New home update

Well, before we start on anything - first of all, Bobby actually remembered to carry me over the threshold!  We do that in every new house we buy.  Glad he is still able to carry me :-)

He did make me bang my elbow on the door frame though.  OUCH!

Not as painful though as this leak that was happening under the sink.  NOOOOoooo...!!!  We eventually had to turn the water main off.  Good thing no one had to use the loo:

And then, I spill a quart of sample paint on the garage floor. It's like a crime scene!  I had to walk over to the neighbor's faucet to clean up.  Glad they are nice!

We are off to buy some appliances!  I love how these palm trees are set in the backdrop during sunset. Definitely very Californian :-)

Soooo... what did we get you ask???  Graham wanted a push-mower:

How many Pridgen boys does it take to put a mower together???  Ok, just 2.  And he's off!  Even the day after mowing, Graham kept talking about how great of a job he did :-)

We also got a brand new stove.  Yay... we have a gas stove again and Yay... we have double ovens again - just like back in Broken Arrow/Tulsa, Oklahoma!

The previous owners took the fridge so tada...!  This one has a special door where you are able to just open the smaller/partial door to milk, drinks, and snacks. I will take a photo of that next time:

Fridge is so nice and shiny but I discovered a ding on the door handle, right by the special button that opens up the smaller door! :-(

Would it be too much to have it changed out just because of that??!  As we still contemplate on that, I can admire my new washer and new electric dryer.  We went with electric as we have solar panels. It will be interesting to see how much the electric bill will be each month.  And yes, the "laundry room" is on the outside of the house! And I finally get the set with bases as well so I don't have to bend over so low to do laundry.  Wooohooo...!!!

The previous owner left this metal filing cabinet by the outdoor stove area.  We are turning it into a storage area for now. Right now it works quite well for the bikes and scooters and maybe later for some of my gardening stuff:

And look what I found in the filing cabinet - a social security card of probably the original owners of the home from 1977!  And also a water bill for back in December 1977 for only $6.82!!! 

I am at the house at night for the first time last night as the movers only showed up at 6:30pm to unload our things from Phoenix.  What a view of the harbor from our backyard!

You can sort of see the truck.  It is basically filled up!  This was their 3rd job of the day and they were told the truck was only half full.  Well, it was filled all the way to the end and all the way to the top too!

As they chowed down on some burritos that we had bought for them, progress was a bit slow.  But it was tough not to feel bad for them as they didn't even get a chance to have lunch:

It started to fill up slowly but surely:

Our neighbor back in Phoenix donated their bbq grill to us.  Can't wait to fire that thing up!

Outdoor patio furniture is all here.  I hope that piece of glass (covered in cardboard) made it. We have yet to uncover that:

Our IKEA furniture made it!  Ha ha... except for one broken dining chair.  We really didn't need 5 chairs anyway :-)

Our massive and heavy bedroom furniture is in but not assembled.  It was already past 11pm once everything was moved into the house and I told the movers to call it a night.  One of the movers said the foot of the bedframe weighed more than everything in his bedroom. Too funny!!!

The daybed in Charlie's room is yet to be put together.  That's a "fun" IKEA one.  Hope they are ready for it when another crew of movers come back this weekend!

Graham's room is still rather empty. He will have mostly the furniture from the apartment.  Can't wait to see how his "inventor" table will look against his red accent wall!

At least the couch is put together... and it is massive for this space!

90 boxes... all in the garage.  And I have to go through all of them???!

The next morning.... oh wait, the boxes have not moved. Still there. It was not a dream. LOL!!!

I also discovered a caterpillar in the front yard.  Looks like it's going to build it's chrysalis soon??? This will be a fun project for the boys!

Aaaaand.... the sprinkler in the frontyard works!

Slowly looking like a home???!?

I still can't believe how big this couch is! I suppose we only had one living area in the house in Phoenix (Gilbert to be exact) and not two, which is probably why it feels a bit more cramp in here.  We'll make it work.  We have to! :-D

Recent happenings

We are finding all sorts of quirky things in the new house.  Like for example, the previous owners have put tape on this one switch (far right) so no one will turn it on.  I still have not dared to turn it on.  Good thing the electrician is coming soon!

Driving along Rolling Hills Estates and I still find these horse rider crossing buttons amusing :-)

I haven't had to do a microwave lunch in a very VERY long time.  This one looks nothing like the photo on the box!  And I only tasted 2 little pieces of pineapple??!

I am volunteering at school in the garden.  Somehow I had managed to sign up for the Kindergarten class instead of Charlie's.  I wonder how that happened!  The one other mom said if it were her, she would have just gone home. Ha ha!  I actually even stayed for a school lunch!  Not too shabby for $4.50... although not sure if I would do it everyday.  Charlie loves school lunches though!

I see Graham during recess and he is busy helping the Garden Teacher weed one of the flower beds.  Hope he will do the same in our garden at our new home!

Our old neighbors in Phoenix gave us some parting gifts - scorpion lollies! As tempting as it looks, no one has tried any yet ;-P

We are slowly moving things out of the apartment but progress is really slow.  Movers are coming next Wednesday and I have barely packed up any boxes!  AaahhhHHH!!!!

Graham and Charlie are not wanting to trim much of their hair of lately and this is all because they want to comb their hair like daddy.  Almost there!!!  Bobby said Charlie spent about 10 minutes after his shower last night just combing his hair.  What has he done to my boys??!  What ever happened to just the buzzed #1 hair cut??!

Found a yummy chicken place today (heck, no more microwave lunches!).  Might be our new go-to/take-out restaurant!

With all that has been going on lately with the house - from painting to contractors coming in (electrician, plumber, stucco repair, landscaper to name a few), I haven't been cooking very much.  Nice to know there is a place for some healthy food!

New paint in new house

We pretty much painted the entire inside of the house, other than the bathrooms and the kitchen.  Well, the master bedroom wasn't painted either by the pros but "someone" decided it needed to be... so Momma had to get to in since I wasn't going to pay the pros any more!  Gosh, we should be in the painting business!

Here is the before photo of the first living room.  Remember that green wall?

Gone!  It is now a nice soothing grey - it's called Sedate Gray.  This will be the boys' living space and hopefully they will be nicely "sedated" when they are playing in it.  Ha ha! Wait, actually that darker/accent shade of gray is Escape Gray.  The lighter color on the other 3 walls is Sedate Gray:

And here is the living room space for Bobby and I.  This is the same accent color in the previous living area called Escape Grey.  Do you see where this is going???!  I am glad it's not too dark.  Actually, the painter said I chose really well. That made me feel pretty good :-)

Graham wanted a red accent wall.  Well, he got red alright!  The painter said he put 4 coats of it!!!  And of course I didn't really pay attention to the quality of the photo when I took it.  Will get a better one next time:

And Charlie wanted a blue room - his favorite color.  It looks like Charlie is giving you the finger in the photo but no, it's actually the "peace" sign :-D

Nice and spacious for the boys to play before all the furniture from Phoenix comes in:

So... as I was saying, Bobby saw the nice fresh paint on all the interior walls and then he opened up the master bedroom and said "What about our bedroom???"   I went with 2 sample colors in the same pallete and basically had to pick one almost immediately as Sherwin Williams was having a paint sale that was ending last weekend:

As you can see, it's lighter on these walls (above) and there is an accent wall on this side of the bedroom (below).  Hmmm.... decisions, decisions!!!

We went with the darker brown instead of the dark green  But as I start painting, I wasn't so sure anymore.  I told Bobby that it looks like "Poop brown" and he corrected me and said "Rustic brown". LOL!!!

In the meantime, I have to clean up and pick up the boys.  This is our Monday pick-up line at school.  YIKES!  Good thing I grabbed a Subway sandwich for the car:

And then a quick playdate at the trees.  Graham and Charlie miss their friends at Lunada Bay!

Later in the evening, it's ball hockey.  The boys got new helmets today!  We are having our first game this Saturday. Will keep you all posted on how it goes!

In the meantime... back to the master bedroom.  How is this color the same brown color on the wall??? It looks green!

It's definitely brown!  And I have decided to change up the accent wall or walls... 3 darker walls and 1 lighter/accent wall:

This color keeps changing on me!

In the end, it actually turned out okay.  Phew!!!  I really didn't want to have to repaint.  Especially now that the furniture from Phoenix has arrived.  This one young mover kept complaining about how heavy our bedroom furniture was so there is no way I am pushing that bed aside to repaint!