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Dining Room Update

{ October 2, 2012 } - Trish

Dining Room Update

I’ve been pretty busy since moving into the new house – cleaning, unpacking, organizing, and decorating. I thought it might be fun to show you a little dining room update. It’s not a completed room yet but I’m making progress. It was quite an undertaking to get my mom’s china cabinet in place and all the china cleaned and put inside. The room is definitely a work in progress.

BEFORE

AFTER

I didn’t think I’d use my mom’s china cabinet because it’s really not my style. My style is more modern, like the house, but the color looks to good with the Brazilian teak floors. So much better than I thought it would. What I’ll probably do is change out the gold/brassy looking hardware, to brushed nickel like the rest of the items I have in the house. That would make it look a bit more modern.

What do you think? Love it? Hate it? Got suggestions? Let me know. I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Our Home Sweet North Carolina Home

{ July 23, 2012 } - Trish

The boxes have arrived and the house is a great big mess but I thought I’d take a moment to share some of the beauty we have going on outside our home. I’ll work on sharing some of the inside photos in an upcoming post if I can get things together enough to make that happen. I can’t make any promises on when that might be though. Stay tuned for how we change things up and make it our own!

Our Home Sweet North Carolina Home

[Show as slideshow]

You can click on the photos to see them full size and click-through the gallery. The kids and I are loving that we’re surrounded by nature (except for the occasional bug that finds its way into our home) and that we get to hear owls, toads, and crickets pretty regularly. I’m looking forward to sharing some photos of our little gardens at a later date. I hope you’ll swing by and peek in.

Big thanks to realtors:
Gail & Kenn Knapp

Knapp Properties

I can’t wait to hear what you think! Drop a comment below with your thoughts.

Hello North Carolina! Farewell Twitter

{ July 18, 2012 } - Trish

Hello North Carolina! It’s taken me a little longer than expected to post an update but we made it safe and sound to North Carolina and we’re settling in. The trip was interesting, to say the least (with two dogs, two rabbits, two kids, and a small parrot) and seemed to take forever with all the potty breaks. The next time we make a long road trip I swear I’m putting everyone in diapers.

Our Traveling Zoo

We traveled with our own zoo. Twitter, our sweet Crimson-Bellied Conure, rode shotgun with me the whole trip. She was a trooper. The kids sat in the back (I have a Lincoln MKX) and the bunnies (Bella and Beau) were in the cargo area so everyone could have enough room. The dogs (Sammy and Sebastian) rode with Mr. Right. It really feel like a traveling zoo when it came time to unload and bring everyone into the hotel room, but we did it! Our trip was successful.

Twitter in her travel cage

Sammy and Sebastian share a crate in the hotel room for the night

and Bella and Beau share a crate as well

Hello North Carolina!

We had one goal – besides making it to NC. The goal was to get to NC and get in the house before Bella’s birthday and the 4th of July weekend. That’s all she wanted. – to be able to celebrate her birthday in her new house, and come hell or high water I was going to make it happen.

We left late Saturday (that’s a whole other blog post) and made is just in the nick of time – arriving Monday night/Tuesday morning at 2 AM. Mission accomplished! The kids were tuckered out but we made it.

Big Birthday Surprises

We lucked out and realized we had a game room type place locally called MacDaddy’s so we surprised Bella and took her there for a great big birthday celebration. The kids had a ball playing games in the arcade and riding the go-karts. It was a nice way to ease them into life in North Carolina. After that, there was no way they were thinking about moving back to Florida.

Making our House Feel like a Home

We wasted no time breaking in the kitchen either. We had a big 4th of July celebration and birthday party with my cousins, who live on the beach, and my three aunts, who also live in the area. After our big Independence Day cookout, the kids were introduced to a homemade slip-n-slide. We took a tarp, laid it out on the group, squirted dish soap on it, and turned on the hose. At first, the kids had no idea what to fo but they got the hang of it. I think they enjoyed playing in the hose and just sitting on the tarp more, though.

Meal Prep begins!

Can you tell we were having a cookout?

It’s a humble little table but we had a great time

Homemade slip-n-slide

Settling into NC

The whole experience here has been great. I haven’t had much of a chance to get out and meet the neighbors just yet, but all in good time. I’m still exploring the city and learning where everything is located. We’re in a great location, close to the grocery store, and a drug store, the hospital, and a few restaurants. In fact, we had breakfast this past weekend at Yana Mama’s located in beautiful, historic Swansboro. It’s so lovely!

Farewell, Twitter

Sadly, we lost our beautiful baby, Twitter. We’re not sure what happened. She was thriving here in NC and loving the new views she had out to the glorious green trees. She was also enjoying all of the extra love and attention she was getting from my cousins. It came as such a surprise last Friday when her right eye swelled up late in the afternoon. I thought she may have scratched her eye since she was scratching her head quite a bit and figured I would take her to the vet first thing Saturday morning – but she didn’t make it through the night. It was such a shock. We were very attached to her and Rex was devastated. Honestly, it was a first for all of us, having never lost a pet so unexpectedly. We’ve purchased a little shovel and I suspect there will be a little funeral in the very near future.

So, that’s life in North Carolina so far. Hope you’ll stay tuned for whatever comes next!

Taking Our Memories With Us

{ June 30, 2012 } - Trish

I thought I’d be sadder, moving away from my family home. Maybe it was time to go. Though I did feel the sting of the tears welling up in my eyes as I snapped a few last photos. I felt more excited about the next adventure than sad about the old house we’d made so many memories in.

The house that was a starter home to a young couple hoping to build a family. A house that became a home as the couple settled in, decorated, made friends. A home that knew heartbreak when they miscarried their first child. A home that became The Family Home when they brought their baby girl home. A home filled with laughter, and love, homecooked meals, board games, holiday celebrations, and all the things that a home should be.

A home that saw its residents grow and thrive then age and then pass. A home that came alive again when the baby girl moved her own family in and there were new babies, and lots more laughter, and silly songs, and all the things that a home should be.

My parents are gone. I have children of my own and like my parents before me who left New York to create a home of their own, it seems time to move on.

Here’s to new adventures and taking our memories with us wherever we go.

We’re Moving But Apparently Not Today

{ June 30, 2012 } - Trish

See that beautiful house? Yes! It’s mine!

This was supposed to be one of those “Yay! We’re moving to North Carolina today” posts, except we’re apparently not moving today thanks to a huge screw up at U-Haul and another no-so-shocking bad customer service experience at Enterprise Rent-a-Car, Hialeah.

U-Haul Your Butt Back Home Little Lady

I don’t know exactly where the mix up occurred but my friend made a reservation for a U-Haul truck and when she showed up at U-Haul there were no trucks available. I’m not a moving specialist, though you’d think I would be by now (Moving from FL to VA and then VA back to FL and now to NC) but if you make a reservation, aren’t they supposed to honor it? Isn’t that kind of the point of making one? Anyway, I made a reservation and no truck was to be had. The thing that burns me about that though, is that this is South Florida, so it’s hard for me to believe that U-Haul seriously couldn’t find a truck at one of their numerous locations to give to us. Believe it, because they had no solution for us but to … wait for it … make another reservation for Monday. LOL. I think not.

Thwart Me Not

Not one to be thwarted by something as silly as a U-Haul screw up I called Budget. Nothing available, but that’s understandable since we did not have a reservation there. It’s June, and apparently, people are moving – just not us and not today.

Adventures with Enterprise Rent-a-Car in Hialeah

Still determined to move TODAY, I called Enterprise Rent-a-Car only to discover that an internal miscommunication that occurred last year, which I’d spent countless hours on the phone between their corporate office, regional manager and local office clearing up – was never actually cleared up. Again, another internal miscommunication by Enterprise Rent-a-Car. Regrettably, the corporate office didn’t take ownership of the issue either and work to clear the mess up with the local office. Their resolution was to have us call back on Monday, regardless if a Monday resolution was too late for us. That’s big corporations for you. This issue was well documented (I’ve referred to it several times when I’ve had to speak to them) and could have easily been looked up and rectified so we could have had an immediate resolution, had someone actually cared about the customer experience and customer service. It was such a huge letdown.

I thought the days of bad service and dealing with bad attitudes at this Enterprise Rent-a-Car location in Hialeah were behind me when the manager was no longer there. Boy was I wrong. The girl on the phone, who I won’t name here, but will share with the corporate office, couldn’t brush me off fast enough. She didn’t want to help or even deal with us at all.

After persisting, she took my number and stated she’d call me back in 20 minutes. Of course, she never called. When I called her back, her response for not calling me was that she was in the office alone and it was very busy. Hey, that’s understandable but isn’t a customer calling in as important as important as one that walks in? That’s the question I’ll be asking because that wasn’t the impression I was given today.

Enterprise Rent-a-Car Really Doesn’t Care

Here I was, once again trying to give Enterprise my business after the last nasty incident and again, they were giving me a hard time. Clearly, I’m an idiot.

But my friend shared this with me and it made me laugh and it will make you laugh as well: Seinfeld – The Car Reservation

So, we’re still in South Florida and working to find a solution to get our stuff loaded and get out of here in time to before I have to be at work on Monday and celebrate Lola’s birthday.

Wish me luck!

A River Runs Through It

{ May 29, 2009 } - Trish

When life imitates art, sort of like the movie “A River Runs Through It,” it’s worth blogging about.

The heavens opened up yesterday and dumped massive amounts of rain on us and apparently, it was more than my pretty new grass could handle so our house flooded.

Looking out the back door

I took that picture standing just inside the backdoor and looking out to the patio and our brand new grass. It didn’t take long before the water started moving from the grass to the patio, to under the back door and into the Florida Room.

I thought Rex might have been exaggerating a bit when he said: “Look, mommy, there’s a river in our house.” Much to my surprise, he wasn’t.

Look Mommy, There’s a River In Our House – Rex

I knew it was raining and raining hard and I’d already laid towels down by the door where the water was starting to come in but I had no idea it was going to start rushing like a river. Boy did it ever!

The Florida Room

Fortunately, this is the one room in my house that is still under renovation. Unfortunately, because this is the one room that isn’t complete yet it’s holding all the renovation supplies and everything else that doesn’t have a home yet or is slated to be given away.

The bottom line, it’s our catch-all room. So in addition to having all this stuff in it, it’s got a river running through it, too.

We survived the river – even though Lola decided to stop and splash in it (Hello Kitty slippers and all) before I could clean it up. I moved the doors and the dogs to higher ground and we’ll see what today brings when we get another 2 hours or so of rain dumped on us.

If you don’t hear from me soon, send the coastguard!

Wish me luck. Anchors away!