Remolding 101

We have done a lot of remolding over the years both on our own and by hiring someone so I though I would start offering some advice if you are looking to do some yourself.

So we have decided to do some remolding on our new place to make it fit our family better and make some improvements.

So how do we start all this....
1. Figure out what you need to do?
      To do this find the major problems in your house.  Do you have draft windows that are letting cold or warm air in around them?  Do you have any insulation in the walls or attic?  How do the pipes look?  Is there corrosion around them? How is your roof and siding?

These are some areas that should be address first. These are areas that will give the structure of your house the security and support that will allow you to make the cosmetic improvements that you want to make in the future.

2. Figure out what you want to do?
      How can you improve this house and make it your own?  Does the flooring need to be change?  Is the carpet or flooring bad?  Do the rooms need to be remodeled or repainted?  What else do you want to change?  Is there walls you want to remove or add? Is the kitchen or bathroom how you want it?

The second ones are all decisions that can be made to make your house your home.  Once you have the bones of your house secure you can change it and make cosmetic improvements.  This is when you get to play.

3. Once you have figured out what needs and what you want to do it's time to either figure out if you can do it yourself or if you need to hire someone to do it.

4. If you are going to hire someone to do it, it is best to find some people to interview and give you bids on the work that you want done.  When we have someone do work for us we usually get at least 3 different bids so we have a general idea of how much it will cost and what we can do for what price.  Usually we ask friends that have had work done and been happy with it to suggest someone.  Another good way to find someone to do the work for you is to stop by a lumberyard or hardware store and get some suggestions from them.  If they are a good one they will only suggest people that will do a good job and that they would personally use.

A new house and a plan to make it a home.

Now that we have a new house it's my job to make it our home.  I hope that this is something that I am able to do.  I also want to make a this home a nice organized place where things get put back where they belong.
We hope to be moved in soon before school starts.  But because of this I want to try to get my girls room done as much as possible. I think it would be the best thing for them to help them feel secure.  I'm not sure if this is going to be possible however.  We are planning on doing some remolding and I was hoping it was going to be done at least in their room before we got in.  But now it doesn't look like that is going to happen.  It looks like the remolding is going to be starting shortly after we get in.  At least I hope most of it can get done as soon as possible.

Thanks to Pinterest I hope to be able to get this house organized.  This site is a great place to get some really good ideas of organizing ideas that have worked for other people and that can be adapted to work for your family.

Since we hope to start our remolding upstairs first I hope to start my organizing in the kitchen.  This is a great place to start since it's one of the most used rooms in the house.  I hope to set up a launch pad for the family just inside of our door.  This will be a place where all the stuff that comes and goes with us everyday can be held.  A place for everything and everything in it's place right?  Well we'll see.  I'm going to try to take what we have and adapt it to our family.  I'll keep you up to date on how it looks and what is working and not working for us.

So now I ask you...where is your launch pad and how do you keep it organized so you don't lose the daily essentials for each day? Also please feel free to share your best organizing ideas for your kitchen.  As I get the kitchen done I will share what I have done.

A new home

Well on Friday we finally closed on our new house. Unfortunately we have not sold our current house yet. But we have had one showing a week since we released the past offer we had. So hopefully we will have a buyer sooner than later.
So now we need to decided when we are permanently going to move into our new place. Currently we are splitting our time between both houses. I laughingly like to say that I now have a summer home and a winter house. The funny part is our new house is only about 10 miles south west from our current house.
Another decision that we need to decide is if we are going to do any remodeling before we permanently move in. The house is live able but could definitely use some updates. It would be wonderful if we were able to do at least some of the fix ups before we were they full-time. If we are able to do any remodeling my plan would be to start in what will be our girls rooms. I would love to be able to get their new rooms done so that they can settle into their new rooms as soon as possible.
Wish us luck and I will keep you updated as we continue on this journey set before us.

House drama, the good,bad and ugly.

So as you all know we have had our house on the market since about September of 2012, in October we accepted an offer. Well we kept our house on the market and had a few more showings but never received another offer as we hoped we would.
In April we heard from our buyers that they had accepted an offer on their house, so we got pretty excited and started the wheels moving on our end with our new house. We had a contract with them to close on June 28th but they were confident that it would happen sooner as in the end of May.
Well as we made it into the middle of May without hearing from them we knew the end of May was no longer going to happen. So we started packing for the end of June and so did they.  At the beginning of June we started to push to see what this were at. Only to find out that their buyer's bank screwed up and never scheduled an assessment. So they pushed and rushed one done. All this while we both were still planning on closing at the end of June. On June 6th we received some bad news.Their assessment had come in under the asking price and the owners dropped the price 3 grand under the assessed value only to have their buyer's pull out of the deal.
So this left us in a tight spot what we're we going to do? And what we're they going to do? We had them check into a bridge loan or other financing but they were unable to secure anything. Because we have held this contract for almost 9 months and could no longer afford to keep it we told them that the contract will express at the end of the month.
We did give them the option of extending the contract till the end of July with no contingencies. They did not accept it.
So now we on still on the market without any offers. So if anyone you know is interested in a six acres hobby farm north of Milwaukee, Wi let me know.
Now the time comes for us to decide what we are going to do about our new house. Do we purchase it and pay that this house sells sooner than later or do we pass on this huge opportunity? Another option would be to rent this house out month by month till it sells. Time will tell.

Toy control needed...help!

So this is the chaos that my kids have created in my living room. They have this little corner of our living room but it seems to be growing and trying to take over.

So I knew it was time to do something otherwise my children would take over and my living room would be lost in the jumble of toys.  I decided to take action and foil their planned take over. (Insert evil laughter hahaha)

Now to address what to do...I had been considering getting a unit you can put the canvas bins into them. My dilemma comes from whether or not to do all this organizing and redecorating because of having our house on the market. Finally  decided to go ahead and do it. So off I went to buy a new unit. I found one I liked and for a reasonable price at Target. (I love Target by the way.)

So after a couple nights of clearing and reorganizing and getting rid of some stuff here are the final results. What do you think? I will say I am happy with the way it turned out and the kids are doing a good job of keeping it up even have more room to play. :)

The joy of Selling a House & Moving

So at the end of October we put our house on the market. This was not something that we really had planned on doing this last year but we had an opportunity arise that we couldn't pass up. We currently are living in a story and a half farmhouse on a six acres hobby farm. The opportunity that we were presented with was to move to a two story farmhouse on 20 acres out of a 75 acre farm. Since the owner of the other 55 acres when our 20 is taken out, is a friend of ours that my husband farms for, it will feel like we own the whole 75. It is a beautiful property that contains a woods and has river frontage on the north side of the property.

So because of all this we are currently on the market. Then shortly after we put our house on the market we received an offer that we accepted.  So we have an accepted offer but I am not necessarily excited about it. The hitch is... the offer is contingent on the sale of their house.  Their house has been on the market since March. Because of this we have continued to have our house on the market. We went for two months with not a single person coming through the house and then we took off. In the last month and a half we have had a showing about once a week. So that is good that we have had interest but no offer so far.

So here we sit in a holding pattern and let me tell you with two kids under the age of 5, keeping the house clean and ready to show at anytime can be a challenge. Also being in this holding pattern brings up another problem in my life. This problem is called to pack our not to pack! When we first put the house on the market I packed up a bunch of stuff and we took it over to the new house to store. But since then I don't know whether I should be packing our not.  Part of me feels like I should be packing some but what do I do with it? Do I just push it up against the wall and still show the house with boxes all over, or do we move it to the new house? The problem with moving it to the new house is 1. what about if we can't move to the new house, then we would have to move it all back, 2. once we are in the new house we are planning to do a bunch of remodeling and 3. why is it when I do pack stuff up and move it to the new house that is when I seem to need it. How crazy is that?

So here we sit with people coming through our house off and on and me trying to keep up with everything and keep the house presentable.