Kids and Houses

As I mentioned, the months of January and February have been pretty busy.  In addition to the usual post-holiday activity, we had quite a surprise when we learned that the offer we made on a house in Fort Collins was accepted.  Since it was a "short sale," there was a pretty good chance that the deal could fall through, right up until closing, so we did not count on getting it.  But low and behold, the seller's bank decided to take our offer after some truly amazing white-knuckled negotiating by Dana.  This is one attorney you do not want to face across the bargaining table!  Then we had just two weeks to finish arranging financing, schedule inspections, and wrap everything up before closing at the end of January.  It was a tight schedule but we made it!

After we closed, we spent the month of February packing and moving our belongings from our old house to our new house, as well as beginning the maintenance and touch-up work on the old house.

We also had some major appliance drama.  First at the beginning of the year, we found out that our washing machine was losing its transmission oil - a death sentence.  So we bit the bullet after we moved and bought a new washer.  It's a very nice front-loading Maytag, in case you're curious.  So far so good.  Then about a week ago, our refrigerator also died - this time it was the compressor.  So we had to turn around and buy a new fridge (another Maytag, if you're keeping score).  We have definitely learned our lesson:  build in more financial padding when you're planning a move like this!!

As if to demonstrate to us how happy we will be in our new house, Mother Nature threw no fewer than three significant snow storms at us in the last few weeks.  We were warm and cozy indeed!  And up until we filled up the garage with boxes from the old house a few days ago, I was able to park my car in the garage every night!

Now for some pictures.

First, continuing the story of the old kitchen, here is a shot of the new granite countertops we had installed (this is one project I did not want to try and tackle myself!) 

 

Still to be done in the kitchen is finishing the cabinet faces and patching and painting the walls.

For 4 weeks between Jan-Feb, Alex was enrolled in a really fun gymnastics class on Saturday mornings at the rec center in Loveland.  He had a great time, and what made it even more fun was that two of his friends from school, AJ and Ty, took the class with him.  It gave the boys a chance to play together, and Dana and I got a chance to get to know their parents Darrin and Chris better.

While the basement was still completely empty and snow was on the ground, we invited AJ & Ty over for dinner one evening, and invited them to bring their cars and wagons to drive around in the basement.  All four kids had a blast racing around the basement on the nice smooth concrete floors.  The laughter and yelling echoed throughout the house.  Too bad we have to fill up most of the basement with boxes!

Moving to Fort Collins has thus far been a total success.  The house itself is a dream.  It is great being 5 minutes from Alex's school and my work.  But by far the best part has been being closer to many of our friends.  We have started having dinners with people we had not seen in months.  It is no big deal for somebody to drop by to say hi.  It is amazing what 15-20 miles distance can do!

Wood Floors

The past few weeks have been tremendously busy. Attentive readers may have noticed the paucity of new posts here. We have been elbow-deep in the process of moving and settling in to our beautiful new house in Fort Collins, while spending equal time working on the old house, preparing it to sell.

Among the projects under way is refinishing the wood floor in the kitchen.

Here it is pre-sanding:





...and post-sanding



...and after the golden oak stain.



Since then I've laid down 2 coats of polyurethane (I've been repeating Ramone's line from Cars over and over, "I think he needs a new coat of poly!"). I think I'm done.

The kids have been so patient and helpful during this move. Alex in particular is eager to help and learn more about what is going on. The other day he watched me unload a truckful of boxes while he read a book on the back porch





Tyr has been extremely gracious to let us borrow his cavernous GMC Sierra for the past month to schlep stuff back and forth. He's my best man, of course :-). Meanwhile Eric and Melissa have loaned us tools and lamps and back muscles and kind words. We hope to repay the effort in a couple of months when their baby boy arrives. Suffice it to say, we are grateful that such cool neighbors as these came pre-installed at our new house!