Update

Yesterday I posted about my crazy neighbor(s) (see the post below) and I promised to keep you updated. Are you astounded that I have an update for you already?!?!

Remember the creep who watched me mow the lawn in my short shorts? Well he did some more creeping today. This time I made sure to wear less revealing clothes, and as I was watering the planter, there was that all too familiar, "Hi neighbor." I looked up and there he was. Turns out he's the caretaker for the wheelchair bound man that lives behind us, and he is also in charge of watering the guys plants. So now I feel guilty for calling him creepy. Kinda. He offered again to help me mow the lawn, and I turned him down and went out front where the real action was.

The screams from the crazy girl's house were MUCH louder than the night before, and that's what drew me out front in the first place. There was a car outside her house with a guy behind the wheel, and it looked like he was waiting for someone. From inside her house I hear "GET OUT! GET OUT! GET OUT YOU A**HOLE! YOU'RE GONNA GET ARRESTED! GEEEEET OOOOOOOOOUT!" Then there were some REALLY loud crashes countined by more screams. This went on for quite a while, and by the time I finished spraying for bugs out front, I finally saw a guy come out of the house and get into the waiting car. The girl was still screaming and throwing stuff and the guy laughed and said, "Do you hear her?" to his buddy and they drove off.

Seriously, you can't make stuff like this up. I will continue to keep you posted as more craziness ensues.

But if you're like me and you prefer looking at pictures rather than reading, check out how great my lawn looked after I mowed it!

Neighbors

Our biggest fear when moving into our house is whether or not the neighbors would like us... or even worse... would we like them?

Less than 24 hours of us living there, we got a note complaining about our dogs, so we weren't off to a great start. However, we knew we couldn't avoid meeting them for too long, so we dove right in. Our neighbors who we share a driveway with have turned out to be the most incredible people. They're funny, SUPER nice, and always willing to help us out if we need it. They've even invited us to Angel games! We love them. (And when we asked about the note, they assured us that it wasn't them.)

Our neighbors on the other side brought over some baked goodies as a neighborhood welcome, and it turns out they're pretty nice too. We don't see them very often, but they assured us that they didn't write the note either. In fact, it's been three months and we still have no idea who wrote it.

Anyway... just yesterday I was in the backyard mowing the lawn in shorts that were too short to wear in the front yard. Hey, no one can see me in my backyard right? So I'm huffing and puffing and pushing this damn mower when suddenly our little dog Cherry starts barking like crazy. I look up and the neighbor behind us (who we've never met) is leaning over the wall watching me. He waved, and I waved back awkwardly after adjusting my "too short shorts," and he continued to stand there staring at me. Finally he went away after a few seconds and I continued on my way, but I noticed he kept peeking over the wall every now and then like a creep. When I was finished I put the mower away and went to work on our planter, when suddenly I hear, "Hi neighbor." I screamed and dropped my clippers and the dog started going nuts again. I looked up and there was Mr. Creepy leaning over the wall staring at me again. "I noticed you're mowing your lawn," he said. "Need any help?" I told him I was good, but thank you, and he slithered away. The best part about this story? I am off the hook when it comes to mowing the lawn now. Yay!

So the day continues on, I go to work, and when I get home (around 12:38am), I do my usual check for wild animals and get out of the car. As I'm walking to the front door, I hear a woman screaming. Now we've been warned about the 20-something that lives a couple doors down. Apparently she goes on binges and screams about the floor moving, and people trying to kill her dog, and whenever she gets a car the damage to it gets worse and worse each day. When we moved in, she crashed into her garage door a week later. All in all, she's crazy. So I hear the screaming, and I keep listening to make sure it's not something I should be sure concerned about. I know she has a boyfriend who rides his bike over there late at night (and I know this because I've almost run him over twice), so I was listening to make sure he wasn't beating her or anything. Whatever was going on over there, she was certainly winning the fight, and when it got quiet I went inside and went to bed.

This morning, I go outside to water the plants, and I see that our crazy neighbor has moved her car into the driveway. I don't know how she did it because two of her tires has been slashed. I also noticed that her gas tank was open, and the cap was missing. Someone either sucked all the gas out, or filled the tank with something. The car also looked like someone took a bat to it, but then again, it's looked like that for the past month.

I can't wait to see what shape the car will be in tonight!

Pets

I thought I'd take a break from house talk and show you some pictures of our family. I have so many pictures that are all super cute, so I'm going to post them all and get it out of my system.

Here's our oldest Peeve.


Then there's Nibbler.


Maple.






And finally, Cherry.






Sunday mornings are the best when we wake up with all of them cuddled up in bed with us, and that's why we call our house The Farm.

Living Room

Before:


As you can tell, along with every room in the house, the formal living room needed some work too. That wood paneling... gross, the nasty carpet... disgusting, and that COLOR! Don't even get me started.

My husband is a history major, so we decided to give the room a regal and historical theme. We wanted it to resemble the Green Room in the White House, but maybe not that extreme. So we picked a soft and soothing green, and we LOVE how it turned out.

Then we got the carpet ripped out. There were HUGE piles of dust because the previous owners weren't big on cleaning, so there was a LOT of dust in the air when I took the picture below.



After we got carpet in, we went and picked out a nice leather couch, and put some of our furniture in there. Mind you, it's still a work in progress and the room is still looking pretty empty, but I couldn't be happier with how it's looking.



You may notice that large bookcase on the right side of the picture above, and let me tell you, that thing weighs a TON. It took the two of us a good hour to move it from the garage to that spot right there, and in the process I broke all the blood vessels in my hand and I looked like I had a lobster hand for a week. That bookshelf now holds trinkets and treasures from our travels. Vases and mosaics from Africa, treasures from Italy, France, and Spain, and a stuffed turtle we fondly call Rowdy that belonged to his Great Aunt. The shelfs also hold books on American History and Presidents.

The room really is a lot of fun. Above the fireplace we want to hang a Betsy Ross flag, with pictures of our favorite presidents on each side. On the walls we are going to hang fun prints of historical documents, and different Americana paintings. I also want to get awesome red armchairs in there. I can't wait for it to be done!

And here's another angle.



I'm really happy with the paint and how happy and cheerful the house looks. It's a BIG difference from where we were living before, and I can't wait to show more pictures as we get more stuff up on the walls.

Guest

I'm a sucker for before and after pictures. Biggest Loser, Extreme Makeover, and Hoarders before and after pictures get me going every time. So when we bought this house and I saw the work that had to go in it, my heart started to flutter and I got that camera charged real quick.

The room that got the biggest makeover is probably our guest room because of the extreme change it got. And now here it is....

BEFORE:


AFTER:


Hooray!!! I love a transformation! We had a bit of a struggle with the paint color, because a tiny paint sample looks different on a 2 inch by 2 inch square than it does on a wall. We fixed that by leaving a wall white, and it will eventually be covered with awesome pictures. Now when it comes to the rooms in the house, we are going with themes, and we decided that the guest rooms shouldn't be left out. We thought long and hard about what theme to give the room, and we decided to give it a Moby Dick Theme. Now if you know me well, you know I'm afraid of fish, but I'm ok with this whole idea because it's not REAL fish, it more Nautical than anything. So stop asking me.

Now bare with me, because the room isn't grand... yet, but it will be when it gets to it's full potential. We just need a little more time, and a lot more money. Anyhow, here's a cute little end table and mirror we picked up. (If you look closely our puppies are photo bombing this picture.)



Yeah yeah yeah... "Welcome to the Beach" isn't very "Moby Dick," but we opted out of pictures of skinned whale carcasses and hooks, and decided to go with a more kid friendly approach. And if you look on the little table, you'll notice a book. I don't own Moby Dick, yet, so True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle is acting as a stand in.

And now for the grand master himself, Moby Dick. Isn't he cute?!?!?!



No nautical room is complete without a good knot board, and we found one! (But ours is blue, not green.)



So there's our guest room! I'm quite fond of the way it's looking, and I know it will be awesome when it's finished. I've been looking online for paintings of whaling ships, and pictures of Herman Melville, and I'm finding some awesome stuff. I also need to invest in sheets for that room that don't have the Eiffel Tower all over them. But when our vision of the room is all put together, it's going to be great.

Timmmmmberrrr!

Here it is again. Our new home. But in this picture, I want to draw your attention to the huge palm tree on the left of the front door. That simple beautiful palm tree (or I guess I should say Palm TREES because there are two), has given us SO much trouble.



Admire it's beauty. The branches sway gently in the breeze, and below it the roots grow into our main sewer pipe, and cause human poop to come up and out of our shower drain.

Not to mention, the first week of home ownership, my husband's family formed a small army to tackle the house and help get it ready for us to live in. Now I wasn't home when this happened, but they thought it would be nice to cut the bundles of berries off the trees. (You can see one of the bundles in the picture below.) The tallest member of the group went up the ladder, clipped the stem of the berry bundle, and when it came crashing down, six rats came running out.

The trees MUST go. But money is tight, so we need to deal with them for just a bit longer.



Cut to today. I'm very fortunate to marry a guy with a great family. Everyone is always so willing to help out when we've needed it, and today was no exception. We are currently dealing with a clogged kitchen sink (Are you surprised? I'm not.), and my husband's older brother offered to help us fix it. Well, we weren't so lucky with that, but on his way out he looked at our demonic palm trees and offered to come back and trim them up a bit. And he did! He did an AWESOME job. I love this action shot I got of him throwing the fond from the roof onto the ground.



And here is all the crap that got cut down. Can you believe it? Now, I was hoping to see a rat today because I certainly see their poop every morning when I water the plants around the base of the tree, but all we found was an empty nest. That rat sure is going to be surprised when it comes home to find nothing tonight. Then again, I'll probably be surprised to come home and see that a rat has made it's new home in our garage.