before:

After:

Before:

After:

So there you have it!  The bedrooms and bathrooms are all still "builder beige," and the backyard jungle seems to grow visibly each day, but I am enjoying the process.  I'm certainly no Martha Stewart or Erica Bartels (Hi, Erica!), but I really do enjoy decorating (once I stop constantly second-guessing myself!).

So what projects are you working on?  Got any before and after pics to share?

Blindly Blooming

Two weeks ago today, we bought a house here in Rome, Georgia.  The first time we ever walked into the house, our names were on the mortgage.

That's right.  We bought it sight-unseen.  What on earth were we thinking?

Let me start by saying that I do NOT recommend doing things this way, especially if you are buying a house for the first time.  But if you've been around me or this blog for any length of time, you know this is not our first rodeo when it comes to moving.  This was our fifth home purchase.

We made two trips to Rome before moving here.  The first time we looked at houses within a certain price range.  The second time - with an actual job offer and specific salary - we looked at houses in a lower price range.  One goal we had was to buy this house on a 15-year mortgage, and thankfully we did accomplish that.

In a certain neighborhood that we really liked, there were three houses in a row for sale.  Let's call them A, B, and C for simplicity.   (They are actually about the same distance apart.  It was hard to get a good picture of all three without causing a bit too much curiosity among the neighbors.)

During the first trip, only House A was for sale, and it was one of the ones we saw.  We loved it!  It was impeccable inside and out, and it had a wonderful play set in a big back yard.

But it went under contract by the time David got a firm job offer.

By the second trip, Houses B and C were listed.  In addition to several other houses in Rome and another in the same neighborhood, we toured House C.  We tried to see House B, but the renters living there were very inflexible when it came to scheduling showings.  Never mind.  House C was a foreclosure and needed some work, but we felt we could get it at a price that would still work with those added expenses, so we put in an offer and headed back home.

We soon found out that there was a second offer on House C, so we put in our best offer.  We "won" the bidding battle, but the bank still countered at a price we felt was too high considering the money we would have to put in.  (We later learned that a previous home inspection had revealed water leaking into one of the interior garage walls.  That, along with other needed things like appliances, blinds on all the windows, and hardware in all of the closets, would have put it out of our price range anyway.  Thank You, Lord, for Your protection!)

While this was going on (after we were back in Fort Smith), our agent finally got in to see House B, and he called me as he was walking through it to tell me how it compared to A and C.  It all sounded good to us, so with an agent sort of trembling with fear (and at first refusing to do it), we wrote an offer on House B, which we had never been inside.

A couple of hours later, the negotiations with the owners began.  The final price was settled within about an hour via text between David, me, and our agent, while I was grocery shopping with the kids in Wal-Mart.  Of course, we had a home inspection done, but it was the most pleasantly boring one I've ever seen.  (The most serious "issue?"  The gutters need to be cleaned out.)

So now we're here living in good ol' House B.  Do I have any regrets?  Nope.  The house definitely has some "quirks" that I'll point out when we get settled enough for me to post pictures, but nothing that would have been a deal-breaker.  We love this neighborhood, and we're happy with our decision.

Now, I must say this wasn't truly a blind decision.  Thanks to sites like Realtor.com and Google Earth (and LOTS of practice studying listings), I had a pretty good idea of the layout of the house.  I spent many hours with those pictures prior to us moving in, but seeing pictures and walking around inside are two different things.  However, with the exception of the living room (which is bigger than expected) and one of the bedrooms (which is smaller than expected), it's pretty much what I thought it would be.  Houses A and C had almost identical floor plans.  While House B looks very similar from the outside, the floor plan is different. While I did prefer the upstairs in A and C, the downstairs in our house is far superior for our needs.  All 3 have very large bonus rooms downstairs, but ours is the only bonus room with a window, and that makes it a perfect, sunny room for homeschooling and for my online teaching.  (If you're studying the picture above, the downstairs window in the other houses is in the laundry room.)

Also, I happen to know that the people who bought House A paid $14,500 more than we did for the very same square footage.

I believe we are in the house that God had for us.  Maybe He used the difficult renters to save the house for us.  We have talked to several people (including the ones who ended up buying House A) who said they tried to look at our house but couldn't ever schedule a showing!

At the end of the day, a house is a house is a house.  There are definitely things to watch for (and I hope to post about those soon), but almost anywhere can be made into a true Home with the right people inside, the determination to love it, and some cans of paint.  :)

Is it perfect?  No.
Is it my favorite house in all of Rome, Georgia?  Nope.
Is it HOME?  Yes!

So have you ever done anything like this?  If so, how did it turn out?  Would you do it again?

{By the way, this is totally off topic, but have you "liked" my Bloom Where You're Planted Facebook page yet?  I'd love it if you would!  The link is at the top of this page on the right-hand side.}




This post may be linked up to one or more of the following blog parties.  Check them out! Monday: Menu Plan Monday on I'm an Organizing Junkie Wednesday: Works for Me Wednesday at We are THAT Family Friday: 5 Minute Friday at The Gypsy Mama, Company Girl Coffee at Home Sanctuary, Pieces of Amy Other days: A Wise Woman Builds Her Home

My First Foray into the World of Window Mistreatments

Two of my favorite blogs are Nesting Place and A Soft Place to Land. Every Thursday, Kimba at ASPTL hosts a DIY Party where readers post links to projects they've been working on. Check it out here! Today she's giving away some Gail Pittman pottery from Southern Living at Home, so you know I'm all over that! Here's a link to where I drooled over some of what I already have.

The Nester emphasizes that "it doesn't have to be perfect to be beautiful," and one of her favorite techniques for decorating on a budget are "window mistreatments." She gives various examples of this, but most involve various lengths and types of fabric, upholstery tacks, and possibly a glue gun. (Actual hardware is optional!)

So a few weeks ago, I excitedly began to "mistreat" some existing valances I already had.

Turns out, mistreating is not as effortless as it appears on the blog.


This first result doesn't look too bad in the picture, but it just didn't look at all right in person.

So in the end, the curtains ended up back in their "standard" position on curtain rods that were left behind. Not bad, but not the exciting creation that I had envisioned.

Not to be deterred, I eventually got up the courage (and found the time) to tackle my laundry room window. I found this fabric called LuLu's Lounge back before we left Alabama.

Well, a few folds, some clips I already had, and some upholstery tacks later, and this is what I had:

Not too bad, I suppose. Again, I had visions of something infinitely more wonderful, but nevertheless, I have a cute window for very little money!

I think it looks even better with this plate I bought for a couple of dollars at Tuesday Morning! I would love to paint the walls a nice, bright color, but that's pretty low on the priority list....

I had better luck (and spent much more time) on the curtains in Megan's room. Let me start by saying that I realize the pink on the wall and the pink in the curtains is a little "off." The curtains were based on her bedding, and the wall color will be changing in the near future to either the right shade of pink or a sage green.

Everything was bought at Hobby Lobby. (LOVE that store!) The topper is just a remnant I found in the clearance bin!

No sewing machine was disturbed at any time. The curtain panel was hemmed and attached to the liner with stitch witchery - an iron-on adhesive. And the trim was attached with my handy-dandy glue gun.

I also found this crystal doorknob at Hobby Lobby and thought it would be great here. (I just hammered a tiny screwdriver end into the wall, and twisted and pushed it in!) You can't see the trim very well, but it's the same as the tieback.

I'm not sure I want to leave the valance like this. Right now, it's just been mistreated with some upholstery tacks, but I do think it has a bit of a princess-y feel to it.

So there you have it, folks. Cheap and cheerful - two of my favorite qualities in home decor!

Encouragement

There's a new site that has burst on to the blogosphere: (in)courage. It's already become super-popular because it's sort of a compilation blog done by about 20 bloggers who are well-known in their own right, plus the Dayspring division of Hallmark.

Anyway, they've challenged readers (and dangled the carrot of winning a new T-shirt) to write posts on the topic What Encourages You?

I've been giving this a lot of thought over the past several days, and particularly today. There is so much to be discouraged about right now in the world at large, so this exercise has been very beneficial for me.

The word I keep coming back to is new.

New things encourage me. New people, new opportunities, new environments, new challenges.

Here are some specifics:

1. New neighbors.

On Sunday afternoon, our next-door neighbors brought us a plate of brownies to welcome us to the neighborhood with a note including their cell phone numbers in case we ever needed anything. It is so encouraging for someone to reach out to us. You wouldn't believe how uncommon this is, even here in the South. The first time (and only other time) anyone has done this for us was the first time we moved to Knoxville. While we were busy unpacking, our neighbor, Rose, brought us a plate of brownies. We were so impressed by how thoughtfully simple that gesture was that we have made it a point to pay it forward. Whenever I see a moving truck on our street, I head to the grocery store to get a box of brownies.

But if you are the new person, let me encourage you not to wait around for your neighbors to make the first move. They most likely won't. Do it yourself! It doesn't have to be fancy. In the words of one of my favorite bloggers, "It doesn't have to be perfect to be beautiful."

2. New environment.

I really enjoy exploring a new territory. My husband calls it "filling in your map." In other words, as you get to know the main streets of a place, explore a little further to discover how they're connected. Get a map of your new (or old!) town just in case you get lost, and just start driving. You may be amazed at what you find, even in a place you've lived for years. If you're in a new place, this is especially important. Few things will make you feel more quickly "at home" than feeling like you know your way around.

3. New opportunities.

Perhaps the very best thing about moving is the chance to start over with a blank slate. How encouraging! While I don't recommend trying to be someone you're not (it won't last very long), it's always good to try to be a better version of yourself. Even if you're not moving at all, you can still make changes every day. Want to be more organized? Start with one drawer (or a shiny sink, a la FlyLady). Want to have more friends? Join a group like MOPS or a Bible study or a tennis club.


4. New ideas.

image from here

This past Sunday was our first time visiting a local church here in Fort Smith. In the Sunday school class, a Messianic (Christian) Rabbi was the guest speaker. (We're Southern Baptist, so that's not common at all!) He showed us things about the Hebrew alphabet and language that pointed to Christ in ways I had never known of before. Having gone to church all my life, it's rare for me to hear something completely new. This captured my interest.

New ideas are encouraging because they keep us from staying stuck in our own ruts and habits. Looking for new ideas? Go to the library. Check out area museums. Sign up for a class at the community college.

5. New mercies.
"The Lord's lovingkindnessess indeed never cease, for His compassions never fail. They are new every morning; Great is Thy faithfulness." (Lamentations 3:22-23)

Nothing is more encouraging than knowing that the Lord never gives up on me. I can have a clean slate with Him anytime, day after day. Every day is a new day. He doesn't hold my past mistakes against me.


So what encourages you?

The First Week

Just a post to get you caught up on our past week. It started with a massive deep clean of our apartment. It's amazing how much stuff can get caught in crevices and overlooked for months at a time - or maybe that's just at my house. It's also amazing how moving and cleaning can make a person a bit crazy. For example, here's my dear husband sitting in the refrigerator, just because he could.

He's going to do a guest post later on about how to load a moving truck, but here's shot of the load right before we started unloading at our new house.

I know it looks like a huge mess in the picture, but it's amazing how much stuff is packed in there. We hired some professional movers to come help unload, and they offered David a job. (I was glad David finally got some recognition for his packing prowess!) :)


There's always a part of me that wants to just leave things on the truck because a nice, clean, empty house soon turns into this.

But later came the best part - unpacking pretty things I hadn't seen in a year. I must tell you that I have never - not for one moment - doubted my choice in fine china. (For that matter, I also love my white "every day" pattern, but I didn't take pictures of it.) Brookhollow by Noritake. I don't think it's made anymore. I just love it. Look at those dainty cups! I have got to use this stuff more often than the occasional Thanksgiving!

Can I just say again that I have missed having pretty things? Now, I must tell you that my kitchen is open to the family room, and this pottery clashes horribly with my living room furniture. I thought about not using it. But I decided that, at least for now, I would rather be surrounded with things that I loved, even if they don't all match each other. I love this pottery, and I use it as accents in my kitchen.

Now if I could just get new couches....

Meanwhile, we have also made two big trips to WalMart, explored our new territory a bit, and made our first trip to the DMV. I say first because David managed to get a driver's license, but he had to go back later to get our new car tags, and I can't get a driver's license until I get a new copy of our marriage license. (Apparently, a social security card is not enough proof that my name is, in fact, Laura Baggett. ARGH!) Has anyone seen our marriage license? I haven't seen it in almost 11 years. Oh well. Just think how much more exciting a trip to the DMV will be when I get to go alone with the two kiddos. I can just imagine how my picture will turn out as I try to keep Nathan from running out the emergency exit. I'll let you know if it turns out to be "post-worthy."

Meeting the Neighbors

Well, thankfully we have arrived, safe and relatively sound. I'll get you all caught up on that soon, but I wanted to share a brief funny story.

We moved in on Wednesday, and trash day is Friday (afternoon). Our landlord had just moved out, and so the trash was piled high with her stuff, including frozen food she had cleaned out of the freezer several days earlier that now smelled to high heaven. Nevertheless, the pile apparently looked intriguing. No fewer than two neighbors came by that day to introduce themselves and ask if they could rummage through the trash....

Strange place, this Four Zits!

It's Getting Closer!

Moving Day is fast approaching. If everything goes according to plan (when does that ever happen?), we will be pulling out of the parking lot at Sunlake Apartments one last time (hurrah!) this coming Tuesday. The next day, we'll be moving into this house:


Words cannot express how happy I am to be moving out of this cramped apartment and into an actual house again. Our neighbors here have actually been quite wonderful, but there's just something about being able to hear your neighbor use the bathroom that just doesn't sit well with me. *shudder*

And I know a couple of kids that are going to love having a back yard to roam in.

Nathan got especially excited when he saw the motorized toy Jeep in the backyard. I have tried to explain that it doesn't come with the house, but I bet he'll still be looking for it when he gets there.

I'll save the inside pictures to use as "befores." The owner is letting us paint and such inside, and I am beside myself with excitement over getting to decorate my own place again! A couple of days ago at WalMart, I bought this fabric:

I bought it simply because it makes me smile. :) The best part? The striped one is called Lulu's Lounge. I love it! I'm planning to use it to make curtains in my new laundry room. Note the upholstery tacks. I have become a HUGE fan of The Nester and her window mistreatments. If you haven't discovered her for yourself, go there NOW!!! I love her motto: it doesn't have to be perfect to be beautiful.

Gotta go! There's lots left to be done!

Home Sweet Home

I have finally realized that if this blog is to ever have more than 3 readers (thank you, David, Mom, and Lora!) I should perhaps try to make it a little more cohesive. I won't promise to never again rant or ramble about totally random things, but I'll try to keep most posts related to the main topics of this blog: moving, establishing a new home, and getting plugged into a new place. Who knows? Maybe someday we will live in one place long enough that I will have to abandon this blog entirely, but until then, these are subjects I have lived and about which I have lots to say. Or at least I hope so.




So with that in mind, let's start with finding a new home.




As I have written elsewhere in this blog, we are about to move for the 11th time since we were married almost 11 years ago. We have rented apartments and houses, and owned houses. Some of these choices were made with a more conscious desire to be in God's will than others, I must admit. The three houses we have owned I believe most clearly demonstrate how God often leads in these situations.

This is the first house we ever bought.

After looking at lots and lots of older homes that just made me sad, I had just about resigned myself to never finding something I would really like. Finally, just before seeing this one, the agent had arranged for me to see a lovely 2-story home on a little over an acre. It was beautiful! But we couldn't get in the front door. Or the back door. Or the side door. Eventually, we gave up, and then I saw The One. It didn't look like anything special on the outside, but I walked inside and "just knew." It's true what they say about that. You just know.

We had to leave that first house earlier than we had wanted to, but once again, God lead the way to the next house. I had fallen in love with this house (or more specifically with the room that was to become Nathan's nursery) online before I actually saw it. The first day I went with our agent to look at houses (I should mention that we've never had more than 2 days to spend looking for houses before putting in an offer), this one was not listed. It had been under contract twice before we bought it, and both times, the buyers' financing had fallen through.

Our usual process for buying a house is that I find several online that I like, I go to see several with an agent, and then David comes to see my favorites. On the second day of looking, this house was once again listed, and I quickly narrowed my favorites to this one and one on the neighboring street. Once again, we were unable to get into see the other house. We took that to mean it wasn't the house for us and made an offer on this one.

Our last house was perhaps the most eventful purchase so far. Once again, we were moving quickly, so I drove up to look at some houses with an agent, and the next day, David went back with us to my favorites. After looking at those plus more older homes to satisfy David that we could not, in fact, afford a newer house in the location we wanted, we put an offer in (albeit half-heartedly) on a house very similar to our first two homes but far away from our target area. The sellers made a ridiculously unaccomodating counter-offer. While mulling it over, David asked me to search online again, upping our target price by just a few thousand dollars. This is the house that appeared on our screen:

Can you hear the choir singing in the background? :) After asking our agent to check it out for us (we were almost 4 hours away at the time), we put in an offer, sight unseen, on Christmas Eve. It was formerly a foreclosure home, so the price was right. It was in our most desired location. And again, we just knew.

Once again, we are in the midst of this process, even though we are looking for a place to rent rather than buy. I'll let you know later how it all turns out.

Here are some tips for finding a new home before you move:

1. Pray - We have often prayed, "Lord, please let us see what we need to see and not see what we don't need to see." He has honored that prayer. In 2 of the 3 house-buying trips we have made, there was at least one house that we literally couldn't see. Don't be afraid to try the backdoor, but don't force the issue. Know that God is involved in the details.

2. The internet is your best friend. Do your homework before meeting with an agent. In addition to national sites such as Realtor.com and Coldwell Banker, many cities often have local real estate sites. If you are new to an area, one of the best ways to learn about the areas within a city is to research the schools, even if you don't have school-aged children. There are several sites for this purpose, but I recommend School Matters. Also, don't be afraid to try networking sites such as Facebook. I made a friend who is from Fort Smith but (at the time I contacted her) was living here in north Alabama. She has since moved back to Arkansas, and I have made many other contacts through her. In fact, we found the house we are likely moving into as a result of contacting a person that she had suggested.

3. Don't choose the largest home in the neighborhood or subdivision. The larger homes will, over time, increase the value of your home as well.

4. Do not, under any circumstances, spend as much as the bank will loan you. These calculations apparently assume that you will never leave home, will only eat macaroni and cheese, and will certainly not be giving any of your income away to church or other charity. I recently contacted Wells Fargo to discuss the terms of a mortgage in case we decided to buy a home in the near future. It turns out we could get a mortgage for $325,000.00!! Out of respect for my husband, I will not divulge our income, but believe me, we have no business even considering such a home! Figure out how much you can afford to pay per month, subtract some from that amount, and base your home search on that number. And remember that the folks at Wells Fargo and their counterparts make money on commission! There's nothing wrong with that, but always remember it.

4B. Shop around for the best mortgage. Lenders vary on interest rates, points, origination fees, and other closing costs. Know what is more important to you: cash to close or monthly payment.

5. Do not buy a house until you have sold your last one. Hopefully, in this day of mass foreclosures and economic downturn, this one goes without saying. If you can afford to pay both mortgages, congratulations! I hope your job is very secure. (I'll write more on selling a home in a later post.)

6. Do not even think about buying a house without getting a home inspection. Spending that $300 could end up saving you thousands. While you're at it, if the house you are considering is more than 10 years old, have a heating/air conditioning person take a look at the unit. An inspector generally just checks to make sure it will come on, and he won't turn on the heat in the summer or the AC in the winter.

7. A can of paint can make a world of difference. Don't pass on a house just because you don't like the color in one room.

I'm sure I could think of many more things we have learned along the way, but I'll stop with those for now. The basic idea is this: learn as much as you can, pray hard, trust that He has opened and closed the appropriate doors, and prepare to Bloom Where You're Planted.