Brrr!

What is this, Michigan? As I write this The Weather Channel says it's 23 degrees F, feels like 7 degrees.  I can confirm the frigid forecast as I was just outside playing ball with Dexter.  We could only play a few minutes before we had to run back inside to warm up.

Yesterday we even woke to snow!

Our beautiful moss backyard with significant accumulation

I can't believe it.  It seems to have gone from 85 degree t-shirt weather to winter overnight.  I don't like it.  It's also hard to believe that about a year ago we got first 3 foot (ish) snowfall day of "Snowmageddon 2010".

From our condo door, Dec 19th, 2009

Amanda's car...not on the road heading to Michigan

Ha!  Poor puppy

Since we now have a long, steep driveway, I hope we don't get any record setting accumulation numbers this year.  It also delayed our Christmas travel plans last year, so I'm doubly hopeful we won't have a repeat.

Here's hoping for a heatwave!

:)

Decorating Grafton

We're closing in on two months of home ownership and we're still getting the place put together.  We recently hung our art and have added some new pieces of our collection, so I snapped a few pictures to share our progress.  Please keep in mind we're still unpacking.  :)

Our new rug and curtains...also, that end table was just given to us by Amanda's parents, more on that in a future post

Our 8-piece grid by Cherie Lester

Our newest piece by Pridon Goisashvili.  I'm a sucker for paintings of townhouses - especially of Capitol Hill 

Of course I have to sneak in a photo of Dexter - no excuses necessary

A painting of Eastern Market, though I can't remember the artist and can't read their signature

Union Station by Zakhar Sasim

Our new dining room table and chairs

Eastern Market photographs by Joe Shymanski

Buddha, mirror and our pie safe - that lamp was purchased from Ten Thousand Villages

I'll get some more photos posted soon, so you can see how everything is laid out...once we finish cleaning up the rest of our loose clutter.

Mutual of Alexandria's Wild Kingdom!

It's amazing, I think, for us to have found such a wonderful little piece of paradise inside the Beltway.  At our previous condo we rented, we were spoiled with wooded views out all of our windows, including daily sightings of deer.

Five (or so) female deer seen from our balcony

When moving from the condo to our new home, we were most sad about not having such beautiful wooded views and would miss the family of deer.  Well, I'm happy to say, the new place isn't as disappointing as originally feared.  In fact, we do have enough trees that I feel like we have "woods".  And!  I've seen deer.  Actually, I've had many animal sightings.  Sadly, I don't have any pictures of my encounters since Dexter and I generally see them late at night when it's very dark.  We've seen deer two or three times, a large (twice the size of dexter) raccoon on two occasions, and our neighborhood coyote at least three different times in our backyard.

Our leafless trees and the ever elusive...bichon!

I shouldn't forget the birds and squirrels.  Amanda's parents bought us a suet bird feeder and suet block of seed as a house warming present.  We installed it over Thanksgiving weekend and it really increased the bird and squirrel activity in our little haven.  They went through the entire thing in just two days!  I've seen many woodpeckers, a blue jay and many little birds I can't identify...yet.

Random picture of Dexter

We're also very happy to have private outdoor space.  Dexter loves to run and play.  Our next door neighbors recently got a puppy (Wesley) and he and Dexter love to romp.  Dexter gets so excited when we hear them outside he goes to the door and whines.  They'll run and play and chase each other until they both lay down in the grass/moss panting.  It's adorable.

Dexter and Wesley eating sticks

On a sad note, our neighbors are moving.  I'm sure Dexter will miss Wesley very much.  It's such a treat for Dexter to have a friend to chase around in the backyard. I think we may end up getting another puppy of our own.  Maybe in the spring.  It's still being discussed, but Amanda's really for it.

End.

3 - 2 - 1 ...Compost!

I've started - and actually finished - making the structure to house our compost pile. It's some really high tech stuff. The first step of the project, as with any new house project, was a trip to The Home Depot. Boy-oh-boy, I love Home Depot. I think I make, on average, one trip per day and probably more like two trips per day on weekends.

Here's my shopping-list:

1. Rubber mallet
2. 4 wooden stakes (I think they are four or five feet long)
3. 25 ft of chicken wire

I think all the supplies ran a bit under $40, but I won't have to ever buy a rubber mallet again!

Here's the required tools that I already owned:

1. Electric Nailer/Staple Gun
2. Hammer
3. 4 foot level

Amanda helped me pick out a nice backyard spot to build the pile.

"a nice backyard spot"

I figured the project would take me less than 30 minutes, so I dove right in!

Dang...that is a sweet Narwhal shirt!

The first step was to measure out and mark where I wanted the posts.  Then I drove the posts into the ground.  Then I stapled the chicken wire to the outside of the posts.

As I suspected, the building was a piece of cake.  Mostly.  The ground is quite rocky and clayish and I think I broke a part of the fourth post...as you can see (front left), it's a bit crooked.  I tried using my level when driving the posts, but this one hit a rock, went sideways, and was never the same.

Day 1

Done and done!  Completed compost pile structure.  Now it's time to make some sweet dirt for our gardens next year.

Day 1.  Pile of leaves on the outside to the left of the pile...one apple.

By day 14, I'd bought myself a Leaf Blower and got to work on the yard.

Day 14

Now it's day 26ish and it's too dark for me to get a current photo.  I've done two runs through the lawn with my blower, mulching the leaves as I go, but with our latest rains, the previously full compost pile has been battered down to being merely half full.  That's fine with me as the trees are finally letting go of their last leaves.  I should be able to spend a few hours this weekend clearing the rest of the front, side and back yards completing my leaf duties for the year and again filling the compost pile.

Grafton's First Thanksgiving

What could be a better time to host Thanksgiving than one month from moving into our first house?  Well, that's our plan, anyways.  My parents (and Shadow) are currently en-route to visit us for the weekend and celebrate the holiday (hooray!).  I'm super excited to see my family again and to have our first non-Keith visitors to our home.  Of course, I had crazy dreams about how much more progress we would have made by now, but I think all things considered, we've made some good strides.  If I could just quit my darn job, I could get so much more done...

One of our biggest hurdles to having overnight guests was figuring out a shower curtain solution for our upstairs guest bathroom, which looks like this...



... minus John creepily hiding in the corner... usually....

It's great to have the third full bathroom, but what were the contractors thinking we'd do to enclose it??  Thankfully, we're just about the most clever people I know.  Here's our solution: a ceiling-mounted track, á la IKEA's KVARTAL system.  John and Dremel Multi Max worked together to mount the track along the ceiling and now we just need to install a curtain.  To allow it to hang correctly, that's going to require some Frankensteining of an extra-long shower curtain we picked up the other night at Bed Bath & Beyond. 

KVARTAL... IKEA, you've done it again!

We'll see how that goes... Just in case, though, we bought a rod and shower curtain for our downstairs guest bathroom.  Always good to have a back up plan.

Although you can't really tell by Target's photo, the shower curtain looks so fancy.  It's more of a vanilla color than the white it appears and the embroidered bordered has a bit of a sheen to it.  Paired with a matching vanilla cloth liner, the sun shining through it this morning made it look like it was glowing.  So classy!

Anywho, the gracious Hilton Gods are letting me free at noon today, so it's a race to get our last minute projects and sprucing up done before my parents and Shadow arrive.  Hopefully along the way, we'll snap some photos of our progress to share.  Things are looking good at Grafton.  We definitely have a lot to be thankful for this year.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy One Month To Us*

(*OK, it's one month and 3ish days now... I started this last Friday and never got around to finishing it... oops!)

It seems like only yesterday that at this time, I was doing something very similar (wasting time) as I waited for 12:00 to roll around to head out for our closing.  At the same time, I can't believe we've only been in our house for a month.  It feels like Bedtelyons and Grafton have been BFFs forever.  :'(

I'd say just one month in, everything has been going great for us.  We've been finding all sorts of sweet deals, undertaking several new projects, and learning something almost every day.  Maybe (most likely) we're still in the "honeymoon" phase of home ownership, but I feel like we're just as excited as Day 1 for our quest to make our house a home.  John has been extremely impressive in his handling of a variety of DIY repairs and projects around the house, but that's no surprise since he seems naturally skilled at everything.  Every Padawan needs a Master, though, and we'd like to give a special shout-out to Papa Harold for his guidance in saving our kitchen from flooding (and thanks for all the future late-night calls I'm sure we'll be making for advice).  It's a little rough being out in NoVA all by ourselves, but it's nice to know we can still count on our family to be there when we need them.

Note: While he does bear a resemblance (and regardless of what my Grandma Doty used to tell me) my dad is not the Pringles man (I think...), but I didn't have any handy pictures of him.  :)

We have been extremely lucky so far to really not be faced with any major challenges/set-backs and nothing we couldn't handle.  I guess all that Buddha belly rubbing has finally paid off.  The biggest issues we've had thus far are our wars on poison ivy and basement bugs.  John has been dousing the vines with herbicide, so I guess only time will tell if the mighty weeds will fall.  While the Home Defense did its trick on most insects, we're still dealing with a few small centipedes and beetles that are seemingly immune or just really determined to come hang out with us.  I mean, if they can see our awesome sectional and adorable pets through the windows, who can blame them for wriggling their way under the door to join the party?  The sprickets are another story.  What could possibly be worse than something that is practically half spider and half cricket??  Who came up with that??  Seriously.  Hopefully some weather stripping under the door and another round of Home Defense will end their evil reign.  I really appreciate Elliot's valiant efforts to stalk and consume the errant pests, but I've seen one too many half-eaten sprickets hanging out of his sweet mouth.  Nobody appreciates spricket breath.  *shudder*

Elli the Exterminator!

So, what's ahead for the upcoming month?  We're expecting our Overlook rent deposit check any day now, so there's a debate as to whether we'll put it towards debt, a fence, or a shed.  Right now, shed seems to be a strong front-runner.  More storage is exciting, but then I think it would only encourage John's landscaping tool habit... More unpacking/organizing/getting settled is definitely on the agenda, but that's not exciting to think about.  I have a few sewing projects I'd like to tackle, mainly figuring out a curtain solution for our angled guest bathroom shower and some entry way bench cushion recovering, but the latter will have to wait until my mom can help me out with more advanced techniques (read: anything that involved anything other than sewing in a straight line... until the thread runs out).  I'm sure plenty of other things will pop up along the way, but that keeps things exciting, right?


The Fence To Nowhere... To be continued??



Busy weekend!

It's funny/disgusting how fast the weekends go by.  It seems like it just began, but here we are and it's already a new week. We had a very busy, but productive weekend at Casa Bedtelyon, and my only regret is there wasn't more time for naps.  :)

The weather was amazing, filled with clear, sunny skies and temperatures around 65.  Just that perfect fall weather that seduced us into taking a short break early Saturday afternoon to run to one of our favorite places - Old Town Alexandria.  We made a quick stop at the Book Bank, a terrific used bookstore where we always seem to find something to buy (like the very handy "How to Be Pope"), before making a slightly longer stop at Random Harvest.  They carry an incredible mix of one-of-a-kind antiques and gorgeous new pieces, with everything expertly grouped and wanting to come home with me.  Although we can't afford anything in there, I love to browse the showroom and dream of one day owning such classy furniture and home decor.  I think I fell in love with just about every lamp in there.  I didn't know it was possible to actually love lamp.  After that, we walked over to Restoration Hardware to pick up a set of knobs to replace the unfortunate ones that adorned our master bathroom vanity.  While we liked the overall look and feel of the existing knobs, my OCD would not allow their brushed finish in an otherwise polished nickel environment.  Lucky for us, they were holding a "Friends and Family" sale, so we were able to pick up the knobs and an extra hook all for 20% off.  Check out the transformation...

Our knob of choice... RH's Gilmore knob

Before: Brushed knobs.  Boo!

After: Polished knobs.  Yay!

Back at the home front, we assembled two of our dining chairs (which wasn't nearly as difficult as I was imagining), installed new toilet seats on all of our toilets (whisper-close is the way to go), and John did a bit of leaf blowing.

Sunday morning began with chocolate chip pancakes, which I must say, is a great way to start a day full of housework (yay chocolate/syrup buzz).  John did more leaf blowing/mulching, and as you can see here, thoroughly enjoys it.  Our yard consists almost entirely of deciduous trees, so luckily for John, there will be plenty of leaf-blowing in his future.

Blow, baby, blow!

While John played in the yard, I took on a new project - spray painting.  In reading all sorts of DIY blogs, I've discovered you can spray painting just about everything under the sun to give new life to old items or help give something a new purpose.  In our case, we purchased a small TV stand for our upstairs living room that needed some feet to lift it up a bit.  We picked up some feet at IKEA, but the only color option is plasticy gray and we needed something black.  Here are the results of my first attempt at spray painting...

Little plasticy feet before...

Little black foot after!

While the feet dried, we decided it would be a perfect time for a Home Depot run.  What Sunday afternoon would be complete without one...or several?  On our way out, we were surveying our pathetic landscaping at the front door and concluded the flower beds are in need of some stone edgers, so a trip to Campbell and Ferrara was added to the itinerary.  We have frequented this local nursery/landscape design center since we moved to the Alexandria/Annandale area and would spend many an afternoon strolling throughout their grounds dreaming of one day having a yard to landscape, but never thought we would be able to afford any sort of property in the area, so it's certainly a dream come true to finally have some land.  With winter just around the corner, now isn't the time to be filling our land with plants, but Campbell and Ferrara was having a great 60% off sale on their outdoor pots, so we picked up a few for next spring.

Pot party!

After returning with our sweet finds, we happened to run into our across the street neighbor and John was able to borrow his ladder to clean out our gutters... which desperately needed some TLC.  Eventually we'll get some gutter guards, but for now, John will have to take care of it.  And look how thrilled he looks to be doing so.

By the time John was done on the roof, my spray painted feet were dry and ready to be installed.  We chose IKEA's Mosjö tv stand to complete our entertainment center and the $40 price tag couldn't be beat.  Assembling the unit was a snap, the feet screwed in perfectly, and just as we were scooting it into place, we realized it was just a couple inches too big.  A real long story and a Dremel Multi-Max later, the unit fit perfectly into place and we were ready to call it quits for the weekend.

Before: mismatching and gross!  Note Elliot being helpful as always, overseeing from his cat tree...

After: so nice!  Check out those cute feet!  Now we just need to do some clever book/odds and ends arrangements.

Rugs from me to you!

Through countless hours (and hours and hours) of HGTV education and house hunting, it is pretty obvious nowadays some of the most coveted requirements of a house are granite counter tops, stainless steel appliances, absolutely no sign of the dreaded brass fixtures, and gleaming hardwood floors (apparently no matte floors are allowed?).  We were very lucky to find a house that has all of these (minus our shiny brass doorknobs), but I've got to say, I don't understand the hype.  Sure, granite can be pretty, but it also can look a little cold and apparently needs its very own special granite cleaner.  Stainless steel appliances are fancy, modern, and sleek... until you touch them.  I can see every finger print, fur, and piece of dust that clings to them... and can only imagine the horror that will ensue once Baby Bedtelyons take over.  I do love our hardwoods, though, but it's the history of them that gets me.  They are the original hardwoods that were installed back in 1948, so all I can imagine is a family that lived there following the war, and who can think of a more romantic time in our recent history than post-WWII?

Even the hardwood floors need special love, too.  If you ever come for a visit, you might notice that every single thing that touches the floors has been covered in little felt pads (you should see the cats trying to walk around with felts pads stuck to their feet).  Now we're finding out area rugs are necessary as well.  What's the point?  Get beautiful floors, then you cover them up.  What can you do?  After weeks of rug hunting (mostly due to the fact rugs are ridiculously expensive), we've finally picked our first one.  It actually caught our eye a week or so ago, but thanks to my amazing powers of indecision, we delayed long enough and it went on sale today.  This definitely seemed like a sign from Cheesus that it was meant to be, and who can argue with that?  So, we promptly ordered it and Overstock says it'll be here before Thanksgiving.  Now our poor little Dexter can finally get some traction to jump on the chairs, we'll add a splash of color and fun, and anchor our living room.  Makes me feel almost motivated to do some unpacking... almost.

 

Ta da!

Who wouldn't buy this dog his own rug?  This face deserves its own house.  :'(



Week 3.5...

It's been a while and I'm sad to report that we have started to slow down a little with our overall enthusiasm.  I don't remember unpacking and getting settled being such a hassle the last time we did it.  It may be due to the fact we're trying to take a more serious and thoughtful approach to our unpacking and deciding how we want our home to function since we'll be here for a while.  Plus, who wants to unpack and clean after working and sitting in traffic all day?

We have been making some slow progress, though, and I'm happy to finally have some "almost" pictures.  We're definitely not at the "after" stage yet, but I think we could say "almost".  So, here we go...

Here is our entry way furniture (the very first thing we bought especially for our house) all assembled.  After years of IKEA construction and feeling pretty confident in our assembly skills, we thought this would be a breeze.  Yeah... we ended up putting the hanging portion together backwards (my fault) at first and then it wasn't screwed tight enough (John's fault), and after all that, we were so traumatized, we abandoned it for a few days.  Of course, upon returning to it, I think it took us another 15 minutes to finish, but in the end, we finally have a place to hang our coats and Dexter's leash at the front door.  I think you'd agree the baskets and cushion are quite plain, though, and we're terribly color-challenged right now (where's David Bromstad when you need him?), so my plan is to re-cover the cushion and figure something out for the baskets.

Our first big ticket purchase for the house are these lovely machines.  After the whole sectional vs. basement fiasco, we were terrified they wouldn't make it down into the basement, but they did and here they are.  As you can see, our laundry space is lacking, so we opted to spend the extra money for the front-loading model to allow us to (one day) install a counter top above the machines.  We'll put some shelves or cabinets up on the wall and I think we'll have a nice little laundry nook.  In case you're curious, we went with the Samsung VRT Steam washer and dryer.  We wanted something that would be gentle on our clothes and the environment, and so far we have been very happy with them.  Plus, the "SteamCare" technology is supposed to be great for reducing allergens (yay for me!) and germs (good for future Baby Bedtelyons... emphasis on future... strong emphasis).

Alright, here we have a nice "Before" and "Almost" comparison of our master bedroom.  For the first week or so, our window coverings were MIA even though I paid for the overnight shipping (curse you, Country Curtains), but I must say, we love them.  Most bamboo shades have a bad reputation for not blocking light and being see-through.  Plus, most look like a bunch of cheap sticks strung together.  Ours have a nice lining on the back that isn't visible from the front and does an amazing job blocking out light (just ask John who has fallen victim to their powers and no longer wakes up before 11:00...).  Not only that, but the warm wheat color accents our hardwoods wonderfully without being too matchy.  We also went ahead and bought a new bed (IKEA's Malm platform bed), as our last one was taller and had a more prominent headboard.  Our master is quite small, so our old bed just took up too much visual space (not to mention poor Dexter had a hard time jumping in and out of it) and made the room look even smaller.  The new, lower bed allows your eye to move around the room, doesn't block the windows, and now Dexter is free to jump around.  PS, making the bed is pointless.... don't judge us.

So, there are a few of the accomplishments we've made.  We have actually have done a lot more, but just haven't had the time to get some nice photos to share.  Hopefully this weekend we'll finish even more and have the opportunity to take some photos in the daylight.  John has also done some great handymanning around the house and yard, but I'll leave that for him to share.  It might not look like much yet, but we have big plans for our little house and even though we're being a little sluggish lately, we'll get there.

Now, time for a few adorable pictures of Dexter enjoying his new yard.  Disclaimer: we will not be held responsible for any injuries caused by cuteness overload.  Dexter's powers are very strong and should not be witnessed by those who are weak of heart.

Someone take away our credit cards!

Although our house is probably what a realtor would call "cozy" in an attempt to hide the fact it's a bit on the small size, we're not worried.  OK, losing our great big windows, walk-in closet, and ridiculously high ceilings for a condo at Overlook was difficult.  *moment of silence*  The more we unpack though, it does feel cozy, like our house is giving us a little reassuring hug at the end of a long day, not strangling us within an inch of our lives.  In fact, we have begun to see we do have some space for things like a real dining room table (for eating, not increased mail storage... I swear), a cute area for our Mac to be displayed in all its glory, and some barstools that don't cut off the circulation to my legs.  So, with an extra bit o' padding in our bank account from our luck at closing, I set out on a new hunt for some sweet deals.  With a whole ton of Googling and a bit of luck, I'm happy to report we've come away with a few pretty OK finds.  Because I have the patience of a two year old, no actual photos yet (besides most of it has to be assembled), but here are some details and store-provided photos of our recent purchases:

1)  A mailbox!  Our current mailbox looks like it could be the original box from 1948 and I'm afraid if we get some strong winds, the rusted thing might disintegrate, showering our Hill of Doom with a lockjaw-inducing dust.  Since I'm not sure if my tetanus shot from my trip to South Africa is still working, we decided to invest in a new one.  Sold in stores like Home Depot for $39.99, we got ours on Amazon for $21.09 and free two-day shipping with Amazon Prime (normal two-day shipping would cost $17.91, almost doubling the price)!  Check it out!  Feel free to send all sorts of mailable junk our way because we splurged for the large box...

Pretty stripes to match our granite!



2)  Chairs!  We went a little crazy with the chairs, but coming from a four-seater table, six definitely seemed necessary for all the amazing parties/holidays we plan on hosting.  I picked up these Parsons chairs from Target, usually $179.99, on sale for $159.99, then an additional 10% off plus free shipping!  And these chairs from JCPenney, originally $250 for a set of two, on sale for $100.  And these matching barstools, originally $300 for a set of two, on sale for $140.  Plus free shipping for those!  The savings... are...too...strong...





Mocha-tastic!



Matching stools!



3)  Table!  After years of hating our wretchedly uncomfortable table, John finally showed some mercy and allowed me to search for a new dining room table.  While we first wanted to go with this looker from West Elm, the exorbitant shipping and handling charges were too much for me to stomach.  So, we settled on this table from Overstock for nearly half the price and only $1 shipping, and no sales tax!  Take that, Uncle Sam, you thieving so and so!





4)  Another chair!  Brace yourselves for this one.  John played good husband last Friday and took me out for some delicious Panda and afterwards we took a stroll through West Elm looking for inspiration for a chair for our Mac desk (handcrafted with lots of love and not as much skill by us).  Lo and behold, a most perfect and beautiful chocolate leather slipper chair hidden in the back, marked down from $149.99 to... wait for it... $59.99.  Come to find out, the $149.99 was a sales price - it originally sold for $199.  It may be a floor model, but it looks as fresh as the day it was built somewhere exotic, like China or Taiwan.

Hopefully we'll get all this stuff up in our house soon and get some "After" pictures rolling.  In the meantime, shipping boxes litter our living room like early Christmas presents and we're just as excited as kids on Christmas Eve to get our place looking like a home and not a giant POD.