The First Tour of Our New House

Last Sunday was moving day! And ummm . . . today was "finally get internet at the new house day" LOL.

So, needless to say, we are FAR from settled, not even close. But now that I have internet back I thought I'd take you on a little tour of our current chaos. Of course, I didn't think about it until this evening, so you get the INDOOR tour tonight, and the OUTSIDE tour another day.

So, when you come in the back door, the kitchen is to the left:

Sassy was fixing supper while I was taking pictures LOL. The back door is right by the butcher block, which, by-the-way, we had in our first house, then it sat in our basement, and my parents' garage for the past 10+ years and now it fits PERFECTLY in that space. We have an over-the-stove microwave that will be installed when my wonderful Dad has time, which will get rid of the one taking up way too much of the limited counter space. And I need to find someplace else for all my plants so they don't take up half the butcher block. Much as I love my Berkey filter, there's really no good place for it in this kitchen (where it's sitting now it blocks one of the upper cabinets) AND the fridge has an ice maker, which I'd also prefer to be filtered water, so also on Dad's to do list is to put in a reverse osmosis filter so then the Berkey filter can move (I'm thinking I might keep it in the pantry and use it as a "back-up" when I need water for spaghetti or something, since I know last time I had an RO filter the tank wasn't big enough for things like that). Also the valances in the kitchen were already there. I have other valances I want to put up when I get a chance.

One thing that I struggled with when we looked at this house was that there really isn't anywhere for a table, I finally figured out that we could use the drop-leaf table (that I used as extra counter space in our last house). When it's not in use, it folds down out of the way (we keep the folding chairs in the pantry), when it's just the girls & I, we can open one side, like is open in these pictures. And if we're all eating, or have company, we can pull it out from the wall and put up the other side.

So moving on . . .

This is the view when you come in the back door. As already mentioned, kitchen is to the left. The first doorway, right past the white table, is the pantry. The door to the basement is across the "hallway" from the pantry door. The other door on the left is the bathroom, the master bedroom is across the hall from it. There isn't a closet IN the master bedroom (the previous owners used it as a den), so we're using the hall closet as our closet, but it didn't have a door on it. I already had that curtain, so at least for now, it works to hide the mess.  The white cabinet is a glass front cabinet that we used for games in our last house. We're using it as a "china cabinet" of sorts now. We have our Shabbat dishes and tea cups in it so far. Sassy is sooo excited to have everything handy for tea parties LOL.

To the right as soon as you come in the door is the living room:

The stairs go up behind the tv, and the front door is at the bottom of the stairs. The other side of the living room is here (yes, Little Bit still doesn't think clothes are necessary in the house, no matter how cold! (seriously, the first night we stayed in the new house we hadn't had the oil tank filled yet, and weren't sure how much oil was in it, so kept the heat REALLY low until they filled it, STILL she was nakey!))

I don't like how the furniture is in here, not sure what I want to do differently, but everything is way too "lined up". My friend, Judy, is coming over tomorrow and she is awesome at decorating stuff, so I'm hoping she'll have some awesome idea for me :)

And now for the messy parts. The pantry:

This is a kind of interesting room . . . it was the original bathroom. Then someone started to turn it into  a laundry room, you can't see it in this picture, but there's a laundry sink in the back left corner. The last owners "borrowed" some space out of the room to recess the fridge, and added a couple shelves over the laundry sink. We had the metal rack (and 3 more like it) in the basement of one house, and the storage shed at our last house, it fits PERFECTLY in this space. Right now it's kind of a mishmash of kitchen stuff I've unpacked, but it's a start . . .

Moving on to the bathroom:

and

Dad's current project is adding a shower. I love the tub, and the bathroom in general, but we kinda like to take showers in the morning too! So, we're adding a shower there beside the tub (in the meantime there's a not very pretty shower in the basement that's better than nothing, but I'll be very happy when the new one is done).

The master bedroom:

For now I'm using the bookcase as my nightstand. Need to figure out a way to have a lamp on it though. Or rearrange things to have a regular nightstand . . . and yes, we do have more pillows, I just didn't bother to track them down for the picture. Now for the messy side of the room, sigh . . .

That bookshelf is actually currently holding empty baskets and such. I want to keep them available to use as I organize things, and I haven't unpacked many books yet anyway. Trust me, when all is said and done ALL bookcases will be at capacity LOL.

So that's the main floor. Upstairs is "the girls' zone". They think that is SOOO cool! Going up the stairs their closet is straight ahead (I need to find another one of those curtains to hide that mess):

The school room is on the left. It also doubles as our "guest room" thanks to an aerobed.

I haven't done much up here yet, mostly just set stuff on the shelves. Eventually I want to sort through things and only keep things we use OFTEN on the shelves (there are more shelves on the opposite wall, and some on the wall by the door). There's storage space under the "eaves" so things we don't use often, I can store there, leaving most of the shelves available for books. The cedar chest needs to move under the window and we'll use it as a "window seat" of sorts. I'm still trying to decide if I want to leave the floor open or have a table of some sort up there. We shall see . . .

And finally, the girls's bedroom . . . not alot to see yet:

The plan is to get (or have Dad make, but Ikea has one that I'm hoping will work) a double bed that the twin mattress can slide under as a trundle. that will give them more room during the day. Little Bit always wants to sleep with one of the big girls anyway, so this should work well. For now we just have the double mattress and twin mattress on the floor, so that takes up a good bit of the room. The rest of the room is pretty much a jumble of boxes for now. I've turned the girls loose unpacking and sorting the toys for now. Once I get more of the house under control, I'll help them finish up upstairs.

So that's our new house, and on that note, I better get some sleep. . .