Just some small projects

Here is a BEFORE picture of part of our new kitchen. Don't you just love the counter top color (for the record, we don't!)

Another BEFORE picture. Because my father in law was really excited to get started I never got a picture of the kitchen with the very dated stove top and oven in. But try and picture a really old electric stove top, with the controls in the vent hood, in the section next to the bag on the counter. Yes, that's right a stove the Megan could reach from 2 sides...not good! Then in the hole in the big column thing, picture an oven that none of my cookie sheets would fit in.

Looking at the kitchen from our "family room" Inviting right!?!

A nice built in desk that had to be sacrificed so we could move some big appliances around. Plus you can see a far window on the left, that is a window in our office/toy room so we didn't need the desk.
Mark and his Dad ripping out the cupboards less then 24 hours after we bought the house!

A fun action shot of the dust flying and covering everything!

An AFTER shot of the kitchen so far. The fridge is in it's final location, but not that fridge. A new stove/oven/range is coming and will go under the new microwave. The base of the cabinets that we took out is going to be a new island and we have one more set of upper cabinets to hang on the far right. But things are looking good, now we just need to pick a floor and order the counter tops.

Megan, completely on her own, pulled her chair over to a window in the playroom and sat down like this. I think she has settled in to her new house quite nicely.

Papa, Mark's Dad (in red) and Uncle Ken doing a little electrical work so we could put a range and a microwave in the spot where the fridge was. Plus Papa has added 14 new lights in our family room/kitchen area. What a difference a little light makes! (it's very nice having a retired electrician in the family!)

My Dad giving up his weekend to help with sanding the 1,600 sq feet to hardwood floors that needed to be refinished. In this picture he is working on the floors in the master bedroom, while my Uncle Jim was running a sander on the main floor. Yes, we rented 2 big sanders to get the job done in one weekend.

So what was I doing, sanding the edges on my hands and knees.

If you could read my mind in this picture it would say "Seriously, how many feet of edging do I need to sand? I can't move and I've only done one room. Why did I say it was ok for Mark to go golfing?"

Thank goodness, my Dad figured out that you could line the sandpaper and pad up in a way on the big sanders that would let you get close to the edges without hitting the trim. We didn't have to sand the edges by hand that way...so nice!

We also did some painting. The other rooms are boring compared to Megan's room. My nieces helped me, but I finished the final coat of paint at 11:00 pm and could not stop starring at these stripes. They are so cool, I'm so excited how well they turned out!

So those are some of the things we have been up to. With the wonderful help of family, we have accomplished a lot in the last 2 weeks. More pictures will come, but in the mean time Mark, Megan, Baron and I need to send a BIG "Thank You" to: Mom and Dad Schutte, Mom and Dad Berthold, Lisa, Jesper, Uncle Jim, Ken, Alice, Tracie, Caila, Kelsey (Conary and Crystal would have helped if they were here) The Olsaver Family and Lowes for taking our money.