Waiting, Waiting, Waiting

Have I mentioned that patience is not my virtue?  Because it's not.  I don't like waiting for something that I know should be happening, or is going to happen soon.  Or maybe it's that I don't like not knowing when something is going to happen.  I actually like waiting for things like vacations or Christmas because the anticipation is half the fun.  So, maybe I'm a control freak (surprise!) and not such an impatient person.  I'm becoming increasingly jealous of all my friends who enjoyed the beauty that is the scheduled induction.
Anyway, all that to say that we're still waiting for Peanut to arrive.  He/she is not overdue yet (official due date is the 14th), but after my doctor's appointment last week, we thought this could happen at any time.  The doctor said I'm ready to go and could go quickly once the birthday party starts.  Well, that was now 10 days ago.  Boo. 
I finished up at work last week (Dec 4) and am now waiting for my new job of stay-at-home-mom to start.  This waiting period hasn't been all bad...I've got to spend some time with a friend and her babies (Peanut's first playdate...too bad he/she was still in utero), catch up on scrapbooking, get some Christmas baking done (although the closer to Christmas this baby comes, the less likely it is that the Klooster Three will be attending Christmas gatherings), clean the house, sleep in and run errands. 
But, I want this baby to get here soon!!  Because a) I'm pretty much done being pregnant, b) I'm beyond excited to meet this child, and c) nobody wants a Christmas birthday!! 
At my last appointment, the doctor said they wouldn't induce until I'm a week and a half overdue (granted, that's still a while away) and upon doing the math, I figured out that a week and a half after Dec 14 is Dec 24/25.  That would make for an interesting Christmas this year and bummer of a birthday for Peanut.  (I will be lobbying for an earlier induction, if needed, at my next appointment : )  So...we're hoping and praying that this child makes a grand entrance sometime in the next week! 

Long Time, No Blog

Fear not...we are still alive in the House of K.  I have been negligent in my blogging duties due to general busyness and things like growing a baby.  But projects around the house have not stopped!  Here's a little overview of what we've been up to...

Nesting in the Nursery...

Here's Daddy - putting together the furniture.  We got the furniture from Wal-Mart - 4 piece Graco set (crib w/ mattress, changing table, glider rocker w/ ottoman) for $400.  Best deal around!  (Side note: I think Pete looks mighty fine standing by that changing table, don't you? ; )

The Bedding: I struggled with whether or not I wanted to buy a bedding set or go rogue because a) baby bedding is ridiculously expensive and b) most gender-neutral stuff is animal-themed.  I don't like animals well enough to theme a room around them, even if it is a baby room.  But, I ran across this 10-piece geometric patterned set for less than $100 and in colors that would match the existing paint job.  Bingo! 

The set came with three wall hangings, but they looked like sad little potholders, so I needed to get creative on the walls.  On the wall across from the crib, I arranged a family photos in various sized frames.  I bought some cheap frames from Target (the "back to college" section is a great place to shop for affordable decor) and spray painted them the four main colors from the bedding (blue, brown, orange, yellow).  Below the photos is a cube bookshelf from Target with some baskets for storing toys and other goodies.

On the other walls, I arranged various sized circles that I made from adhesive wall vinyl.  I found a website (vinylexpressions.com) that sells 1'x2' sheets of removable adhesive vinyl for walls in a rainbow of colors.  I bought a few sheets and cut out circles in a variety of sizes using a cricut die cut machine.  I made a ton of them so I'd have plenty to play around with...if you need some giant circle stickers, let me know!

Once I had them cut out, I arranged them temporarily on the walls using masking tape until I got a look that appeared balanced yet random.  I then used the masking strategies I learned during my college summer job (working at the road commission making road signs) to apply them to the walls.  I must say, they look pretty sweet - much better than the lame-ola wall potholders.  (However, Pete has already informed me that I'm on my own when it's time to take these off the walls.)

 

Here's what the (mostly) completed nursery looks like from a couple of different angles:

Fixing the Facade...



 

Notice anything different?  We painted the front door and upsized what I call "the eyebrows" (the elliptical designs above the windows).  The previous "eyebrows" were about half the width (about as wide as a single window) and I thought they looked a little sad above the double windows.  These give the front of the house a little more presence.  Someday, I'm going to send Pete up on a really tall ladder to paint that white vent the same color as the door and "eyebrows".

Backyard Busyness...

We hired someone to do the excavating and lay the base for a paver patio area (to the right of the deck as you look at it from the yard) and a shed (to the left of the deck).  This would have taken us FOREVER and would have been hard work, so money well spent!

After the base was laid, we got to work on placing the pavers.  I toted literally tons of the them to the backyard from where they were dropped off in the frontyard...maybe not the best idea at 6 months pregnant  - definitely felt that for a few days.  Pete laid them in a pattern he designed using four different sized bricks.

It actually came together fairly quickly and looks really nice.  It was like tiling in the great outdoors...instant gratification!  We bought a patio set on "end of season" clearance at Menards that fits nicely on the space.  We are excited to eat out on the patio next summer!

Work has begun on the shed that will be to the left of the deck.  Pete and my dad are building it from plans they found online.

The rest of the backyard is still a work in progress.  The excavating for the patio and shed left quite a bit of turf damage.  Also, some repair to the sprinklers was required after the excavation and patio installation.  The township has finally installed the yard drain they promised us about 6 months ago, but now we (by we I mean Pete) have to dig a trench the entire length of the yard for the additional drain tile he wants to install yet this fall.  He will also tie in the gutters that were recently installed to the new drainage system.  Hopefully, there will be no "Lake Klooster" next spring!  As I type, Pete is beginning to dig the trench for the drain tile and my dad is cutting lumber for the shed rafters. 

Building a Baby...

So, while all this other stuff has been going on, I'm building a baby...and visiting the bathroom, eating...and visiting the bathroom, sleeping...and visiting the bathroom, reading pregnancy/birth books...and visiting the bathroom, shopping for toilet paper...and (you guessed it) visiting the bathroom.

Here I am at 20 weeks.

Here I am at 30 weeks.

And here is Peanut at 21-22 weeks!

Peanut is quite active these days.  The "experts" say to do kick counts twice a day and to make sure you feel at least 10 kicks in an hour.  I can usually get to 10 kicks in 10 minutes!  Peanut especially enjoys womb gymnastics at 1:00 am, 4:00 am and 6:30 am.  Not so much a fan of that. 

It's hard to believe he/she will be here in 9 short weeks, but we are ready to meet him/her! 



Open House

Mark it down!  You're all invited to check out the house live and in person on September 10!!  We're be having an open house (with ice cream sundaes : ) that Saturday from 6:00-8:00 pm.  Feel free to stop on by!  If you need directions, let me know!

Hostile Takeover!!

Let the baby invasion begin!

Today we acquired our first batch of baby gear (if you hadn't heard, we're expecting in December : ).  A good friend's sister-in-law was getting rid of all her baby stuff that is only a year old & very gently used.  We scored a major deal!!  I'm preparing for this tiny person and all the "stuff" that comes with him/her to takeover our house, but for now this gear is in the basement so that we can enjoy our grown-up house for a little while longer.

In other news, we (and by "we" I mean Pete & my dad, as I have taken up permanent residence on the couch) have begun work on the deck. 

The railing came off pretty easily...let's just say that it wasn't attached very well.

The "addition" part of the deck also came down pretty quickly.  It was basically a master class in how not to build a deck.   

We'll be putting a patio in the area where the deck "addition" was.

We left up the original deck framing and will be putting new timbertech boards on it.

Dad & Pete extended the original framing by about 4 feet.

In other, other news, we are still waiting to finish our refinance that we started about six weeks ago.  We were sailing to close after our stellar appraisal when the brakes were put on in a rather scary way.  Here's the thumbnail sketch of what went/is going down:  Turns out our house was foreclosed by MERS (mortgage electronic registration system), which is basically a service company that banks use to manage their mortgages.  A lawsuit was filed in November against MERS alleging that they are not legally allowed to foreclose on properties because they don't hold title, and a bunch of other legally stuff.  This spring, the Michigan State Supreme Court ruled against MERS, saying that they are no longer allowed to foreclose by advertisement, which is basically the most common type of foreclosure (this was how our house was foreclosed).  So, when the bank went to get title work and title insurance done for our refi, their title company saw MERS in the title history and freaked out.  We are one of the first post-MERS owners to attempt to refi, because you have to wait 6 months after a purchase to refi, and we started the refi process at right around 6 months.  Literally, no one in the "business" has had to deal with this situation before.  We were waiting for a while, but were getting concerned with the lack of answers to our questions, so we decided to consult a real estate attorney that my good friend put us in touch with.  He said we had "reason to be concerned"...yikes!!  We were stressing for a couple of days, planning on what improvement items we could rip out and take with us if we lost the house, and basically losing sleep over all kinds of other "worse case" scenarios.  After a couple of days of sorting out paperwork, the attorney got back to us and suggested that we contact the original title company/insurer who did the work when we bought the property and ask them to write the new policy since their necks are on the line from the first sale anyway.  Pete called them and they said they'd be willing to do that, but that this shouldn't be a problem for any other title company to do either.  Because we purchased the house before the lawsuit and the ruling, and after the house had been foreclosed (legally at the time), the ruling doesn't apply to us.  This is what we've been saying all along!!  Now we're just waiting for title work to be completed again...where we were three weeks ago before this hoopla got going.

Stay tuned, faithful followers, for an open house invite!  We're hoping to host a little party here once we have a deck... : )

Value Added

We recently had the house appraised to refinance it with a conventional mortgage.  The report came in today, and...drum roll please...we more than doubled the value of the house from when we bought it!  The current appraised value is $98,500 MORE than we paid for it!  Which is awesome on many levels....
#1 - Through the refi, we can get all the money out of it that we put into it fixing it up, plus have almost 30% equity already. 
#2 - Even in a down market, real estate karma has finally paid us back!  (See first blog post to read about the spanking we took selling our bachelor & bachelorette pads.)
#3 - An outside observer has validated our work and considers our house "well maintained & highly marketable"...yeah!
#4 - Five+ months of work was worth it!!!

Oh, Happy Day!

It's been a while, but work hasn't stopped.  It's just not nearly as exciting.  But, now that it's warmer and (sort of) dry, we've begun to tackle the great outdoors.  Several weeks ago, Pete, his dad, and his dad's truck yanked out the ugly old bushes.  We were left with this...

...minus the old bushes, which are now at the dump.

But today, thanks to several hours of work, assisted by Lisa, my dad and Aunt Maxine, we now have this...



We planted a ton of perennials, which I'm hoping will fill in like an English Country Garden, and also spread two yards of mulch.  I am thrilled with home much we accomplished today!

And not only that, but we also cleaned up the neighborhood sign, which is on our property.  Since there's no home owner's association, we figured it's our responsibility and have adopted it. 

The backyard is still proving to be a challenge.  We have a drainage issue (see below), but Pete has a plan of attack for dealing with that. 

Today, Pete began digging up the grass along the back fence, which is going to become our seasonal vegetable garden.  Because it's veggie planting time, this project has taken priority over other backyard doings.  (drainage fix, fence painting, and deck rebuild are still to come)

This is the goofy looking tree is the one that broke in half and fell the week before we closed.  We were told that often a new lead branch will take over, so Pete tied two branches together to encourage that process.  Right now, it just looks like a crazy misshapen tree-like thing.  Hopefully, someday it will be a nice, normal looking tree again.

Oh, happy day!  Our new couch arrived about 5 weeks ahead of schedule!  Yay! 

It is practically perfect in every way...except one.  It is a two-piece sectional and the two pieces don't exactly line up in the back, which is a major bummer because the back is visible. 

This seems like a major manufacturing error to me, so we will be in contact with the salesperson and store soon to figure out what can be done to remedy the situation.

But, other than that little bummer, we love it and you can't see the back when you're sitting on it, so from here, it's all good!