Our Floors Are Lookin Good

It's Amazing What Paint Can Do

It has been a busy and exciting couple of days. For weeks I have been looking at paint swatches and going to fabric stores and tearing out pages in magazines trying to figure out what my style is and what colors I wanted to paint my walls. This is my first house so I had never done anything like this before. Paul would say 'no pressure, just pick out colors you like and if we don't like them we can change them later.' But we were hiring people to come and paint all the rooms in the house, so I wanted to make sure I picked good colors out the first time so that I wouldn't have to re-paint the rooms that I just paid people to do. I had decided on most of my colors when Paul called me at 3:30pm on Tuesday and said 'Pedro is coming at 4pm so we can tell him what colors we want in each room. They are starting tomorrow at 8am.' I ran to the store and bought the paint I knew I wanted figuring, at least that will give them a head start. I was thinking it would take a couple of days...but these guys are so fast!

Wednesday morning I went to the house to see if they had started painting and they were still sanding the walls and ceilings. I figured I had at least another day to decide the rest of the paint colors. Two hours later a lady from our church called me. She had helped me pick out colors and had even arranged a visit to her neighbors house to see her paint choices so I could get some ideas. When she called, she said she had stopped by my house to see what they had done and she loved the colors I had picked. I couldn't believe that they had any rooms done in just two hours. I raced over to the house to see and sure enough they were done three rooms already and were asking me where the rest of the paint was for the rest of the rooms. So Paul and I went to Ace Hardware which is right down the road, to buy the rest of the paint. Because of my indecision on paint colors we were there for sometime. I apologized to the guy helping us and somehow we got into a conversation about how he was doing. Turns out his girlfriend had just broken up with him and he was pretty bummed about it. Paul asked him if he had talked to God about it and launched us into this great conversation. He asked us how he could talk to God and how to hear God. I was so excited. Ministry opportunities are everywhere. God used my inability to choose paint colors quickly to build a relationship with the paint guy and now he wants to hang out with us and 'get right with God'. His name is Kenneth and you can pray for him. Paul and I plan to visit him on Saturday at Ace Hardware and get his number so we can hang out.

By the end of Wednesday they had painted the entire house perfectly! It was done so well and I am so excited. They even repainted a room for me after they had completed the whole thing because I hated the color once it was on the wall. Pedro and his crew did a great job and I couldn't be happier.

Today the flooring guy is working on putting the hardwood floors in the upstairs and then next week will do the downstairs. We haven't picked out carpet yet for the bedrooms but we are quickly on our way to being able to move in. It's amazing how quickly it went from being a nasty house to a beautiful house that I am excited to live in. It's amazing what paint can do.

The End is Near!

 After what seems like an eternity (though in reality its only been a little over 2 months), it looks like moving in to our freshly renovated house in Ashley Oaks could be a near reality. Though have been slow to chronicle our progress, we have gotten quite a lot done over the last few weeks. 

 We have finished putting in new sub-flooring throughout the dining room, living room, and den, then removed the particle board from most of upstairs, and finally replaced a few weak spots on the second floor which could have made for a rapid decent through the first floor ceiling. We have removed the fixtures from the downstairs bathroom. We tore out some cabinets in the kitchen. We had recessed lighting installed in the kitchen (as well as two recessed lights in the den for the built-in bookshelves).  Sonja removed all the linoleum from the kitchen (three nasty layers of toilsome labor). Paul removed the appliances (refrigerator, dishwasher, and range) from the kitchen to the garage. Sonja taped all the windows up with plastic in order to prepare for priming the trim. Camille, as well as some other church youth groupers came over and helped do various small but crucial prep items to help us get the house ready for painting. Sonja and I also purchased a washer and dryer in great condition for $225.

  Last week, we had someone sand down all the ceilings, mud and sand all the walls, spray a coat of primer over all the molding, cabinets, and trim, and paint all our newly smoothed ceilings a beautiful coat of white. The house is beginning to look and smell amazing. Its no longer reeks of cat, dog, and smoke, but of paint and drywall dust, which is quite wonderful. Sonja has been working hard, coordinating colors, and trying to decide what fabrics and paint colors will be used to decorate the windows and walls of our home-to-be. 

Today, Sonja worked in nailing down paint colors for all the rooms, and I unloaded 1.5 tons (3000 lbs) of hardwood flooring into our house! Woohoo! Glad that is done. 

If all goes well, in about two weeks, our house will be ready to move in. We are so ready and so excited. Thanks to all who have helped, encouraged, and prayed. The end is near. A new beginning is hopefully right around the corner. We'll have more pictures up soon. 

Wow

Well, its official, the Phillies just won the World Series. Despite starting out with another up and down season, they proved themselves in the post-season by not only getting to the world series, but eliminating the Tampa Bay Rays in 5 games. Though I don't watch a ton of baseball, it has been really good to be able to watch the Phillies in SC. Thanks for going all the way Phillies. 

What is the world coming to?

The Phillies are in the world series. Nothing more need be said. Except that that is incredibly good!

Dog Walking, Dump Runs and Other Assorted Things

The days have finally cooled off here in South Carolina. Typically we have had sunny days in the 80's or high 70's. I have been enjoying my days by walking around the neighborhood with my new friend Lady Bug (the Reader's dog). Lady Bug and I have enjoyed many days walking and sniffing the scenery.

Paul and I have also taken up the sport tennis. My work in PA had given me a gift card as a good bye gift, so a couple of weeks ago we went and bought some rackets and tennis balls. We are not that good, but we are having a lot of fun learning together. Paul even managed to give himself a black eye. I have to say I had never seen a tennis move quite like it. We have not had any more injuries since then and we are getting so we can hit it over a couple of times back and forth.

Today we made our 5th and 6th dump run. This has been our regular weekend "date" activity for the last month. Although this does not sound very romantic, we believe everything is what you make it, and we have had a lot of fun. Today we invited Paul's sister Camille (who is turning 13 next Friday and is counting down the days until she is an official teenager) to go with us to the dump. She came along reluctantly but by the end she was begging us to let her come with us next time saying she had no idea going to the dump could be so much fun. We had lots of fun throwing things into tractor trailer size dumpsters and yelling out our frustrations we had about life and middle school and acting really tough. It was a successful day and I think we might be done with the dump runs! YEA!

Continue to pray for us about the lawsuit. Paul and I are meeting with our lawyer again this Monday to discuss the case and are planning on going to Arbitration in either November or December. We believe God is good regardless of the outcome but we are praying that there will be justice done. We would appreciate your continued prayers in this matter.

Moving Forward!

Its been quite a while since I have blogged, not because I haven't wanted to, but because life has been busy. In fact, stuff has actually been quite blog-worthy and exciting lately. We've seen God answer some big prayers, bring some big encouragements, and at the same time, teach us that we need to be seeking his kingdom first, as our priority pursuit.  So, here are a couple of the blessings we have seen and experienced. 

About three weeks ago, we began to realize that we were really and truly making progress on the house. Sonja's persistent work on scraping the popcorn ceilings and stripping the 80's wallpaper was finally paying off- the walls and the ceilings were almost completely stripped. It was then that we realized that we had worked so hard on getting that done that we didn't know what we should do next. The next thing that needed to happen was to get our contractor in to take out a few walls (so we could put in floors and begin to make decisions about how the house would look at completion). However, our contractor had told us that he probably wouldn't be free until the end of October. Doh! So, on a Monday night, in the midst of our stressful realization that we were almost out of things we could do, we prayed, asking God to free him up to come and work on our house, so that we

 could move forward with other things. 

Wednesday evening (two days later), after not talking to him for weeks, out of the blue, our contractor called and told us that he had the next two days off to work on our house! Once again, God reminded us that he is our father who answers prayer.  However, lacking faith, we totally weren't at all prepared for the possibility that God would answer our prayers, so we had to quickly decide which walls to knock out. Why is it we are so inclined to ask for big things, and then expect that God won't answer our prayers? It was such a good reminder that he is our Father, not because we deserve it, but because he is merciful. 

So, the next day, (which my bosses at church were gracious in giving me off work), Sonja, me, and the contractor made hasty, but faith-filled decisions about which walls we should take out. We totally destroyed the wall between the small living room/office, & the den, as well as widening the doorway (from 30 inches to 75) between the kitchen and the dining room. It was pretty amazing and quite satisfying to rip and shred drywall with a hammer, as well as to take out the studs with a sledgehammer. We'll post some of those pictures soon.  Our contractor also widened up a nasty closet in our den into a space for some built-in bookshelves, and he installed a new set of french doors between the den and the screened-in porch. Pretty Sweet! The best part was that we discovered that none of the walls we chose to take out were "load-bearing" which meant that they were both easy and cheap to remove. God was so good in providing in that way, as we expected it to cost a lot more and be a lot more difficult to do. 

So, since those two days of hard work, we have made multiple trips to the dump to get rid of destroyed materials, and spent a lot of time looking at hard wood floors. 

A second big way God provided was in leading us to our hardwood providers. One afternoon after work, when Sonja and I were trying to find a local hardwood floor company, my GPS unit took us to the wrong location for the hardwood floor company we were trying to find. Instead, we stumbled upon "Builder's Bargain", a local wholesale builder's store which provides overstocked materials (like windows, sinks, and hard-wood floors) to both private builders and the general public and pretty good prices. So instead of having to pay between 6-7 a square foot to purchase, install, sand, and finish some hardwood floors, we will be paying about $3 a square foot for some beautiful pine floors (actually its "Siberian Larch" which looks like Pine) which will fit perfectly to the look of our house. We love the look it will give our house. 

What's even more amazing is that the location of the store we went to is actually closing down this week, and moving about 45 minutes away, and if we hadn't found it when we did, we never would have gotten the floors we really like at a great deal. Once again, God provided. 

Another amazing thing that God did was to give us good neighbors. Our neighbors are awesome. They have all introduced themselves and befriended us. Though we have owned the house for a month now, we have yet to mow our own lawn. In fact, the same neighbor who has been mowing our lawn recently asked me if he could seed it with some of his spare grass seed, and then he proceeded to cover over the new seed with hay. Unbelievable! 

God also has provided a local guy who is going to go through our whole house, sand all the walls and ceilings, fix all the dry wall problems, and spray everything down with a sealing primer for an incredibly cheap amount of money!

Sonja and I have had constant help from youth groupers, church members, friends, and others in just showing up to help out. Lately, as I have torn out the particle board in the first level of sub-flooring, I've been blessed with an army of help! Nothing beats building friendships with hammers and crowbars in the dust and sweat of working together. It is so encouraging to be served by people who are serving us because they love us. 

There are many more encouraging things I could talk about (we are reaping some of the benefits of other people's work in the church and youth group, we've also been blessed financially) but for now, though things are still hard in some areas (the quarks and frustrations of a new church family, missing old friends, being sued by the jerks at Keystone builders, Sonja's frustrating struggle to find a job), we can both say that despite our struggles, God has been abundantly faithful. 

Please do pray that God would take away this lawsuit. Though we know he's still good and faithful, even if we end up going to court, no matter the outcome, it would be a huge burden off our backs if the whole things supernaturally disappeared. So, please praise God for his provision for us, and continue to ask him to give us hearts to be faith and to trust him in any and all circumstances.  We'll put up some cool pictures of the recent work on the house soon.