The House Report

The background:
We were living east of town, in a house that we loved, that we were renting. 23 days before our lease was set to expire, which technically means it had automatically renewed, our landlord informed us he had decided to rent-to-own the house (to a friend, we assume, since no one had seen the house). 2 days later, my grandfather passed away in CA. Two weeks later we returned from our trip there, with two weeks to find a place to live. There was NOTHING. June 1st, we moved into a 1000 square foot apartment - the five of us plus the dog and cat. October 16th, we moved back into the same neighborhood we were in before, with a better house and situation!

The stats:
3rd move in 15 months
To a house that God totally worked out
Owned by a wonderful Christian family who had to suddenly move to CA for a job
Who didn't have much time to clean and prepare the house
Who didn't even charge us a deposit (thankfully, since our last landlord has thus far disappeared with the last one)
3 minutes from our church that we love
5 bedrooms
1/2 acre yard

Favorite thing: bedroom that adjoins the master for Tessa. She's already waking up less.

Least favorite thing: carrying laundry down 4 half-flights of stairs to the basement. I've been spoiled with main or even bedroom-level laundry.

Most surprising: we ended up giving Hannah and Audrey their own rooms and we all love it.

Random project: yesterday I took the cabinet doors off two of the kitchen cabinets and set glass jars full of nuts, seeds, grain, etc. It looks so pretty!

Thanks: to Elizabeth and Karin, who spent most of their Saturday helping me deep-clean the kitchen.

Done: the kitchen and living room...mostly

To do: unpack the bedrooms and bathrooms, magic eraser the walls, clean the carpets, hang curtains, touch up paint in a few places

Need/want: to sell our big oak desk and buy a small one that fits in the kitchen, to sell the entertainment center and buy a tv stand that fits in the tv cubbyhole thingy, to figure out why one upstairs toilet doesn't flush, a garage door opener, bedside tables, a flat screen computer monitor for the small desk, to sell the two counter-top microwaves we have and buy a new over-the-stove one since it doesn't work

We are very blessed. And very busy. :)